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-
- NEWPAPER
- by Jim Button
-
-
- VERSION HISTORY:
-
- Version 1.0 created 7/28/90
- The original
- Version 1.1 created 7/30/90
- Makes automatic choice of tiled or un-tiled wallpaper
- Version 1.1b created 8/30/90
- No changes. Decided to make the source code available.
- Version 1.2 created 16 Oct 1990
- NewPaper now records whether tiling is required for each BMP,
- This information is stored in WIN.INI.
- If it doesn't know about a file, it asks you.
- Version 1.2 by Roger Hadgraft.
-
-
- IT'S TOTALLY FREE
-
- Here's a new program from Jim Button. It's the best kind. It's free! No
- obligation, and no strings attached! I donate it to the public domain.
- I hope you like it. It sure is useful.
-
- Modifications by Roger Hadgraft, Civil Engineering,
- Monash University, Clayton, Vic. 3168. Australia.
- hadgraft@civeng.monash.edu.au.
-
-
- WHAT IT DOES
-
- It changes your desktop wallpaper each time you run windows.
- So, you can have several wallpaper files in your windows subdirectory.
- Each time you run windows, a different wallpaper will be selected.
-
-
- REQUIREMENTS
-
- NEWPAPER requires Windows 3.0 or later and one or more BMP files
- (to use as wallpaper) in your Windows subdirectory.
-
-
- HOW TO INSTALL IT
-
- First, copy the program NEWPAPER.EXE into a subdirectory on your PATH.
-
- Then use a text editor to change the WIN.INI file in your Windows
- subdirectory. (Make sure that your WIN.INI file gets saved back in
- ASCII format when you're finished.)
-
- Inside your WIN.INI file, you should find a line that looks like this:
-
- [windows]
-
- Somewhere in the next few lines that follow the [windows] section, you
- should find a line that starts out like this:
-
- load=
-
- There may be some file names following the load= text, for example
-
- load=eyes.exe
-
- If you don't find a load= line, add one.
- Add the statement NEWPAPER.EXE to the load= line.
- Here are some sample load= lines...
-
- load=newpaper.exe
- load=eyes.exe blanker.exe newpaper.exe
-
- Notice that you must have a space between each program listed on
- the load= line.
-
- You can use the RUN= line if you wish.
-
-
- HOW TO USE IT
-
- This is the easy part. After you've installed NEWPAPER.EXE, just
- run windows. There's nothing else to do. Every time you run
- windows, you should get a different desktop wallpaper.
-
- You can fill your WINDOWS subdirectory with as many bitmap files as
- you like. (These are file names that end with the suffix ".BMP").
-
- NOTE: NEWPAPER doesn't actually change the wallpaper you are
- looking at. It lets Windows do that. So, if you run NEWPAPER from
- your desktop, you will not see a change in your wallpaper. The
- wallpaper will get changed the next time Windows starts.
-
- You may have to indicate whether a BMP is to be tiled or centered.
- More details are contained in the next section.
-
-
- HOW IT WORKS
-
- NEWPAPER changes your WIN.INI file each time it runs. There is a
- line inside of WIN.INI that says "Wallpaper=", followed by the name of
- a bitmap file. NEWPAPER just looks at all the bitmap files in your
- windows subdirectory, and changes the "Wallpaper=" line to point to a
- new bitmap file. Which new bitmap file? The next one in your windows
- subdirectory. After it gets to the last one, it will start again at the
- top.
-
- This version (1.2) of NEWPAPER also makes a decision about whether
- to put your wallpaper up "tiled" or un-tiled. To do this, it looks
- for the setting in the WIN.INI file. If no information is available,
- it asks you. Simply click on YES for tiling, and NO for centering.
- Click on CANCEL for don't know, and you'll get centering, and you'll
- get asked the same question the next time that bitmap is to be used.
- Hopefully you'll know which choice to make next time! After NewPaper
- has been once through all your bitmaps, you won't hear from it again
- unless you add a new bitmap.
-
- The program only runs for a brief instant when Windows starts up. Then
- it goes away. So it doesn't waste any memory or CPU cycles after it
- has done its work.
-
-
- ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
-
- Thanks to Jim Button for the original version.
-
-
-
- CAUTION
-
- You use this program at your own risk. While I have tested it, I
- have not tested it formally (with a team of beta testers, etc.).
- I've tested it extensively myself. I hope it works for everyone else!
- Note (30 August 1990): there are now several thousand known users
- of NEWPAPER. No problems have yet been reported.
-
-
- ADDENDUM
-
- Yes, I co-invented the Shareware concept. But simple, easy to create
- utility programs like this should be donated to the public domain.
- After all, it only took me two hours to create this little gem. And
- it wasn't two hours of lost time... I learned more about Windows
- programming in the process. So please enjoy!
-
- Isn't Windows fun? Suddenly, computing in the DOS world is exciting
- again!
-
-
-
-
- Jim Button
-
- July 28, 1990
-