Club Amiga de Montreal

home *** CD-ROM | disk | FTP | other *** search

/ Club Amiga de Montreal - CAM / CAM_CD_1.iso / files / 424.lha / Mach_III / MachIII.doc.pp / MachIII.doc

Wrap

Text File | 1990-10-07 | 48KB | 2,158 lines

User's Manual for MachIII Version 3.0 and SetMachIII Version 3.0 Copyright 1988-1990 by Brian Moats Copyright MachIII, SetMachIII and this documentation are Copy- right 1988-1990 by Brian Moats. Lawful users of these programs are hereby licensed only to read the pro- grams, from their media into the memory of a computer, solely for the purpose of executing the programs. Duplicating or copying for purposes other than backup is forbidden. This manual, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced in any form without the written permis- sion of Brian Moats and Polyglot Software. Disclaimer This product is sold "as is" without representation or warranty of any kind, either expressed or implied. The user assumes all risks and responsibilities related to its use. Information And Technical Support Polyglot Software 884 W. Melrose Ln Boise, ID 83706 (208) 336-4583 Table Of Contents Introduction ................................ 1 Terms Used .............................. 1 Chapter 1. Usage ........................... 2 Running SetMachIII ...................... 2 Chapter 2. Mouse Features .................. 5 Mouse Accelerator ....................... 5 SunMouse ................................ 5 Window Cycling .......................... 5 Click To Front .......................... 5 Mouse Off ............................... 6 Mouse To Menu ........................... 6 Chapter 3. Clock Features .................. 7 Basic Clock Types ....................... 7 Clock To Top Window ..................... 8 Clock To Top Screen ..................... 8 Online Meter ............................ 8 Alarm ................................... 8 Low Memory Warning ...................... 8 Clock Position .......................... 9 Clock On And Off ........................ 9 Chapter 4. Hotkeys And Macros .............. 11 Recording Macros ........................ 11 Correcting Mistakes ..................... 12 Aborting Execution ...................... 12 Clearing A Macro ........................ 12 Chapter 5. Using SetmachIII And Macros ..... 13 Changing The Current Hotkey ............. 13 Using Select Hotkey ..................... 13 Selecting By Name ....................... 14 Modifying Macros ........................ 14 Copying And Appending ................... 14 To A Named Macro .................... 14 To Another Configuration ............ 15 Maximum Macro Size ...................... 15 Help .................................... 15 Using Show All .......................... 15 Chapter 6. More About Macros ............... 17 ARexx Support ........................... 17 Help In Viewing A Macro ................. 17 Recording Mouse Clicks .................. 18 Using Escaped Characters ................ 19 Moving Windows And Screens .............. 20 Sizing Windows .......................... 20 Layering Windows ........................ 21 Pausing Within A Macro .................. 21 Auto Execution .......................... 22 Executing Programs ...................... 24 Terminating Strings ..................... 24 Identifying Labels ...................... 25 Chapter 7. Configurations .................. 27 Changing Configurations ................. 27 Adding And Deleting ..................... 28 Loading And Saving ...................... 29 The Configuration File .................. 29 Chapter 8. Priorities And Screen Blanking .. 31 Chapter 9. Miscellaneous Features ........... 33 Suspend ................................. 33 Remove .................................. 33 Check Waltz ............................. 33 No Caps Lock ............................ 33 Beep .................................... 33 Hold Qualifiers ......................... 34 Chapter 10. Foreign Names .................. 35 Appendix A - Table of Escaped Characters .... 37 Appendix B - Common Questions ............... 41 Introduction MachIII is a utility program that provides hotkeys and many optional features for both CLI and Workbench users. All options and macros may be changed at any time with SetMachIII. The supplied disk is a standard 1.3 Workbench disk that you may boot from. The sample configuration file, MachIII.Cfg, is in the s: directory. MachIII will be run from the startup-sequence, and then SetMachIII will run. If you do not boot from the disk, make that disk the current disk (with cd df0: for example) and type Run MachIII and then Cancel the s:MachIII.Cfg Not Found and Using Defaults requesters. Now activate the clock window with your mouse and press the right button. This will run SetMachIII, the program used to configure your options and modify your macros. Change s:MachIII.Cfg to s/MachIII.Cfg and click on Load. Terms Used In this manual, qualifiers mean the keys Ctl, Shift, Alt, Left-Amiga (C=), and Right-Amiga. The term hotkey means any other key pressed in combination with one or more qualifiers. The term macro means the string of characters that are sent as keystrokes, or backslash functions that are interpreted as some special action. A macro may be attached to a hotkey or to no key at all. Any macro may have a name, but macros not attached to a key must have a name. A key may have up to 32 macros attached to it, each with a unique qualifier combination. IMPORTANT: All hotkeys referred to in this docu- mentation are included in the sample MachIII.Cfg file. You may change them later to suit your needs. -1- -2- Chapter 1 Usage SetMachIII and MachIII should normally be in your c: directory and MachIII.Cfg in your s: directory. Type: Run MachIII Or... ARun MachIII NOIO Allows the CLI window to close. Or... RunBack c:MachIII >Nil: The CLI window can close. Or... RunBack c:MachIII RunBack needs the full path. Any one of these commands may be included in your startup-sequence file, and MachIII will run every time that you start or reboot your computer. If you do this, be sure that the command is after your Path command (if you have one). The only obvious indication that MachIII is run- ning is the title bar clock. The real power of MachIII is lying in the background waiting to assist you. Exactly what it does will depend on your configuration file. Running SetMachIII There are four ways to run SetMachIII. The easiest is to activate the clock and press the right mouse -3- button. You may use the hotkey Ctl-Left-Amiga-ESC, which has \x as its macro. Or you may simply type SetMachIII in your CLI window. The final method is to execute an \XSetMachIII macro. \x is preferred over this because \x will bring SetMachIII to the front immediately if it is already running, while \XSetMac- hIII must load SetMachIII. NOTE: Do not rename SetMachIII or MachIII won't be able to find it. SetMachIII must also be in the path as it was set when MachIII was run. -4- Chapter 2 Mouse Features All mouse features are adjusted or toggled on or off in the Mouse Features section of SetMachIII. Some features may also be modified with macros. Mouse Accelerator Move the mouse. Notice how much quicker it moves? Both the speed and sensitivity are adjustable. The Speed is an acceleration factor applied to mouse movements. The Threshold adjusts the sensitivity of the mouse. Low values equal decreased sensitivity. Set the Speed to 0 to disable the accelerator. SunMouse Now move the mouse into another window. The window under the mouse automatically becomes the active window. This is called the SunMouse, named for the way in which mice behave on Sun work stations. This may also be toggled on and off with \Ms in a macro. Window Cycling If you have more than one window open, place them so that one is behind the other. Now with the mouse over the top window, press and hold the left button and press and release the right button. The top window will move to the back. This is called Window Cycling. If the mouse is over a "back drop" window or no win- dow, the screen will be sent to the back. Click To Front Now place a window behind another so that you can -5- see just part of it. Move the mouse into this area and click quickly twice. That window should now be the top window. This is the N Click feature where N is the number of clicks required and may be set from 0 to 9. If the mouse is over a backdrop window, the screen will become the top screen. CAUTION! Due to a bug in the intuition library, click- ing to front over an icon may cause a lockup. The program WTFPatch3 (included in the c: directory) by David Jenkins will fix this. Mouse Off Press a key. Notice that the mouse disappeared? Now move the mouse. It reappears! MachIII assumes that if you are typing, you do not want the mouse in the way. It will also turn the mouse off after 5 seconds of inactivity. This time delay is adjustable in Set- MachIII or with \Monn in a macro, where nn equals the number of seconds. Set Mouse Off to 0 to disable this feature. Mouse To Menu One feature that defaults to off is Mouse To Menu. When this is on, every time that you press the right mouse button the pointer will jump to the menu bar. When you release the button, the pointer will return to where it was. This is the MTM gadget in SetMachIII. It may also be toggled with \MM in a macro. -6- Chapter 3 Clock Features There is a wide variety of clocks to choose from Click on the clock type gadget in the Clock Features area to change types. These are shown below. Each of these may be either horizontal or vertical by using the H/V gadget and the time may be in 12 or 24 hour format. If you select Clock+Memory or Memory Only, and if you do not have any "Fast" memory, the clock will not show Chip and Fast, just Mem. Basic Clock Types Clock+Memory ------------------------------- |Chip 456 Fast 357 4:32:45| ------------------------------- Memory Only --------------------- |Chip 456 Fast 357| --------------------- Clock+Date ------------------- | 8-01-90 4:32:45| ------------------- Clock Only --------- |4:32:45| --------- Clock+Memory (No fast memory available) ------------------- |Mem 456 4:32:45| ------------------- -7- Clock To Top Window You may select to have the clock pop to the front window by having Clock Front selected. If Clock Depth is selected, invisible depth gadgets are placed on the far right side of the clock (horizontal clocks only). Clock To Top Screen The clock may pop to the top screen by having Clock To Top selected. This and the Screen Depth option will place an invisible screen depth gadget on the left side of the clock. Or you may select WB Screen to keep it on the Workbench screen. (These must be used with some caution as not all programs work properly with another window on their screen.) You cannont drag a vertical clock unless you select WB Screen. Online Meter You may select to have the time portion of your clock