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1987-10-11
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ALARM : Alarm Clock Program and Utilities
Version 4.00, 11-Oct-1987
SMG Software
(C) Copyright 1986,1987 by
Steven Georgiades
All Rights Reserved
Table of Contents
-----------------
I. Overview ........................... Page 2
II. Program Installation and Usage ..... Page 3
III. The ALARM Configuration File ....... Page 5
IV. Revision History ................... Page 6
V. Additional Utilities ............... Page 7
VI. Program Restrictions ............... Page 7
VII. Program License .................... Page 8
VIII. Program Registration ............... Page 8
IX. Disclaimer ......................... Page 9
X. Reporting Problems ................. Page 9
1
ALARM, Version 4.00 Page 2
I. OVERVIEW
The ALARM program provides a memory resident alarm clock with
eight different alarms, each of which can be set to go off at a
different time of day. This is useful to signal the user about a
meeting, a lunch date, or an appointment. ALARM also has four
reminders, which can be set to go off at different time intervals.
These are useful for reminding the user to perform periodic tasks, such
as doing saves while editing, or taking medication. Each of the eight
alarms and four reminders may have a user-defined message associated
with it, up to 32 characters in length. When the alarm time is reached
(or when the reminder interval has expired), the computer's current
activity will be suspended, and a window will appear in the middle of
the screen indicating the alarm or reminder number, the current time,
and the corresponding message. In addition, a musical tune will be
played, as specified in the alarm configuration file. Using the
supplied tune-files and configuration file (ALARM.CFG), these tunes
will be as follows:
Alarm #1 : Funeral March of the Marionettes
Alarm #2 : Carnival
Alarm #3 : Holiday Road
Alarm #4 : When The Saints Go Marching In
Alarm #5 : Fur Elise
Alarm #6 : O' Solo Mio
Alarm #7 : Turkey in the Straw
Alarm #8 : Aura Lee
Reminder #1 : Oh! Susanna
Reminder #2 : London Bridge
Reminder #3 : Mary had a Little Lamb
Reminder #4 : Yankee Doodle
Note that upon installation, the message associated with each alarm or
reminder is set to the title of the corresponding tune. In all cases,
a tune can be terminated before completion by pressing the Escape key.
Once an alarm or reminder has sounded, the window will disappear
immediately, unless it was set to persist. In this case the window will
remain (persist) on the screen until the Escape key is pressed. If a
second alarm time should be reached before the Escape key is pressed,
that alarm will supersede the first, and the first one will be aborted.
In addition to alarms and reminders, the ALARM program also has
Westminster chimes which can be enabled to sound on the hour, half-hour
or quarter-hour. The chimes can also be disabled.
A facility is also included to disable the ALARM program
completely. This is useful when executing programs which may be
adversely affected by a pop-up window, such as FORMAT or disk
optimizing software.
ALARM, Version 4.00 Page 3
II. PROGRAM INSTALLATION AND USAGE
In order for the ALARM program to work, it must first be installed
as resident in memory. This is accomplished by one of the following
commands:
ALARM I or ALARM Ifilename.ext
The first form will look for the default configuration file, ALARM.CFG,
in the current directory. If not found, ALARM will use no
configuration data and will install a very simple (and very boring)
form of the program, with "beeps" instead of tunes. The second form
will look for the specified configuration file. If not found, an error
will be flagged. Note that the filename may optionally include a drive
letter and/or a path specification. For more information on the ALARM
configuration file, see section III, below.
Once installed in memory, three sub-systems are available: Alarms,
Reminders, and Chimes. The Alarms Sub-System consists of eight alarms,
which may be set by issuing one of the following commands:
ALARM An=hh:mm or ALARM An=hh:mm/"msg"
ALARM An=*hh:mm or ALARM An=*hh:mm/"msg"
where "n" is the alarm number (1 to 8), "hh:mm" is the alarm time, in
24-hour format (5:00 pm is 17:00), and "msg" is an optional alarm
message which may be up to 32 characters in length. If "msg" is
omitted, as in the left column above, then the alarm message remains
unchanged. If an asterisk ("*") is specified with the alarm time, as
in the bottom row above, then that alarm is set to persist. Individual
alarms may be enabled, disabled, queried, and tested, respectively, by
entering the following commands:
ALARM An+ ALARM An- ALARM An? ALARM AnT
Disabling an alarm will not change it's setting. When it is once again
enabled, it will still be set to the same time as before it was
disabled. Note that the act of setting an alarm enables it. The query
option will list the alarm number, the current setting (or OFF if
disabled), and the current message associated with that alarm. Testing
an alarm will cause an alarm window to pop up and the tune to be
played, just as if the alarm time had been reached. This will work
regardless of whether the specified alarm is enabled.
In addition to this, the entire Alarms Sub-System may be enabled,
disabled, or queried, as follows:
ALARM A+ ALARM A- ALARM A?
Disabling the Alarms Sub-System will disable all eight alarms. This is
different from disabling all eight alarms individually, since disabling
and re-enabling the Alarms Sub-System will preserve the enable/disable
status of each alarm. Querying the Alarms Sub-System is equivalent to
querying each of the eight alarms individually.
ALARM, Version 4.00 Page 4
II. PROGRAM INSTALLATION AND USAGE (Continued)
The Reminders Sub-System behaves virtually the same as the Alarms
Sub-System, the only major difference being that a Reminder Interval
("mm") must be specified, instead of an Alarm Time ("hh:mm"). The
reminder interval may be from 1 to 255 minutes. Note that there are
only 4 reminders, so "n" must be in the range 1 to 4. To set a
reminder, use the following commands:
ALARM Rn=mm or ALARM Rn=mm/"msg"
ALARM Rn=*mm or ALARM Rn=*mm/"msg"
To enable, disable, query or test individual reminders, use the
following commands:
ALARM Rn+ ALARM Rn- ALARM Rn? ALARM RnT
To enable, disable or query the entire Reminders Sub-System, use the
following commands:
ALARM R+ ALARM R- ALARM R?
The Chimes Sub-System enables the user to select Westminster
Chimes to sound on the quarter hour, the half hour, or on the hour, as
follows:
ALARM C15 ALARM C30 ALARM C60
Note that only these three values are permitted for chime intervals.
All other values will cause an error. The Chimes Sub-System may be
enabled, disabled, or queried by the following commands:
ALARM C+ ALARM C- ALARM C?
In addition to all of the above, there are Global ALARM Program
functions, which enable you to completely disable the ALARM program,
re-enable ALARM, and query all ALARM parameters, as follows:
ALARM - ALARM + ALARM ?
The global disable will cease all ALARM functions until alarm is re-
enabled. The global query will respond with the status of the ALARM
program, as well as the complete status of all Sub-Systems.
ALARM, Version 4.00 Page 5
III. THE ALARM CONFIGURATION FILE
The ALARM program allows the user to customize the alarm tunes to
his or her liking through use of a configuration file. The
configuration file is a simple ASCII file which may be created using
any standard text editor, or word processor with an ASCII save option.
This file must contain at least twelve lines, the first eight of which
must contain the eight alarm tune entries, and the remainder of which
must contain the four reminder tune entries. Any additional lines
found in the configuration file beyond these 12 are read in by ALARM
and interpreted exactly as if they were found on the command line of
the ALARM program.
Each tune entry may be a file specification (with optional drive
and/or path, i.e. [d:][path/]filename.ext), or one of a few special
codes, explained below. If a file specification is given, ALARM will
look for that file, and if not found, will flag an error. Note that if
no drive is specified, the current default drive is assumed, and if no
path is specified, the current default directory is used.
The special codes that are permitted in a tune entry are a blank
line (CR only, no spaces or tabs), a double quote character ("), or a
pound sign (#) followed by a single digit, 1 to 9. A blank line
indicates to ALARM that you wish for that tune to be set to the
program's default tune, a simple series of tones. The quote character
indicates that you wish for that tune entry to be identical to the
preceding tune entry. Finally, the "#" character indicates that the
current tune entry should be made identical to the tune entry
corresponding to the following digit, i.e. "#2" in the 6th line would
indicate that the tune for alarm #6 should be identical to the tune for
alarm #2. Note that this form MUST point to a preceding tune: it
cannot point forward, or an error will be flagged. Also note that only
the first nine tunes can be repeated using this method, since only a
single digit is recognized. Using the quote or "#" options will reduce
the amount of memory that the ALARM program occupies, since a repeated
tune will only appear once in memory.
Twelve standard tune files are supplied with the ALARM program,
and 19 additional tunes are available in the optional file,
ALMTUNES.ARC. In addition, the user may create his own custom tunes,
using the ATC utility, discussed in section VI, below, and in ATC.DOC.
Additional optional tune sets may be released from time to time.
ALARM, Version 4.00 Page 6
IV. REVISION HISTORY
The development of the ALARM program has been evolutionary (though
not necessarily REVolutionary). Since the first release, I have been
getting a great deal of feedback from users, which has helped ALARM to
become what it is today.
Version 3.10 Initial Release.
Version 3.11 The program was modified to permit poly-phonic
music (chords).
Version 3.12 The program was modified to allow for more
accurate timekeeping, and the quarter-hour
chimes were changed to hourly.
Version 3.13 The program was modified to add the persist
option, and to permit the user to interrupt an
alarm tune in progress. (Thanks to Robert
Warren of El Paso for these suggestions)
Version 3.14 The program was modified to fix bugs in the
persist option, and improve it's usefulness.
The hourly chimes were also modified to
disappear upon completion.
Version 3.15 The program was modified to fix a bug that
would cause the program to re-install if run
above the 512K boundary.
Version 3.20 The program was modified to allow alarm
overlaps.
Version 4.00 MAJOR REVISION. This new version increases
the number of alarms from 5 to 8, enhances the
chimes to allow for a user-specified chime
interval of 15, 30 or 60 minutes, adds four
reminders (NEW), adds the ability to disable
the ALARM program completely, allows the user
to create his own customized alarm tunes, adds
configuration file support, and numerous other
minor changes and improvements. Users of
older versions should read the documentation
thoroughly.
