Supplement to Advantage Manual Documented in this text file will be additions and modifications done to The Advantage after the manual was printed. It is suggested that the user read the manual first before reading this. NOTE: The maximum size of a worksheet is 32000 rows by 32000 columns, not 65000 x 65000 as mentioned in the manual. Startup Options There are several start up parameters which can be set in the Icons Tool Types section. These are: SCREENTYPE=WORKBENCH Loads on the WorkBench Screen. =INTERLACE Loads on a custom interlaced screen. =CUSTOM Loads on a custom screen. DEPTH=2 or 3 or 4 If loading on a custom screen, then loads with a screen of that depth. CURRENCY=$ Sets the currency symbol to a '$'. Up to two characters can be used. FASTREFRESH=ON Makes the windows smart refresh (fast, but uses lots of chip memory) =OFF Windows us simple refresh (slower, but more memory efficient) There are also several CLI parameters that can be used when loading in the program. All of these options are preceded by a '-'. -i : Load on an interlaced screen. -2, -3, -4 : If loading on a custom screen use 4, 8, or 16 colors. -w : Loads on the WorkBench screen. -r : Uses smart refresh windows. -f : Save icons with files. -c$ : Uses '$' as the currency symbol. Up to two characters can be used. Example: Advantage -i -4 -f -cDM 512K Users The Advantage cannot run on an Amiga with only 512K. People with such systems should instead use the program "SmallAdv", which can be found on the Examples diskette. This is a smaller version of the Advantage program. SmallAdv has two limitations: - it always puts its spreadsheet windows on the Workbench screen (it cannot use a custom screen). - it cannot create charts. Except for these two restrictions, SmallAdv can do everything the larger version can. New Menu Item There is a new menu item on the spreadsheet window not discussed in the manual. It is the Command/Names/Select Name. This menu item will bring up the list requester, and show all the available user definable names. If one of these names is chosen, then the cell or range that the name represents will become selected. Example: If the user defines the name "MyCell" to be the Cell C5, then if he/she selects the menu item Command/Names/Select Name, and chooses MyCell from the requester, then the cell C5 will become the current cell. Saving Charts in IFF format The Advantage normally needs a fair amount of CHIP memory to save a chart as an IFF file. However, if the Borderless option is turned on (Graph menu item: Prefs/Borderless/On) the The Advantage needs no CHIP memory to save a chart to an IFF file. This should be the normal way of saving charts as IFF, since this way a full-screen-size chart is generated. Maxi Plan File Support The Advantage can now import MaxiPlan files. To access this feature, use the menu item Project/Open/MaxiPlan. The file requester will come up asking for the name of the MaxiPlan file to be loaded. The Advantage can NOT save files in MaxiPlan format. This feature is provided only as a data transfer mechanism to former MaxiPlan users, and as a method to import worksheet files already out there in MaxiPlan format. Limitations: - All formatting information is lost - User-definable names and ranges will not be imported. The user will have to re-define them within The Advantage - The following MaxiPlan functions are not supported: ATAN2, ERR, NA, REFER Cells with these functions will appear as normal, but will be flagged in the Advantage as having an error. - MaxiPlan allows certain incorrect formulas to be accepted. The Advantage does not allow this, and all such incorrect formulas will be flagged as errors. Examples of such incorrect formulas are leaving out parameters in functions, "=ACOS(4(", "=(1+1", etc. - Macro files are NOT supported. Lotus 1-2-3 File Support The Advantage can now import and export Lotus 1-2-3 files. To import a 1-2-3 file, use the menu item Project/Open/1-2-3. To save a worksheet in 1-2-3 format, use the menu item Project/Save As/1-2-3. Because of the fundamental differences between The Advantage and Lotus 1-2-3, some information will be lost if a 1-2-3 file is loaded into The Advantage and re-saved as a 1-2-3 file. Limitations of importing a 1-2-3 file: - Some formatting information will be lost. - All graph and window information will be lost - Several Lotus 1-2-3 functions are not supported within The Advantage, either because there is no analog in The Advantage, or the analog is sufficiently different to not allow a conversion. The following Lotus 1-2-3 functions are not supported: NA, ERR, ATAN2, ISNA, HOUR, MINUTE, SECOND, ISNUMBER, ISSTRING, LENGTH, VALUE, STRING, CHAR, CODE, TIMEVALUE, CELLPOINTER, MID, FIND, DATEVALUE, VLOOKUP, HLOOKUP, COLS, ROWS, REPEAT, UPPER, LOWER, LEFT, RIGHT, REPLACE, PROPER, CELL, TRIM, CLEAN, S, N, EXACT, CALL, @, RATE, TERM, CTERM, SLN, SYD, DDB. A cell with one of these functions will appear as a formula cell with an error message attached to it. Some of these functions are similar to Advantage functions. These will be preceded by an 'L' (such as "=LRATE()") to show that they are different from the Advantage function