Acorn User 4/AUCD4.iso/acornuser/1998/apr1998/features/Organiser/!Upgrade/!Organiser/!Help

Text File | 1997-11-16 | 19KB | 473 lines

>> !Help file for !Organiser  written by Chris Morison © 1997
   ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

To obtain an Index: with !Zap     : Do a search to buffer for '>>'
                    with !StrongEd: Do a ListOfFound for '>>'


>> Loading !Organiser
   ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

To load organiser: Double click on the !Organiser icon in the filer window.
This will install and icon (either a clock or the !Organiser icon) on the
icon bar.  Click on the icon bar to open the MAIN WINDOW.

>> Deleting all the data
   ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

If you give !Organiser to a friend (which is perfectly legal) then you might
want to delete all your personal information before giving it to them.  To do
this you must:

  1) Quit !Organiser
  2) Make copy of !Organiser somewhere else (Drag it’s icon from the
       directory viewer to another directory viewer)
  3) Open the new copy by double-clicking on it’s icon while holding SHIFT
  4) Double-click on the file called ‘!Delete’.  This will run !Organiser and
       ask you if you really want to delete the data
  5) Click on ‘Continue’ or ‘OK’ if you are sure
  6) Click on ‘Continue’ or ‘OK’ to remove the next message
  7) Save the data
  8) Quit !Organiser

You should now have a seperate copy of !Organiser with no data, which you can
give to anyone you like.

Alternatively, if you have been given !Organiser with loads of data that you
don’t want, just ignore the second step.

>> Icon bar
   ~~~~~~~~

The icon bar is either a • Digital clock
  (see Set-up)           • Analogue clock
                         • !Organiser sprite
                         • A display of free memory

Clicking with the middle (menu) button will open the MAIN MENU
Clicking with the left (select) button will open the MAIN WINDOW
Clicking with the right (adjust) button will open the SET ALARM WINDOW
Clicking SELECT while holding down SHIFT will open the SET-UP WINDOW
Clicking SELECT while holding down ALT will turn the icon into the free memory
display for a few seconds.

>> Main window
   ~~~~~~~~~~~

The main window consists of two pages connected by rings, with vertical,
coloured TABS on the left and right of the pages.  Clicking on the tabs opens
the relevant SECTION.  Clicking the middle mouse button in the main window
will open the relevant SECTION MENU.

>> Calendar section
   ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The calendar section is just a simple calendar, with either one year per
page, or one year spread over two pages.  Depending on the choices (see
Set-up below) clicking with Select/Adjust will either open the diary at the
selected date or open the SET ALARM WINDOW with the selected date.

>> Diary section
   ~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The diary can be displayed in three formats : • Two weeks in view
    (see Set-up)                              • One week in view
                                              • Two days in view

Clicking within a day will open the SET ALARM WINDOW with the selected date.
Clicking on an alarm with SELECT will edit the selected alarm.
Clicking on an alarm with ADJUST will copy the selected alarm.

>> Anniversary section
   ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The anniversary section is used to store peoples birthdays and anniversaries.
To add an anniversary, click in one of the months, enter the date of
birth/marriage, and enter the description.  The description can contain
wildcards, so that they can tell you how old the person is, whether an
anniversary is gold, silver etc.  The wildcards are:

%n number of years since date entered
%t either ‘st’ ‘nd’ ‘rd’ or ‘th’ depending on the value of %n
%T as above but upper-case
%y either ‘year’ or ‘years’ depending on %n
%Y as above but upper-case
%c name of anniversary, eg ‘silver’ ‘golden’ etc.

Here are some examples:

“Chris’s %n%t birthday” could produce: Chris’s 1st birthday
                                       Chris’s 20th birthday, etc

“Parent’s %n%t%c anniversary” results in: Parent’s 27th anniversary
                                      or: Parent’s 50th (golden) anniversary

The message is automatically displayed in the Diary section, so seperate
repeating alarms don’t need to be set.  The actual message depends on the
date of origin and the current date (or the date being viewed in the Diary).
The age/anniversary shown in the Anniversary section is as at the next
birthday/anniversary.

Clicking on anniversaries in the Diary section has the same effect as
clicking on them in the anniversary section.  Clicking with SELECT will edit
the alarm, and clicking with ADJUST will copy the alarm

>> Address-book section
   ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The address-book section contains 3 different types of page:

>>    Important numbers page

This page can be used to store up to 16 important numbers.  To enter (or edit
an existing) important number, just click on the line in which you want the
number to appear.

