home
***
CD-ROM
|
disk
|
FTP
|
other
***
search
/
Amiga Tools 2
/
Amiga Tools 2.iso
/
grafik
/
bildanzeiger
/
p-reader
/
p-reader.doc
< prev
next >
Wrap
Text File
|
1995-03-09
|
14KB
|
312 lines
PRE1
P - R E A D E R V7.1
INSTRUCTIONS
Yet another infernal Reader. There are hundreds of them already, reliable,
comprehensive, user-friendly, sitting around pleading to be used. So pick
the Readers that will properly display texts with multiple colour and style
changes, compressed texts, ILBMs. Now the list gets shorter! Find the
Readers that will also display animations and sounds. . . Finally find the
Readers that will show illustrated texts, with pictures and animations
mixed in with the words. What, none?
Wrong. One.
Press HELP for a summary of the instructions.
Introduction
P-Reader is really three readers in one:
Normal Text reader. Line 20
Illustrated Text reader - containing pics,animations, sounds. Line 104
IFF reader - displaying ILBM pics, Anim5 animations, 8SVX sounds. Line 137
Texts, pictures and animations may be compressed (P-Compress normal or
SuperC) or uncompressed. P-Reader will check and act accordingly.
Operation
P-Reader is mainly controlled by the ten function keys. To produce a key
strip index switch the printer on and click twice on the strip below with
the RIGHT mouse button to print it. Cut out, join, print "P-Reader" on the
back and enclose between two strips of clear Con-Tact film.
#! 1 1 16 0 reader.key
A number of programs intercept the F keys and use them for other tasks.
If you find that your function keys do not give the expected response you
can use
LSHIFT-1
in place of
F1
,
LSHIFT-2
for
F2
, and so on -
LSHIFT-0
replaces
F10
.
NORMAL TEXTS
Calling
From a CLI type
P-Reader <FILE>
. If no file is given P-Reader will open
showing a file requester.
From Workbench there are a number of ways of setting P-Reader to work:
Double-click the P-Reader icon. P-Reader will again open with a requester.
Enter
P-Reader
as the default tool in the text's icon.
Use 'extended selection' - click the P-Reader icon, press and hold
SHIFT
and double-click the text file icon.
If you have Arp Library installed the standard Arp file requester will
be used.
Operation
F1:
Move to Page [n]. To move to any page press
F1
, type the number of
the required page, press
RETURN.
F2, F3:
Press
F2
or
F3
to get the first or last pages respectively.
F4:
Search. A requester will appear. Click on this and replace the word
"text" with the string that you want to find. Set case-sensitivity and
press
RETURN
. The search will always start at the beginning of the file
and a cursor will appear immediately before the required string (if found).
F5:
Search again. Search will continue from the last instance found.
WARNING The Search window must remain active during the search process
If your pointer automatically activates the window over which it is placed,
make sure that it remains over the Search window.
F6:
Print page. The current page will be dumped to the printer.
F7:
Print file. The whole file will be dumped.
F8:
Screen to back. Since P-Reader opens its own screen & window, depth or
window shrinking gadgets are not useful.
F8
, together with
Amiga-N
or
Amiga-M
allow any screen to be brought up.
F9:
Load. Brings up the file requester. You can select a new file at any
time provided it is a normal text file. For illustrated files or IFF close
P-Reader and start again.
F10:
Save. Brings up the file requester again. The text will always be
saved in normal un-compressed ASCii form.
If you do not have the Arp library, a simple string gadget requester will
appear. Enter the required file, press
<return>
and click
<OK>
or
<CANCEL>
.
More functions are performed by page header gadgets. From left to right:
Window close
- terminates P-Reader.
Page up
- Click it to get the previous page.
Palette
- Click to cycle through available colors.
Page Down
- Just click it.
The secondary functions of some keys of the numeric pad are also activated:
Home
(7) - move to page 1.
End
(1) - move to last page.
Pg Up
(9) - move to previous page.
Pg Dn
(3) - move to next page.
Scrolling
Hold
LMB
down to scroll down;
RMB
scrolls up. Press
LSHIFT
to toggle the
scrolling speed.
IFF FILES
Pictures (ILBMs of all types including HAM), animations (Anim5 only) and
sounds (8SVX format) can be shown - or sounded. Call them in exactly the
same way as you would call a normal text.
ILBM Display
To start cycling (if active) press the
TAB
key, to stop it click the LEFT
mouse button.
To dump to the printer place the pointer over the illustration and click
twice with the RIGHT mouse button. Requester will ask for confirmation.
To close the screen click once with the LEFT mouse button.
ANIMATION Display
ANIM5s (as produced by DPaint, Videoscape, P-Animator, etc) can be called
and will display the opening screen while loading. A switch
-r
can be used
to set the framing rate in frames/second; default is 7 frames/sec.
eg:
P-Reader dh0:Marilyn -r12
From Workbench enter
RATE=12
in the Tool Types section of the icon used to
call the animation.
To start the animation click the LEFT mouse button once, to end it click
again. It will be run in continuous mode - starting again at the beginning
each time it gets to the end - if the animation was not designed for this
the second run may look very peculiar indeed.
