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S L I M M E R R E V 2.1 D A T E D S E P 2 5, 1 9 8 9 (c) copyright 1988, 1989 by George D. Summers ****************************** WARNING **************************************** * * * SLIMMER CREATES OR WRITES TO ONE OR MORE FILE(S) EVERY TIME YOU RUN IT! * * THEREFORE, MAKE YOURSELF A WORKING COPY OF SLIMMER & KEEP THE ORIGINAL IN A * * SAFE PLACE FOR REFERENCE. * * * ****************************** WARNING **************************************** DEDICATION SLIMMER is dedicated to the ultimate programmer - the creator of the universe. OVERVIEW SLIMMER will do the following for you: 1. Calculate your ideal weight. 2. Calculate your ideal calorie requirement. 3. Keep track of your weight and calorie intake and plot your progress. 4. Provide you with an extensive look-up data base of food types with their corresponding calorie values. Allows you to select and scale items from the food tables for your daily calorie list. 5. Provide for custom food tables for each user. 6. Allows the user to save the last seven (days of) daily calorie lists. These lists may be recalled and edited - and even copied to a different date if desired. 7. Various types of exercise may be selected by the user and may be scaled and saved in the daily calorie lists. 8. Daily calorie lists can be printed (or if no printer is on-line, a print file will be written.) SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS SLIMMER requires a computer with at least 285K of memory in which to load. If your computer has a math co-processor, SLIMMER will use it. SLIMMER can be run on one and two-disk systems, but runs fastest when loaded to and run from a hard disk-equipped system. INSTALLATION SLIMMER has a large number of data files (77 of them) that are displayed on the screen when you view the food tables. In addition, it has as many as seven custom food table files and/or daily calorie lists, and then an overflow file that accumulates the daily calorie lists after the initial seven-day period. Finally, there is a master Page 1 file of daily date/weight/calorie values (and its backup file) for every individual user. It is therefore recommended, if you have a hard disk, that you create a subdirectory for SLIMMER and copy all the files into it. For those without a hard disk, run SLIMMER from your copy disks after you have safely put away your original. When running from a floppy disk, file maintenance is important since SLIMMER will create new files or addend existing files and eventually fill your disk. To assist you in keeping track of the space available on your disk, SLIMMER will report the space remaining on the default drive in the lower right hand corner of the screen. The message will only come on when the space is less than 10,000 bytes and will stay on for two seconds. When you see this message, you are advised to look at the files on the disk to see which ones could be deleted. To deal with space limitations of non-hard disk systems: 1. SYSTEM WITH ONE 360K FLOPPY DISK - Copy the SLIMMER.EXE and SLIMMER.DOC files onto a working copy disk # 1. Copy all the other files to another working copy disk # 2. Put your original disk away in a safe place. Put disk # 1 in your drive and type SLIMMER <ENTER>. After the program has loaded and you are asked for your name, change to disk #2 before entering anything. The n$.CAL file that you create (your name is = n$) will eventually get too large and will have to be deleted periodically. If you have more than one user in your household, it is recommended that each one have their own working copy disk # 2. Certain versions of DOS have a limitation on the number of files you can have on a floppy disk - possibly a number like 112 files. With multiple users, this limit is quickly exceeded. 2. SYSTEM WITH TWO 360K FLOPPY DISKS - With two floppy drives, follow the directions above for the one disk system and prepare disks # 1 and # 2. In addition, copy file AB.BAT from the original SLIMMER files to disk # 2. This BAT file has the following two lines in it: path = a:\;b:\; slimmer Disk # 2 goes into your A> drive, and disk # 1 goes into B>. Change to your A> drive by typing A:<ENTER>. Start the program by typing ab<ENTER>. This activates the AB.BAT file and starts SLIMMER. All your daily files will now be written to go onto the floppy disk in the A> drive, and the SLIMMER.EXE program will be executed from the B> drive via the path command. 