of the same name. - Macro files are not supported. Limitations of exporting a 1-2-3 file: - Some formatting information will be lost. - Several Advantage functions are not supported within Lotus 1-2-3, either because there is no direct analog, or the analog is sufficiently different to not allow a conversion. The following Advantage functions are not supported in 1-2-3: FVV, NPER, RATE, ISNV, TYPE, AND OR, XOR, PRINTIF, SAYIF, E, FAC, FIB, LOG, ROUND, SIGN, ACOSH, ASINH, ATANH, COSH, DEGTORAD, RADTODEG, SINH, TANH, CELL, COL, LCELL, LRANGE, RANGE, ROW, HOUR, HLOOK, VLOOK, MINUTES, TODAY, NOW, STD, VAR, SECONDS, WEEKDAY, COLOR, STYLE, SETCOLOR, SETSTYLE A cell containing one of these functions will be saved as a Label cell in 1-2-3. - User-definable functions are not supported - Macro files are not supported Please keep this limitations in mind when importing and exporting 1-2-3 files. Multiple Font Support The Advantage supports multiple fonts within the Charts. The fonts are standard Amiga fonts (found within the FONTS: directory). Fonts can be selected for the Header, SubHeader, XLABEL, YLABEL, and Legends. The Advantage supports multiple sizes of these fonts, and supports the following font styles: plain, bold, italic, underlined, shadowed, outlined, extruded and embossed. To change a font, go to the Font menu on the Advantage chart, and select the name of the item for which you wish to change the font. A font requester will come up. Simply select the name of the new font, and the new size. It may take several seconds for the font requester to come up, so be patient. Formatting The Y Axis on Charts The text appearing by the Y Axis on a chart is formatted according to the first cell in the range of data to be charted. This allows the user the same formatting control as is available in the individual cells of the worksheet. 3D Pie Chart Features The 3D pie charts have been enhanced to support all the features of the 2D pie charts. Any of the first 10 pieces can be exploded. Each of the pieces can show its percent composition of the whole, along with text labelling which piece it is. Stacked Area Charts The Area charts can now be stacked. This option shows up on the requester after the main graph requester. AREXX Support Along with the ARexx support outlined in the manual, the user can now "Attach" an ARexx script to any cell. To attach an ARexx script to a cell, select the Menu item Macros/ARexx/Attach. The file requester will come up; select the name of the script you wish to attach to the cell. To execute the script, double click on the cell. When The Advantage is launched from the WorkBench, a small window is opened on the WorkBench screen. This window is used for input and output to ARexx. However, if the WorkBench screen is closed, the user will no longer have access to ARexx. Even if the WorkBench screen is opened back up again, there will be no access to ARexx. A new ARexx function has been added. The function name is GetString. It allows the user to get a string from the data entry box on the window. This function should facilitate data entry. The format of GetString is as follows: GetString "Message to go in Message Box" "Initial String" As mentioned in the manual, the user needs to purchase ARexx, a separate commercial program, in order to use the ARexx features of The Advantage. Transcript Support Through Transcript, The Advantage supports "extended cell notes". A user who owns Transcript can attach a large cell notes to any cell in The Advantage. These large cell notes are separate ASCII text files, probably created by Transcript, but not necessarily. To attach an extended cell note to The Advantage, select the menu item Commands/Cell Note/Extended. The file requester will come up; simply select the file. The next time the user double-clicks on this cell, the file selected will be loaded into Transcript, and the Transcript screen will be brought to the front. NOTE: The user HAS to have Transcript running in order for this feature to work properly. Users who don't own Transcript will still be able to attach these extended cell notes, but will not be able to see or edit them from within The Advantage. There are several potential uses for these extended cell notes. People who share worksheets can use them as messages to explain what is on a particular worksheet, and how to use it. Cell notes can be used to explain changes to the worksheet, or for other such information. In a financial report, these text files could explain why a certain aberration in earnings or sales occurred. There are many similar uses. As mentioned in the manual, Transcript is a commercial program. It must be purchased separately in order to use the Transcript features of The Advantage. Programmer's Note I have spent over two years developing The Advantage. If you, the Amiga community, wish to continue to have such applications developed for the Amiga, please spread the word, not the disk. A special thanks to some of the people who have helped me through the past couple years in developing The Advantage: David Jones Kailash Ambwani Roger Curren Leon Frenkel Robb Moore Ken Yeast Brad Schenk Michal Todorovic