ALARM, Version 4.00 Page 7
V. ADDITIONAL UTILITIES
Included with the ALARM program are three special utilities which
make it a much more powerful program. Each of these utilities has it's
own documentation file, but a brief description is given here.
The first utility is DTCHK, the Date and Time Check Utility. This
program allows you to test the current date, time, and/or day-of-week
from within a batch file, and conditionally execute code. This is
useful for setting alarms based on the date. For example, if you want
to be reminded to attend a 10:00 status meeting every friday, but don't
wish to have an alarm go off EVERY day at 10:00, you can use DTCHK
within your AUTOEXEC.BAT to set that alarm ONLY on fridays. See
DTCHK.DOC for more information.
Another utility is ATC, the Alarm Tune Compiler. This is the
program which allows you to create your own customized tunes. A music
"source" file is created using a text editor or word processor, and
this file is compiled by ATC into a tune file, suitable for use with
ALARM. Tunes created with ATC may also be played using ATP.
ATP is the Alarm Tune Play Utility. This is used to play tunes
compiled with ATC, or the tunes supplied with the ALARM program. This
program is supplied to allow the user to hear what tunes sound like
without having to install them into ALARM (or just to play tunes for
fun). See ATC.DOC for more information on both ATC and ATP.
VI. PROGRAM RESTRICTIONS
The ALARM program should work on any IBM PC, XT, AT or compatible,
running DOS Version 2.0 or later. In order for the program to run,
there must be at least 20K bytes of free memory in the system. When
installed, the resident portion will occupy between 4K and 10K bytes,
depending upon the configuration. The sum of the lengths of all
installed tunes files must not exceed 7503 bytes.
ALARM, Version 4.00 Page 8
VII. PROGRAM LICENSE
The ALARM program is copyrighted material, but is distributed as
ShareWare. "ShareWare" means that you are granted free license to use,
copy and distribute this software, within the following restrictions:
1). It must be distributed in its original, unmodified form,
including program, documentation and all associated files.
2). No fee may be charged for use, copying or distribution
(With the exception of nominal "per disk" copying charges,
not to exceed $6.00 per disk).
3). The program may not be included with other goods or
services supplied for a fee, unless written permission to
do so is obtained in advance from the author.
VIII. PROGRAM REGISTRATION
Since ALARM is ShareWare, you have no legal obligation to
register. But if you are using the program, and find it helpful, you
are expected to register. Registration fees are as follows:
Full Registration (w/full support) ........ $35.00
Basic Registration (w/basic support) ...... $20.00
Please make checks payable to Steven M. Georgiades. Note that you are
not LEGALLY obligated to register, but if you use the software
regularly, you are MORALLY obligated to do so. Aside from easing your
conscience, basic registration will also get you a diskette containing
the latest version of the software (unless you currently have the
latest version, in which case I will send you the next major revision),
and basic user support, which means that I will work with you to
resolve problems, and will do minor customization. Full registration
will get you everything that basic registration does, plus full user
support, which includes telephone support and all major revisions of
the software for a period of two (2) years from the date of
registration. When you register, please specify the name of the
program, and the version number. Fully registered users will also be
eligible to receive custom tune creation, by sending me a copy of the
sheet music. If you do not have the sheet music, send me the title and
composer, or any other information you have to identify the tune, and I
will do my best.
Source code for ALARM and it's subsidiary programs is available to
all registered users for a fee of $75.00. The source code for ALARM
and ATP is Microsoft Macro Assembler, Version 5.0, and for ATC and
DTCHK, is Microsoft C, Version 4.0. All source code is COPYRIGHTED
material and is NOT shareware, and therefore may NOT be copied or
distributed.
Note that no support will be given to unregistered users EXCEPT in
the case of MAJOR bugs which prevent the user from using the program.
I will then do my best to resolve these problems so that the user may
evaluate the software fully.
ALARM, Version 4.00 Page 9
IX. DISCLAIMER
This program is provided AS IS without any warranty, expressed or
implied, including but not limited to fitfulness for a particular use
or purpose. Neither the author nor SMG Software assume liability for
any damages incurred through the use of the program.
The ALARM, DTCHK, ATC and ATP programs are:
(C) Copyright 1987 Steven Georgiades
X. REPORTING PROBLEMS
If you have any problem, or feel you have found a bug in these or
any other SMG programs, please let me know. I also welcome any and all
questions and comments. Address all correspondence (including
registrations) to the following address:
Steven Georgiades
SMG Software
701-H South Hayward Street
Anaheim, CA 92804
Or leave a message for me on the Circuit Board:
The Circuit Board RBBS
SysOp: Dave Kleinschmidt
(714) 778-0948
1200/2400 Baud, No Fee
All SMG Software is initially released to the public through the
Circuit Board. The latest version of any SMG Software can always be
found there.
A diskette containing all of the latest SMG Software can be obtained by
sending a check or money order for $6.00 to the above address. Make
all checks payable to Steven M. Georgiades. Thank you.