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USER INSTRUCTIONS for the TALKING SPELLER TUTOR written by James W. Kummer TABLE OF CONTENTS TALKING SPELLER TUTOR 1.0 INTRODUCTION ........................ 1 2.0 GETTING STARTED ...................... 1 3.0 EXECUTING TUTOR ...................... 2 4.0 TEST-SEQUENCE FILES INCLUDED .......... 3 5.0 TEST-SEQUENCE FILE STRUCTURE .......... 4 6.0 USING THE TAILOR PROGRAM ............... 6 7.0 DESCRIPTION OF PROMPTS ................ 8 7.1 FILE SELECTION ....................... 8 7.2 PRESENTATION OPTIONS ................. 8 7.3 EDIT OPTIONS ......................... 9 8.0 SPECIAL KEYS AND RESTRICTIONS .......... 10 8.1 SPECIAL KEYS ......................... 10 8.2 RESTRICTIONS ........................ 11 9.0 CONCLUSION AND FINAL RECOMMENDATIONS ... 11 - I - TALKING SPELLER TUTOR page 1 1.0 INTRODUCTION The TALKING SPELLER TUTOR is a program which utilizes the speech capability of your AMIGA Computer to provide a self-tutoring productivity tool to help you memorize spelling words, foreign words and phrases, dates, names of places, chemical compounds, physical constants, etc. The possibilities are almost endless. The program prompts you with each word/phase, and you respond with the corresponding word/phrase. Your reply can be either oral or written. The program is a totally open-ended build-it-yourself flashcard program, with the option for random sequencing of the order of presentation. Included with the TALKING SPELLER TUTOR are two programs. One is the TUTOR program, which allows you to test yourself on the words, phrases, etc. which come with the TALKING SPELLER TUTOR, or on the lists which you build yourself. The second program is the TAILOR program, which permits you to build and edit your own word lists. In addition to the two programs, there are 23 files of already-prepared words for self-test. Seventeen of these files contain English-language words for spelling test - only the word is presented, without any meaning. Six additional files are foreign language words and phrases, with their English meanings. Finally, there is a file of all the states in the United States, with their corresponding state capitals. To build your own test-sequence files, utilize the TAILOR program. At your option, you may build or edit test-sequence files with the ED editor that came bundled with your AMIGA. 2.0 GETTING STARTED To use the TALKING SPELLER TUTOR, you need to build your own bootable disk. To do this, the simplest method is to use your CLI to copy your entire SHAREWARE - PLEASE PAY IF YOU USE TALKING SPELLER TUTOR page 2 WORKBENCH disk to a new blank disk (e.g., DISKCOPY DF0: TO DF1: NAME MY-TUTOR; or, if you have only a single-drive system, follow the instructions in your AMIGA manual for the diskcopy procedure). Next, copy AmigaBASIC from your AMIGA EXTRAS disk to your new disk (e.g., COPY DF1:AmigaBASIC to DF0:) Then, from the TALKING SPELLER TUTOR disk, copy everything to the new disk (e.g., COPY DF1:#? TO DF0:). Your disk is now bootable. With your newly-built disk in the internal drive (drive 0), reboot, by pressing the CTRL key at the same time as you press both AMIGA keys. This takes you back to the point where KICKSTART finished initializing your AMIGA. You will be left in the WORKBENCH environment, and you will see the icon for your bootable copy of TALKING SPELLER TUTOR. Before you use TUTOR or TAILOR, be sure to set your PREFERENCES to 80 column display. There is one additional modification you may make, if you wish your boot disk to take you directly to the TUTOR program. If you edit your s/startup-sequence file, adding a statement immediately after the "LoadWb" line, then you will be taken immediately into the TUTOR program. The line to add is: AMIGABASIC TUTOR. With this line inserted, your boot-up disk will take you directly to TUTOR without stopping at the WORKBENCH. When you exit TUTOR, you will return to the WORKBENCH. 3.0 EXECUTING TUTOR When you see the icon for your copy of TALKING SPELLER TUTOR, double-click it, then double-click the TUTOR icon. This will cause the TUTOR program to execute. It will issue a series of prompts to the screen. Simply type in the replies, and you are working with your own personal tutor. One of the prompts is whether you want the order of presentation "randomized". That is, do you want a different sequence of presentation of the English or foreign words (or whatever test sequences you might have built yourself) every time you are tested on them. Ordinarily you will want the sequence randomized. But there are situations where you might want to be presented with the same sequence as the words were stored. For example, if you wish to SHAREWARE - PLEASE PAY IF YOU USE TALKING SPELLER TUTOR page 3 memorize the presidents of