posting code (by copy & paste) with line numbers

gooly

I want to publish code snippets in a forum and refer to them in the explanatory text. It would be nice if I could copy the code snippets with the respective line numbers - is that possible?
If so, how?

Alan Kilborn

@gooly

gooly

@goolyThank you, but this does not work with copy (Ctrl+C) & paste (Ctrl+V) :(
Any solution for this?

PeterJones

@gooly said in posting code (by copy & paste) with line numbers:

@goolyThank you, but this does not work with copy (Ctrl+C) & paste (Ctrl+V) :(

The line numbers aren’t part of the text, so Notepad++ doesn’t have them available for copy/paste with the text normally.

In theory, one could ask for that as a feature (but I doubt it’s likely to be implemented); as a second alternative, one could write a script in a scripting plugin (like PythonScript), which would do the copy then insert the line numbers, or someone in theory could write a full plugin to accomplish this (maybe some other plugin already has copy-with-line-number, but I don’t know of it); but if you are willing to do a multi-step process, it can be done in native Notepad++:

One Time Setup: for a normal installation of Notepad++,

File > Exit all copies of Notepad++, then run one copy of Notepad++.
File > Open: %AppData%\Notepad++\shortcuts.xml

Just before </Macros>, add:

<Macro name="NumberLines" Ctrl="no" Alt="no" Shift="no" Key="0">
    <Action type="3" message="1700" wParam="0" lParam="0" sParam="" />
    <Action type="3" message="1601" wParam="0" lParam="0" sParam="^" />
    <Action type="3" message="1625" wParam="0" lParam="2" sParam="" />
    <Action type="3" message="1602" wParam="0" lParam="0" sParam=" | " />
    <Action type="3" message="1702" wParam="0" lParam="768" sParam="" />
    <Action type="3" message="1701" wParam="0" lParam="1609" sParam="" />
    <Action type="0" message="2316" wParam="0" lParam="0" sParam="" />
    <Action type="2" message="0" wParam="42089" lParam="0" sParam="" />
    <Action type="0" message="2318" wParam="0" lParam="0" sParam="" />
    <Action type="0" message="2312" wParam="0" lParam="0" sParam="" />
    <Action type="2" message="0" wParam="42089" lParam="0" sParam="" />
    <Action type="2" message="0" wParam="42034" lParam="0" sParam="" />
</Macro>
<Macro name="UnNumber Lines" Ctrl="no" Alt="no" Shift="no" Key="0">
    <Action type="3" message="1700" wParam="0" lParam="0" sParam="" />
    <Action type="3" message="1601" wParam="0" lParam="0" sParam="^\h*\d+ \| " />
    <Action type="3" message="1625" wParam="0" lParam="2" sParam="" />
    <Action type="3" message="1602" wParam="0" lParam="0" sParam="" />
    <Action type="3" message="1702" wParam="0" lParam="768" sParam="" />
    <Action type="3" message="1701" wParam="0" lParam="1609" sParam="" />
</Macro>

and save

File > Exit, then run one copy of Notepad++.

From now on, you have two new macros in the Macro menu: Number Lines and UnNumber Lines (and, if you want, you can use Macro > Modify Shortcut/Delete Macro to launch the Shortcut Mapper to add a keyboard shortcut for running these macros)

Every time you want to copy some or all of your code with the line number:

Run Macro > Number Lines, which will add a | at the beginning of every line, then launch the Column Editor
Fill out the Column Editor as follows:
- ⦿ Number to Insert,
- Initial Number: 1
- Increase by: 1
- **Repeat: ** (leave blank)
- Leaing: Spaces
- Format = ⦿ Dec
- Click OK
  
  (it will remember these values for next time)
Do your copy of the code (some or all lines, as you desire)
When done copying code-with-line-numbers, run Macro > UnNumber Lines to remove the line prefixes