Scintilla and SciTE

| Scintilla

## Scintilla Documentation

There is an overview of the internal design of Scintilla.

Some notes on using Scintilla.

How to use the Scintilla Edit Control on Windows.

A simple sample using Scintilla from C++ on Windows.

A simple sample using Scintilla from Visual Basic.

A detailed description of how to write a lexer, including a discussion of folding.

The coding style used in Scintilla and SciTE are worth following if you want to contribute code to Scintilla but are not compulsory.

For now, the best way to work out how to develop using Scintilla is to see how SciTE uses it. SciTE exercises most of Scintilla's facilities.

The Windows version of Scintilla is a Windows Control. As such, its primary programming interface is through Windows messages. Early versions of Scintilla emulated much of the API defined by the standard Windows Edit and Richedit controls but those APIs are now deprecated in favour of Scintilla's own, more consistent API. In addition to messages performing the actions of a normal Edit control, Scintilla allows control of syntax styling, markers, auto-completion and call tips.

The GTK+ version also uses messages in a similar way to the Windows version. This is different to normal GTK+ practice but made it easier to implement rapidly.

The messages are (with wParam and lParam use)

### Text retrieval and modification.

    SCI_GETTEXT(int length, char *text)
    SCI_SETTEXT(<unused>, char *text)
    SCI_GETLINE(int line, char *text)
    SCI_REPLACESEL(<unused>, char *text)
    SCI_SETREADONLY(bool readOnly)
    SCI_GETREADONLY
    SCI_GETTEXTRANGE(<unused>, TEXTRANGE *tr)
    SCI_ADDTEXT(int length, char *s)
    SCI_ADDSTYLEDTEXT(int length, cell *s)
    SCI_INSERTTEXT(int pos, char *text)
    SCI_CLEARALL
    SCI_CLEARDOCUMENTSTYLE
    SCI_GETCHARAT(int position)
    SCI_GETSTYLEAT(int position)
    SCI_GETSTYLEDTEXT(<unused>, TEXTRANGE *tr)
    SCI_SETSTYLEBITS(int bits)
    SCI_GETSTYLEBITS

Each character in a Scintilla document is followed by an associated byte of styling information. The combination of a character byte and a style byte is called a cell. Style bytes are interpreted as a style index in the low 5 bits and as 3 individual bits of indicators. This allows 32 fundamental styles which is enough for most languages and three independent indicators so that, for example, syntax errors, deprecated names and bad indentation could all be displayed at once. Indicators may be displayed as simple underlines, squiggly underlines, a line of small 'T' shapes, a line of diagonal hatching or as strike-out. Additional indicators such as blurred could be defined in the future. The number of bits used for styles can be altered with SCI_SETSTYLEBITS up to a maximum of 7 bits. The remaining bits can be used for indicators.

Positions within the Scintilla document refer to a character or the gap before that character. The caret exists between character positions and can be located from before the first character to after the last character. There are places where the caret can not go where two character bytes make up one character. This occurs when a DBCS character from a language like Japanese is included in the document or when line ends are marked with the CP/M standard of a carriage return followed by a line feed. The INVALID_POSITION constant (-1) represents an invalid position within the document.

All lines of text in Scintilla are the same height, and this height is calculated from the largest font in any current style. This restriction is for performance as if lines differed in height then calculations involving positioning of text would require that text to be styled first.

When wanting to completely restyle the document, for example after choosing a lexer, the SCI_CLEARDOCUMENTSTYLE can be used to clear all styling information and reset the folding state.

    SCI_SETTARGETSTART(int pos)
    SCI_GETTARGETSTART
    SCI_SETTARGETEND(int pos)
    SCI_GETTARGETEND
    SCI_REPLACETARGET(int length, char *text)
    SCI_REPLACETARGETRE(int length, char *text)
    SCI_SETSEARCHFLAGS(int flags)
    SCI_GETSEARCHFLAGS
    SCI_SEARCHINTARGET(int length, string text)

Using SCI_REPLACESEL, modifications cause scrolling and other visible changes which may take some time and cause unwanted display updates. If performing many changes, such as a replace all command, the target can be used instead. First set the range to be replaced. Then call SCI_REPLACETARGET or SCI_REPLACETARGETRE which returns the length taken by the replacement string. The difference between SCI_REPLACETARGET and SCI_REPLACETARGETRE is that SCI_REPLACETARGETRE looks for \d patterns in the replacement text where d is a digit from 1 to 9 and substitutes in the values of tagged matches from the most recent regular expression search.

Searching can be performed within the target range with SCI_SEARCHINTARGET which uses a counted string to allow searching for null characters. Returns length of range or -1 for failure in which case target is not moved. The flags used by SCI_SEARCHINTARGET such as SCFIND_MATCHCASE, SCFIND_WHOLEWORD, SCFIND_WORDSTART, and SCFIND_REGEXP can be set with SCI_SETSEARCHFLAGS. The SCI_SEARCHINTARGET call may be simpler for some clients to use than SCI_FINDTEXT as that requires using a pointer to a structure.

    SCI_SETOVERTYPE
    SCI_GETOVERTYPE

SCI_GETOVERTYPE returns TRUE if overtyping is active otherwise FALSE will be returned. Use SCI_GETOVERTYPE to set the overtype node.

### Standard commands

    SCI_CUT
    SCI_COPY
    SCI_PASTE
    SCI_CLEAR
    SCI_CANPASTE

### Error handling

    SCI_SETSTATUS
    SCI_GETSTATUS

If an error occurs, Scintilla may set an internal error number which can be retrieved with SCI_GETSTATUS. Not currently used but will be in the future. To clear the error status call SCI_SETSTATUS(0).

### Undo and Redo

    SCI_UNDO
    SCI_CANUNDO
    SCI_EMPTYUNDOBUFFER
    SCI_REDO
    SCI_CANREDO
    SCI_SETUNDOCOLLECTION(bool collectUndo)
    SCI_GETUNDOCOLLECTION
    SCI_BEGINUNDOACTION
    SCI_ENDUNDOACTION

Scintilla has multiple level undo and redo. It will continue to collect undoable actions until memory runs out. Sequences of typing or deleting are compressed into single actions to make it easier to undo and redo at a sensible level of detail. Sequences of actions can be combined into actions that are undone as a unit. These sequences occur between SCI_BEGINUNDOACTION and SCI_ENDUNDOACTION messages. These sequences can be nested and only the top level sequences are undone as units.

### Selection and information

    SCI_GETTEXTLENGTH
    SCI_GETFIRSTVISIBLELINE
    SCI_GETLINECOUNT
    SCI_GETMODIFY
    SCI_SETSEL(int start, int end)
    SCI_GETSELTEXT(<unused>, char *text)
    SCI_LINEFROMPOSITION(int position)
    SCI_POSITIONFROMLINE(int line)
    SCI_GETLINEENDPOSITION(int line)
    SCI_LINELENGTH(int line)
    SCI_POSITIONFROMPOINT(int x, int y)
    SCI_POSITIONFROMPOINTCLOSE(int x, int y)
    SCI_POINTXFROMPOSITION(<unused>, int position)
    SCI_POINTYFROMPOSITION(<unused>, int position)
    SCI_HIDESELECTION(bool hide)
    SCI_GETLENGTH
    SCI_SETCURRENTPOS(int position)
    SCI_GETCURRENTPOS
    SCI_SETANCHOR(int position)
    SCI_GETANCHOR
    SCI_SETSELECTIONSTART(int position)
    SCI_GETSELECTIONSTART
    SCI_SETSELECTIONEND(int position)
    SCI_GETSELECTIONEND
    SCI_SELECTALL
    SCI_GOTOLINE(int line)
    SCI_GOTOPOS(int position)
    SCI_GETCURLINE(int textlen, char *text)
    SCI_LINESONSCREEN
    SCI_SELECTIONISRECTANGLE
    SCI_MOVECARETINSIDEVIEW
    SCI_WORDENDPOSITION(int position, bool onlyWordCharacters)
    SCI_WORDSTARTPOSITION(int position, bool onlyWordCharacters)

Scintilla maintains a selection which stretches between two points, the anchor and the current position.

