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- 7 Feb 94
-
- Addendum to the MakeDemo Manual.
-
- 1. If you choose to 'brand' and do NOT include a 'NAG' screen in
- your creation, and the user runs your creation without using the
- correct validation code, it will not run and the user will be
- returned directly to the DOS prompt.
-
- Previously, the presentation would run anyway, showing any 'NAG'
- screens when and if they came up.
-
-
- 2. In response to those who want to assign certain keys to system
- functions like 'SHELL', 'COLOR', etc., but NOT include the always
- accessible "_SIDE0" screen, just rename it "MENU0". Your user can
- still access the screen by pressing <F1>, so you should have
- something on it for him or her to view. You can include a menu
- with highlighted bars or leave it off. It's up to you. The menu
- need not be layed out on the screen for it to be active. Only the
- menu definition need be there. MSHOW.EXE looks for the 'MENU0'
- screen only if it can't find a '_SIDE0' system menu screen.
-
-
- 3. Some MakeDemo afficionados have requested the ability to start
- a presentation in something other than the default "EFFECT"
- presentation mode. The runtimes now recognize the '@' symbol
- prefixed to one of the presentation methods as it appears in the
- system menu, either the accessible "_SIDE0" or "MENU0" screen.
- For example..
-
- MENU0,SHELL=S,COLOR=C,@AUTO=A,N_EFFECT=N
-
- The '@' prefix for 'AUTO' tells the runtime to initially start in
- the 'AUTO' mode.
-
-
- 4. MakeDemo runtimes now look for screen segments and menu bars
- using the same methodology. The width is determined by looking
- along the top edge; the height is found by traversing the right
- edge.
-
- In the case of screen segments, the runtimes look for the top
- left corner of the segment defined by the color attribute NOT
- being a BLACK background and a dull GREEN foreground color. This
- means that the color attribute along these two edges need not be
- uniform.
-
- Defining menu selections is a little more limiting. The top edge
- ( or line for a normal list bars ) must be of the same background
- color. The foreground color can change. This makes highlighting
- certain keys possible. The runtimes determine the the width by
- looking for a change in background color. Multiple line menu
- selections must use the same background / foreground colors along
- the right edge. The runtimes replace the color attribute along
- the right edge with that of the character to its immediate left
- before presenting the screen.
-
-
- 5. A dialog screen named "DIALOG" is now a reserved name. This
- screen presents a message and a button to click on. Right now
- there are three possible messages that use this screen for
- warning the user that something is wrong with whatever has been
- attempted. Primarily used in "MINSTALL.EXE" the three messages
- warn for no disk in disk drive, disk in disk drive doesn't
- appear to have been formatted, and the file to install can not
- be found on the source disk.
-
- The DIALOG screen conatins all the messages. To be recognized by
- MINSTALL, each message must start it's own line aligned at the
- left edge of the screen. The line must start with
-
- D, meaning there is no disk in the disk drive,
- F, meaning that the disk appears to be unformatted, and
- S, meaning that the source disk isn't the correct one.
-
- The messages can be listed in any order and take no more than
- one line.
-
- MINSTALL looks for "<Alt+9>DIALOG" as the upper left corner of a
- screen segment. The width and height are defined as are any menu
- or database fields as defined in the manual.
-
-
- 6. We have added the presentation effect of a "swing arc" or
- 'radar' type effect that progressively reveals the new screen as
- an arc swings around the screen with one end anchored at screen
- center. Additionally, there are sound effects available for all
- presentation styles.
-
-
- 7. Now your computer can access the yellow background color
- along with all the other high intensity background colors for
- display on EGA and VGA monitors. While we locked out access to
- blinking colors, MSHOW as well as the other runtimes, when an EGA
- or VGA monitor is detected, automatically switches your computer
- to substitute the high intensity for the blinking background
- colors.
-
-
- 8. Sound Effects
-
- Now you can choose one of two kinds of sound effects for the
- viewer to hear as a screen is being presented. The first is the
- original tone ramp of ascending or descending tone as the screen
- appears. Screens of older presentations that were keyed to have
- sound effects automatically default to this sound effect.
-
- You can now select an arcade sound from the sound effects menu
- while selecting the appearance mode of MkDemo. Now there is a
- third from which to choose. Have fun!
-
-
- 9. MkInstall discussion:
-
- MkInstall is designed to install a program from archived
- collections of files. By "install" we mean "unpack" or "unarc"
- the archive to a target directory, first creating that directory
- if necessary. Presently, MkInstall can work with PkZipped files,
- LHArced files, or self extracting .EXE files. And MkInstall will
- recreate the sub-directory structure defined in the archive
- itself.
-
- The MakeDemo distribution for the MkInstall program includes a
- unpacking utility WLZ.EXE which you are free to include with
- your distribution. It will unpack LHArced files that have been
- renamed with the ".WLZ" extension. It is designed to be used by
- the MkInstall program and will produce a visual bar graph on the
- screen indicating progress in the unpacking process.
-
- To unpack either ".ZIP" or ".LZH" files requires access to a copy
- of PKUNZIP.EXE or LHA.EXE respectively already installed on the
- user's system. Neither is supplied with MakeDemo. Use of either
- will produce that utility's usual screen showing the progress of
- the unpacking operation.
-
- The real advantage of this methodology is that one install
- program will work unaltered with distributions including either
- PkZipped or LHArced files, or (with the included WLZ.EXE
- utility) LHArced files renamed with the "WLZ" extension.
