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zq(Bpwv"z Introduction 1 MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones All Rights Reserved Special thanks goes to: Ron Sudweeks Who spent much time going over this tutorial. And then spending more time with me, helping me to correct the many errors he had found. Ron also deserves credit for many suggesting that lead to many improvements to the program itself. Roger Nedel Who had all the qualities needed to test this tutorial. He was totally new to MegaD and he had an Amiga Computer. Little did I know how great the bargain was that I had gotten. A few days later I received a 27 page document that included many needed corrections, suggestions and additions. Along with this information he included journal entries that helped me to see where the tutorial had failed in teaching the functions of MegaD to a new user. I claim all responsibility for any errors left within this document. The above mentioned people deserve credit for the many refinements they made upon this document. John L. Jones MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Introduction 2 v"zTable Of Contentsv"z Introduction.................................3 Getting Started..............................6 Simple Commands And MegaD....................26 Source and Destination Commands..............51 AutoBoots....................................72 Program Control Window.......................75 Back To Adding Auto Boots....................82 User Gadgets.................................90 ARexx Gadgets................................95 Menu Sets....................................98 Gadget Sets..................................103 Export File..................................113 MegaD Preferences............................116 MegaD preferences, Colors....................117 MegaD Preferences, Defaults..................118 MegaD Preferences, Display...................123 MegaD Preferences, Menus & Devices...........127 MegaD preferences, Miscellaneous.............128 MegaD Preferences, Set Print.................130 MegaD Preferences, Set Screen................131 MegaD Menus..................................132 MegaD Icon Tool Types........................139 Now What?....................................140 Index........................................141 MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Introduction 3 v"zIntroductionv"z MegaD, is without question, a unique directory utility. It does not play by the old rules set by the gambit of directory utilities. The standard directory utility allows only one source directory and one destination directory and usually places the two available directories in list side by side. MegaD can emulate this type of mode if you need it but this limited mode of left and right Directory Windows restricts many of the unique features of MegaD. Features such as the ability to copy files from more than one source directory, The ability to copy source files to multiple destinations. The ability to copy from multiple source to multiple destinations. The same flexibility is given to all the commands within MegaD, commands such as Copy As, Duplicate, Move, Move as, Rename, Delete, Comments, Set Protect.... This idea of not being restricted to just one or two windows is used throughout MegaD. You are allowed multiple text windows open at one time. The only thing that will limit you with MegaD is your available system memory. Due to the uniqueness of MegaD it was decided that to give you, the user, a better understanding of it features, a tutorial would be beneficial. Thus this text was written. You may want to jump right into MegaD after looking over the MegaD.Doc file, or you may want to take the step by step approach that this file offers. I will show how to use the built in functions of MegaD, how to add new function to MegaD, and how to teach and train MegaD to do new tricks, MegaD can be trained to use any external program. I will be starting from the very basic commands that require only one file to be selected. I will move on from there to show you how functions such as copy and move work that requires both a source and a destination directory. With copy and move we will also show you how to copy from one or more source directories to a multiple of destination directories. You will be shown how to filter the information in the Directory Window so that you will be able to reduce large directory listings to a manageable size by using different file attributes. We will then move on to showing you how to train MegaD to launch your favorite utilities During this tutorial I am going to assume that you are using MegaD in the same state that it was in the first time you ran it. In other words it will be using its own built in defaults. There are so many ways that MegaD can be MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Introduction 4 configured, that it would be confusing to describe it all within this text. I learned how to use MegaD as I wrote it. In its current state I have found it to be so versatile that there is little that it will not do. I hope that with a little ground work, you will be able to maneuver and perform any function that you wish. I will only attempt to give you the very basics. With this and a little imagination you should be able do more with it each time you run MegaD. MegaD is one of those programs that is made for the user to mold to his likes. This is brief outline of how this tutorial is laid out. v"zMegaD Windowsv"z This section is about the different windows used within MegaD. This section is not really a tutorial but a necessary discussion of how the windows used within MegaD work and the main functions of those windows. v"zSimple Commands And MegaDv"z We will start with the simple commands that require one open Directory Window to perform a task. v"zSource and Destination Commandsv"z We will move on to commands that require more than one Directory Window opens to the screen at one time. Commands such as 'Copy' and 'Move' require source and destination directories. v"zFilters and Pattern Matchingv"z This section describes the unique and powerful 'Filters', 'Sel/Clr Pattern' (Select/Clear Patterns) and 'Find' functions of MegaD. All three use a powerful requestor that allows you to use 1 to 5 filters at one time. v"zAutoBootsv"z This is the where you take MegaD to school and teach it new tricks. You will be able to train MegaD to recognize any data file and match it to a program file that can handle the data file. v"zProgram Control Windowv"z This is a detour that we will have to take to understand how to create an 'AutoBoot'. We will also use what we learn in this section with 'User Gadgets' and 'Menu Sets'. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Introduction 5 v"zBack To Adding AutoBootsv"z After the above described detour we will finish off the discussion of AutoBoots. v"zUser Gadgetsv"z We will learn how to add new commands to the existing commands found on the 'Keypad Command Gadgets' of the 'Control Window'. v"zMenu Setsv"z Here, we will add a new 'Menu Set' that we will be able to access within the MegaD 'Utility' menu. v"zExport Filev"z MegaD will create files suitable to create a database of programs and files. This export file works with other existing database programs. v"zMegaD Preferencesv"z MegaD has many user definable preferences' settings. The Preferences are broken into the following groups: Colors Defaults Display Keypads Menus & Devices Miscellaneous Print Screen We will discuss each of the preference areas in detail. v"zMegaD Menusv"z MegaD allows extensive control over the Directory Windows it uses and the displays within them. Much of the control is access through the menus found within MegaD. You will find the step by step approach of this file helpful in your quest to learn MegaD. MegaD, without question, is the most versatile, capable and flexible directory utility to date. This tutorial will help you to understand and harness the power of MegaD. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Getting Started 6 v"zGetting Startedv"z MegaD can be started from the CLI (Command Line Interface) or from the Workbench. To run MegaD from the CLI, CD to the directory that the program file MegaD is in and type "Run MegaD" To start MegaD from the Workbench double click the MegaD icon. You should be greeted with this window containing about 30 different gadgets and one scrolling list at the top. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Getting Started 7 ----------------------------------------------------------------- |MegaD 2.0 Control Window | |---------------------------------------------------------------| | Free Volumes |() Volumes In Memory | | |------------------------------------------------------------| | | First Buffered Volume DF0: 648,324 | |--1 | Second Buffered Volume DF1: 232,987 |/\| | Third Buffered Volume WORK: 22,343,548 |\/| |---------------------------------------------------------------| |**| Device Gadget 1 | Device Gadget 4 | Device Gadget 7 | |**|-------------------+---------------------+------------------| |__| Device Gadget 2 | Device Gadget 5 | Device Gadget 8 | |/\|-------------------+---------------------+------------------|--2 |\/| Device Gadget 3 | Device Gadget 6 | Device Gadget 9 | |__|-------------------+----------------------------------------| | | Device Name: | | | |------------------------------------------------------------| |**| Files Selected Chip | |**| Dir. Selected Fast | | | Bytes Selected Large |--3 |**| Free Disk space Total | |**| Active Directory | |---------------------------------------------------------------| | Keypad '(' | Keypad ')' | Keypad '/' | Keypad '*' | | |--------------+--------------+--------------+--------------| C | | Keypad '7' | Keypad '8' | Keypad '9' | Keypad '-' | - | |--------------+--------------+--------------|--------------| | | Keypad '4' | Keypad '5' | Keypad '6' | Keypad '+' | S |--4 |--------------+--------------+--------------+--------------| - | | Keypad '1' | Keypad '2' | Keypad '3' | | | |-----------------------------+--------------| ENTER | A | | Keypad '0' | Keypad '.' | | | ----------------------------------------------------------------- v"zMain Control Windowv"z Above is an character representation of what the Main Control Window looks like. The titles of the gadgets have been changed to generic names. The actual window that should be up on your system will contain device names and command titles in the gadgets. The Control Window is your link to all the functions that MegaD possesses. Lets break the parts of the window down into its four basic components. The number to the right of the representation corresponds with the below list. 1. Volumes in memory, and Device, Assign and Drives list 2. Device Gadgets 3. Information area 4. Command Gadget MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Getting Started 8 |---------------------------------------------------------------| | Free Volumes |() Volumes In Memory | | |------------------------------------------------------------| | | First Buffered Volume DF0: 648,324 | |--1 | Second Buffered Volume DF1: 232,987 |/\| | Third Buffered Volume WORK: 22,343,548 |\/| |---------------------------------------------------------------| v"zMegaD List Areav"z Above is a cutout of section 1. The Volumes in memory, and Device, Assign and Drives list. Two kinds of list are available in this area. The lists can be cycled in and out of the list area with the cycle gadget at the top of the window. v"z'Volumes In Memory'v"z 'Volumes In Memory' list. This is a list of buffered directories that have been loaded, if any. It may be an empty list at the moment. This is what the cutout represent now v"zDevice Listv"z 'Devices, Assigns and Drives' list. This list is never empty. It shows available volumes and system assigns such as 'Fonts:' The way to chose which list to use is controlled by the cycle gadgets at the top center to right side of the window. It has a small arrow going in a circle at the left side of the gadget. By selecting this gadget the list will change to the one not being displayed. v"zFree Volumes Gadgetv"z On the left side of that gadget is one that is titled 'Free Volumes'. MegaD buffers all the directories that have been loaded. This makes for quick access to those directories. It is also memory consuming. By selecting this gadget once, you can free up memory used by buffered directories. The 'Free Volumes' gadget will be ghosted if there are no buffered volumes in memory. Once any volume or directory is loaded the gadget will be activated allowing you to select it. When a directory is buffered, the contents of the directory are in the computer's main memory. If you close that volume and then access it later, MegaD doesn't have to access the disk because the MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Getting Started 9 contents are still in the computer's memory (in the buffer). This not only saves in access time, but saves wear on the disk. By selecting the "Free Volumes" gadget, you remove the contents of that volume(s) from the computer's memory, and any future attempts to access that volume will result in having to read from disk. To the far right of the upper area of the window is a proportional gadget and two step gadgets for scrolling the list in this window. They work to move the list up or down if the list can be scrolled. If the list can be scrolled the proportional gadget will show where in the list you are at that moment and it will let you move to a new position by selecting and moving the scroller up and down. The arrow gadgets will scroll the list by single steps and will repeat the steps as long as the gadget is selected. v"zBuffered Volume Listv"z The items in the list at the top of the Control Window display information about where the volume was loaded from. If the volume was loaded from the drive DF0: it will display DF0: in the center of the line. To the right of the line the free disk space for that volume is shown. The items in the lists can be selected for special tasks. Double clicking the item will load the directory and place it in a window. Single selecting the item will select it or unselect the item for a task. Some of the special tasks are. v"zLoading selected items from the Device Listv"z Loading a group of volumes by selecting them and then using the menu command 'Windows, Open Windows, Selected Directories' or closing them with the 'Windows, Close Windows, Selected Directories'. This is the only function that is available that works with items selected in the Device list. This is not the only way to open a volume. You will see later that there are shortcuts to this method. (The below functions only works on the Volumes in Memory list.) v"zFreeing Buffered Volumesv"z Freeing a specified volume from the buffered MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Getting Started 10 directories. By selecting items in the 'volumes In Memory' list and then selecting 'Free Volumes' just that volume will be removed from the buffer freeing the memory used by it. If you should select the 'Free Volumes' gadget without any items selected in this list, all buffered volumes will be freed. v"zSelect Volumes for making a listingv"z MegaD allows you to print the contents of a volume (all the directories and files in that volume, including all subdirectories). Not only can you send the volume's contents to the printer, but MegaD allows you to save the contents to a disk file, should you desire. You can send the volumes' contents to the printer by selecting the desired volume in the volume window (directly below the 'Free Volumes' gadget) and then selecting the 'Output Prt' Command Gadget. You can send the volumes' contents to a disk file by opening a Directory Window to the directory you wish the file to be written, and selecting the 'Output File' Command Gadget. Selecting a volume to relabel the volume with the Relabel keypad command. The above mentioned commands will be discussed in detail later on in the tutorial. |---------------------------------------------------------------| |**| Device Gadget 1 | Device Gadget 4 | Device Gadget 7 | |**|-------------------+---------------------+------------------| |__| Device Gadget 2 | Device Gadget 5 | Device Gadget 8 | |/\|-------------------+---------------------+------------------|--2 |\/| Device Gadget 3 | Device Gadget 6 | Device Gadget 9 | |__|-------------------+----------------------------------------| | | Device Name: | | | |------------------------------------------------------------| v"zDevice Gadgetsv"z The second area in the Control Window contains nine booleen gadgets and one string gadget. All ten gadgets serve the same purpose, to load a volume or directory. They can be switch to do another task but we will get in to that later. At first run the device gadgets are set to the first nine volumes and assigns found in the 'Device, Assigns and Drives' list. This may not MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Getting Started 11 be the way you want them and if so it can be changed by using the menu option 'Project, Set Preferences.' The lower nine string gadgets in the window that opens from that option are used to set the device gadgets. Once back to the Control Window select any of the nine gadgets to load a volume or directory. After doing so, and if no errors were encountered, a window should open with the list of items found in that directory. (NEW 3.1) v"zDevice Scroll Gadgetv"z To the left of the Device Gadgets you will see a second scroll gadget, MegaD is capable of 45 separately defined device gadgets. It is impossible to display all with only 9 visible gadgets. By moving this scroll gadget you will be able to access the other 36 hidden device gadgets. v"zDevice String Gadgetv"z Directly below the 9 device gadgets is a string gadget (labelled 'Device Name:'). This gadget is used to type any valid directory name that you want to load. Typing a name and pressing return is the equivalent of hitting one of the upper nine device gadgets. Any string gadget, in any MegaD window, can be activated by pressing the space bar once. The window must be the active window for this to work. This feature includes the Main Control Window Device String Gadget. v"zDevice Gadgets keyboard Equivalentv"z The upper numeric keys on the keyboard 1 - 9 (not the keypad) will do the equivalent of the hitting one of the nine device gadgets. The keys equate to the number found in the above cutout of the window. (NEW 3.1) When you change the device gadgets by moving the scroll gadget to the left of them, the keyboard equivalents will act on the newly displayed directories. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Getting Started 12 | |------------------------------------------------------------| |**| Files Selected Chip | |**| Dir. Selected Fast | | | Bytes Selected Large |--3 |**| Free Disk space Total | |**| Active Directory | ---------------------------------------------------------------| v"zInformation Areav"z The third area of the main window is for information. On the left side it shows how many files and directories are selected and it shows how many bytes are selected. This can be used to judge if the destination disk has enough room to write the files and directories to it. If unbuffered directories are selected, the sizes of those directories are unknown and can not be calculated. If you want to be sure of the actual byte count of a directory, use the 'Go Deep' command on those directories firsts. The 'Go Deep' Command Gadget is found in the second bank of Keypad Command Gadgets. This will buffer the directories and MegaD will be able to tell you just how much space will be needed for the copy or move. This area has a gadget hidden beneath the information, the gadget is quite easy to hit and you may want to try it now to see how it works. Place the mouse pointer directly over the MegaD main menu information window (directly below the string gadget labelled 'Device Name') and single- click. Notice that when you clicked, the information changed from 'all items selected' to 'source items selected By selecting that gadget the information will toggle from all items selected to source items selected. If deleting files, and you wish to know exactly how many files and directory will be deleted, you should use the Selected information mode. If copying or moving files, and you wish to know exactly how many files and directory will be copied or moved, you should use the Source information mode. v"zAvailable Memoryv"z On the right side it shows the system memory four different ways. Available chip and fast memory. The largest chunk of memory still available and then a total of the free Chip and Fast memory. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Getting Started 13 v"zActive Directoryv"z At the bottom of the information window you will see the text: 'Free Disk Space' and 'Active Directory'. These two items will display the amount of disk space that is free on the currently active directory. If no directory is currently active, then both items are blank. Additionally, the directory specified by this 'Active Directory' item is known as the 'destination' directory. What do I mean by that? Well, any command that requires a destination will act on that directory. For instance, if you want to move a file somewhere, it will be moved from some (origin) directory into that (destination) directory. MegaD can use more than one destination directory at a time; however, it can display only one of the destination directories in this area. We will talk more about the multiple destinations later. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Getting Started 14 |---------------------------------------------------------------| | Keypad '(' | Keypad ')' | Keypad '/' | Keypad '*' | | |--------------+--------------+--------------+--------------| C | | Keypad '7' | Keypad '8' | Keypad '9' | Keypad '-' | - | |--------------+--------------+--------------|--------------| | | Keypad '4' | Keypad '5' | Keypad '6' | Keypad '+' | S |--4 |--------------+--------------+--------------+--------------| - | | Keypad '1' | Keypad '2' | Keypad '3' | | | |-----------------------------+--------------| ENTER | A | | Keypad '0' | Keypad '.' | | | ----------------------------------------------------------------- v"zKeypad Gadgetsv"z The fourth and bottom area of the Control Window are where you access the commands that MegaD can perform on windows, directories and files. This area has four sets or banks of gadgets that can be access though the use of the three 'Shift Gadgets' mounted to the right of the gadgets. The 'Shift Gadgets' coincide with the Ctrl, Shift and Alt keys on your keyboard. C = Ctrl (Control) S = Shift A = Alt (Alternate) v"zQuick Command Accessv"z The main group of gadgets is arranged in the same order as the keypad on the side of most Amiga keyboards. Each keypad gadget can be accessed from the keyboard by pressing the equivalent key. You will soon find that you can reach any command quickly and easily with the keyboard. v"zKeypad Banksv"z There are four banks of keypad gadgets. The banks are access by use of ether the 'Shift Gadgets' at the side of the Keypad gadgets or by pressing the corresponding shift key, as listed above. Through the tutorial I will be referring to the sets of keypad gadgets by banks. First bank: is access when there are no shift keys pressed on the keyboard and none of the 'Shift Gadgets' are pressed. Second bank: is access when the Ctrl keyboard key is press or the 'C' 'Shift gadget' is selected. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Getting Started 15 Third bank: is access when the Shift keyboard key is press or the 'S' 'Shift gadget' is selected. Fourth bank: is access when the Alt keyboard key is press or the 'A' 'Shift gadget' is selected. As an example the 'Copy' command is located (at startup default) on the first bank of gadgets in the upper left hand corner. This gadget can be activated by pressing the upper left hand keypad key that is the '(' key on the keypad. To access the 'Copy As' command press the Ctrl key and while holding it down press the upper left hand key of the keypad. This is the same as using the mouse to select the 'C' 'Shift gadget' and then selecting the upper left hand corner gadget (which should be labelled 'Copy as' at default). NOTE: Should you have a MegaD text window active, the keypad is used solely for the text window, and the Keypad Command Gadget functions will not be accessible. |---------------------------------------------------------------| | Ctrl Command | Shift Command| Alt Command | Keypad '*' | | |--------------+--------------+--------------+--------------| C | | Keypad '7' | Keypad '8' | Keypad '9' | Keypad '-' | - | |--------------+--------------+--------------|--------------| | v"zShift Click Window Commandv"z Above is the upper section of the Keypad Command Gadgets. Notice that I have change the names of the first three Gadgets to, 'Ctrl Command', 'Shift Command' and 'Alt Command'. MegaD assigns the above three commands to the respective shift keys during a process that I call 'Shift Click Window Commands'. By using the 'Shift Click Window Commands', you can gain rapid access to three of your favorite commands. At default, MegaD sets the first three Keypad Commands Gadgets to, 'Copy', 'Move' and 'Delete'. This, in turn, sets the 'Shift Click Window Commands' to: Ctrl-Select Directory Window = 'Copy' Shift-Select Directory Window = 'Move' Alt-Select Directory Window = 'Delete' MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Getting Started 16 v"zHow Shift Click Worksv"z Let use 'Copy' for and example here. You would need at least two Directory Windows opened to the screen. You select a few items in one of the windows that you would like to copy. You would then hold down the Ctrl key while you select the scroll area (text listing area) of the Directory Window that you wish to copy the files to, this becomes the 'Shift Clicked Window'. The selected Directory Window becomes a user defined destination directory and the 'Copy' command is called. You can attach any commands you want, to the first three Keypad Command Gadgets of the first bank. The steps taken internally during the 'Shift Click Window Command' process are: 1.Select 'Dest'ination gadget of the Directory window that was 'Shift Selected'. 2.Call corresponding Keypad Command Gadget for the shift key pressed and performs that task. 3.Unselect the 'Dest'ination gadget if it was not selected at the first of the call, restoring the Directory Window to its original state. All of this is a bit much for right now. We have yet to talk about any of the commands, and how to use them. If all of this seems very vague to you, don't let it worry you. Just remember to come back and reread this section once you're done. I want to make sure that everyone using MegaD knows of this feature. Other wise it like driving a great car without knowing it has a fifth gear and never getting it to top speed. | Third Buffered Volume WORK: 22,343,548 |\/| |---------------------------------------------------------------| |**| Device Gadget 1 | Device Gadget 4 | Device Gadget 7 | |**|-------------------+---------------------+------------------| | | Device Gadget 2 | Device Gadget 5 | Device Gadget 8 | | |-------------------+---------------------+------------------| | | Device Gadget 3 | Device Gadget 6 | Device Gadget 9 | | |-------------------+----------------------------------------| | | Device Name: | | MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Getting Started 17 | |------------------------------------------------------------| |**| Files Selected Chip | |**| Dir. Selected Fast | | | Bytes Selected Large | |**| Free Disk space Total | |**| Active Directory | |---------------------------------------------------------------| v"zIcon Gadgetsv"z Among these gadgets are three that are unique in design and nature. They reside on the left side of the window. The character representation of the gadgets is ** ** You can identify them in the actual Control Window by a small horizontal line going across, inside the border of the gadget. By careful examination of the gadgets you will notice that the horizontal line is at different position inside the border. For lack of a better name I call these gadgets, Area Icons. They each represent one of the three lower areas of the Control Window. As the icon gadgets are hit, they will remove or replace areas of the main window. The icon gadget themselves will stay in the window. v"zDevice Icon Gadget:v"z The gadget with the line closest to the top is directly attached to the set of 9 device gadgets in the upper mid section of the control window. Selecting this 'device icon gadget' will remove these 9 device gadgets from the main menu, thereby allocating more space to view the rest of the menu. v"zByte Info Icon Gadget:v"z The gadget that has the line across the center of it is directly attached to the text section of the window that displays selected information and system memory. Selecting this 'byte info icon gadget' will remove the area containing system memory from the main menu, thereby allocating more space to view the rest of the menu. v"zKeypad Icon Gadget:v"z And finally, the small gadget with the line closest to the bottom is directly attached to the command gadgets that are arranged in the same MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Getting Started 18 manner as the numeric keypad (this keypad is not present on the 600 and 1000 Amiga models). Selecting this 'keypad icon gadget' will remove the area containing the numeric keypad gadgets from the main menu, thereby allocating more space to view the rest of the menu. NOTE: You can remove more than one of these areas from the main menu. For instance, click on the upper area icon gadget and notice that the 9 device gadgets are removed from the main menu. Now click on the lower area gadget and notice that the 'Numeric Keypad' gadgets are gone from the menu. All that you are viewing at this time are the 'Volumes Information' area (the very upper portion of the normal main menu) and the 'System Memory Information' area. You could now click on the center area icon gadget and remove the 'System Memory Information' area. At this point, the entire main menu would be displaying the "Volume Information" area. I suggest that you play with those gadgets for a while just so that you can see how they work. Select one of the icon gadgets once and an area will be removed from the window, making the scroll area larger. The icon gadget will be repositioned in the window so that it will fit in the new configuration. The color of the horizontal line in the gadget will change to signify that the area has been removed. Find the gadget again and selected it once more. That area will be replace in the Control Window. Once you're done playing with them be sure to set the window back up so that all four areas of the window are visible and usable. v"zActive Window To Frontv"z Whenever you open a directory or text window, MegaD will automatically bring that new window to the front of all other windows. Furthermore, if a currently open, directory or text window is selected (made active by clicking on it), it will automatically be moved to the front of all other windows. v"zMoving the Control Window to the frontv"z This 'auto-front' feature does not apply to the MegaD control (main menu) window. There are; however, three function keys that will allow you to move the control window to the front or rear of MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Getting Started 19 the screen. The three keys are F8, F9 and F10. One more catch though -- each key can serve more than one purpose. I'll try to explain: Remember from the beginning of the manual about the very top of the control panel. There is a gadget that toggles between "Volumes In Memory" and "Devices, Assigns and Drives". The second feature of each of these keys deals with this portion of the control panel. F8: (1) Will toggle to 'Devices, Assigns and Drives', and (2) Will toggle the control window between the front and back of the screen. F9: (1) Will toggle to 'Volumes In Memory', and (2) Will toggle the control window between the front and back of the screen. F10: The sole purpose of this key is to toggle the control window between the front and back of the screen. NOTE: If the you have set MegaD F10 default to 'F10 Closes Main Control Window', the control window will be closed and reopened with this key. v"zWhat Is MegaDv"z MegaD's main function on the Amiga is to do something with a directory list or item in the directory list. We will need some medium to work with that we both have. I am going to use a copy of the Workbench disk that came with our operating system to demonstrate some of the simple functions of MegaD. So that we can have a common reference, you will be making a copy of your Workbench disk. v"zCreate a Tutorial Diskv"z You should make a copy of the copy of your Workbench disk. (You should only use your original disks once, and that was to make the copy that you will use when you run a program, any program.) This disk contains many files that we can do things with. I will be using the directories and files as examples of how the commands in MegaD work. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Getting Started 20 v"zLoading the copy of your Workbench diskv"z Place the copy of your Workbench disk into your DF0: disk drive. Use the toggle gadget in the upper portion of the MegaD control window to ensure "Devices, Assigns and Drives" (rather than "Volumes In Memory") is selected. Now use the scroll gadget at the upper right of the control window, and scroll until 'DF0:' is visible in the "Devices, Assigns and Drives Window" (immediately below the "Free Volumes" gadget). Double-click on 'DF0:' in this window. A new window should open on your screen displaying all the directories and files on the disk you inserted in 'DF0:'. (NOTE: an alternative, and sometimes easier way, to accomplish the above is to simply enter 'DF0:' in the string gadget (in the center of the control window labelled 'Device Name') and hit the <return> key). MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Getting Started 21 v"zDirectory Windowsv"z This is a character representation of the directory window that came up when I loaded my Workbench disk. Yours should look similar. ------------------------- | Workbench2.0: |#|@|<- Top window drag bar, close and |-----------------------| Zoom Gadgets | Parent / |Dest|Lock| |<- Parent, Destination, Lock gadgets |--------------------| | | C | | | Devs | | | Expansion | | | Fonts | | | L | | | Libs <---------- Scrolling list area. | monitors | | | Prefs | | | Rexxc | | | S | | | System | | | Trashcan | | | Utilities | | | WBStartup | | | disk.info | | | Expansion.info | | | Monitors.info | | | Prefs.info | | | Shell.info | | | System.info | <- Vertical scrolling gadget | Trashcan.info | | | Utilities.info | | | WBstartup.info | | | | | ----------------------/\|<- Up arrow | |<|>| \/|<- Left, Right, Down arrow ------------------------ and horizontal scrolling gadget v"zThe anatomy of a directory windowv"z This window has two main parts. The upper gadgets and the list area. I will discuss the upper gadgets first. All directory windows have a 'Parent', 'Dest'ination, and 'Lock' gadget. v"zParent Gadgetv"z The 'Parent' will move you to the parent of the current directory. Once at the Root: (This is where we are now) the 'Parent' will bring the Main MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Getting Started 22 Control Window to the front unless it is in two window mode. v"z'Dest'inationv"z The 'Dest'ination gadget tells MegaD which directory(s) is the specified destination directory. This is important because many commands (such as copy, move, etc.) will transfer files from the 'origin' directory to the 'destination' directory. The 'Dest'ination gadget has three states. Unselected, Selected and User Selected. Unselected and Selected looks as any other toggle selected gadgets on an Amiga window. The User Selected mode draws a double border around the selected gadget. MegaD will keep the active window as the destination unless you use the mouse to select the 'Dest'ination gadget. To demonstrate the 'User Selected' mode, activate the open directory window by selecting the drag bar at the top of the window. The 'Dest'ination gadget of this window should now be selected. MegaD auto- select the 'Dest'ination gadget of the active window. Now select the 'Dest'ination gadget with by selecting it with the mouse. The border of the gadget will change, it will have a recess area with the outside of the border still looking as if it is pushing out from the window. This is the 'User Selected' mode of the 'Dest'ination gadget. This disables the 'Auto- Select' feature. The User Selected gadget also forces newly loaded directories into that window unless it is 'Lock'ed. Finally, select the 'Dest'ination gadget again. It will become unselected and look like the 'Parent /' and 'Lock' gadget in the window. For certain commands, such as 'Copy' and 'Move', the window(s) with the unselected 'Dest'ination gadget becomes the source or origin directory window(s). v"zLock Gadgetv"z The 'Lock' gadget tells MegaD that this window is locked and that no other directories can be placed into this window. It does not lock the internal directory list it displays. You may perform any function on the items in the list that you want. If all windows are 'Lock'ed and you request a new MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Getting Started 23 directory to be opened, a new window will be opened to place it in. Think of it as a house with all the doors locked. You come home and find that you do not have the keys to get in. What do you do? You open a window. MegaD takes the same steps. Check the first door, Second, Third... finally all the doors are locked it will open a window to do its job. Later on, there will be a section that describes the use of the 'Lock' gadget, we will clarify this feature then. v"zClose Window Gadgetv"z All directory windows have a standard window close gadget except for the two window mode. This close gadget only closes the window. It does not free the memory used to contain the directory list. This has the advantage that when that directory is needed again it will not have to read the directory again and the list will be displayed instantly. It has the disadvantage of using memory. You can use your Control Window Free Volumes gadget to release that memory to the system. v"zScrolling List Areav"z The scrolling area is much like any other scrolling area of other Amiga programs windows. The proportional gadgets show you how much of the list is being displayed and allows you to move the list up and down if the full list cannot be displayed at one time. The arrow gadgets allow you to step though the list one item at a time. You may hold one of the arrows down and the action will repeat until you reach the end of the direction that you were moving the list in. MegaD also has one more way to scroll the list. v"zMenu Button Scrollv"z By having the mouse pointer in the scroll area of the active window and then pressing the Menu Select button on the mouse the mouse pointer becomes your scroller for the window. Moving the mouse 'off center' of the scroll area the window will start to scroll in that direction. So if you move the mouse pointer to the top of the window it will scroll the list down revealing more of the upper part of the list. The same happens if you move the mouse to the bottom or to the sides of the window. v"zAccessing Menusv"z MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Getting Started 24 To get to the menu you must be outside the scroll area of the active window. The easiest place to do this is at the top of the screen where the menu bar will pop up. Your mouse will be out of any of the possible scroll areas, and ready to select the menu item that you want. v"zSelecting Itemsv"z Items within the scroll area can be selected in one of three ways with the mouse pointer. v"zSingle Select Itemv"z Single clicking any item in the Directory Window will toggle the state of that item. If it was not selected it will become selected, if it was selected it will become unselected. v"zDouble Click Itemv"z Double clicking any item in the Directory Window tells MegaD that you want it to do something with that item. v"zDouble Click Directoryv"z If it is a directory, MegaD will attempt to load that directory and place it in a window. v"zDouble Click Filev"z If it is a file and the menu item 'Option, Activate AutoBoot' is set, MegaD will read the first few bytes of the file and see if there is something that it can do with it. At default, MegaD can load and display a text file and it can load and run a program file. However, you will be able to teach it to handle all the different types of data files that you use. We will get into this later. v"zDrag Select Itemsv"z Drag select a group of items. This is done by selecting the start or end of the area that you wish to select. The select state of the first item you select determines what color the rest of the items that you drag select become. Once the first item is selected move the mouse pointer up or down depending on which way you want to select the items in the list. If you move beyond the scroll area the window will scroll, selecting or unselecting the items as they move into the window. v"zAbort Drag Selectv"z MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Getting Started 25 Should you decide to abort the drag select, move the mouse to the outside left or right of the window and release the mouse select button, this will return all the items to the same state that were before the drag select was started. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Simple Commands And MegaD 26 v"zSimple Commands And MegaDv"z v"zRelabelv"z Now that we have explored two of the most common windows that we will use with MegaD. We are going to do a command. We are going to relabel the copy of the copy of Workbench that we made to a new name. We will do this so that we will be less likely to damage our working copy of Workbench. If you haven't done so yet, make a new copy of your Workbench at this time. When complete, return to this manual. v"zRelabel under 1.3v"z If your still using Workbench1.3 MegaD will not do the relabel command. (And you're really missing out on a great improvement on the Amiga Operating System.) File away your original working copy of Workbench, and place your newly created copy in drive 'DF0: You will have to do it from a CLI window. The command line that you will enter will be Relabel DF0: Tutorial Be sure to have your copy of the Workbench disk in drive DF0: before issuing this command. v"zRelabel under 2.0 and Using MegaDv"z To relabel under 2.0, place the newly created working copy of Workbench in 'DF0:'. We will first load the root directory of 'DF0:'. To do this, use the toggle gadget in the upper portion of the MegaD control window to ensure "Devices, Assigns and Drives" is selected (or as an alternative method, hit the F8 key). Now use the scroll gadget or the scroll arrows at the upper right of the control window until 'DF0:' appear in the volume window (the window immediately below the 'Free Volume' gadget). Double click on 'DF0:' in the volume window. A window should appear on your screen that displays the root directory of 'DF0:'. Now we must tell MegaD that we want to perform an operation on a volume, so use the upper toggle gadget again to change from "Devices, Assigns and Drives" to "Volumes In Memory". We've just told MegaD that we are going to perform some (yet unknown) operation on a volume. We must now tell it which volume. To do this, single click on 'DF0:' in the volume window. Notice that when you single click on 'DF0:', it changes color to indicate that it is now 'selected'. Finally, now that we've told MegaD which volume we want to MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Simple Commands And MegaD 27 perform an operation on, we have to tell it which operation to perform. We are going to use the gadgets at the lower portion of the control window for this. We are looking for the "Relabel" gadget. On first glance we can't find it. That's because it is not visible until we press the 'Ctrl' key on the keyboard. Press and hold the 'Ctrl' key and notice that all the bottom gadgets change. Furthermore, the gadget that was labelled "Rename" is now called "Relabel". Release the 'Ctrl' key now. The gadgets all change back to their original state. Find the gadget on the far right of the lower control panel that is labelled 'C' (it is immediately to the right of the "Rename" gadget). Select the 'C' gadget. Notice that all the lower gadgets change again. In fact, clicking on the 'C' gadget performs the same function that holding down the 'Ctrl' key did. Again, the "Rename" gadget has changed to the "Relabel" gadget. To initiate the relabelling of the disk in 'DF0:', select the "Relabel" gadget. A new requestor pops up that reads: Volume Name Copy_of_Workbench2.0: Enter the new name to relabel this volume to This requestor is asking for the new name of the disk in 'DF0:'. Erase the old name, and replace it with 'Tutorial'. Press the return key on your keyboard and the disk name will change to 'Tutorial'. v"zUsing the Tutorial Diskv"z From here on out, all the commands we will learn will be performed on this disk and your Ram Disk:. I am sure that the Tutorial: disk will be useless once we are done. It will be copied to, deleted from, files written to it and directories moved. Before we go on any farther let me ask you this question. YOUR NOT USING YOUR GOOD COPY OF YOUR WORKBENCH DISK ARE YOU? If so Please make a copy of it and catch up with me here. v"zSetting the device gadgetsv"z We are going to be using the Tutorial: disk all through this. It will be nice to set one of the MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Simple Commands And MegaD 28 nine device gadgets to that name. This way you will be able to load that disk with a simple click of the mouse button. v"zMegaD preferencesv"z In the very first menu of MegaD, which is the Project menu, you will find the menu item 'Set Preferences..." Select this menu item. (NEW 3.1) This menu calls the program MDPrefs that should be in the same directory that MegaD was started from. Should this fail it could be any of a number of problems, the two most likely could be that MDPrefs is not in the same directory as MegaD is or you do not have enough system memory to run both programs. If it is the latter problem you will have to Quit MegaD and run MDPrefs by itself. Once you are done in MDPrefs, 'Save' the settings and then re-run MegaD. It will read the newly save settings. v"zMegaD Preferences windowv"z A window will open to the screen. This window has the following gadget to chose from: Colors Defaults Display Keypads Menus & Devices Miscellaneous Print Screen | Save | Use | Cancel | From this list of gadgets select 'Menus & Devices...' A window will open with many string and booleen gadgets. We are only concerned at this moment with the 18 string gadgets arranged at the bottom of this window. (NEW 3.1) The string gadgets are arranged in 9 pairs. You will see that the left string gadget is titled 'Devices' and the right string gadget is titled 'Titles' The 'Devices' string gadget is where you type the actual path of the directory you want to load. The 'Titles' gadget is for giving the gadget a title. This comes in handy for very long paths to directories where the full path will not MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Simple Commands And MegaD 29 fit into the limited area displayed by the device gadget in the 'Main Control Window.' Most if not all of them should be set to something already. We want two of them to be set for our specifications for this tutorial. We need one with the device and title set to "Ram Disk:" (this may already be set.) and the second set to "Tutorial:" Please note the ':' colon at the end of the name. It needs to be there in the Device string gadget. After setting two device gadgets to our specifications select the 'Use' and then the 'Save' gadget. This will write the MegaD preference file (MegaD2.pf) to the same directory that you loaded MegaD from and in doing so you will not have to reset the gadgets each time you run MegaD. The file will save and the MegaD Preference window will close. The device gadgets in the Control Window will now show the modifications that you just performed. You should now have one of the gadgets reading 'Ram Disk:' and another reading 'Tutorial:' v"zAuto Save when Quitv"z MegaD is set at default to save the preference file every time you quit. Each time you are done using MegaD, and quit the program, MegaD will save its preference file. This way you will never need to worry about saving the changes. Eventually saving the preference file each time you quit will be a waist of time, we will show you how to change this setting later. v"zSimple Commandsv"z The first set of commands that I am going to go though will be the simple commands that work without a source and destination directory. Commands such as 'Set Protect', Create Dir' 'View Text'... They are simple to explain and so it will be the best place to start. v"zDelete Commandv"z Place your Tutorial: disk in any of your floppy disk drives. Select the 'Tutorial:' device gadget. The Tutorial: disk will load and the directory will be placed into a directory window. In the newly opened 'Tutorial' window, you will see a number of directories and files ('C', 'Devs', 'Expansion', etc.). One of these directories is labelled 'C'. Double click on this 'C' directory in the 'Tutorial' text window. The MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Simple Commands And MegaD 30 'C' directory will load and replace the 'Tutorial:' directory list in the open window. This directory contains upwards of 165,000 bytes of files. We are going to need some room on this disk to perform some future functions so we will delete most of the files in this directory. We will drag select the first few items in the directory window. Select the top item and drag select (by holding the select button down) downward until just before you reach the 'Dir' entry in this window. Now release your mouse select button. When you release the mouse button, you should notice that approximately the top 11 files (all the way down to but not including the 'Dir' file) in this window are highlighted, and that the remaining (bottom) files are not highlighted. We do not want to delete the 'Dir' command, we will be using it for another function later. v"zFinal Warningv"z NOTE: This is the last time I will warn you. You Must be using a copy of your Workbench disk!!!!! You have now selected a number of files for some function. We are going to delete the files selected. Remember, we have four banks of gadget and that the first bank of gadget is access when none of the keyboard shift keys and non of the 'Shift Gadgets' are selected by the Keypad Gadgets, The 'Delete" function is located in the first bank of gadgets on the second keypad gadget from the right on the top row. Select the 'Delete' gadget. You will get a requestor that reads something like this: 11 File/s marked for delete 0 Directory/ies marked for delete Continue With two gadgets in it, Yes and No. Select the Yes gadget. This can be done with the mouse or from your keyboard. Any gadget with an 'underlined' character in it, can be selected by using the corresponding key on your keyboard. v"zPanic Windowv"z A window will open. This window is called the Panic Window. It shows you what MegaD is currently doing. It has two gadgets at the bottom. Suspend and Cancel. The Suspend gadget MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Simple Commands And MegaD 31 will suspend the current activity, and let you think about 'continuing', by hitting suspend again, or 'aborting' with the Cancel gadget. As the files are deleted they will be displayed in the Panic window. Once all the marked files are deleted the Panic window will close, the directory window will be updated to show the files that were removed from it. Now we will drag select all the other items in the 'C' directory leaving the 'Dir' file entry unselected. Select the Delete gadget again to remove the rest of the files from the disk. You will have noticed that it took very little time to delete this large number of files. This should scare you just enough to be cautious when using the Delete function. Under normal methods the deleted files are gone forever from that disk. v"zRenamev"z The 'Dir' file should be the only file remaining in your 'C' directory at this time. Select this 'Dir' directory (by single clicking on it), and then select the 'Rename' gadget. This gadget is in the first bank of command gadgets. On the top row, far right side. A request window will open that will have 'Dir' in the string gadget. Change the name to "Directory" and press return. The filename will change on the disk and in the directory window to 'Directory'. Rename the file back to its original name 'Dir'. v"zSet Protectv"z Each Amiga file has a set of bits that are associated with it. They tell the operating system what it can and can not do with the file. The different bits are represented by letters: v"zProtection Bitsv"z r The file can be read. w The file can be written to (altered). e The file is executable (a program (not always the case though)) d The file can be deleted s The file is a script. p The file is a pure command and can be made resident. a The file has been archived. ? Were not sure. (Commodore/Amiga has not MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Simple Commands And MegaD 32 finalize what this bit will be used for) v"zDisplay Protect Bitsv"z To get MegaD to display these bits and their settings you need to select the menu item 'Show, Protection' so that it has a check mark in front of it. v"zReformat Directory Windowsv"z The open directory window should now be displaying the protection bits with the directory items. If not, select the 'Show, Reset All' menu item, this will force all open directory windows to reformat the information to the 'Show' menu settings. We left the 'Dir' file in the 'C' directory of the Tutorial: disk. If the window to that directory is not opened, open it now. Select the directory entry for 'Dir'. We are going to reset the protection bits of that file with the MegaD 'Set Protect' command. This command is located on the first bank of command gadgets, second row to the far left. Select this gadget. A window will open with eight check gadgets. One check gadget for each bit. We want to protect this file from deletion. Select the top check gadget, which is 'd Delete', so that the check mark is not visible in it. Then select the Use Gadget. The d flag will no longer be visible for the 'Dir' directory item. Did it really protect this file from deletion? Select the 'Dir' entry again and try to use the MegaD Delete command. You should end up with a requestor that reads: File dir is protected Delete anyway? Answer No to this requestor, we still need the 'Dir' file for a later lesson. MegaD recognized that the bit was set, and that the file could not be deleted. If you would have answered Yes to the requestor MegaD would have set the delete bit so that it could be deleted, and then delete the file. v"zAuto Destinationv"z Place the Tutorial: disk in one of the drives if it is not already. Then select the Tutorial: device gadget to open a directory window to it. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Simple Commands And MegaD 33 You will notice that the 'Dest'ination gadget is selected in this window. MegaD selects the active directory window on the screen as the destination directory. Some of MegaD commands require that a destination window be available. v"zCreate Directoryv"z The 'Create Dir' command is one of those commands that needs a destination. The 'Create Dir' command gadget is located in the first bank of command gadgets, second row, second from the left of the window. Select this gadget and a requestor will open to the screen that should read: Destination Directory Tutorial: Enter the new name for the directory to create It will have a string gadget to enter a directory name to create in the current destination directory. Enter 'My_directory' into the string gadget. Then press return, remember that any requestor that has only one string gadget, pressing 'return' in that string gadget is the same as hitting the 'Use' gadget. The new directory "My_directory" will be created on the disk, and the window will be updated to show the change. MegaD also created a drawer icon with this directory as "My_directory.info". This 'auto-icon' feature can be disabled (and we'll show you how later on). v"zText Readerv"z MegaD has a very powerful built in text reader that can be used to read any text file. It will read non-text files or word processor files to, but the formatting of the text may be somewhat erratic. On the Tutorial: disk you will find some text files in the S: directory. This is the Amiga Startup drawer and many script files can be found there. We are going to get MegaD to read and place the information found in one of the files in to a text window. v"zLoading a text filev"z Open a Directory Window for the Tutorial: disk if one is not already opened. Double click the 'S' MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Simple Commands And MegaD 34 directory so that MegaD will read the 'S' directory and swap it into the same window. Single select the "Startup-sequence" file. With that file highlighted select the command gadget "View Text", it is found in the first bank of command gadgets, second row, second from the right. The file will be read from the disk and place into a text window. v"zText Window Partsv"z This window has the same type of proportional gadgets and arrow step gadgets that a Directory Window has. They work in the same manner as the Directory Window did except that they move your view position of the text to other unseen areas. v"zText Window Menuv"z You will find that the text window has its own menu. This menu will let you do a wide variety of functions such as set the text color, print the text visible in the window or the whole text file. It has cursor moves to jump to the first or last of the file. It will let you search for a string of characters. v"zText Window Keysv"z Many of the keys on your keyboard will perform the same functions as your menu. This is a list of them. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Simple Commands And MegaD 35 Text Window Keypad Key Key Front Action 8 Up Arrow Cursor up one line 2 Down Arrow Cursor down one line 4 Left Arrow Cursor left one line 6 Right Arrow Cursor right one line 7 Home First of text file 1 End Last of text file ( NumL Toggle hex mode 0 Ins Repeat last search . Del Search string 9 Pg Up Page up once 3 Pg Dn Page down once Your cursor keys will move the text in the window in the same direction as the keys point. The window close gadget or your 'Esc' key will close the text window. Close this text window. (NEW 3.1) v"zAuto Text Window Scrollv"z While holding the Shift key down and selecting the text window with the Left mouse button. The text window will start to scroll up or down at different speeds depending on the current position of the mouse pointer. One more select of this window or activating another window will end the scroll. This enables the user to set the scroll of the window slow enough that the text file can be read line after line. v"zDouble Click Text Filev"z We will load the same text file again but we will not use the 'View Text' command gadget. Double click the text file the same as you would double click an icon on the Workbench. MegaD will check the file to see if it contains text and if so it will load the text in to a text window. This, I am sure will become your standard way to load a text file, the double click of a known text file will become second nature to read it. Again close this text window. v"zMultiple Text Windowsv"z As I said MegaD, has a very powerful text viewer, but what we have seen so far is not very uncommon. What makes the MegaD's text viewer so unique is that you may have as many text windows open at one MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Simple Commands And MegaD 36 time as you like and your system memory will allow. To demonstrate this I want you to select about three files in the 'Tutorial:S' directory. With those three files selected select the 'View Text' command gadget. MegaD will load all the selected text files and place each one in a different text window. v"zManipulating Multiple Text Windowsv"z You can toggle through all the text window by using your 'F7' function key. Each time you press 'F7' the next text window will be moved to the front of the screen. We are now done with text windows, so close all the text windows that you just opened. v"zFile Commentsv"z Each directory entry in a directory list can have a file comment associated with it. The comment is a good place to keep special notes with your files. Maybe the file is associated with another file such as a program, yet the name of the file does not seem to relate to it. By adding a comment that tells you of this association to a file it can be easily identified later. The comment can be up to 79 characters long. It can say anything you want it to say. Adding comments to your files will not use any more space on your disk, the space that the comment is stored is allocated away from your free disk space at the time the file or directory was created. Again we will need to have the Tutorial: directory window opened to the screen. Select the first item in this window. Now that the directory item is selected, select the 'File Comment' command gadget, this command is in the first bank, bottom row, far left. It is two gadgets wide, to represent the '0' key on your keypad. Once you select this command a request window will open that should read like this: Source Directory Tutorial: Source Filename C Destination Directory Tutorial: Enter comment to add MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Simple Commands And MegaD 37 to this file A string gadget is in the bottom that reads: File comment And finally four select gadgets: Use, All, Skip, Cancel In the string gadget type 'This is a comment' and press return. The comment will be written to the disk for that file or directory, in my case it was the directory 'C'. The comment should not be visible, an '*' was place in the line that we selected to enter the comment for. v"zSet Show Commentv"z To see the comment in the Directory Window you will need to set the menu item 'Show, Comment' so that a check mark is in front of the 'Comment'. If the comment is still not visible select the 'Show, Reset All" menu item to force reformatting of all open directory window. v"zSetting Multiple Commentsv"z You may set groups of files with the same comment. This is the purpose of the 'All' gadget that was in the 'Set Comment' requestor. At this moment I want you to drag select all the files in the Tutorial: Directory Window. Select the 'File Comment' command gadget. Now in the requestors string gadget enter 'All have a comment' and instead of pressing return select the All gadget. This will only take a moment and all the entries in this directory will have the file comment 'All have a comment' associated with them. Before we leave this section select the menu item 'Show, None'. This will uncluttered the directory windows while we go though the Tutorial. Later you will find that you like to have certain file attributes showing such as the size of the file. For now we are more interested in learning the commands and the less clutter we have the easier it will be. v"zUpdate Dirv"z I will not be teaching you how to use this function as much as when to use this function. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Simple Commands And MegaD 38 v"zBuffered Directoriesv"z MegaD buffers directories. This means that MegaD stores a copy of the disk structure in the computers memory. It does this so that you do not have to wait for the directory to reload when you need it again. One of the pitfalls of this method is that if the directory is changed on the disk by another program other than MegaD, MegaD's buffered directory will be inaccurate. An example of this would be: You use MegaD to open a Directory Window to the directory that you store your word processing files. You switch to using the word processor, create a new file and save that new file in your word processing file directory. You switch back to using MegaD so that you may do something with the file that you just saved using your word processor and find that the newly created file is not listed with the other items in the directory. MegaD simply does not know that the new file exists. 'Update Dir' only updates the destination directories on the screen. Selecting the 'Update Dir' gadget while the 'Dest'ination gadget is selected for this window will force MegaD to reload the directory and re-display any new information found. 'Update Dir' is located on the first bank of command gadgets bottom row, far right hand side. v"zSelect/Clear commandsv"z You may have notice that I have skipped over the commands that start with 'Select', 'Clear', 'Sel' and 'Clr'. You will find a wide variety of these types of commands on both first bank and the second bank of the command gadgets. They work on open Directory Windows in different ways. They all ether select or clear (unselect) items in Directory Window. Some work on all items, some only work of files or directory items, some only work on source Directory Window. Most of them are very simple, Such as 'Select All', by selecting this Command Gadget all items in all open Directory Windows will become selected. 'Clr Dir' will clear or unselect all directories in open Directory Window. 'SelSrcFile' will select all source (non-'Dest'ination windows) files in MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Simple Commands And MegaD 39 open Directory Window. In general, there are 14 of these types of commands. You may want to play around with these. There is not a lot to them except for two special types. Patterns and ABoot (AutoBoot). 'Patterns' can be confusing. They work much the same as 'Filters' and 'Find'. These three will be discussed later in the Tutorial. ABoot (AutoBoot) requires an AutoBoot to have been defined before it can be used so this too will have to wait until we can dig into the concept and use of AutoBoots. v"zDuplicatev"z 'Duplicate' is used to create a new copy of a file or directory in the same directory that the file or directory is in. The duplicate file or directory needs to have a different name than the original, this being that you can not have two files or directories of the same name in any particular directory. The 'Duplicate' Command Gadget is found in the second (Ctrl) bank on the second row, far left of the Command Gadgets. Again we will need to have the Tutorial: directory window opened to the screen. If you have been going along with this Tutorial you should have only one item left in the 'C' directory of this disk. Double click the 'Tutorial:C' directory to read and display the contents. Here we have the "Dir" file that was renamed to "Directory" and then back to "Dir". We are going to make a duplicate of this file. v"zDuplicate a Filev"z Select the directory item "Dir" in the Tutorial:C Directory Window. Select the 'Duplicate' Command Gadget. A request window will open that should read: Source Directory Tutorial:C Source Filename Dir Destination Directory Tutorial:C Enter filename to duplicated this file as You will also find a string gadget that is titled MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Simple Commands And MegaD 40 "Filename" and in this string gadget you will find the original name of the file that you wish to duplicate, "Dir". Change the string in this string gadget to read. "Duplicated" and press the return key. The file will be copied to the same directory under the name "Duplicated". The Directory Window will be updated to show the new file. This command will work on full directories if you wish to do so. v"zGo Deepv"z 'Go Deep' is used to read and place the selected directories or volumes into MegaD's buffers. You may find other reasons to use this command but its main purpose is to calculate how many bytes of disk space a particular directory or set of directories take up to store on disk. v"zSet Show Sizev"z To better see how this works, select the menu item 'Show, Size' so that a 'check mark' is in front of the menu item. Again we will need to have the Tutorial: directory window opened to the screen. The size of files and directories will now be displayed in the Directory Windows. If the size of the files are not being shown, select the menu item, 'Show, Reset All' to force the re-display of all open Directory Windows. v"zCalculating Directory Sizesv"z You will notice that the directories in this window show "(dir)" in the same column that the files of the window show the file size. MegaD can not tell how many bytes of disk space a directory uses until that full directory has been buffered. We will tell it to read and buffer one of the directories. Select the "Devs" entry of the "Tutorial:" Directory Window. Now select the 'Go Deep' Command Gadget. It is located on the second (Ctrl) Command Gadgets bank, second row, far right. After doing so MegaD will read and buffer any selected directory in any open Directory Window. Once it has finished reading the directory it will calculate the actual space used by this directory and replace the "(dir)" with that information. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Simple Commands And MegaD 41 v"zEmpty Directoriesv"z If the directory is empty the size will not be shown and it will be left displaying "(dir)". 'Go Deep' will also work on multiple groups of selected directories. Drag Select the first three or so directory items in the Tutorial: Directory Window, be sure not to select all of them. There is one more variation on the 'Go Deep' command that I want to show you later on that will need a few other directories to read and buffer. After selecting a few other directories select the 'Go Deep' Command Gadget. MegaD will do the same to the selected directories as it did with the one directory selected earlier. v"zBuffering a Full Volumev"z You may tell MegaD to go deep and buffer the full volume by selecting the entry of the volume in the 'Volumes In Memory' list. Select the Tutorial: entry in this list and then select the 'Go Deep' Command Gadget. You will notice that the other directories that are still buffered whiz by at high speed in the Panic Window. MegaD knows what is there and recalculates from memory for those directories. It will also read all the unbuffered directories on this disk and buffer and calculate the directories sizes for them also. Now you should be able to see the sizes of all directories that are not empty. v"zIconifyv"z Iconify puts MegaD to sleep so that it can be called upon later if needed. Iconify works differently depending on what operating system you are using. v"z1.3 Iconifyv"z If you are still using Workbench 1.3, Iconify opens a small window on the Workbench screen and closed all other MegaD window. To reopen MegaD, activate the small window and select the right mouse button as you would if you wanted to select a menu item. This will reactivate MegaD so that you can use it again. MegaD currently supports Workbench1.3 but in future releases this support will be removed. Workbench2.0 offers much more for both you the user and the developers. v"z2.0 Iconifyv"z If you are using Workbench 2.0 MegaD uses what is MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Simple Commands And MegaD 42 called an Application Icon when in Iconify mode. To iconify MegaD, select the menu item 'Project/Iconify'. Please do so at this time. This icon is placed on the Workbench screen, and looks much like any other icon. It will have the title of MegaD 3.1x under the icon. The icon can be double clicked to call MegaD. In doing so the Control Window will be reopened. v"zDropping icons onto the Application Iconv"z You can also drag and drop other icons onto the MegaD application icon to have MegaD try to perform some type of action on the items dropped. At the very least, this action will reopen the Control Window. Here is a list of things that could be dropped onto the MegaD application icon and what will happen. v"zDrop a Disk Icon.v"z By dropping the disk icon onto the application icon, MegaD will reopen and load the volume dropped and open a Directory Window to display its contents. v"zDrop a Drawer Iconv"z By dropping a drawer icon onto the application icon MegaD will reopen and load the drawer dropped and then open a Directory Window to display it's contents. v"zDrop a Program Iconv"z By dropping a program Icon onto the application icon, MegaD will reopen and open a window called "Program Control" that will allow you to run the program in a number of different ways. This window is complex and will be explained when we get into using AutoBoots, User Gadgets, and Menu sets later. v"zDrop a Text File Iconv"z If you drop a text file icon on to the application icon, MegaD will reopen, load the text file and place it into a text window for viewing. v"zDrop a Project Iconv"z If you drop a project icon on to the application icon and MegaD has been trained to know what to do with that type of data through the AutoBoot program controls. This could be a graphics file and MegaD would call your favorite graphics viewer. This could be a word processor file and MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Simple Commands And MegaD 43 MegaD will call the word processor to allow you to edit it. v"zApplication Menuv"z Along with the Application Icon being placed onto the Workbench screen another feature of Workbench 2.0 is used. Two new menu items will be placed into the Workbench Tool menu. One is "Call MegaD" to reopen the MegaD Control Window and the other is "Quit MegaD" to quit and unload the MegaD code that is in memory at the moment. To illustrate this feature, please iconify MegaD by selecting the menu item 'Project/Iconify'. Notice that all MegaD directory windows and the MegaD control window disappear. Further notice that a new MegaD icon was created on your Workbench screen. With MegaD still iconified, select the Workbench menu item 'Tools/Call MegaD'. Notice that the MegaD control window reopens. If you were observant when you selected the Workbench menu item 'Tools/Call MegaD', you noticed another menu item labelled 'Tools/Quit MegaD'. These are the two application menus when MegaD is iconified v"zQuitting MegaDv"z MegaD has six ways to quit and unload the program code from memory. One, the window close gadget in the Control Window. Two, the Quit menu item in the project menu. Three Right-Amiga Q, the menu equivalent of 'Quit'. Four, the Command Gadget 'Quit'. Five, the "Application Menu", "Tools, Quit MegaD" from the Workbench screen. And the ARexx QUIT command, All six do exactly the same thing. The 'Quit' Command Gadget is located on the second (Ctrl) bank, bottom row, second from the right of the Command Gadgets. v"zDisk Labelsv"z MegaD has a complete facility for creating disk labels with very little effort. A printer is required to create them. MegaD can be set to use any size label. It comes set at default to work with an Avery brand pin fed label. The product number is 4241. As mentioned it can be set to use the label of your choice and this is done by the menu item 'Project, Defaults'. Labels can be created from scratch (manually) or from information selected in the directory window for a volume. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Simple Commands And MegaD 44 v"zManual Labelv"z To create a label manually, Be sure that there are no items selected in any of the Directory Windows and that none of the 'Volumes In Memory' items are selected. Select the 'Label' Command Gadget that is located on the third (shift) bank, second row, far left. A window will open titled "Manual Labels". This window has 15 string gadgets and two booleen gadgets. The topmost string gadget is used to enter the volume name. This name is printed on the label in two places. Once where it can be seen at the top where the label folds over the top of the disk. The second time on the front of the label to title it. The other 14 string gadgets are there to enter whatever you want printed below the title. To print the label select the Print gadget. To clear all the strings for a new label select the Clear gadget. The window close gadget will close the window. The 'Q' keyboard key will do the same function as the window close gadget. v"zAuto Labelsv"z The second and quickest way to create a label is to select items in an open Directory Window or to select the volume name in the 'Volumes In Memory' list. After doing so and then selecting the Command Gadget 'Label' MegaD will print the selected information on to the disk label. I suggest that your load the Tutorial: volume into a Directory Window and try the different modes of the label print. Print to plain paper so not to waste any labels and this will give you an idea of how simple it can be to create labels for your disks. v"zLabel Alignv"z Label align is used to help you align the labels in your printer before printing them. It needs to be done only once each time you load the pin fed labels into your printer. Label align prints two dots to the printer. The dots should be just above the label as to not write on the label and should be centered over the label. You may select Command Gadget 'Label Align' as often as you wish and the label will not be advance in the printer. The Command Gadget 'Label Align' is located on the third (shifted) bank, second row, second from the left of the MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Simple Commands And MegaD 45 Command Gadgets. v"zLabel Modifyv"z 'Lab. Modify' is a combination of the auto label and manual label modes. It places selected information found in the ''Volumes In Memory'' list or open Directory Window into the manual label window. This allows you to preview it and modify, before it is sent to the printer. The best way to understand this is to select a few items in Tutorial: Directory Window and select the Command Gadget 'Lab. Modify', this is located on the third (shifted) bank, second row, second from the right. The manual label window will open and the information will be placed into the window for modification. Select Print, Clear or close the window depending on what you want to do from this point. v"zDuplicate Disk Labelsv"z 'Label Times' works the same as Label does only it will give you a requestor before printing the label and allow you to specify how many duplicates you need at the time. Select a couple of items in the Tutorial: Directory Window and select the Command Gadget 'Label Times', it is located on the third (shifted) bank second row far right. Once doing so a requestor will open that will read: Enter the number of labels you wish to print for each marked volume A string gadget title "Number of labels" will be active, and will allow you to enter the quantity of labels to print. Enter a quantity if you want and press return or hit the Cancel gadget to abort the operation. v"zDirectory listingsv"z MegaD allows you to create, and then save or print a list of selected items in Directory Windows. The format and sort order of this list depends upon the settings you have selected in the 'Show' menu. This feature may not be abundantly clear at present, so let me explain. v"zOutput Filev"z If a directory is selected 'Output File' will create a list of all files and sub- directories found in the selected directory. The same is true MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Simple Commands And MegaD 46 if a volume is selected in the 'Volumes In Memory' list. It will create a complete directory listing of all files and directories on the selected volumes. To demonstrate this we will we will need to have the Tutorial: directory window opened to the screen. 'Output File' requires a 'Dest'ination window to be available for it to write the file to. By opening the Tutorial: Directory Window the 'Dest'ination gadget of the Tutorial: Directory Window should have been automatically selected by MegaD. If it is not, select it before continuing. Select a couple of directories and a few of the files in the Tutorial: Directory Window. Then select the Command Gadget 'Output File', it is located on the third (shifted) bank of Command Gadgets, Third row, far left. After doing so a request window will open displaying this information: Destination Directory Tutorial: Enter output filename for Destination Directory Below will be an active string gadget titled "Filename", enter "DirList" into this string gadget and press return. The selected directories will be read from the disk and all the selected information will be written to the file "DirList" in the directory Tutorial:. The Tutorial: Directory Window will be updated to show the new file that has just been written. Now to take a quick look at what was done, double click the "DirList" file and MegaD will load and place that file in a text window so that it can be viewed. v"zOutput Formatv"z Each new level of sub-directories is indented four spaces. If any particular directory contains more than one file, then that directory's file list will be two columns wide. There is a slight variation to how the list can be printed. If you want tree lines to help trace the directories and sub-directory structures, you will find an option in the Output Menu that can be checked to do this. Place a check by the menu MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Simple Commands And MegaD 47 item 'Output, W/Tree Lines'. Now perform the actions required to create another directory listing and place that file into a text window just as we did before. Now you can compare the difference of the two outputs. We can create a full listings of the volume by selecting the Tutorial: entry in the 'Volumes In Memory' list. After doing so select the 'Output File' option again. After answering the requestor, MegaD will read through all the directories and sub directories creating a list of everything that can be found on the volume. I find that this output directory list is very valuable when I am looking to free up a little space on my hard drive. Once the list is made I can scan through it looking for old files that can be archived or deleted. Programs that I no longer have the need to keep readily available. v"zOutput Prtv"z This is the twin brother of the above described Output File. The only different between the two is this will send the output to the printer through the PRT: device. v"zMegaD's Spoolerv"z MegaD uses its own spooler while doing any printing task. This lets you continue using MegaD while your printer is printing away. v"zCancel print jobsv"z There are two special menu items that allow you to communicate with the spooler. You will find them under the 'Panic' menu. They are 'CANCEL PRINT' and 'CANCEL ALL PRINT'. 'CANCEL PRINT' will end the current print job and go on to the next job if one is waiting. 'CANCEL ALL PRINT' will cancel all print task waiting and the current print job. v"zPrinting Text Filesv"z 'Prt Text' will send a selected text file in any of the open Directory Windows to the spooler which in turn will send it to the printer. It will do some minor checking to see if the file can be printed. It will not let you try to print an executable file and it skips over .info files. MegaD is smart enough to prevent the printing of executable files and .info files; however, it cannot distinguish between text files and word MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Simple Commands And MegaD 48 processor formatted files. If you attempt to send a word processor formatted file to the printer with MegaD, the output will not be legible. A good test to be sure that the file is a text file is to double click the file or used the 'View Text' option to see if it will be read and placed into a text window. If you do not have a printer connected to your Amiga this option will not be of any value to you and you should not perform the following actions. We will again need a window open to the "S" directory on the Tutorial: disk. Mark the Startup-Sequence file so that it is selected in the window. Then select he Command Gadget 'Prt Text' found on the third (shifted) bank, third row, second from the right. In a few moments the document will begin to be printed to your printer. You may select one or more text files and the 'Prt Text' command will send all of them to the printer one after the other. Though I do not suggest that you do this now unless you have a reason to create a number of hard copies of the text files. v"zSearching Text Filesv"z 'Search Text' is used to find a word or string of text in one or more selected text files. Should you select a directory, 'Search Text' will look through the full directory and sub-directories for any occurrences of the string. For this example we will use the word "path". MegaD searches are not case sensitive. So "path" will match to "PATH", "Path", "pATH"... as long as it spells "path" the match will be true. It will look for the word "path" within other words, so if it comes across the words "pathway" it will be a match, though it may not be what you want. You can add spaces before the word and after the word such as " path " and the match to pathway will not be true anymore. But this will prevent path from being found if it were the first word on a new line such as "[RETURN]path " or it was the last word in a sentence that ended with a period like this " path." There is a very good chance that the word "path" can be found in one of the text files found in the MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Simple Commands And MegaD 49 "S" directory on the Tutorial: disk. Open a window to this directory and drag select all the files found in it. Select the Command Gadget 'Search Text'. It is located on the third (shifted) bank, forth row, Second from the right. A requestor will open that read like this: Destination Directory Tutorial:S Enter the string to search for in all marked files ?, #?, * permitted Include optional filename to create a list of locations found Below are two string gadgets titled "Search String" and "Optional filename for list" At this moment we only want to fill in the first string gadget "Search String" with "path". After typing "path" into the string gadget, select the "Use" gadgets with the mouse. MegaD will start to search though the selected files. Hopefully it will find the word you are searching for. If so it will bring up a requestor that reads like this. path Was found in path Tutorial:S under filename Startup-sequence Open This text window? Select the Yes gadget so that the text will be loaded and viewed with a text window. The first occurrence of the found string will be highlighted on the first line of the text window, any other occurrences, of the found string, that are visible in the text window will also be highlighted. Now close this text window. This is fine when you are looking for just one text file that has a string in it that you want to find. There may be times that you wish to create a list of all occurrences of a string in one or more text files. To demonstrate this, we will again select all the files in the "Tutorial:S" directory. We must be sure that there is a destination window available. If the 'Dest'ination gadget is not selected for the "Tutorial:S" Directory Window, select it with your MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Simple Commands And MegaD 50 mouse. Select the Command Gadget 'Search Text' again. You should notice that the "Search String" gadget still contains the "path" string. Press return on this and the next string gadget will be activated. In this string gadget, "Optional filename for list" type "findList" and then select the "Use" gadget. If any matches are found a simple message will be placed to the screen, that should read: path was found 4 times and was saved in file Tutorial:S/findList It will have a single gadget at the bottom titled "Continue" select this gadget and MegaD will open a text window of the newly created text file "findList". This text will show the path/s and filename/s that the string was found in, what lines they were found on, and a copy of each line the string was found in. As a personal note: I have found this to be a valuable tool. For example, another program I have, "cxref" includes a similar feature, it creates a cross reference. There are times that the cross reference fails to list just what I want to find. The 'Search Text' feature of MegaD has performed well for me at these times, creating a very usable list of where I can find what I am looking for. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Source and Destination Commands 51 v"zSource and Destination Commandsv"z Up to this point, we have looked at commands that can be used with only one directory window. Hopefully you are now comfortable with the use of the Control Window and the Directory Windows. We have been limited in what we can do with one window. Commands such as 'Copy', 'Copy As', 'Move' and 'Move As' require two or more windows to work. They each require a source and a destination to perform their task. v"zDestination Window Definitionv"z A destination window is any window that the 'Dest'ination gadget of the Directory Window is selected. v"zSource Window Definitionv"z A source window is any Directory Window in which (a) the 'Dest'ination gadget is not selected, and (b) at least one directory item is selected. We will confine our use of the system to two volumes. The Tutorial: volume and the Ram Disk: volume. This way we will not mess up any important disk while we see what MegaD can do. We will also limit ourselves to using only one source directory and one destination directory at a time. Later we will work with multiples destination and source directories but not at this moment to keep confusion to a minimum. v"zAction Warningsv"z 'Copy', 'Copy As', 'Move' and 'Move As' will warn you before the command is executed and if you will be writing over the top of another file. The warnings can be turned off. For now we want to keep them around to insure that we do not do something we shouldn't. v"zAuto 'Dest'inationv"z How to use the auto 'Dest'ination feature. MegaD will select the 'Dest'ination gadget of the currently active Directory Window. This is the window that is active on the system, and can be distinguished from all inactive windows because its window border will be a highlighted color. The Amiga operating system can only have one window active on the system. You can have many windows doing different tasks, but only one of the MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Source and Destination Commands 52 windows will accept input from the user. This input is usually from the keyboard or the mouse. The window can be activated by selecting anywhere within and on the window borders. v"zActive Windowv"z MegaD uses this active window to decide which Directory Window to select as the destination directory. As you select other Directory Window to become active the 'Dest'ination gadget will also be selected with it. v"zOpening Two Directory Windowsv"z Open two Directory Windows by selecting the Tutorial: and Ram Disk: device gadgets. Watch the 'Dest'ination gadgets of the windows as they are opened. You will see the first Directory Window 'Dest'ination gadget become selected. When the next window opens the 'Dest'ination gadget of that window becomes selected and the first Directory Window 'Dest'ination gadget becomes unselected. Now that two Directory Windows are opened, activate the inactive Directory Window by selecting it, the 'Dest'ination gadget of the selected Directory Window will be set. The selection of Directory Windows for destination directory becomes second nature after using MegaD for a time. v"zLast Active Window Destinationv"z For you who are used to the standard two window directory utility that have been available for the Amiga, this active window as the destination will seem backward. There is a check mark in the 'MegaD Preferences, Set Defaults' window that will switch this to last active window destination. Beware, you may not like it after you find how well MegaD works with multiple source directories. v"zOverriding Auto Destinationv"z This feature can be overridden at anytime by selecting any Directory Window 'Dest'ination gadgets. Once the user does this the 'Dest'ination gadget will have a double drawn border the looks different from any other selected gadget. If you have not notice this yet select any 'Dest'ination gadget on a Directory Window, the border will change, select it again and the 'Dest'ination gadget will become unselected with a normal border. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Source and Destination Commands 53 v"zCopying Filesv"z 'Copy' will create a copy of the selected file or files of a source directory in the destination directory. To do this we will need two Directory Windows open on the screen. Select the Tutorial: device gadget and the Ram Disk: device gadget. The Two directories will be loaded and place in separate Directory Windows. If you have been following along from the start you should find a text file titled "DirList" in the Tutorial: Directory Window, if not use any of the .info files in the Tutorial: Directory Window for this demonstration. Select the "DirList" file, then select the Ram Disk: Directory Window to activate it, I usually use the top window border, this way none of the directory items are accidentally selected. As you activated it, the 'Dest'ination gadget of the Ram Disk: Directory Window became selected, showing it to be the destination directory. Now select the Command Gadget 'Copy', this is located on the first bank, top row, far left. After doing so you will get a requestor that reads: 1 file/s marked for copy 0 director/ies marked for copy to be copied to 1 directory window/s Continue Select 'Yes' and the file will be copied to the Ram Disk: and the Directory Window will be updated to show the newly copied file. v"zReplace File Warningv"z MegaD will warn you if you are going to write over the top of an old file, to demonstrate this will perform the same identical actions as before to copy the "DirList" file to the Ram Disk:. Now the file "DirList" exists on the destination directory and the warning will be produced. After trying to copy the file again this warning will be produced and MegaD will wait for your response to the following requestor: You will be replacing the newer file DirList MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Source and Destination Commands 54 in directory Ram Disk: Replace it? If you answer yes the file will be overwritten by a new copy of it. This is inconsequential being the two files are identical but later on as you use MegaD you could replace a file the you wanted to keep only because it had the same name as the file you were copying. There are ways to turn off the warnings, but until you are sure of how MegaD works and what it can do, I suggest that you leave the warnings active. v"zCopying Directoriesv"z MegaD will also copy a directory and its contents, which could contain other directories and files. Select the 'C' directory in the Tutorial: Directory Window. Activate the Ram Disk: Directory Window to make it the destination directory, the 'Dest'ination gadget of that window should be selected. Select 'Copy' again. A request window will open that should read: 0 Files marked for copy 1 Directory/ies marked for copy To be copied to 1 directory window/s Continue Answer 'Yes' and MegaD will read the contents of the selected directory and copy it. Once it is finished an exact duplicate of the selected directory will be created in the Ram Disk: v"zCopying Groups of Files and Directoriesv"z MegaD will copy groups of selected files and directories to a Directory Window. If you have enough spare memory on your Amiga that will allow you to, you may want to try selecting a group of files and directories on the Tutorial: volume and copy them to the Ram Disk: volume. MegaD will not replace a directory with another directory or file. So if you try to copy the "Tutorial:C directory to the Ram Disk: again it will fail. MegaD has the power to delete the directory and then copy the new one to it. I have chosen not to let MegaD perform this as a one step process. You the user will have to take the extra step to first 'Delete' the directory and then mark and copy the new directory or file into its place. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Source and Destination Commands 55 v"zCopy and Rename a Filev"z 'Copy As' is used to copy the file as 'Copy' does, but you have a way to give the copy of the file a different name than the original. It functions 100% the same a the 'Copy' command works except for this. To demonstrate this you will follow the same steps as you did above for the use of 'Copy' only you will use the command gadget 'Copy As'. The only change will be when it comes time to copy the "DirList" file in the Tutorial: Directory Window you will be given a requestor that will read: Source Directory Tutorial: Source Filename DirList Destination Directory Ram Disk: Enter filename to rename copy of this file A string gadget titled "Filename" will be active with the original name of the file that was selected to copy. Simply add a "2" to the end of the name so that it now reads "DirList2" and press return. The file will be copied using the new destination name "DirList2", the Ram Disk: Directory Window will be updated to show the newly added file. If you change your mind and decide that you wish to keep the name of copy the same as the original simply press return without changing the original name when prompted for the new filename. The file will still be copied and the name will be left unchanged. You may have notice that the new filename requestor also gave you a gadget titled "Skip". If you select a group of files to be copied and use the 'Copy As' Command Gadget, you are given the choice to copy the file or to skip that file and go to the next selected item. v"zMoving Filesv"z The 'Move' command is used for moving files from one directory to another. MegaD performs this MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Source and Destination Commands 56 function two different ways. If the file is to be moved from one volume to another volume, the file will first be copied to the destination directory, then the original will be deleted from the source directory. If the file is to be moved on the same volume, it will be renamed to the destination directory. This requires a very low overhead, and being so, a large 200,000 byte file will be moved as fast as a 50 byte file. You only have to make the decision of where your moving the file to, MegaD makes the decision of how to move it. To do this we will need two Directory Windows open to the screen. Select the Tutorial: device gadgets and the Ram Disk: device gadget. The two directories will be loaded and place in separate Directory Windows. You should find a text file titled "Prefs.info" in the Tutorial: Directory Window, if not use any other .info files in the Tutorial: Directory Window for this demonstration. Select the "Prefs.info" file, then select the Ram Disk: Directory Window to activate it. As you activated it, the 'Dest'ination gadget of the Ram Disk: Directory Window became selected, showing it to be the destination directory. Now select the Command Gadget 'Move', this is located on the first bank, top row, second from the left. After doing so you will get a requestor that reads: 1 file/s marked for move 0 director/ies marked for move To be moved to 1 directory window/s Continue Select 'Yes' and the file will be moved to the Ram Disk: and the two Directory Windows will be updated to show the newly moved file. MegaD will warn you if you are going to write over the top of an old file during a 'Move' just as it did during a 'Copy'. There are ways to turn off the warnings but until you are sure of how MegaD works and what it can do, I suggest that you leave the warnings active. v"zMoving Directoriesv"z MegaD will also move a directory and its contents, MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Source and Destination Commands 57 which could contain other directories and files. Select the 'L' directory in the Tutorial: Directory Window. Activate the Ram Disk: Directory Window to make it the destination directory, the 'Dest'ination gadget of that window should be selected. Select 'Move' again. A request window will open that should read: 0 Files marked for move 1 Directory/ies marked for move To be moved to 1 directory window/s Continue Answer 'Yes' and MegaD will read the contents of the selected directory and move it, once it is finished an exact duplicate of the selected directory will be created in the Ram Disk: MegaD will move groups of selected files and directories to a Directory Window. We are going to move all the .info files of the Tutorial: volume to a sub-directory on the same volume. If you have been following along you should find a directory on the Tutorial: disk named "My_directory", this is going to be the destination directory for the next move. Drag select all the files listed in the Tutorial: Directory Window. v"zWorking in the Same Volumev"z Before opening the "My_directory" sub- directory of the Tutorial: disk, select the "Lock" gadget of the Tutorial: Directory Window. As described at the start of this tutorial the "Lock" gadget will lock the window to the screen. MegaD is set to allow only one window per volume, the lock gadget overrides this allowing another window to open. Now double click the "My_directory" of the Tutorial: Directory Window. The empty "My_directory" Directory Window will open in front of the Tutorial: Directory Window. The 'Dest'ination gadget will be selected on the "My_directory" Directory Window marking this as destination directory. v"zNavigating Through Multiple Directory Windowsv"z Lets take a little time out here, This is the first time that we have opened two Directory Window on the same volume. MegaD lets you uses the cursor keys to help navigate through open or previously opened Directory Windows. Left and MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Source and Destination Commands 58 right cursor moves you from volume to volume. Up and down cursors moves you from directory to directory of the current active volume. If you do not have the Ram Disk: Directory Window opened, open it now so that you may use the four cursor keys to manipulate the open Directory Windows. Cursor left and right changing active volumes. Cursor up and down to move within those volumes. Now cursor back to the Tutorial: Directory Window and then cursor down to activate the "My_directory" Directory Window which in turn should select the 'Dest'ination gadget. Now that the "My_directory" is the destination directory, select the 'Move' Command Gadget and answer the requestors, that will in turn move the files we selected earlier to their new directory. We will need the files back in their original position, so drag select all the files in "My_directory", and move them back to the Tutorial: Directory Window. Just as with 'Copy' MegaD will not replace a directory with another directory. So if you try to move the "Tutorial:L" directory to the Ram Disk: again it will fail. v"zMove and Rename v"z 'Move As' is 'Move' with the option to change the name of the file or directory while it is being moved. Much as we did with 'Copy' and 'Copy As', so you should already know how to do this if you've gone through those two functions. You may want to test it out, but once you are done try to have the files and directories of the Tutorial: volume in the same order they are now. This way we will still be on common ground as we walk through some other functions. v"zMultiple Destination And Source Directoriesv"z There is no real secret to how this works. If you want to copy files from more than one directory, simply open more than one source windows and mark the items in the windows that you want to work with. If you want to copy files to more than one directory, simply open the directory windows you wish copy to and select the 'Dest'ination gadget on those windows so that they become user defined MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Source and Destination Commands 59 'Dest'ination. There are no limits to the number of source, or number of destination windows you can use at one time. 'Copy', 'Copy As', 'Move', 'Move As' and 'Create Dir' work with multiple 'Dest'ination windows. The best way to see this in action is to copy some files from your Tutorial: disk to the Ram Disk:. Follow the below steps to perform a 'Copy' using both multiple Source Directories and using multiple Destination Directories: 1. Open a Directory Window for the Tutorial: disk, Lock that window. Select a few files in this window. (Source directory 1.) 2. 'Double Click' the "Devs" entry of the Tutorial: Directory Window, to open the second source window. Lock this window too. Select a few files in this window also. (Source directory 2.) 3. Open a Directory Window for the "Ram Disk:" disk, 'Lock' and select the 'Dest'ination gadget. (Destination directory 1.) 4. 'Double Click' the "T" entry of the "Ram Disk:" Directory Window to open a sub-directory window. Select the 'Dest'ination gadget of this window too. (Destination directory 2.) 5. Select the 'Copy' Command Gadget. After the 'Copy' command is finished, the windows will be updated to show the newly copied files. You have just copied files from two directory window into two other directory windows. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Source and Destination Commands 60 Filters and Pattern Matching v"zFilter Requestorv"z The four functions, 'Sel Patterns', 'Clr Patterns', 'Filters +', and 'Find' use the same requestor. 'Filter -' will be mentioned here because it undoes what 'Filter +' does. The Find requestor changes so that you may define a destination directory and file name to place the list of found items during the search of directory items. All four commands function the same, but produce a different result. Lets examine what they do. v"zFilter + Functionv"z 'Filter +' will filter in or filter out items in the Directory Window, making the list more manageable. An example of this would be a large directory of graphic files. Some have the extension .iff and others have the extension .gif. A filter could be added to the Directory Window that would hide non .gif files listing only the .gif files at the moment. At places in the list where items have been hidden, lines will be drawn showing that the list being viewed is filtered and is incomplete. Think of this as a fold in the list. v"zFind Functionv"z 'Find' will search through whole volumes or selected directories searching for a file or directory. You may know the name of the file that you want but you can not seem to find it. Find will 'Go Deep' into the volume or directory until the file is found or the end of the search area is reached. Find will also make a list of found files that match the select criteria to a specific file that you designate. v"zSelect Pattern Functionv"z 'Sel Pattern' will select items in open Directory Window that match the patterns set in the filter requestor. v"zClear Pattern Functionv"z 'Clr Pattern' will clear or unselect items in open Directory Window that match the patterns set in the filter requestor. We will use the 'Filter +' and 'Filter -' Command MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Source and Destination Commands 61 Gadget to demonstrate how this concept works. After you use it for a few times, getting the hang of how the others work will be a cinch. This filter requestor may look intimidating, but you need only use and set one filter to use it. You are allowed to use up to five filters at one time, but you only have to define one to make it work. We will use it on a single directory at first. First open the Tutorial: Directory Window. The 'Dest'ination gadget of that window should be selected so that it is the destination directory. Set the Show menu to show all information of the directory by using the 'Show, All' menu item. Now select the 'Filter +' Command Gadget. This is located on the second (Ctrl) bank, second row, second from the left. The filter requestor will open to the screen. v"zElements of a Filterv"z Lets take a brief moment and talk about the elements of a filter. The five possible filters are displayed one line at a time. Each filter has four elements to work with. o Type gadget that can be cycled though Name, Size, Date and Protect. o String gadget that lets you type in the filter. o In/Out gadget to filter items in or out. o Activate gadget to turn the filter on or off. v"zIn/Out Filter Gadgetv"z The In/Out gadget have very general rules as to what it does with the filter. o In Rule. If the items match the filter the items will be displayed in the list. All other items will be hidden from the list. o Out Rule. If the items match the filter the matching items will be hidden in the list. o Out overrides In Rule. The Out Rule will override the In Rule if multiple filters are used. An Out filter, in this case, will only remove MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Source and Destination Commands 62 the items left to be displayed, as set by the In Rule. (This Rule can only occur on multiple filters.) If this is the first time into this requestor you will find that the 'In/Out' and the Activate' gadgets are ghosted for all five filters. You need valid filter information in the string that matches the far left cycle gadget, This far left gadget sets the type of filter. The filter type choices are: Name Works on the filename of the directory items. Size Works on the size of the directory items. Date Works on the Date of the directory items. Protect Works on the protection bits of the directory items. At anytime you may select the 'Filters -' Command Gadget to free up the filters that you have installed on your directories. Filters are remembered on your directory even if you close the Directory Window. Only until the directory is freed from memory by the 'Free Volumes' gadget or the 'Filter -' Command Gadget is selected will the filter be removed. v"zUsing Name filtersv"z First off, I can't possibly tell you all the ways to use pattern matches. The new AmigaDOS 2.0 pattern matches are very extensive and powerful. That power is available though MegaD only through the foresight of the programmers who wrote the new 2.0 operating system. Should you need more than simple pattern matches you will find the information in books such as 'The AmigaDOS Manual, 3rd Edition' publish by Bantam Computer books. I will limit this discussion to the simple #? pattern match. Cycle the top filter Type gadget to 'Name' if it is not already set that way. In the top string gadget type "S#?" for the filter to use on the Tutorial: Directory Window. The filters are case insensitive so S or s will both match S. v"zWildcards Patternv"z MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Source and Destination Commands 63 Why #?, AmigaDOS will allow you to use '?' as a wild card in your pattern. On your Tutorial: volume the directory entry "System" should still be there. All the below patterns would match this entry: "S?stem" "Sy?tem" "Sys?em" "S?????" The last one will match any filename that starts with the character 'S' and is six characters long. The # symbol before the wild card character '?' or any other pattern character is used to repeat the pattern character any number of times including zero times. Now that we know this we can create the "S?????" pattern this way "S#?" This pattern will not only select "System", it will also select : "S" "Shell.info" "System.info" As you can see it is less restrictive and lets you select filenames of different lengths. The #? wild card pattern match needs not be at the end of the pattern, it can be the first characters in the pattern or it can be in between characters. "#?.info" Will select all files that have the .info extension added to it. If I use it on my Tutorial: disk, this is the list of files that are selected by the filter: disk.info Shell.info Expansion.info System.info Monitors.info Trashcan.info My_directory.info Utilities.info Prefs.info WBstartup.info "S#?.info" will select all files that have the .info extension added to and start with the letter 'S'. This is the result if I use this filter: Shell.info System.info As you can see we can be very selective in what we want to select by the use of patterns. Through the next few exercises, we will only be MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Source and Destination Commands 64 using one filter. This way we will not be confused with multiple filters. Later, we will work with multiple filters, but until then, work only with the top most set of filter gadgets. v"zUn-Ghosting The Activate Gadgetv"z We are going to create the filter "S#?" in the first filter. Type the characters into the top string gadget and press return. You will notice that the In/Out and the Activate gadget are no longer ghosted. The return on a string gadget tells MegaD that it needs to check to see if a valid filter has been created and if so it will un-ghost the gadgets so that you may select them. v"zActivating a Filterv"z Select that Activate gadget so that this will be an active filter. Now select the use gadget. You will see the Tutorial: Directory Window change to reflect the current filter setting. Only files that start with the letter 'S' are visible now. v"zUsing Filter Outv"z Select the Command Gadget 'Filter +' again and change the In/Out cycle gadget to read "Out". Select the 'Use' gadget again. The Directory Window will again change, showing the new filter settings, this time it will show all filenames except those that start with the letter 'S'. v"zUsing Size filtersv"z Size filters work on the size of files. They do not work on directory sizes. Set MegaD to show the size of the file by checking the menu item 'Show, Size'. A size filter can be specified as 'exact', 'greater than', and 'less than' the numeric size entered into the string gadgets. v"zLess Than Size Filterv"z On the Tutorial: volume are a number of .info files. Some are greater than 1000 bytes in size and some are smaller. We are going to create a filter that will specify files smaller than 1000 bytes. Enter "-1000" into the first string gadget of the filter requestor. The minus '-' sign sets the filter to select files less than the size specified. Set the 'In/Out' gadget to in. Set the cycle type to "Size" and make sure that the Activate gadget is selected for this filter. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Source and Destination Commands 65 Select the 'Use' gadget and the Tutorial: Directory Window will reset itself to show you the current filter settings. This is the listing I ended up with using this filter: disk.info 388 Shell.info 722 Expansion.info 824 System.info 824 Monitors.info 824 Utilities.info 824 My_directory.info 632 WBstartup.info 824 v"zGreater Than Size Filterv"z Select the 'Filter +' Command Gadget again and change the "-1000" to "+1000". The plus (+) sign sets the size filter to look for files with a size greater than the numeric value found in the string gadget. Once again select the 'Use' gadget to set this filter to the Directory Window. The listing that I came up with looks like this: DirList 4,663 Trashcan.info 1,144 Prefs.info 1,144 v"zExact Size Filterv"z There is one more type of size filter and that is when you want to match a file by the exact size. As you can see above, I have two files that use 1,144 bytes. If I want to create a filter for those, I would type into the string gadget "1144", you simply omit the plus or the minus sign to create an exact match. You may have to change the value to fit at least one of the files to create your exact match but you should be getting the idea of how things works. v"zUsing Date filtersv"z You will have to set MegaD to show the date the file and directories were created or last changed. If you're not currently displaying dates in the Directory Window check the menu item 'Show, Date'. v"zSet the Filter Type Gadget Firstv"z It is always best to set the filter type gadget to the kind of filter you want before entering the filter. This way MegaD can help you format the filter. A good example of this is the Date filter type. The date filter requires a rather long string of characters in this format: DD-MM-YY HH:MM:SS (Day-Month-Year Hour:Minutes:Seconds) If you set the filter type to Date and enter just MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Source and Destination Commands 66 the Date of the filter and press return the time will be filled in as zeros. Let test this out. Type in the date like this: 03-05-92 and press return. The time will be added to the end of the filter. 03-05-92 00:00:00 This will tell MegaD to filter with the date of May 3, 1992 12:00 am. Now it is rare that you will be looking for a file on a precise date and time. More than likely you would want to look for files after a date or before a date. To look for files created or modified after a date you would want to add a '+' sign in front of the filter. To look for files created or modified before a date you would want to add the '-' sign in front of the filter. Examples of this are: +03-05-92 00:00:00 would look for files after the date. -03-05-92 00:00:00 would look for files before the date. Now for you to test this you will have to pick a date that has some midway point of the directory list you are looking at. Some files should be older than this date and some files should be newer. The date filter must be entered in this order: Type the number of day first The number of the month second The last two digits of the year last All should be separated by the negative (-) sign. v"zAfter Date Filterv"z Add a plus (+) sign to the front of the date to tell the filter to look for newer files, press return. Set the In/Out gadget to In. The Activate gadget for this filter should not be ghosted (disabled) and you should select it if it is not already selected. Now select the 'Use' gadget. You should now only be able to see newer files than the date you typed in the filter in the open Directory Window. v"zBefore Date Filterv"z Now reopen the filter requestor and change the + to a - at the first of the filter string and select the 'Use' gadget. You should be able to MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Source and Destination Commands 67 see older files than the date specified and the other will be filtered out. You can use an exact date to select on. This has minimal use, It is very unlikely that you will have more than one file with the same date and time. If you should have a reason to do so simply omit the (+) or the (-) sign from the front of the filter. v"zUsing Protect filtersv"z You will need to set MegaD to show the protection bits. If it is not already showing the protection bits check the menu item 'Show, Protect". Set the filter type gadget to Protect. Set the In/Out gadget to In. We will use the Tutorial: volume to test this type of filter on. A good directory for this is the S: directory on it. The startup drawer usually has some items with the s bit set for Script. This is a listing from my "Tutorial:S" directory: BRUtab ----rw-d PCD -s--rwed DPat -s--rwed Shell-startup -s--rwed Ed-startup ----rw-d SPat -s--rwed HDBackup.co ----rw-d Startup-sequence ----rwed Your "Tutorial:S" directory may be different but what we are looking for is a few files with the S bit set for script. If your directory has none with this bit set use the 'Set Protect' on some similar files in your "Tutorial:S" Directory Window. Protection filters are a little different from other filters in that you have to have a + or a - before the bits you want to test. The + tells the filter that the bit must be set for the match to be true. The - sign before the bit tells the filter that the bit must be clear for the match to be true. Type +s for the filter press return and select the Activate gadget for this filter. Hit the 'Use' gadget. You should now only see the directory entries that have the protection bit s set. My prior listing now looks this way for the "Tutorial:S" Directory Window: DPat -s--rwed Shell-startup -s--rwed MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Source and Destination Commands 68 PCD -s--rwed SPat -s--rwed As you can see, only the files that have the 's' (Script) bit set are now listed. Some of my files did not have the 'e' (Execute) bit set. We can use this for an example of selecting on un-set bits. Reopen the filter requestor again and change the protection filter to "-e" then select the 'Use' gadget. You should now only see the directory entries that have the protection bit 'e' un-set. This is my list as a result of this: BRUtab ----rw-d HDBackup.config ----rw-d Ed-startup ----rw-d Enter this for the next filter to test, "+rwed". Press return on this string gadget once done. The filter will expand to "+r +w +e +d". Now use it as a protection filter. Again this is the list that I have as a result: DPat -s--rwed SPat -s--rwed PCD -s--rwed Startup-sequence ----rwed Shell-startup -s--rwed The last example for protection filters we will add "-s" to the last filter so that it now reads "+r +w +e +d -s". This will be the results of this filter: Startup-sequence ----rwed As you have seen, the protection filters are quite versatile and allow a wide variety of ways to select what to view. v"zMixing Multiple Filtersv"z Using multiple filters at one time can become very confusing. (Trust me, I know!) You really can not hurt anything with multiple filters and my theory on the best way to understand them, is to play with them. Things can get really wild when you start mixing filters. Then using the 'In' and 'Out' types complicate things more. The only way to see this in action is to play with it. Filters do not do anything permanent to your directories. They only MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Source and Destination Commands 69 work on the internal list of MegaD and help MegaD decide what to display and not display for you. Remember the simple rules of In/Out filters while you are doing this. The concept of filters are unique. As far as I know MegaD is the only directory utility that supports this concept on the Amiga. With multiple filters you may select files that have the pattern match of MegaD#?.c and greater than a certain date. I do this all the time for back ups. A filter for this is set in this manner. Type filter In/Out Activated Name MegaD#?.c In Yes Date -29-05-92 00:00:00 Out Yes This will show all MegaD#?.c files that are greater than May 29, 1992, early morning. Notice that the date is set with a negative (-) sign in the front to select files older than the date specified. The In/Out is set to Out. This way all older files are removed from the list. The following is an output from one of my source code directories for MegaD. This is before the above filter was used. Work:lc/com closeup 03-22-92 11:41:24 MegaDPrefs.h 05-27-92 08:12:51 LSE.DAT 03-22-92 11:41:24 MegaDHeader.h 05-27-92 08:15:35 makeProto 03-22-92 11:41:24 H 05-27-92 10:46:50 myoMegaD 03-22-92 11:41:26 MegaDSelWin.c 05-29-92 08:50:58 SASCOPTS 03-22-92 11:41:26 MegaDTools.c 05-29-92 09:04:30 Headerlist.c 04-26-92 05:56:59 MegaDPfFile.c 05-29-92 18:27:24 MegaDTools2.c 05-20-92 18:30:19 setup 05-31-92 05:46:39 MegaDControl.c 05-24-92 07:32:09 MegaDPf.h 05-31-92 06:50:10 Megaddir.c 05-26-92 09:55:37 This is after the above filter was used on the same directory. Work:lc/com MegaDSelWin.c 05-29-92 08:50:58 MegaDPfFile.c 05-29-92 18:27:24 MegaDTools.c 05-29-92 09:04:30 NOTE:The date format for a filter must be DD-MM-YY while my list are displayed MM-DD-YY. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Source and Destination Commands 70 This makes a relative mixed list into a very precise list of items that I want to work with for the moment. With a little practice MegaD filters can become a very powerful tool for working with large directories. v"zGlobal Filterv"z We have not talked about one of the gadgets found in the filter requestor. It is the 'Set to all directories'. Filters normally work only on the 'Dest'ination Directory Window unless you select the 'Set to all directories' gadget in the lower area of the Filter requestor. This creates a global filter that all MegaD Directory Windows will use until the filter is removed with 'Filter -' or a new filter is added to the system. Each time you return to the Filter requestor, you will find it in the same state as the last time, when you selected the 'Use' gadget from it. MegaD keeps this requestor set in this manner so that you may quickly reset your last used filter to a new Directory Window. MegaD stores a different set of filters for the three function that use the filter requestor. The three functions are, 'Filters +', 'Sel/Clr Patterns' and 'Find'. v"zFilter -v"z 'Filter -' simply removes all active filters. Unlike the 'Remove' gadget found in the filter requestor, which removes filters from single windows, 'Filter -' will remove any filter attached to any window. As mentioned earlier. 'Find', 'Sel Pattern' and 'Clr Pattern' all use the same requestor for setup. Now that you have a good start on what filters are to MegaD we can get in to the subtitle different of 'Find', 'Sel Pattern' and 'Clr Pattern'. v"zFindv"z 'Find' will search through whole volumes or selected directories searching for a file or directory. A good reason for this is, you may know the name of the file that you want, but you can not seem to find it. Find will 'Go Deep' into the selected volume or directories until the file is found or the end of the search area is reached. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Source and Destination Commands 71 v"zFind List Of Directory Itemsv"z Find will also make a list of found files that match the selected criteria to a specific file that you designate. This option lets you create lists of like items found in more than one directory. You could be looking for all files that end with the .lha extension. If so you would set a name filter "#?.lha" and fill in the "Path and filename for items" string gadget found at the bottom of the filter requestor for 'Find'. You should supply a full path and name for this file such as "Ram Disk:findList". If you just enter "findList" the file will be created in the same directory as MegaD. Once the directories are searched and item/s were found to match the filter, MegaD will load the created file and display it in a Text Window. v"zSelect By Patternv"z This is a very simple function. 'Sel Pattern' will search the current destination directory window. When it finds a file (or directory) that matches the pattern, MegaD will select (highlight) that file/directory. The search will then continue until all open windows have been searched. 'Sel Pattern' also can work on all open windows (rather than just the current destination window). To enable this feature, merely select the 'Set to all directories' gadget in the lower area of the Filter requestor. v"zClear By Patternv"z 'Clr Pattern' will clear or unselect items in open Directory Window that match the patterns set in the filter requestor. This works identically as 'Sel Pattern' except it clears the directory items that match the filter. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones v"zAutoBoots 72v"z v"zAutoBootsv"z AutoBoots are unique, their purpose is to let you to train MegaD to work with types of data files that it knows nothing about. MegaD only knows how to handle a double click on four types of files from default. They are: 1.Icon file (.info) Emulates Workbench. If it is a project icon it will look for a tool type. If it is a drawer icon it will load the directory into a Directory Window. If it is a tool icon it will ask if you want to run the program file associated with it. 2.Text file. It will attempt to load it and place it into a Text Window. 3.Executable file. It will bring up a Program Control Window that can be set in a variety of ways. This Program Control Window is an integral part of AutoBoots, Menu Sets and User gadgets. It allows you execute an external program from within MegaD and offers many options on just how it should be done. This will be explained during this discussion on AutoBoots. (NEW 3.1) ARexx Script. It will bring up a Program Control Window that can be set in a variety of ways. For MegaD to recognize a file as an ARexx Script, the file must have a few characteristics that are common to most ARexx scripts. For this to work the filename must end with .arexx or .rexx and the first non space characters of the file must be "/*". This is rather limiting when you consider the wide variety of data files that are possible on the Amiga. Just to name a few, Graphics, Sounds, Music, Mod, Animations... To even attempt to list all possible data files would be a major job, and once the list was complete someone would write a MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones v"zAutoBoots 73v"z new program that would create a new type of data file making the list incomplete. For this reason MegaD remains and will remain to be a very naive program. It knows very little about the outside world. It is up to you to teach MegaD how it should react when a data file is double clicked. This requires you to know a little about your own system. v"zKnow Your Systemv"z You need to be able to answer this question. "What data files on your system work with what programs on your system?" If you have a word processor, what files did that word processor create?. If you have a program that will display or create graphic files, what graphic files can it handle? If you have a program the will play a sound file, what sound files can it handle? v"zAdd AutoBoot Commandv"z The facility that you use to teach it with is the 'Add AutoBoot' command. 'Add AutoBoot' requires you to select one program file and at least Two data files that the program file can handle. The more data files that are selected the better chance that MegaD will always make the correct choice as to which program file to match it to when the data file is double clicked. I am going to base this piece of the tutorial on an assumption, I am going to assume that you have and have used Deluxe Paint IV. The program name for this is DPaint and from here on out that is the name that I will refer to it with. If you don't have DPaint you will have to improvise and use some other type of program that creates and uses data files, just remember that all that is really required to create an AutoBoot definition is one program file and at least two data files that the program file knows how to use. v"zSelecting The Executablev"z Open a Directory Window that contains the program file DPaint and select it. Select the 'Lock' gadget of this Directory Window, this will prevent it from closing while we open another directory that contains the data files. v"zSelecting The Data Filesv"z MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones v"zAutoBoots 74v"z If your data files are stored with the program file drag select some of them, if not, open a Directory Window that contains the data files, and drag select some of them. v"zAdd AutoBoot Skips Icon Filesv"z Do not worry about the icon files that may have been selected with the data files, MegaD will ignore them through the Add AutoBoot process. Now select the 'ABoot Add' Command Gadget. This gadget is located on the third (shifted) bank of Command Gadget, fourth row, far Left. MegaD will match the program file to the selected data files, by matching common data found at the first of each data file. v"zPossible Uses of File Extensionv"z If common data can't be found yet each selected data file had a common extension such as ".lha", it will use the extension of the filenames to match the files with. If everything goes as planed, a Program Control Window will open that will let you set MegaD to run the program file and the specific actions for MegaD to perform while it is running the program. The next few pages may be difficult to comprehend; however, I think I should introduce you to the AutoBoot requestor before I continue leading you through the DPaint AutoBoot setup. Meanwhile, please bear with me. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Program Control Window 75 v"zProgram Control Windowv"z Now that the Program Control Window is opened, we can discuss all the settings and string gadgets found in it. You will find this discussion useful later on when we discuss Menu Sets, and User Gadgets, they both use the Program Control Window for part of their setup in the same way the AutoBoots are set. v"zAnatomy Of The Program Control Windowv"z The Program Control Window contained nine check gadgets, Two cycle gadgets, six string gadgets and two exit gadgets, Use and Cancel. v"zCheck Gadgetsv"z The check gadgets that have an '*' in front of the title of the gadget has no control over an AutoBoot definition during the double click of a file. They can be set for later use. You will be able to place a defined AutoBoot on one or more of the keypad gadgets once it is defined v"zSkip selected directoriesv"z If checked, ignore selected directories in the directory window during the call. Very few programs can use a selected directory. Some archiving program will compress all files and recreate the directory once un-compressed. v"zSkip selected filesv"z If checked, ignore selected files in the directory window during the call. This is rarely checked. Most programs that you set up will want selected files to work on from open directory windows. v"zWork without selected itemsv"z If checked, MegaD will call the program even if nothing is selected in the directory window during the call. This is useful when creating a program control that will call a program that does not use a data file, such as a terminal program. v"zSkip .info filesv"z If checked, ignore selected .info files in the directory window during the call. Very few programs work on icon files. Usually this will be checked. v"zCombine all selected on one linev"z MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Program Control Window 76 Some programs can accept multiple data files at startup. MegaD launches programs in two basic ways. CLI command line, or as a Workbench task. This works closely with the cycle gadget below that cycles though the different execute modes. If checked: And this is a "Multitasking Workbench (NO I/0)" (see below) type call. All selected items that get past the above criteria will be sent to the called program as a group of Workbench arguments. Some programs do not deal with multiple arguments and will ignore all but the first argument and some times even the first argument will be ignored. And this is not a "Multitasking Workbench (NO I/O)" the selected information will be assembled into a CLI (Command Line Interface) command. A CLI command can be about 255 characters long. If all the selected items can not be place into one line, MegaD will create extra lines and recall the program until all selected items have been fed to the program. (See Command Lines and Program control below for more information.) Combine all selected on one line (continued) If not checked: And this is a "Multitasking Workbench (NO I/0)" type call. All selected items that get past the above criteria will be fed to the called program one at a time. Each time the called program returns, the program will be re-called and given the next selected item. This mode has a high overhead because the program must be reloaded for each call. And this is not a "Multitasking Workbench (NO I/O)" the selected information will be assembled into a CLI (Command Line Interface) command. MegaD will create a command line for each selected item and recall the program until all selected items have been fed to the program. v"zWorkbench screen to front at startv"z MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Program Control Window 77 If checked, MegaD will move the Workbench screen to the front position among all other screens running on the system at the same time MegaD launches the program. v"zMegaD screen to front at endv"z If checked, MegaD will move the MegaD screen to the front position among all other screens running on the system after the launched program ends. v"zReload current directory at endv"z If checked, MegaD will require that at least one destination window is available on the screen. Once the called program returns, MegaD will reload the current directory and re-display the information in this destination window. If the destination window was closed during the process it will be reopened. v"zForced Destinationv"z 'Reload current directory at end' also forces the destination window to become the Current Directory for the called program. This is useful for programs that unarchive information to such directories. If 'Reload current directory at end' is not check the called program is given its own home directory as its current directory, and no directory is reloaded once the launched program finishes. v"zQuery for destination filenamev"z If checked, MegaD will require that at least one destination window is available on the screen. MegaD will then open a requestor for you to input the filename to be used in this directory. This is useful for a program that requires a destination file name such as archivers. (See: Command Lines and Program control below for more information.) (NEW 3.1) v"zWarn before launchv"z If checked, MegaD will open a requestor that reads: Launch Program Control <Program Control name> By answering Yes to this requestor, MegaD will MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Program Control Window 78 launch the Program Control. Answering No will abort the launch. This is useful for potentially dangerous Program Controls, ones that could change, modify or even remove files from you system. (NEW 3.1) v"zQuery for 'Flags to add'v"z Access through the 'More...' gadget. This will open a window that will allow you to fill in the information for the 'Flags to add' string of the Program Control before launching the program. (NEW 3.1) v"zQuery for 'Text to append'v"z Access through the 'More...' gadget. This will open a window that will allow you to fill in the information for the 'Flags to add' string of the Program Control before launching the program. v"zScreen control Cycle gadgetv"z The Screen control only effects which screen the console window is placed for Non- Workbench executed programs. v"zPlace Program on Workbench Screenv"z Place the console window for the program on Workbench screen. v"zPlace Program on MegaD Screenv"z Place the console window for the program on MegaD screen. v"zExecute type cycle gadgetv"z v"zMultitasking executev"z MegaD spawns a simple task to control the called program. This task executes the command line or lines that were created by the program control. If more than one command line was created for this call it will continue executing each line until the job is completed. v"zMultitasking Execute W/Holdv"z MegaD spawns a simple task to control the called program. This task executes the command line or lines that were created by the program control. If more than one command line was created for this call the task will wait for a return or the input of the letter 'Q' for quit. If the letter 'Q' is not entered it will continue calling each line MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Program Control Window 79 until the job is completed. v"zMultitasking Workbench (NO I/0)v"z MegaD spawns the program as a Workbench task. No command line is created. Only Workbench arguments are passed to the called program. Input and Output channels are not supplied, so DO NOT use this call with programs that are CLI type programs. The best way to know if this will work is if the program that you are setting up has an icon file (.info). v"zProgram Control Window, String Gadgets.v"z Please See: Command Lines and Program control below for more information about how the strings are assembled for a command line. v"zTitle String Gadgetv"z You define a unique title for each program control. This title should be one that will remind yourself what the program control function is and will do. This title must be unique from all other program controls titles. Though the room for the title is large, it is best to keep them to 12 characters or less. This way the title will be completely visible if the program control is attach to a keypad gadget. v"zPath and Program Name String Gadgetv"z This should contain the complete path and filename of the executable file for this Program Control. It can be verified by the "Verify Title & Path/name" gadget at the top of the window. (NEW 3.1) You will see a small folder gadget to the right of this string gadget. By selecting this gadget the ASL file requestor will open. You will be able to select the program from this requestor. After doing so the correct path and filename will be filled into the string gadget. v"zFlags to add after Program Namev"z If the program uses special information to tell what to do, usually in the form of flags [-f -a]. This is usually the best place for them. v"zText to append to end of command linev"z After the command line is fully assembled, this information is added to the end. v"zRedirect Output to a file or devicev"z MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Program Control Window 80 If you under stand AmigaDOS redirection this is the output filename for the redirection. A very common one is PRT: to force the output information to be sent to the printer. v"zAccept Input From a file or devicev"z This is a very rare case and unless you are very sure of what you are doing you should not use this. What happens is this. If the called program requires any information from the console window it will instead be given what ever information is found in the input file. Both types of redirection are complex issues and if you need more information consult your AmigaDOS manuals. (NEW 3.1) v"zConsole window stringv"z If you want to define the size of the console window that will open for 'Execute' type program you will use this string gadget. v"zThis is only thev"z v"zfirst part of the CON: string!,v"z you only fill in the CON:x/y/w/h section of the string. To the right of this string gadget you will see a small gadget that if selected will open a sizeable window that you can move, size and close. after closing the window the Console window string will be filled in with the correct string to recreate the window that was just sized and closed. This is the preferred way to create the string. There is now error checking to see if the string is correct and will open a Console window for the Executed program. (NEW 3.1) v"zStack sizev"z This will allow you to enter a predetermined stack size to use when the program is launched. Any value below 4000 will be ignored and the program will be launched with a 4000 stack size. v"zCommand Lines and Program Controlsv"z Working with AmigaDOS and CLI command lines some times requires that full sentences be created to tell the program that is to be called what to do. A very common type of a command that might be used would be this line. LhArc a "Ram Disk:archive" "My Disk:My Data File" This line would call the program LhArc with the MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Program Control Window 81 flag of 'a' and two filenames following. When MegaD creates this line for you it does a couple of other things to it. It also adds standard redirection symbols to it so that the program can work in a supplied console window. When MegaD creates this line it looks like this. LhArc >* <* a "Ram Disk:archive" "My Disk:My Data File" MegaD uses all the information in the string gadgets of the program control and possibly information from selected files in directory window to piece together the command line. The information is patched together with spaces between the information in this order. [Path and Program Name] >[Redirect Output to a file or device] <[Accept Input From a file or device] [Flags to add after Program Name] [Query for destination filename] [complete filenames of selected files] [Text to append to the end of the Command Line] Sorry I had to put you through all of that, But all of it needed to be explained. I will take you through setting up Program Control in a number of different ways. If you can remember we started this discussion by starting to set up an AutoBoot Program Control for DPaint, that Program Control Window should still be open at the moment. We will move back to setting the DPaint AutoBoot up. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Back To Adding Auto Boots 82 v"zBack To Adding Auto Bootsv"z v"zSetting AutoBoots As Command Gadgetsv"z You could select 'Use' at this point and the AutoBoot would be ready to use. We will define this Program Control to the attributes that best suite DPaint. One of the things about this, is the AutoBoot can later be attached to one of the keypad gadgets so you could select a graphic file from a MegaD Directory Window and then select the DPaint keypad gadget. This action would launch DPaint and load the selected graphic file. I always set the AutoBoot Program Control up so that if I want they can be added to a keypad. We will go though the steps to do so. As you will see, the best way to set up a Program Control is to ask yourself "Do I need this attribute to run this program?" The first question you should answer right now is "How should I run this program?" As a Workbench task or as an executed CLI command line? And if it is an executed CLI command line, should the console window that it is run from, wait for a return to close. DPaint will run from the Workbench. We know this because it has a .info icon file that is used with the Workbench. Using the Workbench to launch a program has the lowest overhead, or put another way, it uses less memory. Set the execute type gadget to "Multitasking Workbench (NO I/O)" You will notice that the two bottom check gadgets are ghosted, also the last four string gadgets have become ghosted. These attributes can not be used with the Workbench. The next question is "Will DPaint work with a directory as a tool? The answer is no. You can not give DPaint a directory as a workbench argument and have it know what to do with it. So you will check the "Skip selected directories." Will DPaint work with a file? Yes, it will load most any IFF graphic file. We will not check the "Skip selected files" attribute. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Back To Adding Auto Boots 83 Will DPaint work without any data files. Yes, you can start up DPaint without a file and start working within DPaint from scratch. We will check the "Work without selected items" attribute. Will DPaint use an .info icon file? No, it will not know what to do with it. We will check the "Skip .info files" attribute Will DPaint work on multiple data files at one time. Unfortunately it will not. If you send DPaint more than one Workbench argument it will ignore all but the first one. This means if you were to drag select a group of graphics files and launch DPaint with this attribute set it will load the first selected item and ignore all the others. We will not select the "Combine all selected on one line" attribute. Will DPaint open on the Workbench screen? No, DPaint will open its own screen, and being so, we will not need to shuffle the screens around to see the program. We will not check the "Workbench screen to front at start" And for the same reason will not check the "MegaD screen to front at end" attribute. Now look over to the right side of the window. The top two string gadgets are the only ones we can enter information into and they are both filled. The Title has "DPaint" in it. Path and Program name has the full path and name that you would use to find and run this program. This is my path for it: "Work:Paint/DPaint", yours will be different to match the way DPaint is accessed on your system. Both are filled in properly and we can leave them as they are. Now that we have everything set, select the 'Use' gadget. You should receive a message reading: This AutoBoot has been added To keep, use Save Preferences press 'Continue'. The AutoBoot is now available for use on your system. v"zUsing an AutoBootv"z To use the AutoBoot, all you will need to do is double click a file that it has been trained to MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Back To Adding Auto Boots 84 recognize. DPaint will be launched and the double clicked file will be loaded by DPaint. Test this out and then quit DPaint so that we can go on to the next feature of using AutoBoots. Just as a reminder, there is a menu item in the Option menu that will disable this feature of MegaD. It is the Option, Activate AutoBoot. If you uncheck this, the testing of double click of files for data type will be deactivated. v"zUsing an AutoBoot As A Command Gadgetv"z We have prepared this AutoBoot so that it can be attached to the keypad. Lets do this now. This task is quite simple to perform. In the Project menu you will find the menu item Keypads... Select this item. v"zSet Keypads Windowv"z A window will open that is for attaching commands to the keypad gadgets. The upper area has 42 gadgets in a 6 X 7 grid. This set of gadget are the source gadgets. They are where you will get the commands that you want to place in your keypad. v"zDestination Gadgetsv"z The keypad gadgets are in the lower area of this window aligned to the right side of the window. The keypad gadget area is the destination area of this window. Any one gadget in each area can be selected. As soon as one gadget is selected in both areas the keypad gadget will change to the selected source item. You will find two cycle gadgets, One is for pages of source information, the other is to select the type of source information to transfer or to work on. The types to work on are Built-in, Menu Sets, AutoBoots and User Gadgets. Below this set of cycle gadgets are gadgets labeled Add, Delete, Modify. By selecting a Menu Set, AutoBoot, or User Gadget and then selecting the Modify gadget you can edit how a program control will function. By selecting a keypad gadget and then modify, you can change the title and color of the keypad gadget. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Back To Adding Auto Boots 85 You will need to cycle the source type to AutoBoots. Once doing so you will see the 'DPaint" AutoBoot that we just created. Select the 'A' 'Shift gadget' on the keypad. This will position it to a completely blank bank of Command Gadgets. Select the upper right keypad gadget, it will stay selected after you move the mouse away from it. Select the source gadget 'DPaint', the information will be copied to the selected keypad gadget. Now select the 'Use' gadget. The Set Keypad window will close. Now select the 'A' gadget in the Control Window to shift the Command Gadget to the fourth bank. You will find the 'DPaint' gadget you just place there. Be sure that no Directory Window items are selected and select the 'DPaint' Command Gadgets. DPaint will be launched without a data file to load, (this is why we made sure that none of the Directory Window had selected items in them.) After doing this, Quit DPaint. Now select a data file in a Directory Window that you know will work with DPaint, then select the 'DPaint' Command Gadget again. DPaint will be launched and this time it will have a data file to load and display. I took you on a number of detours to explain how to add an AutoBoot to MegaD. We will add a few more AutoBoots, the first one will work on the same types of graphic data files. I am going to demonstrate how MegaD handles situations where multiple AutoBoots are created for the same type of data file. The other one will work with an archiving utility that needs a console window. There are many programs out there that will display graphic files on the Amiga. They do not include editing functions or ways to modify the graphic file and save it, they are usually fairly small, this gives them the plus that they can be loaded quicker to preview a graphic file than a full blown paint utility. A very good graphic viewer comes with the new 2.0 operating system. This program is named "Display" and you can find it in the utilities drawer of the Workbench. If your not using 2.0 and do not have Display then you will have to find another utility that will work on your system that will display graphics files. A very good choice for this is "Mostra" by Sebastiano Vigna. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Back To Adding Auto Boots 86 Ether program that you use, you should be familiar with it before running it. If you have never used "Display" or "Mostra", you should read the documentation that comes with them, before creating AutoBoots to work with them. This holds true for any program that you wish to run, if it be from within MegaD or from the Workbench or from the CLI. v"zSave Your Workv"z As you have seen, MegaD will remind you after a new AutoBoot definition is created, to save your preference file. The reason, so you will not lose your work. Creating an AutoBoot is a risky business. It is possible that you may define an AutoBoot to use the Workbench type execute, only to find that when you test it out, it crashes because the program needed input and output channels. It is possible that the program is not compatible with the way MegaD launches programs, though I have yet to find one, I sure they exist. For these reason, save your preferences file with the 'Project, Save Preferences' menu or the Command Gadget, 'Save Preferences'. The previous paragraph hold true for the rest of the Tutorial. Until now, we have worked with the default settings of MegaD. We are now modifying MegaD to our needs and wants. All the changes that we have done and all the changes the we will do later can be saved, and should be. Select "Display" in the Utilities Directory Window and lock that window so that it will not close. Open the Directory Window to the same graphic files that you used to set the AutoBoot for DPaint and select some of the graphic files. Select the 'ABoot Add' Command Gadgets. The Program Control Window will open. Perform the next few settings. 1. Check Skip selected directories. 2. Check Skip .info files 3. Check Combine all selected on one line 4. Cycle Execute type to Workbench (NO I/O) Note: This is all that needed to be done to set up ether Mostra or Display. If you're not sure why we set the attributes this way look back at the text that describe the attributes of Program Controls for your answers. 5. Select the 'Use' gadget. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Back To Adding Auto Boots 87 v"zMultiple AutoBoot Windowv"z Now double click one of the graphic files, A Multiple AutoBoots window will open. It will give you the choice of which program to use with this double clicked data file. Two of the twenty gadgets in this window displays the possible choices for programs that can be used with this file, Display and DPaint. Select the Display gadget. The double clicked file will be handed to the Display program as a Workbench argument, in turn it will load the graphic file and display it. v"zAdd Display Command Gadgetv"z Select the Keypads menu item in the Project menu. Add this AutoBoot to the Keypad. Remember the Fourth (Alt) bank is mostly empty, this will be a common bank to add commands while your getting used to MegaD. Add the Display AutoBoot to any of the blank keypad gadgets. Once done select the 'Use' gadget. Remember that we selected the 'Combine all selected on one line' attribute for the Display AutoBoot. Now that it is attached to a keypad gadget we can test this feature of the Program Control. Select a few of the graphic files in a Directory Window and then select the new 'Display' keypad command. Display will load and run, it will load each of the graphic files one at a time for you to see them. By pressing the Space Bar the program Display will switch to the next selected graphic. Lets move on to the next and final AutoBoot that we will add. You will need to have one of many archiving programs available for the Amiga computer. Archiving programs are used to compress a file or a group of files for storage or transmission over telecommunication lines. Two very popular programs of this type are LhArc and LHA. You will also need to have a few files that have been created with the archiving programs. These files usually end with an extension. LhArc files end with .lzh and lha files end with .lha. v"zAdding Archive List Commandv"z Open a Directory Window that has the archiving program and select it and 'Lock" the window. Open a window that has some of the data files that match the archiving program, remember that you need at least two data files selected for Add MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Back To Adding Auto Boots 88 AutoBoot. After doing so select the 'ABoot Add' Command Gadgets. MegaD will look though the selected files for common data, the common data it will find will be the data files all have the same extension. It will open a request window that will read: Use extension lha to match data file to executable? Answer yes to this requestor. The Program Control Window will open so that you can set up this AutoBoot. We want this one to list the contents of the archive file to a console window and it should hold the console window open until we are done reading it. Here are the attributes that we will set: 1. Check Skip selected directories 2. Check Skip .info files 3. Set execute to 'Multitasking Execute W/Hold" 4. Add " list" behind the title so that it will be more descriptive of its task. It could read "lha List" or "LhArc List". 