VPREREX(1)

💖 VPREREX 💖 — like, the manual page, bestie

okay so this is vprerex(1), section 1 of the manual, and she is everything. pull up a chair. 🫶

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✨ NAME ✨

vprerex — a graphical front-end and viewer for the prerex(1) prerequisite-chart editor. she's giving tool, she's giving interface, she's giving both. 💅

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✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

vprerex basefile[.tex] [ chartfile[.tex] ]

vprerex file.pdf

vprerex

three whole moods, three whole ways to run her. pick your fighter. 👑

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✨ DESCRIPTION ✨

so vprerex (short for visual prerex, iconic naming ngl) is a GUI front-end and a viewer for prerex(1), which is the interactive editor for prerequisite-chart descriptions written in the prerex(5) format. 🌸

and like — yes — you can absolutely just use the viewer as a minimalistic little PDF viewer for any old PDF file. no notes. but the main character moment is that it supports editing charts generated using prerex.sty(7), by letting the coordinates of course boxes, arrows, and background points get conveyed back to the prerex(1) command-line using the clipboard. clipboard as a communication channel?? lowkey genius, highkey slay. 🔥

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✨ USAGE ✨

🦋 if you hand her a PDF

If vprerex is invoked on a PDF file, it simply displays that file. that's it. that's the whole job. minimal effort, maximum vibe. 💖

🎀 if the first argument isn't a .pdf

If the (first) argument does not have the .pdf suffix, it's assumed to be the base file for a LaTeX document containing a prerequisite-chart description in prerex(5) format, which is gonna be edited using prerex(1). ✨

And if you supply a second argument? that one gets regarded as an included file containing the specific chart environment to be edited. two files, one destiny. 🫶

🌈 if you hand her literally nothing

If no arguments are supplied, a file-opening dialog lets the user specify the prerex(1) base file to be edited (or the PDF file to be viewed). easy.

⚠️ but bestie, listen — if a separate chartfile is needed, vprerex(1) must be invoked with two arguments on the command line. no dialog shortcut for that one. the dialog can't save you here. 😭

💅 mouse behaviour (the fun part)

If the mouse hovers over a hyperlink in the PDF viewing window, the cursor shape will change to a pointing finger and a tooltip will display the URI. cute, informative, slay.

If the PDF file displayed contains a chart generated using prerex.sty(7) and the background coordinate grid has been enabled, then left-clicking the mouse on a course box, an arrow mid-point, or a background point will load the relevant coordinates into the X clipboard. 🖱️✨

The cursor shape changes to a plus-sign to indicate successful capture of the coordinates — that's your little confirmation wiggle, your vibe check passing. 👑

Then: middle-clicking the mouse at the prerex(1) command-line will paste those coordinates into a command being composed. chef's kiss. 🧚

And if the chart file is regenerated, the updated document will be re-loaded. she keeps up. she's not gonna make you restart her. periodt. 💜

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✨ DEPENDENCIES ✨

vprerex is based on the Qt-4 library. she calls xterm(1) and prerex(1) for the editing window, and she uses poppler-qt4 for rendering PDF files. that's the whole squad. 🌸

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✨ AUTHOR ✨

R. D. Tennent (rdt@cs.queensu.ca), adapted from David Boddie's PDFviewer, described in the QT Quarterly: http://doc.trolltech.com/qq/QtQuarterly27.pdf.

credit where credit is due, always. 🫶

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✨ SEE ALSO ✨

• prerex(1)
• prerex(5)
• prerex.sty(7)
• xterm(1)

go read them, iykyk. 📚💖

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and that's the whole page, bestie!! this was vprerex-6.2, dated 2011-10-28 — a classic, an icon, a legend. go draw some prerequisite charts. mwah. 💅✨🎀🦋