It is not possible to change the modified status as whether the document is modified is determined by whether the undo position is at the save point.

SCI_GETCURLINE retrieves the text of the line containing the caret and returns the position within the line of the caret.

SCI_POSITIONFROMPOINT finds the closest character position to a point and SCI_POSITIONFROMPOINTCLOSE is similar but returns -1 if the point is outside the window or not close to any characters.

SCI_WORDENDPOSITION and SCI_WORDSTARTPOSITION can be used to find the start and end of words using the same definition of words as used internally within Scintilla.

### Scrolling and automatic scrolling

    SCI_LINESCROLL(int column, int line)
    SCI_SCROLLCARET
    SCI_SETCARETPOLICY(int policy, int slop)
    SCI_SETVISIBLEPOLICY(int policy, int slop)
    SCI_SETHSCROLLBAR(bool visible)
    SCI_GETHSCROLLBAR
    SCI_GETXOFFSET
    SCI_SETXOFFSET(int xoffset)

SCI_SETCARETPOLICY can be set to a combination of the flags CARET_SLOP and CARET_STRICT to change the automatic vertical positioning of the view when ensuring a position is visible. If CARET_SLOP is on then the slop value determines the number of line at top and bottom of the view where the caret should not go. If CARET_SLOP is off then the caret is centred within the view. When CARET_STRICT is set then caret policy is rechecked even if the caret is completely visible. If CARET_XEVEN is set then both the left and right margins are treated equally whereas if it is not set then displaying text to the left is preferred. CARET_XJUMPS causes the display to move in jumps and then stay still rather than in a series of smaller movements. SCI_SETVISIBLEPOLICY is a similar function that determines how the vertical positioning is determined when SCI_ENSUREVISIBLEENFORCEPOLICY is called. It takes VISIBLE_SLOP and VISIBLE_STRICT flags for the policy parameter.

The xoffset is the horizontal scroll position in pixels.

### Searching

    SCI_FINDTEXT(int flags, TextToFind *ttf)

Scintilla can find where a string is present in the document. There are several option flags including a simple regular expression search. SCFIND_MATCHCASE indicates that a match only occurs with a string that matches the case of the search string. SCFIND_WHOLEWORD indicates that a match only occurs if the characters before and after are not word characters. SCFIND_WORDSTART indicates that a match only occurs if the character before is not a word character.

SCFIND_REGEXP indicates that the search string should be interpreted as a regular expression. Special characters interpreted are '.' for any character, '\(' and '\)' to tag parts of the match, '\1' .. '\9' to refer to tagged parts, '\<' to match the start of a word, '\>' to match the end of a word, '\' as a quote character, '[' and ']' to indicate a set of characters, ^ within a set to complement the set, ^ outside a set to match the start of line, $ to match the end of line, * to match 0 or more times, + to match 1 or more times

See also SCI_SEARCHINTARGET.

    SCI_SEARCHANCHOR
    SCI_SEARCHNEXT(int flags, char *text)
    SCI_SEARCHPREV(int flags, char *text)

Relocatable search support. This allows multiple incremental interactive searches to be macro recorded while still setting the selection to found text so the find/select operation is self-contained.

### Visible white space

    SCI_GETVIEWWS
    SCI_SETVIEWWS(SCWS_INVISIBLE or SCWS_VISIBLEAFTERINDENT or
    SCWS_VISIBLEALWAYS)

White space can be made visible which may useful for languages in which whitespace is significant, such as Python. Space characters appear as small centred dots and tab characters as light arrows pointing to the right. With the SCWS_VISIBLEAFTERINDENT option, white space used for indentation is invisible but after the first visible character, it is visible.

### Cursor

    SCI_SETCURSOR
    SCI_GETCURSOR

The cursor is normally chosen in a context sensitive way so will be different over the margin than when over the text. When performing a slow action, a wait cursor can be shown by calling SCI_SETCURSOR(SC_CURSORWAIT) and restored with SCI_SETCURSOR(SC_CURSORNORMAL).

### Mouse Capture

    SCI_SETMOUSEDOWNCAPTURES(bool captures)
    SCI_GETMOUSEDOWNCAPTURES

When the mouse is pressed inside Scintilla, it is captured so future mouse movement events are sent to Scintilla. This behaviour may be turned off with SCI_SETMOUSEDOWNCAPTURES(false).

### Line endings

    SCI_GETEOLMODE
    SCI_SETEOLMODE(SC_EOL_CRLF or SC_EOL_CR or SC_EOL_LF)
    SCI_GETVIEWEOL
    SCI_SETVIEWEOL(bool visible)
    SCI_CONVERTEOLS(SC_EOL_CRLF or SC_EOL_CR or SC_EOL_LF)

Scintilla can interpret any of the three major line end conventions, Macintosh (\r), Unix (\n) and CP/M / DOS / Windows (\r\n). When the user presses the Enter key, one of these line end strings is inserted into the buffer. The default is \r\n, but this can be changed with the SCI_SETEOLMODE message taking a an argument of SC_EOL_CRLF, SC_EOL_CR, or SC_EOL_LF. The SCI_GETEOLMODE message retrieves the current state.

The characters that make up line ends can be made visible with the view EOL option. This looks similar to (CR), (LF), or (CR)(LF).

All of the line ends in the document may be changed by calling SCI_CONVERTEOLS with the desired line ending.

### Styling

    SCI_GETENDSTYLED
    SCI_STARTSTYLING(int position, int mask)
    SCI_SETSTYLING(int length, int style)
    SCI_SETSTYLINGEX(int length, stylesequence *s)
    SCI_SETLINESTATE(int line, int value)
    SCI_GETLINESTATE(int line)
    SCI_GETMAXLINESTATE

Scintilla keeps a record of the last character that is likely to be styled correctly. This is moved forwards when characters after it are styled and moved backwards if changes are made to the text of the document before it. Before drawing text, this position is checked to see if any styling is needed and a notification message sent to the container if so. The container can send SCI_GETENDSTYLED to work out where it needs to start styling. Scintilla will always ask to style whole lines.

To perform the actual styling, SCI_STARTSTYLING is sent with the position to start at and a mask indicating which bits of the style bytes can be set. The mask allows styling to occur over several passes, with, for example, basic styling done on an initial pass to ensure that the text of the code is seen quickly and correctly, and then a second slower pass, detecting syntax errors and using indicators to show where these are. After SCI_STARTSTYLING, multiple SCI_SETSTYLING messages are sent for each lexical entity to be styled.

As well as the 8 bits of lexical state stored for each character there is also an integer stored for each line. This can be used for longer lived parse states such as what the current scripting language is in an ASP page.

The last line that has any line state can be found with SCI_GETMAXLINESTATE.

