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- Hints and Tips
- 6.11
- • Amstrad CPC monitor link − Let me describe how to use the old monitor
- left over from your Amstrad CPC for emergency use with your Archimedes.
- 6.11
- You need a six-pin, 270-degree DIN female plug, like the one in your
- CPC, a normal D-sub nine-pin male, to plug into your RGB socket on the
- computer and some soldering skill. (If you use an A5000 or later, you
- need a 15-pin VGA-compatible plug, instead.)
- 6.11
- To make the setup even more user-friendly, you should invest in a two-
- way, double switch, to cater for both mono and colour monitors.
- 6.11
- The DIN plug has six pins, with the centre pin being mono-in. When seen
- from the rear with the soldering lugs towards you, (as in the diagram
- opposite) the pin for the red is top left (1), then comes green (2),
- blue (3), sync (4) and signal earth (5).
- 6.11
- On the 9-pin D-sub, pin number 1 is red, 2 is green and 3 is blue. Pin
- number 4 is sync and 7 signal earth. The rest are unused. The
- arrangement on the new machines is slightly different, as there are more
- pins, but it is essentially the same!
- 6.11
- Basically you connect 1 to 1, 2 to 2 and 3 to 3, but the addition of a
- switch makes it much more useful. Before starting, switch on the
- computer while pressing <0>, to change to monitortype 0 for 50Hz
- monitors and TVs.
- 6.11
- The switch on the cable is essential under two circumstances: You might
- also want to use your TV as a colour monitor. Then you have to use the
- Amstrad TV MP-2 modulator (still available). That does not use the
- central monochrome pin, but the normal three RGB pins. You could make
- two converters of course, but you might forget which is which. Instead,
- you just flip the switch if the picture looks odd! Those with TVs that
- accept RGB through the SCART connector should use those, of course!
- A3010 owners should first try connecting to a TV, but the green CPC
- monitor should be much sharper, if not having a higher resolution!
- 6.11
- Sometimes, when running some games like MiG-29M, you might want to
- switch back and forth as the headup display is almost invisible against
- the sky if you have all colours connected to the middle pin. By
- momentarily switching to the colour setting, everything yellow will
- become easily visible, as it becomes black (or more correctly, a black-
- ish green, if you use the green monochrome monitor)!
- 6.11
- Turbo Challenge II becomes a real challenge in green. Chopper Force,
- Bughunter II and Taipei work fine in green. Impression, Vector and
- ArtWorks are essentially monochrome, if you don’t add colour yourself,
- so they are not affected! Tord Eriksson
- 6.11
- • BASIC64 application − I have, for a long time, toyed with the idea of
- testing BASIC64, by running the PCW Benchmarks with it. The normal way
- would be to RMLoad the BASIC64 module and then type *BASIC64 − not very
- user-friendly, as you have to type in the paths each time.
- 6.11
- Remembering David Pilling’s advice on the uses of the OSCLI command
- (very odd to me, brought up on Spectrums and mainframes!) I wrote the
- following Basic lines:
- 6.11
- *DIR SCSI::Conner170M
- 6.11
- *DIR OldRubbish.BASIC.BenchMARK
- 6.11
- *CAT
- 6.11
- INPUT “Which file? ”;a$
- 6.11
- OSCLI “*BASIC64 -quit ” + a$
- 6.11
- The *CAT shows me which files are available and OSCLI “*BASIC64 -quit”
- loads BASIC64 runs the program a$ and then quits. Your version will have
- to include your drives and directories, of course! This programming
- fragment, I called !RunImage.
- 6.11
- Put this in the directory you have made called !Run64.
- 6.11
- To make this an application, steal some !Sprites from a program you
- like, rename the individual icon sprites to !Run64 and sm!Run64.
- 6.11
- The next step is to make a copy of BASIC64 and drop that into the
- directory. Now for the !Run file:
- 6.11
- Iconsprites <Obey$Dir>.!Sprites
- 6.11
- RUN <Obey$Dir>.BASIC64 -QUIT <Obey$Dir>.!RunImage
- 6.11
- Alternatively, you could run the copy of BASIC64 that you might have in
- your system’s modules directory.