keep track of your online costs by selecting Meter On. Clear your costs with Reset. Put the online rate (per hour) in the Rate gadget. Alarm An alarm may be set in the Alarm gadget. Use 24 hour format. The clock will beep six times when it goes off. (There are ways to set more alarms in mac- ros.) Low Memory Warning If you would like to be alerted to low memory situations, enter the memory warning level in the LowMem gadget. When free memory drops below this value (in kilobytes), the clock's text will turn red or orange (or the color that is set by color number 3. -8- Clock Position You can change the clock's position by entering the left edge and top edge in the appropriate gadgets. An easier method is to position the clock with the mouse and then enter a -1 in the gadgets. The correct value will then be entered for you. Clock On And Off You may, of course, turn the clock on or off with the Clock On / Off gadget. Within a macro, a clock may be turned on with \KD, turned off with \KK, toggled on or off with \KZ and sent to the top screen with \KT. -9- -10- Chapter 4 Hotkeys and Macros The real power of MachIII is its ability to record and playback macros. In their simplest form, macros are simply strings of keystrokes attached to hotkeys. You may, for example, have a macro that contains the text diskcopy df0: to df1:. When played back, these letters will appear in your active window just as if you typed them. But there is much more to macros. Besides having letters in macros, you may include any special key by preceding a letter with a backslash. This is called an escape character. Some examples: \F1 is Function key 1, \E is the ESC key, \5 is numeric key pad 5. In addition, there are many special func- tions that may be performed in a macro. You may send a screen to the back with \sB, or to the front with \sF. (Functions such as these cannot be recorded, they must be entered using SetMachIII.) Left mouse button down may be done with \Mld or up with \Mlu. There are many more of these listed in Appendix A. Recording Macros One of the most important escaped character func- tions is \mk. This is the macro that starts or stops a recording session. In the sample MachIII.Cfg, this is attached to the key combination Alt-ESC. By pressing this, and then pressing the key combination that you want for the hotkey, you begin a recording session. Press any keys that you want recorded and then press Alt-ESC again. The macro is now ready to be played back. A practice session may help to understand this. To do this, you must be in a CLI or shell window. -11- Press Alt-ESC (you will hear a beep and the clock will display the message Select Hotkey...). Press Alt-D (the clock will say Recording Macro...). Now type dir df0: and press Return. The directory of the disk in df0: will be displayed. Now press Alt-ESC again to end recording. You may now press Alt-D and your recorded keystrokes will be played back. There is a beep for each keystroke and mouse button entered during recording. This is not the same sound as in the Beep gadget, it is very brief. Correcting Mistakes Ctl-H may be used to correct a keystroke without recording the mistake or the backspace. Because of this feature, you cannot record Ctl-H. You may howev- er, enter it as \Ch in the macro. (If you are using a keymap that has "H" in a different location, you must use the key that has the key code of 25 hex.) Aborting Execution Pressing ESC during macro execution will abort further execution. An exception to this is when paus- ing for variable length input (\PV). Press Ctl-ESC to abort and ESC to terminate input. Clearing A Macro To clear a macro, press Alt-ESC, then the hotkey, then Alt-ESC again. This records no keystrokes which means that the macro is empty and the hotkey is free. -12- Chapter 5 Using SetmachIII And Macros Macros may also be created, modified, copied or appended in SetMachIII. In the area titled Hotkey / Macro, there are many gadgets that are used to do this. Changing The Current Hotkey The two up/down arrow gadgets next to Hotkey are used to step through all your macros. The word "More" will appear when there are more macros attached to the same key but with different qualifiers. The gadgets Ctl, Shift, Alt, C= and Amiga show the qualifiers for the current hotkey. You may click on them to change current hotkeys. If you select qualifiers that have no macro, the Macro gadget will be empty, ready to accept a new macro. Note: Hotkey is not a gadget. It just displays the current key. Using Select Hotkey You can make a hotkey current by clicking on Select Hotkey and then when prompted by the flashing message, press your desired hotkey combination. This will make that combination your current hotkey and display the macro attached to that hotkey (if there is one). If you want to display a macro that is not attached to a hotkey (that is, a named macro), you should press Caps Lock when prompted and then enter the name in the gadget that will pop up. Note that the red LED on your keyboard will remain on...you need to press it again to deactivate it. If you want to make a mouse button current, hold down your selected qualifi- er keys and click INSIDE the message box. -13- You may also press the letter S instead of click- ing on Select Hotkey. Select Hotkey functions the same way in Show All. Selecting By Name Macro Name displays a (possibly) descriptive name for the macro. You may select a named macro by