Magnum 1.0 Docs --------------- ************************* MAGNUM is Copyright W.H.liu 1992, and is to be distributed as public domain only by libraries who charge no more than 2.00 pounds for it. ************************* ABOUT Magnum is a new utility that allows you to make disk magazines with ease. It follows in the style of popular magazines and I hope you will enjoy using it. It is also Kickstart 2.0> and A500 Plus compatible. This is the first version of Magnum and is limited in that it can only take upto 20 articles. This may seem very little, but if your disk also has utilities, etc. the size will be perfect. ENTERING ARTICLES Each article is to be typed and saved as a normal ASCII text file from any word processor. Note that ansi and styles (italics, bold, etc.) are not currently supported. Once you have your articles ready on a blank disk you can use Magnum! Try to keep each articles to no more than 100 pages as I haven`t tried Magnum with files larger than that. It should be enough however since 100 pages = 2400 lines = 192000 chars. CONTROL PANEL The control panel you are using below can be changed to suit your tastes. The graphics panel must be low-res and in 16 colours. A stencil and example is on the disk to help you (panel.iff). This example has been adapted from LSD`s Grapevine 8 magazine disk. The panel when complete should be saved as a brush Magnum.panel onto your disk. MUSIC Music can be run in the background so you could have Octamed, TFMX or whatever music running. The Music on/off function only applies to music done in a special format so using the first method means you cannot turn it off. Since this function is rendered useless, yo can simply draw some graphics over the unused panel. (logo?). The program will know whether there is music resident in the special format. A converter is supplied on disk to convert Games Music Creator or Tracker music to this format. This converted music should be saved under the name Magnum.music on your disk. TITLE PAGE The title page can be whatever you want, making sure that it is IFF of course. Your completed picture should be saved under the name Magnum.title. INDEX FILE Now a text file must be created to tell Magnum where your articles are on the disk, and what it should show on the menu. You can load up the example file on this disk, Magnum.index . Below is an example... f80 - Colour of line at top. The number is typed in hex format and you must remember to press return afterwards... fff - Top text colour 004 - Background of main text screen ccc - Text output colour on main screen fff - Mouse colour f00 - Mouse border colour My Disk Magazine- The title of your disk magazine. Do not exceed 78 chars. Aliens invade!! - The name of your first article df0:aliens.txt - This is most important, the path of your text file. If you don`t get this right then Magnum won`t know where your text file is! Newsflash! - Another article... df0:article.txt - Path again... You can continue the name and path of this article to a maximum of twenty articles. You must also remember to press RETURN after EACH line. This file should then be saved under the name Magnum.index . TIDYING UP So now you should have on your disk... Magnum.Panel - your gfx Magnum.Title - title page Magnum.Music - (optional, you can use your own player or not have any music at all.) Magnum.Index - your file of names and paths Now all you have to do is to copy across the Magnum.prg file to your disk and also Diskfont.library. If you don`t know how to do this with SID or the CLI, then load up the SET_UP_MAGNUM program on this disk and follow all onscreen prompts. It will also create a startup-sequence (as below). From CLI (One disk users), COPY C:COPY RAM: (Now insert this Magnum disk) RAM:COPY MAGNUM.PRG RAM: RAM:COPY LIBS/DISKFONT.LIBRARY RAM: (Now insert your magazine disk) RAM:COPY RAM:MAGNUM.PRG DF0: RAM:COPY RAM:DISKFONT.LIBRARY DF0:LIBS For users with two disk drives or the A500+ (Use resident command) it is much easier. Now all is needed is a startup-sequence. Make your startup boot up Magnum.Prg or your own music first, etc. eg. MAGNUM.PRG or RUN OCTAMEDPLAYER >NIL: