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Text File | 1992-04-03 | 17KB | 355 lines

DTPBrowser A multi-window bitmap and text viewer\editor. ⌐ 1991, SJHDesign We at SJHDesign would like to thank you for trying DTPBrowser. Anyone who needs to keep track of a hard drive full of text and image files will find this program quite useful. It has the ability to: ░ Load as many text(ASCII) and bitmap (.BMP) files as memory permits. ░ Perform simple text editing on ASCII files or create new ASCII files. ░ Display 2, 16 or 256 color bitmaps and copy them to the clipboard and other applications. ░ Perform case sensitive word searches on text files and replace search strings with another user defined string. ░ Cut and copy text to the clipboard and paste text between windows or into other applications. ▓ Load as many as 8 files from the command line. But best of all, DTPBrowser is compact and FAST. Since the program doesn't impose a large memory overhead, you can load more words and images and easily copy them into your DTP or Word Processing program. This text file contains a general overview of the program and is divided into the following sections: A) Installation(easy) B) Registration(What's in it for you?) C) Tips(Memory, file types and stuff) A) INSTALLATION The following files should be included in the DTBR.ZIP archive: DTPB.TXT- this file 2COLOR.BMP - sample 2 color bitmap 16COLOR.BMP - sample 16 color bitmap 256COLOR.BMP - sample 256 color bitmap DTPBROWS.EXE - DTPBrowser executable DTPBROWS.HLP -DTPBrowser help file REGDTP.TXT - Registration Form for your printer The best way to install DTPBrowser is to copy the files DTPBROWS.EXE and DTPBROWS.HLP to the directory in which you keep the text and bitmap files you will be working with so you can find and load them easily. Note: if that dirctory is not in your PATH statement (this can be found in AUTOEXEC.BAT, an ASCII file on your root drive), you should either include it or move DTPBROWS.HLP to a directory that is included in your path. If you will only be loading the program from Program Manger, you don't have to worry about this, but many third-party application launchers and Program Manager substitutes do not return a fully qualified filename when they launch a program and thus Windows will have trouble finding the help file if it is not on your path. Here is a sample directory setup that I have found to be fast and practical: C: ª This dir has your Publishing or ª--PUBLISHER ½ word processing program. Put ª ª DTPBROWS.EXE and DTPBROWS. ª ª HLP here and include in your path. ª DOCS ½ These directories contain your text ª and bitmap files and will always be BITMAPS ½ visible in the file load box when you run DTPBrowser. Running DTPBrowser: ------------------------------------ There are many different ways to load and run DTPBrowser. Drag the file DTPBROWS.EXE from the File Manager to the Program Manager and run it out of there, or simply click on DTPBROWS.EXE in the file manager. If, like the majority of Windows users, you use a third party application launcher that allows command line parameters like filenames, you can load DTPBrowser and concurrently open multiple text and/or bitmap files by including the full filenames of the text or bitmap files you want to load in the box where you specify switches or parameters. If your launcher supports long command lines, you can autoload load as many files(up to 255 characters)as will fit on the command line. Bitmap and text files can also be autoloaded by editing the [Extensions] section of your WIN.INI file like so: [Extensions] TXT=C:\PUBLISHER\DTPBROWS.EXE ^.TXT INI=C:\PUBLISHER\DTPBROWS.EXE ^.INI BMP=C:\PUBLISHER\DTPBROWS.EXE ^.BMP Of course, you have to substitute the actual drive and directory where DTPBrowser is located on your system and be sure to delete any previous assignments of that particular file format in your Win.Ini file. If you do this, you can also install text and bitmap files in Program manager groups and load DTPBrowser with that file by clicking on the icon. Note: Assigning the .INI extension to DTPBrowser is a timesaver- all you have to do is click on any INI file you want to edit in the File Manager(or whatever third-party file utility you use). Since DTPBrowser supports multiple edit windows, you can view and edit (for example) Win.Ini and System.Ini at the same time. For any situation where it is helpful to edit a number of inter-related files at once, it can save lots of time to assign the file extension to DTPBrowser in your Win.Ini file. I personally find this program useful for editing complex DBase« or Paradox« database script applications which are often composed of many small, inter-related script files. As you use the program, you will find many uses for it other than browsing text and images for your Desktop Publishing application. Using the RUN commands in Program Manager and File Manager will also speed the loading of multiple files. For example, if your Windows directory is current and DTPBrowser is there, type this in the box