3. SYSTEM WITH ONE OR MORE 3-1/2" DISKS - In this case, since the 3-1/2" disk holds at least 720K, then simply copy your entire complements of SLIMMER files unto a working diskette and save your original copy of SLIMMER. Again, there may be a DOS limitation on number of files allowed on a floppy, so make a working diskette copy for each person to use. For the convenience of REGISTERED users, SLIMMER is available to them on a 3-1/2" disk. Page 2 4. IBM AT OR EQUIVALENT WITH HIGH DENSITY 5-1/4" DRIVE Since SLIMMER writes to and updates files in the default drive, it is strongly recommended that you never run SLIMMER from a 360K disk in the AT's high density drive. Either copy SLIMMER to a subdirectory on the hard disk, or copy it to a high density disk before running it. RUNNING SLIMMER To run SLIMMER, type SLIMMER and press <ENTER> after you have either entered the SLIMMER subdirectory on your hard disk, or are on the floppy drive containing your working copy of the SLIMMER files. After you have run SLIMMER a few times and get tired of the opening screens, you can bypass them by entering SLIMMER n$ and pressing return where n$ is your name (or the file name you want to view). For example, you can view the data for Slim by typing SLIMMER SLIM, then pressing <ENTER>. (For the single 360K disk system user, (1. above), you really don't have enough room on a single floppy disk to use this option.) MONOCHROME MONITORS AND LAPTOPS SLIMMER makes extensive use of color in its screens and windows. This looks great on color monitors and in greyscale tones. The truly "black and white" monitor (usually amber or green), however, will be very difficult to read for some color combinations. For you without color capability, you may want to try the "black and white" version of SLIMMER. As you start up SLIMMER, simply type in SLIMMER BW to run in black and white, or as in the example in the previous paragraph, type in SLIMMER BW SLIM to run in black and white and bypass the opening screens. A one-line .BAT file will save you a lot of typing. It would contain the one-line SLIMMER SLIM command (e.g.), and could be called 1.BAT or similar simple name. SLIMMER could then be run by entering "1" and then "<RETURN>". For those of you with laptops, SLIMMER is available on 3-1/2" diskettes. Please indicate your preference for 3-1/2" or 5-1/4" diskettes. DEBUGGING Every effort has been made to program SLIMMER with sufficient internal checks to preclude the more common bugs. It will, for example, open a new file for you if it can't find one already started. Error comments are provided when the data that you input doesn't match what the program expects to see. With a program of this size, I'm sure I've overlooked some combinations that might give strange results. Please contact me with the circumstances and a description of any abnormalities that you find. These abnormalities include any program hang-ups without error message, errors in computations, and instances where you don't get the response that you would expect to see. (See my name and address at the end of this document) SLIMMER will be updated as changes become necessary. Page 3 SLIMMER VERSION # Version 1.0 - initial release - June 1988 Version 1.0a - corrected routines for monochrome monitors - June 1988 Version 2.0 - added calorie counter & improved editor and plot routines - Feb 1989 Version 2.0a - Fix for five food table files to enable space bar to tag files - May 1989. Fixed so that personal tables would be saved when going from edit to calorie counter mode. Released SLIM2FIX.ARC & SLIM2FIX.ZIP for use by Version 2.0 users. Version 2.0b - Fix to link between editor and food tables. Added expanded fast food menu section to food tables. Treats exercise as a (negative) food category for easy input and scaling of multiple daily exercises. Aug 1989. Version 2.0bx - Introduced EGA 640 x 350 color graphics in addition to the the CGA 640 x 200 B&W and monochrome graphics. Fix to CGA graphics of version 2.0b. Version 2.1 - Fix to allow SLIMMER to run on computers with DOS 2.11. Sept 1989. USE OF SLIMMER REV 1 FILES Whenever revisions are made, there's always a question of what to do with the old files from the previous revision. In this case, if you use a REV 1 file 'n$.SLM', SLIMMER will convert it to a REV 2 file. Be sure to back up your REV 1 'n$.SLM' file before you try this. The 'n$.CAL' file from REV 1 should be either deleted, or you can call it into your word processor and delete the null lines that look like "". SLIMMER will write to the 'n$.CAL' file after the seven daily files have been filled up. IS SLIMMER USER FRIENDLY? Whether a program is "user friendly" or not is a function of the amount of you must spend in reading and re-reading the documentation and whether there is sufficient help online. There are certain conventions that have been used within SLIMMER that try to make it respond in the way that you might expect for a given keystroke. Some of these are listed below: <ENTER> - is used to select highlight bar items, to indicate the end of keyboard entries, and to indicate the end of a selected function. <ESC> - used to cancel a function and return to the previous menu. <SPACE BAR> - used only in food tables to tag/untag your food selections. <ARROW KEY> - UP and DOWN arrows are used to move the highlight bar up and down. In addition, HOME and PAGE UP move the bar to the top of the menu, and END and PAGE DOWN move