### Style Definition

    SCI_STYLECLEARALL
    SCI_STYLERESETDEFAULT
    SCI_STYLESETFORE(int stylenumber, int colour)
    SCI_STYLESETBACK(int stylenumber, int colour)
    SCI_STYLESETBOLD(int stylenumber, bool bold)
    SCI_STYLESETITALIC(int stylenumber, bool italic)
    SCI_STYLESETSIZE(int stylenumber, int sizeinpoints)
    SCI_STYLESETFONT(int stylenumber, char *fontname)
    SCI_STYLESETEOLFILLED(int stylenumber, bool eolfilled)
    SCI_STYLESETUNDERLINE(int stylenumber, bool underline)
    SCI_STYLESETCHARACTERSET(int stylenumber, int charset)
    SCI_STYLESETVISIBLE(int stylenumber, bool visible)
    SCI_STYLESETCASE(int stylenumber, SC_CASE_MIXED or SC_CASE_UPPER or SC_CASE_LOWER)
    SCI_STYLESETCHANGEABLE(int stylenumber, bool changeable)

While the style setting messages mentioned above, change the style numbers associated with text, these messages define how those style numbers are interpreted visually. The STYLE_DEFAULT style defines the attributes that all styles will receive when SCI_STYLECLEARALL is called. SCI_STYLERESETDEFAULT resets STYLE_DEFAULT to its state when Scintilla was initialised.

The EOLFILLED style uses the background colour at the end of the line to colour from the last character of the line to the right side of the window. This is useful when a document contains embedded sections in another language such as HTML pages with embedded JavaScript. By setting both the EOLFILLED style and a consistent background colour to all JavaScript styles then JavaScript sections will be easily distinguished from HTML.

SCI_STYLESETCHARACTERSET can set a style to use a different character set than the default. For example, SCI_STYLESETCHARACTERSET(SCE_C_STRING, SC_CHARSET_RUSSIAN) would ensure that strings in Russian would display correctly. This feature currently only works fully on Windows.

The character sets supported on Windows are: SC_CHARSET_ANSI, SC_CHARSET_ARABIC, SC_CHARSET_BALTIC, SC_CHARSET_CHINESEBIG5, SC_CHARSET_DEFAULT, SC_CHARSET_EASTEUROPE, SC_CHARSET_GB2312, SC_CHARSET_GREEK, SC_CHARSET_HANGUL, SC_CHARSET_HEBREW, SC_CHARSET_JOHAB, SC_CHARSET_MAC, SC_CHARSET_OEM, SC_CHARSET_SHIFTJIS, SC_CHARSET_SYMBOL, SC_CHARSET_THAI, SC_CHARSET_TURKISH, and SC_CHARSET_VIETNAMESE.

The character sets supported on GTK+ are SC_CHARSET_ANSI, SC_CHARSET_EASTEUROPE, SC_CHARSET_GB2312, SC_CHARSET_HANGUL, and SC_CHARSET_SHIFTJIS.

As well as the 32 fundamental lexer styles, there are also some predefined numbered styles starting at 32, STYLE_DEFAULT, STYLE_LINENUMBER, STYLE_BRACELIGHT, STYLE_BRACEBAD, STYLE_CONTROLCHAR, and STYLE_INDENTGUIDE. These can be defined with the SCI_STYLESET* messages. To make it easier for client code to discover the range of styles that are predefined, STYLE_LASTPREDEFINED is set to the style number of the last predefined style.

SCI_STYLESETCASE can force text to be displayed in upper case (SC_CASE_UPPER) or lower case (SC_CASE_LOWER).

SCI_STYLESETCHANGEABLE is an experimental and incompletely implemented style attribute. The default setting is changeable but when turned off it makes text read-only. Currently only stops caret from being within not-changeable text and does not yet stop deleting a range that contains not-changeable text.

### Caret and Selection styles

    SCI_SETSELFORE(bool useSelectionForeColour, int colour)
    SCI_SETSELBACK(bool useSelectionBackColour, int colour)
    SCI_SETCARETFORE(int colour)
    SCI_GETCARETFORE
    SCI_SETCARETLINEVISIBLE(bool show)
    SCI_GETCARETLINEVISIBLE
    SCI_SETCARETLINEBACK(int colour)
    SCI_GETCARETLINEBACK
    SCI_SETCARETPERIOD(int milliseconds)
    SCI_GETCARETPERIOD
    SCI_SETCARETWIDTH(int pixels)
    SCI_GETCARETWIDTH
    SCI_SETCONTROLCHARSYMBOL(int symbol)
    SCI_GETCONTROLCHARSYMBOL

The selection is shown by changing the foreground and / or background colours. If one of these is not set then that attribute is not changed for the selection. The default is to show the selection by changing the background to light grey and leaving the foreground the same as when it was not selected.

The colour of the caret can be set with SCI_SETCARETFORE. The background colour of the line containing the caret can be changed to override the styles on that line with SCI_GETCARETLINEVISIBLE and the colour used set with SCI_SETCARETLINEBACK. The caret line background colour is overridden by any background colour used to display markers. The rate at which the caret blinks can be set with SCI_SETCARETPERIOD which determines the time in milliseconds that the caret is visible or invisible before changing state. Setting the period to 0 stops the caret blinking. The width of the caret can be set with SCI_SETCARETWIDTH to a value of 1, 2 or 3 pixels.

SCI_SETCONTROLCHARSYMBOL specifies a character to use to indicate control characters rather than having them displayed as mnemonics.

### Margins

    SCI_SETMARGINLEFT(int width)
    SCI_GETMARGINLEFT
    SCI_SETMARGINRIGHT(int width)
    SCI_GETMARGINRIGHT

Gets or sets the width of the blank margin on both sides of the text. This defaults to one pixel on each side.

    SCI_SETMARGINTYPEN(int margin, SC_MARGIN_SYMBOL | SC_MARGIN_NUMBER)
    SCI_GETMARGINTYPEN(int margin)
    SCI_SETMARGINWIDTHN(int margin, int pixelwidth)
    SCI_GETMARGINWIDTHN(int margin)
    SCI_SETMARGINMASKN(int margin, int mask)
    SCI_GETMARGINMASKN(int margin)
    SCI_SETMARGINSENSITIVEN(int margin, bool sensitive)
    SCI_GETMARGINSENSITIVEN(int margin)

There may be up to three margins to the left of the text display. Each margin may contain marker symbols and some may be set to display line numbers (with SCI_SETMARGINTYPEN). The markers displayed in each margin are set withSCI_SETMARGINMASKN. Any markers not associated with a visible margin will be displayed as changes in background colour in the text. A width in pixels can be set for each margin. Margins with a zero width are ignored completely. Each margin may be made sensitive to mouse clicks. A click in a sensitive margin will result in a SCN_MARGINCLICK notification being sent to the container. Margins that are not sensitive act as selection margins which make it easy to select ranges of lines.

### Other settings

    SCI_SETUSEPALETTE(bool allowPaletteUse)
    SCI_GETUSEPALETTE

On 8 bit displays, which can only display a maximum of 256 colours, the graphics environment mediates between the colour needs of applications through the use of palettes. On GTK+, Scintilla always uses a palette. On Windows, there are some problems with visual flashing when switching between applications with palettes and it is also necessary for the application containing the Scintilla control to forward some messages to Scintilla for its palette code to work.

Because of these issues, the application must tell Scintilla to use a palette. If Scintilla is not using a palette, then it will only be able to display in those colours already available, which are often the 20 Windows system colours.