that comes up when you choose the run command: DTPBROWS WIN.INI SYSTEM.INI CHESS.BMP PAPER.BMP and DTPBrowser will load with with all four files ready for viewing or editing. Menu Commands : The menu commands are explained in detail in the DTPBrowser help file. Just run DTPBrowser and choose HELP(alt-H) from the menu. B) REGISTRATION It costs $29.00(US) to register DTPBrowser. I posted a limited function Demo version(DTPBRO.ZIP) on three CIS forums with an offer for this fully functional version (for $29), had over 400 downloads and a whole lot less registrations than that. I can only assume that this was because either the Demo version was so fabulous that nobody wanted the real thing or else people need more of an incentive than that to spend their money. I'm going on the assumption that the latter is true, so in that spirit, here's what you get if you register DTPBrowser: 1) Major upgrade for $5 - we are currently adding an enhanced text editor, three image file formats (.PCX, .TIFF, Aldus\Corel .MTF), easier loading of multiple files, printing and other improvements. Beta release is scheduled on or before 7/1/92, at which time registered users will recieve an offer to upgrade the program for $5( to cover the disk and shipping costs-$15 for orders outside the Continental U.S.). 2) VGAColor Clipart Collection - I don't know about you, but I'm tired of little stickmen and stuff that looks like it was lifted from greeting cards and such passing for clipart so we put together a collection of two hundred 2,16, and 256 color clipart images that we use frequently in our own work. Polished, useful images for Desktop Publishers in .PCX format (available separately for $19.95). 3) Unlimited Free Tech Support - we'll give you a special number to call evenings and weekends if you have any questions about DTPBrowser. All you pay is the the phone company. 4) There's more coming-we are working on quite a few things here. In particular, a compact Desktop- type program that actually leaves some memory for you to load programs in, a full featured Windows metafile editor as well as a number of utilities to support the upcoming release of «Paradox for Windows. Registered users will be notified of new products by mail and recieve substantial discounts. So if we have you convinced, print out the file REGDTP.TXT (a standard ASCII file that will output on any printer), fill out the information so we know where to reach you for upgrades, etc., and send the form along with a check or money order for $29.00 ($40.00 for orders outside the Continental US) to: SCOTT HANRAHAN 326 E. 34th ST. N.Y. , NY 10016 (make checks payable to Scott Hanrahan) Specify 5.25" or 3.5" disk. Software will be shipped via US Mail or UPS(faster) within 5 business days. Or, if you would like us to send you a copy C.O.D.\Cash(it'll cost you $4.00 extra) call SJHDesign at (212) 683-2264 or leave a request on Compuserve (70144,3033). Any advice, suggestions, praise, criticism, etc. can also be sent to either of the above. If you find a bug, please call me ( if you have a Dr. Watson log, it would be very helpful). C) TIPS Memory Issues ------------------------- DTPBrowser was written in Pascal in a manner that I think makes it as fast and compact as possible. While the program itself doesn't take up much memory, bitmaps do. It takes over 159K to load a 320x200 256 color bitmap-in theory, four of them would take up the entire lower 640K of your computer's memory(and that's not counting the 130-160K overhead the Windows GUI imposes). The following tips are based on what Microsoft calls an "average" Windows configuration : 20mhz 386 with an 80mb hard drive, SVGA monitor with 512k SVGA video card. (If you don't have $2000 for that, write to Bill Gates and ask for a loan) 1)Real Mode - a real problem for programmers. For programs like this one that deal with extremely large files requiring lots of memory, the choices are to limit what your program can do so all of it's functions are available in real mode, or to write a separate real mode compatible program. We have chosen the latter. If you are a real mode afficianado, DTPB16 has all of the text functions of this program but is limited to 2 or 16 color bitmaps. If you are a registered user we will send this to you at no charge. This version of DTPBrowser will run in Real Mode with full text functions, but will only load the smaller bitmaps. 