the bar to the end. < + and - > - The + and - keys are used to increment and decrement the date and weight input values and help to decrease the keystrokes required to input data. In general, there is a list of functions at the bottom of each menu or table that will indicate your choice of keys to press. "Bulletproofing" is a term used to indicate that the user input is Page 4 restricted to certain keystrokes. For example, if you are prompted for a date entry, the keyboard in a "bulletproofed" environment will only respond to entries from 0 through 9 and the / key. Other keys will either not respond or will produce a beep. Much of SLIMMER's user input has been bulletproofed. Where there is a restriction on the length of an input item, the length is highlighted and the input is restricted to that length. Normal editing keys can be used for most of the input items. These include the <BACK SPACE>, <INSERT>, <DELETE> and the arrow keys. In addition, <CTRL - END> will clear and let you start over with the input item. There is a lot of checking, error trapping, and file manipulation that goes on behind the scenes that you the user never get to see. If the program is well written, you will never see an error message, and the program will respond as expected. You the user can help to make SLIMMER friendlier by providing your comments and suggestions. BACKGROUND COLOR Whenever you run SLIMMER in its color mode by simply entering the command SLIMMER, the program will allow you to select a background color from a list of four colors. After you have selected your background color, SLIMMER will recall it whenever you subsequently run SLIMMER using the command in the form SLIMMER n$ (where n$ is your name). If you want a different background, then run it with the single command SLIMMER to get the selection option. NOTE: If you have a monochrome monitor running in the black and white mode, your background choice is either black or white. THE OUTPUT FILES The first time you run SLIMMER, it will create a new file in your name, It requests your first name, then uses the first eight letters of your name plus the extension SLM to create a file such as "JOHN.SLM" for a user named John. An example file named SLIM.SLM is included with SLIMMER to allow you to see a file with some daily weight and calorie data points in it. It can be viewed by entering the name SLIM when your name is requested. The plot of Slim's data can be seen in either or both low or high resolution depending on your graphics capability. Two additional types of files are created by SLIMMER. These are the daily calorie counter files (n$.CL1 thru n$.CL7 and n$.CAL) and the custom food tables (n$.SP1 thru n$.SP7) SLIMMER will only save 100 days worth of weight and calorie data. On the 101st day, it will discard the first value (day 1) and renumber all the other values to maintain a maximum of 100 points. If you want to keep a complete record of your weight, and calorie file, you are advised to make a copy of your output file when it reaches 100 data points, and every 100 data points thereafter. Page 5 HINT: You may, if you wish, use a different name in order to keep your old data on-line. For example, SLIM has accumulated 100 days worth of data. Now, starting on the 101st day, he logs in as SLIM1 for the next 100 days and so on. This will allow him to look at his old file at any time by logging in as SLIM. DATE ENTRIES When you first enter SLIMMER, you will be prompted for a date. This date is the default date for the daily date/weight/calorie file. A bit further along, when you enter the calorie counter section, you are asked again for a date. There are several other places where dates are entered or modified. In each case, the date from your computer's board is used as the initial starting date. You need only press <ENTER> to accept the date, or press + or - to increase or decrease the date by one day. You can also enter the date from the keyboard. When data is entered in non-sequential order into the date/weight/ calorie file it will be sorted and rearranged as you leave that section of the program. Plotted data is output by date entry number rather than date. In other words, if you have 7 daily weights - followed by a 2-week vacation away from the scales - followed by seven more daily weights, it would appear as 14 consecutive data points in your output file and on your graph. YOUR PERSONAL DATA AND GOALS This section of the program should be completed by the user during his or her first session with SLIMMER. Simply start at the top and move the select bar using the up & down arrow keys. The first item "List your Personal Data" will be empty until you complete the rest of the item. Carefully enter your response to each selected item as you work your way down the menu - from frame size down to your height. Finally select the "Calculate Weight and Calorie Goals" item to calculate your ideal weight and calorie goals. As you progress