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Hello
Is it possible to get Windows10 to find text inside a .XAR document?
For a several years I have mostly been using a (paid for) search utility called "X1 Search" to find text within my files. It works pretty well in general, but it doesn't seem to be able to find text within .xar documents.
What about Windows 10's built-in text search function - does that work either? (I can't get it to work for me...)
This is one issue that has stopped me using XDP much more often.
Cheers
J
to recognise text within a document a search utility would need to know how it was encoded, otherwise it is just the equivalent of trying to read a foreign language you have never learned, quite possibly in a script you don't recognise, with no idea of whether to read left/right right/left top/down centre-out.....
I think the chances of windows 10 doing this are nil
I use agent ransack - it will search word [but not xara]; word formatting is not proprietary in the way xara is - interestingly sometimes you can get a 'result' because the search finds a string of characters that 'spell out' a word, but are in fact encoding something else - this often happens with jpg/png files for example when doing a wildcard search
It depends how desperate you are:
- You can File > Export as WIX format. This is a Xara-internal version of a .WEB / .XAR file. The text is unencoded.
- You can File > Export as PDF. You are then at the whim of MS Search and your installed PDF filter.
- You can File > Export website. You can then search within the *.htm(l) files. This is unencoded.
In all cases, I would never use MS Windows Search.
My go-to search tool for this type of operation would be Notepad++ and Find in Files.
Acorn
unencoded here means losing formatting info - right?
these methods may show you what is in the xara file but a bit fiddly for editing puropses... as you say depends how desperate
must look at notepad++ again, not used it for a quite while, windows FE can be a pain in many ways
Hi Shipen. Computer Active magazine did a piece called " Why you must switch to Windows enhanced search" in Issue 585 (29th July - 11th August) which you may be able to still find in the shops. It seems to suggest you can search for files and their content. Might be worth £2.30 if you can still find it ;)
I think you have been rummaging in your garage too long egg ;)
if its not ascii based [remember ascii ?] no show...
You haven't seen my garage HD. Yes remember ascii, just. It was just an article I thought may help. I never tried it, quite happy with my search app.
EDIT: But it might be good if you wish to search for something like:
Quote:
“Š›žULL¤ôÓæ]þÏÓÿ
:D
Quote:
Originally Posted by handrawn
I don't understand this. This is a REALLY important issue for Xara.
Are you saying:
1. That Microsoft are at fault for only allowing their search utilities to do text search through THEIR OWN file formats/encoding system?(e.g. msExcel, msWord, msPowerPoint, msOutlook etc). OR
2. Are you saying that the search utility companies are at fault for not using Xara's file format? OR
3. Are you saying that Xara is at fault for not publishing their file format?
The bottom line is that IMHO, Xara as no hope of ever getting out of "1st gear" and getting anything approaching wide-scale adoption until such time as it is their files are searchable. Why would you leave any content in Xara if you can't search for and find it afterwards?
J
PS If you are saying "1." them Xara (and similar companies?) should sue the hell out of Microsoft, because they are in a near monopoly position and using their dominant position as operating system developer to favouring their own applications.
Shipen, try this. Create an A4 portrait page. Just create the text "Shipen". Save.
Now open the .xar file in Notepad & search for "Shipen".
did you get that to work egg ? I just tried it now and no joy, as I would have expected in a xar file - what acorn suggested should work in it's own way I think, but not yet got notebook++ to try it out properly
@shipen
look it is nobody's fault
different companies have their own way of doing things - some things are standardised and some things are not - some things are kept proprietary because it makes good sense to the company, some things are 'open'
it is not for me to tell any company I am not part of how to run their business, only make suggestions, and I don't do that very often here these days because they seldom ever got anywhere [a couple did for which i am grateful]
Egg, I will stick my neck out here and suggest that does not work.Quote:
Originally Posted by Egg Bramhill
It will if you Export the file as filename.WIX as I mentioned earlier.
@handrawn - unencoded is the plain text. MS Windows and very few programs can find formatting code plus text externally. Some programs are quite limited here as well.
@shipen
1. MS offer up how third parties can create a filter for their file types. PDFs were unsearchable until someone created such a filter. Open up a PDF, DOCX, XAR file in a plain text editor and all you see is gibberish.
