STARTMANAGER PLUS 1.0 FORWARD StartManager Plus 1.0 is a Personal Information Manager (PIM). It contains a phonebook, calendar, infobase, todo list, reminder, journal, daily plan- ner and more. This manual is geared to help you get the most from the program. The following will give you valuable hints and tips to make using the program even easier. The program was designed to be easy to setup and use. Each feature uses a common set of commands and using most functions is very straightforward. The design is clean and simple. This allows you to get more work done, instead of wasting time setting things up. StartManager Plus 1.0 takes up were Business StartManager 4.0 left off. Business StartManager 4.0 was reviewed in the February 1994 issue PC World Magazine. One of the main problems with Business StartManager 4.0 was the editors lack of wordwrap. StartManager Plus 1.0 has an improved editor with wordwap. I also added a label maker and a menu system. The menu system was designed to mostly to launch additional infobases and todo lists. But it will also launch many other DOS programs, memory permitting. Almost every function in StartManager has been enhanced in one way or the other. I am sure you will like this new version. I have been working on this version off and on for nearly a year. About Registering StartManager Plus 1.0. The price to register Start- Manager Plus 1.0 is $39.95. I send registered users the REGISTRATION PASSWORD which turns off the LOGO screens, delays, and let's you write more than 10 records on most functions. If I release another version, I allow my users to upgrade for the difference between what they payed and the price of the new version. If I have to ship floppies there is a $3.00 Shipping and Handling charge. On all floppy shipments. No exceptions. If you use more than one registered version of StartManager Plus 1.0 on more than one computer you MUST: 1. Register all additional copies or 2. Get a site license. A site license allows you to legally make copies of the REGISTERED version of StartManager Plus. 3. ALL government agencies, universities, and business's who use more than one copy must get a site license or register each copy that you use. 4. Bundling agreements are available. I debated for a long time rather I should add "USE" limitations to this version or not. I feel that the file limits allow you, the user, to get a good feel for the program. But to get the most from the program you have to register it. I am sorry if some of you do not like this method, but the bottom line is that I have to eat too. StartManager is high quality shareware. Look at it, compare it to other shareware, this is quality stuff. I am not rich, I cannot invest all these hours into developing quality software and not get something in return. I am not rich, I haven't won the lottery, I don't have a rich uncle. If I don't get registrations, I don't eat. If you use my software, please register it. Also, I want to thank my growing base of registered users, your support keeps me going... A FINAL NOTE BEFORE I MOVE ON Many users think shareware is freeware. They have no problem paying good money for other goods and services, but when it comes to paying for shareware, no dice. So this is why I limited this program to 10 records. If you type in the REGISTRATION PASSWORD, you can make as many records as you want. The REGISTRATION PASSWORD is $39.95. Plain and simple. I try and ship the REGISTRATION PASSWORD as soon as orders come in. So,in summation, if you can find a better PIM/CONTACT MANAGER for the price, then by all means buy it... ABOUT THE NEXT VERSION... --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Registered users will be allowed to get the next version for a small fee plus S&H. I usually allow my current customers to register the new version for the difference between what they payed and the cost of the new version. I believe in taking care of my customers. The next version will have the ability to print information directly from the function, a screen saver, and a phone log + viewer. These are much requested features. Yes, I do listen to my customers. Other possible items will be a full year view, a global find feature and anything I maybe able to come up with by then. Register now and get the benefit of the program today. On a serious note: I learned a long time ago that I can't please every- one. This product will not suit everyones needs. I feel that I offer a fine product for a reasonable price. If it meets your needs, then by all means register it, I do my best to answer serious inquires. SEE ADDRESS AND E-MAIL ADDRESS AT THE END OF THIS TEXT. A NOTE ABOUT HARDWARE --------------------------------------------------------------------------- This program ONLY works with EGA or VGA monitors. This program will not work with CGA monitors !!! TO START --------------------------------------------------------------------------- How to install and setup StartManager. To Start: To install on a Harddrive: 1. Make a subdirectory on your harddrive 2. Copy the contents of the floppy to that sub-directory or UNZIP your downloaded copy. 3. Run the program PIM.EXE. That's it. Your ready to go. Using with a floppy: You can use StartManager on a floppy, though it will be slow, Copy the original to another floppy and run PIM.EXE from that floppy. The next step is to Setup a few things, if you have a mouse and a modem. Goto the UTILITY menu and select SETUP. Move the highlight box down to the modem setup. Press Enter to goto the modem setup. Select the proper com port for your modem (if you have one). If you do not have a modem, ignore this part. This setup is to prevent a conflict if you have a mouse and a modem. Usually a serial mouse will use com 1 and a modem will use com 2. So be sure to use setup to prevent problems. That's it for the mandatory setup. You can change the colors or change how the reminder or calendar is displayed from the Setup Menu. Using the program. You will notice that at the top of the screen are some buttons. Such as Note, Calendar, Todo, Phone, Etc. Press the first letter to use one of these functions. Press C and the calendar pops up. Press Esc and your back at the Main Screen. If you have a mouse, move the mouse arrow to that button and click a button. Easy right ? Remember those two things and the rest is easy. Press H and a help screen pops up. Press Esc and your back to the main screen. To get out of the program, you guessed it, press Esc. INFOBASE -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Infobase is a freeform text database. It can be used to keep notes and information on clients, business associates, etc. The FIND function allows you to get at information in infobase fast. To organize information about people, put their names in the Infobase and info about them. To find this information, use FIND, type the name or some fact that would be in that record. Infobase can be called up directly from the phonebook, this allows you get client info while talking to that client. This version also allows you to create multiple infobases. You can select them from the SELECT button in infobase or use MENU to launch an infobase. All infobases use an .INF extension. When you create an infobase, record 0 allows you to create a form which will be copied to all newly added records. You can type in a form if you like. But this is a very, very limited feature. I suggest that you simply press A for ADD and then ESC and create a blank form. INFO.INF and JOURNAL.INF take you directly to RECORD 1. You can play around with this if you like, but be aware that this is not something I support. Turning INS off makes adding info to the form easier. But most of all, CAVEAT. MENU NAME : CUSTOMERS NAME OF YOUR MENU ITEM PATH : C:\PIM DIRECTOTY OF STARTMANAGER PLUS 1.0 PROGRAM NAME : HDBASE INFOBASE IS HDBASE COMMAND LINE : CUSTOMER.INF 8 CUSTOMER.INF is an INFOBASE. 8 is the color of the INFOBASE. You can use 0 to 15. Try it. MENU __________________________________________________________________________ Menu allows you to launch other DOS programs. A word of warning though, MENU can only run a program if it has enough memory in the lower 640K. If a program is too large or uses memory in an off the wall way, then menu will not launch that program. So test a program to see if it will work properly first. I find that MENU will launch a lot of DOS programs, but not all. I added MENU because it is useful. So please don't write me and say it doesn't run some programs. The above explains why some programs won't work. The following explains how to program it. To create a menu, select one of the menu numbers with the up/down arrow key, then press the Ins key. Type in the setup information as follows: MENU NAME : The name describing the program. PATH : The directory path to the program. Leave blank for if the program is in the current directory. PROGRAM NAME : The .EXE, .COM, or .BAT name of the program. Do not add the .EXE, .COM, or .BAT extension. COMMAND LINE : The command line option. This is optional. EXAMPLE: MENU NAME : SHOW TREE PATH : C:\DOS PROGRAM NAME : tree COMMAND LINE : MENU NAME : QUANTRO PATH : C:\QUANTRO PROGRAM NAME : Q COMMAND LINE : TEST.WQ1 If the program does not run your program, double check your path and program name. There also may not be enough free memory !!!!! LABELER ------------------------------------------------------------------------- This is a useful little program that allows you to print labels. You can Save and Get labels that you create from the Labeler function. Use SELECT to get or save labels. Number of Lines on Label : The number of lines. Number of lines between labels : Used to space labels. Number of labels