To see an example of how to enable palette support in Scintilla, search the text of SciTE for WM_PALETTECHANGED, WM_QUERYNEWPALETTE and SCI_SETUSEPALETTE.

    SCI_SETBUFFEREDDRAW(bool isbuffered)
    SCI_GETBUFFEREDDRAW

Turns on or off buffered drawing. Buffered drawing draws each line into a bitmap rather than directly to the screen and then copies the bitmap to the screen. This avoids flickering although it does take longer. The default is for drawing to be buffered.

    SCI_SETTABWIDTH(int widthinchars)
    SCI_GETTABWIDTH
    SCI_SETINDENT(int widthinchars)
    SCI_GETINDENT
    SCI_SETUSETABS(bool usetabs)
    SCI_GETUSETABS
    SCI_SETTABINDENTS(bool tabIndents)
    SCI_GETTABINDENTS
    SCI_SETBACKSPACEUNINDENTS(bool bsUnIndents)
    SCI_GETBACKSPACEUNINDENTS

SCI_SETTABWIDTH sets the size of a tab as a multiple of the size of a space character in the style of the first style definition. SCI_SETINDENT sets the size of indentation in terms of characters. SCI_SETUSETABS determines whether indentation should be created out of a mixture of tabs and space or be based purely on spaces.

Inside indentation whitespace the tab and backspace keys can be made to indent and unindent rather than insert a tab character or delete a character with the SCI_SETTABINDENTS and SCI_GETBACKSPACEUNINDENTS functions.

    SCI_SETLINEINDENTATION(int line, int indentation)
    SCI_GETLINEINDENTATION(int line)
    SCI_GETLINEINDENTPOSITION(int line)
    SCI_GETCOLUMN(int position)

The amount of indentation on a line can be discovered and set with SCI_GETLINEINDENTATION and SCI_SETLINEINDENTATION. The indentation is measured in character columns which correspond to the width of space characters. SCI_GETLINEINDENTPOSITION returns the position at the end of indentation of a line. SCI_GETCOLUMN returns the column number of a position within the document taking the width of tabs into account.

    SCI_SETCODEPAGE(int codepage)
    SCI_GETCODEPAGE

Scintilla has some very simple Japanese DBCS (and probably Chinese and Korean) support. Use this message with argument set to the code page number to set Scintilla to use code page information to ensure double byte characters are treated as one character rather than two. This also stops the caret from moving between the two bytes in a double byte character. Call with argument set to zero to disable DBCS support.

On Windows, code page SC_CP_UTF8 (65001) sets Scintilla into Unicode mode with the document treated as a sequence of characters expressed in UTF-8. The text is converted to UCS-2 before being drawn by the OS and can thus display Hebrew, Arabic, Cyrillic, and Han characters. Languages which can use two characters stacked vertically in one horizontal space such as Thai will mostly work but there are som eissues where the characters are drawn separately leading to visual glitches. Bidirectional text is not supported.

    SCI_SETWORDCHARS(<unused>, char *chars)

Scintilla has several functions that operate on words which are defined to be contiguous sequences of characters from a particular set of characters. This message defines which characters are members of that set. If chars is null then the default set, alphanumeric and '_', is used.

    SCI_GRABFOCUS
    SCI_SETFOCUS(bool focus)
    SCI_GETFOCUS

On GTK+, focus handling is more complicated than on Windows, so Scintilla can be told with this message to grab the focus.

The internal focus flag can be set with SCI_SETFOCUS. This is used by clients which have complex focus requirements such as having their own window which gets the real focus but with the need to indicate that Scintilla has the logical focus.

### Brace highlighting

    SCI_BRACEHIGHLIGHT(int pos1, int pos2)
    SCI_BRACEBADLIGHT(int pos1)
    SCI_BRACEMATCH(int position, int maxReStyle)

Up to two characters can be highlighted in a 'brace highlighting style' which is defined as style number 34. If there is no matching brace then the 'brace badlighting style', style number 35, can be used to show the brace that is unmatched. Using a position of INVALID_POSITION removes the highlight.

The SCI_BRACEMATCH message finds a corresponding matching brace given the position of one brace. The brace characters handled are '(', ')', '[', ']', '{', '}', '<', and '>'. A match only occurs if the style of the matching brace is the same as the starting brace or the matching brace is beyond the end of styling. Nested braces are handled correctly. The maxReStyle parameter must currently be 0.

### Indentation Guides

    SCI_SETINDENTATIONGUIDES(bool view)
    SCI_GETINDENTATIONGUIDES
    SCI_SETHIGHLIGHTGUIDE(int column)
    SCI_GETHIGHLIGHTGUIDE

Indentation guides are dotted vertical lines that appear within indentation whitespace every indent size columns. They make it easy to see which constructs line up especially when they extend over multiple pages. Style 37 is used to specify the foreground and background colour of the indentation guides.

When brace highlighting occurs, the indentation guide corresponding to the braces may be highlighted with the brace highlighting style, 34.

### Markers

    SCI_MARKERDEFINE(int markernumber, int markersymbols)
    SCI_MARKERSETFORE(int markernumber, int colour)
    SCI_MARKERSETBACK(int markernumber, int colour)
    SCI_MARKERADD(int line, int markernumber)
    SCI_MARKERDELETE(int line, int markernumber)
    SCI_MARKERDELETEALL(int markernumber)
    SCI_MARKERGET(int line)
    SCI_MARKERNEXT(int lineStart, int markermask)
    SCI_MARKERPREVIOUS(int lineStart, int markermask)
    SCI_MARKERLINEFROMHANDLE(int handle)
    SCI_MARKERDELETEHANDLE(int handle)

Markers appear in the selection margin to the left of the text. They are small geometric symbols often used in debuggers to indicate breakpoints and the current line. If the selection margin is set to zero width then the background colour of the whole line is changed instead. There may be up to 32 marker symbols defined and each line has a set of these markers associated with it. The markers are drawn in the order of their numbers. Markers try to move with their text by tracking where the start of their line moves. When a line is deleted, its markers are combined, by an or operation, with the markers of the previous line. The SCI_MARKERDELETEALL removes markers of the given number from all lines, and treats a parameter of -1 as meaning delete all markers from all lines.
SCI_MARKERADD returns a marker handle number which may be used to find out where a marker has moved to with the SCI_MARKERLINEFROMHANDLE message. SCI_MARKERDELETEHANDLE can be used to delete a marker based upon its handle.

SCI_MARKERGET retrieves the set of markers associated with a line. SCI_MARKERNEXT and SCI_MARKERPREVIOUS can be used to efficiently search for lines that contain markers. They return the next / previous line with a set of markers that includes some of the bits set in the markermask parameter.
The markermask is equal to a OR of (1 << markernumber) for each marker of the desired / retrieved set.

The marker symbols currently available are SC_MARK_CIRCLE, SC_MARK_ROUNDRECT, SC_MARK_ARROW, SC_MARK_SMALLRECT, SC_MARK_SHORTARROW, SC_MARK_EMPTY, SC_MARK_ARROWDOWN, SC_MARK_MINUS, SC_MARK_PLUS. The SC_MARK_BACKGROUND marker changes the background colour of the line only. The SC_MARK_EMPTY symbol is invisible, allowing client code to track the movement of lines. Characters can be used as markers by adding the ASCII value of the character to SC_MARK_CHARACTER.

