Shareware Grab Bag/Shareware Grab Bag.iso/005/solveit.arc/SOLVEIT.DOC

Text File | 1986-12-14 | 29.8 KB | 533 lines

                                SOLVE-IT
                                (C) 1986
                            Pine Grove Software


                 WHEN YOU NEED AN ANSWER AND YOU NEED IT NOW!

     SOLVE-IT is simple to run. There are no installation routines for you to
be concerned with in order to us the program.  Copy the version of SOLVE-IT
that you want to use to your work disk. Once SOLVE-IT is on your work disk,
whether it be floppy or hard, put the original away for safe keeping. After
30 days have passed since the original purchase, replacement disks will cost
$10. Remember, never work with the original.

         BEFORE WE GET STARTED....PLEASE UNDERSTAND THAT SOLVE-IT IS
     A SHAREWHARE PROGRAM. THAT IS YOU ARE FREE TO COPY THIS PROGRAM
     AND SHARE IT WITH OTHERS. HOWEVER IT IS COPYRIGHTED, AND AS SUCH
     IF YOU USE THIS PROGRAM YOU MUST REGISTER IT BY SENDING $35 TO
     THE ADDRESS LISTED AT THE END OF THIS DOCUMENTATION. THE
     SHAREWARE CONCEPT ALLOWS YOU TO TEST A PROGRAM BEFORE YOU
     BUY IT. IT'S PURPOSE IS NOT TO GIVE YOU FREE SOFTWARE! PLEASE SEE
     ADDITIONAL NOTICES AT THE END OF THIS MANUAL. AND THANK YOU.

     If you have not already done so, you should read the READ.ME file that
is on your disk. This file will explain the different programs that come on
the distribution disk and any changes that have been made to the program
since these instructions were written. The first thing that you need to do
after making your working copies is to decide if you want SOLVE-IT to be
installed into memory and run as a memory resident program or if you want to
run it as a non resident application.  Aside from how you call up each
version, both programs operate exactly the same way.

     If you are running the memory resident version of SOLVE-IT you may call
up the routines by hitting the "hot-key" that is displayed on the title
screen when you first run the program. DO NOT RUN THE MEMORY RESIDENT VERSION
OF THE PROGRAM MORE THAN ONCE DURING ANY ONE SESSION. To do so will cause you
to use far more memory than is required. If you are going to run it as a
stand alone application, just typing in the program's name, while the program
is in the default drive, will cause the first of the two main menus to be
displayed.

     SOLVE-IT is menu driven so that it is easy for the novice to learn.
However, once one becomes familiar with the menus and the letters that
activate each routine the user does not need to wait for the entire menu to
be displayed to enter a routine. Therefore, speed is not sacrificed for the
sake of simplicity. SOLVE-IT's menu system is easy to use. There are two
master menus for either version. They are labeled FIRST MENU and SECOND MENU.
You change menus by selecting the appropriate option. When the main menu is
visible, just select the routine that you want to run by entering the letter
shown next to the routine. Hitting the ESC key when in either the FIRST or
SECOND MENU will always cause you to exit the program. And if you are running
the memory resident version of SOLVE-IT, exiting SOLVE-IT will put you right
back in your application program, right where you were before you hit the
"hot-key" used for entering SOLVE-IT.

     The 31 routines in this program are all self prompting. After you have
made your selection, assuming that you did not select the other menu and
assuming that you did not hit ESC, you will see a new screen that is waiting
for your input.  Type in the information that is being requested, then press
ENTER or RETURN.  You will be prompted for more information.  When you are no
longer being prompted for information, the program will calculate and display
the results.  Depending upon the complexity of the calculation and the
machine that you are running on, some routine may take a couple of minutes to
provide the answer. You will be shown the message "S O L V I N G  I T!" when
such a situation occurs. In any event, this should seldom happen, but when it
does, please be patient. Delays usually occur when interest is being
compounded daily over the course of several years. You can therefore avoid
such delays by having the monies compounded monthly even if they are actually
compounded daily, for the results will not differ substantially. And in many
cases, speed will probably be more important than an Nth degree of accuracy.