2. The filter to decode text may not exist for the majority of file extensions out there. Companies exist on this and have their own proprietary products to perform the decode.
3. Xara has published its file format and has delivered the WIX file extension for such a purpose. A WIX file can be edited in a Xara Desktop application.
Bottom Line. Any XAR file is searchable within its Xara Desktop application > Find and Replace (Ctrl+F). If you are after a global search for a word or phrase across a collection of XAR files then you must save the version out as a WIX format or publish and search in that or download the PDF (XDPX, XDP+). My bottom line is, if you need to search for text, you must create the right output file.
Acorn
Quote:
Originally Posted by Egg Bramhill
Challenge accepted!
And yes, as expected Notepad can't find the text string.
...And your point is?
J
PS Would it help if Xara were to change their format so that there is a copy of all the text inside any .XAR document attached to the end of the .XAR file as raw ASCII??
Acorn. Yes, I hear you loud and clear. But there is no way on God's Earth that I (and I suspect most all but the most evangelical Xara users) will bother to save a special file of any type just to make their Xara files searchable.Quote:
Originally Posted by Acorn
Early adopters, hard-core geeks & True Believers, yes. But "normal" / "mainstream" users simply don't have time for that sort of thing. They just aren't interested in complicated learning curves. Forget it.
No, the only hope is that Xara do whatever it takes themselves.
A
sure, no problemQuote:
Originally Posted by shiphen
I am not defending the situation but if you can explain what and why you have to do this, it would help.
A XAR file is not a destination, it is a design file. If it returns 100 hits, you'll have no idea where the hit is until you open the file.
I could argue if I have text in a JPEG, I would expect a text search to work for that.
Acorn
@ HD & Acorn:
You got me wrong. I was trying to show Shipen the content of a xar file and how it's unsearchable.
I wouldn't expect it to be searchable, after all it's a vector file which may not include any text. Perhaps Xara could add a 'properties' feature which holds text used in the file but I couldn't see any real use for this.
If I want to search for a xar file I find explorer and everything a great combination.
fair enough egg, it did cross my mind ;)
Sorry Egg, I missed your pointy point. Understand now.
Acorn
Nope, I just don't get it.
OK as an experiment, I have just created various files of various types in them.
They all contains some nonsense text (in this case I added the text string "ERIKKK#3").
I then searched for the text "ERIKKK#3" using Windows's File Explorer
Windows found all of the following files:
- the .TXT file
- the .HTML file
- the .DOCX file
- the .PDF file
- the .XLSX file
- the .PPTX file (PowerPoint)
- the .mmap file (MindManager)
So, look, if Microsoft Powerpoint can be indexed/searched, why can't Xara Designer files?
Even MindManager (by Mindjet) file can be searched!
J
PS By the way, in my life PowerPoint is the dominant competitor to Xara for general-purpose creation of illustrations. Basically everyone in business has the Microsoft Office suite (which is why Microsoft has a Market Cap of $1.54 TRILLION), and almost nobody has even heard of Xara. So when working on a shared project everyone defaults to PowerPoint.
Please don't give me yet another reason why I should use PowerPoint and not Xara Designer.
Shipen, with money behind MS & Adobe,why would they not build suitable filters for their products?
TXT only needed a simple filter but even text files come in different flavours.
MMAP is XML-based anyhow.
The MS Office suite is both deliverable and editable. The XAR format is editable and proprietary and is not published. That's the difference.
The WIX format does what you want.
You have yet to present your own specific need.
You have a gazillion XAR files and you always mispell theit/there/thier.
A Windows filter finds 7 files. You don't know where in the files...
Acorn
let me sumarise all that has been said in words of one syllable
in order for a search program to search a file format:
either the format owner [in this case xara] has to provide a filter/plugin [a code translation routine] to enable the search program to understand what it finds
or
the file format has to be using one that is already esablished elsewhere
xara have not provided such a filter
what other programs you can search is irrelevant to this
there is nothing you can do about this except put in a request to xara, backed up with concerete example of how it would be benificial [and not just generalisations about what you think the situation is or could be]
as acorn said, you have not even told us why you want this
you may have to bite the bullet and accept that the way you want to use this program may not be the way xara have designed it to be used, something that others have had to do in other respects, including myself
now it is my turn not to understand - these two programs are not at all the same - and if you can do what want in PP and that is what others use .. then why not use it?Quote:
Originally Posted by shiphen
Now you're confusing me HD!Quote:
let me sumarise all that has been said in words of one syllable
How many syllables in generalization? = 6 syllables
:-O
figure of speech :p
as when xara says 'smart design made for everyone' ;)
Yes these programs are NOT at all the same.Quote:
Originally Posted by handrawn
But in business almost everyone I know, when they want to do a diagram they reach for PowerPoint.