with your diet, some of your initial data may change. You can update your data at any time and have SLIMMER recalculate your ideal weight and calorie values. The items that could change and affect calculated values are the Activity level and the Frame definition. Note: Those of you who have extremely small wrists or very long slender fingers may find yourselves in the " S " or Small frame category. If this happens, feel free to upgrade yourself to the " M " or Medium frame category. The method used in SLIMMER to select the frame size is admitedly crude - and your doctor's definition should be taken instead. Page 6 UPDATE / EDIT WEIGHT & CALORIE DATA The daily plot data of date, calories, and weight is edited with the weight / cal / date editor. It again has enough checks and balances built in to be fairly foolproof. You can either enter new daily data or edit existing data with the editor. The date may be accepted as the date from your computer, or you can enter a value, or else increment / decrement the prior date date by one day. The default weight is taken as the prior day's value, and it can be incremented up or down with the + and - keys. The weight can be entered here, or else will be requested as you leave the "Count Calories....." section. The calorie data is directly entered into this file when you leave the "Count Calories / View Food Tables" section of the program. The data file drops off the oldest set of daily data and renumbers all the data to have a maximum of 100 values. If you have entered a weight and date value on the wrong line and want to "zero out" the values, then enter the letter N (or n) representing "NULL" for the date. That line will be removed and the remaining data rearranged. GRAPH YOUR PROGRESS Plots of your daily weight, calories, or fat calories can be selected in either low or high resolution. If in doubt about the configuration of your system, try them both. You will need a color graphics adapter (CGA or EGA or VGA) to view the high resolution graphs. SLIMMER will let you know if it can't find a graphics card. If you have placed the command GRAPHICS in your AUTOEXEC.BAT or have executed the command at some time before entering SLIMMER and if you have a CGA graphics card or better, and if your printer can do IBM graphics, you will be able to copy your high resolution plots to the printer with the <SHIFT-PRINT SCREEN> command. COUNT CALORIES / VIEW FOOD TABLES This section of the program is used to generate your Daily Calorie Counter lists. It is both the most complex and also the most powerful section of the program. Its component parts are as follows: 1. SLIMMER food and exercise tables The food tables, starting with "Beverages" and going through the "Vegetables" are selected using the arrow keys. Most of these line items have another set of selectable tables. When you have a food table displayed on the screen, you will see a flashing line which reads "Calorie Counter Mode". When you are in this mode, the <SPACE BAR> key will print a marker on the highlighted line. (If the marker is already shown, then the <SPACE BAR> will remove it). Use the arrow keys to select a line - then mark it with the <SPACE BAR> key. You will now be asked to enter a scale factor. The default value of 1 will save the line as shown. If you enter a 1.5, the quantities will all be multiplied by 1.5 before the line is transferred to your daily calorie counter list. A scale factor less than .001 will return the line with a factor of 1. The exercise tables function in the same way. Page 7 Simply select the items that you have eaten that day. Notice that when you select an item, sometimes another item is selected along with it. This is done to add a descriptive line to your daily Calorie Counter List. When you are finished selecting all the applicable items on a given food table, press <RETURN> to add the items to your daily calorie counter list. If you press <RETURN> before you're finished tagging the items on that food table, you can press <RETURN> again to call back the same table. Note that the previously tagged lines are no longer tagged. They are, however, in your daily calorie counter list and there is a flashing arrow <=== on the screen to remind you to go there to save your daily calorie counter list when you have finished selecting your items for the day. *****THIS IS THE ONLY WAY YOUR DAILY CALORIE COUNTER LIST CAN BE SAVED***** NOTE: You will be given another opportunity to edit the selected items when you select the "Edit Calorie Counter List for n$" line, below. 