9:00 AM PDT Sunday, September 27, 1987 (Sysop Tony) Good Morning. (Sysop Denny) Hi Tony (Sysop Tony) Denny, If I knew you was gonna be here I'da slept in. (Phil) Well, at least you have some one to chat with (Sysop Denny) Well, I'm only here for about 10 min. Working today. (Sysop Tony) Well, I got home at 4 am. (Phil) Gee, heavy date, Tony? (Sysop Denny) Well, I know how that feels! (Sysop Tony) Setting up for the "Osmonds" concert in Reno tonight. (Phil) Gawd -- how wholesome! (Sysop Tony) Would you believe... their crew chief wouldn't allow anyone who smoked to work the call! (grin) (Phil) Fascinating! (Sysop Tony) Mormons, you know. Well, does anyone have a topic to get us going this morning? There's one. .... ga Bob (bob judge) can any one give an example of how to respond to "oldest file in days(?) option prompt when "browsing"? (Sysop Tony) With a number like 7 for 7 days old. That sort of thing. (bob judge) thanks (Sysop Tony) Lessee.... you can get an alphabetical list specifying age in days, with the command BRO *.*/age:7 (bob judge) interesting; thanks again (Sysop Tony) Well, as they normally list, you get last in, first out in the list. It's so much nicer to have them alphabetical. ga Denny (Sysop Denny) That's neat, I never thought about using the *.* I suppose that would work with S *.* as well. (Sysop Tony) Yes, it does. Those are called "switches"... there are several of them ... (Sysop Denny) (or S *.* /DES) (Sysop Tony) *.* is one, /DES is one, /KEY is another, and /AGE is the fourth you can combine any two. Like in S /AGE:7/DES etc. (bob judge) thanks very much (Sysop Denny) I thought the only way to get a alphabetical list was to S A?????.* then B???? etc. Thats much better. (Sysop Tony) Hmmmmm.... gee..... that should have been in the syop manual. It's been around for a long time. I used to use it for catalogging, and now Eiji uses it regularly. (Sysop Denny) (what Sysop manual (grin)) (Sysop Tony) Oh No! You don't mean to tell me... (pause) Where's my slides? (Tom S.) Hi...Q about the Tandy 600 I have been working for hours trying to format a document it's the page length that I'm having trouble with. doesn't seem to change when different top and bottom margins are added. (Sysop Tony) Well, page length is always the same 6 lines per inch, 66 lines per page. (Tom S.) That's what I thought but when you change top and bottom margins then do a repaginate the page breaks should reflect the margin changes, shouldn't they? (Sysop Tony) Yes, if the margins affect the actual formatting. If you don't quite fill a page, they might not have any affect. (Tom S.) Well, with top and bottom margins set at 3, 4, 5, or 6 the page length still only fills 2/3 of a page. (Sysop Tony) Well, assuming you have more than 2/3 page of data and it continues on the next page.... and it only gives you 2/3 of a page too then it would appear that it's not formatting correctly. Are you specifying "Formatted" in the Print menu? (Tom S.) I think that I have specified "formatted" but I'll take a break to check. I am printing a four page document, and there is only 2/3 of a page on each page regardless of type of printer I'll go 10/10 and check. Thanks! (Sysop Tony) Wait! That isn't right, of course. Leave me a message on the board to remind me and I'll try it after the CO, and get back to you. OK? (Tom S.) Ok, Tony. Thanks. (Sysop Tony) OK.... on to Larry. ga Larry (Larry R.) OK some programs have hot keys; that is, when you enter a key, you do not have to enter each time just press a key. I want to incorporate that feature into a project. How do I write the Input or whichever lines to get that feature? (Sysop Tony) OK there are two ways, depending on whether you want a flashing cursor on the screen to indicate waiting for input. If you do, then you use the form Q$=INPUT$(1) ..... The program will wait forever for a keypress; you may need to follow that with an IF-THEN to interpret the input: IF Q$ = "Y" OR Q$ = "y" THEN (Yes...) The above gives you a flashing cursor. The second way is with a self-looping statement as in: 10 A$=INKEY$:IF A$ = "" THEN 10 This form presents no cursor, and will continue to loop until any key is pressed. (Larry R.) So I use one of these lines in lieu of the usual 10 INPUT"PRESS KEY";A$ type of line??? (Sysop Tony) Yes..... I'd do this: 10 PRINT"Press any key ";:Q$=INPUT$(1) (Larry R.) okay let's see if Ted has something to add??? (Ted) You can also enable the function keys if you don't want to hang up the