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Abbreviations

With a phrase or sentence in the message area that you want to use frequently like this: 

PLEASE OPEN THE WINDOW
Choose Cmd > Abbr. There will be a prompt asking for a short abbreviation for that phrase. Enter a series of letters (or digits) ending it with a space. The short name will be an abbreviation for the longer sentence. 
Abbreviation for 'PLEASE OPEN THE WINDOW'?
PW_
(The underscore represents a visible space). Now when you enter: 
PW_
it will expand to: 
PLEASE OPEN THE WINDOW
The space at the end is what signals the end of the abbreviation. You can cancel the definition of the abbreviation by doing 'Clear'.

These special abbreviations are automatically defined: 

TM - current time (like 12:04)
TS - current time with seconds (12:04:32)
DT - current date (10/3/06)
DL - current date long (Sunday April 2, 2004)
DB - current date (2006/03/09)
EP - ... (an ellipsis which is otherwise hard to enter)
Abbreviations can be entered in lower case if you wish. If F is an abbreviation you can use f instead to achieve the same result.

You can see all of the abbreviations you have defined by choosing Browse > Configure > Abbreviations. You can delete them here as well.

Another way to see your abbreviations is to choose Cmd > Abbr when the message area is blank.

If the phrase to be abbreviated ends with '_SP' then the '_SP' will be removed and the message area spoken after the phrase is inserted. If the message area contains a command of some type this may end up doing a 'Go' and taking some action. In this instance you can append the phrase with 'GO' instead of 'SP' if that would be clearer.

If you are a Sue Center Power User here is an advanced feature of abbreviations:

If the long phrase you are abbreviating contains a percent '%' then when the expansion happens the percent will be replaced by the text in the message area before the abbreviation. This feature was implemented specifically for this use:

Make 'F' an abbreviation for 

MP 5 % GO
Then on entering: 
DOG F_
CAT F_
RAINBOW F_
you can quickly find 5 pictures of whatever you want!

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