_ ___ __ _ | \ | |_ _| \ | _| |_| |_/_|_|__|_| \||_ . | ===================== _ _ _ __ _ / |_||_||\|| _|_ |_ o \_| || || ||_||__ _|o ===================== In the last version (2.3) there was a bug that after saving your animation you had lost the real filename in your file-requester, this is now fixed. Also, the last version had some trouble with the gadget-box when you hit one of the color-gadgets. If you moved the mouse after clicking on it (if you were fast enough that is) you could select another color than you meant to. I think I've fixed that to. Animations wasn't without bugs either. If you chose to save an animation you could not quit the animation when entering the animation-number. Another small bug fixed. The gadgets for the style functions and insert toggle were 'fake' gadgets, that is to say, I programmed them myself and were not really adequate for my needs, so in this version I implemented 'real' gadgets for these pur- poses. Future version will also have 'real' gadgets to select the colors. Another annoying thing about 2.3 was that is spent most of it's time in a busy-waiting loop. This took up quite some CPU time and you may have noticed that your CLI was running considerably slower after running DIEd. No more busy-waiting in this version. The solving of the busy-waiting problem posed another problem. I've removed the Munchies because I didn't fancy building in a troublesome timer routine for these. Wait for another update (they weren't all that usefull anyway, but still nice). ====================== _ _ _ ___ __ _ | ||_>| \|_| | |_ |_ o |_|| |_/| | | |__ _|o ====================== Nothing much, I couldn't figure out more animations at the moment, and although the program sometimes crashes when you're trying to mark a block I haven't found out what is causing this bug yet. One distanct change in the menus is the possibility to view a file without losing the one you edit. I didn't have time to implement a safe version of this program, so it still doesn't check if you have enough memory to run it. Nicer graphics (not really what you would call a major update though). ============================================= __ ___ _ __ __ _ _ ___ _ _ |_ | | | | ||_>|_ \ ||_ |_>|_ | | ||\||_ o | |_| | |_|| \|__ \||__| \ _|_|_|_|| | _|o ============================================= -Extended, and faster graphics. -Nicer (and more) gadgets. -'Real' gadgets for the colors. -More animations, including line-animations -CLI default color switch, so you don't have to pick the colors every time you change your CLI-colors to see if they look good. -Adjustable screen-saver to prefent the burning in of your monitor -Lots of other stuff I might implement a multi-screen version of DIEd, but that'll have to wait for some time. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ / \ * / \ * / \ * / \ * / \ * / \ * / \ * / \ * / \ * / \ * / \ * / \ * / \ / * \_/ * \_/ * \_/ * \_/ * \_/ * \_/ * \_/ * \_/ * \_/ * \_/ * \_/ * \_/ * \ This product is shareware. I spent quite some time programming this thing, so if you're satisfied with the program and you would like to see more of these things on your Amiga, please send a contribution of about $10 or the equivalent in your own currency to: P-E Raue Bieslook 92 1422 RS Uithoorn The Netherlands If you're not satisfied with the possibilities of DIEd, or you have some improvements you would like to see incorporated in the program, you can reach meat the following computer-addresses: Crystal Palace BBS [+31-2975-30299] (my name there is PER) peraue@cs.vu.nl (usernet) You can also write me at the address mentioned before. ____________________________________________________________ / \ /****> Let me hear all your suggestions and improvements. <****\ \****> I hope to hear from you all, ]P]E]R <****/ \____________________________________________________________/ [0 p ________ ____  / __ \ / /  / / \ \ / /  / / \ \ / /  / / / / / /  / / / / __ __ __ / / __ __ __ __ __ __  / /_____/ ///_ / / /_// / //\/ / /_ / / //_ /_ /\// /_  /_____________///_// / / //_ /___// / / /_ /_ /_ //_//_ / //_ /__  ____ ____ ____ ____ ____ __ __ ______ ____  / / / / / __// __// __// \/ //_ __// __/  / __/ / / / __//_ // __// /\ / / / /_ /  /_/ /_/\_\ /___//___//___//_/ /_/ /_/ /___/   _ ___ __ __ __  | \ | |_ _| \ / __| _|  |_/IGITAL _|_NTELLIGENCE ANSI |__ |_|ITOR \/ |__ . __|   _  _ __ _  _ ___  \ / |_> |_>|_ |_> | \ |  \/\/RITTEN |_>Y : | |__ | \ OF |_/_|_ [1 p *********************************************************************** * * * This program is shareware, if you like it, please send your con- * * tributions (I suggest $10 or something like that) to: * * * * P-E Raue * * Bieslook 92 * * 1422 RS Uithoorn * * The Netherlands * * * * You can reach me at the following addresses: * * * * Crystal Palace BBS [+31-2975-30299] under the name of PER * * peraue@cs.vu.nl (usernet) * * The address mentioned above * * * *********************************************************************** Since I wasn't satisfied with the possibilities of Cygnus-Ed while editing some Ansi screens I made for Crystal Palace BBS, I came up with the idea of a complete Full-Screen Ansi Editor. You can use this editor, thus making editing logos much easier. I