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1987-05-29
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SETTING UP SHORTCUT YOUR WAY
ShortCut recognizes that you are an individual and you do things
in ways that are unlike any one else. We don't want to cramp your
style, so we allow you to customize ShortCut to suit your own
personal tastes.
In this chapter you will learn about ShortCut's SETUP command.
SETUP permits you to tell ShortCut which text editor or word
processor you want to use for ShortCut's EDIT command. It lets
you determine how you want your ASCII files printed with Short-
Cut's PRINT command. SETUP allows you to create your own commands
for the third and fourth Command Bars. It permits you to color
ShortCut any way you desire if you have a color system, or it
allows you to decide how you want to use highlighting or reverse
video for monochrome systems. Finally, SETUP lets you change
miscellaneous parameters that affect the way ShortCut behaves.
Using the Setup Command
The SETUP command is on the second Command Bar. Press
<Shift-F7> to reach the SETUP command box. Press <Enter>.
You will see the Setup Main Menu appear on your screen
listing six options:
1 Editor setup
2 Printer setup
3 Third Command Bar (Ctrl)
4 Fourth Command Bar (Alt)
5 Screen Display Setup
6 Miscellaneous
At the bottom of the screen you will see a message that
prompts you to choose an option by typing a number or to exit
the Setup Main Menu by striking <Enter>.
Setting Up the Edit Command
The first option lets you tell ShortCut what text editor or
word processor to use whenever you give the EDIT command.
Type 1 and <Enter> to select the first option.
Another menu appears with only two options. The first time
you use ShortCut, the program uses the DOS line editor, EDLIN
to edit files with ShortCut's EDIT command. You will probab-
ly want to change this to a more flexible editor or word
processor. If you do, type 1 and hit <Enter>.
ShortCut will ask you to enter a new value for #1. You
should type the command you would normally use for calling up
your editor or word processor. For example, you would type
WP for WordPerfect, ED for PC-Write, or WS for WordStar.
Although you may precede the editor's name with a drive
SETUP.DOC - 1
specifier, don't include a subdirectory path. For example,
if A is your current drive and you want to use WordPerfect
which will always be on drive B, enter this command in
response to ShortCut's prompt:
B:WP
After you hit the <Enter> key, you will see your command
appear in its proper place on your screen.
When you use the EDIT command on ShortCut's first Command Bar
and you have not marked any files to edit in the Directory
Window, ShortCut will edit a default filename, SCRATCH.PAD.
You can change this name if you wish.
To change the name of the default edit file, choose option
2. You can enter any file name you want in this form:
[drive:][path]filename[.ext]
The information within the brackets is optional. The entire
name must not exceed 40 characters.
If you do not want to edit any file when you have not marked
any files in the Directory Window, you must enter a minus
sign (-). Use the minus sign anytime you want to erase an
option value without replacing it with another.
If you select an option and then decide not to make any
changes, press <Enter> and no changes will be made.
In order for ShortCut to give a filename to your editor,
either because you have marked a file in the Directory Window
or because you have a default edit file specified, your
editor must be capable of accepting the filename as a passed
parameter. Nearly all word processors or text editors will
allow this. Consult your editor manual if are unsure.
When you are through making changes to the Edit Menu, you can
return to the Setup Main Menu by pressing the Space Bar or
you can exit SETUP altogether by hitting <Enter>.
Saving Your Setup Changes
Any time you exit SETUP you are asked if you want to save
your present configuration which will include the changes you
just made. If you type N for No, your changes will remain in
effect until you exit ShortCut, but they will not be saved on
your disk. If you choose Y for Yes, ShortCut will save the
changes you made in its SHORTCUT.DAT file. If ShortCut
cannot find SHORTCUT.DAT in the default directory of the
default drive or along the DOS path, it will create a new
SHORTCUT.DAT file in the default directory.
SETUP.DOC - 2
Trying Out Edit
If you have used SETUP to select an editor for use with the
EDIT command and you have exited SETUP, you can now try using
EDIT.
Press <F4> to move to the EDIT command box. If there is a
particular file you want to edit, mark it in the Directory
Window before you hit the <Enter> key. This marked filename
will be passed to your editor. After you press <Enter>, your
editor will be started up and you will be editing the file
that you marked. If you did not mark a file, ShortCut will
pass the default edit filename you chose with the SETUP
command to your editor.
Printer Setup
If you return to the Setup Main Menu you will see the second
option is Printer Setup. You can use ShortCut to tell your
printer how you want your files printed with ShortCut's PRINT
command. The options available are listed below.
