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HACKDISP.DOC
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1993-08-22
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│ ███ ███ ███ ███ ██████ ███ ██▄ ██████ ▄███▄ ▀█████▀ ████▀▀ │
│ version 1.4 copyright 1992, 1993 James L. Powers │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
The screen conversion utility of choice for
LAUGHING DOG
Wildcat! 3.x
PCBoard
ANSI
display files!
brought to you by:
The Dead LEEEEEEECH! Society BBS & Mortuary
(614) 899-7839
2400-14400 baud 8N1
================================================================================
This program was written after laboriously hand-converting
an ANSI file that should have been a piece of cake for a well
known free utility widely available for WC! 3.x sysops.
From it's humble beginnings as a down and dirty 50 line
utility, HACKDISP has ballooned to some 1500+ lines of code
and boasts an extensive command line set.
HACKDISP is lazy. It works by letting DOS handle the
ANSI conversion. Your file is output to your color display
and HACKDISP lifts the characters and color attributes
directly out of screen memory. ANSI.SYS or an equivalent
ANSI driver must be loaded. There is *NO* support for ANSI
animation (other than that which your ANSI driver supports)
or WC! v2.x or PCBoard system codes.
HACKDISP will also convert from or to Laughing Dog
v1.0-v1.14 (copyright 1992, Jeff Sloan) format if the file
extension .DOG is found in the command line. HACKDISP is THE
ONLY alternative to LDOGRAB.EXE, a terminate and stay
resident screen capture program bundled with Laughing Dog
Screen Maker. No other Laughing Dog conversion utility is
known to exist. Converting your present ANSI or @-coded
screens to DOG format is quick and easy with HACKDISP!
HACKDISP creates compressed Laughing Dog screens in some
cases tighter than Laughing Dog itself and can also create
them in the uncompressed form.
HACKDISP will also convert and view PCBoard @X-coded
files.
Finally, HACKDISP will take your Wildcat, PCBoard, or
Laughing Dog file and hack it back to ANSI. This is a "last
ditch" feature and HACKDISP does NOT produce the tightest
possible ANSI files. But if you lost your ANSI originals,
HACKDISP can and will get them back for you. Use a file
extension of .ANS or the /A switch on the command line to
force ANSI output.
In addition to converting files, HACKDISP will also allow
you to view the converted files or your ANSI originals in
color or black and white.
A great deal of effort has been put into making HACKDISP
produce the smallest possible WC! v3.x or PCBoard equivalent
of your ANSI or Laughing Dog files. Although this will
probably not help you save hard drive space in the long run,
it will help enhance Wildcat's or PCBoard's performance when
displaying @-coded screens, since HACKDISP's mission is to
create a display file with as few attribute changes as
possible.
It is assumed WC! 3.x sysops will know where and when to
system codes necessary to pause or clear the display and will
edit the output of HACKDISP as required. However, with the
additional support for file prefixes and suffixes in HACKDISP
v1.3, many modifications can now be made "on the fly".
HACKDISP will only handle one screen (25, 43, or 50
lines) at a time. You can specify the number of lines (1-50
depending on the current video mode) to convert on the
command line or convert the entire screen. Please note that
not all ANSI drivers can support 43 and 50 line mode! If you
convert a screen while in 43 or 50 line mode but view it in
25 line mode, HACKDISP will scroll the display.
HACKDISP will refuse to run on monitors with less than 80
columns or versions of DOS less than 3.0!
HACKDISP will neither convert nor display files larger
than 65,535 bytes. That's the breaks. Got one? I'd like to
see it!
HACKDISP writes directly to screen memory during
conversion and display and may cause "snow" on some CGA
systems.
HACKDISP has been tested under DESQview and LANtastic and
works well under either environment. HACKDISP supports
SHARE.EXE but opens and closes most files so quickly that
it's hardly worth the bother.
HACKDISP is free for personal and non-business use.
================================================================================
================================================================================
Usage:
To convert ANSI files to WC! 3.x @COLOR@ codes:
HACKDISP [d:\path\] INPUT_FILE.EXT [d:\path\] OUTPUT_FILE.EXT
To convert Laughing Dog v1.0 files to WC! 3.x @COLOR@ codes:
HACKDISP [d:\path\] INPUT_FILE.DOG [d:\path\] OUTPUT_FILE.EXT
^^^
To convert ANSI or WC! 3.x files to Laughing Dog v1.0 format:
HACKDISP [d:\path\] INPUT_FILE.EXT [d:\path\] OUTPUT_FILE.DOG
^^^
To convert nn lines of the present screen to WC! 3.x @COLOR@ codes:
HACKDISP SCREEN [d:\path\] OUTPUTFILE.EXT /L=nn
The value of nn is in the range 1-50 and will default to the
maximum number of screen lines if omitted. nn is disregarded
if you are converting to Laughing Dog format.
