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- • • General Overview • •
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- Evolutions is a simple utility program to convert certain types of
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- files into more usable formats. It will add or remove linefeeds, or
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- eliminate extraneous control characters. It will also allow you to
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- adjust line lengths and change spaces into tabs. This last little func-
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- tion comes in quite handy when you need to convert a spreadsheet
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- that you may have captured on the screen during a communications
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- session, and you would like to tabulate the columns for use in your
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- favorite spreadsheet program.
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- This program was developed to solve specific in-house problems at
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- Emerald, if you have other uses that require added functions just
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- drop us a line and let us know about them. More than likely, I’ll just
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- add them to the program!
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- • • Set Up • •
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- The first window that you see when the program starts is the set
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- up dialog. This is where you decide all the good things that will hap-
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- pen during the evolution.
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- First of all, you should notice that there are three major sections to
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- the set up dialog box. The first has to do with converting spaces to
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- tabs. The second will get rid of unwanted control characters (those
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- things that look like little empty boxes on the Mac’s screen), or add
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- linefeeds to the end of lines (useful if you are going to give an IBM a
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- text file). And lastly, you can remove characters from the begin-
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- ning or end of a line (we use this to eliminate extra spaces or gar-
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- bage at the ends of each line in spreadsheets that we download from
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- a mini-computer).
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- • • Tabular Additions • •
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- Use the first radio button marked “Replace 1 or more spaces with a
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- tab” to change most files to column format. The next button is use-
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- ful if you want to discern between row labels and an actual column
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- separation. The third button will stop the program from changing
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- any spacing.
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- The “Ignore spaces” line is useful if you cannot use the rule that
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- “words are separated by one space, columns by two or more.” A
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- combination of button number one and an entry in the “Ignore
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- spaces” box is often the answer.
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- Note: The “Line Sizing” function take priority over the other two,
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- so consider the line as being resized before you start
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- counting characters to ignore.
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- • • Control Clean-up • •
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- Obviously the first button will not change your file much, but the
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- others may. If you need to remove linefeeds (you have probably
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- seen them before, they appear as little boxes at the start of the line
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- in files you get from non-Macs), you should choose the second but-
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- ton “Remove all linefeeds.” The third button is nice to use if you
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- must transfer your file to a non-Mac computer and it requires line-
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- feeds (or the document tends to print out all on one line). And fin-
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- ally, if you want to strip a file of all extra control characters (with
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- the exception of tabs and carriage returns), use the fourth button.
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- • • Line Sizing • •
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- To cut a line length down to size, enter a number in either of the two
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- available boxes. If the second box contains a number that is less
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- than or equal to zero, no characters will be removed from the end of
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- the line. Please notice that the second box is asking for the actual
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- line length, NOT the number of characters to remove.
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- • • The Evolution • •
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- When you have everything the way you want it, click the Start
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- button. You will be asked to select a file for conversion and then a
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- filename to hold the converted information. You may click on
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- either dialog boxes’ Cancel buttons to stop the evolution and return
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- you to the Configuration dialog.
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- After selecting the files, a status window will appear. You may
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- pause the evolution by clicking on the title bar of the status window
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- or cancel it by clicking on the Cancel button. A dialog box will
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- appear to confirm that you want to stop.
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- The gray indicator will show how much of the original file has been
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- read into memory (each jump is about 5K). The black indicator will
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- show the actual percentage of completed evolution. Watch closely,
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- most evolutions go quite quickly (especially on a hard disk) and you
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- may barely get to see the indicator if the file is less than 5K in size.
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- • • Change Configuration • •
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- Pull down the file menu and choose the first command if you want to
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- change the owner of the text file that is created during an evolu-
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- tion. A small dialog box will appear, just click on the name of the
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- program that you want and then click the OK button. This is helpful
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- if you want to double-click on the resulting file from the Finder to
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- examine it.
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- • • Price & Support • •
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- The price is quite minimal…ten bucks if you find this program to be
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- of any use to you. If you do not feel like spending the dough be-
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- cause the program is not useful enough, give me a call! Maybe I can
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- make some change to give it some more marketability (that is a word
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- isn’t it?). Either way, please let me know what you think of it!
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- Kevin M. Hoctor
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- Emerald Computing Services, Inc.
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- 2707 N. Loop West, Suite 490
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- Houston, Texas 77008
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- (713) 880-2705
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