NAME

       dasher - graphical predictive text entry system

SYNOPSIS

       dasher [OPTIONS] [filename]

DESCRIPTION

       Dasher  is  an  information-efficient  text-entry  interface, driven by natural continuous
       pointing gestures. Dasher is a competitive text-entry system wherever a full-size keyboard
       cannot be used.

OPTIONS

       dasher takes the following options:

       -a, --appstyle=STYLE
              Application   style.   STYLE  can  be  any  of  traditional,  direct,  compose,  or
              fullscreen.  The default is whatever was specified on the  previous  invocation  of
              Dasher, or traditional when Dasher is started for the first time.

       -?, --help
              Describe command line options.

       --help-options
              Describe the options available with --options.

       -o, --options [option=value[,option=value...]]
              Override  stored options.  Options values are remembered for subsequent invocations
              of Dasher.

USAGE

       The main Dasher interface is a window with a  blank  background  containing  a  column  of
       letters  on the right hand side.  Click the mouse button to start.  When the pointer is to
       the right of the crosshair the screen will zoom towards the  point  underneath  the  mouse
       pointer.   To  select  a  letter,  move  the  mouse pointer into it and watch how it zooms
       underneath the crosshair.  A new column of letters will appear.  Staying  within  the  box
       for  the  selected  letter, move the pointer over one of these letters to select it as the
       next letter.  Moving the mouse pointer to the left of the crosshair, or outside of the box
       for previously selected letters, allows you to change previously selected letters.

Application Styles

       traditional
              Dasher  displays  an  edit box above the main window.  Text entered via Dasher will
              appear in the edit box allowing the text to be edited directly.

       direct The edit box is not displayed.  Dasher runs without focus and the  text  goes  into
              whatever  window  does have focus.  This way you can use it more practically to run
              your desktop.

       fullscreen
              dasher expands to the entire screen.

MENUS

   File
       New    Clear the edit box and associate a random filename with it.

       Open   Read a text file into the edit box for further editing.

       Save   Save the contents of the edit box to its associated file.

       Save as
              Save the contents of the edit box to a selected file.

       Append to file
              Add the contents of the edit box to the end of a selected file.

       Import training text
              Use a file to further improve Dasher's prediction of the next  letters  to  present
              (for  instance,  a  training file containing scientific terms to add to the initial
              English training).  Training files must be UTF-8 encoded.

       Quit   Exit Dasher.

   Edit
       Cut    Remove the highlighted text from the edit box and copy it to the clipboard.

       Copy   Copy the highlighted text from the edit box to the clipboard but don't remove it.

       Paste  Paste the contents of the clipboard into the  edit  box  at  the  position  of  the
              cursor.

       Copy all
              Copy the entire contents of the edit box to the clipboard.

       Select all
              Highlight all of the text in the edit box.

   Options
       Preferences
              Opens the preferences dialog.

   Help
       About Dasher
              Display information about the current version of Dasher

THE PREFERENCES DIALOG

       The preferences dialog is split into several panes.

   Alphabet
       Choose  a  different  alphabet.  Dasher  will automatically retrain itself if the alphabet
       specified training file is present.

   Colour
       Choose a different colour scheme.

   Control
       Alter various control options

       One dimensional mode
              Map the Y position of the mouse to a 2 dimensional position on  the  Dasher  canvas
              (useful for limited mobility users)

       Eyetracker mode
              Similar to one dimensional mode, but behaves normally except at the right-hand side
              of the canvas. Designed for eyetracker users.

CONVERTING TRAINING FILES TO UTF-8

       Dasher requires that training files be in the UTF-8 format, whereas most  text  files  are
       likely  to  be  in  ISO-8859  format.  This  doesn't  matter  for plain text, but accented
       characters are encoded differently. In order to convert them, use  the  iconv(1)  program.
       For  instance, if your training file is in ISO-8859-1 format (Western European), run iconv
       -f ISO-8859-1 -t UTF-8 trainingfile >newtrainingfile

FILES

       /usr/share/doc/dasher
              Directory containing system-wide configuration files.

       ~/.dasher
              Directory containing user specific configuration files.

       Dasher will utilise files of the following form from both of these directories:

       alphabet.ALPHABET.xml
              The files defining the alphabets available to Dasher.

       colour.SCHEME.xml
              The files defining the colour schemes available to Dasher.

       training_LANGUAGE*.txt
              Files containing the training data used by Dasher.  These are  UTF-8  encoded  text
              and should contain a representative sample of the relevant language.  User specific
              training files can be used to augment system wide data.

       Refer to the Dasher manual for more information regarding the format and editing of  these
       files.

AUTHOR

       The Dasher Project <dasher@mrao.phy.cam.ac.uk>.

SEE ALSO

       The Dasher project web page is ⟨http://www.inference.phy.cam.ac.uk/dasher/⟩