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**************************** *--------------------------* *- MegaBoard Version 1.67 -* *--------------------------* **************************** Please note this program is SHAREWARE, please refer to the end of this file for details. --------------------------------------------- - Upgrading from versions earlier than 1.50 - --------------------------------------------- In this version of MegaBoard the special icon interface has been completely rewritten (for exact details see the ProgInfo file), therefore special icons written for earlier versions will no longer work. This drastic change was necessary because of the unpredictable memory requirements of BASIC libraries. I apologise to any authors of special icons for this inconvenience. Saved configurations that do not contain special icons can still be used with this version. ---------------- - Introduction - ---------------- MegaBoard is a desktop Backdrop utility designed as a replacement for the Pinboard Module supplied with Risc OS 3. It offers a number of extra features and enhancements. ----------------------- - System Requirements - ----------------------- MegaBoard requires Risc OS 3.5 or greater in order to operate correctly. At the time of writing this was only available on the RiscPC. Should a version be released for other models MegaBoard should run correctly on these machines as well. --------------- - Terminology - --------------- "MegaBoard" refers to this Program. "Pinboard" refers to the Risc OS 3 utility. --------------- - Starting up - --------------- MegaBoard can be Loaded by double clicking on the icon !MegaBoard in the directory viewer. When MegaBoard is first loaded it is necessary for it to reinitialise the Filer. This will cause all open Filer Windows to be closed. Installing MegaBoard into the boot sequence (see below) avoids this Problem. ------- - Use - ------- Filer icons ----------- Placing Filer icons on MegaBoard: An icon is placed on MegaBoard by dragging it from a Filer window and dropping it on MegaBoard. Moving: An icon dragged and dropped onto another part of MegaBoard will be moved to that position unless it is locked (see below). Positioning and Grid lock: Normally filer icons are positioned at the exact position they were dropped on MegaBoard. However if the Grid lock option is on then any icons placed or moved on MegaBoard will be positioned at the closest grid point. The Grid lock option is toggled by choosing the Grid lock menu item on MegaBoard menu. Note: Grid lock only applies to Filer icons placed or moved when it is activated. Activating Grid lock has no effect on existing icons unless they are moved. Grid lock has no effect on special or window icons Double-clicking: Double-clicking Select on an icon placed in the manner described above has the same effect as it would in a Filer window. Double-clicking Adjust is identical unless the 'Adjust Removes' option is set in the main menu, in which case the icon is also removed from MegaBoard. Dragging: Icons dragged from MegaBoard and dropped on other applications (including the Filer) are also treated in the same way as icons dragged from a Filer window with the exception of dragging with Shift copying not moving the selected items. Dragging with Adjust additionally removes the items from MegaBoard if the 'Adjust Removes' option is set in the main menu. Selecting: Filer icons can be selected in several ways: 1. Clicking Select on an unselected icon selects it and deselects all others. Clicking Select on a selected icon has no effect. 2. Clicking Adjust on an unselected icon selects it. Clicking Adjust on a selected icon deselects it. 3. Dragging Select on MegaBoard produces a bounding box within which all icons are selected. 4. Dragging Adjust on MegaBoard produces a bounding box within which all unselected icons are selected and selected icons are deselected. 5. Clicking Menu over an icon when none are selected selects that icon and opens the main menu. Information: Information on a Filer icon can be obtained by choosing the 'Info' option from the 'File' Submenu. Removing: Filer icons that are no longer required can be removed from MegaBoard by selecting them and choosing the 'Remove' option from the 'File' submenu. Opening the parent directory: The parent directory of a file or directory can be opened by choosing the 'Open Directory' option from the 'File' submenu. Locking: An icon can be locked to MegaBoard to prevent it from being moved. Locking is toggled by choosing the 'Lock' option in the 'File' submenu. Locked filer icons can still be dragged, but dropping them back onto MegaBoard will not move them. Moving to the front or back: Should an icon be obscuring another it is possible to move it to the back of the heap by choosing the 'Back' option from the 'File' submenu. Similarly an icon can be moved to the front by choosing the 'Front' option from the same submenu. Altered files: If a file whose icon is on MegaBoard, is deleted or renamed the icon will be automatically removed from MegaBoard. Similarly if the filetype is altered, the MegaBoard icon will be updated to reflect the change. Window icons ------------ iconising application windows: Clicking on a window's close icon with Shift will cause it to be reduced to a MegaBoard icon. An exception is filer windows, these will only be handled in the same way if the 'iconise dirs' option is set in the MegaBoard menu, otherwise the icon of the parent directory is placed on MegaBoard as a Filer icon (see above). Removing: Window icons cannot be removed using the MegaBoard menu. Double clicking Adjust or Select on a window icon brings the window to the front and removes the icon. The icon will also be removed if the window's parent application closes or reopens the window. Accessing menus of iconised windows: iconised