     When you enter values you may use commas and dollar signs.  DO NOT use
a percent sign or a cent sign.  If you do so, the program will not accept the
input and an error message will indicate that you did not enter a valid
number.  The program will then wait for you to reenter the information.

     Remember, all interest rates are expressed as an annualized figure.
Periods Per Year means how often are the monies compounded?  Withdrawals and
deposits are done at the start of each compounding period.  Thus, if the
routine asks for a rate of interest, you might reply 12.5, meaning the
annual rate of interest is 12.5 percent.  If the rate is compounded
quarterly, then when asked how many periods, you would respond with 4.  And
finally if you want to withdrawal or deposit $1,000 a year you would have to
divide this amount by four ($250) and enter that figure since there are four
periods per year. (SIDEKICK, by Borland, would be a great aid for this
calculation.)

     At the end of each routine you are prompted for M(ain Menu) or
R(epeat)?  Type M if you want to return to the main menu from which you
called the routine or type R if you want to run another of the same
calculations with different input.  You must return to the Main Menu to quit
the program. When you select the repeat feature, each prompt will display the
value entered from the previous calculation. To accept this value simply hit
the ENTER or the RETURN key on your computer. Please note that you cannot
edit this value. That is, you cannot change just one digit for example. YOU
MUST ACCEPT THE VALUE AS IT IS DISPLAYED OR ENTER AN ENTIRELY NEW VALUE. By
accepting the previous calculations value for each entry, SOLVE-IT allows you
to very quickly calculate the results for a given problem when only one
variable changes. Suppose you wanted to demonstrate the effect that a small
change in interest rate has on a given loan, by only changing the interest
rate, you can have the answers very quickly.



     The following is a brief description of what each routine does:

                                  FIRST MENU

A: Future Value of a Deposit
     This routine will calculate the future value of a deposit. In other
words how much will a given amount be worth after a period of time when
invested at a given rate of interest.


B: Future Value of a Series
     This routine is just like the one above accept that it assumes that
there is a series of deposits being made.  That is, there are deposits being
made of a fixed amount at the start of each compounding period.  These
deposits are made for the life of the investment.  Example:  Your IRA funds
are invested at a rate of 8.8 percent compounded quarterly. You want to
invest $2,000. each year for a period of 15 years.  For this program, you
must enter $500.00 when ask for the deposit amount since it is assumed that a
deposit is made at the start of each compounding period. The program will
return to you the value of the account after the 15 years, assuming that the
same deposit was made each quarter.


C: Payment Needed for Future Sum
     This one is fun.  You want to be worth a billion in 5.5 years!  How much
do you have to deposit each compounding period at a particular rate of
interest to make it happen.


D: Present Value of Amount & Time to Double
     Your Brother-In-Law owes you 100,000 big ones due in 7.2 years.  He
offers to pay you $90,000 dollars today.  This routine will tell you if it
is a good deal.  You can throw the bum out if the present value exceeds the
90,000 that he is offering.  On the other hand you can show your wife just
how dumb the guy is if the present value is less than $90,000.
     At a given rate of interest, at a particular rate of compounding, this
will show you how long it will it take for you to double your money.


E: Present Value of a Series
     As above accept that the routine will tell you the present value of a
series of payments.  Example:  Your profit sharing may be drawn down in one
lump sum or you may accept a series of payments.  Use this routine to tell
you which is the best way to go. If the present value is worth more than the
series of payments for the period, you'll know what to do.


F: Net Present Value, Uneven Cash Flow (NPV)
     Very simple, if the result is positive, you have found an investment
that is returning your desired yield. If it is negative, it is not giving
you the return on your investment that you would hope to get.  Routine asks
for amount invested and annual interest rate that you would LIKE to earn.
You then supply the cash flows that you expect.  Each one can be different.
To stop entering cash flows, enter a 0.


G: Interest Rate Earned
     You held some stock for 3.75 years.  When you bought it it was worth
$7,500 and when you sold it it returned, after commissions, $12,274. What is
the effective annual interest rate?  If it is more that the average money
market rate for the period, pat yourself on the back.


