 Contents

 WinCIS Charges calculates general and detailed information about CompuServe calls, connect time and charges from WinCIS log files.  By default, the program calculates and displays information about these quantities for the current month.

Interface

Menu Bar

File Commands

Options Commands

Details of Operation and Limitations

This program was developed using log files produced by WinCIS, version 0.94C.  WinCIS was developed by Larry Lee, CIS ID:  77670,1471.

Direct comments and questions about WinCIS Charges  to:

Jack McDowell

CIS ID:  72707, 642


 Interface

 WinCIS Charges calculates and displays information about CompuServe calls, connect time and charges for a specific month or year.  For incomplete time periods, projected charges are also calculated and displayed.

Pricing Plan Option Buttons

Either the Standard Pricing Plan or the Alternative Pricing Plan can be selected for calculating charges.  Fees for these plans are listed in the Rates dialog box.

Add-Base-Fee Check Box

When this box is checked, to-date and projected charges include the monthly flat fee for basic services (when the Standard Pricing Plan is selected) or the monthly membership fee (when the Alternative Pricing Plan is selected).  Addition of the monthly base fee is reflected in the yearly graphs.  For the current month the base fee is added to the total cost on the first day of the month, but is added to the average cost on a prorated basis (see Details).

Additional Features of the Interface

The graph shows charges for each day or month.  In the white box are listed the total number of calls, the total connect time, and the total costs to date, along with the average and projected number of calls, connect time, and costs.


 Menu Bar

 File commands on the menu bar are used to open log files, reprocess log files, save and export information calculated by WinCIS Charges,  view and change CompuServe rate information, and save WinCIS Charges settings.  Options commands on the menu bar are used to display call, time and cost detail, and to switch between monthly and yearly time periods.


 File Commands

 The following commands are accessed by selecting File from the WinCIS Charges menu.

Open is used to select a new log file.

Refresh reprocesses the current log file.  This command is useful for recalculating charges after completing a CompuServe session.  If the Show Year option is checked, then only the current month's log file is reprocessed.

Save charges saves the information calculated by WinCIS Charges to a text file with the default name wcyymm??.chg, where yy and mm are the year and month of the log file (mm = 00 for a full year).  The first ? identifies the pricing plan (s for Standard Plan, a for Alternative Plan).  The second ? is b if the base fee is added to the charges; this character is omitted if the base fee is not added to the charges.

Export charges exports the detail calculated by WinCIS Charges to a comma-delimited text file with the default name wcyymm??.exp, where yy and mm are the year and month of the log file (mm = 00 for a full year).  The first ? identifies the pricing plan (s for Standard Plan, a for Alternative Plan).  The second ? appears in full-year file names only and is b if the base fee is added to the charges; this character is omitted from the full-year file name if the base fee is not added to the charges.  The comma-delimited text files contain unrounded data that can be imported into many spreadsheet and database programs.

Rates opens the Rates dialog box, which lists CompuServe's fees as of 28 February 1993.  WinCIS Charges uses the rates in this table for all calculations.  New rates can be entered in the text boxes when necessary.  If newly entered rates are not saved by selecting Save Settings, a "Save new settings?" prompt is generated before the program terminates.

Save settings saves the schedule of fees listed in the Rates dialog box, the status of the Pricing Plan option buttons, and status of the Add Base Fee check box to the wccharge.ini file.


 Options Commands

 The following commands are accessed by selecting Options from the WinCIS Charges menu.

Show Detail opens the detail window which shows call, time, and cost detail by day or month.

Show Year toggles between monthly and yearly time periods.


 Details of Operation and Limitations

 Details

1.  WinCIS Charges accommodates different baud rates for different on-line sessions.  For example, the program correctly calculates CompuServe charges if one session occurs at 9600 bps and a second occurs at 2400 bps.

2.  The program correctly calculates values for sessions that span midnight.

3.  Slight discrepancies may occur between displayed projected values and projected values calculated from displayed averages due to rounding error in the displayed averages.  The program calculates projected values from unrounded averages.

4.  When the Add Base Fee check box is checked for the current (incomplete) month, the total month-to-date cost includes the full monthly base fee.  However, the average daily cost includes only a prorated portion of this fee.  This means that the average daily cost calculated from the displayed total month-to-date cost will not agree with the displayed average, although the two values will converge as the month progresses.

Limitations

This version of WinCIS Charges calculates charges for all connect time, including time in basic services (regardless of the status of the Pricing Plan option buttons) and time in free forums.  It does not take into account communications surcharges or additional charges for special services, and it does not provide forum detail.  If there is interest in these or other features, it might be possible to incorporate them in a later version of WinCIS Charges.  In the meantime, the greatest accuracy will be obtained by users who do not incur communications surcharges, do not use premium services, and who turn off WinCIS session logging before going online to access basic services (if on the Standard Pricing Plan) or free forums.  WinCIS session logging can be turned off and on by selecting Settings|Processing Options from the WinCIS main menu.


 WinCIS log files are located in your WinCIS directory and are named wcisyymm.log, where yy and mm are the year and month of the log.


 Projected charges are based on average charges to date for the incomplete time period.


 This initialization file is located in your windows directory and was created by WinCIS Charges the first time it ran on your system.


 Time is expressed in hh:mm:ss format, where hh is hours, mm is minutes, and ss is seconds.


 Projected values are based on average values to date for the incomplete time period.