There are also marker symbols available for the folding margin in a flattened tree style: SC_MARK_BOXMINUS, SC_MARK_BOXMINUSCONNECTED, SC_MARK_BOXPLUS, SC_MARK_BOXPLUSCONNECTED, SC_MARK_CIRCLEMINUS, SC_MARK_CIRCLEMINUSCONNECTED, SC_MARK_CIRCLEPLUS, SC_MARK_CIRCLEPLUSCONNECTED, SC_MARK_LCORNER, SC_MARK_LCORNERCURVE, SC_MARK_TCORNER, SC_MARK_TCORNERCURVE, and SC_MARK_VLINE.

The marker numbers SC_MARKNUM_FOLDER and SC_MARKNUM_FOLDEROPEN are used for showing that a fold is present and open or closed. Any symbols may be assigned for this purpose although the (SC_MARK_PLUS, SC_MARK_MINUS) pair or the (SC_MARK_ARROW, SC_MARK_ARROWDOWN) pair are good choices. As well as these two, more assignments are needed for the flattened tree style: SC_MARKNUM_FOLDEREND, SC_MARKNUM_FOLDERMIDTAIL, SC_MARKNUM_FOLDEROPENMID, SC_MARKNUM_FOLDERSUB, and SC_MARKNUM_FOLDERTAIL. The bits used for folding is specified by SC_MASK_FOLDERS which is commonly used as an argument to SCI_SETMARGINMASKN when defining a margin to be used for folding.

### Indicators

    SCI_INDICSETSTYLE(int indicatornumber, int indicatorstyle)
    SCI_INDICGETSTYLE(int indicatornumber)
    SCI_INDICSETFORE(int indicatornumber, int colour)
    SCI_INDICGETFORE(int indicatornumber)

These messages allow setting the visual appearance of the three (0, 1, and 2) available indicators.

The indicator styles currently available are INDIC_PLAIN, INDIC_SQUIGGLE, INDIC_TT, INDIC_DIAGONAL, and INDIC_STRIKE.

The indicators are set using SCI_STARTSTYLING with a INDICS_MASK mask and SCI_SETSTYLING with the values INDIC0_MASK, INDIC1_MASK and INDIC2_MASK.

### Autocompletion

    SCI_AUTOCSHOW(int lenEntered,char *list)
    SCI_AUTOCCANCEL
    SCI_AUTOCACTIVE
    SCI_AUTOCPOSSTART
    SCI_AUTOCCOMPLETE
    SCI_AUTOCSTOPS(<unused>,char *chars)
    SCI_AUTOCSETSEPARATOR(char separator)
    SCI_AUTOCGETSEPARATOR
    SCI_AUTOCSELECT(<unused>,char *stringtoselect)
    SCI_AUTOCSETCANCELATSTART(bool cancel)
    SCI_AUTOCGETCANCELATSTART
    SCI_AUTOCSETFILLUPS(<unused>,char *chars)
    SCI_AUTOCSETCHOOSESINGLE(bool chooseSingle)
    SCI_AUTOCGETCHOOSESINGLE
    SCI_AUTOCSETIGNORECASE(bool ignoreCase)
    SCI_AUTOCGETIGNORECASE
    SCI_AUTOCSETAUTOHIDE(bool autoHide)
    SCI_AUTOCGETAUTOHIDE
    SCI_AUTOCSETDROPRESTOFWORD(bool dropRestOfWord)
    SCI_AUTOCGETDROPRESTOFWORD

Auto completion displays a list box based upon the users typing showing likely identifiers. The user chooses the currently selected item by pressing the tab character or another character that is a member of the fillup character set defined with SCI_AUTOCSETFILLUPS.

The SCI_AUTOCSHOW message causes this list to be displayed, with its argument being a list of words separated by separator characters. The initial separator character is a space but this can be set or got with SCI_AUTOCSETSEPARATOR and SCI_AUTOCGETSEPARATOR. SCI_AUTOCPOSSTART returns the value of the current position when SCI_AUTOCSHOW started display of the list. An entry can be selected SCI_AUTOCSELECT. The list of words should be in sorted order.

The current selection can be triggered with the SCI_AUTOCCOMPLETE message. This has the same effect as the tab key. When in autocompletion mode, the list should disappear when the user types a character that can not be part of the autocompletion, such as '.', '(' or '[' when typing an identifier. A set of characters which will cancel autocompletion can be specified with the SCI_AUTOCSTOPS.

If set to ignore case mode with SCI_AUTOCSETIGNORECASE, then strings are matched after being converted to upper case. One result of this is that the list should be sorted with the punctuation characters '[', '\', ']', '^', '_', and '`' sorted after letters.

The default behaviour is for the list to be cancelled if the caret moves before the location it was at when the list was displayed. By calling SCI_AUTOCSETCANCELATSTART with a false argument, the list is not cancelled until the caret moves before the first character of the word being completed.

The list will also be cancelled if there are no viable matches. To avoid this behaviour call SCI_AUTOCSETAUTOHIDE with a false argument.

When an item is selected, any word characters following the caret are first erased if SCI_AUTOCSETDROPRESTOFWORD is used to set this mode.

### User lists

    SCI_USERLISTSHOW(int listType,char *list)

User lists are similar to auto completion but do not insert text when an item is selected, instead notifying the container with a SCN_USERLISTSELECTION. The listType parameter is returned to the container and can be used to differentiate between different types of list such as between a list of buffers and a list of keywords.

### Calltips

    SCI_CALLTIPSHOW(int posStart, char *definition)
    SCI_CALLTIPCANCEL
    SCI_CALLTIPACTIVE
    SCI_CALLTIPPOSSTART
    SCI_CALLTIPSETHLT(int highlightstart, int highlightend)
    SCI_CALLTIPSETBACK(int colour)

Call tips are small windows displaying the arguments to a function and are displayed after the user has typed the name of the function. As the user types values for each argument, the name of the argument currently being entered is highlighted.

SCI_CALLTIPSHOW starts the process by displaying the calltip window, with the definition argument containing the text to display. SCI_CALLTIPPOSSTART returns the value of the current position when SCI_CALLTIPSHOW started display of the list. SCI_CALLTIPSETHLT sets the region of the calltip text displayed in a highlighted style. The background colour of calltips can be set with SCI_CALLTIPSETBACK with the default being white.

### Keyboard Commands

    SCI_LINEDOWN
    SCI_LINEDOWNEXTEND
    SCI_LINEUP
    SCI_LINEUPEXTEND
    SCI_CHARLEFT
    SCI_CHARLEFTEXTEND
    SCI_CHARRIGHT
    SCI_CHARRIGHTEXTEND
    SCI_WORDLEFT
    SCI_WORDLEFTEXTEND
    SCI_WORDRIGHT
    SCI_WORDRIGHTEXTEND
    SCI_HOME
    SCI_HOMEEXTEND
    SCI_LINEEND
    SCI_LINEENDEXTEND
    SCI_DOCUMENTSTART
    SCI_DOCUMENTSTARTEXTEND
    SCI_DOCUMENTEND
    SCI_DOCUMENTENDEXTEND
    SCI_PAGEUP
    SCI_PAGEUPEXTEND
    SCI_PAGEDOWN
    SCI_PAGEDOWNEXTEND
    SCI_EDITTOGGLEOVERTYPE
    SCI_CANCEL
    SCI_DELETEBACK
    SCI_DELETEBACKNOTLINE
    SCI_TAB
    SCI_BACKTAB
    SCI_NEWLINE
    SCI_FORMFEED
    SCI_VCHOME
    SCI_VCHOMEEXTEND
    SCI_DELWORDLEFT
    SCI_DELWORDRIGHT
    SCI_DELLINELEFT
    SCI_DELLINERIGHT
    SCI_LINESCROLLDOWN
    SCI_LINESCROLLUP
    SCI_LINECUT
    SCI_LINEDELETE
    SCI_LINETRANSPOSE
    SCI_LOWERCASE
    SCI_UPPERCASE
    SCI_WORDPARTLEFT
    SCI_WORDPARTLEFTEXTEND
    SCI_WORDPARTRIGHT
    SCI_WORDPARTRIGHTEXTEND

To allow the container application to perform any of the actions available to the user with keyboard, all the keyboard actions are messages. They do not take any parameters.

