^C{Hardly Working}
^Cby  James Gulledge

Hardly Working is a program that is designed to fool people into thinking that your computer is busy with some important task, allowing you to take a much needed break.  Or if you simply want to leave your desk for a while, but don't want anyone else to "borrow" your computer, Hardly Working will ensure that your computer will remain untouched while you are away.

So, what does it do?  It mimics eight common time-intensive computer chores that no one in his right mind would dare to interrupt.  The eight modules are:

Virus checking
Video diagnostics
Spreadsheet calculating
Database sorting
File compressing
Modem downloading
Disk defragmenting
and... Program compiling

To use Hardly Working, get to the DOS prompt and type "hw," then choose which operation you wish to mimic.  You can pass in "parameters" to the program to tell it to go immediately to a specific module, if you wish.  For example, type "hw /1" to immediately launch Hardly Working as a "disk defragmentor."

Full help is available from within the program.  You can edit the supporting text files to reflect your own system for the downloader, compiler, file compressor and virus checker.  This way you can tailor Hardly Working to your own tastes.