enter- ing the name in the Macro Name gadget and pressing Shift-Return. Pressing just Return will simply change the name of the current macro. This operates the same way in Show All. Modifying Macros The gadget titled Macro holds the macro that is attached to the current key. You may modify it, or delete all its text to free that hotkey. To enter the example from Chapter 4, click on Select Key and press Alt-D. Now enter dir df0:\N in the Macro gadget and press Return. That's it! dir df0:<Return> will be played back when you press Alt-D. If you recorded the previous example, the macro will already be there. Copying And Appending Copy will copy a macro from one hotkey to another and Append will append a macro to another hotkey. First make the hotkey that you want to copy or append from the current hotkey. Then select Copy or Append. When prompted by the flashing message, press the desired destination hotkey combination. To A Named Macro To copy or append to an unkeyed named macro, -14- proceed as above but press CapsLock when prompted for a hotkey and then enter the name in the gadget that will appear. To Another Configuration Proceed as above and then while the message is flashing, switch configurations with the up/down arrows in the Configuration area. Then select your hotkey. CAUTION! Since any key or mouse button may be copied or appended to, there is no way to back out when the message is flashing. If you make a mistake and do not want to continue, you MUST select some- thing. Use a key that does not have a macro attached, and then later delete that macro. Do not simply click the left mouse button or that button will replay the macro whenever you press the left button. Maximum Macro Size The default maximum macro size is 512 characters but this may be changed in the Max Size gadget. This controls the size of dynamic buffers which are allo- cated only during macro recording or when SetMachIII is running. The actual macros take up only as much space as they need plus a little bit of overhead. Help Clicking on Help will show all the escaped charac- ters that may be used in macros. They are also listed in Appendix A. Using Show All Show All opens a window that has most of the same Macro / Hotkey functions, but up to eight macros for a -15- particular key are displayed together. If you have more than eight macros for a key, the rest may be viewed by using the scroll bar. The top macro is the current one. Only the current macro may be modified. As you select other macros, the macros that scroll off the top wrap around to the bottom. Some help is dis- played in the upper right corner. The text depends on just what you are doing at that moment. You may click on the Qualifier gadgets to make other hotkeys current, or if no macro is attached to the combination, you may enter a new macro. Selecting Add Macro will prompt you to select a new hotkey. Again, you may use CapsLock to select an unkeyed named macro. Copy and Append operate the same as in the main SetMachIII window except that you can not copy or append to a macro in another configuration. -16- Chapter 6 More About Macros ARexx Support Macros may be sent to MachIII from ARexx programs with the ARexx command "address 'MachIII Port' `macro string'". MachIII will execute the macro just as if you pressed the hotkey. Help In Viewing A Macro You can view a macro by issuing the help command (\h) in a macro. This is Alt-Help in the sample MachIII.Cfg file. You will be prompted for a hotkey combination. Use the same macro (\h) to end help. An Example As an example of the flexibility and power of MachIII (and to show why there are so many escaped characters), this macro will toggle the Workbench screen to interlace and change your preferences: (Assuming that you have wbLace in c: and a system- configuration (preferences) file named prflace in devs:) Endcli\N\KK\PS1\Xc:wbLace\\pdevs:prflace\\KD\ j\XNewShell "Newcon:0/0/640/400/AShell" Ends the current shell - Endcli\N Turns the clock off - \KK Pauses 1 second - \PS1 Executes wbLace - \Xc:wbLace\ Changes preferences - \pdevs:prflace\ Turns the clock back on - \KD And creates a new shell - \j\XNewShell "NewCon:0/0/640/400/AShell" -17- Recording mouse clicks Mouse button clicks may be recorded, or entered manually in the string gadget. When recording a button click, MachIII puts in the mouse's position, which button it was and whether it was pressed or released. For example: \Mx155\My075\Mld When played back, the mouse will be moved to x = 155, y = 75 and a left button down will be sent. A \PSnn will be inserted for every nn second delay between clicks. This will allow for menus to drop or requesters and windows to open. You may adjust or delete them from your macro if desired. If you record just the left button, you might see something like this for the macro: \Mx152\My\095\Mld\Mx152\My095\Mlu unless you moved the mouse between clicks in which case the x and y values would change. You may edit this to \Mx152\My095\Mld\Mlu if the x and y values are unchanged. Notes: The mouse will be moved to the same position as when recorded which may or may not be over the desired gadget or icon. If you are pressing a qualifier such as Shift, it (\S) will be placed before a \M and will affect the mouse movement and the first click. e.g. \S\Mx330\My122\Mld. -18- When a menu item has a subitem it may be necces- sary to bring the mouse down to the menu item, click the left button on it, then