H: Equivalent Interest Rate
     CitiTrust is offering 9.9 percent compounded daily. First Bostonian is
offering 9.5 percent compounded quarterly.  Now just exactly who is giving
you the best deal?  Run this routine to find out.


I: Withdrawal of Funds
     Congratulations! You just won the Publishers Clearing House's Grand
Prize of $125,000 and being a frugal person, you immediately run over to the
corner office of E. F. Hutton and deposit the funds in their money market
account.  Now the question is, if you withdrawal a little bit every month,
how long will your prize last you?  There will be no guessing with this
routine. This routine takes into account any interest rate, compounded for
any period and any size of withdrawal.

J: Straight-Line Depreciation
     Computes an annual depreciation table using the above method.

K: Declining-Balance Depreciation
     Computes an accelerated depreciation schedule using the above method and
prints a table. Use these tables to help decide which is the best method to
depreciate the office computer.

L: Sum-of-Years-Digits Depreciation
     Computes an accelerated depreciation schedule using the above method and
prints a table. Use these tables to help decide which is the best method to
depreciate the office computer.

M: Return on Daily Investment
     While the other routines calculate return for periods exceeding a year,
you are actually after a quicker buck. Use this routine to find out how much $2 million
will earn you overnight. (or for any other period that is less than a year.)
This assumes daily compounding of interest.

N: Economic Ordering Quantity (EOQ)
     What is the most economical quantity to order for an item?  Allows you
to input the overhead costs in processing an order.  Then the routine takes
the total annual units of an item used and the unit carrying cost (interest
rate your funds earn multiplied by the purchase price for each unit) of the
item to calculate the most economical quantity to order.  Buyers and Bosses
should love this one!

O: Get Directory & Dos Functions
     While this routine does not give you answers to financial or statistical
problems, it does provide a solution to several system orientated problems.
How often have you been annoyed by having directory listings scroll off the
screen before you could read them? Have there been times when you wanted to
see more than twenty-four directory entries at a time with all of the
statistics about the files intact? This routine will display a directory
listing, sorted in one of four ways. The display is capable of showing 52
files at one time. Using this routine, you can change the default drive and
or directory. You can also view any directory on any drive in the system.
When you choose the "O" selection from the first main menu, the default drive
and directory will be immediately displayed.
     The display gives you several important pieces of information about the
contents of your disks.  As the highlight is moved, (more on that later) the
top line is updated with the size, date and time information for the
particular highlighted file. The two lines below the file listings gives
information that is not file specific but rather drive specific. The first
item "V(iew)" serves as a reminder that hitting "V" will allow you to view
the directory for any drive. When the user chooses "V", there will be a
prompt displayed between the two bottom lines asking "View directory for
which drive?"  Simply type the letter of the drive that you wish to to see.
As with all of the options there is no need to type RETURN. And when a new
drive is displayed it will also have had the added benefit of changing the
default drive for the current application. So if the application does not
make provisions for changing drives, then you can use SOLVE-IT to accomplish
the task. With SOLVE-IT it actually takes less key strokes to view a
directory of a drive than if you were in DOS. And can you imagine how many
key strokes one would need if they had to close down an application to see a
directory listing?  (With SOLVE-IT it takes, at the most, three strokes of
the keys to see a directory of up to 52 entries. In DOS it takes 5 i.e.
"dir/w" to get the same results. Well not actually the same results, because
the operator will still not know what the file size is etc!)
     The next item on the line is a count of the free bytes remaining on the
current drive.  Next to that is a number that DOS does not give you but is
none the less very useful and that is the total bytes used in the current
directory. This is valuable information if one wants to know if a
subdirectory can be backed up to a single floppy disk.  (The total bytes used
reports only those bytes used in the current directory.  Thus total bytes
used plus total bytes free will NOT add up to the total disk space.) If one
does not have a hard disk, this feature can still be useful for trying to
squeeze a number of small programs found on one floppy onto another partially
filled floppy.  Finally, the current (default) drive and directory is the
last item shown on the first of the two lines.
     The last line starts off with a listing of the four ways that a
directory can be sorted. You will see displayed A(lpha), E(xtension),
D(ate/Time), and R(everse D/T). The default is a simple alpha sort and the
initial display shows the files sorted this way. Thus, when you first enter
this routine, A(lpha) will be printed in a reverse highlight since that is
the default way for a directory to be sorted. That is, it will be sorted
alphabetically by the name of the files. To change the sort order, just type
the first letter of any of the three other options. For example, if you wish
to see the files sorted from the newest to the oldest just type "D" and
instantly the files will be sorted and displayed in a date/time order. Also,
please note that the inverse highlight is no longer over the A(lpha) option
but rather it is over the D(ate/Time) option.  Next, M(ain) tells you that
typing "M" will take you back to the first main menu. The final item on the
line is the number of files in the current directory.
     While the last two lines only change when you change the drive, the
directory, or the sort order, the top line will change whenever you need
specific information about a specific file. By using the cursor keys located
on the numeric keypad, you can move the inverse highlight through the
listings. The arrow keys move the highlight one file at a time in the
indicated direction. The other keys on the keypad will move the highlight in
an express mode. Note that the HOME key takes you to the first listing in the
upper left corner of the screen. The END key takes you to the last file in
the lower right hand corner of the screen. The PgUp and PgDn moves the
highlight to the top of the current column and to the bottom of the current
column respectfully. If there are more files than there is room for on the
screen, the screen will be updated with more files as the highlight is moved
off the right hand side of the screen using either the right arrow key or the
down arrow key. What was the last column, now becomes the first column for the
new display. The additional files will be listed in the remaining columns.
Conversely, if one wants to go back, all one has to do is to move the cursor
to the left side of the screen and hit the left pointing arrow key once.
THESE CONTROLS ONLY WORK IF THE NUM LOCK IS NOT ACTIVATED.
     For hard disk users, listings that begin with a "\" are directories. The
user can change to a directory that the highlight is on by simply hitting
RETURN.  One can also move back through the directory hierarchy by hitting
return when the highlight cursor is on a "\.." entry. This also has the
effect of changing the default directory. So if you are in an application
that does not allow for changing the default directory, you can now
accomplish it by using this feature of SOLVE-IT.
     (If you like the idea of having these features along with several other
DOS functions available in a RAM resident program then watch for a new
program that we will be releasing in the first quarter of 1986. As always, it
will be fast, feature laden, easy to use, and moderately priced.)