-
- An example might show how MkInstall is designed to work. You'll
- note that a menu selection prefixed with "&&" tells MkInstall
- that the following menu selection is the name of a file to be
- installed. For example
-
- &&MDEM5A
-
- is interpreted thusly. MkInstall first looks for as file named
- "MDEM5A" with the one of the following extensions: "COM", "EXE",
- "BAT", "ZIP", "LZH", or "WLZ", in that order. Once a match is
- found, MkInstall performs as follows:
-
- 1. Copies the archive to the target directory, creating it
- first if it doesn't already exist.
-
- 2. MkInstall internally changes to the target directory and
- performs the equivalent of
-
- MDEM5A Self-extracting .EXE file
-
- PKUNZIP -d MDEM5A PkUnzip MDEM5A.ZIP
-
- LHARC x MDEM5A LHArc (eXtract) MDEM5A.LZH
-
- WLZ x MDEM5A WLZ (eXtract) MDEM5A.WLZ
-
- 3. Deletes the source archive file from the target directory.
-
- 4. MkInstall changes back to the source directory, ready to
- present the next screen and the possible unpacking of
- another archive.
-
- If you intend your program to be installed in a number of
- subdirectories of the target directory, you'll need to make sure
- that your files are archived using the correct switches. Here
- are a cople of lines from a .BAT file we use to put together the
- MakeDemo distribution.
-
- pkzip -a -P mdem5a @mdem5a.cfg
-
- lha a /x1 mdem5a @mdem5a.cfg
-
- We use a configuration file listing all files that go into the
- archive. That file lists each file complete with its own path.
- Of course, these subdirectories must exist below the directory
- where the packing occurs and contain the files so defined.
-
- Show below is the list of files that go into the MDEM5A archive
- and where they can be found.
-
- file_idm.diz
- readme
- exam\watch_me.1st
- exam\go_show.bat
- doc\register.doc
- wwp_make.com
- mshow.exe
- doc\pack_a.lst
-
- Large programs can be broken into a number of small archives
- with a screen in your install program devoted to describing
- each's unique features. And if your packed files are organized
- differently depending upon the capacity of the medium being
- used, the screen can alert the user as to how to handle the
- differences. Or you can easily make a MkInstall variation for
- each.
-
-
- CHK_SYS Screen
-
- This screen empowers the install program to check a number of
- system parametes and present a warning message if a problem is
- found. Generally, the MkInstall program can install a program on
- virtually any system, you might want to alert the user of
- possible problems area in the system configuration. For example,
- maybe you would like to alert the user that RAM is not adequate
- to eventually run your program.
-
- The CHK_SYS screen is basically a dialog screen that can present
- a half dozen messages should conditions warrant. It is similar to
- other MakeDemo dialog screens. Instead of the defining menu
- selections in the lines with a preceding <Alt,4> character, we
- list the system conditions for checking. If MkInstall finds any
- of the selections not adequate, the apprpriate message comes up.
- For example, if DOS version less than 7.10 is discovered, the
- message following the "D," is displayed shown on the screen
- below, there being no DOS greater than 6.2 as of this writing. In
- like manner, MkInstall checks available RAM and as long as
- MEM=641 or more, message "M" appears. Message "C" appears only if
- the there is a math coprocessor present.
-
- +------------------------------------------------------------+
- | <Alt,4>CHK_SYS,DOS=7.10,MEM=710,FILES=70,BUFFERS=70,8087 |
- | |
- |D,MakeDemo requires DOS version 2.10 or greater to function |
- |M,Crea|ing an application needs 256 kBytes RAM; running it, |
- |F,FILES=15 or less can thwart apps running under DOS version|
- |B,MakeDemo creations work best with disk caching or BUFFERS=|
- |C,MakeDemo does not make use of a math coprocessor. |
- | |
- | +------------------------------------------+ |
- | | W a r n i n g | |
- | | | |
- | | <Alt,6> X | |
- | | X | |
- | | X | |
- | | | |
- | | To continue, press a key or click mouse. | |
- | +------------------------------------------+ |
- | |
- +------------------------------------------------------------+
-
- The message is placed like any other field on a MakeDemo screen.
- The space following the <Alt,6> defines the upper left corner.
- The left edge, defined by a different foreground and background
- color, sets the width and height. Three lines of 35 spaces should
- be allocated for displaying the message. MkInstall word wraps the
- message to fit.
-
-
- PROBLEM Screen
-
- MkInstall uses this screen to warn the installer that something
- is wrong with the way the installation is progressing. There are
- ten malfunctions for which a message will pop up on the screen.
- Most of the message are self explanatary, but you might wish to
- express the problem a little differently.
-
- The layout is much the same as other dialog screens. Please note
- that the <Alt,9> character is used to define the upper left
- corner of the message area. This different from the CHK_SYS
- screen where the <Alt,6> character was used.
-
- +----------------------------------------------------------+
- | <Alt,4>DIALOG,_YES=O |
- | |
- |D,The requested disk drive does not exist on your system. |
- |R,The disk drive is not ready. Make sure disk is in drive |
- |F,Can't find disk sectors. Possibly disk needs first to b |
- |S,Unable to continue. Problem is possibly limited availab |
- |M,Unable to create requested directory and/or tree struct |
- |X,You must prefix the directory with the drive letter des |
- |P,Unable to continue: can not find PKUNZIP.EXE by followi |
- |L,Unable to continue: can not find LHA.EXE by following s |
- |Z,Miscellaneous error. |
- |A,Unable to find archive. Make sure file exists, possibly |
- | |
- | +------------------------------------------+ |
- | | X W a r n i n g | |
- | | X | |
- | | X <Alt,9> DIALOG X | |
- | | X | |
- | | X X | |
- | | | |
- | | <Alt,6> Ok X | |
- | +------------------------------------------+ |
- | |
- +----------------------------------------------------------+
-
-
-