move the mouse over the subitem and click the left button or release the right button. Sometimes gadgets will not respond to a quick button down/up. It may require a pause of 1 second between the down and up (\PS1). Do not depend on the SunMouse to activate a window on playback. When recording, click in the window to activate it even if it is activated by the SunMouse. Using Escaped Characters All non-printable keys and many special functions are preceded by a \. For example, \B is the Backspace key, \H is the help key and \F3 is function key 3. These qualifiers modify the key or mouse activity immediately following them: \C Control. \S Shift (either one). \A Alternate (either one). \L Left-Amiga (C=). \R Right-Amiga. An example: \Cc\u\A\S\l This plays back the key combinations: Ctl-c up-arrow and Alt-Shift-Left-Arrow You do not need \S or \A before any character that is printable. For example Alt-E displays the copyright -19- symbol. You can press Alt-E instead of entering \Ae. But if you need Alt-E played back, use \Ae. Note that all escaped characters must be used in the case as shown. That is, if a macro is described as \WF, you cannot use \wF or \Wf. Moving Windows And Screens MachIII implements many functions by putting certain escape sequences in macros. For example, \WF will bring the back window to the front while \WB will send it to the back. You can replace the combination Left-Amiga-N with the macro \sF to bring the back screen (instead of the Workbench screen) to the front. Replace Left-Amiga-M with \sB. Add \WA to make \sF\WA and \sB\WA, which activates the window under the mouse. CAUTION! When using these, there are some instances when you have an interlaced and non-interlaced screen - the interlaced may become deinterlaced and possibly lock up the computer. There are more functions listed in Appendix A. Sizing Windows The active or the top window may be resized with \Wsxxx,yyy or \WSxxx,yyy. Some examples: \Ws640,200 Make the active window 640 by 200. \Ws0,200 Make the active window 200 pixels tall and do not change the width. \WS,+10 Increase the top window's height by 10. \WS-90,+10 Decrease the top window's width by 90 and increase the height by 10 pixels. -20- An omitted number is assumed to be 0, which will leave that value unchanged. If the requested size is to large for the window's position, the window will be moved. If it is to large for the screen, the screen size will be used. Finally, if it is to small, it will be ignored. So to make a full sized window, it is save to use "Ws1500,1500", for example. You can combine this with \Watitle to size a specific window. For example: \WaAmigaShell\\Ws0,100 will make your AmigaShell window 100 pixels tall. Be sure to note the \ terminating the title. Layering Windows Windows may be layered or stacked with \WL. When this is executed in a macro, all windows will be ar- ranged in a stack. Windows listed in No Layer Titles= in MachIII.Cfg will not be layered. Typically, these would be MachIII and your shell. You can include as many as 5 titles. Due to the length of time that Workbench takes to refresh a window filled with icons, this function may not be very useful when using Work- bench. Pausing Within A Macro There are three types of pauses, pause for 1-99 seconds, pause for fixed length input, and pause for variable length input. -21- Examples: \PS1 Pause for one second. \PK5 Pause for five keystrokes. \PV Pause for a variable number of keystrokes. Terminate input with ESC. Abort this macro during input with Ctl-ESC. \PKn and \PV may be useful in some data entry macros where the macro performs some functions, waits for some user input, and then continues with more functions. The macro may even call itself over and over. An easy way to setup such a macro would be to record a complete data entry loop, and then, using SetMachIII, enter the pause in the appropriate place. A data entry macro might look like this: \Mx150\My40\Mld\Mlu\PV\\Mx460\My23\Mld\Mlu\F1 With this attached to the F1 key, the mouse would click in a gadget at 150,40, wait for a variable number of keystrokes, click on another gadget (which might be a "Next" gadget), and then execute F1 which would then cause it to repeat. Remember to abort a recursive macro like this with Ctl-ESC for a \PV pause, or just ESC for all others. Auto Execution \annnn is the auto execution command. If nnnn = 0 or is omitted, the macro will be automatically execut- ed when MachIII is started. -22- An example: \a\XNewCli will open a new CLI window automatical- ly when MachIII is first run. If nnnn equals a time of 0001 to 2400, the macro will be executed at that time. Another example: \a930\XNewcli CON:220/50/200/50/Alarm\Call Joe\G\PS3\CxEndCLI >nil:\N At 9:30 this will open a window in the center of the screen, print the text Call Joe, beep, pause 3 seconds, delete (Ctl-x) the text and end the CLI window. (Note the \ terminating the newcli string.) \a1200\Xecho >speak: "Lunch time. Why not take 2 hours?" Assuming that you have mounted the device speak:, at 1200, speak the quoted string. You may use \a+nn which will execute the macro every nn minutes per hour. \a+30 will execute every 30 minutes, but \a+45 will execute only at 45 minutes past the hour. \a+10\RS Every 10 minutes, issue the key combination of Right-Amiga-S (which might be a save file keystroke). A popular combination of macros is this: \a+15\G \a+30\G \a+45\G\G \a+60\G\G -23- This will beep