P: SECOND MENU
     You guessed it, selecting "P" from the first menu will display the
second menu.


                                 SECOND MENU


A: Monthly Payment Calculation
     Your in a fix and you need to borrow 10,000 from the local loan shark.
You can borrow the funds for 2.3 years at an annual rate of interest of 22.3
percent.  What will your monthly payment be to the guy?


B: Loan/Mortgage Schedule  (Amortization Table)
     This will show you a loan schedule and what portion of any payment is
applied to interest and what part is applied to principal.  You are asked
for the loan amount, interest rate, term of the loan, and the year for
which you want the table shown.  At the end of the program you are prompted
with the usual M(ain Menu) and R(epeat) as well as A(other Year). The
difference between REPEAT and ANOTHER YEAR is that another year will use
the same loan conditions and just report back a table for a different year.
Repeat allows you to change the conditions of the loan.  Note: you can see
a table for the twelve months following the 4.5 year mark, for example,
just by entering 4.5 when asked for what year.  Also note, that when
prompted for the year the program will not allow you to enter a year
greater than the term of the loan.  This routine can be used at tax time
when you need to see how much interest you paid on a loan.
     If you would like a printed copy of the amortization table for a
particular year, just hit "SHIFT PrtSc" when your printer is on. You will
then have a hard copy of the year that is displayed on your screen.


C: Remaining Balance
     Things are a little easier now and you want to pay off some loans.
This routine will show you what the balance is on a loan after any
particular payment.