the United States, in order, from George Washington through the current office-holder, then it would do you no good to have your list of U.S. presidents presented to you in random order. You would want to have them presented to you in chronological order. The TUTOR program will ask you if you want a written test. If you respond in the affirmative, then you will need to type in each word or phrase that is the expected answer. You may answer "NO" to this prompt, in which case you will say or spell the answer mentally (or aloud, if you wish). When you choose the written test, then the AMIGA TUTOR program will check to see if you have spelled each entry correctly. If you have spelled it wrong (remember, you must enter it exactly as it is stored in the file, including the proper number of blanks between words, etc.), then the TUTOR will tell you that, and show you the correct spelling. Of course, if you elect to say or spell the answer mentally, or verbally, then the TUTOR cannot check whether you are correct. But it will show you the correct spelling, so that you can check yourself. After you have completed the file of words/phrases, if you were taking a written test, the program will tell you how many you spelled correctly out of the total in the file. If you wish, you may restart the program immediately, and test yourself on another file of words. To do this, hold down the right AMIGA key (just to the right of the space-bar) while you depress the 'R' key. If for any reason you wish to terminate the program before its completion, simply hold down the right AMIGA key and depress the 'period'. This reverts you to AmigaBASIC. The program can be restarted at the beginning with the right AMIGA key and the 'R'. When you are finished using TUTOR, clicking the dot in the upper left-hand corner will exit AmigaBASIC. This returns you to the WORKBENCH. 4.0 TEST-SEQUENCE FILES INCLUDED A total of 24 test-sequence files are included with the TALKING SPELLER TUTOR. There are approximately 900 spelling words, taken from the Jefferson County, Colorado, Public Schools District list of words a typical ninth-grader should know. These SHAREWARE - PLEASE PAY IF YOU USE TALKING SPELLER TUTOR page 4 words are distributed among 17 files. The files are EASY1 through EASY6, MEDIUM1 through MEDIUM6, and HARD1 through HARD5. The names of the files are indicative of the level of difficulty of the words, in the context of the typical ninth-grader. Six additional files contain foreign words and phrases, and their English equivalents. The files are GERMAN1, GERMAN2, FRENCH1, FRENCH2, SPANISH1 and SPANISH2. The words and phrases in these files are some of those that a traveler would find useful. There are about eighty words/phrases in each of the languages. Finally, there is a file named STATE-CAPITALS. This file lists all the states of the United States, and their capital cities. The state is listed first, followed by its capital. 5.0 TEST-SEQUENCE FILE STRUCTURE There are four fields in a TUTOR file. These are: word; word phonetics = meaning; meaning phonetics. You can omit either the word phonetics or the meaning phonetics, and the program will pronounce it as it is spelled (which may be close enough to be understood). If you are only interested in spelling tests, the '=' and everything to the right may be deleted. That is, your file may only include words and word phonetics. And, the phonetics are optional as well. Thus a TUTOR file could consist of nothing but a sequence of spelling words, with no phonetics and no meanings. Here is an example prompt file, called "TEST1", which displays some of the features of the TALKING SPELLER TUTOR test-sequence files which come with the program, or which you may build yourself. It consists of the following lines: [line 1: ] POSTCARD [line 2: ] SOLAR SYSTEM [line 3: ] HELLO=GREETING [line 4: ] GOODBYE;GOOD BY=ADIOS;AHDEEOSE [line 5: ] TEST CASE=TRIAL;TRY.UL [line 6: ] PNEUMONIA;NEW.MOWN.YUH SHAREWARE - PLEASE PAY IF YOU USE TALKING SPELLER TUTOR page 5 [line 7: ] WATER;WOH.TER=H 2 O [line 8: ] ALCOHOL;AHL.KUH.HALL=C 2 H 3 O 2 [line 9: ] PI;PIE=3.14159 [line 10:] CENTIMETERS PER INCH=2.54 [NOTE: in the above sample file, the line numbers are for reference only.] The first two lines exemplify a simple spelling test, with no added meaning/definition. Line 3 shows how the program can be used to quiz you on the word and its corresponding meaning. The way in which the AMIGA computer pronounces the words is usually close enough to trigger your memory so that you can recognize the word or phrase and respond with the spelling or meaning. However, if the way the word or phrase is pronounced is particularly important, especially if a young child is the user, then, in addition to the spelling, you can enter in a phonetic