PPB 1.0 WRITTEN BY THOMAS C. DEVEAU Copyright 1990 (c) All Rights Reserved Shareware Notice: PPB is Shareware. This means that if you like PPB and use it, PLEASE send a registration fee of $5.00 (US). By sending me the registration fee, your name will be put on my users list and you will be sent a serial number to use if technical support is required. Technical support CANNOT be given to un-registered users. Fill in form below and send with fee to address below. Thank You. What is PPB? PPB is a Full-Featured Paint Program and Image Editor. Originally designed for my gadget programming needs, it is well suited for creating clip art and other graphics. For artists, you have the choice of painting in 4 different resolutions, with upto 32 color choices. For programmers, there are 3 choices of languages supported for creating source code, plus the ability for saving images as RAW data. What's inside PPB? When PPB is started (CLI only, for now), you are presented with an options window. Here you specify resolution and depth of the screen that you will be using. The gadgets are as follows: 320x200 320x400 -> RESOLUTION 640x200 640x400 -> GADGETS 1 2 3 4 5 -> DEPTH GADGETS OKAY Cancel -> CHOICE GADGETS When you select a resolution gadget, if the depth is set for a depth greater than is allowed for that resolution, the depth will automatically be reset to the maximum allowed. Selecting OKAY enters PPB. Selecting CANCEL returns you to the CLI. The next window that is presented is the current status. This shows the author info, the current pen color, the current tool, the current font, the current font size, available CHIP and FAST memory. Use the CloseWindow gadget to proceed. Under the status window is the heart of PPB, the "Tool Screen". This is where you control PPB. There are NO menus in PPB, everything is controlled by the tool screen. When a tool is selected, the mouse pointer will be changed to represent that tool. By doing this, if the tool screen has been sent to the back of the display, you can identify the current tool by the shape of the pointer. The SPACE BAR toggles the Tool Screen to the front/back of the display. THE GADGETS: 1st Row: CLEAR = Clears the screen. UNDO = Undoes the last action. Keyboard Shortcut: U DRAW = Allows freehand drawing. BOX = Allows drawing rectangles. ELLIPSE = Allows drawing ellipses. PAINT = Allows filling an area with color. ZOOM = Allows editing a potion of the current project. See "Using The Zoom Funtion" below. TEXT = Allows direct text entry. See "Text Note" below. 2nd Row: ORIGINAL = This is a supplement to the UNDO function. After a pic has been loaded, and it's too late to use UNDO, select ORIGINAL to get the pic back without having to reload. Keyboard Shortcut: O BG COLOR = Opens a requester for BackGround COLOR selection. LINE = Allows drawing lines. CIRCLE = Allows drawing circles. See "Circle Note" below. FILL = This works with BOX, CIRCLE, and ELLIPSE. It is a toggled function that allows filling to be done when drawn. BRUSH = This allows creation of custom brushes. GRID = This turns on/off the invisible grid, and sets the grid-snap function. FONT = This allows selection of the current Font. 3rd Row: Note: For using the file requester, see "FR_User.Doc". OPEN PIC = Loads a pic file from disk. SAVE AS = Save a pic file under a new name. OPEN BRU = Loads a brush file from disk. ASM SRC = Saves current brush as Assembly Language source. C SRC = Saves current brush a C Language source. PALETTE = Open the Palette requester for color modification. STATUS = Opens the Status window. 4th Row: SAVE PIC = Saves pic under current file name. PRINT = Performs a 'Screen Dump' to the printer. IFF = Saves current brush as an IFF file. See "Brush Note" below. BAS SRC = Saves current brush a AmigaBASIC source. RAW DATA = Saves current brush as Raw Data with the option of C language Image structure. RS GRID = Resize the invisible grid. FONTS: = Allows reAssigning the current FONTS: directory. See "FONTS: Note" below. 5th Row: SAVE/EXIT = Saves current project under current file name, then exits PPB. EXIT = If project has NOT been saved you are asked if you want to save it. If no, PPB exits. If yes, the project is saves and PPB exits. MOUSE POINTERS: D.....................: DRAW L with arrow..........: LINE Square................: BOX Circle................: CIRCLE Oval..................: ELLIPSE Paint Roller..........: PAINT Small F lower right of Box,Circle,Ellipse.: FILL Cross Hair w/rubberbox: ZOOM Cross Hair w/o box....: BRUSH T.....................: TEXT Note: When using PAINT Mode, the "Hot Spot" of the pointer is in the center of the roller section of the pointer. It is also aligned with the left side of the roller handle. Using The Zoom Function: Select Zoom from the Tools screen. Position the box that is attached to the pointer and click the left mouse button. Inside the Zoom window, drawing will be allowed after the 'scanning phase'. The Zoom window opens in 4x magnification. Current implemented magnification powers are 4x, 8x, 16x. To change the power setting, click on the ZOOM gadget. Scrolling is done using the cursor keys. To select a new