windows may have menus associated with them, if this is the case then clicking Menu while pressing Shift opens this menu. Note: Window icons cannot be locked. Backdrops --------- To create a backdrop execute the following steps: 1. Choose the 'Make' option from the backdrop submenu. This opens the backdrop setup dialogue box. 2. Drag the object (directory (see below), sprite, or draw file) containing the backdrop to the appropriately marked icon. 3. Select the desired horizontal and vertical positioning icons or the tiled icon. 4. Click on 'OK'. To remove a backdrop choose the 'Remove' option from the Backdrop submenu. To change the colour of the background choose the 'Colour' option from the Backdrop submenu. The colour can then be chosen using a standard colour selector. If the 'Autoscale' option in the 'Backdrop' submenu is selected then the backdrop will be scaled to always occupy the same number of OS-units not pixels on the screen in the same way as icons. E.g. a backdrop in the standard 1600x600 mode will be scaled to the same size it would be if the resolution were 1600x1200. This sounds more complicated than it is the effect of the autoscale option is best understood by experimentation. When a backdrop is created, it is possible that part of the screen becomes corrupted and is then redrawn, this is normal and not a bug. Cycled backdrops: It is possible to select a number of backdrop pictures that will be displayed successively each being visible for a user-defined time period before being replaced by the next. This is achieved by the following procedure: - Create a directory to hold the backdrop pictures. - Copy the files into this directory (it is irrelevant whether these are draw files or sprites or a mixture of both). - Create a script file, either by using the supplied !MakeScrpt application or you can write it yourself: Write a text file containing a list of entries of the following format: Start_Backdrop Horizontal position: <position> Vertical position: <position> Time: <Time the file should be displayed seconds> Name: <Filename of the file> Background colour red component: <percentage of colour saturation> Background colour green component: <percentage of colour saturation> Background colour blue component: <percentage of colour saturation> End_Backdrop Where the horizontal position is one of the following words: Centered Scaled Left Right and the horizontal position one of the following: Centered Scaled Top Bottom The colour saturation percentages are floating point numbers between 0 and 100 e.g. "53.86%". The percent sign "%" is optional. If one or more of these fields is blank then those colour components be preserved from the previous backdrop. The filename should not be a complete path, but only a leafname i.e. if the pathname was "adfs::harddisc4.$.fred.pic0" then the filename would be "pic0". If this field is blank or the file does not exist in the directory then the backdrop picture will be removed for the specified time. There should be one such entry for each file to be displayed. Save the file in the same directory as the pictures with the filename "Script". - Use the same procedure described above for creating normal backdrops, but instead of a sprite or draw file, drag the directory to the icon in the backdrop setup window. The settings of the positioning icons is irrelevant in this case as the positioning of the pictures is determined by the script file. Special icons ------------- Special icons are icons which can perform a variety of additional functions, and can be defined by users with a knowledge of ARM code programming. See the files 'ProgGuide' and 'ProgTut' for instructions on how to create new special icons. Placing: Special icons are placed on MegaBoard by choosing their menu items from the Special icon submenu. Locking: Special icons can be locked in the same way as filer icons, but contrary to filer icons they cannot be dragged at all when they are locked. Moving to the front or back: Special icons can be moved to the front or back the same way as filer icons (described above). This version of MegaBoard includes the following special icons: Pointer: Displays the current position of the mouse pointer in screen coordinates. Time: Displays the current time in the format defined in its Format parameter (see below for how to edit parameters). The Format parameter is a standard time and date format string as described on page 327 of the RISC OS 3 User Guide. If the format string contained a syntax error the icon will not display the time, but the word "ERROR" instead. Gobbler: Deletes files dragged onto it. Acornlogo: Displays an Acorn logo in the top-right corner of the screen. (Logo sprite by Adam Goodfellow (adam@comptech.demon.co.uk)). Parameters: Some special icons (e.g. Time) can be configured by the user. This is accomplished by editing its parameters in the following manner: A special icon has parameters associated with it if its menu item has a submenu arrow pointing to a parameter dialog box which contains a writaeble icon for each parameter. Initially these icons contain the default values for the parameters. If you wish to change any of them edit the value displayed. When all parameters contain the desired values place the icon by clicking on the 'Create' icon in the dialog box. The Overview Window ------------------- Opening: The overview window is opened by choosing the 'Overview' option from the MegaBoard Menu. Function: Displayed on the overview window is a "map" of MegaBoard. The white rectangle around the centre represents the visible area i.e. the screen excluding the icon bar. The surrounding light grey represents the area invisible to the user. Icons: Icons are represented on the overview menu by small colour coded rectangles, the following is a table of icon types and their colour codes: Red......File