2. Edit Calorie Counter List for n$ When you have entered all the items, you can now edit the list for quantity by selecting the line "Edit Calorie Counter List for n$". In this editor, you first select the line number, then enter a multiplier for the line. If instead of 1 ounce you want three ounces, you enter a 3 as the multiplier. Similarly, enter 0.5 to get a value of .5 ounce. Experiment a bit with this until you get the hang of it. NOTE THAT IF YOU SCALE A LINE BY 0, THE LINE WILL BE DELETED. When you finish editing that page, press <ENTER> for either the next page or else to leave the editor. You can return to this editor to revise it after you leave it. As you leave, you will be given the opportunity to enter your daily weight (if you didn't do it before in the "Update / Edit Weight & Calorie Data" section). Finally, the daily data is entered into your daily date / weight / calorie table and your daily calorie counter list is saved. NOTICE: NO DATA WILL BE SAVED AS EITHER A DAILY CALORIE COUNTER LIST OR IN THE DAILY DATE/WEIGHT/CAL TABLE UNLESS YOU PASS THROUGH THIS EDIT ROUTINE. The flashing arrow <=== will remind you that there is data in the computer's memory that hasn't been saved. 3. Special Items for n$ When you first enter one of these tables, you will see a list of Item numbers. You will also see the same flashing "Calorie Counter Mode" sign. This table is where you can place special items that are not on the food lists. These are truly unique tables for you alone. In order to enter items into this table, move the select bar to the last line marked "<Select to Toggle between EDIT and CALORIE COUNTER modes>". When you press the <ENTER> key, you will see a flashing "[ EDIT MODE ]" sign. You are now in an editor to enter your special items. Select a line and follow the format on the food table items by entering the description, quantity, calorie and fat calorie values for any line that you select. You will be prompted for each of the four entries on each of the lines. A conservative number for use in defining fat calories is 9 fat calories per gram of fat. When you are finished, use <ESC> to leave the editor or select the last line to go to the CALORIE COUNTER Page 8 mode. Your Special Items files will be selectable just as are the Food Table files. 4. Hint When you are near the top of the menu and want to go to the bottom line of the menu, use the <PAGE DOWN> or <END> key. Similarly, the <PAGE UP> or <HOME> keys take you to the top. FILE MANAGEMENT SELECTIONS This section of the program will let you see which daily calorie count lists are stored for you. As you enter this section of the program, there is a list of dates displayed on the left side of the screen. If you are just starting out, the list will be empty. Below the list will be displayed "today's" date. The working date - or "today's" date can be changed by selecting the "Change Today's Calorie Counter Date" line. After you have selected a new date, it may coincide with one of the dates on the left hand display of dates. If, you go from here into the "Edit Calorie Counter List ....." section, the old data will be recalled and may be edited. If you want a blank list for that date, you can select the "Erase Today's Calorie Count List" item to clear the file and let you start over for that date. The daily date/weight/cal entry for that date will not be changed, but you will be given a chance to overwrite it when you leave the "Edit Calorie Counter ....." section. The "Print Your Daily Calorie Count List" line, if selected will send your file to the printer. If you have no printer, SLIMMER will create a print file named n$.prt (where n$ is your name). This file is overwritten every time the printer is not found to be ready for use. (so remember to print it when you get out of the program). If you don't have a printer and use this option, your computer may be inactive while the computer tries repeatedly to contact the non-existent printer. After the computer has tried a pre-determined number of times and "timed-out", control will be returned to you. If control does not return to you, then you can try the <CONTROL-BREAK> followed by the <CONTROL-C> commands. NOTE: SLIMMER print files only use the standard BASIC print commands and should work with most printers. No attempts are made to change line spacing, to skip perforations, etc. I leave the printer settings for you to do for your own individual printer prior to running SLIMMER. You can recall a prior day's file into today's date (if you have the same thing to eat each Friday, for example) by selecting the "Recall Old List for Today's Date" line. You will be given a choice of the last seven (or less) daily calorie count files that have been saved for you. After the file is recalled, you MUST still pass through the "Edit Calorie Counter List..." section in order to SAVE and process the data. It is important to come here (to the FILE MANAGEMENT area) first if you Page 9 want to recall a list from seven days ago. Otherwise the data from seven days ago is rolled into your n$.CAL file where you can no longer access it. NOTE: NO FILES ARE SAVED IN THIS SECTION OF THE PROGRAM. ALL FILE UPDATES ARE PERFORMED IN THE "EDIT CALORIE COUNTER....." SECTION. (See item 2. above.) NOTE: If you already have a file saved for today's date, you will be unable to recall a file