- 6.11
- It seems idiotic to run BASIC64, in order to run BASIC64, to run the
- program you have selected, but it works perfectly.
- 6.11
- I tried using the more logical *RMLoad BASIC64, but then you fall into
- the editor and we do not want that!
- 6.11
- Finally, you need a !Boot file:
- 6.11
- Iconsprites <obey$Dir>.!Sprites
- 6.11
- (A sample Basic64 application is on this month’s program disc.) Tord
- Eriksson
- 6.11
- • ColourCard and VIDC software − After I had installed my ColourCard and
- (thanks to a hint in Archive) realised that I still would have to use a
- VIDC module (Careware 18) to make my monitor display modes 12 and 15, a
- problem arose. I had configured my machine to one of those wonderfully
- large screen modes (1152×848 logical pixels), and then when I found the
- time to play a mode 15 game, (Tower of Babel, which is completely mouse-
- controlled), there was no pointer!
- 6.11
- This is what Nigel Star of Wild Vision told me: In a ColourCard mode,
- the VIDC pointer is disabled and some games don’t re-enable it so all
- you have to do is switch to mode 15 first, and only then start the
- game. Jochen Konietzko, Köln.
- 6.11
- • Combatting fiddlers − A solution for teachers who suffer from children
- ‘fiddling’ with the palette, task windows, applications accessing the
- hard disc and destroying files might be to use the RMKill command in the
- !Boot file. Any or all of the following lines can be added to the !Boot
- file.
- 6.11
- RMKill ResourseFiler
- 6.11
- RMKill ADFSFiler
- 6.11
- RMKill PaletteUtil
- 6.11
- RMKill Taskmanager
- 6.11
- This will leave the iconbar empty. Pressing <reset> will give error
- messages. If you want a particular program to run, this could be done
- from the !Boot file or from an application launcher such as !Menon or
- !Two. Directories can be opened in the same way. Switching on whilst
- holding down <shift> avoids running the !Boot file and returns icons to
- the iconbar. Paul Harrigan, Hong Kong.
- 6.11
- • DragASprite module − After seeing the tip on the dragging of solid
- sprites from a previous Archive, I decided to explore the DragASprite
- module for myself. I have not worked on it exhaustively but I have come
- across the following which users could put in their Basic programs.
- 6.11
- The DragASprite module supports two SWIs but the more useful of these
- two is the SWI DragASprite_Start. It requires the following parameters:
- 6.11
- R0 control value
- 6.11
- R1 1 (this seems to be the only value that works)
- 6.11
- R2 pointer to sprite name
- 6.11
- R3 points to start coordinates of the drag box
- 6.11
- The control value consists of bits which affect the drag. The only ones
- I have worked out are:
- 6.11
- bit 6 allow dragging outside graphics window
- 6.11
- bit 7 shadow the sprite
- 6.11
- Bits 0 and 4 seem to allow only the value 5, as far as I can work out.
- 6.11
- I have found that the two most useful values for the control value in R0
- are:
- 6.11
- &85 non-shadowed drag outside the graphics window
- 6.11
- &C5 shadowed drag outside the graphics window
- 6.11
- R2 points to the first character of a string which is the name of the
- sprite to be used for the drag, for example “file_fec”.
- 6.11
- R3 points to four 32-bit coordinates which describe the start and size
- of the drag box (which is the same size as the sprite).
- 6.11
- This is about all I have been able to work out in the time I have spent
- on it, but it is possible to modify Basic programs using the Save As
- window to use DragASprite_Start instead of Wimp_ DragBox.