ILLUSTRATED TEXTS
Illustrated texts for P-Reader can be identified by the letters
PRE
at the
start of the file followed by a number (1 indicates that a
PAL
page size
will be used, 2 for
NTSC
). They are called in just the same way as the
other types of file - P-Reader will see the
PRE
code and act suitably.
A number of changes will be visible as soon as the screen opens - a non-
laced screen, two new gadgets in the header which will show page rather than
line numbers. The colour gadget will not work, nor will scrolling. Since
pictures and animations must appear complete - not split between pages -
the display has to be based on showing complete whole pages, and colors must
appear as the artist intended.
The two new header gadgets are labelled:
NOP
. No pictures. Only the text will appear and no illustrations. The
display adopts the non-illustrated mode of operation.
NOC
. No cycling. Cycling cannot be activated.
Once illustrations have been inhibited by toggling
NOP
the necessity for
stopping the operation of scrolling and color changes disappears, the mode
of operation changes to that used for normal texts, scrolling and the color
gadget are enabled, and the header shows line rather than page numbers when
The position in the file has been changed.
If
NOP
is clicked again the display will revert to the illustrated mode.
The function keys will work as before, however calls to print the page or
file using
F6/7
will print only the text. To dump a picture to the printer
set the cursor over the picture and double-click the RIGHT mouse button. A
requester will come up asking for confirmation before the picture is dumped.
Any new file called by
F9
must be of the same type, that is another
illustrated file.
PREPARATION OF ILLUSTRATED TEXT FILES
The preparation of illustrated texts for P-Reader is much easier with
P-Writer, its partner in the P-Suite stable. However P-Writer is not
essential.
Colour and Style Changes
The normal escape codes are used. The most useful being:
reset ^[[0;31;40m b'ground Pen1 ^[[41m style bold ^[[1m
text Pen1 ^[[31m b'ground Pen2 ^[[42m style italic ^[[3m
text Pen2 ^[[32m b'ground Pen3 ^[[43m underline ^[[4m
text Pen3 ^[[33m
The initial ^[ represents the insert introducer or CSI, the non-printing
character produced by 'Esc'. Refer to the instructions for your text
editor to see how to insert this.
Three types of graphics (four if you count sounds) can be called :
ILBMs (IFF pictures)
True ILBMs produced by DPaint or any of the standard drawing software can
be used, provided that:
Size is no greater than 640 X 256 (PAL) or 640 X 200 (NTSC).
No HAM or HALFBRITE.
Depth is three planes (eight colours).
The picture shares a screen with the text, so the palette used by the
picture will affect screen colours. Wherever possible the first four
colours of the picture should be close to 000, FFA, 3F3, F20. The rest of
the default palette is 45F, FC8, A60, 0A0.
Calling syntax: (do not leave any space between # and !) :
# ! 1
[Left edge] [Top edge] [Cycling] [File]
(Cycling: ON = 1, OFF = 0)
The sequence may be placed anywhere on the page, but is best put at the
bottom so that all text is displayed first. Any text after # followed by !
is not displayed. (Which is why "# followed by !" has to be written here).
ANIMATIONS
This version supports straightforward ANIM5 animations as produced by
DPaint, Videoscape, The Projector, P_Animator and others. Full information on
how to create animations for P-Reader are given in P_Animator. The animation
must be HIRES, 3 planes, 640*256 for a PAL text, 640*200 for NTSC.
The command syntax is:
# !
2 0 0 0
[File]
The sequence can go anywhere on the page. There should be no text directly
under the anim.
UP TO THREE ILBMs OR ONE ANIM MAY BE CALLED ON EACH PAGE
SOUNDS
Sound effects can be included if they are in the normal 8SVX format.
Command syntax:
# !
4
[File]
BORDERS
Provides a standard Intuition Border which may be used to enclose text or
pictures.
Command syntax is:
# !
3
[Left edge] [Top line] [Width] [Height] [Pen]
The command sequence may be placed anywhere on the page, however to prevent
the border from being over-written by text it is best put on a line below
where the border will appear.
SUMMARY OF KEY-COMMANDS
(Pressing
HELP
key displays this)
F1 <page> or <line> <return> Move to <page> or <line>
F2/F3 Move to first/final page
F4/F5 Search/search again
F6/F7 Print Page/File
F8 Move screen to back
F9 Get next file
F10 Save file ASCII
Inset graphics Stop Cycling Press any key
Print Click RMB twice
ILBM reader Start/stop cycling Press <TAB>/any key
Print Click RMB twice
Animation Start Click LBM
Stop Click again
Scroll up/down RMB/LMB <SHIFT> toggles speed
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
P-Reader may be freely copied and circulated in whole or in part, provided
that any distribution is accompanied by this file. The programme may be
used for any non-commercial or non-profit-making purpose. Authority for
commercial or profit-making purposes may be obtained from the author -
proposals for payment in kind will be looked on favorably.
Reactions, suggestions, bug-reports all welcome.
A.M.H Wyndham
1265 Canning Mills Road,
Roleystone,
WA 6111
Australia