program (Larry R.) What I want is to set up a program where the operator can press any number key and get a randomized response, or press any letter key to end the program and return to either BASIC or to the top menu, via a closing screen The idea is to make a model 100 program that will function like one of those old 8 balls that you ask it a question flip the ball over and a random answer appears. Is there already such a critter in DL??? After all why reinvent thr wheel??? (Sysop Tony) Function keys don't really apply to what you want to do, but of course they COULD be used. There are other approaches, too. But there isn't a program of that sort available here yet. (Larry R.) RATS!!! (Phil) [An opportunity, Larry!] (GENE NESTRO) What about the 2 or 3 AI progs here? they can be altered. (Sysop Tony) Possibly... Can you point Larry to some names? (Darn noisy phone line today!) (GENE NESTRO) I'm looking up the latest UP but 1 of the original was "Deety" (Larry R.) Which DL??? (GENE NESTRO) [SEARCHING] (Sysop Tony) I think it would be easier to start from scratch. You have a three line program and a bunch of branch print statements. Sort of like chinese fortune cookies. (Help! I'm being held prisoner in a Chinese bakery!) (Larry R.) That, I believe, is the basic idea. I guess I can go play with that. I want to take junior here to a hallowe'en party as a fortune teller. (GENE NESTRO) [ DL 5 ] (Tom S.) Format was on "yes" left a message for you under T 600 (Sysop Tony) OK. Anyone else on Larry's program idea? (GENE NESTRO) Latest UP was "DEJAH.BA" dl5 ga done (Sysop Tony) OK (Larry R.) Bye 4 now (Sysop Tony) Hmmmm I remember one such program... It's not here, it's on a North Star I have that's called Zodiac. You give it your zodiac sign and it comes back with a perfectly AWFUL character analysis. (grin) "You are a shallow individual. Self-centered, and ambiguous." etc... Guess I could port it over, if I could find it. (grin) (GENE NESTRO) RE: New use for M100 Have a client who uses the 100 to prime his 1200 ie, his printer to use the 1200. (Sysop Tony) On the topic of odd uses There was a fellow here some time ago, who used the 100 as a diagnostic tool for printers. His program would output various commands and the printer would step through it's paces. Interesting. (GENE NESTRO) Yup! (Sysop Tony) It's too bad the external A-D converters cost so much. A lot could be done with the 100's. (GENE NESTRO) Here's one for you...the month of Dec, I sold 26 m100 or 102's & applied for a part time job with RS & didn't get hired (Sysop Tony) Well, you wouldn't want to work for minimum wage, anyway. The salaries for salesmen there are really considered to be sub-par for sales people. It's very low, plus a small commission. It's so bad, actually, that there is a constant turnover of sales folks in the computer stores as they make contacts through sales, and then move into the commercial world. ... Anyway, back to the printer situation there are several printer "setup" programs in DL2. I have one such for the Epson's that I can load into one computer, set the printer the way I want it, then switch to the other computer for data printing. It's useful. (GENE NESTRO) My favorite, that I never Up uses the F keys [ Up = uploaded ] (Sysop Tony) Well, that's an idea... but it would seem limited. How do you do it, exactly, in the program? (GENE NESTRO) ON KEY etc I'd upload it, but I think there are enuff progs of that type (Sysop Tony) But that only gives you 8 choices unless you use sub-menus. (GENE NESTRO) rite on the 8 choices but I have one in the DL that gives 12 0r 14 - DMP 105 specific (Sysop Tony) I think I have 12 on my menu, but probably only use 3 or 4 of them with any regularity. So a function key driven one would probably work for me, too. It's just that it _seems_ so limiting. (grin) Any more on this topic? (GENE NESTRO) it is! but I very seldom use underline etc ga done (Sysop Tony) Actually, I don't use underline that much either but I do use Pica, Elite, Compressed, and Superscript a lot. I also use 8 LPI occassionally. There is a tip file I did once on archiving documents in subscript, at 10 LPI to save mucho on paper. (GENE NESTRO) I'm familiar on your tip I use it! (Sysop Tony) Great. You know, I did that about the same time as the PHONEBOOK program which used some of the same techniques and there has been a lot of interest in that phone book program. I ran across a guy at work a couple weeks ago who I didn't know from Adam, and