D: Accelerated Payments
     You were just promoted to head boss and with it you got a big fat
raise.  Now you can pay an extra $125.00 toward the principal on your
mortgage.  This routine will show you when your loan will be paid off and
how much interest you will save over the remainder of the loan.  The
program prompts you for the terms of the loan (years, amount, & interest
rate) as well as the year of the increase and the extra amount paid.  When
asked for year, DO NOT enter a year such as 1985, rather enter the year in
which the increase payments started, such as 3 for the third year or 9 for
the ninth year. Just for fun, assume you have a 30 year $75,000 mortgage
and you decide to pay and extra $75. per month after the fifth year.  Take
a guess as to what year the loan will be paid off in and how much interest
you will save for the balance of the loan.  Now run the routine and see how
close you came to the correct answer. Unless you are in finance, we guarantee
you will be surprised.


E: Balloon Payment
     You are considering using one of the new "creative" ways to finance a
home.  This calculates what the balloon payment is after a particular
number of years.


F: Affordable House Price
     This will help you decide what mortgage you can afford.  The routine
asks you for the annual interest rate on the loan, the length of the loan,
your annual income, an estimate of property taxes and insurance, the
percentage of your income for payments and the percentage you want to put
down.  It will use these values to figure what you can afford when shopping
for a home.


G: Mortgage With Second
     This will calculate the total monthly payment when carrying two
mortgages.  It is assumed that only the interest on the second mortgage is
being paid.


H: Rental Property Analysis
     If you are a land lord, or considering being one, this routine will
calculate your monthly cash flow from your rental property.  The routine
considers your mortgage, annual interest rate, term of the loan, annual
insurance, taxes, & maintenance and the monthly income.  Of course, if you
are a real estate agent, you can use this to show the potential income from a
piece of property. (If you are a renter, you could also figure out what your
landlord is making off of you!)

I: Combinations
     How many? This routine and the next one will give you the answer to that
often asked question. When the order of elements is NOT significant and only
which elements are present is of importance, that arrangement is called a
combination of the elements. Suppose you need to form a committee limited to
six people. However, believe it or not, you have 10 volunteers. This routine
will tell you how many different committees could be formed. Note that a
committee of say A,B,C,D,E,& F is the same as committee F,E,D,C,B,& A. And
thus, since the order of the elements is unimportant, this counts as one
combination. Note that a value can not be repeated.

J: Permutation & Ordered Arrangement
     Permutation will tell you how many different groups there are for a
given number of values filling a different number of positions. Values can be
repeated. Let's say that you want to know how many 7 digit account numbers
can be generated using the ten available digits. 1234567, 1111111, 7654321
would all be different valid account numbers. Order is important and values
can obviously be repeated.
     The ordered arrangement part of the routine will tell you how many
different combinations there are when you have say 10 potential values
filling 6 positions, and no value can be repeated.  Suppose, for simplicity's
sake, you want to know how many different 5 digit codes can be generated
using the 10 possible digits. In this example, order is important since code
54321 is different from 12345. Ordered arrangement does not allow for the
repeating of a value. (This is the routine that you would use if you want to
know how many possibilities there are for a lottery ticket.)


K: Mean, Median & Mode
     This routine and the next two are for the statisticians among you. For
all of these routines you will be given the opportunity to enter up to 1,000
values. These values, once entered, can be saved to disk or used in any of
the other statistical routines. (See routine "Q" second menu for more
details on how to save, change or retrieve the data.)  For a refresher, mean
is what is commonly called the average. In this case, you can obtain an
average on your data set of up to 1,000 values. The median is the middle
value in the data set. And mode is the value or values that occur with the
greatest frequency.

L: Range, Variance & Standard Deviation
     Range is the difference between the highest and the lowest value in the
data set. Variance is the variability about the mean. It is usually used to
compare to data sets. For example, two sets could have the same mean and even
the same mode, but one set may vary a great deal more than another. Student A
has the scores of 90, 70, and 50 on three tests, and student B has the scores
of 75, 70, and 65 on the three tests. They both have the same grade average
but student B is more dependable than student A. On the other hand, student A
shows the capacity to do better work.

M: Standard Deviation From Mean
     Exactly what it says. You will be prompted to enter a value. This
routine will tell you how many standard deviations it is from the mean of the
data set.