These commands are also used when redefining the key bindings with the SCI_ASSIGNCMDKEY message.

The SCI_WORDPART* commands are used to move between word segments marked by capitalisation (aCamelCaseIdentifier) or underscores (an_under_bar_ident).

### Key Bindings

    SCI_ASSIGNCMDKEY((short key,short modifiers), int message)
    SCI_CLEARCMDKEY((short key,short modifiers))
    SCI_CLEARALLCMDKEYS
    SCI_NULL

There is a default binding of keys to commands in Scintilla which can be overridden with these messages. To fit the parameters into a message, the first argument contains the key code in the low word and the key modifiers (possibly shift and control) in the high word. The key code is a visible or control character or a key from the SCK_* enumeration, which contains SCK_ADD, SCK_BACK, SCK_DELETE, SCK_DIVIDE, SCK_DOWN, SCK_END, SCK_ESCAPE, SCK_HOME, SCK_INSERT, SCK_LEFT, SCK_NEXT, SCK_PRIOR, SCK_RETURN, SCK_RIGHT, SCK_SUBTRACT, SCK_TAB, and SCK_UP. The modifiers are a combination of zero or more of SCMOD_ALT, SCMOD_CTRL, and SCMOD_SHIFT. SCI_NULL does nothing and is the value assigned to keys that perform no action.

### Popup edit menu

    SCI_USEPOPUP

Clicking the wrong button on the mouse pops up a short default editing menu. This may be turned off with SCI_USEPOPUP(0).

### Macro Recording

    SCI_STARTRECORD
    SCI_STOPRECORD

Starts and stops macro recording mode.

### Printing

    SCI_FORMATRANGE
    SCI_SETPRINTMAGNIFICATION(int magnification)
    SCI_GETPRINTMAGNIFICATION
    SCI_SETPRINTCOLOURMODE(int mode)
    SCI_GETPRINTCOLOURMODE

On Windows SCI_FORMATRANGE can be used to draw the text onto a display context which can include a printer display context.

To print at a different size than drawing on screen use SCI_SETPRINTMAGNIFICATION with a value which is the number of points to add to each style. -3 or -4 gives reasonable small print.

If a black background is used on the screen then it is best to invert the light value of all colours with SCI_SETPRINTCOLOURMODE(SC_PRINT_INVERTLIGHT) when printing to give a white background. If intermediate tones are used on screen then black on white print can be chosen with SCI_SETPRINTCOLOURMODE(SC_PRINT_BLACKONWHITE). Other options are the default, SC_PRINT_NORMAL, and SC_PRINT_COLOURONWHITE and SC_PRINT_COLOURONWHITEDEFAULTBG.

### Direct Access

    SCI_GETDIRECTFUNCTION
    SCI_GETDIRECTPOINTER

On Windows, the message passing scheme used to communicate between the container and Scintilla is mediated by the operating system SendMessage function which can lead to bad performance when calling intensively. To avoid this overhead a pointer to a message handling function inside Scintilla can be retrieved with SCI_GETDIRECTFUNCTION. The first argument to use when calling the returned function is the value retrieved from SCI_GETDIRECTPOINTER. After that go the message number, wParam, and lParam.

While faster, this direct calling will cause problems if performed from a different thread to the native thread of the Scintilla window in which case SendMessage should be used to synchronize with the window's thread.

This feature also works on GTK+ but has no significant impact on speed.

### Multiple Views

    SCI_GETDOCPOINTER
    SCI_SETDOCPOINTER(<unused>,document *pdoc)
    SCI_CREATEDOCUMENT
    SCI_ADDREFDOCUMENT(<unused>,document *pdoc)
    SCI_RELEASEDOCUMENT(<unused>,document *pdoc)

This is to allow simple split views of documents and so applications may maintain multiple buffer which may be individually selected into the editor. Each Scintilla has a pointer to a used document. Initially the used document is a default one created when the Scintilla was created. The SCI_GETDOCPOINTER call returns a pointer to the used document. SCI_SETDOCPOINTER sets the used document. SCI_SETDOCPOINTER(0) switches to a new empty document. Before closing down Scintilla make sure all document pointers retrieved are released to avoid memory leaks.

A new document may be created by SCI_CREATEDOCUMENT which returns a pointer to the document. This document is not selected into the editor and starts with a reference count of 1. A document may be released with SCI_RELEASEDOCUMENT and have its reference count incremented with SCI_ADDREFDOCUMENT.

### Folding

    SCI_VISIBLEFROMDOCLINE(int docLine)
    SCI_DOCLINEFROMVISIBLE(int displayLine)
    SCI_SETFOLDLEVEL(int line, int level)
    SCI_SETFOLDFLAGS(int flags)
    SCI_GETFOLDLEVEL(int line)
    SCI_GETLASTCHILD(int line)
    SCI_GETFOLDPARENT(int line)
    SCI_SHOWLINES(int lineStart, int lineEnd)
    SCI_HIDELINES(int lineStart, int lineEnd)
    SCI_GETLINEVISIBLE(int line)
    SCI_SETFOLDEXPANDED(int line)
    SCI_GETFOLDEXPANDED(int line)
    SCI_TOGGLEFOLD(int line)
    SCI_ENSUREVISIBLE(int line)
    SCI_ENSUREVISIBLEENFORCEPOLICY(int line)

The fundamental operation in folding is making lines invisible or visible. Line visibility is a property of the view rather than the document so each view may be displaying a different set of lines. SCI_SHOWLINES and SCI_HIDELINES show or hide a range of lines. SCI_GETLINEVISIBLE determines whether a line is visible. When some lines are hidden, then a particular line in the document may be displayed at a different position to its document position. SCI_VISIBLEFROMDOCLINE and SCI_DOCLINEFROMVISIBLE map from document line to display line and back.

Generally the fold points of a document are based on the hierarchical structure of the contents of the document. In Python, the hierarchy is determined by indentation and in C++ by brace characters. This hierarchy can be represented within a Scintilla document object by attaching a numeric level to each line. The initial level of a file is SC_FOLDLEVELBASE to allow unsigned arithmetic on levels. The SC_FOLDLEVELNUMBERMASK constant can be used to mask out the other bits to reveal the fold level number. There are also two bit flags associated with each line. SC_FOLDLEVELWHITEFLAG indicates that the line is blank and allows it to be treated slightly different then its level may indicate. For example, blank lines should generally not be fold points. SC_FOLDLEVELHEADERFLAG indicates that the line is a header or fold point.

The hierarchy can be navigated just through SCI_GETFOLDLEVEL, but it is often useful to find the parent of a line (SCI_GETFOLDPARENT) or the line that is the last child of a line (SCI_GETLASTCHILD).