Leading printer code - This code is sent to your printer
whenever you use the PRINT command. No code is entered here
until you put one in. You can enter a code to control how
your printer will print anything you send to it. For ex-
ample, you could specify a leading printer code that would
change the print font to 12 characters per inch, or possibly
to have the file printed in correspondence quality print.
The options available will depend on your printer. Consult
your printer manual for the correct printer codes to use.
The codes you enter must be no more than 40 characters in
length.
To enter decimal printer codes less than 32 or greater than
127, you must use the <Alt> key and the numeric key pad.
Press the <Alt> key and keep it depressed while you enter the
number you want on the numeric key pad. When you release the
<Alt> key, you will see that you have entered a character you
will not find on your keyboard. You may enter one or a
series of printer codes before you press the <Enter> key.
If you don't want to send any leading printer code to your
printer, remember to enter a minus sign (-), not a blank
space.
Trailing printer code - The trailing printer code is a code
sent to the printer after a file has been printed. The
default setting is a page-feed which is a character that
looks like the female symbol. You may change this code in
the same manner as you change the leading printer code.
Remember, if you don't want a trailing code, enter a minus
sign (-). Also, the codes you enter must be no more than 40
characters in length.
SETUP.DOC - 3
Page size - This is the number of printed lines on a page.
The default setting is 60 which means that 60 lines of text
will be printed before your printer skips to a new page. A
page is usually 66 lines long, so printing 60 lines of text
will allow 3 empty lines on both the top and bottom of the
page. You may change the number of lines printed to any
number you wish. It is up to you to make sure the paper in
the printer is properly aligned. In other words, ShortCut
does not provide for top or bottom margins.
Expand tabs - If your printer has preset tab settings, you
will not need to expand tabs. If it doesn't, enter Y, and
the tab characters sent to your printer will be expanded up
to the number of spaces specified in the next option.
Tab size - This sets the maximum number of spaces your
printer will move when it encounters a tab. As you can see,
the default is 8 spaces. You may enter any number you
choose. This option is in effect only if the expand tabs
option is on.
Send leading printer code now - If you choose option 6, your
leading printer code will be sent immediately to your print-
er. You do not have to use the PRINT command to put it into
effect.
Send trailing printer code now - If you choose option 7, your
trailing printer code will be sent immediately to your
printer. You do not have to use the PRINT command to put it
into effect.
User Commands
You can put your own commands on ShortCut's third and fourth
Command Bars. With this capability you can start up any
program as easily as hitting the Enter key, just as you would
give any ShortCut Command Bar command. Or you can put any
DOS command on the Command Bar that ShortCut doesn't already
include. Also you can enter some specialized commands that
make ShortCut even faster and easier to use.
Entering Your Command
To put your commands on the third Command Bar, select option
3 from the Setup Main Menu. The Third Command Bar menu will
appear.
Choose the Ctrl-function key combination you want to define.
For example, if you want your command to use the <Ctrl-F2>
command box, select option 2. You can see that we have
already put a couple of commands on the Third Command Bar.
You may change them to whatever suits you best, but for right
now select another key.
SETUP.DOC - 4
Type in your command. Whatever you type is what ShortCut
sends to DOS. You can enter a DOS command, for example:
chkdsk b:.
You might want to enter command that executes a program. For
example, suppose you want to set up a command box so that you
can run dBase III. You would type dbase, the usual command
to start up the program.
In addition to running programs, you can execute a batch file
to send several commands to DOS at once. Any command you can
give to DOS is acceptable.
ShortCut also allows you to enter some specialized commands.
You already know that you can mark one or more filenames in
the Directory Window and then when you execute a ShortCut
command, these marked files are acted upon. You can have
your third and fourth Command Bar commands do the same thing.
For example, suppose you enter dbase as a command. Often
when you start up dBase you want to begin running a dBase
program immediately. If you mark a dbase program file in the
Directory Window and give the command, dBase will start up
and begin running your marked program file. If you want
ShortCut to remind you that you must mark a filename before
giving the command, type ~M after your dBase command so that
the whole thing will look like this:
DBASE ~M
If you want to have your command repeat for every marked
file, type ~R. For example:
COPY ~R C:\BUSINESS\BACKUP
This command would copy every file marked in the Directory
Window to the C:\BUSINESS\BACKUP subdirectory.