N: Weighted Average
     Calculates an average value for input of different values and amounts.
If you bought stock the first of each month at different prices and in
different quantities this routine will tell you what you paid in terms of
the average price per share.  To stop entering values, enter 0 at a value
prompt.  This routine will allow you to average up to 1,000 different values
and units.  If you need it to allow for more inputs, contact the author!

O: Break-Even Point
     You are about ready to market the next best seller.  This routine asks
you for your total of fixed costs. (Phone, Rent, Insurance etc.), Cost of
manufacturing the product (total cost of materials etc.) and the selling
price of the item.  It then returns to you the number of units that must be
sold to break-even in your venture.

P: Gross Profit Margin of Series
     If you manufacture a product or have sales that are made up of several
items. This routine will calculate the gross profit margin of a series of
sales for you.

Q: Save, Change or Get Data Files
     Selecting this option will allow you to save to a file the data that you
laboriously keyed in for the statistical routines. ("K", "L", & "M" above) A
menu will be displayed when you select "Q" and you will be given the three
choices that you see here. If you are keying in a quantity of data for one of
the routines, it will be here that will allow you to change a single data
item if you discover a mistake. You will be also given the option of adding
to an existing data file.
     Several words of caution. If you have enter data for one of the above
routines, and you should decide to leave SOLVE-IT you will loose your data if
you did not save it to disk. However you will be reminded that you have
entered the data and that it is not yet saved. If you wish to save it, find
your way to this section, and you will be given the opportunity to save it.

R: First Menu
     Want to go back to the first menu to rerun some of the routines found
there? Select "R" from the second menu and the first menu will be displayed
as fast as you can blink an eye. Guaranteed.

AND NOW SEVERAL WORDS OF CAUTION....
     Memory resident programs have gotten much more popular since the advent
of Borland's SideKick. And as such, there may be conflicts when several
memory resident programs are loaded into memory at the same time. Therefore,
PLEASE, BEFORE CALLING SOLVE-IT, SAVE YOUR WORK FOR THE APPLICATION THAT YOU
ARE IN. While every attempt has been made to assure you that there are no
conflicts with other popular memory resident programs, we cannot gurantee
that there will not be such conflicts. Here an ounce of prevention is worth a
pound of cure. We are sure that you will understand how no such gurantee can
be made. And that is why we include a non-resident version of the program.
SAVE YOUR WORK. You may be glad some day that you did.
     Contrary to popular belief, computers are NOT 100% accurate. Therefore,
there are bound to be some round off errors in these routines. That is why
the results you get using SOLVE-IT may be slightly different from the results
you get when you use a table in a reference book. We are very sure that
difference of say $1.23 on $75,000 loans will not be cause for great concern.
Please note though, due to the computers overflow, the Combination,
Permutation and Ordered Arraignment routines will have a large degree of
error once the results exceeds about 11 or 12 places. We hope that this does
not cause you any great concern.
     Our lawyers ask us to tell you that while all of the routines have been
thoroughly tested for their functionality, we can not be responsible for the
way in which they are used. The routines are to be used as an aid in reaching
decisions. They are not to provide final answers and we cannot be liable for
how the results are interpreted. As with any financial planning, caution
should be used.

JUST A REMINDER....

 *IMPORTANT*IMPORTANT*IMPORTANT*IMPORTANT*IMPORTANT*IMPORTANT*IMPORTANT*


        SOLVE-IT is a SHAREWARE program. If you use it you are
   strongly encouraged to register your copy. To register please send
   $35 dollars to the below address. You will automatically receive
   the next update which is scheduled to be released in Feb. 1987. It
   will allow you to set the colors, and decide if the program is
   to be memory resident or not. It will also let you select your own
   HOTKEY to activate the program.



                     PINE GROVE SOFTWARE
                     atten: Karl Thompson
                     67-38 108TH ST. SUITE D-1
                     FOREST HILLS, N.Y. 11375


        In any event, whether you choose to use SOLVE-IT! or not, we
   ask that you share this program with others by giving them a
   complete copy of the program. The complete copy consists of the
   program, this introduction and the documentation and maybe a
   readme file and a sample data file.


 *IMPORTANT*IMPORTANT*IMPORTANT*IMPORTANT*IMPORTANT*IMPORTANT*IMPORTANT*