to print : How many labels you want to print. The first parameter above establishes how many lines your label will use. The second sets the spacing between your labels. Always test your label setup by printing a couple of test labels to make sure your labels are properly aligned... NOTE ------------------------------------------------------------------------ This feature allows you to leave a note to yourself. Imagine that it is like a note taped to your computer screen. When StartManager Plus 1.0 detects the presence of a note it displays it when you start the program. To add to or update the note, Press U or point to it with the mouse and click the button. To Delete the program Press D. CALENDAR ------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Calendar is one of the two central areas of the program. You use the calendar to create and access both the Notes and Daily Planners that are created for associated dates. Regular Notes are created by first moving the RED HIGHLIGHT BOX to a date that you what to create a Note or Daily Planner for. To create a Note, Press A, this allows you to add a Note. To create a Daily Planner, Press ALT A, this allows you to create a Daily Planner. Once you create a Daily Planner, you use the up/down arrows to access one of the hours, Press Enter to Add/Update information for your planner. To delete a Note, Press D. To delete a Daily Planner press, ALT D. The calendar displays an N or P in a calendar date to indicate if it has a Note or Daily Planner. To View a Note, move the RED HIGHLIGHT BOX to a day that has a NOTE and Press ENTER. To View a Daily Planner, move the RED HIGHLIGHT BOX to a day that has a Daily Planner and Press the SPACE BAR. It is a good idea to DELETE already used Notes and Daily Planners. The program does not erase NOTES and DAILY PLANNERS, it reuses deleted spaces (if available) to create new NOTES or DAILY PLANNERS. Even though you can create thousands of notes and planners, it can slow things down on slower systems (AKA 286 or less). So be aware. Cut & Paste. This allows you to grab a note and copy it to another date. IMPORTANT - You must first make a blank note for the date that you want to paste to, this version does not create blank notes. Use delete to remove the old note. PHONEBOOK -------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Phone book is the second central area of the program. From the Phone- Book you can call up all of the other features of StartManager Plus 1.0. This can be very handy when talking to a customer. If you have a Hayes compatible Modem you can dial a phone number directly from the Phonebook. If you have a modem, it first must be setup, this is done from the Setup function. See above. PhoneBook entries are created by Pressing A for ADD. Enter the appropriate information and press Esc to finish. To find a Name quick, Press L to List. A list of Companies and Names will be displayed. Use the up/down arrow to select the entry you want, then Press Enter to goto that entry. To dial a phonenumber, move the Highlight box to the PhoneNumber and press Enter. If you have a modem it will dial the number for you. From the PhoneBook you can access the Daily Planner from the Calendar or by Pressing F2 (if a Daily Planner exists). You can also select another display format for the phonebook from the Setup Menu. Move the bar to the bottom entry and press Enter, this toggles the phonebook screen to the other display format. TODO -------------------------------------------------------------------------- TODO is a handy little function to plan things which need to be done. Things can be moved up and down on the list in order of importance. Like infobase, you can create as many TODO lists as you like. The program LISTS.EXE makes TODO style lists. All LISTS have a .lst extension. See the MENU example. REMINDER -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Events can be programmed in advance to display a note on a given date. Useful for reoccurring events. JOURNAL -------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Journal is an INFOBASE database automatically created when you run PIM.EXE It can be used to keep notes on daily events or used to keep notes and information on customers. The FIND function allows you to get the information you need, fast. Very handy if used from the PhoneBook. Used daily it can be invaluable for recalling past events and/or important customer data. DAILY -------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Daily Planner is displayed from MAIN SCREEN if one exists for the current date. If you press D from the MAIN SCREEN and no planner is displayed, then the current date doesn't have a Daily Planner. Go to the Calendar and Create one for that day. SETUP ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Setup allows you to customize how you use StartManager Plus 1.0. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- The functions are as follows: Modem allows to select the com port that your modem (if any) is attached to. You can also select Tone or Pulse. Color allows you to select a color scheme more to your liking. Select the item that you want to change, with F1-F7 or use your mouse. Press ESC to stop. Press Y to save or N to leave colors alone. How Reminders and Calendar Notes are displayed on startup are determined by this setup function. The mouse can be toggled on or off by using this feature. Becomes active when you use the program the next time. The "icons" can be toggled on or off. The two PhoneBook display types can be toggled on or off from here. The Starting Hour for the Daily Planner can be setup from here. If your day begins a 7:00 AM, type in 7, this will cause your Daily Planners to begin at 7:00 AM in the morning. If your day starts at 11:00 AM, type in 11, etc. The default is 6:00 AM. Password - Add a password to prevent others from using StartManager Plus 1.0. To get rid of a Password, simply Press ENTER when the program asks for a New Password, this turns off the Password. Great for use on Notebook Computers. NOTE: Password protecting only offers some protection against prying eyes. I suggest that you use a good third party encryption program if data security is important to you. CALCULATOR ------------------------------------------------------------------------- StartManager Plus 1.0 also has a simple calculator. Press F1 from the MAIN SCREEN or PHONEBOOK to use this handy little calculator. Useful when talking to a client for doing quick calculations... HINTS & TIPS --------------------------------------------------------------------------- The ESC key will get you out of most features, when in doubt press Esc. Sometimes you have to hit Esc a couple of times !!! Press the H key for HELP. Works in most but not all places in the program. Run StartManager Plus 1.0 from your AUTOEXEC.BAT file. When you first turn on your computer, the reminders and such will be displayed, pressing Esc allows quick exit back to dos. This is why I named it StartManager !!! Using StartManager Plus 1.0 in the Autoexec.bat assures that you'll get the most from this powerful pim. When Adding records and notes, Press Esc to finish. StartManager Plus 1.0 automatically saves all information when you press Esc. To prevent a note from being displayed on startup, be sure to use the DELETE option in the NOTE feature. If the calendar or reminder is not displaying the calender or a reminder on startup, then check your setup. Hint: A quick way to find a name in the phonebook is to use the LIST function. You can press Esc to get out of the FIND function in the Journal. NOTE: Some conditions may call for this. HINT: To speed things up in the EDITOR mode, use the down arrow to move down in your text. It is faster than using ENTER. Turning off the INS mode also speeds things up. When the calendar finds a note on startup, it displays the calendar. The date will have an N to indicate that it has a note attached. Press Enter to display the note. Always backup your files. StartManager Plus 1.0 produces a number of data files. Removing or renaming data files. Data files are created by StartManager Plus 1.0 when it is first started. If a data file already exists, it uses it. If the Journal file gets to big, you can rename it, say to HJOURNAL.001. When StartManager Plus 1.0 is started again it will create a new Journal Database. The same is true with all the data files. You can use this to archive files. This will sometimes speed things up, also. The bigger the file, the longer it takes to access it. If you no longer need any of the Calendar Notes or Daily Planners, erasing HAPPOINT.DAT and/or HDAILY.DAT will speed up the Calendar. All data files are denoted by the .DAT extension. When you first start StartManager Plus 1.0, the 1st journal record is blank, use Update to add your first record. After that all records are "added" by using the ADD function. Be sure to take the time to learn the features of StartManager Plus 1.0. It has some powerful features. I find the journal, even though its small, is very useful for jotting down daily events. The auto dialing (if you have a modem) feature of the phone book is a real timesaver. The todo list is handy for planning and prioritizing things which need doing. Don't be afraid to play around with StartManager Plus 1.0. It was designed to be easy to use and it is hard to get in trouble by exploring. So enjoy. Also, every effort has been put into developing a fine dependable product. I cannot and will not be held responsible for damage done from using this product. So be aware. Again, please register if you can afford to... I can be reached at: John Linnabary P.O. Box 247462 Columbus, OH 43224 @ Compuserve 75014,2735