- 6.11
- For example, in FormEd 1.24, modify line 4810, which normally reads:
- 6.11
- 4810 SYS “Wimp_DragBox”,,q%
- 6.11
- to
- 6.11
- 4810 SYS “DragASprite_Start”,&C5 ,1,“File_fec”,q%+8
- 6.11
- I’m sure a similar fix could be used for other programs to give solid
- sprite dragging. Robin Terry, Newcastle upon Tyne.
- 6.11
- (Those who can afford £100 for a RISC OS 3 PRM will find more details on
- page 3-299. Ed.)
- 6.11
- • Free space on hard discs − In Hints and Tips, Archive 5.12, Steve
- Drain asked if the same problem of allocating 28Kb to each new directory
- applies to IDE drives. I checked this for my A5000 40Mb drive and found
- that 7Kb is allocated per directory which seems a reasonable compromise.
- This is lucky as there seems to be no way to alter the default format
- using HForm.
- 6.11
- N.B. Count only reports the size of the data, not the actual space used
- on the disc. This can only be found by using *FREE from the command line
- before and after creating a directory/file and subtracting the values.
- 6.11
- The structure of !Fonts is where most directories occur. In my case,
- there are 111 directories requiring 777Kb of space initially, but since
- each contains over 7Kb of data for IntMetrics and Outlines, the space is
- not wasted. However, if 28Kb were allocated, as with Steve’s make of
- SCSI drive, then 111 × 28 = 3108Kb would be allocated. In my case, only
- 2625Kb would be used as font data, losing 483Kb on fonts alone! When
- Computer Concepts released Compression, I thought that this would solve
- space problems, but I was told by CC that it retains the directory
- structure (I assume with the same overheads per directory) and is not
- very effective at reducing the disc space taken up by !Fonts.
- 6.11
- I have now installed SparkFS from David Pilling. Although each compacted
- Spark file can contain lots of directories when opened, to the IDE
- filing system it is only one file and only allocates one lot of 7Kb (or
- 28Kb for Steve). So it is not sensible to have a Spark file containing
- less than 7Kb. (The Count facility is misleading as it only gives the
- size of compressed data not the space allocated by the IDE drive.) There
- is a speed penalty for using a Spark file but there is also a Spark
- directory option which is a lot faster according to the booklet although
- it seems to have a much larger disc space requirement of about 14Kb
- which does not all seem to be recovered.
- 6.11
- So the conclusions seem to be:
- 6.11
- 1) If possible, reformat with the smallest file allocation.
- 6.11
- 2) Only create a new directory if you are going to store an amount of
- data comparable with the directory space (7Kb for my IDE drive, 28Kb for
- Steve’s original SCSI).
- 6.11
- 3) Be aware of the overheads due to any compression system you use,
- checking by using *FREE at the command line (particularly if it retains
- directories.)
- 6.11
- 4) If using SparkFS on an A5000, ensure any Spark file will contain
- at least 7Kb of data.
- 6.11
- 5) If space is tight, remember that a Spark directory will have space
- overheads although it is faster.
- 6.11
- It would be interesting to hear the findings from other people using
- other compression systems, types of drive and any information on
- reformatting A5000 IDE drives with different file allocation sizes.
- Alan Dawes, Ilford
- 6.11
- • Help_ with menus in C − In Archive 6.10 p8, Richard Simpson asks about
- using help_ with menus. I enclose a program (on the monthly program
- disc) to demonstrate a solution.
- 6.11
- The program offers help via !Help in the following situations:
- 6.11
- • The main iconbar icon.
- 6.11
- • Menu (with sub-menu) from from the iconbar.
- 6.11
- • Dialogue box from iconbar, including special processing for
- version details.
- 6.11
- • A simple window.
- 6.11
- • Menu from the simple window.
- 6.11
- The program doesn’t actually do anything and is quite long, so I won’t
- attempt to explain its operation here. There are a number of comments in
- the code which should, hopefully, be sufficient for a C programmer using
- help_.
