
				ConvertHAM v1.3
				---------------

			     ©1992-94 David Kinder
			     ---------------------

Introduction
------------

ConvertHAM is a little utility to convert HAM (Hold-And-Modify) IFF pictures
into ordinary IFF ILBM pictures. On an ordinary Amiga the converted pictures
can have between 2 and 32 colours; on an AGA equiped machine the maximum
number of colours is 256. I quite often want to use a piece of a HAM picture
in DPaint for my own work, and getting at the data proved very difficult.
Okay, so I could have bought one of the commercial conversion programs
available, but I don't have that sort of money to spend and anyway I don't
really need the complexity they offer, so I wrote this.

Running ConvertHAM
------------------

Just type 'ConvertHAM' at the CLI or click on it's icon. Note that both
'reqtools.library' v38+ and 'iff.library' v23+ must be in the current LIBS:
directory for ConvertHAM to be able to run.

Using ConvertHAM
----------------

ConvertHAM is controlled using the gadgets and the menu. Looking at the
window, the layout is:

Loaded 			Gives the name of the HAM picture currently
			loaded into memory.

Colours			Use the slider to select how many colours you wish
			the converted picture to use. Obviously the best
			results are obtained by using the most colours.

'Load' gadget           The file requester to allow you to select a HAM
			picture to load in, erasing the HAM picture
			currently in memory.

'Save' gadget           When active, allows you to save a converted picture.

'Free' gadget           Frees memory by closing the screen (if active) and
			flushing any HAM picture out of memory.

'Screen' gadget         If active brings the screen to the front of the
			display.

'Convert HAM picture'   Initiates the conversion routine. The currently
			loaded HAM picture is analyzed. After a short pause
			the program will then open a screen and draw the
			converted picture into the screen. While the program
			is working you can press the 'ESC' key to stop.

'About' gadget		Some information about the program.

Status			Tells you what the program is currently doing.

The options in the menu are:

Load HAM		Same as 'Load' gadget.
Save IFF		Same as 'Save' gadget.
Free Mem		Same as 'Free' gadget.
About			Same as 'About' gadget.
Quit			Quits ConvertHAM.

A quick example
---------------

When the program has started, click on the 'Load' gadget. Find a disk with
some HAM pictures on it then use the file requester to select a HAM file.
ConvertHAM will load the picture. Click on the 'Convert HAM Picture' gadget
and wait until the program has finished drawing the converted picture on the
screen. Go back to the ConvertHAM window and click on the Save gadget, then
use the requester to select the name of the file to save to, e.g.
'RAM:Test.pic'. Now you can load 'Test.pic' into DPaint or whatever you
wish.

Finally
-------

This program was written in with HiSoft's Devpac assembler. Thanks to

Niço Francois		Author of 'reqtools.library'
Christian Weber 	Author of 'iff.library'

History
-------

v1.0	First release.

v1.1	Improved appearance when running under AmigaDOS2.

v1.2	ConvertHAM now behaves if the system font is not topaz/8.
	Menus have new look for AmigaDOS3.
	Redesigned main window; new 'About' gadget; slider gadget to
	select colours.
	Changed from 'req.library' to 'reqtools.library'.
	Now requires 'iff.library' v23 or higher to avoid a bug that
	crashes ConvertHAM while saving a picture on 68000 machines.
	On AGA machines converted pictures can have up to 256 colours.

v1.3	Window redrawn correctly after resizing while processing.
	Slightly improved menus.
	More accurate testing for AGA chips.
