We appreciate your support as a registered Buddy System user. The Buddy System represents the first of its kind in completely interactive education. It is designed for all types of users, both novice and advanced, to be a source for instant, insightful and useful information. Please take a few moments to read the following text in order to become well acquainted with the Buddy System's operation and features. The most effective way to learn computer applications is to learn WHILE ON A COMPUTER and to practice as you learn. Books, manuals and videotapes exist to help with the learning process but above all, nothing works better than "hands-on" training. The Buddy System conveys a tremendous amount of information through an easy to use, point and click interface. This interface, along with speech narration and concise text descriptions, gives to you a functional and enjoyable learning system in a truly hands-on format. THE INTERFACE: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Once loaded, The Buddy System is always available by pressing the HELP key. The interface consists of a screen similar to DeluxePaint III's own screen. This allows you to quickly and randomly access the information you need. Simply select the desired item from the Buddy System's matching menu or gadget selections. Complete information, or a lesson as it is called, is composed of text descriptions, picture files, and a demonstration that takes place on a real DeluxePaint III screen. When a particular lesson is selected, the text description is displayed on the Buddy System screen in the same way this text file is being displayed. Multiple pages can exist and you can step through them by clicking on up and down arrows at the bottom left of the screen. You can also step through pages by using the up and down cursor keys on your keyboard. The text file controls access to any existing demonstrations or picture slides by activating or deactivating the !Demonstrate! or Picture gadgets located at the bottom of the screen. If a picture slide exists, the Picture gadget will be active. Clicking it will display the picture related to the lesson. Hit any key after you have finished viewing the picture. If the !Demonstrate! gadget is active you can select it for a visual demonstration of the lesson. At this point, the DeluxePaint III screen (if DeluxePaint III is running) will be brought forward for the demonstration. Control of your keyboard and mouse will be taken over by the Buddy System in order to show you the demonstration. FOR PROPER OPERATION, VERSION 3.21 OR GREATER OF DELUXEPAINT III MUST BE LOADED AND RUNNING. TO CHECK YOUR VERSION NUMBER, SELECT "ABOUT" FROM THE DELUXEPAINT III PROJECT MENU. Demonstrations assume that you have loaded DeluxePaint III in the default mode of: -LO-RES, 320 x 200 resolution -NTSC -32 colors -LOAD ALL mode If not, demonstrations will not properly execute. Accompanying the demonstration, is a small status display window that opens on the bottom of the DeluxePaint III screen. This window is displayed after the initial setup portion of the demonstration. The purpose of this status window is to allow you follow the keyboard presses and mouse clicks that are taking place during the demonstration. These events are important to notice and significantly add to the content of the lesson. For instance, it is important to notice when the left button of the mouse is used as opposed to the right button. In addition to the visual status display, Narration, using the Amiga's built-in speech synthesizer, is available if the Narrator program included with the Buddy System has been loaded. This narration greatly enhances the impact of the lesson by speaking the demonstration's mouse and keyboard events as they take place. But that's only the basic function of the Narrator. Commentary, in the form of fully spoken phrases, is narrated during important parts of the demonstration. ADDITIONAL INFORMATION: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ * during a demonstration you can PAUSE the action by pressing the SPACEBAR once. Press it again to resume the demonstration. * pressing the ESC key aborts a demonstration in progress. NOTE: THE PROPER OPERATION OF A DEMONSTRATION DEPENDS ON THE DEFAULT SETTINGS OF DELUXEPAINT. A LESSON ASSUMES THAT DELUXEPAINT IS SET UP AS WHEN IT WAS FIRST LOADED. ABORTING A DEMONSTRATION MAY NOT GIVE IT THE CHANCE TO RESET ANY CHANGES MADE DURING THE DEMONSTRATION. USE WITH CAUTION! * A recommended way to use the Buddy System is to work on the main DeluxePaint III screen for practice and use the SPARE PAGE as the demonstration screen. IE. press 'J' to swap the main screen with the SPARE PAGE before selecting a lesson. * Make sure no animation frames exist when selecting a non- animation lesson. Either delete all of the animation frames or jump to the spare page before selecting the lesson. Otherwise the demonstration will not execute properly. * ******************************** * The HELP key * ******************************** The HELP key on your keyboard makes it possible to quickly jump back and forth between DeluxePaint III and the Buddy System. Pressing HELP while in the Buddy System will bring the DeluxePaint III screen forward and pressing HELP while in DeluxePaint III will bring the Buddy System forward. Right ALT & HELP brings the Workbench screen forward. Try it now! * The SLEEP mode, from the last Buddy System menu closes down the main Buddy System screen and places a tiny window on the Workbench screen. This allows you to conserve memory while not using the Buddy System. Pressing the HELP key or clicking the tiny window's close gadget will reopen the Buddy System. * The lessons in the last Buddy System menu cover Advanced topics used for practical applications. A mastery of the basic topics covered by the standard lessons is recommended before accessing these lessons. * Most of the standard lessons contain a single demonstration. In many of the more involved lessons, such as those for animation functions, multiple demonstrations may be available as you page through the text. When selecting a demonstration, you will be notified if it is a new demonstration or not. Also, notice that the name of the demonstration is displayed in the title bar of the Buddy System screen. BUDDY SYSTEM KEYBOARD EQUIVALENTS ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ CURSOR UP page text backward CURSOR DOWN page text forward RETURN !Demonstrate! P show Picture ESC END lesson or ABORT demonstration DEL Activate SLEEP mode SPACEBAR Pause/Resume demo HELP Call Buddy System or jump into DPaint rALT-HELP jump to Workbench THE NARRATOR ~~~~~~~~~~~~ The Narrator program included with the Buddy System can be run separately, as desired, to provide speech narration. When it is loaded, it communicates with the main Buddy System program so that narrated commentary can be synchronized with the lesson. The volume, pitch and speed of the Narrator can be adjusted from its window on the Workbench screen. Adjust the settings to your own ears for the most understandable speech. AUTO-LOADING ~~~~~~~~~~~~ The LoadALL program on the Buddy System disk will automatically start up the entire Buddy System environment. It begins by loading the Narrator. It then looks for: DeluxePaintIII: which is either the name of the disk containing DeluxePaint III or the ASSIGNed name of a device or directory such as a harddrive. (Refer to the usage of ASSIGN in your AmigaDOS manual). Finally, LoadAll will start the main Buddy System program. HARD DRIVE INSTALLATION ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Included with the Buddy System is a harddrive installation program, HDinstall. You can create a new drawer or directory for the Buddy System or you can install it in an existing directory, such as the one containing DeluxePaint III. Once you have decided where you want to place the Buddy System, run the HDinstall program, type in the full destination name and click the INSTALL gadget. ie. DH0:DPaint ********************************* We appreciate and depend on your continued support as a registered user for this and future Buddy System titles. *********************************