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1988-02-02
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POWERKIT Documentation
January 1988
Version 1.72
Copyright 1987-88 by John H. Brooks.
All rights reserved.
Permission is granted to
distribute copies of this documentation.
DISCLAIMER: This software is sold "as is." No warranty is given, either
express or implied, that any specific POWERKIT feature will work on any
particular machine. The manufacturer will not be liable for any damage
caused by the use of POWERKIT.
The names of hardware and software products, and companies mentioned in
this document are trademarks or service marks of the respective companies.
To registered users, version 1.70 is a free upgrade.
FORWARD: Welcome, I'll be brief. I'm asking you to please pay for POWER-
KIT if you use it. At $9.95*, I believe the price is fair. Give POWERKIT
a good workout, then remit to:
CENTRAL DATA SERVICES
1641 WINONA COURT
DENVER, CO 80204
(303) 595-4218
or 595-4074
SUPPORT FOR POWERKIT: Since there are so many different video cards,
versions of PC/MS-DOS, flavors of the BIOS ROM, hardware configurations,
all calling themselves "PC compatible," the "non-guarantee" above is
regrettable but necessary. Obviously, you won't buy POWERKIT if it
doesn't work on your machine, but if you could spare a few moments to let
me know what would not work, and what kind of machine you have, I'll do my
best to get POWERKIT to work on your machine. As many registered users of
POWERKIT have already discovered, I intend to have POWERKIT be one of the
best supported SHAREWARE (or commercial, for that matter) programs in the
business.
INSTALLATION: To operate POWERKIT, the file POWERKIT.OBJ must be on your boot
disk, and the line
DEVICE=POWERKIT.OBJ (optional instructions to POWERKIT may go here)
Page 2
must be in the CONFIG.SYS file on your boot disk. Ideally, this line
should be the FIRST line in your CONFIG.SYS file, but more on that
later. Your boot disk is the floppy disk you place in disk drive "A"
when you turn the machine on, unless you have a hard disk drive, in
which case your boot disk is the hard disk. If you do not have a file
named CONFIG.SYS on your boot disk, transfer the CONFIG.SYS file that
comes with this package to your boot disk at the same time you trans-
fer POWERKIT.OBJ. To transfer these files, boot up, put the disk con-
taining POWERKIT.OBJ and CONFIG.SYS in floppy disk drive "B", then
type:
COPY B:POWERKIT.OBJ <press ENTER> COPY B:CONFIG.SYS <press ENTER>
On some machines, the ENTER key is labeled RETURN, on others a down-
ward and leftward pointing, right-angled ARROW. If your machine has
only one floppy disk drive and no hard disk drive, drive "B" is also
drive "A", and the above procedure will involve swapping your boot
disk with the POWERKIT.OBJ disk, and back again.
Reboot your computer, POWERKIT will let you know if it is loaded.
NOTICE TO USERS WHOSE CURSORS VANISH: Some device drivers mess up screen
scrolling while installing themselves (see READ.ME). POWERKIT sets
the cursor at the bottom of the screen after installing itself. There-
fore, if you have other device drivers installed from CONFIG.SYS,
after PK, you may be left in the dark, with only POWERKIT's opening
display showing, until another program resets the display. If this
happens to you, set /Cn (described on page 4) high enough on the
screen to prevent this.
INTRODUCTION: POWERKIT is small, about 2400 bytes of it stay in memory. If
each of POWERKIT's tasks were to be done by separate "COM" programs,
many thousands of bytes would be used. Almost all of POWERKIT's
operations may be controlled from the defining line in the CONFIG.SYS
file or the command line for the "COM" version of POWERKIT, with a
keyboard "hot" key, or from a pop-up "1-2-3" style menu, even while
you are inside another program. Many can be disabled, if your
favorite utility program does the same thing better. After all,
POWERKIT uses very little memory.
You will like the way POWERKIT handles your keyboard. A key, when
pressed, starts to repeat after a waiting period whose length you set,
accelerates smoothly at a rate you set to a top speed you set, and
when released, "stops on a dime." Keystrokes also may be made to
repeat very slowly, or to repeat not at all. POWERKIT's AutoPilot
lets you teach your machine how to do a repetitive task, while you sit
back and relax. If that's not enough, add an extra large keystroke
buffer and an ability to view what's in it, a way to route printer
output to your screen, an escape hatch from programs that falter, a
screen blanker, a floppy disk motor early shut-off, a way to protect
your machine from prying eyes and mischievous fingers (even at
bootup), a few other things, and there's HOOK.
HOOK is unique. HOOK will open up many of those programs that won't
let your "can't live without" pop-up utilities pop up. HOOK will do
other things too (see /K)eyboard redefine, and KEYPAD 5, H, page 10).
Page 3
INEXPERIENCED PC USERS: Don't be put off by the wealth of more or less techni-
cal data which follows. You already know how to get POWERKIT working
and if you read how to get the help menus (see /U1 farther down this
page) you may never have to read anything else about POWERKIT.
COMMANDS executed from the CONFIG.SYS file: Most POWERKIT parameters may be
set by including them on the line DEVICE=POWERKIT.OBJ in CONFIG.SYS,
and several MUST be set from this line. BE SURE to leave a blank
space after "... .SYS", then put a "/", the first letter of the
command, and the number to which you wish to set the parameter. For
example, the line:
DEVICE=POWERKIT.OBJ /b35/M15/W5/d2/f110/g68
^ blank space
will set the keystroke buffer size to 35, the floppy disk motor to
shut off after 1.5 seconds (15 tenths), the wait before repeating a
keystroke to 1/2 second (5 tenths), the display to switch off after 2
minutes (if no keys have been pressed during that time), the keystroke
repeat speed to a maximum of 110 keystrokes per second, and replaces
KEYPAD 5 with F10 (68 is the decimal scan code for F10) as the HOT
key. The commands may be entered in any order, in lower/UPPER case.
The following commands can be given ONLY from the DEVICE=POWERKIT.OBJ
line in the CONFIG.SYS file, or the command line of POWERKIT.COM
(more on the "COM" version of POWERKIT later):
/U1 is for NEW USERS who would like to have a menu to remind them of
POWERKIT's many options. /U1 tells POWERKIT, as it is being loaded, to
attach an interface to itself which will allow it to communicate with
a public domain program called SlashBar. Slashbar is a program that
pops menus of the user's choice onto the screen whenever the "ALT" and
"/" keys are pressed simultaneously. SlashBar, and its complementary
program, MAKEBAR (MAKEBAR creates the menus SlashBar pops up), was
written by R.L. Hummel, who wrote a de