************************************************** * 80Questions 1.0 * * November 8, 1994 * * by * * Sean J. Miller * ************************************************** I. TABLE OF CONTENTS Section Line ------------------------------------------------- II. Installation............................28 III. What is 80Questions 1.0?............... 37 IV. Making a Test.......................... 60 V. Starting the Program...................121 VI. Using the Program......................145 VII. Using Responses........................195 VIII. Future Versions........................213 IX. Acknowledgements.......................224 X. Last words.............................249 ***** Final Note.............................267 II. Installation Just execute the install program named INSTALL. This will copy the required fonts from the 80Questions directory to your FONTS: directory. Otherwise, copy the files in the Fonts directory of 80Questions to your FONTS drawer of your Workbench manually. III. What is 80Questions 1.0? FREEWARE-I know that was bothering your conscious, so I got it over with as quickly as possible. You don't owe a thing for it. How could I ask you for money when I can't pay the one's who created much better programs. So if you do feel generous, send your donations to authors of such programs as FreePaint, ACE, and DICE. These have helped many broke Amiga users make the most out of their machines-especially in the States where an Amiga owner is as common as necrophilia. The program is a flashcard simulator to help one study. It has all the features of handwritten flashcards. For instance, one can randomize the order of the cards or flip them over and view the answer and respond with the question. It is very helpful to me for classes which require blind memorization since I don't like studying for classes like that, but I do like using the Amiga. For those of you who prefer the Amiga for the home, but have to use an IBM compatible at work, I also have a PC version so that one could use it to study their tests at work. Just contact me at the address at the end for a copy. IV. Making a Test I wanted to make an editor that was easily manipulated for all users; therefore, I didn't make one at all. Instead, I decided to let you use your own favorite text editor. I prefer "ED" which came with my Amiga from Commodore due to its simplicity. You may prefer to use your word processor because of the advantages of spell-checking. "80Questions" really doesn't care. What it does care about, though, is that the test is in ASCII. Text editors such as ED that came with the Amiga already write in the ASCII format with no imbedded commands, but most word processors usually do not. There should be an option, however, in the word processor to export the file as ASCII. Be sure to do so. Also, DO NOT ALLOW WORD-WRAPPING! This can be accomplished by extending you right margin way out in your word processor, or using a text editor that does not care how long a row of text is. "80Questions" will do the word wrapping for you. The reason for no word-wrapping when entering the text is that the computer takes each line as a separate entry. The first entry (line) is the first question, the second entry (line) is the first answer, the third entry (line) is the second question, the fourth entry (line) is the second answer...etc. Here is an example: How old are you? 21 What year were you born? 1972 What is your girlfriend's name? Rosie Palm As you can see word-wrapping would cause the wrapped part of the line to become the answer to the first part of the line. So, don't let this happen!!! Look at the file "example.txt" to see how a test may be written if you still don't understand. It is okay, however, to put a row of nothing between each question and/or answer. The program will ignore any empty lines (which consist of just a hard return). Here is an example of what I mean: How old are you? 21 What year were you born? 1972 What is your girlfriend's name? Rosie Palm This would be perfectly acceptable. Remember: the only thing not acceptable is for a continuous line to be word-wrapped by the text editor or word processor!!!! V. Starting the Program After you have made a test there are two ways to begin it: Workbench: Create a project icon for the test or copy one of mine to it (see below). Click on the test icon, hold down shift, then double click on the 80Questions icon. Cli: Type: 80Questions [TestFilename] To copy my icon to your test, go to the Cli (shell) and type the following using your TestFileName: copy example.txt.info to .info Of course, be sure to be in the appropriate directory before doing so. VI. Using the Program The program is pretty straight forward. Here are definitions of features. You always get to choose which questions of the test in which to apply the features. ORIGINAL - The questions and answers are directly in the order written. RANDOM - Scrambles the order of the questions and answers. REVERSED - Gives the answer and asks for the question, but still in the original order written. NEW - Let's you go to another test without having to exit the program. SNAPSHOT - If you find the original program's windows and centered text to look absurd with your Workbench, then adjust them to your preferences (while still maintaining program readability) and choose this option. The new settings are then written to the file "80Questions.cfg." HELP - Everything you need to know about "80Questions" without my wordiness. Other things to know: [-quit] (including the dash) will stop a test in progress immediately. [-responses on] turns on the samples during a test. [-responses off] turns the samples off. [-talk on] turns on the Amiga's speech. [-talk off] turns off the Amiga's speech. [-back] lets you flip through previous questions. [-help] gives you help VII. Using Responses Responses are to add a little fun to the program. I was afraid of users getting bored of them, so I made it flexible. To add your own responses you must edit the following files: rightiffs wrongiffs These files must hold the complete pathname of an IFF sampled sound. Place only one pathname per line. The LIMIT IS FORTY SAMPLES per file. I have included some of my favorites to help you get started. Remember: if you move my favorite samples to another directory, you MUST change the path name in the appropiate file! VIII. Future Versions Since I am a big music buff, I also thought it would be neat to add a soundtrack option in which the user specifies the path of an OctaMed song to play while taking the test. I like to try to milk the Amiga for what it's worth. I'm already totally revamping the program to be almost totally graphically based so there are no longer any keywords to memorize. IX. Acknowledgements I'd like to thank the following for their greatly appreciated, though unrewarded help on this project: David Benn - Creator of the great compiler ACE. In essence, he did all the hard work. He could also find bugs in a second that I didn't notice all year. You can get the ACE BASIC compiler at: ftp.appcomp.utas.edu.au. /pub/amiga/ACE Björn Trost - Good friend from overseas who has enlightened me on many things concerning the Amiga. Also, the author of FreePaint which was used to create the icons (except the .doc icon which is from the icon package MagicWB.) Brenda Jarrell - For her last minute ideas such as the '-back' keyword. X. Last Words If you find any bugs, can't get the program to work on your machine, or want to give any advice on improvements, feel free to contact me through the following methods. Mail: Sean J. Miller 4701 Lafayette Road Hopkinsville, KY 42240 United States of America EMail: sjmill01@ukcc.uky.edu I hope this program helps you in your work, and good luck towards earning your degree or whatever you're studying. -Sean **** FINAL To increase or decrease the limit of questions **** NOTE: allowed, change line 16 of the source code to: CONST MAX = Your desired value Just in case, "Your desired value" is an integer! Then recompile using the compiler ACE found at: ftp.appcomp.utas.edu.au Under the directory: /pub/amiga/ACE