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Text File | 1991-02-26 | 34KB | 765 lines

Sue's Ornament Master A database for Christmas ornaments -- plus MORE! ***** NEW ***** Ever finished all your shopping weeks before the rush -- and then realized the day before Christmas that you forgot Aunt Sophie? How many times have you returned to the same store to do extra shopping that you "forgot" to do? Ever torn your desk apart hunting for Charlie & Julie's new address for your Christmas cards? Need help building your invitation list for your Christmas party? NO MORE! Sue's Ornament Master now not only maintains your valuable Christmas ornament collection, it also helps you organize your shopping trips and maintain your Christmas card list and a party list! ***** NEW ***** This is a SHAREWARE product! I encourage you to freely experiment with and use this product in order to evaluate it. If you feel this is a useful product, then please send a $10.00 registration fee to: Sue Robichaux P. O. Box 91016-199 Baton Rouge, La. 70821 This registration fee entitles you to the registered version. The registered version contains a wide range of print functions and a printed, bound manual. The timed "Shareware" displays at the beginning and end of the program have been removed. A registration form in the file "REGISTER.DOC" has been included for your convenience. ORNAMENT requires an IBM or compatable PC with a hard drive. A printer is required to print reports. The program works in 640K of RAM; I suspect it may work with less, but I don't know for sure. DISCLAIMER -- This ornament package has been written using industry-standard database tools that have been developed and tested over a period of years. It does not trash files or hard disks. However, neither I nor anyone else except yourself can be responsible for any mishaps or other inconveniences that may arise during your computing experiences. If you're using a HappyTimes PC with an IBM emulation board running an operating system kludged from six different bandit versions of DOS, 19 different TSR's, and you're using an I/O conversion utility that let's you perform hard disk writes to a video tape, then I really have no idea what'll happen when you use ORNAMENT! VERSION HISTORY: Version Date 1.5 2/91 Added Christmas party list. 1.4 2/91 Added Store(shopping) list, Christmas Card list, and Christmas shopping list. Create shopping lists (by store) and print card labels in registered version. 1.3 10/90 Finally -- a minor change! When you were adding or editing an ornament, the message on the bottom of the screen was misleading. 1.2 09/90 OOPS! The incremental search facility didn't always work correctly. It does now. 1.1 09/90 Corrected miscount in printed list. Total number of ornaments included any deleted records sitting around since the last time the index was rebuilt. Total should now always be the number of (undeleted) ornament records. Also, program misses the ornament database if you change the selected printer. Corrected. 1.0 08/90 Original version. INSTALLING AND BEGINNING ORNAMENT: Copy all the ORNAMENT files to a subdirectory on your hard disk. If you're not familiar with subdirectories, then please refer to your DOS manuals. Next, you may have to deal with FILES and BUFFERS in your CONFIG.SYS files. Yuk! Check your CONFIG.SYS file. You MUST have FILES = 25 (or greater). Your buffers aren't that important, but setting them to at least BUFFERS = 8 is a good idea. More than likely, you already have these values set. Type ORNAMENT and press Enter to begin the program. THE MAIN MENU: The main menu has five options: Ornament Maintenance Christmas Card List Shopping List Utilities Terminate Menus always use a sliding bar. Your arrow keys move the selection bar up and down. To select an option, highlight that option with the selection bar and press ENTER. You can also select an option by pressing the first letter of the option (For example, "U" for Utilities.) An information message on the bottom of the screen always tells you what you should do next. ORNAMENT MAINTENANCE: This is the first portion of the system. Select this option and an Ornament List window pops up on the right hand side of your screen. This window lists all the ornaments in the database. The informational message on the bottom of the screen tells you to press <INSERT>, <DELETE>, <ENTER>, or <ESCAPE>. Pressing the INSERT key lets you add a new ornament to the list. Pressing the DELETE key lets you delete an existing ornament from the list. Pressing the ENTER key lets you edit an existing ornament in the list. Pressing the ESCAPE key exits from Ornament Maintenance mode. It returns you to the main menu. ADDING ORNAMENTS At the Ornament List window, press the INSERT key. A second window pops open. This window contains four fields: 1) A "Short" name field. This is a 20 character field you can use to name the ornament. This name appears in the ornament list window. 2) A "Long" description field. This 64 character field lets you further describe or add comments about the ornament. 