If sometimes you want to use a marked filename when you use a
command and sometimes you don't, type ~N for not required or
you can enter the command alone:
EDLIN ~N or EDLIN
If you want ShortCut to change to another directory before
executing your command, follow this procedure: type in the
full path name of the directory followed by the command. For
example:
C:\SARA\BUSINESS\LOTUS
ShortCut will change both the Display and Default drives to C
SETUP.DOC - 5
and run Lotus 1-2-3. When you exit 1-2-3, you will see that
BUSINESS is the Current Displayed Directory.
Or suppose you want to delete all filenames with a .BAK
extension in the BUSINESS subdirectory. Your command would
look like this:
C:\SARA\BUSINESS\DEL *.BAK
If you just want ShortCut to change the Display and Default
drives to C without running any program and to make BUSINESS
the Current Displayed Directory, you would enter this com-
mand:
C:\SARA\BUSINESS\
Notice that a backslash (\) must follow the last directory in
the path or ShortCut will think BUSINESS is a command and try
to run it.
Of course you can do all these things with ShortCut anyway,
but running commands like these is the quickest way to do
these tasks. If you find yourself repeating the same rou-
tines over and over again, do yourself a favor and put them
on the Command Bar and save yourself some time.
Labeling Your Command
After you finish typing in your command and hit <Enter>, the
third Command Bar will appear at the bottom of the screen.
You will see the cursor in the command box you are defining,
ready for you to type in a label.
Type in a label that will remind you what the command is.
For example, if you are defining a command box to call up
Lotus 1-2-3, you might enter the label 1-2-3 or maybe Lotus.
You should capitalize only the first letter of your label as
the regular ShortCut commands are. Then when you select your
command by moving to the command box of your choice on the
Command Bar, all the letters of your label will appear in
capital letters. Notice that not all of the command boxes
are the same size.
Boxes F1 - F5 are six characters wide.
Boxes F6 - F8 are seven characters wide.
Boxes F9 - F10 are eight characters wide.
You might want to choose where you put your commands based on
the length of your label so that the result is aesthetically
pleasing.
That's it! Just remember to save your changes when you leave
SETUP. Now when you press <Ctrl>, you will see your command
SETUP.DOC - 6
on the third Command Bar, and if you select it, your command
will be sent to DOS.
You can do the same thing with the fourth Command Bar.
Select option 4 from the Main Setup Menu and enter your
command and label as above. Then when you press <Alt>, your
command will appear on the fourth Command Bar.
Screen Display Setup
We think ShortCut is beautiful just as it is but you may have
other preferences. We chose the colors we did so that
ShortCut will be legible on all types of monitors. You can
color ShortCut to suit your own taste. Even if don't have a
color system, you may want to change "colors" to make high-
lighted areas of the screen more noticeable.
The Screen Display Setup menu gives you eight options. If
you have a color monitor, you will use the first four, and if
you have a monochrome or single color monitor, you will use
the final four. After each option you will see a number.
These are the color settings ShortCut uses when it first
comes to you.
There are four parts of the ShortCut screen you can color.
They are:
Normal color - This is the color of the filenames when they
are not marked. Other variable information that ShortCut
must determine is also this color.
Marked color - This is the color of files that are marked and
the color of a directory if it is the Current Displayed
Directory. It is also the color of the message line and the
File Template.
Frame color - This is the color of ShortCut's frame - all
those lines and boxes on your screen.
Mode color - This is the color of active modes. It is also
the color of the date and time.
Each color option number is the sum of two numbers: a fore-
ground color number and a background color number. To get
the color effect you want, select the foreground color you
need from the list of foreground colors on your screen and
add it to the background color you want chosen from the list
of background colors. For both foreground and background
colors, black has a value of 0.
Let's look at some examples.
Suppose you want red on a black background. You would choose
SETUP.DOC - 7
12 from the foreground list and 0 from the background list.
Add 12 to 0 and your color number = 12.
Now you want bright white on a blue background. Bright white
is 15 and dark blue is 16. 15 + 16 = 31.
Suppose you want black letters on a red background. Add 0
for black to 64 for red to get 64.
If you want a foreground color to blink, add 128 to it. For
example, 15 + 128 + 16 = 159. This will produce a bright
blinking white on a dark blue background. This might be
distracting, but if you want to do it, who are we to say you
can't?
If you want everything to have the same color background, add
all your foreground colors to the same background color of
your choice for each color (normal, marked, frame, and
mode).
Once you enter a color option number, you will see its effect
immediately on the text of the color option itself.
Single Color Monitors
If you use a single color monitor, you will notice that
"highlighted" areas on the ShortCut screen are actually
reverse video. If your monitor does not display the intense
color so that it is easily distinguished from the normal
color, you may want to keep things this way.
