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- _1_3. _Q_U_E_S_T_I_O_N_S & _A_N_S_W_E_R_S
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- 1111)))) HHHHoooowwww ccccaaaannnn IIII mmmmaaaakkkkeeee eeeellllvvvviiiissss rrrruuuunnnn ffffaaaasssstttteeeerrrr uuuunnnnddddeeeerrrr DDDDOOOOSSSS????
-
- There are several things you can do. The first thing
- to do is get a good screen driver such as NANSI.SYS.
- This can speed up screen redrawing by as much as a
- factor of eight! The DOS-specific part of section 12
- tells you how to do this.
-
- You might also consider reducing the size of the
- blocks that elvis uses. You'll need to recompile
- Elvis to do this. The default BLKSIZE is 1024 byte
- for the DOS version of Elvis, which means that for
- each keystroke that you insert, elvis must shift an
- average of about 500 bytes. That's a lot to ask from
- a little old 5MHz 8088. A BLKSIZE of 512 bytes might
- be more appropriate.
-
- If you're _r_e_a_l_l_y desperate for more speed, you might
- want to make Elvis store its temporary files on a RAM
- disk. However, this limits the size of the file you
- can edit, and it eliminates any chance you may have
- had to recover your work after a power failure or
- system crash, but it might be worth it; you decide.
- To do this, add ":set dir=R:\" (or whatever your RAM
- disk's name is) to the _e_l_v_i_s._r_c file.
-
- Next, consider turning off the "sync" option. When
- the sync option is turned on, Elvis will close the
- temporary file and reopen it after every change, in
- order to force DOS to update the file's directory
- entry. If you put ":set nosync" into the _e_l_v_i_s._r_c
- file, then elvis will only close the file when you
- start editing a different text file, or when you're
- exiting Elvis. Consequently, there is no chance that
- you'll be able to recover your changes after a power
- failure... so if you're going to this, then you might
- as well store the temp files on the RAM disk, too.
-
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- 2222)))) WWWWhhhheeeerrrreeee''''ssss tttthhhheeee <<<<EEEEsssscccc>>>> kkkkeeeeyyyy oooonnnn aaaa DDDDEEEECCCC kkkkeeeeyyyybbbbooooaaaarrrrdddd????
-
- I don't know. Maybe the <F11> key? You could always
- use ":map!" to make some other key act like the <Esc>
- key. If all else fails, use <Control><[>.
-
-
- 3333)))) IIIIssss tttthhhheeeerrrreeee aaaa wwwwaaaayyyy ttttoooo sssshhhhoooowwww wwwwhhhhiiiicccchhhh kkkkeeeeyyyyssss ddddoooo wwwwhhhhaaaatttt????
-
- Yes. The command ":map" will show what each key does
- in command mode, and ":map!" (with an exclamation
- mark) shows what each key does in input mode.
-
-
-
- June 13, 1992
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- 13-2 QUESTIONS & ANSWERS 13-2
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- The table is divided into three columns: the key's
- label, the characters that it sends, and the charac-
- ters that Elvis pretends you typed.
-
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- 4444)))) HHHHoooowwww ccccaaaannnn IIII mmmmaaaakkkkeeee EEEEllllvvvviiiissss ddddiiiissssppppllllaaaayyyy lllloooonnnngggg lllliiiinnnneeeessss lllliiiikkkkeeee tttthhhheeee rrrreeeeaaaallll vvvviiii????
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- You can't yet. The next version of Elvis shouldsup-
- port this, though.
-
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- 5555)))) IIII ccccaaaannnn''''tttt rrrreeeeccccoooovvvveeeerrrr mmmmyyyy tttteeeexxxxtttt [[[[uuuunnnnddddeeeerrrr MMMMSSSS----DDDDOOOOSSSS oooorrrr AAAAttttaaaarrrriiii TTTTOOOOSSSS]]]]....
- AAAAccccccccoooorrrrddddiiiinnnngggg ttttoooo tttthhhheeee ddddiiiirrrreeeeccccttttoooorrrryyyy lllliiiissssttttiiiinnnngggg,,,, tttthhhheeee tttteeeemmmmppppoooorrrraaaarrrryyyy ffffiiiilllleeee iiiissss
- 0000 bbbbyyyytttteeeessss lllloooonnnngggg.... WWWWhhhhaaaatttt wwwweeeennnntttt wwwwrrrroooonnnngggg????
-
- MS-DOS and TOS only update a file's directory entry
- when the file is closed. If the system crashes while
- the file is still open, then the file's length is
- stored as 0 bytes. The ":set sync" option is sup-
- posed to prevent this; you probably turned it off in
- the interest of speed, right?
-
- Under MS-DOS [I don't know about TOS], you should
- delete the empty temporary file, and then run
- CHKDSK/F. This _m_i_g_h_t find the data that belonged in
- the empty file, and place it in a new file with a
- name like "000001.CHK" -- something like that. You
- can then try to extract the text from that temporary
- file by giving the command "elvprsv -R 000001.chk
- >goodnews.txt". If you're lucky, then your text
- might be in GOODNEWS.TXT.
