The point of it

The idea is to identify text files and set a suitable date for each. The example here is a set of Shakespeare plays where you wish to date each one with the year it was written. Unfortunately, 16th Century dates cannot be simply stored on a PC file system, the earliest date stored being 1980.

We want to process a list like this so that WordSmith knows how to assign the right date despite this restriction:

 

A Midsummer-Night's Dream        1595

All’s Well that Ends Well        1602

As You Like It        1599

...

 

How to do it

1. Choose the folder where your texts are stored

 

Your texts may be in various different sub-folders, as in this example where comedies are separated from tragedies and history plays:

2. Press Match dates using a list.

3. Choose the text file list which specifies file-names and dates (an example is in your Documents\wsmith9 folder named shakespeare_plays_dated_plain.txt)

4. Press Load. File Utilities looks at each text in the parent folder and sub-folders, and any matching file-names will be listed in the box.

5. Press OK, and a list of these files with their dates gets saved as a favourite for you to use when concordancing, word listing etc.

 

Format for the text file with the list

The format of the list is

filename<tab>date (formatted YYYY or YYYY/MM/DD for year, month and day).

Examples:

A0X.xml        1991

B03.xml        1992/04/17

Tale of Two Cities Chapter 05.txt        1852/05/15