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                            metapad 1.0b

                    A smaller, faster and better
                  FREE 32-bit Notepad replacement
                            
                            March 1999

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(C) Copyright Alexander Davidson, 1999

What?
=====
If you are like me, one of the most useful programs for everyday use is
Microsoft Notepad. I realized that Notepad was quite powerful and did 
almost everything I want in a simple text editor. Yet I found the UI to
be unlike most 32-bit Windows applications and actually quite poor...

metapad is a small, fast (and completely free) text editor for Windows 
9x and Windows NT with similar features to Microsoft Notepad but with 
many added extra (and useful) features. It was designed to completely 
replace any use of Notepad. It is smaller than Notepad (40 KB) and maybe
even a bit faster! All of Notepad's features are included (except for 
printing - but who ever prints from Notepad?!?).

Extra features include:
		
    Persistent window placement -
        Optionally save the position and size of the editor.

    Dirty file notification -
        A '*' appears in the caption for any unsaved file.

    Intelligent Find and Replace - 
        Automatically use the word under the cursor or selected text.

    External viewer support -
        Load a viewer (Web browser, MS Word, ...) with current file.

    Usable accelerator keys -
        Save is Ctrl+S, Find is Ctrl+F, etc..

    Dual customizable font support -
        Easily switch between a proportional and a fixed width font.

    Optional Quick Exit -
        Hit Esc to quit.. a personal favourite.

    Configurable tab stop setting -
        I prefer 4 to the default 8.

Why?
====
I created this program as a personal project. I was simply annoyed with
the usability of Notepad and it was clear that Microsoft wasn't ever
going to improve it (although their latest versions now support fonts).
I was pleased with the outcome of metapad (I actually renamed 
notepad.exe to notepadx.exe and use metapad instead of Notepad) so I
decided to polish it up a bit and release it as freeware.

How?
====
metapad was created (as was Notepad) in pure C with the Win32 API. It is
a small program containing just over 1200 lines of code. Thus, it is as 
small and fast as Notepad is. Unlike some other so-called Notepad
replacements, metapad actually loads in an instant. (Those other 
programs tend to approach 1MB instead of 40KB and are written using C++
with MFC or even (gasp!) Visual Basic.) 

metapad was compiled with Microsoft Visual C++ 6.0 (SP2).

Contact
=======
Please contact me with any bugs, (modest) feature requests or comments.

        WWW:   http://welcome.to/metapad
        email: metapad@home.com

Changes
=======
1.0b - Fixed infinite loop when doing Replace All on the same text (ouch!)
1.0a - Fixed Ctrl+A keyboard accelerator
1.0  - Initial release

Disclaimer
==========
metapad is freeware and is freely distributable. Hence, use it at your
own risk.