>>    Address entry page

This page is used to add new addresses, or to edit existing ones.
To add a new address, type in the information, then click on ACCEPT (or press
the INSERT key).

>>    Addresses pages

These pages are found by clicking on the capital letters down the right-hand
side of the Address-book.  The number of address per page can be altered from
the Set-up window.

Clicking on an address will move it to the Address entry page, so that it can
be editted or deleted.  The ADDRESS-BOOK menu can also be used to edit, copy
or delete the address that the menu was opened over.  The menu can also be
used to paste the address details the cursor within another application.

>>       Pasting address details

To paste some address details into another (target) application (eg !Edit or
Impression):

  1) Position the caret in the target window (this can be done later)
  2) Open the ADDRESS-BOOK menu over the required address by clicking the
     MIDDLE mouse button
  3) either:
     • click on ‘Paste at cursor’ to paste the default fields
     • click on one of the ‘Paste at cursor’ sub-menu options to paste
       specific fields
  4) If you haven’t done so already, position the caret in the target window

>>    Importing Addresses from other databases.

If you already have an address database, and would like to import all the
addresses into Organsier quickly, then follow these steps:

  1) In the other database, save the data in CSV (Comma Separated Values)
     format, either to disc, or straight onto Organiser. If you have saved it
     to disc, then drag the CSV file onto any Organiser window or icon.  This
     will cause Organiser to open to the Address Entry Page and to open the
     Import window.

  2) The Import window contains a list of the fields used for addresses
     within Organiser, and against each field is a column number.  This
     column number is the column in the CSV file which will be used for the
     corresponding field.  Change these column numbers until the data in the
     Address Entry Page is all in the correct place.

     In some circumstances, the other database may save a persons name in one
     field, eg “Chris Neil Morison”.  If this is the case, then select both
     ‘Surname’ and ‘First Names’ fields to be taken from the same column, and
     give the ‘Surname’ field the ‘After last space’ special treatment, and
     give the ‘First Names’ field the ‘Before last space’ special treatment.
     This will ensure the ‘Surname’ becomes “Morison”, and that the ‘First
     Names’ becomes “Chris Neil”.

     Some databases store an address in a single column, with each line
     separated by ‘\n’, eg “4 Arley Close\nMacclesfield\nCheshire”.  If this
     is the case, then you can split the address over several fields by
     mapping each field to the same column, selecting the ‘Line separator’
     option, and typing in the separator into the writable icon.

     Example:  If a line of the CSV file was:
     ~~~~~~~

     "Chris Morison","4 Arley Close\nMacclesfield\nCheshire\nSK11 8QP"...

     Then you would map the ‘First names’ and ‘Surname’ fields to column 1,
     giving the ‘First names’ field the ‘Before last space’ special
     treatment, and the ‘Surname’ field the ‘After last space’ special
     treatment.  Then you would map the address fields to column 2, select
     the ‘Line separator’ option, and enter “\n” into the writable icon.

  3) When the data is all in the correct place, select ‘Accept’ either from
     the Import window.  This will add the address that was in the Address
     Entry Page, and load the next line from the CSV file.

  4) If you are confident that all addresses from the other database will be
     in the same format, then you can click on ‘Accept all’, which will add
     the current address, and all the rest from the CSV file.  However, if
     you have given the ‘Surname’ and ‘First names’ fields the above special
     treatments, and some of your addresses are for businesses with names
     like ‘Acme Computers Ltd’, then ‘Ltd’ will be chosen as the surname, and
     the address will be stored under ‘L’.  If this may be the case, then you
     should accept the addresses on at a time, making sure they are all
     mapped correctly first.

  5) Once all the addresses have been added, either close the Import window,
     or click on ‘Cancel’ within the Import window.

