Idea Delivered

XPP 9.3 will include this functionality as described at the conclusion of this thread.

Copy x-path from the Status window and/or Show SGML/XML window

It would be a huge time saving option for developers to be able to copy  the Xpath from both the XPP Status window and the XPP Show Sgml/Xml window. Whilst this would not be in the right format all the time for CSS it would still save a lot of typing for long x-paths, in particular when attributes are included in the required item format or CSS selector.

Chris Leggett

  • I took a look at this. I know why it doesn't just work "out of the box" since the status window should just be a nice text area with clipboard support.

    It has to do with window focus. In order to always keep the user's typing in the "page", the software always redirects focus back to the main text area. When you try to do a select/copy, the focus moves off the status window and back to the main window, so you can't do the CTL-C for the copy of the text.

    The only way to make it work would be to have the status window retain focus. However, that now makes it a place for keyboard events to take place. Consequently, the "copy" would work, but the focus would not move back to the "page". So if you click on the status window, you would have to click back to the main text area to start typing again.

    This would be a change in behavior, that others might not like.

    I would be interested in people's comments.