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CSHAPES.DOC
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1991-05-08
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8KB
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221 lines
COUNTING SHAPES
by
Sunbeams and Rainbows
(C) Copyright 1991
SHAREWARE SOFTWARE:
COUNTING SHAPES is a shareware program. The shareware concept
allows you to review the program without having to pay for it. If
you decide to use the COUNTING SHAPES program then you are
expected to register your copy for $10. If you have multiple PC's
at your location, for example a school, you can register
additional PC's for a fee of $2 each. For your convenience an
invoice has been included on this diskette and can be printed by
entering 'PRINT INVOICE.DOC'.
QUESTIONNAIRE:
I have also included a questionnaire to assist with future
enhancements and the distribution of the Sunbeams and Rainbows
products. To print a copy of the questionnaire enter 'PRINT
QUESTION.DOC'.
DISTRIBUTION DISKETTE:
The following files are included on the distribution diskette.
CSHAPES.DOC
CSHAPES.EXE
CSHAPESC.DAT
CSHAPESE.DAT
INVOICE.DOC
QUESTION.DOC
AUTOEXEC.BAT
INSTALLATION:
If you do not want to execute the COUNTING SHAPES program from
the distribution diskette you can use the following steps to
create working copies. There is no copy protection on this
software so you can copy it anywhere that suits your needs.
INSTALLING ON A FLOPPY DISK:
This section is will set up a bootable diskette that executes the
COUNTING SHAPES program. If you have a hard disk drive installed
on your computer please refer to the section "Installing on a
hard disk drive".
I am assuming that you have a system with two floppy drives.
1. Place your DOS system diskette in the A drive and turn ON the
system. If the system is already ON hold down the Ctrl Alt and
Del keys at the same time then let go. This will boot your system
from the DOS diskette in drive A.
2. Place a new diskette in your B drive.
3. Format the diskette in drive B as a system diskette. NOTE:
this will delete any files on the diskette in drive B.
FORMAT B:/S
4. Now remove the DOS diskette that is in drive A and replace it
with your original COUNTING SHAPES diskette.
5. Copy the files on the original COUNTING SHAPES diskette in
drive A to the new system diskette in drive B.
COPY A:*.* B:*.*
6. Remove the diskette in drive B and label it COUNTING SHAPES
system disk.
7. Now test the diskette that you have just made by inserting it
into drive A and pressing Ctrl, Alt and Del keys at the same time
to boot the system. The COUNTING SHAPES program should
automatically start.
INSTALLING ON A HARD DISK DRIVE:
If you do not have a hard disk drive please skip this section. I
am assuming that you will be installing COUNTING SHAPES to your C
drive.
1. Make sure that you are in the root directory.
CD \
2. Create a subdirectory to that will be used to hold the
COUNTING SHAPES files.
MD \S&R
3. Now change to the new subdirectory.
CD \S&R
4. Place the original copy of the COUNTING SHAPES program into
drive A and copy the files to your new directory.
COPY A:*.* C:\S&R\*.*
5. Since you will not be needing the AUTOEXEC.BAT file that you
just copied rename it to GO.BAT.
RENAME C:\S&R\AUTOEXEC.BAT GO.BAT
6. Start the COUNTING SHAPES program by entering GO.
GENERAL DESCRIPTION:
This program has been written because much of the software on the
market does not lead to simple use by small children. Many of
these software packages make requirements of the child that are
beyond their abilities like requiring that a floppy be inserted a
into drive 'A' and booting the machine, or having to press the
'ENTER' key after every question. It is difficult enough for a
small child to relate to pressing the one key that is correct to
make the program run correctly let alone being able to follow
some kind of copy protection scheme.
This program is designed to display a randomly selected shape,
one to nine times on the screen. The child needs only to press
the correct number key that matches the number of shapes
displayed. Each set will allow three tries with the third and
last try assisting the child with number prompts. After ten sets
of randomly selected shapes and colors a total screen is
displayed. Since this program is aimed at very young children, an
older person should assist the child in this learning process. To
end the program simply press the 'ESC' key.
Designed into the startup of this program are some command line
switches. If any of these switches will be used regularly to run
COUNTING SHAPES, they should be placed in a BAT file like the
AUTOEXEC.BAT supplied on the distribution diskette. When the
program name is entered followed by a number from 3 to 9 a limit
will be set as to the number of objects to guess from. This will
allow the child to develop counting skills at various levels and
hopefully keep their frustration level down. This will also
change the size of the shapes that are displayed. There are two
other cmdline switches, '-e' and '-c' to force the video mode to
either EGA or CGA respectively. I have included these for those
machines that might have non-standard video cards.
Command line summary:
Switch - Description
-c - to force CGA mode
-e - to force EGA mode
# - number from 3 to 9 which will be the number of objects
displayed to guess from
Samples:
CSHAPES - Highest Video mode (EGA, CGA) and 9 objects
CSHAPES -c - force CGA mode (default 9 objects)
CSHAPES 8 - display up to eight objects
CSHAPES -e 7 - force EGA mode and up to 7 objects
CSHAPES 4 -c - force CGA mode and up to 4 objects
DEVELOPMENT:
During the writing of this program I would let my two sons try
it. As expected, I soon found out which problems needed to be
addressed. The first problem came about as my youngest would hold
down a key and fill up the keyboard buffer. Since the program
never cleared out the buffer it would keep looping through the
screens. Another problem that was found during development was
the addition of sound. At first I only added sound to the sad
face and not to the happy face. Since this made the sad face more
fun than the happy face I never saw a correct answer. The
solution was to add sound to the happy face. One problem that I
did not change and do not have a good answer for is having to
press the 'ESC' to end the program. This causes problems with
small children since the 'ESC' key is placed next to or near the
'1' key. It is very simple to press this key and end the program
by accident. Oh well, I guess you could put plastic over the
'ESC' key.
GENERAL:
Even if I never hear from people who use this program I have
received the biggest compliment from both of my sons. On the
happy and sad faces I originally did not have color in the eyes.
When I added color to the eyes to make them stand out both sons
immediately saw the colored eyes, looked at me with a great big
smile and said 'look eyes' (their vocabulary is very limited).
That made writing this program worth while.
This program has been written entirely in C. For those of you who
are interested it is about 1700 lines of code. I have plans to
write additional educational programs that address counting,
letters, matching, math and colors. I would be interested to hear
ideas and suggestions along these lines and for additional
programs that you might have. To allow me to continue to develop
educational programs I would like some feedback on the good and
bad features in this program and in other programs that you have
used.
The registration fee for CSHAPES is $10. This will allow Sunbeams
and Rainbows to continue the development of additional education
programs. By registering this program you will be notified of
other programs offered by Sunbeams and Rainbows and of any
changes or additions to existing programs.
To register this program please read the file INVOICE.DOC. To
fill out the questionnaire read the file QUESTION.DOC.
Sunbeams and Rainbows
P.O.Box 866312
Plano, Texas 75086-6312