spelling to more precisely pronounce the words, as shown in lines 4 thru 9. Note that, if you do not supply the phonetic spelling, the semicolon is not required. In the above example, there are records both with and without an 'equal-sign'. In ordinary usage, either all records would have the equal-sign, or none would. The example shown mixes the two types of records for tutorial purposes only. By now you probably have figured out the pattern. The 'equal-sign' separates the word/phrase and its meaning. And, on either side of the equal sign, the semicolon separates the exact spelling from the phonetic spelling. Without equal-signs, a tutor source file is simply a spelling test. With the equal-signs,it becomes a test of spelling and meaning, of English phrase and foreign equivalent, of name and assigned value. If your tutor source file has equal-signs, then the program asks you if you want to be prompted with the first or the second phrase. That is, for example, if you want to be prompted with the English word or the foreign language word. In this way, you can build one file with words and meanings, and then test yourself on both the word given the meaning, and vice versa. In the foreign language files, supplied with the TALKING SPELLER TUTOR, the first field is the SHAREWARE - PLEASE PAY IF YOU USE TALKING SPELLER TUTOR page 6 English phrase, followed by its phonetics. The third field is the foreign phrase, followed by its phonetics. If you wish to copy the EASY, MEDIUM and HARD files to make them foreign-word files, simply edit the third and fourth fields in the copied file with the foreign phrase and its phonetic. You can also start with a new file (choose any name you want, meaningful to you) and build files containing chemical names, historical names, dates, places, etc. You are limited only by your imagination. 6.0 USING THE TAILOR PROGRAM If you want to build your own TUTOR test-sequence files, or edit existing files, then you may use the TAILOR program. Simply select (i.e., double-click) the TAILOR icon from the workbench. TAILOR will prompt you for the name of the file which you wish to edit. Or, you may choose a new file name, and start from scratch. Once you understand the structure of the records in the test-sequence files, you can use virtually any editor you wish to edit or create files (NOTE: Some word-processors insert binary format information; be sure that the one you use has the option to save to disk only the text.). The ED editor, a full-screen editor that is bundled with your AMIGA, can be used very effectively to create or modify files to be used by the TUTOR program. You may wish to build your new files initially using the ED editor, and then use the TAILOR program to edit or revise them. The advantage the TAILOR program has over ED is that TAILOR has the feature of pronouncing the word/phrase to you, and letting you continue to re-edit the phonetic spelling until you are satisfied with it. The TAILOR program's disadvantage is that it cannot be used to delete entries from or add entries to an existing file. That is, if you want to add more vocabulary words to a file that you have already been working on, you will have to use the ED editor, or something comparable. The TAILOR program was built on the premise that, if you have more words to test yourself on, you will put them in a new file, and not bother trying to add them to an existing file. Like the TUTOR program, TAILOR issues a series of SHAREWARE - PLEASE PAY IF YOU USE TALKING SPELLER TUTOR page 7 prompts. You are asked to enter the name of the file you want to create or edit. You are then presented with the option of entering or revising any or all of the four fields. The "fields" are those described in section 4.0 of this manual. By selecting the "SAY" box with the mouse, the AMIGA will pronounce your entry. If you select the upper SAY, then your AMIGA will pronounce the second field, unless the second field is blank, in which case it will pronounce the first field. Similarly, selecting the lower SAY causes the AMIGA to pronounce the fourth field, unless it is blank, in which case the AMIGA pronounces the third field. In many cases, the normal spelling is adequate for the AMIGA to pronounce, and it is not necessary to enter the phonetic spelling. If you have typed in fields 1 and/or 3, and are not satisfied with the pronounciation, then you can cause a copy of the text to be placed in fields 2 or 4 by pressing F6 or F7, respectively. In this manner, you can edit the text for phonetic spelling without having to retype the whole text. Function keys F1 and F2 may be used as an alternate to the upper and lower SAY mouse selections. If you use the ED editor to build your file, then you will need to supply the equal-sign and semicolons in