>> Alarm system
   ~~~~~~~~~~~~

>>    Adding an alarm

To add an alarm, either:
  • click on the Organiser icon with the right mouse button
  • click on the required date in the Diary
  • click on the required date in the Calendar
  • select the ‘Set alarm...’ menu option in the MAIN MENU

To change the date of the alarm, click on the date text near the top of the
SET-ALARM WINDOW.

>>    Editing an alarm

To edit an alarm, click on the alarm (in the Diary section) with the left
mouse button (select).

>>    Copying an alarm

To copy an alarm, click on the alarm (in the Diary section) with the right
mouse button (adjust).

>>    Deleting an alarm

To delete an alarm, edit the alarm as above, and either:
  • Click on the ‘Delete’ icon in the Edit-Alarm window
  • Press Ctrl-X or Ctrl-D

>>    Task Alarms

Task alarms are alarms whose ‘message’ is executed just as if it was typed in
at the command line.  These alarms can be very useful for doing certain
tasks at regular intervals, such as automatically scanning hard discs for
viruses once a week, backing up certain files once a month, etc.

To create a task alarm, you must open the Set Alarm Window first (see Adding
an alarm), then you can either:

  • Drag the file/application that you want to be run into the Set Alarm
    Window.  This will select the ‘Task’ option and insert the full path of
    the object into the message.
  • Manually select the ‘Task’ option and type the *command or path into the
    message writeable icons.  If you run out of space in one icon, then
    continue typing in the next icon.

NB  A ‘*’ is not needed before the command.

It often doesn’t look very nice if the *command or filename is displayed in
the diary.  For example, if you wanted to run a virus scanner and it’s path
was ‘ADFS::HardDisc4.$.Apps.Virus.Scanners.!VirusKill’, then it wouldn’t make
much sense for this path to be displayed in the diary.  Therefore task alarms
can be given descriptions.  To give a task alarm a description, prefix the
message with (eg) “=Check for viruses*”, so that the complete message would
be: “=Check for viruses*ADFS::HardDisc4.$.Apps.Virus.Scanners.!VirusKill”.
If this format is used then anything between the ‘=’ and the first ‘*’ is
displayed in the diary, and only text after the first ‘*’ is executed as a
command.

An easy way to execute a list of commands with only one alarm is to create
and ‘Obey’ file (file type &FEB) containing all the commands you want to be
executed, and then run this Obey file from the task alarm.

If the task is a file or an application, then Organiser will try to interpret
how to run it.  If the object is a file, and no ‘Filer_Run’ or ‘Run’ precedes
it, then Organiser will ‘Filer_Run’ the file.  However, this will cause an
error if you are trying to pass parameters to the file (‘Filer_Run’ cannot
take paramters). In this case you should prefix the filename with ‘Run ’.

>> Choices window
   ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The chioces window can be used to configure Organiser to your preferred
settings.  Some of the settings are explained:

>>    Quick boot up

      This option forces the data to be loaded in the background, so that if
      Organiser is automatically loaded in your Boot up sequence, it will
      wait until everything else has loaded before the data is loaded.  You
      can even do stuff while the data is loading.

>>    Use fonts in icons

      This option should only be selected if you have don’t have RiscOS 3.5
      or higher.  If you do have RiscOS 3.5, alternative fonts in ‘OK’ icons
      can cause the desktop font to be forgotten.

>>    Allow <CTRL-S> case switching

      For compatibility with some other programs, I have allowed the case of
      the character just entered to be changed by pressing <CTRL-S>.  Incase
      this interferes with another hot-key on your system, this feature can
      be disabled.

>>    Rings

      This option allows the fussy among you to change the number and spacing
      of the rings connecting the left and right hand pages.  The text
      entered should consist of only ‘0’ and ‘1’.  The total number of
      characters will be the total number of possible rings, and any of them
      can be turned on or off.  Eg, ‘111000111’ draws three rings near the top
      and bottom of the page, and ‘10100’ draws one ring near the bottom and
      one ring near the middle of the page.

>>    Auto Open

      This option will cause the main window to be opened automatically EVERY
      time Organiser is run.  By using the radio buttons adjacent to the
      auto open option, it can be made to open either in the centre of the
      screen or at its current position.  The current position will be
      remembered when the OK button is pressed in the choices window.

>>    Switch between BST and GMT automatically

      When selected, Organiser will monitor the time and date, and if it
      discovers that the computer’s clock should be in Daylight Saving Time
      (called British Summer Time in the UK), when it isn’t (or vice-versa),
      it will alter the clock as necessary.  The dates for the switching to
      and from Daylight Saving Time have been confirmed for the European
      Union upto the year 2001 as being:

         DST start: last Sunday in March   at 1am GMT
         DST end:   last Sunday in October at 1am GMT (2am DST)

      If these dates are incorrect for your country (or it is past 2001),
      then you can contact the author for current dates, or if you happen to
      know the dates, you can edit the Messages file (the format is explained
      within the file).

>>    Quiet hours

      Organsier can be forced not to beep (when alarms or anniversaries are
      actioned) either all the time, or between certain hours.  The hours
      during which is can beep should be selected using the up/down arrows.

>>    User Definable Digital Clock

      The digital clock can be defined by the user by typing in a string of
      field names in to the writable icon.  The field names available are:

        Name    Value                           Example

        %cs    Centi-seconds            99
        %se    Secnds                59
        %mi    Minutes                05
        %12    Hours in 12 hour format        07
        %24    Hours in 24 hour format        23
        %am     ‘am’ or ‘pm’            PM
        %pm    ‘am’ or ‘pm’            AM

        %we    Weekday, in full        Thursday
        %w3    Weekday, in three characters    Thu
        %wn    Weekday, as a number (Sunday=1)    5

    %dy    Day of the month        01
    %st    ‘st’, ‘nd’, ‘rd’ or ‘th’    st

    %mo    Month name, in full        September
    %m3    Month name, in three characers    Sep
    %mn    Month as a number        09

    %ce    Century                19
    %yr    Year within century        87

    %wk    Week of the year, Mon to Sun    52
    %dn    Day of the year            364

    %%    Insert a ‘%’            %

      Case is ignored, and inserting a ‘z’ between the ‘%’ and the field name
      will cause leading zeros to be omitted.  An example is:

       ‘%z12:%mi:%se %am. %sy/%mn/%yr’ => ‘9:53:56 am. 26/10/97’

>> Get Date Window
   ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The Get Date Window is used in a variety of places:
  • To ‘Go-To’ a particular date in the Diary
  • To set the date of an alarm
  • To set the current date.

To change the Month, click any mouse button on the date at the top of the
window.  To change the date, click on the icon containing the date required,
or double click to select the date and close the window.  To change the year
click on the up/down arrows either side of the year, or hold down SHIFT while
you click to change the year in steps of 50.

>> Hot-Keys
   ~~~~~~~~
s=<SHIFT> c=<CTRL>

