Thank you for trying E-Clean!  E-Clean is a simple text editor which allows you to clean up and reconstruct e-mails. 

This sample file explains how to use E-Clean.  The text below looks similar to an e-mail that has been forwarded many times to several people.  Notice all the spaces and ">" characters in front of each line?  These are called forwarding characters.  E-Clean removes these characters so that your e-mail is easier to read.

Let's try out E-Clean now.  

Follow these easy steps to remove forwarding characters:

1.)  Select "Clean E-Mail Document..." from the "Edit" menu above.  The program displays a window allowing you to change the way E-Clean will clean your document.

2.)  For now, do not change any of the options in the window entitled "E-Mail Cleaning Options".  Simply accept the default options by clicking the "OK" button with your left mouse button.

3.)  Look at the text below!!!!  The forwarding characters are gone!  But that's not all... read on!

============ SAMPLE E-MAIL ============

>>	>>>>Dear 
>Hank
>>	>>>>>
>>	>>>>I have a great idea for a new
>>	>>>>product line for the ACME Widget 
>Company!  
>>	>>>>>
>>	>>>>Since we make the smallest and 
>>	>>>>fastest widgets 
>in the world, 
>>	>>>>why not make the most expensive?  We 
>>	>>>>could add a new gizmo to the 
>wacha-ma-callit 
>>	>>>>or a whatsit to the thing-a-ma-jiggy 
>>and 
>>	>>>>add 500% to our margin!  People 
>>	>>>>just love gizmo's and whatsit's!
>>	>>>>>
>>	>>>>But Best of all, each gizmo will 
>>	>>>>only add 1% to 
>the cost of making 
>>	>>>>a widget and whatsit will only add 
>>	>>>>2%.  This could be colossal!  I just 
>>	>>>>don't know what people did before 
>>	>>>>gizmo's and whatsit's where
> invented, 
>>	>>>>but we have to add them to our 
>>	>>>>widget.  Let me know what you think.
>>	>>>>
>>	>>>>Best regards,
>>	>>>>
>>	>>>>Bill

======== END OF SAMPLE E-MAIL =========

But there is more to E-Clean!  Not only does it remove the forwarding characters, you can optionally reconstruct the original paragraphs that where split up into individual lines during this e-mail's transmission.  Notice that the sample e-mail above has several lines that look as though they belong on the line above?  You can fix this!!!

Simply follow these steps to reconstruct the paragraphs.

1.)  Using your left mouse button, click (hold the left mouse button down) and drag the cursor over the text you wish to reconstruct.  Release the left mouse button.  This is called selecting text.

2.)  After selecting some text to reconstruct, select the "Reconstruct Selected Text" from the "Edit" menu.  Notice that the text you selected has been reconstructed into paragraphs.  See the note at the end of this document for more information regarding reconstructing paragraphs.

3.)  Repeat steps 1 and 2 for all paragraphs you wish to reconstruct.

That it!!!  You have used the basic features of E-Clean.  But, you may be wondering how do I clean my other e-mail?  Simple.  Since E-Clean works like any other text editor, you can open existing text files that contain an e-mail message or you can copy and paste e-mail text into E-Clean from your e-mail editor.  Since you will most commonly be pasting text into E-Clean from your e-mail editor, those steps will be covered next.  Important!!!  The next steps will cover creating a new document.  Unfortunately, creating a new document will remove these instructions from the screen.  Please print these instructions now so that you can refer to them as you finish the next section.  To print these instructions, select "Print" from the "File" menu.

Follow the following steps to Clean new e-mail:

1.)  Start your e-mail editor and view an e-mail.

2.)  Using your left mouse button, select the text you wish to copy.

3.)  From your e-mail editors "Edit" menu, select "Copy".

4.)  If E-Clean is not already running, start E-Clean.  If E-Clean is running, switch to it now.

5.)  From E-Clean (not your e-mail editor), select "New" from the "File" menu.  You may be prompted to save the current file.  If you are prompted to save this sample file (Sample.txt), select no in response to the save file request.  If you are editing another document that you wish to save, click yes.

6.)  After creating a new document, select "Paste" from E-Clean's "Edit" menu.

7.)  Follow the steps listed above to clean the forwarding characters from the e-mail you just pasted into the new document.

8.)  Follow the steps listed above to reconstruct the paragraphs of the e-mail you just cleaned.  

Important!!!  Be sure to always clean your e-mail prior to reconstructing the paragraphs.  Since E-clean only removes forwarding characters from the beginning of each line, some forwarding characters will be missed if you reconstruct the paragraphs prior to cleaning the forwarding characters.

Another thing to keep in mind is that E-Clean reconstructs all lines into a single paragraph unless a blank line separates them.  So, when reconstructing your paragraphs select only the text that belongs in one paragraph at a time if a blank line does not separate the paragraphs.

Thanks again for trying E-Clean.  If you have any questions, comments or concerns, please feel free to e-mail me at JohnDecker@aol.com.
