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ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED MAY 1991 IN LIMA NEWSLETTER
^^^^^^^ ADDITIONAL COMMENTS ABOUT Y.A.P.P.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^by Charles Good
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^Lima Ohio User Group
Y.A.P.P. (Yet Another Paint Program), written by
Alexander Hulpke and published by Asgard, has been discussed
extensively in Micropendium. A full review by Harry
Brashear was published in the December 1990 issue. A letter
to the editor by Lutz Winkler questioning Y.A.P.P.'s ability
to display 424 vertical lines of resolution appeared in the
January 1991 issue. In the March 1991 issue, a letter by
Paul Charlton says such resolution is indeed possible. A
letter to the editor by Alexander Hulpke in the February
1991 issue clarified some of the features of the software.
When I purchased Y.A.P.P. at the November 1990 Chicago faire
I intended to write a complete review for this newsletter.
Since this has already been done in Micropendium, what I
have to say below will be "additional comments" directed at
both current and potential purchasers of Y.A.P.P. Readers
interested in my comments are urged to read the Micropendium
articles and letters mentioned above.
Y.A.P.P. is an "artist" program designed for those with
80 column systems (a Geneve or a 99/4A with 80 column
peripheral). Its features resemble those of TI ARTIST, and
it allows the user to take full advantage of all the color
and graphics capabilities of the 9938 and 9958 video chips
to produce stunning color pictures. Comparable software
that unlocks the color features of the 9938 chip includes
XHi (also by Alexander Hulpke) and MYART. In my opinion,
Y.A.P.P. is by far the best of these three. It is one of
only two software packages for the TI that make full use of
the 192K video ram possible with the 9938 or 9958 video
chip. (Funnelweb is the other.) It is the only "artist"
software for the TI or Geneve that allows manipulatin of GIF
pictures, and it is unique in its ability to create double
vertical resolution pictures consisting of 424 lines and
either 256 or 512 columns. The other two "artist" programs
mentioned are limited to 212 pixels vertically.
---------------
To load GIF pictures into Y.A.P.P. takes a lot of RAM.
You either need a Geneve, or you need a 99/4A with a
supercart or gram device to provide RAM via the cartridge
port. Without this extra RAM you lose the ability to
manipulate GIF pictures with Y.A.P.P. In order to utilize
double resolution, it is necessary to have 192K video RAM
installed. Most TI 80 column peripherals have this much
video RAM, but the Geneve doesn't. Y.A.P.P. comes with
instructions and testing software for adding the necessary
video ram to a Geneve. With only 128K of video RAM, the
standard configuration on a Geneve, Y.A.P.P. users are
limited to 212 lines of vertical resolution.
There are lots and lots (probably thousands) of high
resolution GIF format pictures on BBS systems that support
IBM clones. These can be downloaded into an ordinary TI
(with a disk system and memory expansion but without an 80
column peripheral) and viewed with GIF MANIA, a Texaments
product. The results with GIF MANIA are less than ideal,
because you are squeezing a high resolution picture with 32
or more original colors into the 99/4A's lower resolution
display of only 16 colors. Those of us with 80 column
systems can view GIF pictures in their full glory with the
public domain program G99. However, neither of these GIF
viewing programs allows the TI or Geneve user to manipulate
the displayed image. This can only be done with Y.A.P.P.,
and this is one of the reasons Y.A.P.P. is so significant.
An example of such manipulation is shown in THE CITY picture
that accompanies the hard copy version of this article.
This picture was originally in GIF format. I added the text
at the bottom of the picture and changed some colors so that
it would produce a better half tone dot matrix printout.
XHi and MYART can only load previously created high
resolution pictures that were saved in MYART format for
enhancement or alteration. (XHi can also load low resolution
TI Artist format pictures.) The number of MYART images
available on BBS systems or user group libraries such as the
Lima UG library is quite small compared to the number of
available GIF pictures.
---------------
The HARDCOPY utility that comes with Y.A.P.P. was used
to print the picture that accompanies the printed version
of this article. This utility was originally created for
use with Alexander Hulple's XHi, and is even easier to use
with Y.A.P.P. HARDCOPY will print in black and white on a
dot matrix printer a good representation of a high
resolution MYART format picture that has been saved to disk.