from the list of old files. You will physically have to first select the "Erase Today's Calorie Count List" item to clear today's file. Then you will be able to recall an old list. This feature prevents the unintentional overwriting of a file over which you had labored long and hard ... COMMENTS FOR THE MORE TECHNICALLY MINDED The special food list tables that you prepare for yourself (n$.SP1 thru n$.SP7) are formatted the same as the programs food list tables. SLIMMER treats them both the same. If you were to enter one of the program's food list tables into your favorite word processor, you would see something like this: "[ VEGETABLES ]" " Food Portion Total Sat Fat" " Size Calories Calories" " ----------------------------------------------------------" "Lettuce,raw" " butterhead, Boston (5-in diam)" " 1 head 20 trace 6" " 1 outer or" " 2 inner leaves" " 2 leaves trace trace 6" " crisphead, iceberg (6-in diam)" " 1 head 70 1 11" " (1/4 head)" " 1 wedge 20 trace 11" " chopped or" " shredded" " 1 cup 5 trace 11" " looseleaf, romaine chopped or" " shredded" " 1 cup 10 trace 18" When you study this table, you will notice that there are numbers in column 59 and 60 which don't show up on the screen when SLIMMER calls up the file. These numbers are a left-justified two digit line number. When SLIMMER finds a number in column 59-60 of a line that has been selected in the Calorie Counter Mode, it will also select the line indicated by the two digit number. For example, when the last line (line 20) is selected, line 18 is selected with it. This is done so that there will be enough descriptive information in your daily calorie Page 10 counter file for you to be able to identify the items. All this information is given to you for this reason: If you want your Special Food Table files have the same multiple line selection feature, you can edit your n$.SPx files (offline in your own editor) to add the appropriate line numbers in columns 59 and 60. Note that the entire line must be enclosed with quotes "". UNEXPECTED ERRORS AND LOCKUPS While every attempt has been made to squash all the bugs, there may be a few that remain. The bugs that throw the program suddenly back to DOS are very hard to trace since no error messages are given. An attempt has been made within SLIMMER to include error-trapping code to cover every line of the program. Therefore, if an error should occur, an error comment will appear and you will be able to return to DOS by pressing any key. Some multiple errors may even lockup your computer at this point. (If you reach such a point, make a note of the circumstances and drop me a note about it.) Try the control-break followed by control-c to see if there is a response. If there is none, simply reboot your computer (turn it off then on again) and it will be none the worse for wear. NOT ENOUGH MEMORY TO LOAD SLIMMER? SLIMMER will require 285K to load. If you have some other programs loaded in memory and SLIMMER doesn't fit, you may have to remove some of the other ones. As an aid in determining how much memory is left after SLIMMER is loaded, run SLIMMER and whenever you are asked for a date, respond with <ALT><F1>. This will trigger a routine that will provide you with the memory available. Since some of the arrays in SLIMMER are allocated dynamically, the memory available will be different in the various sections of the program. RANGE OF APPLICABILITY As an Engineer, I often deal with the twin "concepts" of interpolation and extrapolation. Interpolation means simply to obtain tabular values from within the limits of the table. Extrapolation is fabricating data beyond the limits of the table by making some assumptions to extend the data. SLIMMER, on order to not quit every time that data is requested from beyond the limits of the tables, is written using linear extrapolation functions - much like weather forcasters do - and assumes that what went on before will continue into the future. There will therefore be some error introduced into your ideal weight and calorie calculations when you fall outside the following limits: Weight: minimum = 90 lbs, maximum = 220 lbs Height: for men minimum = 5'-1", maximum = 6'-3" for women minimum = 4'-8", maximum = 5'-10" Page 11 Age : Adults 25 years of age and above. (If between 18 and 25, your ideal weight could be reduced by one pound per year for every year below age 25.) Exercise Calories: are based on data given for a weight of 150 lbs. An adjustment is made for weight in the range of 110 lbs to 190 lbs. The range of applicability is therefore 110 lbs thru 190 lbs. SOURCE CODE For those of you who have Borland's Turbo Basic and want to have a copy of the SLIMMER source code, it is available to REGISTERED users for $10. For unregistered users, the cost is $45 (and includes the registration). The source code is provided to registered users with the request that any modification or variation of SLIMMER be released under a different