Part of Nobumi Iyanaga's website. n-iyanag@ppp.bekkoame.ne.jp. 10/14/01.

---

Hobogirin Style Reference to CBETA Text

What is this tool for...?

Now that all the texts of Indian and Chinese sections of the Taisho Canon are available online, thanks to the GIGANTIC efforts of the Cbeta team, we -- researchers of Buddhism -- often want to look up some text from this huge collection of e-texts.

Unfortunately, the processus is not very simple... Suppose that you have all the needed reference of the text you want to look up: the Taisho volume, the number of the work, the number of the juan/kan (fascicule) if necessary, the page number, the column (a/b/c) and the line numbers -- you will have to open first the folder that corresponds to the Taisho volume, the file that corresponds to the work's (and juan/kan's) number, then search the page, column and the line numbers...

The tool provided here is intended to simplify this processus. You will have to enter the needed reference, in a document of the editor named Style, in the Hobogirin style, for example:
T. XXV 1506 ii 20b8-c29
or
Ttt. XLIX 2035 i 129a8-b15
and choose the menu-item named "Hobogirin2Cbeta" in the "Scripts" menu of that editor, and..., after some seconds
Voila!
A new window will open, and you will see all the text that you wanted in the Taipei font (if your system has the CLK installed...!).

Hobogirin Style Reference

The Hobogirin Style Reference system is described in:
Supplement au Quatrieme Fascicule du Hobogirin.
Paris, Tokyo, 1967, p. vii.

Here are the essential points:

• T., Tt., Ttt., Tttt. refer respectively to works
  • T.: supposedly preached by the Buddha himself (sutra, vinaya...)
  • Tt.: written by Indian authors or in India (sastra, avadana, etc.)
  • Ttt.: written by Chinese authors or in China (or in Korea)
  • Tttt.: written by Japanese authors or in Japan
  There may be forms like T[tt]. refering to an "apocryphal" sutra written in China, or Tt[t]., refering to an "apocryphal" treatise supposedly written by an Indian author, but actually by a Chinese author, etc.
• Taisho volume number in capital Roman numerals:
  • I, II, III, IV, V, VI, VII, VIII, IX and X for 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10
  • X, XX, XXX, LX, L for 10, 20, 30, 40, 50
  • LX, LXX, LXXX, XC and C for 60, 70, 80, 90 and 100
• Work number in Arabic numerals
• juan/kan number in lower Roman numerals if necessary
• page number in Arabic numerals
• column: a, b or c
• line number in Arabic numerals

Thus, for example:
T. I 1 i 1b7-15
refers to the first volume of the Taisho Canon, first work (a sutra supposedly preached by the Buddha), first juan/kan, page 7, column b, line 7 to 15;
Ttt. XLIX 2035 i 129a8-b15
refers to the volume 49 of the Taisho Canon, work no. 2035 written by a Chinese author, first juan/kan, page 129, column a, line 8 to column b, line 15.

Requirements

You need:

• A system with the Chinese Language Kit
• the editor Style
• MacPerl or MacJPerl (you can use either of them)

and

• my package HobogirinToCbeta (12K to download) (folder named "HobogirinToCbeta")
  

This package contains

• Hobo2Cbeta.pl              MacPerl script (Text)
• Hobogirin2Cbeta             AppleScript script (application)
• ReadMe.html                same text as this file.

How to install

• Put the decompressed folder hobogirintocbeta anywhere you want.
• Put the AppleScript script "Hobogirin2Cbeta" in the folder named "Style Scripts" inside the folder of Style.
• Open this AppleScript script with Script Editor (that you should find in your AppleScript folder)
  • locate the lines:

    
    -- Change in the next line the path for "Hobo2Cbeta.pl"!!
    set thescript to "Macintosh HD:Desktop Folder:web sites:objects to release:HobogirinToCbeta:Hobo2Cbeta.pl"
    

    and change the path name in red characters to the path name of the file "Hobo2Cbeta.pl" in your hard disk

  • locate the lines:

    
    --Change in the next line the path for "Application:CBETA:"!!
    set thecbetafolder to "Application:CBETA:"
    

    and change the path name in red characters to the path name of the folder containing the Cbeta files in your hard disk (don't forget to add ":" at the end of the path name!!)

  • If you use MacJPerl instead of MacPerl, locate the line:

    
    tell application MacPerl
    

    and change it to:

    
    tell application MacJPerl
    

  • Compile the script (press the Enter key) and save the change of the script.

The installation is complete.

How to use this tool...

1. You can use either the Cbeta files downloaded directly from the Cbeta site (or its mirror sites), each file corresponding to a work, or a single juan/kan of a work. E.g.:
   • 0001_000.txt
   • 0001_001.txt
   • 0001_002.txt
   • 0001_003.txt
   • 0001_004.txt
   • 0001_005.txt
   • 0001_006.txt
   • 0001_007.txt
   • .....
   or the concatenated files that you can download from http://www.indiana.edu/~asialink/canon.html -- each file corresponding to a work, and not to a single juan/kan. E.g.:
   • 1911_all.txt
   • 1912_all.txt
   • 1913_all.txt
   • 1914_001.txt
   • 1915_001.txt
   • 1916_all.txt
   • 1917_001.txt
   • 1918_all.txt
   • ......
2. The Cbeta files must be in a folder containing all the folders, each of which corresponding to a Taisho volume. And each folder must be named in the following way: "t01", "t02", "t03" .... "t53", "t54", "t55", "t85":
   

   

   Here is an example of folder hierarchy:

   
   Application:CBETA:
   	t01:
   		0001_000.txt
   		0001_001.txt
   		0001_002.txt
   		0001_003.txt
   		0001_004.txt
   		....
   	t02:
   		0099_001.txt
   		0099_002.txt
   		0099_003.txt
   		0099_004.txt
   		0099_005.txt
   		....
   	....
   

   Etc.

3. Launch the editor Style, and write in a document a valid Taisho reference in the Hobogirin style, e.g.:

   T. XXV 1506 ii 20b8-c29
   or
   Ttt. XLIX 2035 i 129a8-b15

   Select that reference, and choose the menu-item named "Hobogirin2Cbeta" in the "Scripts" menu;
   a new window will open, and the referenced Taisho text will be displayed in Taipei font.

   Note that...:

   • The selected reference must begin with a "T", and must not contain any carridge return.
   • In fact, after "T", "t" or "tt" (or "[t]", "[tt]") have no effect. E.g. the reference
     Ttt. XLIX 2035 i 129a8-b15
     may be
     T. XLIX 2035 i 129a8-b15
     as well.
   • If the given reference is not good, an error message will alert the user.

   ---

   I would be grateful if you could write me your comments, bug reports or suggestions for these scripts.
   Thank you in advance!

   ---

   Go to Research tools Home Page
   Go to NI Home Page

---

This page was last built with Frontier on a Macintosh on Sun, Oct 14, 2001 at 21:17:15. Thanks for checking it out! Nobumi Iyanaga