each line. If you use the TAILOR program, it will supply the equal-sign and semicolons. Neither the equal-sign nor the semicolon can be used anywhere else in the fields, because of their special meanings. Also, you cannot use a comma anywhere in your file, in any field. This is because both TUTOR and TAILOR are written in AmigaBASIC. The comma is used in BASIC as a separator between input strings. The presence of a comma would fragment your fields, and cannot be allowed. If you are editing an existing file, then the TUTOR program will step you through all records of the file. Whenyou have had the opportunity to edit every record, the program presents you with the option of choosing the name for the file you wish to store. In this manner, you may select an existing file to edit, and then save it to a completely different file name. For an existing file, it is not necessary to view/modify every record. If you only wish to correct some errors in early records, then you may select QUIT EDIT & SAVE FILE box with the mouse SHAREWARE - PLEASE PAY IF YOU USE TALKING SPELLER TUTOR page 8 after the last correction. The corrected file will be saved, in its entirety, despite the fact that you only viewed/edited a portion of the file. If you chose to edit a new file, then you must indicate to the program when you have entered all the words you wish for this file. After you have typed in all the words/phrases on your list, and are satisfied with the spelling and/or pronounciation, you signify this to the TAILOR program by selecting with the mouse the QUIT EDIT & SAVE FILE box. When you have so indicated that you have completed your edits of the file, the program will ask you if you want to store it back onto the same-name file. If your answer is 'N', then you will be prompted to enter the new file name. Using this feature, you may select any of the EASY, MEDIUM or HARD English language files, add fields three and four for the foreign language meaning and pronounciation, and then save the resulting file onto a new-name foreign language file. 7.0 DESCRIPTION OF PROMPTS This section of the manual describes in detail the prompts and expected replies for both TUTOR and TAILOR. 7.1 FILE SELECTION Both of the programs will ask you to 'SPECIFY YOUR FILE NAME BY PATH. If your source file is on the disk in drive 0, and is not in a sub-directory, then you only need specify the name of the file. However, if you place your source files on separate disks, or if you place common type files in separate directories (e.g. DF1:GERMAN/WEEK2, and DF0:CHEM/HYDRATES) then you must specify the file by path sufficiently for the program to be able to find it. The first prompt issued by the TAILOR program is 'DO YOU WANT TO EDIT AN EXISTING FILE (1) OR CREATE A NEW ONE (2)?' If you are changing a file that you have already created previously, then enter '1' followed by Carriage Return (CR). If you are starting a new file from scratch, enter '2' plus CR. SHAREWARE - PLEASE PAY IF YOU USE TALKING SPELLER TUTOR page 9 7.2 PRESENTATION OPTIONS If the file you have chosen contains equal-signs, that is, it contains word/phrase plus the meaning, then the TUTOR program asks 'DO YOU WANT TO BE TESTED ON THE FIRST (1) OR THE SECOND (2) PHRASE?'. In the foreign language files that come with your TALKING SPELLER TUTOR, the first phrase is the English word/phrase, and the second phrase is the foreign equivalent. Select whichever you wish to have presented to you first, and follow your selection with a CR. The TUTOR program will also ask you 'DO YOU WANT THE LIST RANDOMIZED (Y/N)?'. Enter whichever option you wish, followed by CR. Normally you will answer 'yes' unless the sequence of the list is part of what you wish to memorize. 7.3 EDIT OPTIONS The TAILOR program gives you the opportunity to edit any of the four fields of an existing file, or to enter data into a new file. Four field editing windows are displayed, and, for an existing file, the data records, one group at a time. All editing is in the "insert" mode, like that used in the ED editor. Any character entered at the cursor causes any characters to the right of the cursor to shift to the right by one character, making room for the inserted character. The left and right arrows move the cursor within the window, and the up and down arrows move the cursor to another window. The 'TAB' and 'RETURN' keys behave the same as the down-arrow key. While you are editing the record, you may have the phrase pronounced for you, by selecting the 'SAY' boxes with the mouse. The upper SAY pronounces field 1 if field 2 is blank, otherwise it pronounces field 2. Likewise, the lower SAY pronounces field 3 if field 4 is blank, otherwise it pronounces field 4. If field 2 or 4 is blank, and you want to improve on the pronounciation, pressing F6 or F7 causes a copy of field 1 or field 3, respectively, to be placed in field 2 or 4. Function keys may also be used in place of the mouse selections. Mouse selection of the upper and lower SAY fields may simulated by pressing keys F1 and F2, respectively. Simulated mouse selections of the ACCEPT GROUP & EDIT NEXT and QUIT EDIT & SAVE SHAREWARE - PLEASE PAY IF YOU USE TALKING SPELLER TUTOR page 10 FILE boxes may be effected by the Alt-N (for "NEXT") combination and the Alt-Q (for "QUIT") combination, respectively. 