-
-
- 6666)))) WWWWhhhhaaaatttt iiiissss tttthhhheeee mmmmoooosssstttt ccccuuuurrrrrrrreeeennnntttt vvvveeeerrrrssssiiiioooonnnn ooooffff EEEEllllvvvviiiissss????
-
- Each version of Elvis that is released to the public
- has a version number of the form "number point
- number". As I write this, the most current version
- of elvis is 1.6.
-
- The intermediate steps between one release and the
- next are labeled with the _n_e_x_t version number, with a
- letter appended. For example, after 1.4 was
- released, I started working on 1.5a. I am currently
- working on 2.0a. When Elvis reaches a stable state,
- I'll call it 2.0 and release it.
-
- Sometimes a beta-test version of elvis will be avail-
- able via anonymous FTP from m2xenix.psg.com, in the
- directory "pub/elvis/beta".
-
-
- 7777)))) IIII oooonnnnllllyyyy ggggooootttt eeeexxxxeeeeccccuuuuttttaaaabbbblllleeeessss,,,, bbbbuuuutttt nnnnoooowwww IIII wwwwaaaannnntttt tttthhhheeee ssssoooouuuurrrrcccceeee ccccooooddddeeee....
- WWWWhhhheeeerrrreeee ccccaaaannnn IIII ggggeeeetttt iiiitttt????
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- June 13, 1992
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- 13-3 QUESTIONS & ANSWERS 13-3
-
-
- If you have access to the Internet, then you should
- be able to fetch it from one of the public archives
- such as ppppllllaaaaiiiinnnnssss....nnnnooooddddaaaakkkk....eeeedddduuuu. It is accessible via
- anonymous FTP, or via an email server named
- "archive-server@plains.nodak.edu". Elvis is located
- in the directory "/pub/Minix/all.contrib".
-
- I will also offer it to the C Users' Group. They
- sell C source code for us$8 per diskette (or slightly
- more outside North America). Their phone number is
- (913) 841-1631, and their address is:
-
- The C Users' Group
- PO Box 3127
- Lawrence KS 66046-0127
-
-
-
- 8888)))) IIIIssss tttthhhhiiiissss sssshhhhaaaarrrreeeewwwwaaaarrrreeee,,,, oooorrrr ppppuuuubbbblllliiiicccc ddddoooommmmaaaaiiiinnnn,,,, oooorrrr wwwwhhhhaaaatttt????
-
- It is not public domain; it is copyrighted by me,
- Steve Kirkendall. However, this particular version
- is freely redistributable, in either source form or
- executable form. (I would prefer that you give
- copies away for free, complete with the full source
- code... but I'm not going to force you.)
-
- It is not shareware; you aren't expected to send me
- anything. You can use it without guilt.
-
- It is not "copylefted." I hold a copyright, but
- currently I have not added any of the usual restric-
- tions that you would find on copylefted software. If
- people start doing really obnoxious things to Elvis,
- then I will start adding restrictions to subsequent
- versions, but earlier versions won't be affected.
- (So far, everybody has been pretty good about this so
- no restrictions have been necessary.)
-
-
- 9999)))) CCCCaaaannnn IIII rrrreeeeuuuusssseeee ppppaaaarrrrttttssss ooooffff yyyyoooouuuurrrr ssssoooouuuurrrrcccceeee ccccooooddddeeee????
-
- Yes. Please be careful, though, to make sure that
- the code really is mine. Some of the code was con-
- tributed by other people, and I don't have the
- authority to give you permission to use it. The
- author's name can be found near the top of each
- source file. If it says "Steve Kirkendall" then you
- may use it; otherwise, you'd better contact the
- author first.
-
- Please don't remove my name from the source code. If
- you modify the source, please make a note of that
- fact in a comment near the top of the source code.
-
-
-
- June 13, 1992
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- 13-4 QUESTIONS & ANSWERS 13-4
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- And, finally, please mention my name in your documen-
- tation.
-
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- 11110000))))CCCCaaaannnn EEEEllllvvvviiiissss wwwwoooorrrrkkkk wwwwiiiitttthhhh nnnnoooonnnn----AAAASSSSCCCCIIIIIIII ffffiiiilllleeeessss????
-
- Elvis can't edit binary files because it can't handle
- the NUL character, and because of line-length limita-
- tions. However, it is 8-bit clean so you should be
- able to edit any European extended ASCII file without
- any surprises.
-
- Elvis has also been modified to work with 16-bit
- character sets. Yongguang Zhang (ygz@cs.purdue.edu)
- has created a Chinese version of Elvis that uses 16-
- bit characters and runs under cxterm (Chinese X-term)
- on X-windows systems. Junichiro Itoh
- (itojun@foretune.co.jp) has modified Elvis to edit
- Japanese text under MS-DOS.
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- June 13, 1992
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