DOCUMENTATION FOR THE "PRINT" AND "SPOOL" PROGRAMS Version 12.31.88 Author: Robert W. Albrecht jr. (ZAP Software) 1457 Zion Way Ventura CA 93003 Purpose: Prints text files in the background, or any printer-ready file. Comment: These programs are in the public domain. The programs may be freely distributed so long as the documentation is with them and it is not altered, and the Icons are not modified. They were a leisure time project to test inter-process communications. It turns out that it is very easy on the Amiga to get two programs to talk to each other using message ports. This program has been modified several times to get to it's current state. Modifications: SPOOL changes directories to that of the PRINT program File requester added, so works with workbench No longer caches whole file in memory Fixed crashes with 1.3 Made spool 1/2 the size PRINT QUIT terminates SPOOL immediatly (from CLI only) Directory sorting function written in assembly language Made so Spool can't be run twice File requester remains up until 'Cancel' is pressed File requester reads current directory when executed from workbench Error messages go to a RAW: window when executed from workbench Created Icons for programs and documentation SPOOL SYNTAX: RUN SPOOL Where is the name of an Amiga Dos device such as PRT:, PAR: or SER: (the printer device, the parallel device, the serial device). SPOOL can also be run from the workbench, but the device will default to PRT:. PRINT SYNTAX: PRINT or PRINT QUIT Where is the file you want to print. You can expand wild cards with like "*.c" etc. If you run PRINT with no command line arguments, or from the workbench it will bring up a file requester. PRINT sends messages to the SPOOL program telling it what files to print. PRINT QUIT will cause the SPOOL program to terminate. This is the only way to kill SPOOL and get the memory back without re-booting. Real Names Size ARC'd names PrintSpool.Doc 2668 PRTSPOOL.DOC PrintSpool.Doc.info 1302 PRTSPOOL.INF Spool.info 1358 SPOOL.INF Spool 3680 SPOOL Print.info 998 PRINT.INF Print 15244 PRINT renam 170 RENAME (renames files) use "execute renam" from the CLI to rename the files Warning: If the size of the programs is altered, suspect a virus or something.