8.0 SPECIAL KEYS AND RESTRICTIONS There are certain limitations which must be recognized in the use of the TALKING SPELLER TUTOR. Also, there are certain keyboard keys that have a special meaning to the program in certain situations. 8.1 SPECIAL KEYS As mentioned previously, the AmigaBASIC conventions which use the right AMIGA key, followed by the 'period' or the 'R' key, prevail respectively as the program-stop and program-run functions. Additionally, the following keys are employed in special contexts: F1 - When executing the TAILOR program, causes the Amiga to SAY field number 2, or field 1 if 2 is blank. F2 - When executing the TAILOR program, causes the Amiga to SAY field number 4, or field 3 if 4 is blank. F5 - This key, used during the TUTOR program, provides an alternate to selecting the NEXT PHRASE box with the mouse. F6 - This key is available during TAILOR execution, and, provided the field 2 is blank, causes a copy of field 1 to be placed in field 2, for easy editing. F7 - This key is available during TAILOR execution, and, provided the field 4 is blank, causes a copy of field 3 to be placed in field 4, for easy editing. F10 - This key, used during the TUTOR program, provides an alternate to selecting the SAY AGAIN box with the mouse. Alt-N - This key combination is available during SHAREWARE - PLEASE PAY IF YOU USE TALKING SPELLER TUTOR page 11 TAILOR execution, and provides an alternate to selecting the ACCEPT GROUP & EDIT NEXT box with the mouse. Alt-Q - This key combination is avialable during TAILOR execution, and provides an alternate to selecting the QUIT EDIT & SAVE FILE box with the mouse. 8.2 RESTRICTIONS There are some restrictions and limitations which apply to the TALKING SPELLER TUTOR. One such restriction is that you cannot add new word/phrase groups, or delete existing ones, using the TAILOR program. You may add or delete lines using some other editor, like ED. And, using TAILOR, you can redefine existing lines to take on some completely different meaning. Another restriction is that, for a given file, you cannot exceed ninety records (test-sequence entries). Ninety is, after all, a large number of word/phrases to test yourself on in a single sitting. You are much better off breaking your test-sequence files up into smaller increments, of not more than 50-60 entries. Finally, you must not include any 'commas', 'equal-signs', or 'semicolons' in your test-sequence files, in any field. Periods and hyphens are permitted, and can be used effectively to break up separately-sounded syllables in phonetic spellings. Commas will fragment your input line, and must be totally avoided. Equal-signs and semicolons are used to separate fields, and likewise cannot be otherwise used. 9.0 CONCLUSION AND FINAL RECOMMENDATIONS The best advice for spelling your words phonetically is just "spell it like it sounds". If you want to break up words into syllables, which the AMIGA can better pronounce, you may insert periods or hyphens between the syllables. To shorten a vowel sound, follow it with an 'h', such as FAHR, WIHNTER, or SHAREWARE - PLEASE PAY IF YOU USE TALKING SPELLER TUTOR page 12 WOH.TER. Often, the AMIGA will pronounce the words as spelled with sufficient clarity to permit comprehension, so that no phonetic spelling is needed. For additional guidance on phonetic spelling for the AMIGA, refer to Appendix H of your AmigaBASIC Manual. Disregard the paragraphs which address STRESS AND INTONATION, inasmuch as these sections do not apply to the TALKING SPELLER TUTOR usage. Enjoy your use of the TALKING SPELLER TUTOR. And remember to occasionally backup the disk(s) that contain your TUTOR source files, just in case you have a disk failure. And copy your TUTOR and TAILOR programs for backup as well - neither are copy-protected. Because these two programs are not copy-protected, those users who are comfortable in BASIC programs may wish to effect customized enhancements to the programs. As you wish! You are also encouraged to pass the program and data files on to your friends and associates who have Amiga computers. If you use the TALKING SPELLER TUTOR, please send five dollars to: James W. Kummer 784 South Hoyt Street Lakewood, CO 80226 Thanks! SHAREWARE - PLEASE PAY IF YOU USE