- 6.11
- The short-hand strings supported by !Help are (this is from !Help’s
- message file), note the spaces:-
- 6.11
- \S ’Click SELECT to ’
- 6.11
- \A ’Click ADJUST to ’
- 6.11
- \G ’This option is greyed out because ’
- 6.11
- \D ’Drag SELECT to ’
- 6.11
- \w ’window’
- 6.11
- \a ’ADJUST’
- 6.11
- \R ’Move the pointer right to ’
- 6.11
- \T ’This is the ’
- 6.11
- \W ’This window is ’
- 6.11
- \d ’Drag ADJUST to ’
- 6.11
- \s ’SELECT’
- 6.11
- Please bear in mind that the documentation in Release 4 is sketchy and
- this may not be Acorn’s preferred solution, but it works. Hope this is
- of some use. Joe Wood, Goring-by-Sea.
- 6.11
- • Impression master pages − To create a document with the same master
- page as an earlier document in Impression, load the first document, save
- a new copy with a new name, create a new chapter with the following
- choices: Insert after current chapter / Restart page at 1 / Copy master
- page and delete all of the chapters except the new one. George Foot,
- Oxted.
- 6.11
- • Numeric resets − I have a 420/1 and, because of lack of space on the
- table where the computer lives, the keyboard has to be kept upright
- behind the computer when it is not in use. One day, I turned the
- computer on and was greeted by a display moving rapidly upwards and
- slowly sideways. Adjusting the monitor had no effect. It turned out that
- one of the numeric keys was being held down by the corner of the monitor
- and the monitor type had been reconfigured as I switched on. So, if you
- keep your keyboard upright (yes, I know it’s bad practice, but where
- else can I keep it?) and your display goes crazy, try a <numeric> reset
- before panicking! P Young, Cheltenham
- 6.11
- • Pocket Book and BJ10ex problems − It appears that the Pocket Book’s
- built in Canon BJ10e driver does not work correctly with the Canon
- BJ10ex. We have a printer driver (supplied to us from Psion via Richard
- Collinson) which works. If you have this printer, send us a formatted
- SSD or a disc and your problems will be over. Psion can also supply
- other drivers on SSD if necessary. Simon Moy, Archive.
- 6.11
- • SigmaSheet revisited − John Waddell’s SigmaSheet fix in last month’s
- Hints & Tips requires one more line within DEFPROCexit: *Country UK.
- 6.11
- • Solid icons − If the ‘drag solid file icons’ option is set in RISC OS
- 3, it causes applications like DrawPlus to reject the file as being of
- an incompatible file format. This prevents files being dragged between
- applications in the normal way. Mike McNamara, Dunstable. A
- 6.11
- Using RISC OS 3.10
- 6.11
- Hugh Eagle
- 6.11
- Neil Dickson asks a jolly good question: have I or Archive ever had any
- response from Acorn indicating that they are paying attention to this
- column? Well, I haven’t (yet) and I think Paul would have told me if he
- had. Surely, it’s inconceivable that Acorn are not interested in the
- experiences that have been recounted, the suggestions offered and the
- views expressed here. Isn’t it? Perhaps we’ll have some comment for next
- month. Let’s wait and see ...
- 6.11
- RISC OS 4 Wish List (continued)
- 6.11
- • Alarm – (a) An option to display the digital clock not on the iconbar
- but at the top right corner of the screen in front of all other windows.
- (b) An option to set an alarm that goes off after every n (settable)
- minutes − to remind you just how much time you are spending on the
- machine!!?? (Rex Palmer)
- 6.11
- • Shutdown – The <shift-ctrl-F12> routine should dismount any floppy
- discs that may be present, then remind the user that they are still
- there. (Peter Young)
- 6.11
- All the following are from Neil Dickson:
- 6.11
- • Paint – (a) Allow local fills with the “mask” colour. (b) Use outline
- fonts.
- 6.11
- • Edit – (a) Use multiple fonts (and maybe accept graphic files: i.e.
- have a simple wordprocessing option). (b) Update the font list each time
- a new font directory is loaded (like Draw and Impression do.)