However, if you can adjust the contrast and/or brightness of
your display so that intense coloring stands out clearly, you
can choose to use true highlighting. In this case, set the
single color monitor normal and frame colors to 7 and the
marked and mode colors to 15.
Try it both ways to see what works best for you and your
system. You can always go back to reverse video by setting
the single monitor color marked and mode colors back to 112.
Viewing Your Colors
To see the total effect of your color changes, you must leave
SETUP. After you have, you will see some of your color
changes in effect. To recolor your entire screen, hit
<Ctrl-Break>. This will essentially restart ShortCut and
your color changes will be in effect.
Miscellaneous
This is a catchall category. Most of these options determine
how ShortCut will operate. You decide what suits your needs
best.
SETUP.DOC - 8
BASIC to be used - The first option of the Miscellaneous Menu
allows you to decide which BASIC interpreter or compiler will
be used to run programs whose filenames end with the exten-
sion .BAS. The default is BASICA which is the advanced
version of Microsoft BASIC used on the IBM PC. If your
computer uses a different BASIC interpreter or compiler, you
will want to enter that name. Enter it just as you normally
would call it up from the DOS prompt. You may include a
drive specifier, but do not include a path.
Screen blank - This feature is designed to save your moni-
tor's screen from "burn in". A Y for Yes means that if you
have not pressed any key on your keyboard for an amount of
time specified in the next option, your screen will go
blank. To get your screen display back, press any key. You
might want to get in the habit of hitting the <Alt> key when
you return to avoid doing something with the running program
you did not intend to do.
Minutes before screen is blanked - This option works with
Screen Blank. You can specify the time interval in minutes
before your screen display is blanked. Enter any number you
want between 1 and 30.
Refresh directory on return from DOS - Usually when the
ShortCut screen reappears after it flips back from the DOS
screen, ShortCut will update the display in its Directory
Window by reading the Current Displayed Directory on your
disk. This does not take long, but if you wish to prevent
ShortCut from doing this to save time, enter N for No. If
you do, remember that the Directory Window may not always be
correct when you return from the DOS screen. The Directory
Window will not be updated until the next time ShortCut goes
out to read your disk. You can always force ShortCut to do
this by pressing the space bar when the screen arrow is
pointing at the Current Displayed Directory.
Confirm before erasing files - You can decide how cautious
you want to be when you are erasing files. Anytime you use
the ERASE command, ShortCut will ask you if you want to erase
each marked file before it is actually deleted. If you do
not want this extra degree of protection, change the setting
for this option to N. ShortCut will then erase all marked
files without seeking your confirmation.
Low disk space warning - When the remaining free disk space
goes below the number of bytes specified here, the number of
free bytes message on ShortCut's screen will blink on and
off. This is to warn you that not much disk space remains
for you to store data. You can change this to whatever
number you like.
Expand keyboard buffer - When this is on, your keyboard's
buffer is expanded from 16 to 128 characters. This means you
SETUP.DOC - 9
can continue typing even if your computer is doing some other
task without getting a beep indicating your keyboard buffer
is full. Set it on with Y or turn it off with N. Do not use
this feature with SuperKey or other programs that have their
own expanded keyboard buffers.
Use Ctrl-Left Shift to pop up ShortCut - Other RAM resident
programs may use <Alt-Left Shift>, the usual key combination
to pop up ShortCut, for a specialized purpose. SuperKey is
an example of such a program. To avoid conflict, set this
option on with Y and then press <Ctrl-Left Shift> whenever
you want to pop up ShortCut. N will reset back to <Alt-Left
Shift>.
Saving Your Current Configuration
You already know how to save any changes you made using the
SETUP command by responding with a Y when you leave SETUP and
ShortCut asks you if you want to save your current configura-
tion. Suppose you decided not to save your changes and later
changed your mind. You can still save your current con-
figuration without using the SETUP command.
Pressing <Alt-S> will save your current configuration any
time. ShortCut must be able to find SHORTCUT.DAT in the
default directory of the default drive or along the es-
tablished DOS path any time you give this command.
Whenever you save your current configuration, you not only
are saving any changes you may have made with the SETUP
command, but also the way the ShortCut screen is set up at
the moment. These things are also saved:
Which piece of information to display about a
file (DATE, TIME, or SIZE)
How the displayed files are sorted (by TIME,
SIZE, EXT, NAME, UNSORTED, and in ascend-
ing or descending order)
PAUSE - on or off
CHIME - on or off