3) A "Date Acquired" field. This lets you enter the date you acquired the ornament. This must be a valid date (No February 32nd allowed). Since you often don't know the exact day or month, you'll have to "round off" dates (For example, 11/01/87 for "sometime in November of 87") 4) A Value field. This is a dollar value. You may enter values up to $999.99. Its up to you whether to use original purchase price or current replacement price. Also, you may only enter valid numeric characters, a minus sign, and a decimal point. Your cursor is placed on the first field. You may use the up and down arrows or the ENTER key to move between the fields. The right and left arrows, the HOME key, and the END key move you back and forth within a single field. You may also use the DELETE key and the BACKSPACE key to delete characters; you may toggle insert or overstrike mode with the INSERT key. If you've opened this window unintentionally, you can exit without adding a new ornament. Simply press the ESCAPE key. This returns you to the Ornament List window. Once you've successfully entered the fourth field (the value field), you'll return to the Ornament List window. Your new ornament has been added to the list! (NOTE: You may also enter your ornament by pressing the Control-W key combination -- press the "W" key while holding down the Control key -- at any point while entering your ornament. This forces the program to accept the ornament definition without having to enter all four fields.) DELETING AN ORNAMENT At the Ornament List window, use your arrow keys, the PgUp and PgDn key, the Home key, or the End Key to locate an ornament that you wish to remove from your list. You may also try entering in the ornament's name. As you press each letter in the ornament's name, the window list will scroll to the ornament group matching what you've typed in. If it can't find a match, it will "beep" at you. Once you've located and highlighted the desired ornament, press the DELETE key. An information message appears at the bottom of the screen asking you to confirm you wish to delete the ornament. If you then press the "D" key, the ornament will be removed from the list. You'll return to the Ornament List window. EDITING AN ORNAMENT At the Ornament List window, use your arrow keys, the PgUp and PgDn key, the Home key, or the End Key to locate an ornament that you wish to edit. You may also try entering in the ornament's name. As you press each letter in the ornament's name, the window list will scroll to the ornament group matching what you've typed in. If it can't find a match, it will "beep" at you. Once you've located and highlighted the desired ornament, press the ENTER key. A second pops open (similar to the INSERT window) containing the four data fields describing the ornament. You may then alter this information if you wish. You can use the same editing keys (BACKSPACE, arrows, DELETE, INSERT, etc) you used when adding the record. When you press ENTER after the fourth field, you'll return to the Ornament List window. OR, you can press the Control-W key combination to force the program to accept what you've entered at that point. RETURNING TO THE MAIN MENU Simply press the ESCAPE key while at the Ornament List window. The window will disappear and you'll return to an active main menu. CHRISTMAS CARD LIST This is the second portion of the system. Select this option and a Christmas Card List window pops up on the right hand side of your screen. This window lists people by name. The informational message on the bottom of the screen tells you to press <INSERT>, <DELETE>, <ENTER>, or <ESCAPE>. Pressing the INSERT key lets you add a new person to the list. Pressing the DELETE key lets you delete an existing person from the list. Pressing the ENTER key lets you edit an existing person in the list. Pressing the ESCAPE key exits from Christmas Card Maintenance mode. It returns you to the main menu. ADDING PEOPLE At the Christmas Card List window, press the INSERT key. A second window pops open. You can enter a person's name and address. This window contains several fields: 1) A name field. This is a 30 character field used for a person's name. This name appears in the Christmas Card List list window. 2) The first Address field. This 30 character field is the first line in the person's address. In many cases, this will be the ONLY line in the person's address ... for example, "307 St. Patrick Street". 3) The second Address field. If you need a second address line -- for an apartment number, or a P.O. box, or whatever, you can use this 30 character field. Just skip over it if you don't need it. 4) The "C/S/Z" fields. Really three fields -- the first is a 20 character "City" field, the second is a 2 character "State" field, and the third is a 9 character "Zip Code" field. Note the State field defaults to upper-case alphabetic characters. 