The Atari Compendium/The Atari Compendium (Toad Computers) (1994).iso/files/umich/utils/desktop/newicons.lzh/NEWICONS.DOC

Text File | 1990-04-23 | 8KB | 184 lines

You should have:
NEWICONS.PRG
DSKMAKE.PRG
DSKMAKE.RSC
NEWICONS.DOC(what you're reading)

PLEASE READ THIS
These programs are NOT free.  I spent a lot of time working on
them and am releasing them to the public under a concept known as
SHAREWARE.   This means that I am letting you examine the programs
risk free and at your leisure.  If you like and use them, all I
ask is a small contribution of $5 or so.  If you don't use them or
do not want to pay then you must delete them.  Of course I can't
come into your home and enforce this- it's up to you to do the
right(and legal) thing.  But remember, by supporting myself and
other SHAREWARE authors, you support yourself and the ST because
it encourages us to write new programs, and add features to
existing ones, all for very low prices.  Think about it.

Please send payments to:
1000 Klub Software
c/o Paul Chinn
1000 El Embarcadero #E
Isla Vista, CA 93117

CIS ID#: 76157,55

Of course comments and suggestions are always welcome.

On with the show....

     If you're like me, and own a hard drive, you probably have
partitioned it into several separate drives, each one having a
fairly specific purpose, such as graphics, or programming, or
desktop publishing for example.  Although each drive gets a unique
name on its desktop icon, they all share the same old file cabinet
icon.  Aside from not being a very good visual clue as to what is
on the disk, the file cabinet just isn't much fun to look at.

     With NEWICONS you can now change your desktop disk icons to
whatever you want.  Other commercial and PD programs try this but
they are usually complete desktop replacements or only allow one
new icon for all your drives, getting rid of the file cabinet but
still not giving your drives visual distinction.

     NEWICONS allows you to replace any disk with any icon at any
time without locking out other important programs(like Hotwire!)
or eating up valuable RAM with lots of extra reworks of features
the desktop already handles pretty well.  Not only that, but you
can change your trash can icon as well, and changing a drive's
icon is as easy as changing its name.
USING NEWICONS

     NEWICONS runs automatically by putting it in your auto folder
and requires a file called ICONS.DSK also be in the auto folder of
the boot disk.

     Once your system has booted up, NEWICONS will cause each icon
on the desktop to appear differently depending on the disk icon's
name.  This is NOT the actual disk's name but rather the name you
gave the icon when you clicked on INSTALL DISK DRIVE in the
options menu.

     To change how an icon looks, you just have to change its
name. This is done by clicking on the icon and then INSTALL DISK
DRIVE under the options menu of the desktop.  To give the icon a
new name, click on INSTALL and if NEWICONS finds a match in the
ICONS.DSK file, you'll see the new icon.

     When you are first setting up NEWICONS for your system you
probably won't see any change because NEWICONS most likely won't
find a match for what you've typed.  However you can try a couple
of my defaults by naming your icons PROGRAMMING, GRAPHICS,
RAMdisk, or DOUBLE SIDED.

     Of course, NEWICONS wouldn't be much fun or very useful if
you had to name your disks the same as mine just to look at icons
I picked.  That's where DSKMAKE.PRG comes in...


Using DSKMAKE.PRG

     DSKMAKE.PRG lets you create custom .DSK files which allow you
to have your own icons and name them whatever you want.  Version 1
of DSKMAKE doesn't provide a means of drawing the icons
themselves, instead you must have already drawn them and saved
them in a Degas picture(HI or Medium res only).  If you don't know
how icons are drawn but are interested read the ICONS section
below.

     Assuming you have a Degas pic with your icons or a pre-made
.DSK file, run DSKMAKE.PRG and you will be presented with
DSKMAKE's main menu.  The first thing you'll probably do is [LOAD
.DSK].  A file selector will come up and you can load in ICONS.DSK
or any other .DSK file you may have access to.  You can now scroll
thru the available icons by clicking on the little UP/DOWN arrows.
As you do so you will see the icons as they will appear on the
desktop, and the name used that will cause that icon to appear.

     Now you can [KILL ICON]s(delete them) or [CHANGE NAME] of the
icons.  If you click on [CHANGE NAME] a dialog box will come up
asking for the new name.

     To actually [ADD ICON]s you must first [LOAD DEGAS].  After
this has been done, when you click on [ADD ICON] you will be shown
the picture and a small 32x32 box that follows the mouse. Notice
that if you hold the left shift key while dragging, the box will
"snap" to the nearest pixel that is a multiple of 16. Position the
box and grab your icon by clicking the left button.  The icon will
flash and then you will be given the 32x32 box again.  This is so
you can grab the icon's mask.  If you don't understand what a mask
is, read the notes under ICONS below.  You'll return to the main
menu and be given a dialog box to name the icon.  You can add as
many icons as you want, they don't all have to be shown on the
desktop at the same time but will appear as soon as their name is
used for an icon.

     I mentioned before that you can change the trash icon as
well. To do this, grab an icon as usual but name it TRASH.  That
icon will be used for your trash can REGARDLESS of what you call
your trash(I call mine NUKE!).  Version 1 only permits one
alternate trash can icon because changing the name of the trash
icon requires editing the DESKTOP.INF file and most people
probably don't do that much.

     Save your changes in ICONS.DSK and you are ready to go!
Unless you make further changes to the DSK file, you don't have to
worry about NEWICONS or DSKMAKE anymore...once you reboot, your
custom icons will appear without further ado...


ICONS
Icons- are simply 32x32 pixel monochrome graphics.  They also have
what is called a MASK which is just a 32x32 graphic image used to
punch a hole in the screen, sort of like a cookie cutter.  When
the desktop draws an icon it first puts down the mask which is the
white part of the icon.  Then it draws the icon's data which is
the black part.  For this reason you generally want the mask to be
a copy of the icon data, with a one pixel border around it and
filled in anywhere you don't want the desktop to show through.

VERSION 1 NOTES:
     If NEWICONS can't find a match for the name you've typed it
will default to the file cabinet.
     When working with Degas Medium res pictures, all color
information is automatically stripped out of the picture when you
load it.

STOP THE PRESSES!!!!!!!!!

     Just before releasing NEWICONS I added a fun(if not
particularly useful) new feature.  NEWICONS now lets you change
the icons that appear in standard alert boxes(the stop sign,
question mark, and exclamation mark).  To do so, just [ADD ICON]
as you normally would in DSKMAKE.  Grab your new icon with the box
then the mask(alert icons don't use masks so it doesn't really
matter what you grab for the mask)  Then to tell NEWICONS this is
an alert replacement, name the icon one of the following:
A1   to replace the exclamation mark
A2   to replace the question mark
A3   to replace the stop sign

     Save and reboot and when you get an alert in any program,
your new icon will appear.  Like I said, not too useful, but
somehow being told you just formatted your entire Hard Disk is a
little easier to take when Calvin or Hobbes tells you.


PROGRAM INFO

NEWICONS is 100% assembly language.  Although most of it is my own
work, I would be remiss if I did not credit Stefan Becker whose
program ICONDESK provided a valuable example of intercepting GEM
AES and VDI calls.  ICONDESK is itself a really neat program which
lets you give custom icons to EVERY single file on you disk, just
like a Macintosh.  Since I use Ho