Text 7318, 177 rader
Skriven 2006-11-05 18:26:50 av Sean Dennis (1:18/200)
   Kommentar till text 7309 av Ian Hoare (1:275/311)
Ärende: Behind!
===============
Hello, Ian.

Replying to a message of Ian Hoare to Sean Dennis:

I'm going to just quote a little to save people room on my reply (I know that
not everyone gets their feeds for free!). ;)

 IH> Do you intend the program to be able to read MM files directly then?
 IH> As stored by MM, I mean?

Yes, that's exactly what I'd like to do. :)  I have my ways of wanting to do
this (using typed files).  On a side note, if you and I want to continue
discussion of the more arcane technical details, jump on over to my board and
we can chat there.  I really don't want to clutter up the echo with our nerdly
talk. <G>

 IH> advanced (as well as basic) options. It's an excellent method of
 IH> making the program very flexible yet easy to set up for relative
 IH> beginners. 

There hopefully won't be too much to configure.  I will, though, get the basic
program written then "retrofit" configurable color choices. :)  That way, you
can make your own custom colors, et al.

 IH> Okay, I've looked that up. The equivalent of a Dos box, like
 IH> Mealmaster then.

I apologize; I should have called it Command Line Interface (Windows' term).  I
call it VIO (Virtual Input/Output) in OS/2 terms.

 IH> What do you envisage it being able to do that MM can't? (see below)

Well, the subsearch thingie as well as being not so structured and rigid as MM.

 IH> Simple. Actually, I do hope you implement the "absent" search with -
 IH> it's one of the features whereby MM still outperforms NYC, IMO.

Absent search?  Searching for something that isn't in a recipe and the recipie
shows up?

 IH> It's not fear, I just think they're user hostile, there's no intuitive
 IH> link between the keystroke and the function. Look, I'll give an

8< snipped

Okay, I see what you're talking about.  However, being a former heavy UNIX
user, I happen to like F-keys. <G>  But I understand what you mean IRT the F
keys for moving.  No.  Here's what I'd probably use:

[ Backwards
] Forewards
CTRL Home - the beginning of the database
CTRL End  - the end of the database
Home - beginning of recipe
End - end of recipe

The F keys would be for something akin to:

F1 - Help
F2/ALT-A - Add a recipe
F3/ALT-L (mnemonic: Look) - Search for a recipe
F4/ALT-P - Print a recipe
F5/ALT-S - Save database
F12/ALT-X - Exit the program

and et cetera.

A little secret: I have pretty severe carpul tunnel syndrome in both hands
(enough to where I am awake at night with it).  Doing the "metakeys" (two or
more keys at once) is difficult for me, so that's where the F-keys come in.

Yes, not for everyone, but important for some.

 IH> Ah... I had thought that with modern compilers, they understood the
 IH> different GUIs of Linux and Windows at the least. I don't understand
 IH> about Dos. Didn't you say that it wouldn't work with 16 bit O/S? Will
 IH> you therefore be restricting the prog to 32 bit dos? Or have I
 IH> misunderstood? If the total number of PC users of a 32 bit DOS who
 IH> don't have Windows exceeds 100 I'll eat my socks. Come to that, I'll
 IH> eat yours as well!

There are semi-cross-platform GUIs, but from a programmer's standpoint, they're
a real pain in the a**.  Double the code, double the bugs and double the
program size.

This program will at first run solely on Win32 and OS/2.  Why?  I use a 32-bit
compiler.  When I get further along, I can add additional code to make a DOS
version.  It's actually harder to do things with DOS with DOS's memory
limitations, etc.

But, there is a 32-bit DOS version out there. <G>

First, I will actually design this to run under OS/2, of course.  But
thankfully, I just "flip a switch" in my compiler and it can spit out Win32
code.

 IH> An icon - with respect - is not a pretty picture, it takes up far less

An icon is a pain too.  In order to use icons, there would be some serious
overhead.

 IH> Meaning? More records presumably, and more and larger field?

Yes.

About conversions: that will come much later, but I may do limited ability.

I believe that a cook would be far better at doing a conversion than a program
would. :)

 IH> However, the way in which NYC deals with resized recipes is clunky, in
 IH> that it doesn't like printing a resized recipe without saving it
 IH> first, which is a PITA. MM is better in this respect. 

Doubling and tripling wouldn't be too hard to start with.

 IH> I see. So, I ask again, what do you envisage it doing that MM doesn't?
 IH> Seems to me that's the question then. MM works well in a Dos window,
 IH> though only if you can cobble together a printer driver for it. But
 IH> if the main weakness of MM is in its lack of printer drivers, and
 IH> your clone would have no way of driving about 60% of the newer
 IH> printers on the market because it has no USB support.... Do I need to
 IH> say more?

Okay, here's the skinny: no one is interested in doing CLI-mode USB support,
period.  Unless a miracle happens and I can find the code to do it, the program
will simply print to the following devices: LPT1, LPT2, PRN or CON (the
screen).  PRN is another name for the printer.

This is not to sound arrogant, but since no one in here is actively
programming, I do not expect anyone to understand how much of a royal pain it
is to get USB printers working.  I don't even have USB enabled on my OS/2
machine, let alone have an USB printer.  I have a HP DeskJet 500 (from the
early 90s) and a Panasonic KX-P2324 (132 column, 24 pin dot matrix).  That's
it.  However, there IS a way under Windows to assign a USB printer to a LPT
port or so I'm told.  I will look into it.

 IH> And yes, I DO have very definite ideas about what a recipe program
 IH> should do. I wrote my own back in 1984 or so for the Spectrum, which
 IH> got into the best seller charts, and have frequently havered over the
 IH> idea of doing it again, but there are so many on the market nowadays
 IH> (which shows there's no clear market leader - with the implications
 IH> that has) and programming a PC is such a different affair to what
 IH> programming a spectrum in basic and machine code 20+ years ago, that
 IH> I've chickened out. 

I can still use your ideas.  You do know that there's Visual BASIC out there
that this can be written in. :)

However, these are my main points for this program:

- As small as possible
- Able to run under Win32, OS/2 and DOS (possibly Linux if I can get the right
stuff I need)
- Simple yet efficient
- Configurable yet not too overpowering
- Does what you need, nothing more (meaning feature creep)
- Stay freeware!  As Michael has noted, the more I put into this, the more I
may need to get out of it.  But I can assure you that there are no plans for
this being a shareware program.  Only if you hogtie me to get out Delphi, learn
it and try to work in it.  However, a little point: a lot of this code that I'm
using now will work in a Delphi environment, so there could be possibly (this
would be a LONG way down the road) a nice neat Win32 version.

 IH> Grin!! I think I should shut up.

Rather, your ideas (as everyone's) are very important to me.  Believe it or
not, I'm mostly writing this for you all in the echo. <G>  I'm in it for the
learning process and the nice enjoyment of writing a non-BBS related program.

Later,
Sean

// sean@outpostbbs.net | http://outpostbbs.net | ICQ: 19965647

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