StartupDate Version 1.0 ----------------------- 1.1 Copyright 1.2 Disclaimer 1.3 Distribution 2.1 Introduction 3.1 System Requirements 3.2 Installation 4.1 Useage 5.1 Bug Report 5.2 1.3 Users 6.1 Contact E-Mail Address 1.1 - Copyright --------------- This guide file, the supplied document file and the supplied executable file are all now relased as open source. You may modify the program and documentation as you see fit - I claim now copyright on it. The source code is available in the same aminet directory as this file but with the name sdate10_src.lha. 1.2 - Disclaimer ---------------- This software and information is provided "as is". No warranties are made either expressed or implied with respect to the accuracy, reliability, performance, currentness, or operation of this software and information and all useage is at your own risk. The author does not assume any responsibility or liability whatsoever with respect to your use of this software and information. Basically if this software goes wrong and does anything bad then I cannot be held responsible. Not that anything bad should happen. If you have found a serious bug then please let me know. 1.3 - Distribution ------------------ This program and supplied files can be freely distributed. There are no conditions of distribution. You may modify the program as you see fit using the source code in the archive sdate10_src.lha. You can release this software as your own if you wish, although I would apreciate a metion in the documentation. 2.1 - Introduction ------------------ This program was written because I became fed up with my files not having the correct date and time on them. My Amiga 1200 does not have a battery backed clock so I decided to write this program. It enables you to set the date and the time on startup. This is done using this program and the AmigaDos® Date command. The idea for this feature came from MS-DOS® which automatically requests the date and time if there is no clock present. I hope you like this program! 3.1 - System Requirements ------------------------- This program requires no special version of the operating system. It works on Floppy Disk or Hard Disk. The following files are needed in your C: directory :- Version 2.04+ Users :- Date Delete Execute Version 1.3 or less users :- Echo Date Delete Execute If you wish to use the supplied Installer® script then you will need installer. Any version should work. For more information see Installation. 3.2 - Installation ------------------ Please use the installation script provided in this archive. It requires the installer program from Commodore (RIP) or Amiga Technologies / Escom. If you get the message Unable to open your tool 'Installer' then you will need to find the installer package. You will probably already have this on your system. Check on your original Operating System disks as well as any application software disks you have. It is usually stored in the C or Utilities directory of your disks. These may not have icons, so remember to Use Show... All Files from the Window menu on your Workbench (Workbench 2.0+ Only). Copy this to your C directory or simply change the default tool of the install icon to point to the location of Installer. See your Workbench manual for information on Default Tools. You should select a mode appropriate to your Amiga knowledge. Novice user is completely automatic and will create an install log file. Amateur allows you to select operations regarding log files and installing for real or pretending to install. After that installation is again automatic. If you select expert you must confirm at every stage of the installation procedure. You MUST however select to install the main executable StartupDate or the program will not work. The script does modify your User-Startup sequence file (which it creates if you do not have one) so bare this in mind if you ever want to remove StartupDate. Should the installation procedure fail at any time check that you have inserted the right disk, that the disk is not damaged in any way and that there is enough room free on the disk. (StartupDate requires about 10K of disk space). If problems persist then you will have to install manually. The instructions for doing this are below:- Manual Installation Instructions 1. Copy the StartupDate program to the C directory of your boot disk. 2. Add the following lines to your user-startup file in the S directory of your boot disk. :- StartupDate Execute ram:date.tmp Delete >nil: ram:date.tmp echo "Date set as:-" Date 4.1 - Useage ------------ The program should be fairly self explanatory, however you should first be prompted to enter the date. This is in the form of the AmigaDOS® Date command. For example 15-Aug-97. The day must be numerical (A zero is not necessary before the number if it is single digit). Then the month, which uses the first three letters of the month, E.G. Jan, Feb, Mar etc. Case is not important. The year is just the last two numbers of the current year. The dashes between the numbers and months are necessary. Use the minus key (right of the 0 on the main keyboard). Press return to enter the date. Next you will be asked to enter the time. Enter the hour (in 24 hour notation) then a colon (:) and then the minute. You can also optionally enter the second, although don't forget that there will be a short delay between you entering the time and this actually being set. Again a colon should be used. WARNING : This program does not contain any error checking. All the error checking is done by AmigaDos, therefore if an error occurs the date command will inform you and not StartupDate. Therefore if an error occurs then the Startup procedure will be aborted with an error message and you should reboot. If errors persist then check you are using the correct syntax. If problems persist than it may be a bug in this program. If this is the case then please contact me. 5.1 - Bug Report ---------------- Whilst every attempt has been made to ensure this software is bug free, there may well still be some bugs in the code. If you find anything happening which you do not think is supposed to then I would like to know about it, so I can fix it! Please make sure that if you are reporting bugs, that you have the program installed correctly and that you have read all the supplied documentation. If you need more help you can E-Mail me at: - Joncombe@yahoo.com Please include all details of your system configuration and any programs you are running (in case of conflicts). I will try to reply to all messages even if I cannot fix the problem. 5.2 - 1.3 Users --------------- StartupDate will work on your system. However installation can be harder than on newer systems. All versions of the Amiga installer up to and including 1.24 will work on your machine. However the updated Installer by Amiga Technologies / Escom will not. This version is called 43.3. The file user-startup is not a standard part of Workbench 1.3 and was introduced in Workbench 2.0. The StartupII file is similar to the user- startup file. However the install script for StartupDate was written with 2.0+ users in mind. Therefore it expects a user-startup file to be present. You will be prompted by the installer that some lines need to be added to your startup-sequence. These are the files to load the user-startup file the installer creates. The default location should be fine, but if you are in doubt then you should check the detailed help file for this section. The user-startup file will now be created. This should cause no problems and should work fine, but you should note that this is not the standard way of working under version 1.3 The line delete ram:date.tmp >nil: is added to your user-startup file. This is so that under Workbench 2.0 or greater the message ram:date.tmp deleted is not displayed. However this feature is not supported by Workbench 1.3. This means that on booting up you will be asked to insert volume nil. You should cancel the error message. The program will still work fine. If this bothers you then you should remove the >NIL: part in this line, but do NOT remove any other part of this line, or any other line. 6.1 - Contact Address --------------------- You can contact me at the following E-Mail address only: - joncombe@yahoo.com I will try to reply to all messages.