About TextEdit

TextEdit provides features for working with different scripts. You can use

TextEdit to provide the basic text-editing and formatting capabilities needed

in your application. TextEdit uses the

Script Manager routines just as any application would to work across all

scripts. TextEdit describes some routines, not previously documented in

Inside Macintosh, that are not specific to working with script systems. It also

clarifies several previously documented routines and includes an overview of

all TextEdit data structures. Most new features of TextEdit are only

apparent for non-Roman script systems.

To use the new features of TextEdit, you should be familiar with the basic

concepts and structures behind QuickDraw, the Event Manager, the

Gestalt function.

For an introduction to the Macintosh Script Management System, see the

Worldwide Software Overview description.

The version of TextEdit referred to in here is included with System 6.0.5

and later unless otherwise stated.

In addition to all the text-handling features of earlier versions, TextEdit

now allows you to take advantage of the Script Manager's treatment of

system software with more than one script system installed. TextEdit uses

the Script Manager to support such systems. TextEdit exhibits the correct

behavior for editing and displaying text in multiple styles and different

scripts. Multiple scripts can even exist on a single line due to styled

Throughout the TextEdit topics, script is used to mean a writing system such

as Roman, Japanese, or Arabic. Script system is used to denote a specific

collection of software components for handling text in a particular script.

Examples of script systems are the Roman Script System, the Japanese Script

System (KanjiTalk), as well as the Traditional Chinese Script System and the

Simplified Chinese Script System (both referred to as Zhong-WenTalk).

At least two script systems are always present when a non-Roman script

system is installed. For example, Japanese system software is the combination

of the U.S. system software (which includes the Roman Script System, the

Macintosh Operating System, the Toolbox, and so forth) and the Japanese Script

System, all of which are localized for Japan.

Localized system software-such as the Japanese system software-has been

adapted to a particular region or language. The French and Turkish versions of

the Macintosh system software are simply examples of localized variations of

the U.S. system software that do not include a second script system.