SmartMath Plugin for AkelPad

SmartMath is a lightweight, powerful plugin that turns AkelPad into a dynamic real-time calculator, inspired by tools like Soulver or Numara. It allows you to perform calculations naturally in plain text, showing results instantly on the screen without altering your actual file content.

✨ Features

• Real-Time Evaluation: Instantly evaluates addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division as you type.
• Non-Invasive Rendering: Results are drawn directly onto the screen margin using Windows GDI. Your actual text document remains 100% untouched and clean.
• Variable Support: Define variables (e.g., base = 100) and reference them in subsequent lines (e.g., base * 1.15).
• Smart Percentage Logic: Intuitive handling of the % character relative to the left operand (e.g., 500 + 21% correctly yields 605).
• Advanced Number Formatting:
  • Customizable precision from 0 up to 14 decimal places.
  • Optional Thousands Separator with smart locale handling (uses . for thousands and , for decimals, e.g., 1.000.500,50).
• Customizable Aesthetics: Choose from 6 different text colors (Green, Blue, Red, Yellow, White, Black) to match your AkelPad theme. It also perfectly integrates with AkelPad's "Active Line" background highlight.
• Native Autoload: Integrates directly with AkelPad's plugin manager to remember its active state across sessions.

🛠 Technical Details

• Language: 100% FreeBASIC (Modular architecture).
• Interface: Built on top of the AkelPad Plugin API (AkelDLL.bi) and Windows API.
• Rendering Engine: Uses Window Subclassing to intercept WM_PAINT and WM_SIZE messages, dynamically expanding the right margin (EM_SETMARGINS) and drawing numbers via TextOut. It does not rely on text annotations like Scintilla.
• Parsing: Features a custom, highly optimized Recursive Descent Parser. Zero dependencies on external scripting engines (like VBScript or JScript).
• Architecture: Compiles to a highly optimized x86 (32-bit) and x64 (64-bit) native Windows DLL.
• Storage: Settings are saved in a SmartMath.ini file seamlessly within the AkelPad plugins configuration folder.

⚙️ Compilation

To compile the plugin yourself:

1. Ensure you have the FreeBASIC compiler installed and added to your PATH.
2. Open a terminal in the project's root folder.
3. Run the Compile.bat file. This will link all the modules (SmartMath.bas, SmartMath_Config.bas, etc.) into a single DLL.

📦 Installation

1. Locate your AkelPad installation directory.
2. Copy the compiled DLL (SmartMath.dll) into the AkelFiles\Plugs\ folder.
   • Typical path: C:\Program Files (x86)\AkelPad\AkelFiles\Plugs\
3. Restart AkelPad.
4. Go to Options -> Plugins (or press Alt+P), find SmartMath::ToggleSmartMath, and check it to enable it and set it to Autoload.

🙏 Special Thanks

I would like to express my deepest gratitude to Mysoft, whose persistence and insights were instrumental in convincing me to embrace FreeBASIC for plugin development. While the Notepad++ version of this tool was originally a port from FreePascal, this AkelPad version was built from the ground up using FreeBASIC.

I also want to give a special mention to Jepalza, who provided essential help in overcoming a critical technical roadblock at the very beginning of this project. Thanks to his expertise, I was able to move forward with the development of SmartMath.