TURBOTXT - Text File Compiler _____________________________________________________________________ DESCRIPTION TurboTxt will convert a standard text file into a self displaying COM program, containing both text and the necessary code to display the text. VERSION 1.11 11/10/92 COMMAND FORMAT TURBOTXT [/Axx] [/Fxx] source [destination] /Axx Sets the video attributes for the text being displayed. xx is the attribute value. Use the chart below to calculate the attribute value you wish to use. /Fxx Sets the video attributes for the help line at the bottom of the screen being displayed. xx is the attribute value. Use the chart below to calculate the attribute value you wish to use. source the source text file to be compiled. Can be any standard DOS text file up to 63k bytes. destination can be any valid dos filename. If no destination is entered the file created will be called README.COM. TURBOTXT - Text file Compiler _____________________________________________________________________ COLORS TurboTXT allows you to choose the video attributes that will be used to display the text in the compiled README.COM program. The number used to set the attribute is calculated by choosing the background color and then the near ground color. The formula to use to get this number is: A = BACKGROUND COLOR x 16 B = NEARGROUND COLOR xx = A + B; BACKGROUND COLORS NEARGROUND COLORS BLACK 0 BLACK 0 BLUE 1 BLUE 1 GREEN 2 GREEN 2 CYAN 3 CYAN 3 RED 4 RED 4 MAGENTA 5 MAGENTA 5 BROWN 6 BROWN 6 LIGHTGRAY 7 LIGHTGRAY 7 DARKGRAY 8 LIGHTBLUE 9 LIGHTGREEN 10 LIGHTCYAN 11 LIGHTRED 12 LIGHTMAGENTA 13 YELLOW 14 WHITE 15 so to display LIGHTRED text on a BLUE background you would use the following calclation: A = 1 x 16 = 16 B = 12 xx = 16 + 12 = 28 TURBOTXT /A28 README.TXT NOTES The code overhead is slightly more than 1k bytes. When this program is executed, the displayed text can be scrolled with the cursor keys. Direct screen writing is used so the display is extremely fast. Snow supression will occur if a CGA monitor is detected. The text file must be less than 63k in size and any lines exceeding the width of the screen will be truncated. It is possible for the resultant COM program to be smaller than the original text file. Most text files use a two byte sequence of a carriage return and line feed (0Ch and 0Ah) to terminate each line. When the text is converted the two bytes are replaced by a single null byte (00h). Needless to say, the larger the text file the better the chance of a size savings. If the output file is not specified README.COM will be used. If the extension is omitted from the output filename, COM will be used. The following keys are available when the created program is executed: Up Arrow Scroll up one line Down Arrow Scroll down one line Page Up Scroll up one page Page Down Scroll down one page Left Arrow Scroll Left one character Right Arrow Scroll Right one character Home Go to start of text End Go to end of text ESC Exit program Alt-X Exit program The .COM program produced automatically supports screen sizes other than 80x25. As long as the proper screen values are in the BIOS data area and the screen width is at least 80 columns and no greater than 255 columns it will work with the detected mode automatically. EXAMPLES TurboTxt help.txt help The text in HELP.TXT is used to create HELP.COM.