WOOD AND WIND COMPUTING
Bill Cable : RR-2 Box 92 : Cornish, NH 03743 : 603 675 2218
Dear Bill,
At the end of this letter you will find information about changes I made for the Cable issue disk. I feel that with these changes the overall quality will be greatly improved.
The Cable Column looked very good. You did a nice job in laying it out. It is nice to get so much material in one issue. Most publications are limited in space so yours really stands out for its size.
I am making a new version of REFIELD plus adding a few new ARCHIVE utilities into a package. I wish that I knew of a way to start up an Archive Program automatically but unfortunately it takes two steps. First you must boot up Archive, and then type ‘RUN (program)’ from the Archive Menu.
Your idea about having all of the PSION softwares on a disk with a menu to boot whichever one needed is good. But, you have to be careful what you INITIALIZE, because I, for one, do not have Speed Screen in ROM, so your first line crashes with my system with the ‘_SPEED’ statement. If you initialize anything you’ll have to trap possible errors by using WHEN ERROR. Then a user who does not have the capability that you try to initialize wont experience a crash.
There was a good series in the Curry Report about using WHEN ERROR. If you dont have all of the issues of the Curry Report I would suggest that you get them. They have lots of good tips and also give a nice chronology of the QL in North America.
I dont like to use “FLP_USE MDV_” because then you cannot use the real MDV when you want to. Instead, run the CONFIG_BAS program supplied with the PSION programs and specify which floppy or mdv that you want to use as the default device. One thing is clear. We have to be very careful and try to spell out very carefully what QL configuration is needed to run a particular piece of software. There are so many ways of setting up the QL. Up until now all of my software has been designed to work on any system, but there is a need for Trump Card Specific software because so much more power is available with Trump.
The TRUMP CARD tool kit is very powerful but the manual leaves a lot to be desired. Do you know that ‘<ALT><ENTER>’ retypes your last line. That ‘SDP_KEY p<ENTER>’ will allow you to do a screen dump every time you press ‘<ALT>p’ (it takes 20 seconds to begin). Try running the program I put on the disked called ‘quill_hotkeys’ and after running it start up QUILL. then
<ALT>p will print out your document <ALT>t will take you to the top <ALT b will take you to the bottom <ALT>l will activate load <ALT>s will activate save <ALT>f will activate find(search)
How to set this up is under ‘ALTKEY’ in the TC manual. A series of articles on all the features of the TRUMP CARD would be very handy.
Changes for the Cable Issue Disk and Cartridge
I made changes to 3 files and you should update your copies of them to go out on the Cable Issue Disk. They changed files are : scan_prg, helper, and helper_doc.
Scan_prg has only a very minor change. A little ‘bug’. Nothing really needs to be mentioned about the change.
Helper has had a major revision. It does everyting it use to but with more flash and it does a few new things. I wasn’t really happy with the old helper so I made it into something that is much more professinally done. You should definitely mention that it has been improved to anyone who buys the disk.
Helper_doc has been enlarged to explain in more detail. You might want to include a listing of it with each disk otherwise make clear that they should print it out because there are major differences from the magazine text.
(Signed, Bill Cable)
Editor’s notes: Bill’s letter refers to a disk that I had sent to him, where I had stuffed all four of the PSION softwares into one floppy, along with his HELPER Tool Kit program. Each of the PSION BOOT programs was changed to “Qboot (Quill), Sboot (Spread Sheet), Dboot (Data Base), and Bboot (Bus Graph). Then HELPER was saved as the “BOOT” program. The whole stew worked fine for me, but the porridge had too much sauce for him. I had initialized both TK2_EXT and _SPEED 2, and made the mistake of locking out Micro Drive with “FLP_USE MDV”. He did a good job explaining this novice’s mistooks, dont you think?
Bill’s updates and improvements to the Cable Disk (MDV) programs came in time to update the disks and mdv’s before orders were received. So, all of the improvements are included. I like the HELPER program so much that I always boot it in first, no matter what software I intend to use. When HELPER boots in, all of the tool kit functions are available, and the HELPER Menu serves as a “Master Menu” for all other softwares in my disk and mdv library. I can quickly “check out” a disk or mdv by popping it in and selecting DIRECTORY at the HELPER Menu. This allows one to quickly check the contents of as many mdvs or disks as necessary to select the one that has the program desired. If I want to run a program, that disk or mdv directory is presented in a screen window for easy selection.
Update rates HELPER as an OUTSTANDING group of management utilities, useful to both those who DO HAVE disk drive and those who DO NOT have disk drive. HELPER is a friendly program and I have not found any “Gotcha’s” in it that cannot be overcome by a simple RUN command to get back the main menu. HELPER is extensively documented within the program by reading files that can be selected from menu. These help files may also be printed to paper. The use of split screen windows presents complete information about two disks or mdvs plus all of the functions available. WHOLE copy of all files from any storage device to any other storage device is just one of the options. When ready one can quickly boot in another operating program from menu.
HELPER is only one-fourth of the contents of the Cable Issue Disk (MDV). See the discription of the other programs contained in the Cable Issue Disk in the “library page” near the back page of this issue.