5) A free-form "NOTES" field. This scrolling field lets you enter up to 128 charcters of free-form comments. As you reach the right-hand side of the field, it "scrolls" to let you enter more information. Your cursor is placed on the first field. You may use the up and down arrows or the ENTER key to move between the fields. The right and left arrows, the HOME key, and the END key move you back and forth within a single field. You may also use the DELETE key and the BACKSPACE key to delete characters; you may toggle insert or overstrike mode with the INSERT key. If you've opened this window unintentionally, you can exit without adding a new person. Simply press the ESCAPE key. This returns you to the Christmas Card List window. Once you've successfully entered the last field (the value field), you'll return to the Christmas Card List window. Your new person has been added to the list! (NOTE: You may also enter your person by pressing the Control-W key combination -- press the "W" key while holding down the Control key -- at any point while entering your information. This forces the program to accept the information without having to enter all four fields.) DELETING A PERSON At the Christmas Card List window, use your arrow keys, the PgUp and PgDn key, the Home key, or the End Key to locate the person that you wish to remove from your list. You may also try entering a name. As you press each letter in the name, the window list scrolls to names matching what you've typed in. If it can't find a match, it will "beep" at you. Once you've located and highlighted the desired name, press the DELETE key. An information message appears at the bottom of the screen asking you to confirm you wish to delete the person. If you then press the "D" key, the person will be removed from the list. You'll return to the Christmas Card List window. EDITING A PERSON At the Christmas Card List window, use your arrow keys, the PgUp and PgDn key, the Home key, or the End Key to locate the person that you wish to edit. You may also try entering a name. As you press each letter in the name, the window list scrolls to names matching what you've typed in. If it can't find a match, it will "beep" at you. Once you've located and highlighted the desired name, press the ENTER key. A second pops open (similar to the INSERT window) containing the data fields describing the person. You may then alter this information if you wish. You can use the same editing keys (BACKSPACE, arrows, DELETE, INSERT, etc) you used when adding the record. When you press ENTER after the last field, you'll return to the Christmas Card List window. OR, you can press the Control-W key combination to force the program to accept what you've entered at that point. RETURNING TO THE MAIN MENU Simply press the ESCAPE key while at the Christmas Card List window. The window will disappear and you'll return to an active main menu. SHOPPING LIST This is the third portion of the system. Select this option and a Shopping List window pops up on the right hand side of your screen. This window lists people by name. The informational message on the bottom of the screen tells you to press <INSERT>, <DELETE>, <ENTER>, or <ESCAPE>. Pressing the INSERT key lets you add a new person to the list. Pressing the DELETE key lets you delete an existing person from the list. Pressing the ENTER key lets you edit an existing person in the list. Pressing the ESCAPE key exits from Shopping List Maintenance mode. It returns you to the main menu. ADDING PEOPLE At the Shopping List window, press the INSERT key. A second window pops open. You can enter a person's name and gift ideas. This window contains three fields: 1) A name field. This is a 30 character field used for a person's name. This name appears in the Shopping List list window. 2) The gift ideas field. This 64 character field is a scrolling field. Type in your gift idea. As you reach the right-hand portion of the field, the window will "scroll" to let you enter up to 64 charcters. 3) The Store field. Use this field to enter the store you'll shop for this gift. You can print a shopping list by store (in the registered version) to help you coordinate your shopping -- no more wasted trips because you "forgot" something! This field must be a "real" store. If you misspell a store name, or if you enter a blank, a window appears listing the stores you've identified in the Utilities section (see Shopping Stores in Utilities). This is a scrolling window -- you can "point" to the desired store and press ENTER to capture this information on your gift idea record. Actually, the easiest way to enter a store is to simply leave this field blank -- you'll then receive the scrolling "stores" window to select from. Your cursor is placed on the first field. You may use the up and down arrows or the ENTER key to move between the fields. The right and left arrows, the HOME key, and the END key move you back and forth within a single field. You may also use the DELETE key and the BACKSPACE key to delete characters; you may toggle insert or overstrike mode with the INSERT key. If you've opened this window unintentionally, you can exit without adding a new person. Simply press the ESCAPE key. This returns you to the Shopping List window. Once you've successfully entered the last field (the value field), you'll return to the Shopping List window. Your new person has been added to the list! (NOTE: You may also enter your person by pressing the Control-W key combination -- press the "W" key while holding down the Control key -- at