Using The Workbench


Take a moment right now to look at your pull down menus on your Workbench. Notice the far right menu item that says TOOLS and the only command under it is RESETWB? That menu was put there for programmers who wanted to add their own menu items to the pull downs. You can utilize it for your own use! You can make menu items that will launch programs, copy disks, or anything you might want! There are several public domain programs like ToolsDaemon and Tool Manager that will help you do this. Each program has its own way of doing business so check the documentation that comes with the program to find out how to set things up. It is a lot easier than opening a hundred windows to get to your favorite programs. Being in the Workbench environment is rather limited, but you can access a lot of power here all the same if you know what you are doing. As you know, not every file has an icon to activate it. What gives a file an icon is another tiny file called the .info file. This little file actually holds the graphic information that you see displayed on your Workbench. It also holds the coordinates of where on the screen your icon is placed when displayed. As you may already know, you may change how the icon looks and how it looks when it is selected or clicked on. The program called ICON EDIT on your Workbench disk or partition will help you do the deed. There are also several PD programs that will do it even better as ICON EDIT is pretty basic. Any program that has an icon can be manipulated with the mouse on the Workbench by simply clicking once on the icon and using the pull down menus under ICONS to DELETE, RENAME, etc. Most programs, though, contain more than simply one program file. Most of them have many data files that go along with it. Many programmers are kind enough to put related files together in a single directory for ease of moving, deleting, etc. If for some reason this is not the case and you find yourself with a directory of twenty or thirty programs, here is a little trick you can do. Although it is documented in the manual, many people don't think about it. You can make the Workbench show you ALL the files in a directory, not just the ones with icons. Once all the files are displayed, you can manipulate them in the standard way. Look on the WINDOWS pull down for a command that says SHOW FILES and select ALL. Now all the files in that window (drawer) are now visible with 'pseudo' icons. Play away! Another little known command is the ability to select multiple icons for the purpose of deleting, copying, etc. to save time. You will notice that you can only select one icon at a time. To rectify that problem, hold down your SHIFT key while selecting icons. You will be able to highlight as many as you want. Now, you can select delete or drag ALL the files to another drawer for copying. Pretty neat. Another very basic function that goes unnoticed for the most part is the EXECUTE COMMAND menu item. With this option, you may send a command to DOS just like you were in a SHELL, but not actually open a SHELL window. This could be useful if you are very tight on memory or just wanted to do one single command and not spend the extra time opening a SHELL. When activated, it will open up a requester and you simply type in the command. It is a good way to open a SHELL from the Workbench if you don't have another fast means to do so. This command would also be handy for those with removable media hard drives such the Syquest drive where they have to execute a DISKCHANGE command when they swap cartridges. This way is much easier than opening a SHELL and doing it. Many people like to have custom programs running on the Workbench such as a clock, Tool Manager, a virus checker, etc. Now in the old AmigaDOS there was no real easy accommodation for this. If you wanted to do this, you would have to learn to use the SHELL (CLI back then). Now with 2.0 or better, you have a neat little drawer called WBSTARTUP on your Workbench disk or partition. Any file you 'drop' or copy in there will automatically be executed for you when your Workbench loads up! So if you wanted VirusZ to run on startup, just drop the icon in this drawer and it will be done. A great tool for those who do not want to learn the ways of the SHELL. The AmigaDOS OS is the most advanced easy-to-use GUI out there. Enjoy every aspect of it!

Happy Computing :)
Ian C Fyvie (Dual Editor THe CRYPT)
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