should warn you though, there are some bugs. I didn't send out this version until I removed every bug I could find at programming time, but there are still quite a few lying around I guess. If you find any bugs, please send a complete report to Crystal Palace where I can be reached under the name of PER, my usernet address or my home address. I hope all of you like the editor and will use it. If you have any other suggestions for the editor, please let me know. This version only contains the normal editing functions, still nothing fancy, or elaborate, but I'm working on a new version which can do even more than this one. It may take a while though for that version to reach you, mostly because after working for a continuous 5 weeks on this version, I kind of lost interest in this project and moved on to other things. ************************** ******************** ******************* ************************ **** PROJECT MENU **** ***************** ************************** ******************** ******************* »»> CLEAR ----- Clears your Ansi-Screen. BEWARE: this is irrevocable, so be carefull. »»> ABOUT ----- Some useless information about the editor (my address and stuff). »»> LOAD [Right-Amiga o] -------------------- Loads an Ansi-Screen in the editor. The editor will cut lines with more than 80 characters to 80 characters and screens with more than 30 lines to 30 lines. Also, if your screen contains escape codes ending on some- thing different than 'm', the editor will reject the screen saying it contains unsupported escape-sequences. »»> SAVE [Right-Amiga w] -------------------- Saves the file to the current filename. It doesn't warn you if you overwrite (which you always do). If you call this function without having given a file name it will prompt you for one. At the beginning of the file it saves an extra escape-code (ESC-'[0 p') which switches the cursor off, so drawing the picture will be faster. When you break drawing the picture your won't have a cursor, the program saves another escape code (ESC-'[1 p') at the end of the file to restore your cursor. »»> NAME & SAVE [Right-Amiga s] --------------------------- See save, except it will always prompt you for a filename and will warn you if you overwrite an existing file with that particular name. »»> VIEW FILE --------- View a file from disk without losing the one you're editing. »»> QUIT [Right-Amiga q / Control C] -------------------------------- Quits DIEd and returns control to the OS. If you've altered the file it will warn you and ask if you want to continue. <============> NOTES: <============> Since this editor is not as simple as a normal text-editor, but allocates memory with every key pressed and every alteration to the styles - every piece has it's own memory chunk - it may take a while to clear up the screen, or quit the editor. Don't worry, if you have a screen containing a lot of escape-sequences it is natural that it takes some time for the editor either to exit, or to clear the screen. Since I changed the clean-up routines however, the time to clear the screen has reduced drastically so now the maximum clocked time was about 40 seconds compared to over 10 minutes in the beginning. A last thought on memory requirements. The program allocates memory as you go on typing keys. However, I don't check if the memory CAN be allocated, so if you've got quite some programs in RAM: or running the program may crash because it tries to access memory it couldn't allocate. I hope none of you will encounter this problem, I never have, but if you do, just clear some RAM: or wait for the next version which will check if it can allocate memory. I checked the maximum I could allocate and I got to something of 217K of memory, so beware with large programs. *************************** ***************** ********************* ************************* **** EDIT MENU **** ******************* *************************** ***************** ********************* Some more things to tell here. This is one of the most used menus in the program, and you will probably have to use it quite some times. I tried therefore, to make the codes to enter quite easy to remember so you won't have to use the mouse every time you want to edit something. You may think that the shortcuts resemble those of CygnusEd. I did this because I use CEd quite often and it would be an impossible nuisance to have to remember the two seperatly. You may think the codes are terrible, but the next version will have completely adjustable shortcuts, so wait for that version. »»> REDRAW SCREEN [Right-Amiga r] ----------------------------- Redraws your screen. If the program works as good as it should, you should never need this function, but it can come in handy when you have a loose cursor floating around on the screen. When you're typing under- scores with bold on, you may think the program screws up your bold but try hitting Right-Amiga-r and you'll see that the bold option works correctly. The problem with the entering of bold-underscores is that they sometimes overlap and nick a piece of the other one so you'll see gaps. This is evident when you're typing backwards ( '_', CRS-LEFT, CRS-LEFT, '_' ). »»> TOGGLE INSERT [Right-Amiga t] ----------------------------- Toggles between INSERT and OVERSTRIKE mode. You can also chose this function in the gadget box. »»> DELETE LINE [Right-Amiga k] --------------------------- Deletes the line on which your cursor is positioned. »»> INSERT LINE [Right-Amiga l] --------------------------- Insert a blank line before the line your cursor is positioned on. Beware if your screen is 30 lines long and you insert a line. You will have lost the last line. »»> DELETE TO EOLN [Right-Amiga y] ------------------------------ Delete from your cursor to the end of the line. »»> REMOVE ESC-CODES [Right-Amiga e] -------------------------------- Removes all escape codes from your screen. If you save the screen though, you will have some escape codes at the beginning of each line. »»> MARK HORIZONTAL [Right-Amiga h] ------------------------------- Mark a horizontal block for cutting and/or copying. »»> MARK VERTICAL [Right-Amiga v] ----------------------------- Mark a vertical block for cutting and/or copying. »»> COPY BLOCK [Right-Amiga c] -------------------------- Copies the block you previously marked/ »»> CUT BLOCK [Right-Amiga x] ------------------------- Cuts the block you previously marked, after copying it to the buffer. »»> PASTE BLOCK [Right-Amiga p] --------------------------- Inserts a copied block after the cursor position. <============> NOTES: <============> A thought on blocks : When you've marked a block, you might find it disappears immediatly or after a keystroke. This is not unusual because I programmed it that way. Don't worry, the computer will still recognize the block you marked. What's more, the program will always insert the block. There is no overstrike mode on blocks. This may seem stupid, but overstriking the block is a hell of a lot of work, and I didn't want to waste my time on non-essentials. The next version I'll program will probably check the mode you are in and if you're working in overstrike will overstrike with a block copy. ************************** ****************** ********************* ************************ **** STYLE MENU **** ******************* ************************** ****************** ********************* Not much to tell here. The menu adjusts the style of the text you're typing. In future version you will find that you can also chose a character set under this menu, but since this is a first version, I didn't think it much use bothering with. I thought it was more im- portant to get the program to work correctly. Except for the choosing the NORMAL function, the program will not adjust the colors you are typing in. NORMAL switches the colors to background color 0 and foreground color 1. Besides choosing the styles from the menu bar or with menu- shortcuts it is possible to choose the style by clicking on one of the gadgets in the gadget box. ******************* ********************************* ************* ***************** **** PEN AND SCREEN COLOR MENU **** *********** ******************* ********************************* ************* Again, two pretty straigh-forward menus. You can chose the menu points either by using the mouse all the time, or you can shortcut them with right Amiga and 1 through 8 (foreground color) or SHIFT-1 through SHIFT-8 (background color), or if you want to use the mouse, yet don't want to chose the menu every time, use the gadget box. One thing I'm considering is the following: Now the menu points are to be chosen either by mouse or with Right-Amiga 1 through 8 (fore- ground) or SHIFT-1 through SHIFT-8 (background). Someone suggested that it might be easier for the user to use the function keys to choose the colors. As for now I've let the menu-shortcuts stand because chosing with the function keys is a lot harder to program, but if I get enough responses asking for this option I'll implement it. *************************** ***************** ********************* ************************* **** MOVE MENU **** ******************* *************************** ***************** ********************* What's there to tell, some functions to help you move the cursor faster. You can go to the last line on the screen by either chosing LAST LINE or typing SHIFT-CRS_DOWN, the first line on the screen, by chosing so in the menu or SHIFT_CRS_UP, begin and end of line are SHIFT-CRS_LEFT and SHIFT-CRS_RIGHT. There are no possibilities to mark places in the screen because I didn't think it was neccessary on a 80*30 screen (max). You can go to every position on the screen by positioning the mouse pointer over it and pressing the left mouse button. ************************ ********************** ******************* ********************** **** ANIMATION MENU **** ***************** ************************ ********************** ******************* For all you CLI-Animation freaks out there, I programmed these animations to make life easier for you. Until now I haven't come up with more than ten animations on characters and a few on lines (which I will implement in the next version). If you want to make more elaborate animations, I suggest you use PrismV1.0 (for now, until I finish my animation-editor, I think it's the best). +--------+------------------------------------------------------------+ |ANIM-NR | DESCRIPTION | +--------+------------------------------------------------------------+ | 1 | Builds your screen in a triangle growing to the top and | | | sides of your screen. | | 2 | Builds even lines odd characters, odd lines even characters| | | first and then fills in the open spaces. | | 3 | Builds screen from left to right. (two chars at a time) | | 4 | Builds screen from right to left. (two chars at a time) | | 5 | Builds screen from left and right to middle. (two chars at | | | a time) | | 6 | Builds screen from middle to left and right. (two chars at | | | a time) | | 7 | Builds screen diagonaly from left to right. | | 8 | Even lines from right to left, odd lines left to right. | | 9 | Build in decreasing rectangles. | | 10 | Builds your screen randomly. (character by character) | +--------+------------------------------------------------------------+ »»> SAVE ANIMATION -------------- After chosing this function you will be prompted with a file requester asking you for the name you want the file to be saved to. After having made your choice another requester will appear prompting you for a number between 0 and 10. Any number from 1 through 10 will start the animation. During saving the program will also display the animation on the screen. You can stop the animation at any moment in time, but the program will delete the output file. If you type a 0 it means you want to terminate and the program will return to it's normal input- state. »»> ANIMATION HELP -------------- A complete description of what the animations do (see above). <============> NOTES: <============> Every animation can be halted at any given moment by a touch of a key. The program will inform you you aborted the animation and re- build your screen for you. I would apreciate any new ideas that lead to more animations in this menu. It seems kind of simple right now. The next version will also contain a few animations using lines (and being faster therefore) instead of characters. You'll have to wait for that one for more animations, or make your own. ************************** ******************* ******************** ************************ **** EXTRAS MENU **** ****************** ************************** ******************* ******************** This menu contains everything I didn't fancy placing under a header. You can pick your own colors using this menu, you can hide or show the gadget box, center screen, block or line, save the default values and pick PAL or NTSC screen (the new version will check this itself). »»> PICK COLORS ----------- You will be prompted with a color-requester in which you can set your favorite colors. »»> DEFAULT COLORS -------------- Uses either the colors implemented in the program, or your colors saved in the default value file. »»> CENTER SCREEN [Right-Amiga minus ('-')] --------------------------------------- Centers the entire screen. »»> CENTER BLOCK [Right-Amiga equal-sign ('=')] ------------------------------------------- Centers a block you will be prompted to mark. »»> CENTER LINE [Right-Amiga backslash ('\')] ----------------------------------------- Centers the line in which the cursor is placed. »»> SAVE DEFAULT ------------ Saves the default values of the editor, these include your own color- table, if you had insert on or off at the moment of saving and the size of your screen (NTSC or PAL). »»> NTSC / PAL ---------- With these you can pick the size of your screen. If you pick NTSC, you will have a smaller file-requester and the gadget-box will be placed higher on your screen. You still have 30 lines you can edit though, and you still have a screen which is over 256 lines in height. »»> HIDE GADGETS ------------ Hides the gadget-box, same effect as pressing ESC when the gadget-box is on the screen. »»> SHOW GADGETS ------------ Shows the gadget-box, same effect as pressing ESC when the gadget-box is not on the screen. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ * *X* *X* *X* *X* *X* *X* *X* *X* *X* *X* *X* *X* *X* *X* *X* *X* *X* * \*/*\*/*\*/*\*/*\*/*\*/*\*/*\*/*\*/*\*/*\*/*\*/*\*/*\*/*\*/*\*/*\*/*\* *X* *X* *X* *X* *X* *X* *X* *X* *X* *X* *X* *X* *X* *X* *X* *X* *X* *X* / \_/ \_/ \_/ \_/ \_/ \_/ \_/ \_/ \_/ \_/ \_/ \_/ \_/ \_/ \_/ \_/ \_/ \ Well, that's it for explaining the menu-points. I hope you like the editor and find it easy to work with. In case you don't or have other complaints on the editor or suggestions for future versions, you can reach me under the name of PER on Crystal Palace BBS (number to follow). One final remark : Since I was feeling bored one evening, I thougth I'd reduce the problem of monitors burning in because of a picture being on the screen to long (because you're having a telephone conversation or something), so I programmed the Munchies. The idea is that if the editor doesn't get a signal for 90 seconds, it draws twenty small squares on your screen and starts moving them around at random speeds. This clears your screen, thus avoiding the picture burning in. I'm currently working on an animation editor in the same style, so if you have any suggestions for that one, I'm also interested in hearing about it. Well, that's all folks, ]P]E]R signing off.