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AutoRaise 2.0 docs 29th December 1992
(Look, I know I shouldn't be writing software
on my birthday...)
Annius Groenink
Laan van Borgele 24
7415 DJ Deventer
The Netherlands
+31 5700 29396
AVGROENI@CS.RUU.NL
INTRODUCTION
AutoRaise 2.0 is the second, enhanced version of AUTORAIS, which
(V1.1) I released as freeware a year and a half ago and has been
widely spread partly because it appeared on the cover disk of the
British magazine ST User. [Very impolite of ST User, by the way, is
that they seem to think 'freeware' means they can just put your
program on a cover disk without even sending you a letter and a copy
of the magazine... a terrible shame!]
AutoRaise is a small program that raises windows for you. This will
make your Atari feel faster and easier to use.
COPYING
AutoRaise 2.0 is freeware. You may freely copy and distribute the
AutoRaise executable, provided that this document file is included.
For any other purposes like publication in a magazine or commercial
public domain catalogue, or any other situation where money of some
kind is involved, permission of the author is needed. All rights
reserved; AutoRaise and these documents are (C) 1992 Annius Groenink.
WHY USE AutoRaise
1. If you have always had to click on a window to top it, especially
with single tasking TOSes, where nothing can be done in background
windows unless they belong to the active application, you simply
don't know what you've been missing. Try AutoRaise, and you'll
feel far more comfortable with GEM than you did (it might even
prevent you from buying that cheap 486 you saw in the paper this
morning...)
2. If you use/have used Double Click's 'equivalent' DCTOPPER: this
program sticks to all conventions and is hence TOS-independent. It
tops windows less quickly, and hardly ever tops a window when you
don't want it to; this version 2.0 includes fixes for a number of
frequently occurring cases where a window is topped when the user
clearly does not want it to be raised.
WHAT'S NEW IN THIS VERSION
1. AutoRaise 2.0 will work with any TOS, and with the new
multitasking AES. The problem with MultiTOS was that the simulated
mouse clicks could be on the window's gadgets, which could
sometimes even close a window! MultiTOS provides an
alternative, which makes use of the new wind_get option WF_OWNER
to send a WM_TOPPED message to the relevant AES process. The
accessory will do whatever is right in your OS.
2. AutoRaise 2.0 raises windows less often than AutoRaise V1.1; to be
precise:
- A window is topped only after the mouse has been stationary for
one tenth of a second. This used to be: the mouse was on the
same window. You can now slowly move the mouse towards the menu
bar, crossing a background window, without the window being
topped. As long as you move the mouse faster than one pixel per
tenth of a second, which I think is OK.
- Windows will not be topped when any of the four shift keys or
the mouse buttons are held down. So e.g. when you wish to drag
a file out of a background window of NEWDESK, hold down the
right button, then move to the background window and pick up
the file.
- AutoRaise 2.0 does not allow the current top window to be
comletely buried when it tops a window. I reckon a lot of V1.1
users must have hated using the control panel because when you
opened it, you had get the mouse on its window very quickly,
otherwise it would be covered by a desktop window. A pain,
especially for owners of a TTM194, or users of BigScreen or my
STRETCH.PRG.
- Any change of the top window NOT caused by mouse movement will
be 'respected', so you can open and close windows by key
commands without having to worry about getting the mouse on the
right window. AutoRaise 2.0 will not top a window until you've
moved the mouse again.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I'd like to thank Alan Kennedy for suggesting that I should wait for
the mouse to be stationary rather than hanging around above the same
window for a while. This major improvement of user friendliness was a
good excuse to implement the suggestions I had from others. Whoever
did those suggestions, ta! (And I'd be delighted to receive more)