he had a list of stuff produced with that program! Floored me! (GENE NESTRO) You remember me - I'm the guy who reworked Phone.BA with...Lildos Etc & printed Disk Directories (Sysop Tony) Yeah, yeah I remember. I've been working on a list of frequencies used by the Hotel/Resort/Casinos in Northern Nevada using the program, for the benefit of those who want to evesdrop. (GENE NESTRO) How do you get these freqs? I'm only 2 hrs from Atlantic City (Sysop Tony) Well.... first, you need a scanner radio, so you can monitor the business band and you can figure out, from listening, what some of them are. ... There's also a company in one of the Eastern states that publishes a book listing many of the license holders on the business band. They also have some listings, sorted by state. I can get you an address if you want it. Other than that, you need to ask around. The Radio Shack books are no good unless you're looking for Police and "Public Service" freqs. (GENE NESTRO) Be interested But how does the FCC fell about business bands I assume they're not private (Sysop Tony) No, not really "private"... they're shared frequencies There is, of course, an old law stating that you can monitor any channel you want but can't disclose the substance of any communications you overhear. (GENE NESTRO) old law "The airways belong to the American Public" [ FCC ] (Sysop Tony) True... but like everything that's regulated, there are lawyers involved. And when they get involved, they muddle up everything for everybody. (GENE NESTRO) Years ago I rigged CB radios in autos with phone patches at a base station for telephone from car (Sysop Tony) Yeah, that was done in the early days. The CB band is now virtually unregulated. You buy a radio, and assign yourself call letters, and go on. Unless you are causing somebody some real interference, you'll be totally ignored. Interesting on the phone patches, though they're not legal on the lower band, and were recently outlawed on the GMRS 460 mhz band, too. Now if you want a legal phone patch you gotta get a business or ham license. (GENE NESTRO) I used CB channels below CH 1... I guess about 26.100 etc (Sysop Tony) Tch, Tch, Tch. Illegal, you know. Lots of folks in the LA area switched channel 10 crystals putting the Rec Xtal in the Xmt socket, and vice versa. It threw them below the band, and on an even freq, instead of an odd freq. Some fellows also used the 5 channels "hidden" in among the original 23 for RC uses. (GENE NESTRO) You bringing back mems I always used the "dime" side 26.100 instead of 26.105 ("nickel" side) (Sysop Tony) Ah, the old days. ..... I remember them well. Palomar linears.... (foot warmers, the truckers called them....) etc. ...... Little activity on CB any more..... I understand that a lot of hams are buying old CB's and converting them for use on 10 meter phone. There's even some info on how to make them into FM transceivers. I think novices now can use phone in 10 meters, and it's a low-cost start for them. (GENE NESTRO) I used to run 250 Watts in car & 2000+ at base station (Sysop Tony) Oh, you were one of those guys who could be heard all accross the country, huh? (GENE NESTRO) I wonder if radio trans (CB - HAM) were prone to buy m100 Yes I talked all over the world on CB bands (Sysop Tony) I don't know. But CompuServe's CB emulator is one of the most popular products on the service. They have two forums to carry the traffic. I guess those who want to "reach out and chew somebody's ear" are still around. (GENE NESTRO) The 1st time and the only, time I tried CB on CMPSV I erroneously tuned into the "gay" channel It was fun!!! (Sysop Tony) Ha Ha Ha.... I understand there is a lot of "sex" going on over there. Or a lot of talk, anyway! Some of the handles are outrageous. (GENE NESTRO) It was "hard core" but fun (Sysop Tony) Well, due to lack of interest If no one has any pressing questions, we might as well close this... (Gerald G) ? (Sysop Tony) conference early, and save you all some connect charges. Any objections? (Gerald G) ? (Sysop Tony) Oh, OK.... ga Gerald (Gerald G) With regard to the program PRINTR.100 I used a DWP210 printer and I would like to use 8 1/2 X 11 " sheets of paper Is there anyway or any program that will count the number of lines in a text file and let me continue on to the next page without losing the whole file. (Sysop Tony) You should be able to add that to the program without too much trouble. That's a good question for the message board, since we can go