Fritz: All Fritz/All Fritz.zip/All Fritz/FILES/UTILENUS/STS_110.LZH/MRE_INFO.TXT

Text File | 1991-03-03 | 9KB | 134 lines

                        M.R.E. INFORMATION FILE.

      The purpose of this file is to provide users of this program with
 some insight and information about the author of StS, my company, and a
 brief history of the program.

      My name is Emery Wooten and I am a 32 year old graduate of
 Mississippi State University's college of Mechanical Engineering.  I
 currently own a home here in West Point, Ms. and also own and operate a
 machine shop where our primary business is industrial maintenance and design
 work.

      I first became involved with computer programming in the mid 1970's
 while in college.  Back then it was punch cards and FORTRAN IV on a Univac
 that stayed broke most of the time.  Being mechanically inclined and having
 worked with machines most of my life, I was instantly "hooked" on this
 wonderful piece of junk.  In my primary line of work (machinist) when you
 made a mistake your efforts usually wound up in the scrap pile, so the fact
 that I could debug and edit programs after only a few short hours of
 fighting keypunch machines and hungry card readers was probably one of the
 most fascinating aspects of the machine.  I have yet to overcome my
 fasciation with computers.  The procedural logic and the thrill of seeing
 your finished product work make for a natural transition from my skilled
 trade and engineering roots.

      When the IBM-PC was introduced in 1981, I bought one.  I thought it was
 great that I could have a "personal computer" and hey, NO PUNCH CARDS!
 Now I am your curious type, the science and technology type of person, who
 reads Scientific American, enjoys The Discovery Channel, and thinks kids
 with orange hair should seek medical attention immediately.  I tore into
 that IBM-PC from both the hardware and software sides of it.  I wrote
 programs and built interface boards, modified the ROM code, and performed an
 assortment of other radical things.  Hey, at one time I had that computer
 believing that I built it instead of IBM!  In any event, I learned a great
 deal about how it worked and how to program it.  I adopted assembler
 language as my primary means of communication with the PC.  It was the
 obvious choice to satisfy my interests and MASM 1.00 was how I started down
 the road that leads to this text file.

      In 1982-83 I found myself making the transition from BASIC/FORTRAN
 programming into the deep dark world of machine language.  I had heard it
 was hell to learn and use so naturally I dove into it full force.  What I
 discovered was that assembler language was in fact the most logical and
 powerful language I had ever encountered.  It wasn't (and still isn't) that
 hard to master, and the absolute power it provides to the programmer is
 addictive.  My problem was that at that time, I could find no text editor
 that suited my liking.  Well, to make a long story short, I wrote The E88
 Text Editor and started using it to do all my programming with.

      Around about mid 1984 The E88 Text Editor version 1.00 was completed
 and I was using it solely for my own purposes when some friends of mine got
 a look at it and urged me to market the program.  I looked into several
 marketing strategies and decided that the shareware concept made the most
 sense and best fit my general philosophy about computer software.  The way I
 see it, most all software is shareware anyway.  I would be willing to bet
 that 99% of the people reading this file at least looked at or even used most
 of the so called "commercial" software packages they now own.  Shareware
 represents honesty on both the part of the users and sellers.  As a
 producer, I didn't want to put some kind of "guilt trip" on people because
 they were using a "pirate" copy of my program.  I knew from my own personal
 experience that people who had the opportunity to "try before they buy" were
 going to do it anyway, so why not encourage them to do it and let them feel
 good about it.  As a user, I also knew that of the programs I had tried and
 found useful, I bought.  I can appreciate the effort that goes into writing
 software and believe in paying for what I use.  I also think that most of
 the people who use computers at any kind of serious level also feel the same
 way.

      So enter M.R.E. Software, a shareware company.  I posted E88 on a few
 BBS systems around the area and in a couple of months I started receiving
 letters and registration forms.  What I found was a wealth of ideas from a
 bunch of good people.  I took this user input and began updating and
 changing E88.  It is now at version 4.22 and climbing.  As the program
 became more widespread and my user base grew, I realized the need to install
 a BBS system to provide user support and provide a convenient means for
 users to register.  To get the BBS system operational required the help of a
 friend, Tom Ford, to set-up and sysop the board.  With Tom as sysop, I was
 free to continue programming without worrying about taking care of the
 intricacies of BBS operations.

      Now everybody knows that with BBS systems and computer communications
 one must deal with compressed files.  With Tom on the BBS and me accessing
 it daily, we were up to our necks in .ARC files.  So I had created (as often
 happens) a new problem, or at the very least agitated an old one.  I kept
 most of my less used programs on my system as .ARC files to save space.
 Every time I wanted to run some of these programs I had to "dig out" PKXARC
 and un-arc the files into a clean sub-directory.  I had one game in
 particular that I enjoyed fooling with, it must have had 75 files
 associated with it.  I had to find a better way to handle the situation, so
 I wrote a program to do it.  I called it ARCOM ... meaning ARC Commander.

      Two weeks after releasing ARCOM, news of the lawsuit between System
 Enhancements Associates and Phil Katz was released and shocked the shareware
 world.  This lawsuit was soon settled with the net result being that the PK
 series of archiving programs could no longer use the .ARC format.  Since
 ARCOM supported PKARC exclusively, I knew that its days were numbered and
 that I had to release an update.  What I decided, was to completely
 eliminate the ARC name association my program carried, enhance its shell
 capabilities, and name it Stereo Shell.

      What you now have here is the third real update to Stereo Shell.  The
 major changes, improvements and additions are outlined in the included file
 CHANGES.TXT.  This version represents just one of what I hope to be a
 long continuing sequence of updates as has been the case with E88.  I
 plan to support StS and try to keep it current with the changing conditions
 in the evolving file compression utility market.
                                 ----
      It is now Jun. 20, 1990 and I am updating this and all the other text
 and document files in preparation for the release of StS version 3.00.  StS
 has undergone some significant changes since its original release as ARCOM
 and M.R.E. Software is about to undergo some as well.  As of July 1st I am
 going to try my hand at being the BBS sysop.  Tom has been at the helm for
 two years and has done a good job but has tired of what can sometimes be
 a thankless chore.  We have also had some problems in the past with having
 the BBS located remotely from home base here and figure that relocating it
 and changing the decor will be in the best interest of both of us.  Tom will
 still be around to answer your questions and shoot the bull with everyone,
 the difference being that he will be operating remotely and be doing it at
 his leisure instead of as a spare time job.

      I hope that you have found this information of interest.  I included it
 in an effort to help answer some of your questions about who and what
 M.R.E. Software is all about and where we will be tomorrow.  I guess I can
 sum it up by saying that we are a small software company located in a nice,
 quiet, small, but ever growing, southern town.  Its operated by a guy who
 has some very stable business roots and will be here tomorrow.  I would
 like to express my gratitude to my many friends and supporters who have
 helped make StS and my other programs possible and successful.  This may be
 serious business, but it sure is fun!


      Enjoy this program, and yawl have a nice day...
                                                      -Emery Wooten-