HARDCOPY uses up to 256 different dot densities to sumulate
the 256 colors of a MYART format picture. THE CITY picture
that accompanies this aritcle has 32 colors and a resolution
of 256 x 212 pixels. The reason that HARDCOPY is easier to
use with Y.A.P.P. than it is with XHi is that changing a
picture's colors is much easier with Y.A.P.P. HARDCOPY
works best when there is lots of difference between the
darkest and lightest colors of the picture. A picture that
looks great on screen but is made of similar shades of dark
colors will print with HARDCOPY to look like a black cat in
a coal bin. Changing a few colors, particularly lighetning
background and border colors, as the original picture is
displayed on screen before saving back to disk in MYART
format will greatly enhance the subsequent printout with
HARDCOPY. Such color changes are relatively easy with
Y.A.P.P. and very cumbersome with XHi.
There are a couple of minor limitations I found with
HARDCOPY. 1- Its default starting point is the left side of
line 212. If you use this default, HARDCOPY will only print
out the upper half (the top 212 lines) of a picture created
and saved as double 424 line resolution. The thing to do is
change the "dH" default from 212 to 424. 2- In setting up
HARDCOPY (with the HARDCOPY setup utility) you should chose
SG10 as the printer type if you are using a STAR Gemini 10X
or SG10. However, the resulting printouts will have narrow
horizontal white lines because the resulting line feeds are
too great. This can be corrected as follows for those with
Gemini 10X or SG10 printers. After setting up HARDCOPY for
the SG10 printer use a sector editor and examine the only
sector of the file HC#SU. Look in Hex for the string 1B4A0F
and change this to 1B4A0E. This will reduce line feeds by
1/144 of an inch and eliminate the little white horizontal
lines.
40 column users take note! HARDCOPY can be used with
an ordinary 99/4A (without an 80 column device) to print any
MYART format picture of either 212 or 424 vertical
resolution.
--------------
A neat feature of Y.A.P.P. is the ability to load any
TI Artist font into the program and then to display text
anywhere on the picture currently displayed on the monitor.
Text can be positioned with one pixel accuracy, and the
modified picture with added text saved back in Myart format.
The Lima User Group's software library has lots of these
fonts.
I sometimes have trouble trying to use a large font to
add text to a double resolution picture. The text refuses
to be displayed on top of the displayed picture. Apparently
double resolution pictures really push the limits of memory
of my 99/4A with AVPC and supercart. I have no trouble
displaying text with normal resolution (212 pixel vertical
resolution) pictures.
---------------
The drawing cursor of Y.A.P.P. can be moved with a
mouse or a joystick. A mouse is definitely preferable
because joystick movement is limited to only 8 directions
whereas the direction of mouse movement is basically
unlimited. Some things are very difficult to draw with a
joystick, such as good spirals or cursive writing. DSR's
are included on disk to allow you to use the Myarc mouse,
Mechatronic mouse, and Asgard mouse. Unfortunately, if you
have an AVPC card and do not have a IBM bus mouse
specifically wired to attach directly to the AVPC mouse port
you are out of luck. In a March 15 phone conversation with
Asgard's Chris Bobbitt I was told he recently discovered
that the Asgard mouse is not compatible with the AVPC even
if the AVPC has the revised EPROM 2. Asgard has for months
specifically advertised Y.A.P.P. for AVPC users, and only
now do I learn that ASGARD'S OWN MOUSE WON'T WORK WITH THE
AVPC unless Chris can cob together some sort of software
patch.
This is especially distressing because the joystick DSR
that comes on disk with all copies of Y.A.P.P. sold to date
doesn't work either!! This non working joystick DSR was not
written by Alexander, but was instead written at Asgard's
request by another person. I wrote Alexander directly about
this problem and he responded by sending me on disk a
joystick DSR that does work well with Y.A.P.P. He sent the
same DSR to Asgard. Presumably Asgard will include this
working joystick DSR with Y.A.P.P. from now on. But, THOSE
WHO HAVE PURCHASED Y.A.P.P. PRIOR TO MARCH 1, 1991 SHOULD BE
AWARE THAT THEY HAVE A NON WORKING JOYSTICK DSR.
