So...are you a programmer?  Or at least aspiring to be?


  Good!  Here are some everyday basic utilities that I think could use some

  improvement, or thoughts of new ones, maybe you'll want to give 'em a

  whirl.  For most of them, size of your program doesn't matter in the

  slightest.  Indeed, size consideration was probably what kept some of

  them from being properly written in the first place!


  - For me, bouncing around between interlace and non-interlace like I do,

    first and foremost would have to be an interlace switch that fully works.

    The "Lace.lha" on the board is the best I've found, but it's not perfect,

    in that it doesn't remember where your interlace windows were, when you

    come back to interlace from non-interlace.  It leaves them halfway up the

    screen, a little pesky.


  - A good, up-to-date file identifier.  CFX and FileType are the best I've

    found, but they're had their day.  If it were -really- correctly done,

    it would have a small interface where one could enter in a new, unre-
 
    cognizeable file and description, and the program would work its magic
 
    on it so it could recognize the same type next time.  Simple, eh?  There's

    a PD one on the board called TClass that does the remembering thing, but

    it's just a hack, we need something pro.
 

  - A bugless program that puts your current directory in the CLI title bar.

    I've tried a number of them over the years, but never found one that

    worked faultlessly.  Talkin' 1.3 here.  I don't want a three-inch long

    prompt when I'm deep in a directory, I want it on the title bar.


  - A 1.3 AddBuffers with an OFF switch.  Amazing no one has ever done it.

    You'll go down in floppy history.


  - They've got some excellent undeleters for disks out there...how 'bout

    one for Ram, heh.


  - A pic viewer that combines the best of Mostra, Zhow, DynaShow, FastGIF 

    and VJPEG1.0 would be nice.  Very nice, even.


  - And speaking of GIFs, if ya want a real challenge, how 'bout a paint kit

    that handles GIF and/or JPEG pics?  That could be ALL it does and it'd 

    be great.


  - Ah, here's something that's cropped up since I got my 030 board, and

    now certain "action" games won't play at the proper speed any more, even

    with Degrader and the like run first.  How about a CPU "dampener" that 

    would slow things down?  It should be variable, of course, with a nice 

    simple interface.  It should work on 68000s too, so you could set it on, 

    like, 60% speed for some tough new game as a "trainer".  There are a 

    few around, but they're junk.


  - And we -certainly- need a program that will 1) copy DMS'd non-DOS

    disks to the hard drive (to its own partition, if need be), and then

    2) RUN the dang thing!  Talk about history!


  - A slick WB interface for changing the priority of tasks is needed.

    There're a small handful running around, but they just expand the

    -5 to +5 out to some 200 numbers or so, but if you're, like, downloading

    a file and bump another program's priority up a notch, pow, the term

    prog grinds to a halt.  We need a priority-changer that will work in

    small steps, so you could slow the term program down so that something 

    else will run a bit faster, but not stop the thing altogether.


  - How about an UnMount command?  I link my two computers with the parnet

    system, which, once mounted, hogs the parallel port and won't let the

    printer work.  I actually have to reboot just to print something.  I

    don't print many things, so it's no big deal, but for others, an "UnMount

    the device and clear out any devices/drivers/libs it used" command would

    be a gift from Heaven.


  - How about a ReContiguous command, one that'll put as much mem as it can

    back into the largest contiguous block it can manage?  Some programs

    fragment the hell out of your mem, and the only way to get it back into

    one large piece is to reboot.  Yuck.


  - And...I don't know about you, but I'm STILL looking for the perfect

    List command!  :)

 

%Z