To view converted files in COLOR:
HACKDISP [d:\path\] FILENAME.EXT
To view converted files in B&W:
HACKDISP [d:\path\] FILENAME.EXT /B
Please note HACKDISP does NOT recognize wildcards in filenames!
================================================================================ =======================================================================
-=≡COMMAND LINE SWITCHES IN DEPTH≡=-
/N Ignore all spaces from bottom of screen to last character
of last non-blank line.
/F Fast conversion. No default 2 second delay. Ignored
when files are displayed. When converting to Laughing
Dog format, forces UNCOMPRESSED format.
/P=text Define file prefix. For instance, you might want to
convert an ANSI score file from a game to a WC 3.x
bulletin:
HD SCORE.ANS C:\WC30\BULL\BULL1.BBS /F/N/P=@07@@CLS@^M
This will prepend @07@@CLS@ and a CR/LF pair to
BULL1.BBS, do it fast, and end the file at the last
character of the last non-blank line. You can use as
many ^M's as the command line will allow. Some ANSI
drivers may take ^M (caret-M, NOT Ctrl-M) literally and
ignore everything after it. In this case, use ~M to
force a CR/LF pair.
/S=text Define file suffix. As above:
HD SCORE.ANS C:\WC30\BULL\BULL1.BBS /F/N/P=@CLS@/S=~M@PAUSE@
This will prepend @CLS@ to BULL1.BBS and append a CR/LF
pair and @PAUSE@ to the end of the bulletin.
/CLS This switch will prepend @CLS@@NOPAUSE@ to your converted
file. Good choice for making bulletins on the fly when
combined with /S=^M@PAUSE@. When output is ANSI, the
escape code "^[2J" is prepended to the file. No effect
whatsoever when output is PCBoard (use a file prefix).
/PC Force PCBoard output.
/A Force ANSI output.
/TDF Fix Wildcat @-coded files produced by utilities or
drawing programs that do not reset the background
attribute to black at the end of a line. Used during
conversion only.
/I Ignore WC! @-codes in a primarily ANSI file. Effectively
shuts off auto-detect of @-coded display files and forces
ANSI input. Strips @-codes from the beginning and end of
a file. For displaying or converting. Used, for
instance, when you want to display or convert an ANSI
screen that begins with a @CLS@ and ends with a @PAUSE@,
and you are too lazy to edit out the @-codes. Rarely
used. HACKDISP will not allow you to use this switch
with the /O (overwrite) switch. Very likely to cause
strange results with PCBoard files.
/D=xxx Delay for xxx seconds after converting or viewing a
file. Ignored during conversion if /F is specified on
the command line.
/L=xx Convert only xx lines of display. If xx is greater than
the maximum lines available, HACKDISP will harass you and
hurt your feelings.
/R When enabled, HACKDISP will attempt to read or write to
locked files once a second for ten seconds if the initial
attempt fails. HACKDISP will emit a clicking sound while
retrying the file. No retries will be made if this
parameter is left out and HACKDISP will notify you of the
error at program exit. Can be used during conversion or
while viewing.
HACKDISP will yell at you if you use this switch and
SHARE.EXE is not installed!
/@ Force HACKDISP to recognize a poorly made @-coded file.
HACKDISP recognizes a Wildcat or PCBoard @-coded file IF
AND ONLY IF the first character in the file is the "@"
symbol. In my opinion, any file that purports to be
@-coded MUST start with either an attribute (@xx@),
@CLS@, @NOPAUSE@, or whatever. Files that do NOT are
considered poorly made.
/B Viewing only. Views files in black and white.
/? View HACKDISP help screen.
Invalid command line switches are ignored. Switches may be
separated by spaces or run together to save command line space.
However, the slash character ("/") MUST be used. The underscore
character ("_") in file prefixes or suffixes will be translated
into a space. File prefixes and suffixes are not applicable when
converting to LAUGHING DOG format.
All command line parameters (including suffixes and prefixes) are
forced to UPPER CASE by HACKDISP. HACKDISP terminates with
ERRORLEVEL 0 upon success, non-zero otherwise.
================================================================================
HACKDISP DOES WHAT TOMCAT CAN'T!
================================================================================
Tomcat has an internal ANSI translation buffer that is
just TOO SMALL for some @-coded screens! If a line on your
"problem screen" has a lot of attribute changes and Tomcat
overflows this buffer, the rest of that line is just plain
GONE.
