Fortune displays and reads aloud a random, hopefully humorous adage in a small window on your screen. It draws from a vast pool of more than 1,600 "fortune cookie" phrases from its Fortunes File. The phrases range in content from wise to witty to weird.
Requirements
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Any Macintosh with System 7.1 or newer, Speech Manager and Sound Manager 3.0. Fortune runs comfortably in 256K of RAM, even when using a high quality voice (Macintalk Pro), but if you're trying to use more than one high quality voice at a time, you'll have to increase its memory allocation by at least a megabyte. Experiment with the memory settings in Fortune's Get Info dialog.
Installation
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Place the Fortune application and the Fortune File in the same folder. That's it. If you want Fortune to run each time you startup, make an alias of Fortune and drag it into your Startup Items folder in the System Folder.
Using Fortune
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When Fortune runs, it displays and speaks a fortune. You can get another fortune by choosing New from the File menu or clicking on the fortune text in the Fortune window.
To assign custom voices, choose Preferences from the File Menu or click on the "good luck" icon in the Fortune window. In the Preferences dialog you can assign voices to the fortune speaker and the two speakers in the About dialog box, Dawn and Morgan. If you assign high-quality voices to Dawn and Morgan, you'll need to increase Fortune's memory (see Requirements above).
The Startup Item section of the Preferences dialog box applies when Fortune is run as a Startup Item. Check "Bring Finder to the front" to bring the Finder forward so Fortune stays in the background (undersirable side effect: Finder windows may obscure Fortune's). Check "Quit when done speaking" so that Fortune will automatically quit after the startup fortune is spoken. You can avoid the auto-quit setting by interacting with Fortune before it finishes reading the initial fortune: press a key, make a menu selection, close a window, etc. It'll be up to you to quit when you're done.
Choose About Fortune... from the Apple menu, or click the MDG logo in the Fortune window, for some silly banter between the author and his wife.
Fortune File
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The Fortune File is a regular text file that you can edit with any text editor or word processor to add your own fortunes. Each fortune is on a line by itself and no longer than 255 characters. The file doesn't have to be sorted (though it is).
Change History
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1.1 8/20/93
+ Supports user-assigned voices
+ Preferences dialog, saves settings in Fortune Prefs file
+ Remembers window locations
+ Clicking on parts of Fortune window opens relevant dialogs
= Better fortune randomization
= Cleaned up Fortune File (spelling, speakability of some words, etc.)
= Nicer About info display
= Better icons (Chinese "good luck" character; rebuild desktop to see them)
= Smarter handling as a Startup Item vs. user-launched application
- Smaller footprint (saved 40K by reducing the About picture)
1.0b1 8/10/93
+ Initial release
Support
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Fortune 1.1 is distributed as shareware for $10. Support is provided for registered (paying) users only. Visa and Mastercard accepted. Registered users will be able to upgrade to future versions. Fortune 2.0 will be distributed as a commercial product (for a higher price, of course), and will include additional features such as multiple, topic-oriented fortune database files and a fortune editor.
Other Cool MDG Products
======================
MiniScreen -- Emulates a smaller desktop Mac on your larger screen display. Great for software development, publishing (screen shots), multimedia presentations. Used by employees of Apple, Microsoft, WordPerfect Corp, Lattice Semiconductor, US Sprint, and other corporations.
Powerless -- Automatically shuts down your Macintosh at a configured time. Let your Mac finish backups, disk optimization, file transfers, print jobs, etc., and then turn itself off while you enjoy your leisure time.
Write or call for a free product catalog for more details.