- 6.11
- • Printers – (a) Put as much as possible of the code into ROM, to save
- loading time. (b) A quicker method of “toggling” within !Printers when
- deciding which are active and which are inactive.
- 6.11
- • Calc – Make it better, but less complicated than SciCalc. (E.g.
- include memory buttons and a percentage button, and allow
- multiplication, division, etc, by a constant.)
- 6.11
- • Draw – (a) Optional detachable toolbox. (b) An option for redefining
- the toolbox (e.g. to include zoom and edit tools.) (c) Patterned fills
- (hatching, stripes, etc.)
- 6.11
- • Tidy windows – Include a “Tidy windows” option on the desktop.
- 6.11
- • Filer multitasking – An option to make all filer actions (load and
- save, disc mounting, etc) multitask.
- 6.11
- • Replacement of system font – Optional replacement of the system font
- by an outline font on the desktop (like the Germans seem to have already
- in RISC OS 3.12)!
- 6.11
- • RMFaster – An option to RMFaster various modules, such as
- SharedCLibrary, from the Task Manager (rather than having to type in the
- command at the command line).
- 6.11
- • Virtual memory – For hard disc users.
- 6.11
- • Built in sounds – A greater variety.
- 6.11
- • Simpler mode changing – A less fiddly method.
- 6.11
- • Keyboard emulation of the mouse – e.g. using <Alt> and the arrow keys.
- 6.11
- • Auto-scrolling of font menus – Make the list of fonts scroll
- automatically when the pointer reaches the bottom.
- 6.11
- • Compression of sprite files – Either in addition to, or instead of,
- compression of entire discs, arrange for sprite files to be compressed
- always.
- 6.11
- • Font management – Put a Font Manager on the icon bar showing a list of
- available directories which you can select and deselect by clicking.
- (Sounds like !FMaster from Risc User.)
- 6.11
- Miscellaneous
- 6.11
- Superfluous icons in template definitions
- 6.11
- Mick Day has found numerous examples of template definitions in standard
- RISC OS 3 applications which contain extra unused icons. The “save”
- window in Alarm is just one example: this has four superfluous icons.
- (To see for yourself: find the template file inside Resources:$.
- Resources, load it into FormEd, use the menu to assign vertical and
- horizontal scroll bars and a size icon, then scroll around the window.)
- He has also noted inconsistent naming of templates and numbering of
- icons. If you use existing windows borrowed from existing applications,
- beware that the templates may require more memory than you might expect
- because of the space taken by the extra icon definitions and pay close
- attention to the icon numbering. As Tim Nicholson comments: it is a
- great pity that Acorn did not supply a suitable “clean” set of templates
- to work from.
- 6.11
- “OS_Find” and image filing systems
- 6.11
- In one of my programs, I need to be able to check that a specified
- filing system object (which might be either a file or directory) is
- actually present and, in particular, is not on a floppy disc that has
- been removed. In RISC OS 2, I found that the following code seemed
- fairly foolproof:
- 6.11
- ON ERROR LOCAL:PROCReport(“Can’t find ”+Object$):ENDPROC
- 6.11
- SYS “OS_Find”,&40,Object$ TO FileHandle%
- 6.11
- IF FileHandle%<>0 THEN SYS “XOS_Find”,0,FileHandle%
- 6.11
- RESTORE ERROR
- 6.11
- This relied on the fact that the SWI call “OS_Find”,&40 (which is the
- general routine for opening a file) should “open” Object$ whether it is
- a directory or a file. However, with the arrival of “image” filing
- systems such as DOSFS and SparkFS, I found that this wouldn’t work,
- because an attempt to “open” a directory inside an image filing system
- (e.g. a directory inside a SparkFS archive) resulted in an error
- (contrary to the rules set out in the Programmer’s Reference Manual).
- 6.11
- David Pilling says “there are two entry points to SparkFS, one via the
- OS image filing system, the other via a traditional FS entry. The code
- in these after the entry point is the same. So it looks like it is the
- OS that is faulting your operation and not SparkFS.”