name. I wish to reserve the name SLIMMER, SLIMMER.EXE, SLIMMER.ARC, SLIMMER2, etc as unique names on the bulletin boards. SLIMMER is written and compiled with Turbo Basic Version 1.1. (It will compile with Version 1.0 if desired) DISCLAIMER For obvious reasons, no claims are made or implied that SLIMMER is more than a database and a tracking tool. All medical data contained herein is correct to the best of my knowledge, but the user (YOU) assume complete responsibility for the use of and the results of the use of this software. ON THE IMPORTANCE OF EXERCISE Dieting without a concurrent exercise program is dangerous. It can lead to a serious loss of muscle and a drop in metabolic rate. Results of a study were reported in 1984 in "the Yo-Yo Syndrome" by G.L. Blackburn, M.D.,Ph.D., K.N. Pavlou, Sc.D., and V. Zak in RxWeight Control, Vol.2, No.5, Jun-Jul 1984. When 1000 calorie a day diets were administered to separate groups of exercisers and non-exercisers, the following results were found: EXERCISE GROUP NON-EXERCISE GROUP Food Calories 1000/day 1000/day Total Weight Loss 19 lbs 18 lbs Body Fat Lost 23 lbs 11 lbs Muscle Gained 4 lbs - Muscle Lost - 7 lbs Page 12 If you attempt to diet without exercise, you will reach a plateau at a weight higher than your ideal weight, and your metabolism rate will decrease as your body tries to compensate for the lack of calories. The above table should help to convince you of the need to exercise. A WORD OR TWO ABOUT CHOLESTEROL Cholesterol comes in two component parts. The HDL (high density lepoprotiens) and the LDL (low density lepoprotiens). The HDL transports cholesterol to the liver where it is eliminated. The LDL carries the cholesterol in the blood and can clog arteries and cause heart disease. Typically, total cholesterol levels over 200 mg/dl are of concern. You are not automatically risk-free if you test below 200. If your HDL levels are too low, you can be just as succeptable to heart disease. Values of HDL below 35 mg/dl are just as bad as total cholesterol levels over 200. The usual screening test in the $3 to $5 range will only give you the total number of HDL and LDL combined. Your doctor can arrange for a more sophisticated test that will give you the component parts and a lot more - - .(for a lot $ more) Ways to Help to Lower High Cholesterol Levels: 1. Decrease or eliminate coffee and alcohol from your diet. 2. Include fish in your diet. 3. Include soluble fiber in your diet - especially that found in beans (pinto or navy) and from oat bran. 4. Exercise at least 3 or 4 times a week. This helps increase the good cholesterol HDLs and decrease the bad cholesterol LDLs. HOW TO USE THE FOOD TABLES TO LOWER YOUR BLOOD CHOLESTEROL The food tables and data methods are based on "EATER'S CHOICE: PATIENT GUIDE" and is based on the guidelines of the American Heart Association. Eater's Choice is a system that allows you to choose foods that you want to eat while you lower your blood cholesterol. The key to the plan is controlling your intake of the nutrient that most affects blood cholesterol levels - saturated fat. Saturated Fat: Fats contain a mixture of fatty acids - saturated, monosaturated, and polyunsaturated. Animal fats contain a greater proportion of saturated fatty acids, which raise blood cholesterol levels; vegetable oils usually contain a greater proportion of polyunsaturated fatty acids, which lower blood cholesterol levels. The more saturated the fat, the more solid it is at room temperature. Examples of saturated fat include beef fat, butter, lard, shortening, coconut oil, and chocolate. Figuring your Daily Allowance of Saturated Fat: Page 13 The Heart Association recommends that no more than 10% of your total calories come from saturated fat. SLIMMER will calculate your daily allowance as you input your initial values and it perform the ideal weight and calorie calculations. Translating Your Saturated Fat Quota Into Foods: The Food Tables that are included in SLIMMER list the saturated fat calories in foods. Keep track of the foods you eat during the day, along with their saturated fat calories. Limit your saturated fat intake to the 10% level calculated by SLIMMER. You may want to begin by determining which foods your saturated fat calories are coming from. You can then decide which foods to cut back on or eliminate to lower your saturated fat intake. The food tables will also help you choose foods low in saturated fat to substitute for foods high in saturated fat. Controlling Dietary Cholesterol and Other Fats: Dietary cholesterol can be controlled by simply eliminating the few high cholesterol foods ( egg yolks, organ meats, sardines, and shrimp). Substituting polyunsaturated margarines and oils for butter and shortening will give you adequate polyunsaturated fat. Sources: United States Department of Agriculture, "Nutritive Value of Foods", Home and Garden Bulletin Number 72, Revised 1981. United States Department of Agriculture, Handbook No. 8, Revised Sections 8-1 thru 8-12. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS My thanks and a registered copy of SLIMMER to Rick Fothergill for the TBWINDO.INC window routines that make SLIMMER an attractive program. For those of you that want to contact him, Rick can be reached thru his Compuserve # 76210,443. Other routines written by others and used in SLIMMER are INPSUB.INC - Author Unknown This routine is used to replace the INPUT command and has been modified to make "bulletproof" input routines for dates and weights etc. JULIAN.INC - Public Domain by Joe Vest This is used to transform the Gregorian date into a Julian date where it can easily be included into the +/- routine for the date input and then reconverted. A very handy routine. Page 14 FNEDIT.INC - Public Domain by Joe Vest This routine was used to remove leading blanks from some of the string data. GETFREE.BAS - Author Unknown Renamed space.bas and used to determine space remaining on the default drive. CHKCRC.INL - Written by Craig J Kim Used within SLIMMER to determine if a file has changed during the present session. The data and methods used in SLIMMER were taken from a handout that I got from my doctor when he measured my blood cholesterol levels and gave me this plan to follow. ABOUT THE AUTHOR / PROGRAMMER SLIMMER is the first major program written by myself in TURBO BASIC. It has been a vast learning experience and I'm learning more daily. There is still much more to learn. My background is in Structural Engineering, and I'm currently working as an Aerospace Structures Engineer for Fairchild Space Co. in Germantown, MD. I hold a PhD in Applied Sciences from the University of Delaware, where I completed a dissertation on various solution techniques for laminated plates. My interests include the violin which I currently play with a music group known as "Servants of the Lord Most High". My home computer is an XT clone, operating at 10 mhz with a 20 meg hard disk, a 3-1/2" 720k and a 5-1/4" 360k floppy. I use a 2400 baud modem and BOYAN's version D4 shareware communications package to access the various boards. While I only have an amber screen, I can nevertheless see some of the effects of color with a Paradise Monochrome EGA color emulation adapter card. It provides full graphics on TTL monochrome monitors with 16 shades of intensity. If any of you want to drop me a line or leave a message, my mailing address is: George D. Summers 2117 Coon Club Road Westminster, MD 21157 and my Compuserve number is: 76276,564 Page 15 WHERE DOES SLIMMER GO FROM HERE Every major revision to SLIMMER takes about six months or so to formulate and test. You the users will, to a large part, be the ones that dictate what is and is not included in future revisions. Do send your comments and suggestion. Some possible directions are as follows: 1. Write a version for the Macintosh. 2. Prepare an international version with possibility of having dates in the form dd.mm.yy instead of mm/dd/yy and use kg instead of lbs etc. 3. Mouse drivers - I'll prepare one for the Logitech C7 mouse. Those of you who write drivers for other mice can send them to me to include with the next revision. 4. Add carbohydrates and cholesterol to the food tables. 5. Rewrite SLIMMER in the C language. 6. Include on-line HELP screens. 7. Increase the number of food selectons from the present < 1000 to more than 3000 and include B-tree database management and recall. REGISTRATION For those of you interested in registration, all the information you need is found by selection the REGISTRATION line in the main menu. You are shown a registration form that you can send to your printer. Be sure to indicate your preference for 3-1/2" or 5-1/4" disks. You may use the form found on the next page of this document file instead if you have printed this file. Page 16 SLIMMER REGISTRATION FORM Your Name _____________________________________________________________________ Street Address ________________________________________________________________ City, State, Zip ______________________________________________________________ Phone # (Optional) ____________________________________________________________ Disk Size Desired 3-1/2" ________ or 5-1/4" _______ Registration # shown in SLIMMER closing screen _______________________________ Amount Enclosed: $35 for registration __________ $45 for registration and source code __________ $50 for registration outside USA __________ Please describe your equipment (optional): Computer type _________________________________________________________________ Amount of RAM (memory) __________ k ; Hard disk size ___________ meg Graphics type: Mono _____ , CGA _____ , EGA _____ , VGA _____ , Other _________ Comments_______________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________________________ Please send this form and your check to: George D. Summers 2117 Coon Club Road Westminster, MD 21157