Each fold point may be either expanded, displaying all its child lines, or contracted, hiding all the child lines. This is per view state and can be manipulated with SCI_SETFOLDEXPANDED and SCI_GETFOLDEXPANDED. Using SCI_SETFOLDEXPANDED does not show or hide any lines but only changes a state flag and the margin markers that show the contraction state. SCI_TOGGLEFOLD performs the expansion or contraction of a fold point in the manner normally expected.

A hidden line may be hidden because more than one of its parent lines is contracted. SCI_ENSUREVISIBLE travels up the fold hierarchy, expanding any contracted folds until it reaches the top level. The line will then be visible.

The fold flags is a set of bit flags set with the SCI_SETFOLDFLAGS message to determine where folding lines are drawn. 2 is draw above if expanded, 4 is draw above if not expanded. 8 is draw below if expanded and 16 is draw below if not expanded. 64 is display hexadecimal fold levels in line margin to aid debugging folding. This feature needs to be redesigned to be sensible.

### Line Wrapping

    SCI_SETWRAPMODE(SC_WRAP_NONE or SC_WRAP_WORD)
    SCI_GETWRAPMODE

When the wrap mode is set to SC_WRAP_WORD lines wider than the window width are continued on the following lines. Lines are broken after space or tab characters or between runs of different styles. If this is not possible because a word in one style is wider than the window then the break occurs before after the last character that completely fits on the line. The horizontal scroll bar does not appear when wrap mode is on.

    SCI_SETLAYOUTCACHE(SC_CACHE_NONE or SC_CACHE_CARET or SC_CACHE_PAGE or SC_CACHE_DOCUMENT)
    SCI_GETLAYOUTCACHE

Much of the time used by Scintilla is spent on laying out and drawing text. The same text layout calculations may be performed many times even when the data used in these calculations does not change. To avoid these unnecessary calculations in some circumstances, the line layout cache can store the results of the calculations. The cache in invalidated whenever the underlying data, such as the contents or styling of the document changes. Caching the layout of the whole document has the most effect, making dynamic line wrap as much as 20 times faster but this requires 7 times the memory required by the document contents.

SC_CACHE_NONE performs no caching and is the default. SC_CACHE_CARET caches the layout information for the line containing the caret. SC_CACHE_PAGE caches the layout of the visible lines and the caret line. SC_CACHE_DOCUMENT caches the layout of the entire document.

### Zooming

    SCI_ZOOMIN
    SCI_ZOOMOUT
    SCI_SETZOOM
    SCI_GETZOOM

The text can be made larger and smaller by using SCI_ZOOMIN and SCI_ZOOMOUT. The zoom level can be retrieved by SCI_GETZOOM and set by SCI_SETZOOM. The zoom factors may range from -10 to + 20 and is added to each styles point size. The calculated point size never goes below 2.

### Long Lines

    SCI_GETEDGECOLUMN
    SCI_SETEDGECOLUMN(int column)
    SCI_GETEDGEMODE
    SCI_SETEDGEMODE(int mode)
    SCI_GETEDGECOLOUR
    SCI_SETEDGECOLOUR(int colour)

This mechanism marks lines that are longer than a specified length in one of two ways. A vertical line can be displayed at the specified column number (EDGE_LINE) or characters after that column can be displayed with a specified background colour (EDGE_BACKGROUND). The vertical line works well for monospaced fonts but not for proportional fonts which should use EDGE_BACKGROUND. The default is to not have any form of long line marking (EDGE_NONE).

### Lexer

    SCI_SETLEXER(int lexer)
    SCI_SETLEXERLANGUAGE(<unused>, char *name)
    SCI_GETLEXER
    SCI_COLOURISE(int start, int end)
    SCI_SETPROPERTY(char *key, char *value)
    SCI_SETKEYWORDS(int keywordset, char *keywordlist)

If the SciLexer version of Scintilla is used, then lexing support for some programming languages is included. A particular lexer may be chosen from the SCLEX* enumeration and it is invoked automatically to style the document as required. Lexers can also be chosen by string name rather than by integer ID. If the lexer is set to SCLEX_CONTAINER then the container is notified to perform styling as is the case with the standard Scintilla.DLL version. Styling may be requested for a range of the document by using SCI_COLOURISE.

Settings can be communicated to the lexers using SCI_SETPROPERTY. Currently the "fold" property is defined for most of the lexers to set the fold structure if set to "1". SCLEX_PYTHON understands "tab.timmy.whinge.level" as a setting that determines how to indicate bad indentation. Many languages style a set of keywords distinctly from other words. Some languages, such as HTML may contain embedded languages, VBScript and Javascript are common for HTML. SCI_SETKEYWORDS specifies the keywords separated by spaces. For HTML, key word set is for HTML, 1 is for Javascript and 2 is for VBScript.

### Notifications

Notifications are sent (fired) from the Scintilla control to its container when an event has occurred that may interest the container. Notifications are sent using the WM_NOTIFY message on Windows and the "notify" signal on GTK+ with a structure containing information about the event.

    SCN_STYLENEEDED(int endstyleneeded)

Before displaying a page or printing, this message is sent to the container. It is a good opportunity for the container to ensure that syntax styling information for the visible text.

    SCN_UPDATEUI
    SCN_CHECKBRACE

Either the text or styling of the document has changed or the selection range has changed. Now would be a good time to update any container UI elements that depend on document or view state. Was previously called SCN_CHECKBRACE because a common use is to check whether the caret is next to a brace and set highlights on this brace and its corresponding matching brace.

    SCN_CHARADDED(int charadded)

Fired when the user types an ordinary text character (as opposed to a command character) which is entered into the text. Can be used by the container to decide to display a call tip or auto completion list.

    SCN_POSCHANGED(int newPos)

Fired when the user moves the cursor to a different position in the text. Can be used by the container to cancel some time consuming thread.

    SCN_SAVEPOINTREACHED
    SCN_SAVEPOINTLEFT
    SCI_SETSAVEPOINT

Sent to the container when the savepoint is entered or left, allowing the container to display a dirty indicator and change its menus.

The container tells Scintilla where the save point is by sending the SCI_SETSAVEPOINT message. This is usually done when the file is saved or loaded. As Scintilla performs undo and redo operations, it will notify the container that it has entered or left the save point, allowing the container to know if the file should be considered dirty or not.

    SCN_MODIFYATTEMPTRO

When in read-only mode, this notification is sent to the container should the user try to edit the document. This can be used to check the document out of a version control system.

    SCN_DOUBLECLICK

Mouse button was double clicked in editor.

    SCN_KEY

Reports all keys pressed. Used on GTK+ because of some problems with keyboard focus. Not sent by Windows version.

    SCEN_SETFOCUS
    SCEN_KILLFOCUS

SCEN_SETFOCUS is fired when Scintilla receives focus and SCEN_KILLFOCUS when it loses focus. These notifications are sent using the WM_COMMAND message on Windows and the "Command" signal on GTK+ as this is the behaviour of the standard edit control.

    SCN_MODIFIED
    SCEN_CHANGE
    SCI_SETMODEVENTMASK(int eventmask)
    SCI_GETMODEVENTMASK

SCN_MODIFIED is fired when the document has been changed including changes to both the text and styling. The notification structure contains information about what changed, how the change occurred and whether this changed the number of lines in the document. No modifications may be performed while in a SCN_MODIFIED event.

SCEN_CHANGE is fired when the text of the document has been changed for any reason. This notification is sent using the WM_COMMAND message on Windows and the "Command" signal on GTK+ as this is the behaviour of the standard edit control.

