Tools of the Trade
Creating SPFLite involves much more than simply writing and testing code to make things work. There are many facets and many tools used in the process. I'd like to acknowledge the creators of all these tools. Some of these are purchased software (thanks to all of you who have donated over the years), but many are Freeware, Open Source or 'donation-ware'.
PowerBasic (formerly Turbo-Basic)
Undoubtedly the best and fastest BASIC compiler. Sadly, no longer supported, but there is still a very active user forum (https://forum.powerbasic.com/forum/user-to-user-discussions/powerbasic-for-windows)
HelpNDoc
With the ability to create Windows Help files, PDF manuals and Online HTML manuals from one single source, HnD is invaluable for creating and publishing SPFLite documentation. BTW - it is also used to maintain the SPFLite Web Site.
CreateInstall
To distribute software, you need to create the InstallerSetup program. CreateInstall handles this task admirably.
(https://www.createinstall.com/)
Paint.NET
There's always some graphic editing to do and Paint.NET is both simple and powerful.
(https://www.getpaint.net/download.html)
True Launch Bar
While it is mainly a Launch Bar (i.e. Start menu alternative), one of it's plug-ins is an excellent screen snapshot tool, supporting full screen, Application, or individual dialog capture. The majority of sample screenshots in the SPFLite documentation were made with TLB. I highly recommend TLB for it's main LaunchBar abilities, I have been using it for many years.
(https://www.truelaunchbar.com/)
Advanced PDF Compressor
I have been using this for years to 'shrink' the SPFLite PDF manual from it's generated 24mb size down to about 8mb. However it does not appear to be downloadable anymore, but there seem to be many alternatives.
Balabolka
I'm sure nobody has heard of this one. It's a text extract tool that can access a wide variety of file formats, extract the raw text and save the data in other plain text files. It is used by SPFLite to build the extended HELP indexing support.
(https://www.cross-plus-a.com/btext.htm)
IcoFX
IcoFX is a simple and easy to use Icon editor, and SPFLite is crawling with Icons (think KEYMAP)
UPX Executable Compressor
An excellent tool for reducing the size of EXE files. e.g. The compiled size of SPFLite3.EXE is over 3mb, after UPX compression it is just over 500 Kb,
Included software Libraries
And then there are the programming libraries that are embedded within SPFLite, without which many of SPFLite's advanced features would not exist.
thinBasic
thinBasic is the macro engine used by SPFLite's macro language. It has proven to be an excellent, easy to interface with application. And of course thinBasic is a great interpretive language on it's own.
SQLite
SQLite is probably the most used database engine in the world. In SPFLite it is used for access to the SPFLite CFG file where all; global and Profile settings are stored.
PCRE (PERL Compatible Regular Expressions)
This library provides all the support for Regular Expressions within SPFLite. This means the R"xxx" type literals as well as internal RegEx usage by SPFLite in other internal routines.
HunSpell
HunSpell is a highly used spell checker library used by many major applications. It is used within SPFLite to support the SPELL command and the (SpellChk) keyboard primitive.