ZAP! Adios! Siyonara!
The result is an UGLY CHOPPED UP ANSI SCREEN in your
users' QWK packets which makes YOU, the sysop, look like an
idiot.
I think this bug could be easily fixed by analyzing the
worst case scenario: every character in a line could have a
completely different attribute from the preceding character,
requiring a twelve-byte ANSI escape sequence to change the
attribute of each character. This would make the buffer
(13*80)+1 bytes long. Indeed, a 1K buffer would suffice for
99.99% of ALL @-coded screens.
HACKDISP's support for ANSI actually grew out of MSI's
seeming unwillingness to solve this SIMPLE problem.
If you have an @-coded screen that Tomcat can't handle,
try this in your MAIL.BAT file:
CD DISP
HD HELLO1.BBS HELLO1.SCR /A/F/CLS/N/S=^M@PAUSE@
CD\WC30
TOMCAT
CD DISP
DEL HELLO1.SCR
Sysops of multi-line BBS's may also want to use the /R
switch to avoid SHARE conflicts.
This should fool Tomcat into thinking the *.SCR file is
the REAL color screen and your users shouldn't have any weird
truncated screens in their QWK packets. But remember, if you
have any cursor-positioning ANSI escape sequences embedded in
an @-coded screen, HACKDISP will treat them as valid
characters and totally destroy your screen.
Of course, this practice of changing @-coded screens back
to ANSI screens with a third-party utility is absolutely
ridiculous. It shouldn't be necessary. If you have too many
screens that require this, the best advice is to forget
@-codes completely and use separate .SCR and .BBS display
files.
After all, if your MSI software doesn't totally support
@-codes, why should you?
Are they listening?
================================================================================
================================================================================
-=≡POST CRYPT≡=-
If you experience any difficulty converting any ANSI,
PCBoard, or LDOG file, viewing any converted file, or if you
are experiencing strange results when a converted file is
displayed by Wildcat, please feel free to upload the original
ANSI or LDOG file and the file created by HACKDISP to the
"Sysop ONLY" file section of The Dead LEEEEEEEECH! Society
BBS & Mortuary at (614)899-7839 and the problem will be
investigated. Please leave a message indicating which
Wildcat version you are using! I also "hang around" in the
MSI Support Net conferences, so drop me a message there.
If you get what appear to be weird results when
displaying a file created by another utility, note that
HACKDISP displays your files in "worst case mode"! That
bulletin or menu you're so fond of my look fine while you sit
in front of Wildcat's local display, but do you REALLY know
what your caller is seeing? HACKDISP knows.
Remember that if your ANSI or LDOG screen uses all 80
columns, the local Wildcat display may insert blank lines.
Remote viewing will look fine. It's best to use a maximum of
79 columns if you want things to look pretty on both ends.
Also, HACKDISP will display characters that Wildcat, some
modems, and many communications programs may not like.
However, since most ANSI drawing programs don't offer 90% of
these characters, it shouldn't be a problem.
@-coded files that use ANSI escape sequences for cursor
positioning will also not display properly and TABs are NOT
expanded by HACKDISP.
Beware of ASCII 127! It is the "tiny house" or "delta"
character () in the IBM graphics character set, but it is
hardwired in several telecommunications packages as a
backspace. Too bad. Nice little character. At least all
MSI products will display it intelligently.
Since HACKDISP uses your computer's ANSI driver, a full
screen (25 line) ANSI file will scroll up and you WILL lose
the topmost line. The best workaround for this so far is to
pop into 43 or 50 line mode and specify /N on the command
line. Of course, if you only have a CGA monitor, you are out
of luck. An internal ANSI driver for HACKDISP is currently
in the works. When it's finished HACKDISP will also be able
to convert more than the current 50 line maximum.
MODE CON LINES=xx may NOT work with drivers other than
ANSI.SYS!
Displaying a single "@" character is still a hassle.
HACKDISP will always display one correctly, but Wildcat gets
horribly confused whenever it encounters one. Avoid them
like the plague and complain about it to MSI. It's not my
problem. I hereby propose that "@@@" or "@@" should be the
@-code for the "@" character.
THANKS FOR DOWNLOADING HACKDISP!
================================================================================
================================================================================
-=≡STANDARD DISCLAIMER≡=-
Not responsible for direct, indirect, incidental or
consequential damages resulting from any defect, error, or
failure to perform. No other warranty expressed or implied.
Some of the trademarks mentioned in this product appear for
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persons, living or dead is purely coincidental. Void where
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may settle during shipment. Use only as directed. Do not
use while operating a motor vehicle or heavy equipment.
Postage will be paid by addressee. Apply only to affected
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