Are you someone who gets really annoyed at those people who always seem to know how many days it is until a certain event (ie: “Hi John, did you know it’s only 278 more days to my birthday? Better make sure you buy me a present!”). Well, if you can’t beat them, join them.
This handy little control panel will let you do just that. Every time you start (or restart) your computer, a little box appears approximately 3/5ths down the screen, telling you how many days there are until the date you specified (if the date has already passed it will give you a nasty little note to say that you have missed it!) Use it to annoy your friends, count down to Christmas, or to know how much longer that someone special in your life is going to be away.
Requirements
Days To Go requires a Mac Plus, running System 4.2 or later.
Installation
Days To Go is very easy to install. Simply place the control panel in the System folder (pre System 7) or the control panels folder (System 7 or later).
Setting It Up
The control panel allows you to set up one date to count down to, a message to display while counting down to that date, and a message to display when that date is reached and passed. All this information is entered in the appropriate text boxes when the control panel is opened. The messages can be up to 255 characters long, although in practice a message that long probably wouldn’t fit on the screen at startup (the messages aren’t wrapped, so would go off the screen either side).
When entering the date in the control panel, there are a few hidden “features” that aren’t apparent:
• If a day or month is entered that is outside the allowed range, it is replaced with a 1 when you close the control panel (note that the control panel doesn’t make checks for particular months, so you can enter the 30th of February if you so desire - the control panel will simply interpret it as the 2nd of March if it isn’t a leap year, or the 1st of March if it is).
• If the year entered is outside the allowed range, it is replaced with 1995.
• If the year you enter is below 95 (but not 0), it is interpreted as being in the next century (ie: 20xx, where xx is between 1 and 94 inclusive).
• If the year entered is between 95 and 99, it is interpreted as being this century (ie: 19xx, where xx is between 95 and 99 inclusive).
• If you enter 0 for the year, the date is interpreted as a re-occurring event (so you could enter 25/12/0 as the specified date, and the control panel will always give you a countdown to Christmas without you ever having to touch it again).
Disclaimer
THIS PROGRAM AND THE ACCOMPANYING DOCUMENTATION ARE PROVIDED “AS IS”. WHILE EVERY EFFORT HAS BEEN MADE TO TEST THIS SOFTWARE TO ENSURE IT PERFORMS AS EXPECTED, NEITHER THE AUTHOR (JASON ANDERSON) OR BEYOND MIDNIGHT SOFTWARE CAN BE HELD RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY CONSEQUENTIAL, INCIDENTAL OR INDIRECT DAMAGES THROUGH THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE.
Roundup
I hope that you find Days To Go as useful as I have. Any comments, suggestions or (dare I say it) bug reports should be sent to:
Normal Mail:
Beyond Midnight Software
PO Box 471
Devonport, TAS 7310
AUSTRALIA
e-mail (Internet):
jason_ga@postoffice.sandybay.utas.edu.au
Finally, Days To Go is distributed as freeware so feel free to use it as much and for as long as you like (and pass it around to all your friends!)
Days To Go was written using CodeWarrior C/C++, and the “CW CDEV Framework” by Matthew E. Axsom (if you are at all interested in writing a control panel, and own CodeWarrior, this is a must to have!)
Version History
• v1.0 (February ‘95)
- Initial release.
• v1.0.1 (March ‘95)
- Fixed a very stupid bug introduced when adding the ability to have re-occuring dates (Days To Go always thought that the date you were interested in was going to occur this year).