Blue.....Directory Green....Application Magenta..iconised window Black....Special icon Dragging icons on the on overview window: Dragging an overview window icon and dropping it back onto the overview window has the same effect as dragging it would on the MegaBoard i.e. the icon is moved to the position it is dropped on. Dragging an overview window icon to a different window has no effect. Unless the 'Move locked' radio icon on the overview window is selected, an attempt to drag a locked icon will have no effect. If the 'Move locked' radio icon is selected, icons can be dragged and moved regardless of whether or not they are locked. However this only applies to the icons' representations on the overview window, restrictions to dragging locked icons on the MegaBoard remain. * Commands ---------- MegaBoard's support module provides two * Commands, '*Pin' and '*Backdrop'. '*Pin <Pathname> <x_coordinate> <y_coordinate>' places the filer icon specified by <Pathname> on the MegaBoard at the given coordinates. Example: *Pin adfs::harddisc4.$.fred 200 200 '*Backdrop [-options] [Pathname]' creates a backdrop, whose positioning is determined by the options as follows: '-Centre' centres the backdrop horizontally and vertically. '-HCentre' centres the backdrop horizontally. '-VCentre' centres the backdrop vertically. '-Scale' Scales the backdrop horizontally and vertically. '-HScale' Scales the backdrop horizontally. '-VScale' Scales the backdrop vertically. '-Tile' Makes the backdrop tiled. '-Top' Aligns the top of the backdrop picture with the top of the screen. '-Bottom' Aligns the bottom of the backdrop picture with the top of the icon bar. '-Left' Aligns the left of the backdrop picture with the left of the screen. '-Right' Aligns the right of the backdrop picture with the right of the screen. '-Remove' Removes the current backdrop (if present). This list of options is in order of reverse priority i.e. if two or more contradictory options are specified (e.g. -hscale and -hcentre) in one command the one lowest on the above list will take effect. Example: *Backdrop -HCentre -VScale adfs::4.$.Pic0 Will use the picture in the file 'adfs::4.$.Pic0' as a backdrop. The picture will be horizontally centred and vertically scaled. ----------- - Credits - ----------- Thanks are due to the following for testing, ideas and nagging for more features: Pavendip Birah (IRC nickname: PAV) Asif Nazir (IRC nickname: Hawks) and to Adam Goodfellow for letting me use his AcornLogo sprite. -------------------- - Copyright notice - -------------------- Except for the addition of special icons this application may NOT be altered. Nor may it be distributed for profit without my approval, this includes distribution as an 'extra' with commercial products, however should you wish to do so you are welcome to contact me do discuss details. A small charge to cover copying and media is acceptable. This program is SHAREWARE, if you find it useful please register as a user. Registered users will be entitled to receive free upgrades (see below) and improved support. The cost of registration is 15 Deutschmarks or 5 UK pounds including a disc with the latest version of MegaBoard. Please make all payments in cash only. Users outside the UK or Germany may send local currency in, it should be equivalent to 15 Deutschmarks. (No coins please. Should the amount sent exceed DM 15, you will be entitled to receive upgrades free of P&P equivalent to the excess amount.) Send registrations, comments, bug reports etc. to: Sham Gardner Vorderstr 19 76189 Karlsruhe GERMANY or EMail: un9l@rz.uni-karlsruhe.de Upgrades -------- Registered users can receive upgrades as follows: From within Germany: Send a disc and a stamped-addressed jiffy bag to the above address. From outside Germany: Send a disc and the equivalent of 3 Deutschmarks (e.g. 1 Pound) to cover P&P to the above address. Or by EMail from anywhere in the world: Send a short mail to the above address and I will reply with a uuencoded archive containing the latest version of MegaBoard (no P&P for EMail). ------------------- - Version history - ------------------- 1.00 - First release version 1.01 - Minor bug fixed that occasionally caused icons to disappear. Option added to prevent double clicks with Adjust from removing icons. 1.50 - Special icon interface rewritten to require special icons to be written in ARM code. Avoiding the unpredictable memory requirements of BASIC librarys. The three special icons provided with MegaBoard rewritten in ARM code to adjust to this requirement. 1.51 - Minor bugs fixed and several little features added. 1.52 - Overview window and option to place directories instead of iconising filer windows added. iconised windows reopened by their tasks are now automatically removed. 1.53 - Selections of objects dragged from filer windows no longer all appear in the same spot 1.54 - Bug in special icon placing removed 1.55 - Scaled backdrops now require less memory. 1.61 - * commands '*Pin' and '*BackDrop' supported allowing e.g. textures to be set from !Configure. Special icon 'AcornLogo' added. 1.62 - Cycled backdrops supported. 1.63 - Changes to the desktop font handled properly. The colour picker now always reflects the current backdrop colour. Filer and window icon text is either black or white to ensure it is readable with any backdrop colour. Filer icons whose objects are altered e.g. their have type changed are automatically updated to reflect these changes. 1.64 - Facility to move icons to the front or back of the heap added. Window icons not longer slow down the system. 1.65 - Option added to auto-scale backdrops to fit the screen size in OS units not pixels. 1.66 - Minor bug fixes. Special icon parameters are now edited using a dialog box instead of a cumbersome submenu structure. 1.67 - Option to save as additional items added.