2) 256 Color Bitmaps-a good rule of thumb is that a 512k video card can load the palette table for one 640x480x256 image with little loss of color. Since DTPBrowser loads multiple bitmap images, when two or three images of that size are loaded, some loss of color(washing out) is inevitable. In Enhanced mode, Windows compensates to some extent by making additional virtual memory available to the Palette Manager, but this memory is slow and involves much disk thrashing. If you have two or three 256 color bitmaps loaded and want to copy one with a full palette, maximize it, pull down the BITMAP menu (alt-b) and choose the REFRESH command. This takes all available video memory for the palette of that image (at the expense of the other images, which will wash out further). If you still do not get a realistic palette, try closing the other bitmaps or minimizing any other programs currently running and repeat the refresh command. If you have a 1024k video card and 8 megs of ram, this is not as much of a problem, but the rest of us have to find ways to work around it. 2)Low Memory Warnings-there are two places where you could get one of these: If you load a bitmap and the program can't find enough memory for the operation, a message box saying "Not enough memory to load bitmap" will appear and you will get an empty bitmap window, which you can close. Or, if there is not enough memory available to copy a bitmap window to the clipboard, you will see a "Not enough memory to copy image" message box and the operation will be terminated. 3)Text Files-at this time, DTPBrowser can load and save text files of 32k or less. If you load one larger than that, you will see a message box saying "Unable to load entire File", and the program will load as much of the file as it can. It is wise not to edit and save files after you see this warning, as the file will be truncated to 32k when it is written to disk. For large text files, it is always better to work on copies of your original files. As you load additional text files, this limit tends to become lower, so try to load the largest files first. This and other editing limitations will be corrected in the next version of DTPBrowser(available around 7/92 for $5 to registered users). 4)Text Clipboard-cut and paste operations are limited to 8192 bytes(characters) at a time. Anything over that will be cut or copied from your document but will not be written to the clipboard. Keep this in mind when using the CUT command- when working with large blocks of text, it's best to use COPY instead, paste the text to your destination file or check the clipboard to make sure it's all there and then go back to the source document and delete the text with the CUT command (it will still be highligted). This way, there is no chance of losing text in cut-paste operations. 5)Text Searches-have the same 8192 byte limit as cut and paste operations. File Types ------------------ There are as many of these as stars in the sky. Text files come in hundreds of flavors, but ASCII is the closest thing to a standard. Most Word Processors and DTP programs read and write ASCII files, often automatically converting them to and from their native format. When you choose the Load Text command, the load box will have a wildcard (*) where the file extension normally is- this is because ASCII files are saved under many different extensions(*.txt, *.doc, *.asc, read.me...). This means that you can load any type of file (even binary) into an editor window, but be careful in editing non-ASCII files: ******************************************************************** * If you edit a non-ASCII file(such as a binary, bitmap, * * word processor or desktop publisher file) and save * * the changes to disk, chances are it will not be usable * * by it's native program, or in the case of a binary(.exe) * * file, it will not run correctly. * ******************************************************************** It's pretty simple to figure out which files are ASCII and which are not. ASCII files (like this one) contain only readable text-if you see symbols like ┴╝╡ƒ▒┐»ó╣Ñ│╟╣║¬▓┤ê─ in your editor window, then it's probably not an ASCII file, so if you make any changes in it, don't save the file, just close it (a message box will appear asking if you want to save your changes-hit the tab key so that NO is highlighted, and hit ENTER. It would be a simple matter to add an ASCII-only filter to the program that would only allow ASCII files to be loaded, but this is too restricting-after all, this is a BROWSER and most word processing file formats are quite readable in the editor - you see the actual text along with the strange characters described above, and you can even copy and paste the text portions-BUT DON'T TRY TO SAVE THE FILE!!! File Errors: As mentioned above, the editor window will load any type of file, but the Bitmap viewer is a little more particular-it will only load a Windows 3.x - type bitmap. If you load a pre-Windows 3.0 bitmap, or some other file type with an incorrect extension, you will get a message box that the file is "Not a Windows 3.0 Bitmap". Hit the OK button(or ENTER) and a blank bitmap window will appear, which you can close by pulling down the system menu in the upper left hand corner of the window and choosing the CLOSE command. DISCLAIMER This software is offered for use as is, and no warranty is offered or implied. We are not responsible for any loss of data, damage to hardware nor any resulting loss of time or revenue. Like all commercial software, this program is utilized entirely at the user's risk. «Paradox, «Paradox for Windows and «DBase are registered trademarks of Borland International, Inc.