once at 15 after, twice on the half hour, three times at three quarters after, and four times on the hour. These are 4 separate macros and may be unkeyed. Executing Programs Many programs can be run from a macro. Simply put \Xprogram in a macro. For example, \Xrun myapp would run a program named myapp. Usually, you would want to use Run in your command string to keep from suspending MachIII during the application's execution. Terminating Strings Strings following escaped characters like \Xstring and \pconfiguration must be terminated with a \ if anything will follow. e.g. \XNewCLI\Dir\N or \XRun Comm\\F1\F2. Note the two \s after Comm. One terminates the \XRun Comm string and one introduces a function key. When creating a NewCLI, you probably want to preface the command with \j. This will bring the Workbench screen to the front. For Example: \j\XNewCLI You need to have NewCLI and Run in the c: direc- tory. A full window example might look like this: \j\XNewCLI CON:0/0/640/200/MyCLI Or \j\XNewShell NEWCON:0/0/640/200/MachShell -24- Identifying Labels For the purpose of identifying portions of your macro or for adding comments, you may insert text following \i. Terminate the text with a \. Example: \iMouse To Close Gadget\\Mx014\My004\Mld\Mlu -25- -26- Chapter 7 Configurations You may have more than one configuration within your MachIII.Cfg file. The term "configuration" in this section refers to a configuration inside MachIII.Cfg. Let's assume that you've set up the SunMouse, some macros attached to function keys and other features that work well in a shell. Now you want to run a program such as WordPerfect. Well, WordPerfect doesn't like the SunMouse and it uses the Function keys. You could disable MachIII when running WP but that's not very good. Another alternative is to add another configuration to the one that you have already set up and modify it to work with WP. To do this, select Add in SetMachIII. This will make a duplicate configura- tion and number it 2. Set the SunMouse to off and clear your macros that are attached to the function keys. Next, in the gadget to the left of Add, type in " WordP" (notice the space before the WordP, that's like it is in the title bar). Now whenever you click in a WordPerfect window, this configuration will become the active one. In your first configuration, you should type in the title AmigaShell or whatever is in the title bar of your shell. Now, when you click in a WordPerfect window, the second configuration becomes active. Click in your shell window and its configura- tion becomes active. Changing Configurations You may have as many configurations as you like. Each one may be attached to a window or screen through its title and activated by clicking in that window. The first configuration with no title will be activat- ed when no title matches. The title need be just long -27- enough to uniquely match a window's title. An @ as the 1st character will lock a configuration which may then only be changed from SetMachIII or by executing a macro that has \cN \cL or \cT in it (see Appendix A). When a configuration is changed from within a macro, there will be no further execution of that macro. Note that you must click in the window to change configurations, even if SunMouse activates it. When a new configuration is made active, its title will appear in the clock for about one second. If the clock is identical to the clock in the previously active configuration, it will not be closed and reopened when configurations are changed. You may put in multiple window titles separated by a | such as Ashell|TextEd| WordP up to a maximum of 40 characters. Not all windows or screens have real titles. It may be just text written where the title should be. MachIII cannot locate these titles and thus cannot change to the proper configuration. You can manually change to these configurations with a \cN macro. A program supplied with MachIII call AllTitles will list the window and screen titles that are useable. Simply type AllTitles at the CLI prompt. Adding And Deleting Add duplicates the current configuration and then makes that one current. You may then delete or modify macros in the new configuration. Delete a configuration with the Del gadget. You cannot delete the last configuration. -28- Loading And Saving For any changes to be permament, you just need to click on Save. When MachIII is first run, it looks for s:MachIII.Cfg and loads that. You may save configura- tions to other file names, but only s:MachIII.Cfg will be loaded automatically. Click on Load (or use \cLfilename in a macro) to load other configurations. The Configuration File MachIII.Cfg is straight ASCII text and may be edited (but does not need to be except to enter No Layer Titles, Month Names, Day Names and Date Format). Multiple configurations are all saved togeth- er under one file name. Each configuration within this file must start with ID=3.0. The specific order of everything else is not important except Month Names and Day Names which must be sequential. These are not needed unless you want to use names other than the English names that are internal to MachIII. Macros must be in the following format: Macro=key\qualifiers{macroname}Macro body The keys and qualifiers are identified in Appendix A. The name should be no more than 12 characters. To enter no name use {}. Examples: Macro=J\L{WinToFront}\WF This is Left-Amiga-J Window to front. Macro=\E\L{newshell}\j\XAShell "newcon:0/1/640/100AShell" This is Left-Amiga-ESC and executes a newshell -29- command. (Note the \j brings the Workbench to front before executing the command string.) Macro=\E\A{Start/Stop}\mk This is Alt-ESC and begins or ends a recording to key session. Macro=N\C\L{X named mac}\n This is Ctl-Left-Amiga-N and it will execute a named macro. -30- Chapter 8 Priorities And Screen Blanking Priorities All tasks in the Amiga's multitasking operating system run at a particular priority. Higher priority tasks have higher numbers and will run while other tasks wait. Most user tasks run at a priority of 0 and share the computers time equally. MachIII runs well at 1. MachIII can change its priority while playing back a macro. A priority of 1 is usually ok here too. You may experiment with these numbers and your particular applications to find what works best. Don't try to set them very high though, usually no more than 6 and certainly no more than 10. Blanking After a preset length of time, you may have the screen either go blank or just dim. If you select a dimness of 0 and have Check Waltz on, there will be two dancing check marks on the blanked screen. As these are sprites and the pointer is also a sprite, the pointer is moved to the lower right corner. You may adjust the tempo with the keys 1-9. The screen may also be blanked with \b in a macro. -31- -32- Chapter 9 Miscellaneous Features There are six features that don't fit into any of the above categories. Suspend MachIII may be temporarily suspended by clicking on the Suspend gadget. Or, you may create a macro that has \Z as its first 2 characters. Pressing the hotkey that this macro is attached to will either suspend or activate MachIII. Remove You can remove MachIII completely by clicking on Remove. \Q in a macro may also be used. Check Waltz When you have selected 0 for your Dimness in screen Blanking, and you have Check Waltz on, screen blanking will include two dancing check marks. The speed of these may be adjusted with the keys 1 to 9. No Caps Lock Selecting No Caps Lock on will disable your Caps Lock key. It actually may be still used by pressing Left-Amiga-CapsLock. Beep You can use a custom sound for MachIII's beep. The sound should be a raw data file with the file size in bytes 1 to 4 and the period value in bytes 5 and 6. As this file is read in for each beep, it should be as -33- small as possible and perhaps even copied into RAM. Several samples are provided. This sound will not be the sound used when recording macros. It will be re- peated 6 times for the alarm. Enter the name and com- plete path in the Beep gadget. Hold Qualifiers If Hold Qualifiers is on, you may press and re- lease any qualifier and it will be remembered and added to the next non-qualifier key or mouse button. Many disabled people find it difficult if not impossible to type key combinations such as Ctl-Shift-F1. So you could for example, press Shift, Alternate, and then F1. The Shift and Alternate would be added to the F1 just as if they were pressed at the same time. This feature is not intended for someone who doesn't need it as it sometimes may cause unex- pected results. For example, if you press Alternate and then change your mind, the Alternate will still be added to the next key pressed. Pressing Caps Lock or the right mouse button will clear the qualifiers. Pressing a qualifier again will clear that qualifier. An orange or red (color #3) bar will appear on the clock's left edge when there are qualifiers accumulat- ing. Qualifiers may be held for multiple keystrokes if you first press Alt-CapsLock. This may also be used with Workbench's extended selection. Press the Shift key, then click on your icons. Hit any non-qualifier key or the right mouse button to clear the Shift. -34- Chapter 10 Foreign Names You may include in your MachIII.Cfg file alternate names for months and days. The format to use is this: Month Name=Name Day Name=Name These may be placed anywhere after the ID=3.0 line, but they will be saved after Clock Screen Type=. Enter 12 lines of month names followed by 7 lines of day names followed by 1 line of 3 characters of date format. The date format can be mdy, dmy, ymd etc. The date output by the short form \y will be displayed accordingly as will the Clock+Date display. If you select dmy, the long form \Y and the Clock+Mem will display DD. Month Year. (y = year, m = month, d = day). Do not use names longer than 10 characters. A German file might look like this: Month Name=Januar Month Name=Febuar Month Name=Marz Month Name=April Month Name=Mai Month Name=Juni Month Name=Juli Month Name=August Month Name=September Month Name=Oktober Month Name=November Month Name=Dezember -35- Day Name=Sonntag Day Name=Montag Day Name=Dienstag Day Name=Mittwoch Day Name=Donnerstag Day Name=Freitag Day Name=Samstag Date Format=dmy -36- Appendix A Escaped Characters Letter Funnction Example Comments A Alt Qualifier \A B Backspace Key \B C Control Key \C D DELete Key \D E ESCape Key \E F Function key \F1 Function key 10 is \F0. G Beep Function \G I J K Clock D Display \KD Display the clock. K Kill \KK Turn off the clock. T Top screen \KT Clock to top screen. Z Toggle clock \KZ Turn clock on / off. L Left Amiga \L AKA C=. M Mouse xnnn \Mx127 Send mouse position. ynnn \My058 lu \Mlu Send left button up. ld \Mld Send left button down. mu \Mmu Send middle button up. md \Mmd Send middle button down ru \Mru Send right button