- 6.11
- I have now rewritten my code so that it checks to see whether Object$ is
- a directory and, if it is, it looks inside it for a file and tries to
- open that. This seems to work with image filing systems as well as
- others, but is a bit cumbersome to say the least (and as David Pilling
- observes is still open to being fooled by cacheing). Does anyone know of
- a simple and genuinely foolproof way of ensuring that a filing system
- object is present?
- 6.11
- Applications that refuse to Shutdown
- 6.11
- Keith Gardner has experienced problems with applications that interfere
- with the Shutdown process and cause the computer to hang. He refers to
- advice in the June issue of Risc User, according to which the Shutdown
- routine in RISC OS 3 (which can be selected from the Acorn icon or by
- pressing <ctrl-shift-F12>) cannot cope if more than one Run file is open
- at the time of Shutdown. Run files are left open while applications are
- running if there are any lines after the line that calls RunImage. One
- way to avoid the problem is to remove surplus blank lines or lines
- containing remarks (prefaced with a | ). However, applications sometimes
- contain tidying up commands such as RMKill commands to get rid of
- modules: in these cases, it may be necessary to Quit one or more
- applications before selecting Shutdown.
- 6.11
- Matters arising
- 6.11
- Testing a printer’s on-line status
- 6.11
- (Archive 6.9 p12) Mick Day found that the printer test routine published
- in the June edition of Archive lied! It told him that the printer was
- not on line whether it was or not, and the printer beeped if it was on
- line. Tim Nicholson says that the routine (as previously published) can
- fail for two reasons: Firstly, it assumes a printer buffer of 1024
- bytes, but the actual size depends upon the setting of *Configure
- PrinterBufferSize, which may be different from the default of 1Kb.
- Secondly, the first line of the program redirects the whole output
- stream to the printer, thus if the program is run from the desktop, the
- output which normally goes to the Task window that the desktop
- generates, goes to the printer instead as well as the test byte of
- CHR$(0). Typically this stream will contain several control codes to
- open the task window display and the Task window title, e.g. RUN
- ADFS::DiscName.$.PrintTest. Although this stream is sent before running
- the program, the FX 3 call at the top of the program is executed in time
- to redirect this part way through and upset the printer.
- 6.11
- Tim suggests the following variant of the routine:
- 6.11
- *FX21,3
- 6.11
- empty%=ADVAL(-4)
- 6.11
- PRINT “Printer is ”;
- 6.11
- *FX3,10
- 6.11
- PRINTCHR$(0);
- 6.11
- a%=INKEY(20)
- 6.11
- a%=ADVAL(-4)
- 6.11
- *FX3,0
- 6.11
- *FX21,3
- 6.11
- IF a%<>empty% THEN
- 6.11
- PRINT “not on line”
- 6.11
- ELSE PRINT “on line”
- 6.11
- ENDIF
- 6.11
- END
- 6.11
- This deals with the first problem by comparing the buffer length
- immediately after flushing with the length after inserting the test byte
- and pausing to allow throughput, and with the second by including a
- PRINT statement before redirecting the output stream.
- 6.11
- Tim notes that the original program would run correctly (subject to the
- buffer size being correct) from the command line, i.e. after pressing
- <f12>, and CHAINing or LOADing and RUNning.
- 6.11
- Tim does not understand the supposed warning from Acorn about the use of
- ADVAL(−4) (see Archive 6.7 p41) since it is a use specified in the Basic
- manual. He can only assume it is a confusion with the use of positive
- ADVAL parameters, which are only meaningful if a podule with an analogue
- input which mimics that of the original BBC Micro is fitted. He has
- experienced no difficulties using negative ADVAL parameters to inspect
- the condition of buffers and is not aware of any differing action under
- RISC OS 3.1x as opposed to 2.0 with this facility.