Both these notifications can be masked by the SCI_SETMODEVENTMASK function which sets which notification types are sent to the container. For example, a container may decide to see only notifications about changes to text and not styling changes by calling SCI_SETMODEVENTMASK(SC_MOD_INSERTTEXT|SC_MOD_DELETETEXT).

The possible notification types are SC_MOD_INSERTTEXT, SC_MOD_DELETETEXT, SC_MOD_CHANGESTYLE, SC_MOD_CHANGEFOLD, SC_PERFORMED_USER, SC_PERFORMED_UNDO, SC_PERFORMED_REDO, SC_LASTSTEPINUNDOREDO, SC_MOD_CHANGEMARKER, SC_MOD_BEFOREINSERT, SC_MOD_BEFOREDELETE, and SC_MODEVENTMASKALL.

    SCN_MACRORECORD

Tells the container that an operation is being performed so that the container may choose to record the fact if it is in a macro recording mode.

    SCN_MARGINCLICK

Tells the container that the mouse was clicked inside a margin marked sensitive. Can be used to perform folding or to place breakpoints.

    SCN_NEEDSHOWN

Scintilla has determined that a range of lines that is currently invisible should be made visible. An example of where this may be needed is if the end of line of a contracted fold point is deleted. This message is sent to the container in case it wants to make the line visible in some unusual way such as making the whole document visible. Most containers will just ensure each line in the range is visible by calling SCI_ENSUREVISIBLE.

    SCN_PAINTED

Painting has just been done. Useful when you want to update some other widgets based on a change in Scintilla, but want to have the paint occur first to appear more responsive.

    SCN_USERLISTSELECTION

User has selected an item in a user list. The list type is available in wParam and the text chosen in text.

    SCN_URIDROPPED

Only on the GTK+ version. Indicates that the user has dragged a URI such as a file name or web address onto Scintilla. The container could interpret this as a request to open the file.

    SCN_DWELLSTART
    SCN_DWELLEND
    SCI_SETMOUSEDWELLTIME
    SCI_GETMOUSEDWELLTIME
    SC_TIME_FOREVER

SCN_DWELLSTART is generated when the user hold the mouse still in one spot for the dwell period. SCN_DWELLEND is generated after a SCN_DWELLSTART and the mouse is moved or other activity such as key press indicates the dwell is over.

The time the mouse must sit still, in milliseconds, to generate a SCI_DWELLSTART. If set to SC_TIME_FOREVER, the default, no dwell events will be generated.

### Edit messages currently supported by Scintilla which will be removed in the future.

    WM_GETTEXT(int length, char *text)
    WM_SETTEXT(<unused>, char *text)
    EM_GETLINE(int line, char *text)
    EM_REPLACESEL(<unused>, char *text)
    EM_SETREADONLY
    EM_GETTEXTRANGE(<unused>, TEXTRANGE *tr)
    WM_CUT
    WM_COPY
    WM_PASTE
    WM_CLEAR
    WM_UNDO
    EM_CANUNDO
    EM_EMPTYUNDOBUFFER
    WM_GETTEXTLENGTH
    EM_GETFIRSTVISIBLELINE
    EM_GETLINECOUNT
    EM_GETMODIFY
    EM_SETMODIFY(bool ismodified)
    EM_GETRECT(RECT *rect)
    EM_GETSEL(int *start, int *end)
    EM_EXGETSEL(<unused>, CHARRANGE *cr)
    EM_SETSEL(int start, int end)
    EM_EXSETSEL(<unused>, CHARRANGE *cr)
    EM_GETSELTEXT(<unused>, char *text)
    EM_LINEFROMCHAR(int position)
    EM_EXLINEFROMCHAR(int position)
    EM_LINEINDEX(int line)
    EM_LINELENGTH(int position)
    EM_SCROLL(int line)
    EM_LINESCROLL(int column, int line)
    EM_SCROLLCARET()
    EM_CANPASTE
    EM_CHARFROMPOS(<unused>, POINT *location)
    EM_POSFROMCHAR(int position, POINT *location)
    EM_SELECTIONTYPE
    EM_HIDESELECTION(bool hide)
    EM_FINDTEXT(int flags, FINDTEXTEX *ft)
    EM_FINDTEXTEX(int flags, FINDTEXTEX *ft)
    EM_GETMARGINS
    EM_SETMARGINS(EC_LEFTMARGIN or EC_RIGHTMARGIN or EC_USEFONTINFO, int val)
    EM_FORMATRANGE

### Edit messages never supported by Scintilla

    EM_GETWORDBREAKPROC EM_GETWORDBREAKPROCEX
    EM_SETWORDBREAKPROC EM_SETWORDBREAKPROCEX
    EM_GETWORDWRAPMODE EM_SETWORDWRAPMODE
    EM_LIMITTEXT EM_EXLIMITTEXT
    EM_SETRECT EM_SETRECTNP
    EM_FMTLINES
    EM_GETHANDLE EM_SETHANDLE
    EM_GETPASSWORDCHAR EM_SETPASSWORDCHAR
    EM_SETTABSTOPS
    EM_FINDWORDBREAK
    EM_GETCHARFORMAT EM_SETCHARFORMAT
    EM_GETOLEINTERFACE EM_SETOLEINTERFACE
    EM_SETOLECALLBACK
    EM_GETPARAFORMAT EM_SETPARAFORMAT
    EM_PASTESPECIAL
    EM_REQUESTRESIZE
    EM_GETBKGNDCOLOR EM_SETBKGNDCOLOR
    EM_STREAMIN EM_STREAMOUT
    EM_GETIMECOLOR EM_SETIMECOLOR
    EM_GETIMEOPTIONS EM_SETIMEOPTIONS
    EM_GETOPTIONS EM_SETOPTIONS
    EM_GETPUNCTUATION EM_SETPUNCTUATION
    EM_GETTHUMB
    EM_GETEVENTMASK
    EM_SETEVENTMASK
    EM_DISPLAYBAND
    EM_SETTARGETDEVICE

Scintilla tries to be a superset of the standard windows Edit and Richedit controls wherever that makes sense. As it is not intended for use in a word processor, some edit messages can not be sensibly handled. Unsupported messages have no effect.

### Building Scintilla

To build Scintilla or SciTE, see the README file present in both the scintilla and scite directories. For Windows, GCC 2.95.3, Borland C++ or Microsoft Visual C++ can be used for building. For GTK+, GCC 2.95.2 should be used. Only GTK+ 1.2x is supported.

### Static linking

On Windows, Scintilla is normally used as a dynamic library as a .DLL file. If you want to link Scintilla directly into your application .EXE or .DLL file, then the STATIC_BUILD preprocessor symbol should be defined and Scintilla_RegisterClasses called. STATIC_BUILD prevents compiling the DllMain function which will conflict with any DllMain defined in your code. Scintilla_RegisterClasses takes the HINSTANCE of your application and ensures that the "Scintilla" window class is registered. To make sure that the right pointing arrow cursor used in the margin is displayed by Scintilla add the scintilla/win32/Margin.cur file to your application's resources with the ID IDC_MARGIN which is defined in scintilla/win32/platfromRes.h as 400.

### Ensuring lexers are linked into Scintilla

Depending on the compiler and linker used, the lexers may be stripped out. This is most often caused when building a static library. To ensure the lexers are linked in, the Scintilla_ForceLexers() function may be called. This function is not normally compiled and to ensure it is compiled the preprocessor symbol LINK_LEXERS should be defined.