up. rd \Mrd Send right button down onn \Mo05 Set MouseOff seconds. s \Ms Toggle SunMouse. M \MM Toggle Mouse To Menu. N Newline \N Return key. O Macros On/Off \O Must be 1st in macro. -37- P Pause Snn \PS01 Pause 1 second. Knn \PK4 Pause for 4 keystrokes V \PV Pause for a variable number of keystrokes. End input with ESC. Q Quit \Q Remove MachIII R Right Amiga \R S Shift \S T Tab Key \T U V W Window A \WA Activate window under mouse. atitle \WaAsh Activate by title. B \WB Top window back. b \Wb Active window to back. F \WF Back window to front. f \Wf Active window to front L \WL Layer windows. N \WN Activate next window. Sxxx,yyy \WS640,200 Size top window. sxxx,yyy \Ws640,200 Size active window X Execute command \Xcomm End the command with a \ if not at the end of the macro. Y Long date \Y Send date as keystrokes Z Suspend \Z Suspend MachIII. (Must be 1st in the macro). a Auto execute \a1730macro Execute at 5:30 pm \a+5macro Execute every 5 minutes. b Blank screen \b -38- c Configuration L load \cLfilename Load configuration N next \cN Switch to next. S save \cS Save configuration. T title \cTtitle Switch to configu- ration with title. d Down arrow key \d e Enter \e Numeric keypad. f g h Help \h Display a macro. i Identifier \ilabel\ This is a comment. j Workbench to \j front k l Left arrow key \l m Macro k \mk Record to a key. n \mn Record to a named macro n Execute macro \n Get name from user. by name Must be last item in a macro or followed by a blank. nname Execute macro \nsetup Execute macro named setup. o p Set preferences \ppreffile q r Right arrow key \r s Screen B \sB Screen to back. F \sF Screen to front. btitle \sbWorkB Screen titled WorkB???? to back. ftitle \sftitle Titled screen to front. t u Up arrow key \u -39- v w x Run SetMachIII \x Brings to front or top if already running. y Short date \y Send date as keystrokes z 0 Numeric pad number \0 to \9 ()/*.+- Numeric pad \( \) \/ \* \. \+ \- -40- Appendix B Common Questions Q. Why does the SunMouse sometimes not work? A. When a string gadget (or any gadget anywhere) is active, the SunMouse will not work. You must deactivate the gadget with a click of the left mouse button. Q. Why does the SunMouse seem to fight some pro- grams? A. When a program such as WordPerfect has a reques- ter up, it tries to keep the requester's window active. If MachIII has the SunMouse option on, every mouse move will activate a window and then WP will activate its requester's window. The only thing to do in this case is to turn off the SunMouse or hold down the left button. (Or use a second configuration with a title of WordP and the SunMouse turned off and perhaps move the clock over off of the extra gadget.) Q. How can I run MachIII from an icon? A. This program is usually run from your startup- sequence, but if you want to run it from an icon you can by using XIcon. See your AmigaDos manual for more information. Q. Why can't I close my CLI window after running MachIII? A. In order to keep the current path, MachIII does not detach from the CLI. Use RunBack c:MachIII or ARun MachIII NOIO. Either of these will allow the CLI window to close. -41- Q. Why does my application crash when I run it from the NewCLI or \X? A. Programs executed with \X (such as NewCLI) will have a stack the size that was set when MachIII was run. These and ones that you may run from a new CLI may need a larger stack. Either set the stack before running MachIII, or after you create a NewCLI use the stack command to set your stack to a larger value. The default stack size is 4000. Many programs need 10000 or more. Q. Why does MachIII ask for my Workbench disk when I run a program from a macro? A. MachIII uses the "Run" program which may be in your c: directory. Also, if you made "Run" resi- dent, it will not be found unless you run the patch program SetPatch (Workbench 1.3). Q. Why am I in the c: directory when I create a new CLI? A. MachIII's current directory is the one that was current when MachIII was run. If you bring up a new CLI and find yourself in the c: directory for example, it is because that was the current directory when MachIII was run. You probably did a "cd c:" somewhere before running MachIII. Q. Why am I getting a Close Screen Vector message? A. The clock options Screen Depth and Clock To Top replace the CloseScreen vector with one that will allow MachIII to close its clock window. Select- ing WB Screen or removing MachIII will put back the original vector. If another program also replaced the vector, you will be given the oppor- tunity to terminate that program before the original vector is replaced. If you get a reques- -42- ter with the message Close Screen Vector Was Changed!, either terminate the program that changed the vectors and click Retry or just click Cancel. If WB Screen is selected, the vectors are not changed. Q. How can I display only the total memory in the clock? A. You can fool the clock into displaying your total memory even if you have fast ram. In your start- up-sequence, turn off your fast ram with a com- mand like "nofastmem", run MachIII, then turn your fast ram back on. Q. Why doesn't it change configurations when I click in a window? A. The title entered in the string gadget in the Configurations section must exactly match the window or screen title (although it may be short- er). It may also be that there is no real title in your window or screen. Check the section in Chapter 8 that deals with this. -43-