- 6.11
- Basic program compaction
- 6.11
- (Archive 6.9 p65) Rex Palmer says that in his experience compacted
- programs only cause problems when you try to alter them. The problem
- seems to occur with both Edit and BasicEdit. If a compacted program is
- loaded into either of these and any alterations made, then when the
- program is re-saved, the line that has been altered will generate the
- error even if the resulting error is not part of the line that was
- altered!
- 6.11
- Altering the keyboard status
- 6.11
- (Archive 6.8 p27 and 6.9 p65) Rex Palmer has written to explain the
- purpose of bit 7 (the “Shift enable” bit) of the keyboard status byte.
- When this bit is set, the <Shift> key reverses the action of the
- <CapsLock> key. Thus, if you hold down <Shift> while pressing <CapsLock>
- then release both keys, you put the computer in a state where pressing
- the <Shift> key with a letter key gives you lower case letters. The
- computer can be configured to start up in this state. Alternatively, the
- command *FX202,128,111 will achieve the same effect ... since 111 = 255
- − 128 − 16 the command sets bit 7 (Shift Enable on) and unsets bit 4
- (Caps Lock on).
- 6.11
- To recap, the most useful commands are likely to be:
- 6.11
- *FX202,0,239 to set Caps Lock on
- 6.11
- *FX202,16,239 to set Caps Lock off
- 6.11
- *FX202,128,111 to select ShiftCaps
- 6.11
- Programmer’s Reference Manual
- 6.11
- The increase in the number of pages is not “nearly 50%”, as I said last
- month, but is in fact over 70% (excluding the indexes, there were 1,882
- pages in the RISC OS 2 manual and there are over 3,200 in the new
- edition.) Sorry about the mistake!
- 6.11
- Arm3 hare and tortoise (again)
- 6.11
- (Archive 6.6 p59, 6.8 p30 and 6.10 p63) With the help of Jim Nottingham,
- I have found out the source of my problem. The Run file of the Aleph One
- !Arm3 application should read:
- 6.11
- IconSprites <Obey$Dir>.!Sprites
- 6.11
- |Use only one of the lines
- 6.11
- |below, comment out the other.
- 6.11
- |Load <Obey$Dir>.CMdlUnix
- 6.11
- Load <Obey$Dir>.CacheMdl
- 6.11
- Load <Obey$Dir>.IconMdl
- 6.11
- <Obey$Dir>.Kick CacheIcon
- 6.11
- In my file, the CacheMdl line had somehow got REM’d out. I vaguely
- remember that when I first tried to install !Arm3 with RISC OS 3, I read
- the instruction about “using only one of the lines below” as meaning
- that only one of the following three lines should be used and, since I
- assumed that I no longer needed “CacheMdl” because RISC OS 3 now had a
- module to deal with this, I removed it as well as the CMdlUnix line. On
- looking at the file again, I now presume that you are only supposed to
- remove one of these two lines, so I have reinstated the CacheMdl line
- and everything seems fine. A case of trying to be too clever, it seems.
- 6.11
- Redraw problems (and an alternative)
- 6.11
- (Archive 6.8 p29 and 6.10 p63) Richard Hallas confirms that the problem
- of incorrect screen redrawing in Edit and DeskEdit is indeed due to a
- bug in the Shared C Library and that the problem seems to occur with
- particularly long lines. He says that any program which uses the C
- library’s text object feature will suffer from the bug until Acorn
- corrects it in a future version of CLib. He adds that Acorn has been
- aware of the problem for some time, so hopefully a fix should not be too
- far off.
- 6.11
- Richard used to use DeskEdit to produce files for input to PMS which
- frequently involved very long input lines indeed (up to several hundred
- characters). He would occasionally reposition the caret and start
- typing, only to find that his input had gone into a separate part of the
- file which was not on the screen! Partly because of this bug, he has now
- moved over to using the public domain text editor, Zap, which he
- thoroughly recommends: “It has its own redraw routines, which are
- unbelievably fast and totally accurate: plus you can get twice as much
- text on the screen in multisync modes.” A
- 6.11
-