color, click the mouse Menu button.This is the same as when in the main drawing window. When finished with the Zoom, click on the close window gadget. Using PPB: To select a color, press the mouse menu button. A requester will appear for color selection. After selecting a color the requester will disappear. For drawing Freehand, hold the left mouse button and do your drawing. When drawing is to your liking, release the left mouse button. Please Note: The drawing is not continuous. Unless drawing is done slowly, there will be breaks in the line. For drawing Lines, Boxes, Circles and Ovals, hold the left mouse button. When you are satisfied with the final position, release the left mouse button. If you are not satisfied, click the right mouse button to abort the operation. When using the OVAL and the CIRCLE tools, a cross-hair will appear where the mouse is first clicked. This is a center point indicator. Also, a box will be drawn when the mouse is moved. This shows the x,y diameter of the oval or circle to be drawn. When using the Text function, move the pointer to where you want to begin entering text, click the left mouse button and a box will appear according to the size of the current font. Normal keyboard entry will then be allowed. Note: when either SHIFT or CAPS LOCK is engaged, all printable character will be their uppercase equivelent, INCLUDING the numeric keys on the main keyboard. To break out of TEXT mode, use the ESC key. To Abort TEXT mode use the DEL key. By using the DEL key, it acts as UNDO erasing the current string. Using The Palette Requester: The palette requester that is used is unique, in that there are no sliders. What I have used in thier place are simple boolean gadgets (i.e. on or off). Modifying the palette to colors more to your liking is easy. You are presented with a number of gadgets. The description of the requester is as follows: R -> Indicates current Red Intensity. G -> Indicates current Green Intensity. B -> Indicates current Blue Intensity. The three "+" gadgets and the three "-" gadget are for increasing or decreasing the color intensity by one (1). The intensity values are displayed in Hexadecimal. The long, thin block (at the top of the requester) of color is the current color indicator. On the right side of the requester, are the main color selection gadgets. Click one of these to select the current color to be modified (NOTE: These gadgets do not highlight in any way.). OKAY! -> Means that you are happy with your choices. SWAP -> Allows swapping two colors. RESET -> Resets the default colors. CANCEL -> Resets the default colors and returns to the main program. Using The Modify Grid Requester: This is where you can change the grid size. All functions in this requester can be accessed by either the mouse or keyboard. Entry in the X or Y gadgets is in pixels. The Gadgets include: X -> For modifying the left-right size. Y -> For modifying the up-down size. MODIFY -> This puts your changes into effect, and set the grid to the new values. CANCEL -> This cancels whatever changes you have made, and resets the grid. The Keyboard Shortcuts are: X -> Selects the X gadget. Y -> Selects the Y gadget. M -> Selcets the MODIFY gadget. C -> Selects the CANCEL gadget. Using The File Requester: See the file "FR_User.Doc". TEXT Note: When in TEXT mode, using the BackSpace key erases the previous character using the background color. It is suggested that if the text is to be placed on a multi-colored background, that you enter your text in a large enough area where the background color is visible. CIRCLE Note: When using CIRCLE in 320x400 or 620x200, the circle drawn is a vertical ellipse. It is best to use the ELLIPSE function instead. BRUSH Note: When using a program such as Power Windows(tm), you will find that IFF brushes created with PPB are used as images for gadgets, the width has been extended to the next full WORD. I realise that this means extra work, but until I find a saving routine to correct this, we have to live with it. This problem is not a problem with PPB source code creation. FONTS: Note: The following files MUST be in your C: directory for the FONTS: function to work. C:Run and C:Assign. Thomas C. DeVeau Compuserve ID#: 72500,21 ---------------------- CUT HERE ---------------- CUT HERE ---------------------- NAME..........:_________________________________________________________________ ADDRESS.......:_________________________________________________________________ CITY..........:_________________________________________________________________ STATE/PROVINCE:_________________________________________________________________ COUNTRY.......:_________________________________________________________________ AMIGA MODEL...:_________________________________________________________________ OS VERSION....:_________________________________________________________________ (Personal Info: this section is optional. Just curious about the users) AGE:________________________________ GENDER:_________________________________ Send this form and $5.00 (US) registration fee to: Thomas C. DeVeau P.O. Box 594 Manlius, N.Y. 13104-0594 USA Thank you for using PPB.