Any commercial distribution is strictly prohibited!
(MultiDialog is a kind of Public Domain.)
What does MultiDialog ?
-------------------------
MultiDialog puts nearly any GEM-dialogbox into a GEM-Window. The
result is that you can access the menu-bar or other applications
while a dialog is running.
This is especially VERY usefull for multitasking TOS-releases.
Though MultiDialog was designed to work with Atari's MultiTOS it
runs with all other TOS versions, too (i.e. TOS 1.0 - 4.xx and
multitasking enhancements like MultiGEM). (I hope :-)
Installation
--------------
MultiDialog can be installed (and configured) in several ways,
because it can be started as a GEM-Applikation, a GEM-Accessory
or as an AUTO-folder TOS-program (You just need to change the
extension of "MULTDIAL.*" from "PRG" to "ACC" - the program-file
is the same, it recognizes the way it's started!).
I suggest the following way of installation:
1. Copy MULTDIAL.PRG to your AUTO-folder.
(MULTDIAL.PRG will display a message when it's started
via the AUTO-folder.)
If you have to configure MultiDialog very often:
2. Copy MULTDIAL.ACC in your root-directory (or from whereever
your ACC's are loaded.)
If you don't want to reset (in order to load the AUTO-Folder),
you can install MultiDialog just by starting MULTDIAL.PRG from
the Desktop, too.
Configuring MultiDialog
-------------------------
You can configure MultiDialog using a GEM-dialog. To do so you
should have MULTIDIAL.ACC installed and chose the menu-item
"MultiDialog" from the accessory-menu.
(If MultiDialog wasn't installed or if it isn't installed as
Accessory you will have to start MULTDIAL.PRG now to install or
to configure MultiDialog.)
A dialogbox should appear now.
- The first parameter you can change is "MultiDialog: [An|Aus]".
When " An " is selected this means that MultiDialog does
interfere in the AES-calls to handle dialogs. When " Aus " is
selected MultiDialog does not interfere in these calls (But
still remains installed in memory and in several vector-chains.)
The next items consider application specific configurations.
- "FormCenter: [immer|Mitte|Ecke|Maus]" is the AES-routine which
centers a dialogbox in the middle of the screen. Especially when
using bigscreens it's annoying that a small dialogbox appears in
the middle of the big screen, because you have to move the mouse
quite far. MultiDialog can stop this. You can tell MultiDialog
to put dialogboxes in the upper left corner (item " Ecke "),
just at the mouse-pointers position (item " Maus ") or in the
middle (items " immer " or " Mitte "). The options " Mitte ",
" Ecke " and " Maus " do remember the position a dialogbox had
before, so you can move them at a position you like and they'll
appear from now on at this position. If they are displayed for
the first time they'll appear in the corner, the middle or at
the mouse-position (just as you've configured). In contrast the
item " immer " displays the dialogbox in the middle everytime
(just as you are used to with the original GEM-routine).
If you've got any problems with dialogboxes which are not
completely visible try the " immer "-button, it's the most
compatible.
- The next line "Fenster bei: [Alert|FormDial|FormDo]" considers
the circumstances to open a window for a dialogbox.
The first item " Alert " is used to decide whether alertboxes should
be displayed in windows or not. I suggest to activate this because
MultiDialog can handle alertboxes without any problems (well, in
fact you might get problems with the redraw...).
The next two items refer to ordinary dialogboxes. " FormDial " is
the most comfortable setting, but it works only with programs which
use FormDial calls.
The last item " FormDo " works with nearly any program, but it
is not a very elegant way. A window is created at the beginning
of a FormDo-call and deleted at the end of the FormDo call.
There are two disadvantages:
In a lot of dialogs the user can scroll or display different
items (e.g. the "Install icon"-dialog of Atari's NEWDESK, but this
is no good example as you will see later). In this case the window
MultiDialog creates is opened and closed every time a new item is
displayed. This slows down the dialog very much.
The window MultiDialog creates is opened AFTER the dialog was
drawn. When createing the window the dialog might get painted by
other windows which are already visible. So the optic gets
destroyed.
- to handle this problem you can choose with "ObjcDraw bei
FormDo: [Ja|Nein]" whether to repaint the dialog or not. " Ja "
will repaint the dialog if the window was created by FormDo. This
can slow down the dialog handle once again. Furthermore some
programs do paint some graphics (e.g. images, color ranges)
in the dialog which MultiDialog cannot repaint. For those
programs you should choose " Nein ".
Because you won't have these problems with FormDial-dialogs
this selection is only available if " FormDo " is selected at the
"Fenster bei:" line.
(That's why I say "Fenster bei: [FormDial]" is more
comfortable, because this setting is absolutely compatible to the
original GEM-routines (with 1 exception - see Bugs/Restrictions)).
Because some programs need other configurations than other
programs you can tell MultiDialog to take for specific
applications specific configurations - MultiDialog switches
automatically.
- The " Neu "-button is used to create new entries in the auto-
switch list. You can type in the name of the application in the
edit field and MultiDialog takes the configuration you have
chosen for that application (take the name which is displayed as
window-name).
- With the up- and down-arrow you can scroll between the different
applications which need a special configuration.
Most of the application work with the same standard configuration.
This configuration-entry has the name " Default "; MultiDialog
takes it if it couldn't find the application's name in the list
you've entered.
- If you want to delete entries from the auto-switch list you have to
use the " Löschen "-button which deletes the entry which is
visible at the moment. (You can't delete the " Default " entry!)
- The " Sichern "-button saves the auto-switch list in your AUTO-folder
in a file named "MULTDIAL.INF" which will be loaded next time if it is
is found in your AUTO-folder.
- " OK " closes the dialogbox. " Abbruch " does the same but it
doesn't update the changes you have made (this only works with
the changes you've made on the entry which is visible now.
Whenever you press the arrow-buttons the changes for that entry
are updated at once.)
How to handle MultiDialogs
----------------------------
Dialogs which profit of MultiDialog will appear in a window. This
window has the title " MultiDialog: <app_name> " (where <app_name>
is the name of the application). If MultiDialog recognizes an
accessory the app_name will be " Accessory " (using MultiTOS
you'll see the names of accessories, too). You can manipulate
the buttons of the concerning dialog as you're used to.
But furthermore you can now access the menu-bar (e.g. the accessories)
and the windows of other application which can do graphics in their
windows even while the dialog is active.
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