any point while entering your information. This forces the program to accept the information without having to enter all the fields.) DELETING A PERSON At the Shopping List window, use your arrow keys, the PgUp and PgDn key, the Home key, or the End Key to locate the person that you wish to remove from your list. You may also try entering a name. As you press each letter in the name, the window list scrolls to names matching what you've typed in. If it can't find a match, it will "beep" at you. Once you've located and highlighted the desired name, press the DELETE key. An information message appears at the bottom of the screen asking you to confirm you wish to delete the person. If you then press the "D" key, the person will be removed from the list. You'll return to the Shopping List window. EDITING A PERSON At the Shopping List window, use your arrow keys, the PgUp and PgDn key, the Home key, or the End Key to locate the person that you wish to edit. You may also try entering a name. As you press each letter in the name, the window list scrolls to names matching what you've typed in. If it can't find a match, it will "beep" at you. Once you've located and highlighted the desired name, press the ENTER key. A second pops open (similar to the INSERT window) containing the data fields describing the person. You may then alter this information if you wish. You can use the same editing keys (BACKSPACE, arrows, DELETE, INSERT, etc) you used when adding the record. When you press ENTER after the last field, you'll return to the Shopping List window. OR, you can press the Control-W key combination to force the program to accept what you've entered at that point. RETURNING TO THE MAIN MENU Simply press the ESCAPE key while at the Shopping List window. The window will disappear and you'll return to an active main menu. PARTY CARD LIST This is the fourth portion of the system. Select this option and a Party List window pops up on the right hand side of your screen. This window lists people by name. Of course, you can use this to maintain any list of people -- not necessarily just for party invitations! The informational message on the bottom of the screen tells you to press <INSERT>, <DELETE>, <ENTER>, or <ESCAPE>. Pressing the INSERT key lets you add a new person to the list. Pressing the DELETE key lets you delete an existing person from the list. Pressing the ENTER key lets you edit an existing person in the list. Pressing the ESCAPE key exits from Party Maintenance mode. It returns you to the main menu. ADDING PEOPLE At the Party List window, press the INSERT key. A second window pops open. You can enter a person's name and address. This window contains several fields: 1) A name field. This is a 30 character field used for a person's name. This name appears in the Party List list window. 2) The first Address field. This 30 character field is the first line in the person's address. In many cases, this will be the ONLY line in the person's address ... for example, "307 St. Patrick Street". 3) The second Address field. If you need a second address line -- for an apartment number, or a P.O. box, or whatever, you can use this 30 character field. Just skip over it if you don't need it. 4) The "C/S/Z" fields. Really three fields -- the first is a 20 character "City" field, the second is a 2 character "State" field, and the third is a 9 character "Zip Code" field. Note the State field defaults to upper-case alphabetic characters. 5) A free-form "NOTES" field. This scrolling field lets you enter up to 128 charcters of free-form comments. As you reach the right-hand side of the field, it "scrolls" to let you enter more information. Your cursor is placed on the first field. You may use the up and down arrows or the ENTER key to move between the fields. The right and left arrows, the HOME key, and the END key move you back and forth within a single field. You may also use the DELETE key and the BACKSPACE key to delete characters; you may toggle insert or overstrike mode with the INSERT key. If you've opened this window unintentionally, you can exit without adding a new person. Simply press the ESCAPE key. This returns you to the Party List window. Once you've successfully entered the last field (the value field), you'll return to the Party List window. Your new person has been added to the list! (NOTE: You may also enter your person by pressing the Control-W key combination -- press the "W" key while holding down the Control key -- at any point while entering your information. This forces the program to accept the information without having to enter all four fields.) DELETING A PERSON At the Party List window, use your arrow keys, the PgUp and PgDn key, the Home key, or the End Key to locate the person that you wish to remove from your list. You may also try entering a name. As you press each letter in the name, the window list scrolls to names matching what you've typed in. If it can't find a match, it will "beep" at you. Once you've located and highlighted the desired name, press the DELETE key. An information message appears at the bottom of the screen asking you to confirm you wish to delete the person. If