---------------
Lutz Winkler in his Micropendium letter and in several
personal letters to me questions the claim made by Harry
Brashear in his Micropendium review that Y.A.P.P.'s double
resolution is "almost as good as VGA". According to one of
Lutz's letters to me, and according to Alexander (see the
documentation for XHi v3.6) with the proper programming
tricks the 9938 chip does allow 424 lines of resolution in
G6 and G7 graphic modes. However, to properly display this
type of ultra high resolution requires an exceptionally high
quality color monitor with a dot pitch of .31 or less. Few
TI or Geneve owners use such a monitor. The commonly used
Magnavox 8CM515 professional monitor has about .42 dot
pitch. When you turn on interlace to display 424 lines you
get a flicker or jitter on screen with the 8CM515. This is
more apparent with some of Y.A.P.P.'s double resolution
pictures than with others. Y.A.P.P.'s double resolution
pictures are absolutely the highest resolution graphics
possible on any 99/4A or Geneve system. I don't mind the
jitter my 8CM515 monitor shows in interlace mode, and the
double resolution color pictures remind me of the
photograph-like quality (individual pixels invisible or
nearly so) of IBM VGA color displays. However, some users I
have corresponded with are annoyed by the interlace jitter.
I guess the esthetic quality of Y.A.P.P.'s double resolution
display on a medium cost monitor is "in the eyes of the
beholder".
Is Y.A.P.P.'s double resolution "almost as good as
VGA"? Y.A.P.P. pictures can simultaneously display all 256
colors of a 256 color palette with 256 pixel horizontal by
either 212 or 424 pixels vertical resolution. Alternately
it can simultaneously display any 16 colors from a 512 color
palette with 512 horizontal by either 212 or 424 pixel
resolution. IBM's VGA graphics can simultaneously show 256
colors from a 256000 color palette with 320 x 200 pixel
resolution, or any 16 of the 256000 colors in 640 by 350
pixel resolution. Ignoring the jitter problem, which can be
corrected with a more expensive monitor, VGA is probably
better but not by much.
---------------
Asgard did a sloppy last minute hurry up job just
before the November 1990 Chicago faire trying to get
Y.A.P.P. ready for market when in fact the product wasn't
quite ready. Although Y.A.P.P. is a powerful well thought
out product, what was sold in Chicago was very rough around
the edges, particulatly the documentation. Although I
informed Asgard of these problems a few days after the
Chicago faire, as far as I know an updated corrected version
of Y.A.P.P. has not been released. As a registered owner,
Asgard should have informed me of any corrections or
improvements. Problems are as follows:
--At one point, Y.A.P.P. displays "version 1.00" and
elsewhere in the program the screen says "v0.71".
--The non working joystick DSR. Registered owners
should be notified by Asgard of the existence of Alexander's
working joystick DSR.
--The documentation sometimes refers to "Paint-Pro" and
sometimes to "Y.A.P.P." In a letter to me Alexander said
that he initially named the program Y.A.P.P. Asgard wanted
to change the name to PAINT PRO, but Alexander insisted on
using Y.A.P.P. (which I like better anyway). References to
PAINT PRO in the documentation can cause confusion, and are
an indication of sloppiness on Asgard's part.
--The Y.A.P.P. package is, according to the
accompanying documentation, supposed to come with some TI
Artist fonts on disk. Mine had no such fonts. This may be
a sample defect not representative of Y.A.P.P. packages that
have been sold.
--Page 2 of the documentations mentions an on disk GIF
converter program called GIFFER1. There is no such on disk
file.
--The package includes the public domain utility G99.
Page 37 of the documentation tells you in great detail how
to use G99 to convert GIF pictures to MYART format.
Well....you can use G99 to load and display on screen GIF
pictures, but you CAN'T USE G99 TO SAVE these pictures to
Myart or any other format.
-----------------------------
LATE NOTE ADDED APRIL 8: I just learned that Asgard
has released an update of Y.A.P.P. The update is said to
include corrected documentation, access to an enhanced
HARDCOPY from within Y.A.P.P., and better compatibility with
DIJIT AVPC cards. The update is available to Y.A.P.P.
owners who return their original system disk to Asgard along
with $4.
------------------------------
YET ANOTHER PAINT PROGRAM (Y.A.P.P.)
Price- $29.95 + shipping
Available from dealers, and from
^^^^^ASGARD Software
^^^^^P.O. Box 10306
^^^^^Rockville MD 20849
^^^^^703-255-3085
.PL 1