look at the program and give you an exact answer. But in general, somewhere in the program there is a statement that sends output to the printer like in "LPRINT A$" or something; right after that, you can add a counter line, to count up the lines sent, and do an automatic top of form command, or stop when you hit a certain number. For example, if you want 50 lines, you could say L=L+1:IF L/50 = INT(L/50) THEN LPRINT(FF CHARCTER):Q$=INPUT$(1) (Phil) Yes, there are such printing programs in the Forum. What you want is a "Wait between pages" option. One I know of is PRN100, a very good M/L program And I suspect that PRTEXT, TXTFMT, QIKPRT & PRINT.100 (all DL2) also have that option. (Bill H.) I use a program called Men-u-tility from Custom software that does that It asks for top- side and legnth and spaces as many as you want at the bottom for the break in paper also I believe the RFU program in the DLs also do that You can cOntact Rush Caley for info on the program.. (Gerald G) Got it in my buffer, will analyze and get back either on the board or here next week. (Sysop Tony) OK... ga Gene (GENE NESTRO) If this helps, Phils suggestion of PRN100 gives the option of reviewing all pages before they are printed ala pixels on the M100 screen (Sysop Tony) OK... any more on this topic? Pixel plotting is very interesting... (Gerald G) Thank you. (Sysop Tony) I recall we have a program in the DL's that does just that, and nothing more. PLOT.BA? (DL4) Hmmm why isn't that in DL2? Will have to see about that later. (GENE NESTRO) [ PIXMAP.BA ? ] (Sysop Tony) Maybe. Gotta check. Maybe it needs to be converted for the 200. Phil, are you there? (grin) ga Bill (Bill H.) I believe the program I was refering to is RFU.100 in DL 7 (Sysop Tony) Could be. As I recall, though that program needed some subroutine programs also loaded or something. Right? (Bill H.) Don't believe so its been some time since I use it as it took up a lot of bytes and menutility uses under 2000 in ML (Sysop Tony) I recall that RFU went through several generations, and was even published in P100. We may currently have a self-contained version. But I seem to recall the original did work in "modules". If you wanted to sort, you had to load the sort module if you wanted to search/replace, you had to load that module. the RFU program was little more than a menu program. Anyway any more on this fellows? (Phil) [not from me!] (Bill H.) negitive good buddy 10-4 (Sysop Tony) ----------------- | | | @#@#@#@ | | # ^ ^ # | | -(o)-(o)- | | ( _U_ ) | | \ `-' / | | \___/ | | | ----------------- The Great ynoT (Phil) bye-bye! (GENE NESTRO) 77's upon your little bodies SUL (Bill H.) [thought that was 88s ] (GENE NESTRO) [ maybe it was I recall 33's 77's & 88's] (Bill H.) [ 73s & 88s] in L.A.] (GENE NESTRO) You are rite!!! (Bill H.) [oh my - what has this forum come to? ] Tony did you leave ? (GENE NESTRO) [ lately I've been on for the full 2 hrs ] (Sysop Tony) Looks like more CB/Ham stuff this morning, than anything else. (GENE NESTRO) SU all later done (Sysop Tony) But Gene Is it worth the 12 bucks it costs? (GENE NESTRO) I think so I really enjoy it...got me trapped for full $12 huh? (Sysop Tony) Well, that's at least what it costs to be here for two hours. It's interesting what folks are willing to pay that to get answers to their questions. (Bill H.) thats why I come in late cause I cant leave til the funs over (Sysop Tony) Well, since it's just us three ... (GENE NESTRO) You guys on the west coast have to start at 9:00? (Sysop Tony) Go home! Save some money. Yeah... It used to 8 am when Dave did it. Terrible! most of us are also up late fielding the late Sat. night questions. We tried evenings, but they didn't catch on. (GENE NESTRO) I think I was on 1 or 2 Weds (i think) (Sysop Tony) Could be. I don't recall. (GENE NESTRO) Well I'm outa here bye (Sysop Tony) Bye Gene. See you next week. (Sysop Tony) Well, it looks like we're out of time for this morning's conference. So I'll end the formal conference now. Feel free to stick around and chat further, if you like. Thanks for coming this morning, we appreciate your input. Bye. *** END OF FORMAL CONFERENCE *** List of Participants: 70250,211 PETER 70366,1316 Steve 70741,127 TED 71266,125 Phil 72207,1265 bob judge 72216,512 GENE NESTRO 72276,2454 Wayne Scott 72300,3072 Bill H. 72316,647 R Caley 72516,475 LARRY R. 73337,350 ROY COLLETT 74425,231 Gerald G 76120,2244 CHARLES CULHANE 76672,606 Tom S. 76701,40 Sysop Denny 76703,4062 Sysop Tony