5. Type a lower case 'l' in the 'Flags to add after Program Name' string gadget. This flag tell LhArc and lha to list the contents of the archive file. 6. Select the 'Use' gadget. You can now double click any of the archive files that was created with the archiving program and the contents will be listed into a console window. The window will wait for a return key press to close. v"zWe are the teachersv"z To summarize what has just happened, we have taught MegaD how to handle graphic and archived files. An ability that it does not have on it's own. By training MegaD on what program to call for certain types of data files we have made MegaD a little more useful while navigating around our file systems. We have also added the AutoBoots to keypad gadgets so that new commands are available to work on selected items in Directory Windows. We can even set keypad gadgets so that we can call our favorite programs making MegaD a very powerful tool manager. Now that we have created a few AutoBoots we can MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Back To Adding Auto Boots 89 discuss how to select and clear items in open Directory Windows with "Sel ABoot" and 'Clr ABoot'. This is a unique feature of MegaD, instead of selecting files by name or file attributes you select it by the actual contents of the file. This has a very high overhead when you use it, MegaD reads the first few bytes of each file found in each open Directory Window to decide if the file will match the AutoBoot. At times it may be the only way you can tell a word processor file from a text file in a mixed directory. You could use this function of MegaD to clean up a directory of mixed items. Select the files by the AutoBoot criteria and then move all of those files to a specific directory that is to be dedicated to only those types of files. It becomes a very powerful reorganization tool. Open one Directory Window that has some data files of the same type that was used to create an AutoBoot. Remember, MegaD will look into all open Directory Window so it is best to have only the Directory Window open that you want this to happen in. Select the "Sel ABoot" Command Gadget that is found on the first bank of the Command Gadget, third row, far right. MegaD will open a window with all the available AutoBoot definitions that have been created thus far. v"zSelect/Clear AutoBoot Windowv"z This window functions much like a Directory Window, you can single select or drag select AutoBoot definitions. You can test by multiple AutoBoots, but for our purpose we will select by only one. Once you have selected the AutoBoot that you want to test the files by, close the window by using the window close gadget of this window. MegaD will read the first few bytes of each files and if the file is of the same type the AutoBoot was trained to recognize it will select the item. "Clr ABoot" will work exactly the same only it will clear the data files that matches the AutoBoot selected for the function. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones User Gadgets 90 v"zUser Gadgetsv"z User Gadgets are program controls, much like AutoBoots, that you define so that you can launch other programs from keypad command gadgets. You've seen what it takes to add an AutoBoot to MegaD and then attach it to a keypad gadgets. v"zWhy User Gadgets?v"z The advantage of User Gadgets is that you do not need to have data files to create them. Take JrComm, a very popular telecommunication program, it does not have to have a data file to run. JrComm would be a good program to attach to the keypad for quick access while MegaD is running. I am assuming that you made it through the Add AutoBoots and that you were able to successfully add the AutoBoots to your Keypad Command Gadget. Unless a User Gadget is accessible from the keypad, it is useless I will be adding JrComm to my keypad, you may add JrComm if you have it, or any other program that you would like to have quick access to. MegaD will launch any program you want it too. Simply use the program you wish to attach in place of my references to JrComm. v"zAdding User Gadgetsv"z User Gadgets are added by selecting the menu item Project, Set Preference... and then selecting 'Keypads...' The Set Keypads window will open. Cycle the command type gadget to "User Gadgets". The Add gadget will become un-ghosted. Select this gadget, the window will change to "User Gadget, Program Control". v"zUser Gadget Program Controlv"z This window should be very familiar to you. We will set this up to launch a program that will ignore all selected items in the directory windows and launch the program found in the "Path and Program name" string gadget. Take the following steps: 1. Check 'Skip selected directories' 2. Check 'Skip selected files' 3. Check 'Work without select items' 4. Check 'Skip .info files' 5. Set execute type to "Multitasking Workbench MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones User Gadgets 91 (NO I/O)" Note: if the program you are setting up requires input and output channels (CLI type), set this to "Multitasking Execute". You will crash the system launching a CLI program as a Workbench task. 6. Enter "JrComm" into the Title string gadget 7. Enter "JrComm:Jr-Comm" into the Path and program name string gadget. You will have to know the full path to the program you are adding as a User Gadget. v"zVerify Title And Path/Namev"z There is a gadget that we have not discussed yet. It is found in the upper right hand corner of the program Control Window. The "Verify Title & Path/name" gadget is for testing the Title to be sure that it is unique from all other Program Control titles. And for making sure that the Path and Program name was entered correctly. Select this gadget once, If errors are found you will be notified by a message window describing the problems. If no problems are found you will receive the message: "Title & Path/name are good" If any errors were found, correct them and re-test the verify. When your information Verifies select the 'Use' gadget. You will be returned to the Set Keypad window. Find the new User Gadget JrComm in the source area and copy it to one of the keypad gadgets, preferably a blank one. Now select the 'Use' gadget of the Set Keypads window. You will now be able to launch the program from the keypad Command Gadget in the Control Window. Select this to see if it works properly. JrComm should start and run from the selection of that command gadget. v"zCurrent Directoriesv"z The next User Gadget that we will add is going to be useless other than it will demonstrate a feature of MegaD Program Control that is not readily apparent. This works with the Reload current directory at end attribute. This attribute does two things. One, as it describes, after ending it reloads the directory that was active at the time the program was run. Two, it forces the Active Directory of MegaD to become the launched program current directory. The Active MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones User Gadgets 92 Directory of MegaD is listed in the text area of the Control Window. v"zAnother Reason to Switch to Workbench 2.0v"z A note to Workbench 1.3 users. This feature does not work correctly, In fact it does not work at all. The current directory usually becomes the boot disk. I have no plans to make this work under 1.3. If you're not Using 2.0 yet you should be. It is well worth the upgrade fee. v"zWhen You Need A Current Directoryv"z At what times would you want a directory to become the current directory? Any time you have a program that creates a file that will be written to the current directory. Archive programs are known for this feature, before archiving a set of files, you should always CD (change directory) to the directory that you wish the archive to be created in. MegaD does this automatically for you when you use the Reload current directory at end attribute. A program that will help show this in action is the "Dir" command found in your C: directory. Dir will list the current directory if it is entered on a CLI without any arguments. The current directory will be listed in the CLI window. Lets create a User Gadget that will do this for us. v"zDir User Gadgetv"z Select the 'Project, Set Preference...' and then selecting 'Keypads...' gadget. Cycle command type to 'User Gadgets' and select the Add gadget. The Program Control Window will open so that a new User Gadget can be created. Set the following attributes: 1. Check 'Skip selected files' 2. Check 'Work without selected items' 3. Check 'Skip .info files' 4. Check 'Reload current directory at end' 5. Cycle Execute type to 'Multitasking Execute W/Hold'. (Dir needs input and output channels.) 6. Enter "Dir" into the Title string gadget. 7. Enter "C:Dir" into the Path and Program Name string gadget. 8. Verify the Title, Path and Program name. 9. Select Use. The Set Keypad window will reopen. You will now be able to copy the new 'Dir' User Gadget to one MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones User Gadgets 93 of your keypads gadgets. Once copied, select the 'Use' gadget and the Set Keypads window will close. v"zTesting the Reload Current Directoryv"z You will now be able to access the new 'Dir' command from your Keypad Command Gadgets. Open a Directory Window to a directory that has a few items visible in it, the 'Dest'ination gadget should be auto selected. Select the new 'Dir' Command Gadgets. A console window will open, the directory will be read and listed into the console window as if you had CD to that directory in a CLI window and then typed "Dir". Press the return key to close this console window. Open a few other Directory Window and test the 'Dir' command as new 'Dest'ination Directories are selected. Each time the launched program will be given the MegaD Active Directory as its current directory. v"zModify or Delete Program Controlsv"z As mentioned, this is a useless command. MegaD is already displaying the directory and a list in a console window is of very little use. There is a way to modify or delete User Gadget. Select the menu item 'Project, Set Preference...' and then select 'Keypads...' again. If the command type is not set to User Gadgets, cycle it to it. You will be able to select the 'Dir' User Gadget that you have just created. Select it and then select the 'Modify' gadget found in the lower left spot of the Set Keypad window. If you wanted you could modify this Program Control. I just brought you to this point so that you can see how to modify a Program Control when it is needed. You can modify all the different types of Program Control from the Set Keypad window, this is one of its major functions. You can access Auto Boots, User Gadgets and Menu Sets from this point. Select the Cancel gadget. We are going to delete the 'Dir' User Gadget. Select the 'Dir' User Gadget in the source area, then select the 'Delete' gadget found just above the 'Modify' gadget in the lower left section of the window. A requestor will open that reads: Cancel will not restore deleted program controls MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones User Gadgets 94 Continue This is warning you that there will be no way to retrieve this Program Control later. Select Yes and the User Gadget 'Dir' will disappear from both the Source area and the place that it was copied to your keypad Command Gadgets. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones ARexx Gadgets 95 v"zARexx Gadgetsv"z (NEW 3.1) ARexx is a very powerful programing language written by William Hawes, it was adapted from the REXX programming language. Starting with OS 2.0 ARexx has been part of the operating system for the Amiga. There is a number of good texts to help you understand more about ARexx. The official REXX language definition is completely documented a book by M. F. Cowlishaw, "The REXX Language: A Practical Approach to Programming" (Prentice-HAll, 1985; 2nd edition, 1990). One of the best books that I have found for ARexx on the Amiga is one by Chris Zamara and Nick Sullivan, "Using ARexx on the Amiga: Guide to using the ARexx programming language" (Abacus, 1991; 1st edition) This text is not intended to teach you ARexx. The MegaD ARexx commands are fully described in the document MDARexx.doc. There are 119 commands that you can use to communicate to MegaD with though the ARexx port "MEGAD". If you are new to ARexx and wish to to use the ARexx port of MegaD, I suggest that you start from the basics of ARexx by reading one of the above text or many other that are available. This text is intended to show you how to call ARexx programs from MegaD. This is done with ARexx Program Controls. An ARexx Program Control is created in the same way that you created "User Gadgets." v"zCreating ARexx Program Controlsv"z User Gadgets are added by selecting the menu item 'Project, Set Preference...' and then select 'Keypads...' The Set Keypads window will open. Cycle the command type gadget to "User Gadgets". The Add gadget will become un-ghosted. Select this gadget, the window will change to "User Gadget, Program Control". With MegaD a special directory is supplied called 'rexx.' A number of ARexx programs that are intended to work with MegaD can be found there. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones ARexx Gadgets 96 The directory 'rexx' should be in the same directory that MegaD was run from, if not you will have to modify the 'Path' of the 'ARexx Program Control' to the correct directory that contains the ARexx programs we will be referring to. v"zParse.rexxv"z This is a simple ARexx program that will open an output window on the MegaD screen and then display the arguments that were used to start the ARexx program with. The program is useless as it stands but it lays the ground work for you, the user, to create programs that will deal with the arguments sent. By changing the line that has the 'SAY' command in this file to something that performs a useful action to the supplied argument, only then will this be a useful ARexx program. Check the 'Combine all selected on one line' flag. This is so we can send multiple selected items to the ARexx program. In the 'Title' string gadget enter 'Parse'. In the 'Path and Program name' enter 'rexx/Parse.rexx'. After doing so, select the 'Verify Title & Path/name' gadget to verify the path, correct any errors that verify may find. You should notice that the a number of gadgets are ghosted. These options are not available to ARexx program controls. Select 'Use'. You will now be able to select the 'Parse' ARexx source gadget in the keypad window and copy it to one of your blank keypad gadgets. Do so now. Select 'Use' in the Set Keypad window and then select 'Use' from the 'MegaD Set Preferences' window. Your new 'Parse' ARexx gadget is now available from your keypad. Open any directory window and select a few items in the directory window. Now select the new 'Parse' gadget from your keypad. An output window will open to the MegaD screen and it will display each item with the path that was selected. Should more items be selected than would fit on one command line, 'Parse.rexx' will MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones ARexx Gadgets 97 be called repeatedly until all selected items have been passed to the program. When ARexx is started from MegaD, there are not output or input channels for ARexx to use. The first few lines of the ARexx program 'Parse.rexx' open an output channel that also places the window on the same screen as MegaD. Without the two lines the have the 'CLOSE' and 'OPEN' commands, all output from the ARexx program would be unseen. As stated before, 'Parse.rexx' is useless and only for demonstration. But it does create the ground work for a number useful possibilities. A word or warning: When executing scrips that use the MEGAD port it is best not to try to use MegaD until the script has run its coarse. An example of this is: A scripts opens a window and selects a few items in that window, you physically select a few more items. Now, the ARexx script ask for the selected items. It gets the original selected items and the items you have selected with the mouse. The outcome could be disastrous! ARexx programs launched from MegaD can be for any program, not just MegaD. You may call your favorite scripts with 'ARexx Gadgets' or 'Hot Keys.' Getting output from ARexx programs When an ARexx program is run from MegaD is not an output window for commands that print text, command such as SAY. By adding the next two lines to scripts which require a window to print the information this problem is solved. call close 'STDOUT' call open 'STDOUT','con:0/12/640/100/MegaD RX/SCREEN MEGAD', 'W' The '/SCREEN MEGAD' section of the console line will place the console window on the current MegaD screen if it is open. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Menu Sets 98 v"zMenu Setsv"z Menu sets are user defined menus. You access them in the 'Utilities' menu. They take up the first five items in this menu. For this reason they are setup in groups of five. A user defined menu can do anything that a User Gadget can do. The only real difference is that you access it from the menu instead of the Control Window. Predefined Menu Sets There are three predefined menu sets that come at default. They are Lha, Arc and LhArc. To access the Menu Set you can use the menu 'Project, Set Preference...' and then select 'Menus & Devices...'. We were in this window once before to set the Device Gadgets up. We will be concentrating on the upper area this time, it is dedicated to the Menu Sets. You will see that the five menus of a Menu Set are grouped line by line. Each line is titled Menu 1 through Menu 5. To the far right of each line is a gadget titled Control..., select any one of these gadgets. v"zMenu Set Program Controlv"z This window should be getting fairly familiar by now, The Program Control Window. When modifying a Menu Set, it is best to do it from within the Program Control Window. Only a few of the attributes can be changed by the four string gadgets that were in the previous window. The four are "Title", "Path and Program name", "Flags to add after Program Name" and Text to append to end of Command Line". Select the Cancel gadget and we will return to the Preferences window. v"zSelecting Menu Setsv"z The first three gadget at the top of the window are titled 'Lha', 'Arc' and 'LhArc'. As you can see the default Menu Sets have been set up to work with archiving programs. 'Arc' is rather outdated but 'LhArc' and 'Lha' are still very widely used programs. Select the three gadgets one at a time and watch what they do. They change the information to the corresponding default menu set. v"zNext/Previous Step Gadgetsv"z Just to the right of those three gadget you will find two that will allow you to step through the MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Menu Sets 99 Menu Sets one after the other forward or backward. Play with the 'Next' and the 'Prev' gadgets watching how they control the information that you can change and modify. v"zAdd, Delete Menu Set Gadgetsv"z Finally the last two gadgets are for adding new Menu Sets. The first three default sets can not be deleted but the can be modified to anything you would like them to be. There is a new and popular archiving utility available now that is in wide use in the Amiga community. It is LhA. LhA is written by Stefan Boberg and is a Shareware offering that can be found on most BBS (Built-in Board Systems). I will be showing you how to set LhA as a newly Added Menu Sets. v"zAdding A Menu Setv"z Select the 'Add' gadget of the Preferences window, a requestor will be opened that reads: You will need to successfully define all five menu Sets This is to remind you that you will need to create all five menus that create one Menu Sets. Select Yes, All the string gadgets will be cleared and ready for new information. v"zCreating A New Menu Setv"z As mentioned it is best to create the Menu Sets from within the Program Control Window. Select the 'Control...' gadget for Menu 1. The Program Control Window will open. v"zMaking A Pack Menuv"z We are going to set this Menu Sets so that we can archive selected files into a single file that will be written to the current Active Window of MegaD. Set the following attributes: 1. Check 'Combine all selected on one line' 2. Check 'Reload current directory at end' (remember that this CDs to the Active Directory) 3. Check 'Query for destination filename' This attribute tell MegaD to open a request window for a file name. the filename will be for the name to create the archive file as. 4. Set execute type to 'Multitasking Execute' 5. Enter "LhA Pack" into the Title String MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Menu Sets 100 gadget. 6. Enter "C:LhA" into the Path and Program name string gadget. This assumes that your LhA utility is found in your C: directory. 7. Enter "a" into the Flags to add after Program Name string gadget. This flag tell LhA to add files to the Archive file. 8. Test the information by selecting the Verify.. gadget at the top of the window. If the Path or title needs to be changed, do so. 9. Select the 'Use' gadget. You will see the information that you have entered in the first line for Menu 1. v"zMaking an UnPack Menu Setv"z We will set Menu 2 to unpack the archive. Select the 'Control...' gadget for Menu 2 and set it in the following manner: 1. Check 'Skip selected directories' 2. Check 'Skip .info files' 3. Check 'Reload current directory at end' 4. Be sure execute type is Multitasking Execute 5. Enter "LhA UnPack" in the Title string gadget. 6. Enter "C:LhA" in the Path and program name. 7. Enter "e" into the Flags to add after Program Name string gadget. This tell LhA to extract the files from the selected archives. 8. Verify the Title, Path and Program name. 9. Select the 'Use' gadget. We now have two of the five done to create one full Menu Sets. v"zMaking A List Menuv"z Menu 3 will be set to list an archive file. Select the "Control..." gadget for Menu 3 and set the Program Control to: 1. Check 'Skip selected directories' 2. Check 'Skip .info files' 3. Be sure execute type is 'Multitasking Execute W/Hold' 4. Enter "LhA List" into the Title string gadget. 5. Enter "C:LhA" into the Path and Program name string gadget. 6. Enter "l" into the Flags to add after Program Name string gadget. This tell LhA to list the selected archive files. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Menu Sets 101 7. Verify the Title, Path and program name. 8. Select Use. Three Menu Sets down and two to go. v"zMaking A Test Menuv"z The next Menu Sets we will set will test the validity of an archive file. Select the "Control..." gadget for Menu 4 and set the Program Control in the following way: 1. Check 'Skip selected directories' 2. Check 'Skip .info files' 3. Set execute type to 'Multitasking Execute W/Hold' 4. Enter "LhA Test" into the Title string gadget. 5. Enter "C:LhA" into the Path and Program name string Gadget. 6. Enter "t" into the Flags to add after Program Name. 7. Verify the Title and Path/name. 8. Select the "Use" Gadget. Four down one and the last to go. v"zMaking A Recursive Menuv"z We will add a command that will allow us to archive directories and all of its contents, this will include sub directories and files. Select the "Control..." gadget for Menu 5 and fill the Program Control in with the following attributes: 1. Check 'Reload current directory at end' 2. Check 'Query for destination filename' 3. Set execute type to 'Multitasking Execute' 4. Enter "LhA Recursive" into the Title string gadget 5. Enter "C:LhA" into the Path and Program name string gadget 6. Enter "-r a" into the Flags to add after Program name string gadget. This tells LhA to Recursively add files found in selected directories. 7. Verify the Title, Path an Program Name. 8. Select the 'Use' gadget. We have successfully set all five menus sets. v"zSave Your Workv"z We have put quite a bit of work into this so to MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Menu Sets 102 close the Preferences window we will use the Save Gadget. This will save the preferences file for MegaD and close the window. I tend to place archiving utilities in the utilities menu but any programs that you wish can be added here. They do not need to be like programs but you can organize programs into groups that you use for certain task. You can now access the new menu from the Utilities menu. The utilities menu has provisions to change the current active Menu Sets. You can choose Menu Sets by moving to the 'Next', 'Previous', 'First' or 'Last' Menu Sets by selecting the corresponding menu item. v"zSwap Device Gadgets for Menu Gadgetsv"z You can also replace the nine Device Gadget in the top of the Control Window with the Menu Sets, this is done by checking the "Utilities, Utilities in Window" menu item. This gives you quick access to your current active Menu Sets. The Device Gadgets can still be accessed through the keyboard. By pressing keyboard numbers 1-9 (across the top of the keyboard) MegaD will load the corresponding directory as if you hit the Device Gadget that have been replaced by the Menu Sets. This is just one of the many way MegaD can be changed to suit your taste or style of work. We will be getting into the way that MegaD can be modified in a later section of the tutorial. Export File MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Gadget Sets 103 v"zGadget Setsv"z (NEW 3.1) With the new Gadget Sets facility you can create a wide variety of gadget configurations. You may create simple windows that open with just a few gadgets and is set for a very specific task or you could create full screen layouts of strategically place Gadgets Sets and Snapshot windows so that you can have a directory utility of your own design. Following is a discussion of the parts that create and become a 'Gadget Set.' After the discussion we will put it all together and create a useful 'Gadget Set.' v"zCreating a Gadget Setv"z Gadget Sets are created and designed from the Set Keypads window of Set Preferences. You must first cycle the Source area to "Gadget Sets". Once this is done you may select the "Add" gadget. A new window will open. v"zDefine Gadget Set Windowv"z You will find 5 string gadgets in this window to let you define the size of the window and how many gadgets you wish to have in this window. Gadget Set windows are font sensitive, so the number and size of your gadgets are effected by this. v"zGadget Set Titlev"z This is a string gadget for you to enter the title of the Gadget Set. Like all other titles of object in MegaD, it should be unique. MegaD will test this title and tell you if it finds other objects with the same name. MegaD will not let you create an object with the same name. v"zInner Window Widthv"z This is what you would like to set the inner window width to. The inner window width is the size of the window without the window border calculated into it. The reason we use the inner width and height of the window is due to the fact that this is where we will be placing the gadgets. You will notice to the right of the gadgets a minimum and maximum value that show the range that can be enter into the gadget. v"zInner Window Heightv"z This is to set the height of the Gadget Set MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Gadget Sets 104 window. The higher you set this value to the more gadgets you will be able to place in a column. Once again you will see minimums and maximum values displayed to the right of the gadget. v"zGadgets Acrossv"z Gadgets are created in the Gadgets Set window in a grid fashion. You are allowed to set the number of gadgets across with this gadget. Gadgets can be so small that they will only display one character or they can be as wide as the screen. You should notice that at the bottom of the display area is a value title "Gadget Char. " This displays how many characters the gadgets will display at the current settings. This is there to help you judge if you are creating your gadgets wide enough to display the information you would like to see displayed. The maximum value is effected directly by the setting of the "Inner Window Width." v"zGadgets Downv"z This will let you set the number of gadget the window will have down the window. The maximum value is effected by "Inner Window Height." To figure out how many gadget your window will have once it is opened is a simple multiplication problem. Gadget Across * Gadget Down = Number Gadgets v"zWindow Typev"z This is a cycle gadget that lets you cycle to one of three settings. v"zUnder Mousev"z The Gadget set window will always open under the mouse pointer. v"zFixedv"z The Gadget Set window will always open at the last place it was closed. v"zRigidv"z The Gadget Set window will be an immobile backdrop window that cannot be moved. This window will not have any window boarders. This type of window is very effective when designing a full screen of Gadget Sets and snapshot windows. v"zSizing Windowv"z MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Gadget Sets 105 This is a small gadget below the Window Type gadget. When selecting this gadget you will be given a window that can be moved, sized and then closed. This will fill in the information for the size of the window. It will also define the location of the screen it is to open to if you create a 'Rigid' or 'Fixed' window. v"zClose once usedv"z This is a check gadget. If it is checked, MegaD will close the Gadget Set window once it has been used. v"zKeep to frontv"z This is a check gadget. If it is checked, MegaD will try to keep the gadget set window to the front of other windows while it is open. v"zOpen at startupv"z This is a check gadget. If it is checked, MegaD will open the window when the program is started or if a new preference file is loaded with this type of Gadget Set found. If one of these are set with this checked, MegaD will not open the "Main Control Window", if you need this window opened you may use the F8, F9, or F10 key to open it once the program and/or the preference file has loaded. The 'Main Control Window' will be forced open if the flag 'F10 Closes control window' is NOT checked. This flag can be found in the 'MegaD Preferences, Set Defaults' window. v"zRigid and Open at startupv"z By setting one or a few Gadgets Sets with Rigid windows and Open at Startup, you can end up with some very impressive screens. You'll be surprised as to what a few vertical and/or horizontal bars of gadgets and a few snapshot directory windows can do to create a productive environment to use you directory utility from. v"zBuilding a Set Preference Gadget Setv"z We will now take and put all of the parts together to create a 'Gadget Set'. MegaD has the ability to go directly to an MDPrefs sub-window such as 'MegaD Preference, Set Keypads' bypassing the 'MegaD Preference' window. The built-in commands to do this are: Set Colors... Set Defaults... Set Display... MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Gadget Sets 106 Set Keypads... Set Menus & Devices... Set Misc... Set Print... Set Screen... You will notice that these are the same gadgets that you gain access to with the Menu item 'Project, Set Preferences...' We are going to place all of the previous mentioned commands into one 'Gadget Set' for quick easy access. To access the 'Gadget Sets' you can use the menu 'Project, Set Preferences...' and then select 'Keypads.' Cycle the source area to 'Gadget Set.' Select the 'Add' gadget. The MegaD Define Gadget Set window will open. Type 'Preferences' into the Title string gadget. We are going to need room for nine gadgets in this window. Nine gadgets can easily fit in one column in the Gadget Set window so we will define the window to have one gadget across and nine gadgets down. Enter 1 into the 'Gadget Across' string gadget. By looking to the right of the string gadgets, we can see that the window is not tall enough to fit the nine gadgets we require. The Maximum number of gadget we can have down in the windows is 4. (this is on a system with Topaz 8 as the font, yours may vary with your current font setting.) Change the Inner Window Height to 108 and press return. The Maximum gadgets down will change to 9. Now you can enter 9 into the 'Gadget Down' string gadget. If we did not set the 'Inner Window Height' before enter this, the 'Gadgets Down' string gadget would not accept the larger value. The 'Window Type' cycle gadget should be set to 'Under Mouse,' if it is not cycle it to that setting. Check the 'Close once used' check gadget. We check this so that the window will close after we decide which part of preferences we want to change. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Gadget Sets 107 We have define the size of the window, the configuration and number of the gadgets that the window will have. Now we need to define what commands the gadgets will perform. Any object can be assign to a gadget in a 'Gadget Set' window, or the gadget can be left undefined. Select the 'Use' gadget of the 'MegaD Define Gadget Set' window. The 'MegaD Define Gadget Set' window will close and a new window will open. The title of the window will be 'Preferences,' this is the same as the 'Title' we typed into the 'MegaD Define Gadget Set' window. All of the gadgets are undefined. We define the undefined gadgets the same as we would define a gadget on the keypad. The 'Preferences' window and the 'MegaD Preferences, Set Keypads' window are interactive. Cycle the Source gadget to 'Built In's.' To find all of the 'Set Preference' type commands you will need to cycle the Page gadget to 'Page 2.' All of the Preferences built in commands start with 'Set ', they should be easy to locate. To define the topmost gadget, select the built in command 'Set Preferences' in the source area, then select the topmost gadget in the new 'Gadget Set' window, 'Preferences.' The command will be copied to the 'Gadget Set' gadget. Copy the following commands in the same manner, so to define the rest of the undefined gadgets in the 'Gadget Set' window, 'Preferences,' Set Color...', 'Set Default...', 'Set Display...', 'Set Keypad...', 'Set MenuDev...', 'Set Misc...' 'Set Print...', and 'Set Screen...' Suggestion: The MegaD Preference window is not much smaller than a standard non-interlace screen. This makes it difficult to define a large 'Gadget Set' window and still get at the 'Set Keypad' command and source gadgets. When this is a problem set MegaD to use an Interlace screen, define the large 'Gadget Set' keeping the window within range of your normal screen (640 X 200.) Once it is defined, reset MegaD to use the smaller screen that you are used to. We now need a way to call this 'Gadget Set' when we need it. This will be an excellent time to MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Gadget Sets 108 show you 'Hot Keys.' v"zDefining a Hot Keyv"z At the right hand bottom of the Set Keypads window you will find a gadget titled "Hot Key." You may give any object a "Hot Key" by using this gadget. You must first select the object you wish to give the "Hot Key" to then select the "Hot Key" gadget. After doing so, a window will open. Cycle the source area of the 'Set Keypads' window to 'Gadget Set'. Select the 'Gadget Set,' 'Preferences' then select the 'Hot Key' gadget. (NEW 3.1) v"zHot Key Windowv"z This window will open with the title, "Define Hot Key for Preferences. The title of the object you selected will be place in the window title to help you remember what you were setting the "Hot Key" for. v"zHot Key Qualifiersv"z You may use qualifiers with your "Hot Key." The possible qualifiers are: Left Shift Right Shift Caps Lock Control Left Alt Right Alt Left Amiga Right Amiga Numeric Keypad Middle Mouse Button Right Mouse Button Left Mouse Button You may select the qualifiers with your mouse by checking the corresponding check box. Or better yet, just hold the qualifiers down and press the regular key you wish to use. As the key is pressed, MegaD will also keep track of the qualifiers that was used during the key press. As soon as you press a regular key, That key will be displayed in the Hot Key character box. We will define Ctrl-P as the 'Hot Key to open the 'Gadget Set,' 'Preferences.' While the 'Hot Key' window is active, hold the Ctrl key down and then press the 'P' key. 'P' MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Gadget Sets 109 will be displayed in the 'Hot Key character' box and a check will be placed in the Control check gadget. To use this Hot Key definition select the "Use" Gadget. v"zDelete Hot Keyv"z An object that has been defined to have a Hot Key can have that Hot Key remove in one of two ways. The first way is to select the object that has the Hot Key you wish to have removed, you select this object within the Set Keypad window, select the "Hot Key" gadget and finally select the "Delete" gadget in the "Hot Key" window. The "Hot Key" definition will be removed. The second way is to define the same key press and qualifiers for a new object and then select the "Use" gadget from the "Hot Key" window. You will be greeted with a requestor asking: Replace Hot Key defined for <Object Name> Answer yes to this requestor and the Hot Key definition will delete from the old object and then created for the new object. v"zHot Keys are not globalv"z Unlike the Hot Keys you define for a commodity that take high priority over the system input channels and steal the input from the active program or window, Hot Keys in MegaD are only good if one of the MegaD windows are active and accepting the input. Key press that are define as menu short cuts, such as "Left Amiga O" for Open will take priority over the same Hot Key defined for MegaD. We have defined a 'Gadget Set' and defined a 'Hot Key' to open the new gadget set. As with all MDPrefs settings, MegaD will not know about them until the 'Use' or 'Save' gadget is selected from the main 'MegaD Preferences' window. Select 'Use' from the 'MegaD Preferences, Set Keypads' window and then select 'Save' from the 'MegaD Preferences' window. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Gadget Sets 110 v"zCalling your new 'Gadget Set' windowv"z Hold the 'Ctrl' key down and press the 'P' key. The new 'Gadget Set,' 'Preferences' will open. It will open under the mouse pointer and should you select any item from it, it will close after performing the function. The color of the gadgets in the 'Preferences' 'Gadget Set' are a bit bland, lets modify them. Select the 'Set Keypad...' gadget in this 'Gadget Set.' With this action, we have move directly into the 'MegaD Preferences, Set Keypads' bypassing the main 'MegaD preferences' window. The 'Gadget Set,' 'Preferences' window close during this process. v"zSetting gadget colorsv"z Cycle the source area of the 'Set Keypads' window to 'Gadget Sets.' Select the 'Preferences' source object and then select the 'Modify' gadget. The 'MegaD Define Gadget Set' window will open. We do not want to change any of the settings to the window, we just need to modify the gadget of the 'Gadget Set', 'Preferences.' Select the 'Use' gadget of the 'MegaD Define Gadget Set' window. The window will close and the 'Gadget Set,' ' Preferences' will open. You can now select the gadgets in this window and modify the colors of the gadget. Do this by selecting the 'Modify' gadget of the 'Set Keypads' window. (NEW 3.1) v"zQuick color copyv"z There is a feature to help you set the destination gadget colors. I found that setting the colors of the Keypad Gadgets and the Gadget Set gadgets was a very tedious job. Select one of the destination gadgets that has the color set to the color you wish to copy. Select the gadget once more to unselect it. MegaD will now remember the text and background colors of that gadget. Hold a Shift key down and select the other destination gadgets that you wish to copy the colors to. You may copy the colors to as many destination gadget as you wish. The color will remain the same until you select a new color. Once you are done, you may close the Gadget Set window with the window close gadget or by pressing the Esc key while it is the active window. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Gadget Sets 111 v"zMoving 'Rigid' windowsv"z NOTE: This only operates under OS 2.0 A 'Rigid' 'Gadget Set' window does not have a drag bar once it is opened from MegaD. MDPrefs gives all 'Gadget Set windows a drag bar to help you move them to the area you want them to open at. With the Rigid window, this is somewhat 'Hit and Miss' when trying to get the window to the exact place you want it to be. The 'Gadget Set' windows can be moved from within MegaD once they are open by using the shift, Ctrl-shift, and the cursor keys. To move a 'Rigid' window, that window must be active. It is hard to tell if a 'Rigid' window is active being it does not have a drag bar and does not change colors when it is active. To insure that a 'Rigid' 'Gadget Set' window is active, select one of the gadgets in the window but do not release the mouse button. Move the mouse away from the selected gadget and it will become deselected, you can then release the mouse button. Now that we know the window is active, hold the shift key down and then press one of the cursor keys to move the window in the desired direction. The window will move one pixel at a time in the direction the cursor key points to. If you want the window to move eight pixels at a time, hold the Ctrl and Shift key at the same time while using the cursor keys. You will be able to fine tune the 'Gadget Set' window position to any location on the screen. MegaD will keep track of the location that your "Gadget Sets" are at when you save the preferences file. To test your custom made screens, use the menu 'Project, Open...' and select the preference file that was just saved. MegaD will reset and open all of the 'Open at startup' 'Gadget Set' windows. I have supplied a number of preset MegaD .pf files that you may access by the 'Open...' command. You will notice that some directory windows are opened when the screen is reset to the new preference file. This was accomplished with the '-L' flag added to the end of the 'Device' string gadget MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Gadget Sets 112 found in the 'MegaD Preferences, Set Menus & Devices' window. The supplied .pf files are not intended for general use but as examples. MegaD preferences files are very machine dependent. The supplied files are set to use the screen size of 640 X 200 with Topaz 8 as the screen and text font. I suggest that you load each of the .pf files to see a very small fraction of the ways MegaD can be configured. After doing so, you may want to create you own custom screen, the one you've always wanted but could never get the other utilities to do it for you. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Export File 113 v"zExport Filev"z MegaD can create a data file from selected files and directories in Directory Windows that is compatible with a Database. This database would be one that would allow you to keep track of your many disks, and the many programs that are on those disk. This text can not possibly teach you how to use or control a database. If you are familiar with databases and know the difference between a record and a field you will feel right at home with this part of MegaD. If you do not have a database this command will be of little value to you and you may want to go on to the next section of the tutorial. v"zSetting Up Exportv"z "Export File" needs to have the attributes for the export function set before it will work. This is done by the menu item "Output, Setup Export". You will also need a 'Dest'ination Directory Window open that you want the export file written to. A good directory for this is the same directory that you would place the data files for the database. Once this Directory Window is opened and the 'Dest'ination gadget is selected, select the menu item "Output, Setup Export." The "Set Export" window will open. This window lets you set what file attributes you wish to include in your database export file. It is important that you think this part out very well or that you know your database very well. Both is even better. Some databases are rigid and allow very little changing once the database is started, others allow new fields to be added to the database and allow you to change your mind later for what information you wish to keep track of. Think about what file attributes listed on the left side of the window that you wish to keep track of and select those. I am going to select all nine of them. v"zField Sizesv"z As you can see to the right of the attributes the size of the field is listed. Should you create your database so that the fields are smaller than what is listed, you may lose information or your database will not accept the export file, It is best to create the database with at lease enough MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Export File 114 room to store the information. v"zField/Record Separatorsv"z To the right of the window you will find two integer string gadgets. One is titled 'Field Separator', the other is titled 'Record Separator'. Both require that you know the ASCII value of the character that separates your field and records as defined by your database. The defaults are the norm for most databases. The value for the Field Separator is 44 that is the ASCII value of a comma. The value for the Record Separator is 10 that is the value of a return character. Below is the results of the export if only two files were selected to show you how and where the separator characters fit. DPaint,Work:,Work:Paint,FILE,03-26-92 17:40:35,375084,743,-- --rwed,, DPaint.info,Work:,Work:Paint,FILE,03-26-92 17:40:36,1630,4,- ---rwed,, As you can see the commas separate the file attributes and there is a return at the end of the line to signify a new record. The format is visually ugly to look at but is easily digested by a good database program. v"zEmpty Fieldsv"z Notice the two commas at the end of the line. This is where the File comment should be but the files did not have one so this is an empty field that will be read by the database as such. The Filename for path string gadget is for naming your database import file. It will be appended to the path the is listed above in the text area of the Set Export window. This becomes a permanent path and filename until you change it. One of the cycle gadgets will allow you three settings. 'Export Directory & Files', 'Export Files' only and 'Export Directories' only. This should be self explanatory and it lets you fine tune the types of directory entries to be sent to the export file. There is another cycle gadget that allows two different settings. 'Overwrite old file' and 'Append to end of file'. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Export File 115 'Overwrite old file' will always create a new export file each time you select the Export File function. This deletes the old file first but not without warning you first with an option to cancel. This requires you to read the data file into your database before the Export File command is used again or you will lose your previously created export file. The 'Append to end of file' option is my favorite way to use this. The first time the 'Export File' command is used the new file is created. Each time after that the newly exported information will be appended to the end of the file. Now remember that the filename you created is somewhat permanent. As long as you save the preferences after setting the export function up, MegaD will always try to write the file to the same place and in doing so will constantly append the newly exported information. This has one drawback. You MUST delete the export file once you have read it into your database, otherwise MegaD will constantly append new information to a file that has already been used and the records for those have been created in the database. I suggest that you create an export file a few times. Each time load the newly created export file into a text window so that you can visually see how it is working. After you are sure that it is exporting the kind of information you want it to, you may start creating a database of all of your files and programs. MegaD will export all the information found in selected volumes and directories. To send all the information found in a volume, select the volume you wish to export from, by selecting the corresponding entry in the 'Volumes In Memory' list. Then select the 'Export File' Command Gadget. To send all the information found in a directory, select the directory entry in a Directory Window. Then select the 'Export File' Command Gadget. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones MegaD Preferences 116 v"zMegaD Preferencesv"z The MegaD preferences change only the internal preferences of MegaD. It has nothing to do with your system preferences for the Amiga. All mentions of preferences from this point on refer to the internal setting of MegaD. If you have taken even a quick look into what Set Preferences has to offer you will find that MegaD can be modified in many ways. There are eight different areas that make up preferences, we have visited two in this tutorial so far. Set Menus & Devices and Set Keypads are those two, we will take another look at those areas and look into the new areas. This is a list of the areas within 'Set Preference': Colors Defaults Display Keypads Menus & Devices Miscellaneous Print Screen All areas have a 'Cancel' gadget that will cancel all changes to that area. All areas have a 'Use' gadget. This gadget accepts the changes made so far. Only the 'MegaD Preferences' window has a 'Save' gadget. When this gadget is used, the current changes are accepted and saved to the '.pf' file. This file is located in the current directory that MegaD was loaded from. (NEW 3.1) You can save your current preference settings to different files. This is set through the main program, MegaD. Within the Project menu of MegaD, there is an option to 'Save as.' Should you use this option and create a new MegaD preference file under a new name, such as 'MyPrefs.pf', MDPrefs will save the preference file as this name. The new name must be set before calling 'Set Preference...' MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Set Preferences, Colors 117 v"zMegaD preferences, Colorsv"z Select the menu item "Project, Set Preference... and then select 'Colors...' to open the Set Colors window. This area of Preferences is dedicated to the colors available for the display of information within MegaD windows. v"z1.3/2.0 Color Switchv"z In the very center of this window is a single check type gadget which by default is set. The title of this gadgets is "1.3 / 2.0 Colors Switch" One of the many changes that happened with the new 2.0 OS for the Amiga was the change of the default colors. With this gadget checked, the system will be checked for 1.3 or 2.0 and the colors will be set accordingly. If you want to define any of the colors to your own settings this gadget will have to be unchecked. v"zColor Conflictv"z MegaD will check for conflicts of colors and will warn you if you try to use the conflicting colors. An example of this would be the Directory and the File colors are the same. MegaD will display the resulting selected colors in small boxes to the right of the gadgets to show the effect of the selections. You may change the colors to what you would like to have them. If you want to use more colors with MegaD, you will have to change the screen setting found in the Display preferences Display MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones MegaD Preferences, Defaults 118 v"zMegaD Preferences, Defaultsv"z Select the menu item, "Project, Set Preference... and then select 'Defaults" to open the Set Defaults window. This area here is controlled by 'Check' gadgets. v"zAuto resize windowsv"z This only works in window overlap mode set in the menu "Windows, Overlap locations. It will attempt to resize the directory windows larger or smaller to display as much as needed. v"zAuto update windowsv"z Each time the directory window is opened it will be updated. MegaD buffers EVERYTHING that it loads. If that information has been changed by some other program MegaD will not know about it. MegaD first tests the actual directory entry or volume data stamp to tell if the directory has been changed. If it finds a different date it will reload the directory so that it will be current. This has the side effect of forcing you to insert a floppy disk that has been buffered, just to reopen the directory window. v"zConfirm quitv"z Gives you a chance not to quit MegaD if an accidental quit was issued. A simple requestor will open that reads: Quit MegaD With the options Yes or No. (NEW 3.1) v"zDisplay memory, date, timev"z This displays the system memory, date and time in title bar. This message will cycle with Display File, directory, bytes message below if it is also selected. The full path of the current directory will also be cycled with these messages if the mouse in not in the scroll region of the current active window. (NEW 3.1) v"zDisplay file, directories, bytesv"z This displays in selected files and directories and total byte count in the screens title bar. This is dependent on the setting of the information area of the Main Control Window. This message will cycle with Display memory, MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones MegaD Preferences, Defaults 119 date, time message above if it is also selected. The full path of the current directory will also be cycled with these messages if the mouse in not in the scroll region of the current active window. v"zIconify at startv"z MegaD will iconify it self at startup. This is very useful if you place MegaD in your startup sequence or in the WBStartup drawer. If you do so MegaD will load and place an Icon on the Workbench screen that can be double clicked for instant access to MegaD. v"zKeep active window to frontv"z This will force the active window directory or text window on MegaD to the front of the screen. It will not work on the Main Control Window. The F10, F9 and F8 keys will move that window to the front if needed. v"zLast active window is destinationv"z The last active directory window will become the destination window if no user defined destination windows are on the screen. The default is the active window is destination. (This is the default that other directory utilities have used.) v"zPlace tool icon & menu on Workbenchv"z This only works if you are using the new 2.0 operating system. (and if you're not, WHY?) MegaD uses Application Icons and Application Windows on the Workbench. This way you can drop any icon on to it and MegaD will attempt to do something with it. At the least the MegaD screen will be opened if it is closed or the screen will be moved to the front of all the screens. If a disk icon or a directory icon is dropped onto the MegaD Icon or Main Control Window MegaD will load that directory and place it into a directory window. If an AutoBoot is available that knows how to work the data file, MegaD will use the AutoBoot to work on the file. You may drop up to 10 Workbench objects onto the Icon and MegaD will work each one in sequence. v"zMessages offv"z This will cancel all simple information messages that only use the Continue gadget to get an answer to the request. The information usually tells you MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones MegaD Preferences, Defaults 120 why a function or task did not work. This may cause confusion, if you can't tell why a function does not seem to work. v"zPanic button windowv"z While tasks are working such as Delete, Copy, Move... a window will open. This window prints and scrolls information about the processing of the current task (copy, delete, etc.) There are two gadgets at the bottom of the window. The first one, 'Suspend', temporarily stops the processing of the current task, allowing the user time to reevaluate whether he really wants to continue the task. The second gadget, 'Cancel', will immediately end the current task. Both gadgets are hard to hit in a time of panic so the 'Esc' key at the upper left corner of your keyboard is dedicated to stopping the task, this is the equivalent of selecting the 'Cancel' gadget of the Panic window. The Esc key works with or without the panic window open. (NEW 3.1) v"zReturn keypad to unshiftedv"z If you check this item, MegaD will always return the Keypad Gadgets to the unshifted state after a command has been selected from it. v"zSave defaults at closingv"z MegaD will save the current preferences before quitting. This is very useful at first while getting MegaD set up. This way all the preferences will be updated after each run. Through this tutorial I have depended on this flag being set. This is why the changes that you have made were always saved when you quit. v"zSave window positionsv"z MegaD will remember the locations of requesters and special windows and reopen them in the same locations. The default is to open the windows with the gadget under the mouse pointer if possible or to center the window under the mouse. v"zSimple refresh windowsv"z Save memory by opening windows that must be refreshed after having been covered by other windows. This feature takes a little more time while you're moving and changing the depth of windows, but it will save memory for systems with not enough memory to spare. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones MegaD Preferences, Defaults 121 v"zWarn before copyv"z Gives you a chance to cancel a call to copy v"zWarn before deletev"z Gives you a chance to cancel a call to delete. (You're a gutsy person if you uncheck this item. Remember, MegaD deletes ALL marked items in ALL open Directory Windows) v"zWarn before movev"z Gives you a chance to cancel a call to move. v"zWarn if deleting protected filev"z If the file is protected MegaD will warn you and give you the option to cancel the delete or delete anyway. v"zWarn if replacing larger filev"z During copy/move you will be warned if you try to copy over a larger file. v"zWarn if replacing newer filev"z During copy/move you will be warned if you try to copy over a newer file. v"zWarn if replacing filev"z During copy/move you will be warned if you try to copy over any file. (NEW 3.1) v"zWarn if replacing preferences filev"z This will warn you if you are about to write over an old preference file with the 'Save' or 'Save As...' command. v"zF10 Closes Control Windowv"z The F10 key normally moves the MegaD Control Window to the front and rear position on the screen. If MegaD is running on the Workbench it will only work if there is a directory window open to receive input from. With this checked, instead of the window moving to the rear position the window is actual closed. You will find that there are keyboard equivalents for most functions that the Control Window provides. Thus getting rid of the Control Window will provide you with a less crowded screen. (NEW 3.1) This attribute also works with 'Gadget Sets' should you define any 'Gadget Set' that is set to MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones MegaD Preferences, Defaults 122 'Open at startup' and this item is checked, MegaD will open the 'Gadget Set' and not the 'Main Control window.' MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones MegaD Preferences, Display 123 v"zMegaD Preferences, Displayv"z Select the menu item "Project, Set Preference... and then select 'Display...' to open the Set Display window. It lets you change how MegaD displays certain information such as dates and numbers. v"zDate Formatv"z v"zThe Date format gadget Cycles thoughv"z v"zmm/dd/yyv"z, dd/mm/yy , yy/mm/dd and dd/mmm/yy. This defines how MegaD will display the dates for your directory items. v"zUse Today / Yesterdayv"z This is a check gadgets that will tell MegaD to display files created today to be marked with "Today" and files created yesterday to be marked with "Yesterday" instead of using the date for that directory item. This only functions under the 2.0 OS. v"z12 Hour Clockv"z Changes the 24 hour date to a 12 hour time with am, or pm behind the date v"z1000 Separatorv"z Set the separator to a comma, period, space or no separator for thousands. v"zDecimal is commav"z This is a 'do nothing' gadget at the moment but should MegaD ever need to display floating point information, Its ready! v"zDirectory listing orderv"z This is a cycle gadget that will cycle though: List directories first List files first List items mixed v"zOrder of file informationv"z There are five small cycle gadgets for this setting. The higher the number, the later the information will appear in the line displaying the directory item. By setting the cycle gadgets to other values the information can be displayed in all possible orders. The 'Show, ...' menu may alter the final display. Perform any changes that you would like and select MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones MegaD Preferences, Display 124 the 'Use' gadget to see how things work. v"zForce Update Directory Windows To show Changesv"z If Directory Windows are open the change will not be performed on the directory listings found in them. You will have to use the menu item "Show, Reset All" to force the reformatting of the displayed information. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones MegaD Preferences, Set Keypads 125 v"zMegaD Preferences, Set Keypadsv"z Select the menu item, "Project, Keypads" to open the Set Keypads window. We have spent some time in here and what follows is a recap of those functions. This is a very powerful area of MegaD Preferences. You can modify Menu Sets, AutoBoots, User Gadgets, ARexx Gadgets, Hot Keys and Gadget Sets though here. You can rearrange, remove, duplicate functions on the keypad. Change the color of the keypad and 'Gadget Sets' gadgets. v"zSource Areav"z There are two major areas of gadgets. The upper area can be considered as source gadgets that information can be copied from. v"zDestination Areav"z The lower area of gadgets, that are arranged in the order of a keypad at the right side of most Amiga keyboards. 'Shift Keys' to the right of the keypad represent the shifted mode of the keypad, Ctrl, Shift, Alt. This can be considered the destination area. v"zCopying Commandsv"z Any single item can be selected in one of the two areas. As soon as an one item is selected in both areas, the information is transferred to the keypad gadgets. A blank source will create a blank do-nothing keypad gadget. You will find two cycle gadgets, One is for pages of source information, the other is to select the type of source information to transfer or to work on. The types to work on are 'Built-in', 'Menu Sets', 'AutoBoots', 'User Gadgets', 'ARexx', 'Dev. Gadgets', and 'Gadget Sets.' Below this set of cycle gadgets are gadgets labeled 'Add', 'Delete', 'Modify'. By selecting a 'Menu Set', 'AutoBoot', or 'User Gadget' and then selecting the Modify gadget you can edit how a program control will function. By selecting a keypad gadget and then modify, you can change the title and color of the keypad gadget. (NEW 3.1) Below the 'Modify' Gadget is the 'Hot Key' gadget MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones MegaD Preferences, Set Keypads 126 Should you set MegaD to 'Two Window Mode' the keypad gadgets will be arranged in the two window style so that you will be able to see just how they will look in that mode. The disadvantage of this is the keyboard equivalent of the gadgets is not represented very well. Exit from this window using the Cancel or the 'Use' gadget. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones MegaD Preferences, Menus & Devices 127 v"zMegaD Preferences, Menus & Devicesv"z There are two main purposes of the Menus & Devices. One, the setting of the Menu Sets. Two, the Setting of the Device Gadgets. We have already covered this. Being we have already worked with both the Device Gadgets and the Menu Sets, we can go on to other areas that need to be explained. Close the Preferences window by selecting the Cancel gadget. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Set Preferences, Miscellaneous 128 v"zMegaD preferences, Miscellaneousv"z v"zCopy/Format Program Controlv"z MegaD will call any stand alone copy/format program. To the right of the string gadget is a "Control..." gadget. This will open a Program Control Window that will let you set your favorite disk copier/formatter. It comes set at default to run MDDisk copier/formatter. v"zView Text Program Controlv"z MegaD has one of the most versatile text viewers around. But if you feel that another program should be called if a text file is double clicked in a directory window you may set it here. You will find another "Control..." gadget to the right on this one too. Again, it will open a Program Control Window so that you may set your favorite program to work with MegaD. v"zSource icon for directoriesv"z If you supply a name here for the an icon MegaD will use a copy of it to give newly created directories an Icon. It defaults to SYS:system that usually exist. If you do not want Icons created with directories delete all the characters from this string. You may also select the 2.0 Default check gadget found to the right of this. This will use the system default for the icon gadget while running under the 2.0 OS. v"zDictionary filenamev"z This must be the name only, without a path statement, of the dictionary file that you wish MegaD to use. The dictionary file must be in the same directory that the program MegaD resides in. This provides the user with the option to translate MegaD to any language he or she wishes. At this writing there are no dictionary files available. To create a dictionary file, please see the regular MegaD.Doc file for that information. v"zCreate Master Dictionaryv"z By selecting this gadget MegaD will create the master dictionary. The main purpose of this file is for easy translation of MegaD to other languages. This can be used to change any display line that you wish in MegaD. Please see the regular MegaD.Doc file for that information. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Set Preferences, Miscellaneous 129 (NEW 3.1) v"zView Text tab widthv"z This will set the spacing for View Text to use when tabs characters are encountered in a text file. This value can be 1 through 20. (NEW 3.1) v"zView Text word wrapv"z This will set the length at which the line should be word wrapped to the next line of a text file. If 0 is entered here the lines will word wrap to the current screen width. You can override this by setting the value anywhere between 20 to 999. A high value pretty much disables word wrap. v"zClose the Defaults Windowv"z Select the 'OK' gadget and then the 'Use' gadget to exit and test the changes that you have made. Again if Directory Windows have information displayed in them the have been affected by the modifications you will have to select the menu item "Show, Reset All" to reformat then. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones MegaD Preferences, Set Print 130 v"zMegaD Preferences, Set Printv"z v"zLabel heightv"z How many printed lines are on the labels that you wish to use with MegaD Label. v"zLabel widthv"z How wide, in characters, is the label that you wish to use with MegaD label. v"zPrint spoolersv"z MegaD has a very nice built-in print spooler. It will let you print all day long and not freeze the program while it is sending information to the printer. I has one drawback, it will not let you view the list of jobs waiting to be printed and it will not let you pick specific jobs from the job list to be removed. For those of you who feel that you need better control over the jobs waiting to go to the printer, MDSpool has been written and ARexx support has been added to MegaD to control it. This is the purpose of the new Set Print preference settings. MDSpool is a stand alone program with a full ARexx port. Very little effort is required for you to set MegaD from the internal spooler to the new external spooler that has a full graphic interface. At the bottom of the Set Print window you will see two gadgets. The first gadget Is "Set to MDSpool" which will set all of the settings to the correct ARexx commands to communicate with MDSpool. The second gadget "Set to internal spool" will return MegaD to using the simple internal spool program. For more information on MDSpool, read the supplied documentation for it. You will find that MDSpool has enough features to make it a worthwhile addition to your software collection by itself. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones MegaD Preferences, Set Screen 131 v"zMegaD Preferences, Set Screenv"z This area lets you set the screen type and the depth or colors that you want to run MegaD under. v"zPossible Screensv"z 'Screen Type' contains a cycle gadget that can be set to one of five different settings. These five possible settings define what type of screen MegaD uses. Workbench Places MegaD on the Workbench screen. Hires Creates a hires screen (usually about 640 X 200 lines) Hires-Interlace Creates a hires-interlace screen (usually about 640 X 400 lines) SuperHires * Creates a SuperHires screen (usually about 1280 X 200 lines) SuperHires-Lace * Creates a SuperHires-Interlace screen (usually about 1280 X 400 lines) The above screens that end in an '*' are only available if your system has the new ECS Chip. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones MegaD Menus 132 v"zMegaD Menusv"z You've just seen how preferences allow you the ability to customize MegaD to suit your own needs. That's not all. MegaD allows you to further modify Directory Window features. We have briefly touched upon some of these modifications while specifying file attributes (such as protection bits, file comments, etc.) Other menus give you the power to alter the complete appearance of MegaD. In this section, we will discuss how the Windows and the Show menus can change how MegaD looks and works. v"zWindows Menuv"z The top two selections in this menu are 'Open Windows' and 'Close Windows', both have two sub selections, 'All' and 'Selected Directories'. v"zOpen/Close Allv"z The All selections will only work with previously opened Directory Windows. It will close all directory windows on the screen or open all previously opened Directory Windows. If the 'Windows/Use Limits' menu item is not checked, you may end up with an overcrowded screen. v"zSelected Directoriesv"z The Selected Directories selection is of more use. This works on selected directories in Directory Windows, selected volumes in the 'Volumes In Memory' list and selected items in the Devices, Assigns and Drives list. v"zLoading Directories From the Device Listv"z This is one of those options that it will be best if you test it out to see how it works. First cycle the list gadget in the Control Window to 'Devices, Assigns and Drives', select a few items in that list. Then select the menu item Windows, Open, Selected Directories. MegaD will load each selection and place it in a Directory Window. After they have been loaded, select the Windows, Close, Selected Directories. Unlike other commands, the selected items will stay selected so they can be used again. After testing this out clear all the selected items in the Device, Assigns and Drives list, even if the list is hidden the selected items in the list will be used. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones MegaD Menus 133 v"zOpening windows from the Volumes In Memory Listv"z We now have some buffered directories from the last action. Cycle the list gadget of the Control Window to 'Volumes In Memory' and select some of the buffered volumes in this list. Again select the menu item Windows, Open, Selected Directories, the windows will be opened if not already on the screen. Select the opposite menu selection Windows, Close, Selected Directories and they will be removed from the screen. Clear the selected items in the 'Volumes In Memory' list for the next test of this feature. v"zOpening Directory Windows From Selected Directoriesv"z Open a Directory Window that has a few directories in it. Select some of those directories. Uncheck the 'Windows, Use Limits' menu item so that the list will not be swapped out with other directories. Select the menu item, Windows, Open, Selected Directories, the selected directories will be loaded and placed into new directory windows. Close the same windows by selecting the menu item Windows, Close, Selected Directories. Before we move on, check the 'Windows, Use Limits' and close all the windows open to the screen. v"zWindow locationsv"z The next section of the 'Windows' menu will allow you to define how MegaD places windows on to the screen. There are three modes listed here, 'Use Overlap Locations', 'Use Grid Locations' and 'Use Snapshot Locations'. v"zOverlap Locationsv"z The Overlap Locations is the default that MegaD comes set with. It tries to place newly loaded volumes to the right side of the last loaded volume on the screen. If the room for the new volume window is less than the smallest width that a Directory Window can be sized it will open the window to the far left of the screen instead. If you are only displaying the filename of the directory entries you can get three volume to fit on one screen. The overlap comes from when you open more than one directory in one volume. You need to have the windows per volumes set to more than one. The MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones MegaD Menus 134 windows are overlapped by opening the next window down a full drag bar (Window title area) and shifted to the right about the width of the close gadget. This arrangement will let you see all the titles as the windows are overlapped on each other. v"zSetting Volume and Window Limitsv"z Lets take a look at this in action. Select the 'Windows/2 Volumes Per Screen' and 'Windows/1 Window Per Volume...' menu items (note: these two menu items are tied together to form one menu item). A requester will open that has two integer string gadgets titled: Number Volumes Per Screen and Number of Windows per Volume Leave the Volumes set at 2 but change the 1 in the "Number of windows per Volume" to 3. Select the 'Use' gadget. Now that you have changed the limits of directories per volume you can have multiple windows open for a volume. Open a Directory Window that has a few directories listed in it. Double click some of the directories to see how the windows will overlap. Test this out with other volumes and see how this looks. After you get the feel for the overlap mode select the menu item 'Windows, Close', All so that we can test out the next mode. v"zUse Grid Locationsv"z The 'Use Grid Locations' menu item, if checked, will place windows in a fixed grid arrangement. The grid is determined by the limits settings. At the moment the limits should be set to 2 Volumes per Screen and 3 Windows per Volume. Also the 'Use Limits' should be checked. Being the Volumes is set to two, MegaD will divide the screen width by two to determine how wide each Directory Window should be, thus giving us the width of each grid. This way, if the maximum number of volumes are opened to the screen the windows will fill the screen. The Windows per Volumes are set to three, MegaD will divide the screen height by three to decide how tall each directory window will be opened as. It will also MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones MegaD Menus 135 place each newly loaded volume window under the pervious until the limits is reached. After the limit is reached it will swap out directories to place newly requested directories in the windows. This arrangement allows you to see all of each window opened to the screen. The draw back is the full width of the information in the Directory Windows may not be visible. The windows will be a fixed width and height that will not be automatically resized to allow you to view the full information. Although you can still manually resize the window with the window resize gadget. Again test this mode out and get the hang of it. Once you are satisfied that you understand how it works close all the Directory Windows so that we can go on to the next mode. Set Snapshot / Use Snapshot v"zWhy Snapshotv"z Snapshot is for people who want windows in set places. A snapshot window will not respect the 'Auto resize' option or the 'Use limits'. With the addition of 'Gadget Sets', Snapshot window locations become an important part of creating customized screens. v"zSetting Snapshotv"z The easiest way to set up the snapshot mode is by starting out with the 'Use Overlap locations' Menu checked and the 'Use Limits' unchecked. This way MegaD will open a new window for each volume or directory requested. Select a directory to load that will have a few sub directories in it. During this process try to open windows only from within this one volume. Open this directory so that you will have a window open to the screen. It is important to place each window in the place you wish it to be, and size it to the dimensions that you want as you open them. This not only sets the placement of the window but the order that the location will be used to place windows to the screen. v"zTake A Snapshotv"z Open, Place and size all the windows that you want on the screen in fixed locations. MegaD will MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones MegaD Menus 136 remember up to 30 window position. Select the 'Window, Set Snapshot' menu item. This will record the order, location, and size of each open Directory Window. v"zUse Snapshotv"z The 'Window, Use Snapshot' menu item will become unghosted, now you can check the 'Window, Use Snapshot' menu item. Directories will now be placed in the snapshot location that you set. The snapshots are used one after the other regardless of Volumes or sub-directories. Once all the snapshot locations are filled, MegaD will start swapping directories within open windows to get them to the screen. v"zForcing More Windowsv"z The 'Lock' gadget comes in handy to prevent the directory you want from getting swapped out for another directory. As long as the window is Locked, MegaD will not place another directory in it. Should you lock all the snapshot windows and request another directory, a window will open in the upper left corner of the screen for this directory. Remember to save your preferences file once you are happy with the window locations with 'Windows, Save Preferences'. The locations can be changed with 'Windows, Set Snapshot' as you please. v"zTwo Window Utilityv"z This is for the die hard fans of the older, less capable, two window utilities. The Two Window Utility is your basic idea of what a Directory Utility should be. One window to the left, One window to the right and little flexibility, that was until MegaD came along. Select the Two Window Utility menu item. If you were running on the Workbench screen MegaD will open a non-interlace screen for the two window mode. v"zTwo Window And The Workbenchv"z The two window mode can not coexist with the Workbench screen. It would cover the Workbench making it useless. If you were running under you own MegaD screen MegaD will use that screen for the two window MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones MegaD Menus 137 mode. Things have been shuffled around in Two Window mode. If you had buffered directories, some of those directories will have been placed into the two windows other wise the windows will be empty. v"zCommand Gadget Locationsv"z Across the bottom of the window you will find the command gadgets that used to be arranged in the same order as the keypad on the side of the keyboard. They are now in a 6 X 3 grid arrangement with the 'Shift Gadgets' located just above them in the center. v"zDevice Gadget Locationsv"z Above the 'Shift gadget' you will see your nine device gadgets. The 'Device Gadgets' have an imaginary vertical line running right down the center of them. Lets say you want to load 'Tutorial' into the left window. You should click the "left half" of the 'Tutorial' gadget. You will see a momentary flash in the left half of the 'Tutorial' gadget (the left half will be highlighted for a brief moment), and the Tutorial directory will load into the left window. Now, if you wanted to load 'Ram Disk' into the right window, you would click the "right half" of the 'Ram Disk:' gadget. This time, the right half of the Ram Disk gadget will momentarily highlight, and the Ram Disk directory will load in the right window. The 'Lock' gadget will override this feature. At the top center are three gadgets. The top gadget is the 'Free Volumes' gadget that functions the same as the Free Volumes in the Control Window. The second is a cycle gadget that can be cycled from "Vol In Mem" that is the same as the 'Volumes In Memory' in the Control Window to "Devices" which is the same as the "Devices, Assigns and Drives of the Control Window. It can be cycled to a new setting in the Two Window mode. This setting is "Directory". The right window is shared by these three lists. The third is titled "Byte Info" that will bring up the byte information that use to be displayed in the center of the Control Window. the Byte window MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones MegaD Menus 138 once opened is interactive with MegaD and you may use the Directory Window while it is opened. v"zTwo Window Modev"z There is not a lot to say about this mode. It is easy to get used to but somewhat restrictive. It only allows you two windows to work out of. There is a way to force more windows out onto the screen. By locking both Directory Windows and requesting a new directory, MegaD will have to open a new window to place the directory in it. As with all the other modes, play around with it for a while to see how it works. You have seen all the different modes that MegaD can be placed into to help you navigate through your volumes and directories. You should be able to find one that suits your needs. MegaD allows you to switch modes with ease so that with some tasks you may use a mode more suited for it. I suggest that you find the mode that you like best, set it to that mode and save the preference file. v"zThe Show Menuv"z The show menu is very self explanatory. We have changed it at times so that we could see different file attributes. MegaD will let you display all the attributes or none of the attributes except for the filename, the filename is always placed into the listing of the Directory Window. You may uncheck or check the menu items to set what items to format into the Directory Window. v"zSorting Directoriesv"z The show menu also has a Sort sub menu that allows you to sort the directories by any file attribute. Or it will sort on None, this will display the directory entries as they were read from the volume. All windows are not reformatted if the some of the show menu items are changed. Only the 'Dest'ination windows will reformat to show the new settings. If you wish to reformat all the window to the new settings select the 'Show, Reset All' menu item. MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones MegaD Icon Tool Types 139 v"zMegaD Icon Tool Typesv"z (NEW 3.1) MegaD supports the following tools types within the MegaD Workbench icon. v"zAREXXSTARTUPv"z If you wish to have special ARexx commands executed each time you run MegaD, add this tool type. It will look for the program and if found it will launch it as an ARexx task. MegaD will automatically look for MDARexxStart.rexx within MegaD's current directory as a default. Example: AREXXSTARTUP=MEGAD:MDAREXXSTART.REXX v"zCREATEICONSv"z MegaD will create icons for all saved preferences file. If you do not want them created add this tool type as: CREATEICONS=NO v"zMDPREFSv"z When setting MegaD preferences, MegaD needs access to the MDPrefs program. If it is in MegaD's current directory, MegaD will have not problem finding it. If you feel that you need MDPrefs in its own directory or on another disk, you will need to set this tool type. Example: MDPREFS=MEGAD:MDPREFS v"zSETTINGSv"z If you wish MegaD to find the preferences files in other than the MegaD's current directory, you will need to set this to point to the path of the directory. MegaD always loads 'MegaD2.pf' files at startup if it can be found. If you wish to have this in a separate directory, set this tool type. Example: SETTINGS=MEGAD: MDGUIDE If you wish MegaD to find the MegaD.Guide file in other than MegaD's current directory, You will need to set this to point to that file. Example: MDGUIDE=MEGAD:DOCS/MegaD.Guide MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Now What? 140 v"zNow What?v"z We have touched base on all the aspects of MegaD. There is no way that we can describe all the different ways MegaD can be arranged. As you have seen MegaD has been made to be fine tuned to the users wishes. By now, you should have a basic knowledge of how MegaD works. You should be able to perform any task you want with MegaD. If MegaD can't do what you want with one of its built-in commands, you should be able to add an external command to it to do it. You should be able to change any display attribute that MegaD uses, from major settings such as screens, to the simple setting of dates displayed in the directory listings. You should be able to modify any file attribute you wish. Copy, Move, Delete,... files and directories one at a time or in large groups. You should be able to create a listing of a directory, create a label for your disk or create a database export file for your database. You should be able to use directory patterns to reduce large listings down to a refined list to select from. The same type of patterns can be used to select items with or to search deep within volumes and directories. You many want to look through the MegaD.Doc file if you have not done so. There is information in there on how to use the dictionary file that allows you modify any displayed information that MegaD uses. If you feel that a title or message would be better written another way you may change it. Almost everything else we have covered here. The Rambling_on file may offer some other answers that are still not apparent. This file is a collection of questions and answers that have been asked about MegaD. END OF TEXT END OF TEXT MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Index 141 v"zIndexv"z 'Dest'ination 16, 21-22, 33, 38, 46, 49, 51-54, 56-59, 61, 70, 93, 113, 138 'Volumes In Memory' 8, 10, 19, 41, 44-47, 115, 132-133, 137 1.3 Iconify 41 1.3/2.0 Color Switch 117 1000 Separator 123 12 Hour Clock 123 2.0 Iconify 41 Abort Drag Select 24 Accept Input From a file or device 80-81 Accessing Menus 23 Action Warnings 51 Activating a Filter 64 Active Directory 7, 12-13, 17, 33, 51-52, 91, 93, 99, 119 Active Window 11, 18, 22-24, 51-52, 99, 110, 118-119 Active Window To Front 18, 119 Add AutoBoot Command 73 Add AutoBoot Skips Icon Files 74 Add Display Command Gadget 87 Add, Delete Menu Set Gadgets 99 Adding A Menu Set 99 Adding Archive List Command 87 Adding User Gadgets 90 After Date Filter 66 Anatomy Of The Program Control Window 75 Another Reason to Switch to Workbench 2.0 92 Application Menu 43 AREXXSTARTUP 139 Auto 'Dest'ination 51 Auto Destination 32, 52 Auto Labels 44 Auto resize windows 118 Auto Save when Quit 29 Auto Text Window Scroll 35 Auto update windows 118 AutoBoots 2, 4-5, 39, 42, 72, 75, 82, 84-90, 125 Available Memory 12 Back To Adding AutoBoots 5 Before Date Filter 66 Buffered Directories 8-9, 12, 38, 41, 133, 137 Buffered Volume List 9 Buffering a Full Volume 41 Building a Set Preference Gadget Set 105 Byte Info Icon Gadget: 17 Calculating Directory Sizes 40 Calling your new 'Gadget Set' window 110 Cancel print jobs 47 Check Gadgets 32, 75, 82, 123 Clear By Pattern 71 MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Index 142 Clear Pattern Function 60 Close once used 105-106 Close the Defaults Window 129 Close Window Gadget 23 Color Conflict 117 Combine all selected on one line 75-76, 83, 86-87, 96, 99 Command Gadget Locations 137 Command Lines and Program Controls 80 Confirm quit 118 Console window string 80 Copy and Rename a File 55 Copy/Format Program Control 128 Copying Commands 125 Copying Directories 54 Copying Files 53 Copying Groups of Files and Directories 54 Create a Tutorial Disk 19 Create Directory 33 Create Master Dictionary 128 CREATEICONS 139 Creating a Gadget Set 103 Creating A New Menu Set 99 Creating ARexx Program Controls 95 Current Directories 91 Date Format The Date format gadget Cycles though mm/dd/yy 123 Decimal is comma 123 Define Gadget Set Window 103, 106 Defining a Hot Key 108 Delete Command 29, 32 Delete Hot Key 109 Destination Area 84, 125 Destination Gadgets 84, 110 Destination Window Definition 51 Device Gadget Locations 137 Device Gadgets 7, 10-11, 17-18, 27-29, 52, 56, 98, 102, 127, 137 Device Gadgets keyboard Equivalent 11 Device Icon Gadget: 17 Device List 8-9, 132 Device Scroll Gadget 11 Device String Gadget 11, 29 Dictionary filename 128 Dir User Gadget 92 Directory listing order 123 Directory listings 3, 45, 124, 140 Directory Windows 3, 5, 16, 21, 23, 32, 37-38, 40, 43-45, 47, 51-53, 56-59, 70, 75, 88-90, 105, 111, 113, 118, 121, 124, 129, 132-133, 135, 138 Disk Labels 43, 45 Display file, directories, bytes 118 MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Index 143 Display memory, date, time 118 Display Protect Bits 32 Double Click Directory 24 Double Click File 24 Double Click Item 24 Double Click Text File 35 Drag Select Items 24 Drop a Disk Icon. 42 Drop a Drawer Icon 42 Drop a Program Icon 42 Drop a Project Icon 42 Drop a Text File Icon 42 Dropping icons onto the Application Icon 42 Duplicate 3, 39-40, 45, 54, 57, 125 Duplicate a File 39 Duplicate Disk Labels 45 Elements of a Filter 61 Empty Directories 41 Empty Fields 114 Exact Size Filter 65 Execute type cycle gadget 78 Export File 2, 5, 102, 113-115, 140 F10 Closes Control Window 105, 121 Field Sizes 113 Field/Record Separators 114 File Comments 36, 132 Filter + Function 60 Filter - 60, 62, 70 Filter Requestor 60-61, 64, 66, 68, 70-71 Filters and Pattern Matching 4, 60 Final Warning 30 Find 4-5, 14, 18, 23, 27-28, 33-34, 37-40, 46-50, 52-53, 56-57, 60, 62, 70-71, 75, 83-86, 88, 91, 96, 98, 103, 107- 108, 114, 116, 121, 125, 128, 130, 137-139 Find Function 60 Find List Of Directory Items 71 Fixed 104-105, 134-135 Flags to add after Program Name 79, 81, 88, 98, 100-101 Force Update Directory Windows To show Changes 124 Forced Destination 77 Forcing More Windows 136 Free Volumes Gadget 8, 23 Freeing Buffered Volumes 9 Gadget Set Title 103 Gadgets Across 104 Gadgets Down 104, 106 Global Filter 70 Go Deep 12, 40-41, 60, 70 Greater Than Size Filter 65 Hot Key Qualifiers 108 Hot Key Window 108 MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Index 144 Hot Keys are not global 109 How Shift Click Works 16 Icon Gadgets 17-18 Iconify 41-43, 119 Iconify at start 119 In/Out Filter Gadget 61 Information Area 7, 12, 118 Inner Window Height 103-104, 106 Inner Window Width 103-104 Keep active window to front 119 Keep to front 105 Keypad Banks 14 Keypad Gadgets 14, 18, 30, 75, 82, 84, 87-88, 90-91, 96, 110, 120, 125-126 Keypad Icon Gadget: 17 Know Your System 73 Label Align 44 Label height 130 Label Modify 45 Label width 130 Last Active Window Destination 52 Last active window is destination 119 Less Than Size Filter 64 Loading a text file 33 Loading Directories From the Device List 132 Loading selected items from the Device List 9 Loading the copy of your Workbench disk 20 Lock Gadget 21-22, 57 Main Control Window 7, 11, 19, 21, 29, 105, 118-119, 122 Making A List Menu 100 Making A Pack Menu 99 Making A Recursive Menu 101 Making A Test Menu 101 Making an UnPack Menu Set 100 Manipulating Multiple Text Windows 36 Manual Label 44-45 MDPREFS 28, 105, 109, 111, 116, 139 MegaD List Area 8 MegaD Menus 2, 5, 132 MegaD Preferences 2, 5, 28, 52, 105, 107, 109-110, 112, 116-118, 123, 125, 127-128, 130-131, 139 MegaD Preferences window 28 MegaD screen to front at end 77, 83 MegaD Windows 4, 109, 117 MegaD's Spooler 47 Menu Button Scroll 23 Menu Set Program Control 98 Menu Sets 2, 4-5, 42, 72, 75, 84, 93, 98-102, 125, 127 Messages off 119 Mixing Multiple Filters 68 Modify or Delete Program Controls 93 MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Index 145 Move and Rename 58 Moving 'Rigid' windows 111 Moving Directories 56 Moving Files 12, 55 Moving the Control Window to the front 18 Multiple AutoBoot Window 87 Multiple Destination And Source Directories 58 Multiple Text Windows 3, 35-36 Multitasking execute 78, 88, 91-92, 99-101 Multitasking Execute W/Hold 78, 88, 92, 100-101 Multitasking Workbench (NO I/0) 76, 79 Navigating Through Multiple Directory Windows 57 Next/Previous Step Gadgets 98 Open at startup 105, 111, 122 Open/Close All 132 Opening Directory Windows From Selected Directories 133 Opening Two Directory Windows 52 Opening windows from the Volumes In Memory List 133 Order of file information 123 Output File 10, 45-47, 80 Output Format 46 Output Prt 10, 47 Overlap Locations 118, 133, 135 Overriding Auto Destination 52 Panic button window 120 Panic Window 30-31, 41, 120 Parent Gadget 21 Parse.rexx 96-97 Path and Program Name String Gadget 79, 91-92, 100-101 Place Program on MegaD Screen 78 Place Program on Workbench Screen 78 Place tool icon & menu on Workbench 119 Possible Screens 131 Possible Uses of File Extension 74 Print spoolers 130 Printing Text Files 47 Program Control Window 2, 4, 72, 74-75, 79, 81, 86, 88, 91- 92, 98-99, 128 Program Control Window, String Gadgets. 79 Protection Bits 31-32, 62, 67, 132 Query for 'Flags to add' 78 Query for 'Text to append' 78 Query for destination filename 77, 81, 99, 101 Quick color copy 110 Quick Command Access 14 Quitting MegaD 43 Redirect Output to a file or device 79, 81 Reformat Directory Windows 32 Relabel 10, 26-27 Relabel under 1.3 26 Relabel under 2.0 and Using MegaD 26 MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Index 146 Reload current directory at end 77, 91-92, 99-101 Rename 3, 27, 31, 55, 58 Replace File Warning 53 Return keypad to unshifted 120 Rigid 104-105, 111, 113 Rigid and Open at startup 105 Save defaults at closing 120 Save window positions 120 Save Your Work 86, 101 Screen control Cycle gadget 78 Scrolling List Area 21, 23 Searching Text Files 48 Select By Pattern 71 Select Pattern Function 60 Select Volumes for making a listing 10 Select/Clear AutoBoot Window 89 Select/Clear commands 38 Selected Directories 9, 40-41, 46, 60, 70, 75, 82, 86, 88, 90, 100-101, 132-133 Selecting Items 10, 24 Selecting Menu Sets 98 Selecting The Data Files 73 Selecting The Executable 73 Set Keypads Window 84, 90-91, 93, 95, 103, 108, 125 Set Protect 3, 29, 31-32, 67 Set Show Comment 37 Set Show Size 40 Set the Filter Type Gadget First 65 Setting AutoBoots As Command Gadgets 82 Setting gadget colors 110 Setting Multiple Comments 37 Setting Snapshot 135 Setting the device gadgets 27 Setting Up Export 113 Setting Volume and Window Limits 134 SETTINGS 5, 28, 32, 45, 64-65, 75, 86, 104, 109-110, 114, 116-117, 130-131, 134, 138-140 Shift Click Window Command 15-16 Simple Commands 2, 4, 26, 29 Simple Commands And MegaD 2, 4, 26 Simple refresh windows 120 Single Select Item 24 Sizing Window 104 Skip .info files 75, 83, 86, 88, 90, 92, 100-101 Skip selected directories 75, 82, 86, 88, 90, 100-101 Skip selected files 75, 82, 90, 92 Sorting Directories 138 Source and Destination Commands 2, 4, 51 Source Area 91, 93-94, 103, 106-108, 110, 125 Source icon for directories 128 Source Window Definition 51 MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Index 147 Stack size 80 Swap Device Gadgets for Menu Gadgets 102 Take A Snapshot 135 Testing the Reload Current Directory 93 Text Reader 33 Text to append to end of command line 79, 98 Text Window Keys 34 Text Window Menu 34 Text Window Parts 34 The anatomy of a directory window 21 The Show Menu 61, 132, 138 Title String Gadget 79, 91-92, 99-101, 106 Two Window And The Workbench 136 Two Window Mode 22-23, 126, 136-138 Two Window Utility 136 Un-Ghosting The Activate Gadget 64 Under Mouse 104, 106 Update Dir 37-38, 124 Use Grid Locations 133-134 Use Snapshot 133, 135-136 Use Today / Yesterday 123 User Gadget Program Control 90 User Gadgets 2, 4-5, 42, 72, 75, 84, 90, 92-93, 95, 125 Using an AutoBoot 83-84 Using an AutoBoot As A Command Gadget 84 Using Date filters 65 Using Filter Out 64 Using Name filters 62 Using Protect filters 67 Using Size filters 64 Using the Tutorial Disk 27 Verify Title And Path/Name 91 View Text Program Control 128 View Text tab width 129 View Text word wrap 129 Warn before copy 121 Warn before delete 121 Warn before launch 77 Warn before move 121 Warn if deleting protected file 121 Warn if replacing file 121 Warn if replacing larger file 121 Warn if replacing newer file 121 Warn if replacing preferences file 121 We are the teachers 88 What Is MegaD 19 When You Need A Current Directory 92 Why Snapshot 135 Why User Gadgets? 90 Wildcards Pattern 62 Window locations 133, 135-136 MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones Index 148 Window Type 104-106 Windows Menu 132 Work without selected items 75, 83, 92 Workbench screen to front at start 76, 83 Working in the Same Volume 57 MegaD 3.1 Tutorial, Copyright © 1992 - 1993 John L. Jones