Now, if I am working in a Team environment... can I convince everyone else to buy Xara?
Can I convince everyone else to struggle up the learning curve of Xara's (not rather dated) whole user interface?
Can I convince everyone else to try Xara Cloud?
No, of course I can't.
I can built my diagrams in Xara, but I need other people to edit them. And then I need to edit their edits....
And guess what, I'm forced to use PowerPoint.
To answer other question... I find Xara a serious pain to use because as soon as I have too many Xara files, without any way of doing a text search across them I suddenly find it super-hard to find the correct file.
J
ok well the horse has probably left the paddock by now never mind the stable door, but the answer to 'the other question' is forward planning - acorn has been sugesting mirroring your files by saving them in wix as well as xar, one way to do it - keeping your own database would be another... yes more work than batch searching *.xar but you can at least batch search *.wix
I have 169,000 XAR files and 2,600 WEB files.Quote:
Originally Posted by shiphen
I work in Teams all the time. I use folders, project names and meaningful file names to organise things.
As an IT business consultant I have to work with the tools available or prescribed.
In your example, I would not force a Xara Desktop application (XDA) on the Team but use the XDA to create the text and diagram and Export as a PPTX.
I then have a source file (XAR) and output file (PPTX).
If there were lots of Team transactions then I would work in PowerPoint and finally import into the XDA, update or keep as a version and PPTX out.
Inbetween, I might (meaning I have) created the Slidepack into a Xara Website and embedded into the corporate environment, avoiding the mess of downloading a PPTX and running PowerPoint to view. When this is done the quirkiness of the XDA vanishes as other Team members start asking how was all that done.
Corporate deliveries on a stick or as a published website or even in Xara Cloud all allow for interactive presentation, bids and contracts to be generated as HTML, PPTX and PDF.
I turned round a quality management system costing £250,000/y for a large organisation into a collection of XWDPv12 licences quite a time back. No one complained.
Again, a XARA file is an editable source with multiple output formats.
Try version controlling a PPTX without a proper CMS and even the simple XDA Backup becomes a godsend.
Acorn
that sounds like very good advice
After reading the Xara Format Document http://http://site.xara.com/support/...atDocument.pdf
I am sure that Magix/Xara could provide a plugin to search inside Xara documents.
Notice that on installation, Xara install a program that allows Windows to read the preview bitmap of the Xara document.
If I understood well the Xara format manual, Xara files are compressed using the zlib format, so a plugin that reads inside Xara documents must be able to uncompress each one of these zlib compressed records inside the file and read the text.
By the way, Does wix format works well in all Xara versions?
In my computer, only Xara x1 could read and write wix files.
The rest could not write wix files but could read them.
Al
wix is an export format - it's there in my xdpx15.1 - afaik it's always been there
reading the preview bitmap does not, afaik, require the whole xar to be uncompressed, it is a specific function that integrates with the window OS
maybe it is possible for xara to write a plugin, but that is not to say it there would be money in it for them...
capellan - your link is broken....
Al, WIX is Xara's internal unpacked format. All Pro versions can export WIX.
Text exists in Links, Alt Text, Layers, Pages, etc, and Text Objects including Text Inside & Placeholders. Gaining a coherent understanding of these is difficult.
I have tried.
Acorn
@handrawn - strip off the duplicate protocol.
yes I got there eventually, thanks
along the way I got to https.com, which was confusing :D
Hi Acorn,Quote:
Originally Posted by Acorn
Did you try to export and reopen wix files from
every version that you have installed?
In my computer, only Xara X1 could export and read
wix files. All other versions only read, but do not export.
I have two more Xara versions that are not installed.
Let me try with these versions too.
By the way Acorn, Do you know if anyone have tried to create Xara files
using scripting programming languages, like python or javascript?
Al
I fixed your link, I think
http://site.xara.com/support/docs/we...atDocument.pdf
Many thanks! :)
Al, I have looked at all my XDAs and each has a .wix Import and Export.