Main window :   F1  Load the help file (this file)
                F2  Open the Set-up window
                F3  Save
               sF1  Open the Calendar section
               sF2  Open the Diary section
               sF3  Open the Anniversary section
               sF4  Open the Addressbook section
               cQ   Quit Organiser
               PgUp Turn back a page
               PgDn Turn over a page

Calender    :  HOME Goto the current year

Diary       :  HOME Goto the current date
                F4  Open the GET DATE WINDOW
                F5  Find the first diary entry
                F6  Find the diary entry before to the current page
                F7  Find the diary entry after to the current page
                F8  Find the last diary entry
               cX   Will delete the alarm being editted
               cD   Will delete the alarm being editted

Anniversary :  cX   Will delete the anniversary being editted
               cD   Will delete the anniversary being editted

Address-book:  INS  Will go to the Address entry page, unless
                    editing/creating an address, in which case INS has the
                    effect of clicking on ‘Accept’

>> About the Author
   ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

!Organiser was written by me, Chris Morison

     This program is supplied “as is”.  No warranty, express or implied,
     of the merchantability of this program or its fitness for any
     particular purpose is given.  In no circumstances shall the author,
     or any provider or distributor of this program, be liable for any
     damage, loss of profits, or any indirect or consequential loss
     arising out of the use of this program.

The program is Free-Ware, and may be distributed freely provided that no
changes are made to any part of the program (including Help files, Sprites,
Templates, excluding data), and that this file accompanies any copy made.

If you have any suggestions for future versions, or have come across any
bugs, the please contact me:

Chris Morison
4 Arley Close
Macclesfield
Cheshire
SK11 8QP

email: [e-mail]  (may change after June 1998)
www:   http://www.angelfire.com/mo/chrismorison

>> Latest Version
   ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

My web-site above will always contain the latest version of !Organiser (and
any of my software I deem fit enough for distribution), However if you
contact me now, I will keep you informed of new releases (preferrably by
e-mail).