Sorting Notebooks and Notes

TexNotes Pro offers very flexible sorting options in the Navigator. Usually, when a PC displays information in columns, sorting affects the entire column, from top to bottom. For an outline, however, that's not good enough. You may need to sort the items in one section, but have the items in another section set in a special sequence.

TexNotes Pro allows you to sort one section by name, sort another subsection by date or keywords, and still leave other sections unsorted.

Sorting can be automatic, or manual. With automatic sorting, new Notes are positioned in the correct sorting position under the parent Note. In other words, the section of the Outline remains in alphabetical order (or date order, or whatever).

With manual sorting, Notes stay where you put them, and new Notes are created at the end of the current section.

If you manually reposition a Note, that section of the Outline automatically turns off auto-sorting. This permits you to rearrange the order as you need, without having to remember to turn sorting off. New Notes now go at the end of the section.

How to Sort

To sort a section, click the top level of the section to select it, and then click the column head to sort by.

To sort the section in reverse order, just click the column head a second time. Each click reverses the sequence.

Here's an example:

So far, nothing is sorted in this example.

To sort Top Section on the Name column:

1. Click the section name.

2. Click the column head.

Here's what happens:

Top Section is highlighted, there is a
sorting arrow in the Name column head,
and the children of Top Section are now in
alphabetical order. The children of Zzzz,
however, are still in their original sequence.

Since Top Section is still selected, you can sort in reverse by clicking Name a second time:

Now add some comments for the Notes in Zzzz. (Do this by editing each Note's header. Jump here for details.) The Outline now looks like this:

The only change so far is the numbers
added in the Comments column.

Now sort subsection Zzzz by the Comments column. Click the Note name of the subsection to sort Zzzz. and then click the column Comments to sort by:

Note Zzzz is selected, the sort triangle
is showing in the Comments column head,
and the Notes in Zzzz are sorted by the
contents of their Comment fields.

Remember that sorting is always within a section. If you click a column head and nothing happens, it's probably because you forgot to select the Note whose children you want to sort.

Each Note or Notebook with children is, in effect, a subsection of your file. If the current Note has no children, then there is nothing to sort.

Sorting What?

TexNotes Pro provides these fields to sort on (if you choose to display them in the Outline):

Created On        Date current Note was created.

Size             Byte count of current Note.

Custom Date        Any date & time you wish to enter.

Author             Optional author name.

Key Words             Optional key words for sorting & searching.

Flag Marker             Optional flag selection.

Comments             Free-form text (shows in Notebook cells).

Turning Sorting ON and OFF

To turn sorting off for a given section, right-click any column head and choose Automatic Sorting/Switch Off Automatic Sorting. When you do this, the triangle indicator disappears from the affected column head.

Remember, once you drag any Note into a new position in the Outline, the affected section switches off automatic sorting until you sort that section by clicking on a column head.

The sorting criteria (ascending, descending, which column to sort, and whether it's automatic) are saved separately with each subsection of the Outline. There is no global sorting rule, because it's handled on a section-by-section basis.

Turn auto sorting on and off using menu commands by:

• Right-clicking the header (usually Name) in Navigator Outline to access the sorting menu.
  
  
  
• Selecting Automatic Sorting from the Navigator menu. Then choose the appropriate sorting type from further popup menus, or turn off Automatic Sorting. When you choose automatic sorting type, you can also specify the order:
  Ascending or Descending.

When you move any item in Navigator Outline, auto sorting turns off. Auto sorting is off only within the group where manual movement occurred.

• Automatic Sorting
  Once activated, all existing and newly added items in Outline are sorted automatically according to the current sorting criteria. If you have chosen to sort items by name, they are sorted alphabetically in ascending or descending order as you specify.
• Manual Sorting
  You can turn off sorting by using menu commands (as described above), or by moving an item in Navigator Outline in any direction. This overwrites automatic sorting.

Navigator Outline sorting is not global. It's based on individual groups.

You can, for example, apply automatic sorting to the Outline item named Productivity Tools in ascending order by name, while leaving the rest of the items in the Outline unsorted.

Sorting or non-sorting can be applied at any level. It doesn't have to be a Notebook, but also applies to a Note and its child. This means you have a lot of scope for sorting your Outline in the way you prefer. Just select an item in Outline and apply, or don't apply, sorting.