As Xara uses this format for testing (probably), it is what I expected.
I have a large site in German that unpacks into 15MB as a WIX.Code:C:\Program Files\Xara\Xara Designer Pro+\FileFormats.xml (2 hits)
Line 39: <Format Id="205" Name="Xara (*.wix)"/>
Line 104: <Format Id="205" Name="Xara (*.wix)"/>
C:\Program Files\Xara\Xara Designer Pro X\17\FileFormats.xml (2 hits)
Line 39: <Format Id="205" Name="Xara (*.wix)"/>
Line 104: <Format Id="205" Name="Xara (*.wix)"/>
C:\Program Files (x86)\Xara\Xara Photo Graphic Designer 10\FileFormats.xml (2 hits)
Line 38: <Format Id="205" Name="Xara (*.wix)"/>
Line 101: <Format Id="205" Name="Xara (*.wix)"/>
C:\Program Files\Xara\Xara Designer Pro X10\FileFormats.xml (2 hits)
Line 38: <Format Id="205" Name="Xara (*.wix)"/>
Line 101: <Format Id="205" Name="Xara (*.wix)"/>
C:\Program Files\Xara\Xara Designer Pro X11\FileFormats.xml (2 hits)
Line 38: <Format Id="205" Name="Xara (*.wix)"/>
Line 101: <Format Id="205" Name="Xara (*.wix)"/>
C:\Program Files\Xara\Xara Designer Pro X\12\FileFormats.xml (2 hits)
Line 38: <Format Id="205" Name="Xara (*.wix)"/>
Line 101: <Format Id="205" Name="Xara (*.wix)"/>
C:\Program Files\Xara\Xara Designer Pro X\15\FileFormats.xml (2 hits)
Line 38: <Format Id="205" Name="Xara (*.wix)"/>
Line 101: <Format Id="205" Name="Xara (*.wix)"/>
C:\Program Files\Xara\Xara Designer Pro X\16\FileFormats.xml (2 hits)
Line 39: <Format Id="205" Name="Xara (*.wix)"/>
Line 102: <Format Id="205" Name="Xara (*.wix)"/>
C:\Program Files\Xara\Xara Web Designer 10 Premium\FileFormats.xml (2 hits)
Line 38: <Format Id="205" Name="Xara (*.wix)"/>
Line 101: <Format Id="205" Name="Xara (*.wix)"/>
C:\Program Files\Xara\Xara Web Designer 11 Premium\FileFormats.xml (2 hits)
Line 38: <Format Id="205" Name="Xara (*.wix)"/>
Line 101: <Format Id="205" Name="Xara (*.wix)"/>
C:\Program Files\Xara\Xara Web Designer Premium\FileFormats.xml (2 hits)
Line 38: <Format Id="205" Name="Xara (*.wix)"/>
Line 101: <Format Id="205" Name="Xara (*.wix)"/>
C:\Program Files\Xara\Xara Web Designer Premium\15\FileFormats.xml (2 hits)
Line 38: <Format Id="205" Name="Xara (*.wix)"/>
Line 101: <Format Id="205" Name="Xara (*.wix)"/>
I searched for "angegangen" ['approached'] from the open design file in the phrase "und tiefgründig angegangen um das Beste von " in a text editor and found a WIX line:
What is clear is the fragmentation and the lack of context, which would require a lot of back-tracking to determine where and what in the design the WIX code referred to.Quote:
{2201,246,WCS("und altersbedigten Ver"),W(228),WCS("nderungen die ver"),W(228),WCS("nderte "),W(228),WCS("usserliche "),W(196),WCS("sthetik kunstvoll und tiefgr"),W(252),WCS("ndig angegangen um das Beste von "),WCS(" von")}
You would then need a click-link to open the XDA with that WIX in the right place.
Clearly, just bite the bullet and export as PDF and use that or as a Vertical Supersite Export and the browser's Find function.
No, I have been waiting for the always-promised/never-delivered API for SmartShapes before looking at the possibilities.Quote:
Originally Posted by capellan
On my Acorn Archimedes, I have a program in BBC Basic that allows coding to generate AFF and DRW files that can be imported into an XDA.
It is probably easier to address such things now as SVGs.
Acorn