you then press the "D" key, the person will be removed from the list. You'll return to the Party List window. EDITING A PERSON At the Party List window, use your arrow keys, the PgUp and PgDn key, the Home key, or the End Key to locate the person that you wish to edit. You may also try entering a name. As you press each letter in the name, the window list scrolls to names matching what you've typed in. If it can't find a match, it will "beep" at you. Once you've located and highlighted the desired name, press the ENTER key. A second pops open (similar to the INSERT window) containing the data fields describing the person. You may then alter this information if you wish. You can use the same editing keys (BACKSPACE, arrows, DELETE, INSERT, etc) you used when adding the record. When you press ENTER after the last field, you'll return to the Party List window. OR, you can press the Control-W key combination to force the program to accept what you've entered at that point. RETURNING TO THE MAIN MENU Simply press the ESCAPE key while at the Party List window. The window will disappear and you'll return to an active main menu. UTILITIES: This is the fifth option on the main menu. When you select this option, a second menu window opens. This second window lets you: Change Name Build new index Select a printer Print List Shopping Stores Use the arrow keys to select an option (or press the first letter of the option). Press the ESCAPE key when you're ready to return to the Main Menu. CHANGE NAME This option lets you change the name that appears to the left of the main menu ("Welcome to xxxxx Ornament Master System"). Highlight this option and select it by pressing the ENTER key. A new window pops open, asking you to enter your name. Enter your own name. If you add an apostrophe-S ('s) at the end, it'll look a little better. If you press ESCAPE, you'll return to the Utility menu without changing anything. If you press ENTER or Control-W, you'll see your new name appear as soon as you return to the Main Menu. BUILD NEW INDEX You'll possibly never have to use this option. However, it's possible if you lose power during an editing session that you may corrupt an index file. (The index file is what keeps the ornament list in alphabetical order.) You can tell the file is corrupted because the program begins acting wierd -- most probably, you'll either get an error message or the Ornament List looks strange. If you highlight and select this option, it will reconstruct the index file. It then returns control to the Utility menu. SELECT A PRINTER Ornament Master lets you select one of 8 popular printers. If you select this option, a windows pops open listing 8 printers. They are: HP LaserJet NEC Pinwriter P2/P3 Canon LBP-8 A1/A2 Diablo 620 & 630 Generic Printer IBM Proprinter HP LaserJet 500/+/II Epson RX/FX/etc. These are some of the most popular printers. If your printer is not on the list, it probably is emulating one that is on the list -- most probably either the Diablo, the IBM Proprinter, or the Epson. (NOTE: HP LaserJet 500/+/II also supports the IID, the III, and the IIP.) If you can emulate nothing on the list, then select "Generic Printer". You select a printer by moving the bar with the arrow keys to highlight a printer and then pressing ENTER. Ornament Master saves this information. When you later try and print your ornament list, it will use the appropriate printer drivers for the printer you've selected. IMPORTANT: If you select this option, the highlighted bar will be set on the first item. If you then press ENTER to return to the Utility Menu, you've changed your printer driver to the first printer. You must either point the the appropriate printer and press ENTER, or you must press the ESCAPE key to exit without changing the selected printer. PRINT LIST When you select this option, you'll see a list of print options. In the unregistered version, the list is pretty short -- a simple Alpha List of Christmas ornaments. The registered version has a wide range of ornament listings, plus Christmas card lists and labels, and shopping lists. Use the arrow keys to select the desired reports (only one in the unregistered version). These reports are created with a run-time version of R&R Report Writer from Concentric Data. After the report prints, control returns to the Utility menu. SHOPPING STORES This option displays a list of store names. You can insert, delete, and edit store names the same way you've entered ornaments, card lists, gift ideas, etc. The purpose of the Shopping Stores is to make sure you spell all the store names consistently! When you're entering gift ideas, this is the list you must match when you select a store. Later on, you can print a shopping list by store -- the consistent spellings ensure your shopping lists are built properly. LEAVING THE UTILITY MENU To leave the Utility menu and return to the Main Menu, simply press ESCAPE at the Utility menu prompt. The Utility window will disappear and you'll return to the Main Menu. TERMINATE: The last option on the Main Menu is the Terminate option. Select this option when you're ready to leave Ornament Master and return to DOS.