Solid Cursor (SOLIDCUR.COM) 0. NOTE AT THE BEGINNING This program will work with some computers. And with some, it won't. 1. GENERAL Solid Cursor creates a large, non-blinking cursor in place of the normal IBM-cursor. Solid Cursor is a memory resident program. 2. FUNCTIONING Solid Cursor blanks the ordinary blinking cursor (if it is allowed by the computer's hardware), and creates a large, non-blinking block image in place of the ordinary cursor. Color of the block image is always reverse compared to the overall color at that location. 3. EQUIPMENT REQUIREMENTS The Solid Cursor Program requires certain features in the computer hardware. The program also requires some features in EGA or VGA hardware, if installed in the computer. Some computers will meet these requirements and some won't. A "compatibility" simply isn't enough, the only way to see is to experiment with the program. In addition, the program requires that the computer is booted with ANSI.SYS. Program requires DOS 2.0 or above. Program is active with DOS modes 0, 1, 2, 3 and 7, that is to say with text modes. Program switches automatically off if the computer is changed to graphics mode. 4. TESTING When testing the program for the first time, please follow these steps: 1) At worst case, you may have to reboot your computer in order to continue. Please be prepared for this. 2) Give the CLS command at DOS prompt. This clears the display, and the cursor is moved close to the upper left corner. 3) Give SOLIDCUR command at DOS prompt. Do not give any parameters on command line. This installs the Solid Cursor Program resident in memory. 4) Now, a solid non-blinking block image should be seen at the cursor location. Height of the image should be from top to bottom of the text line, and color should be reverse compared to the overall color. For example, if you are using white characters on black background, you should now have white color inside the block image. 5) If your display got confused or if something else happened with your cursor, then this program will not function with your computer - sorry for that. Please check however that you gave the SOLIDCUR command without any parameters. 6) If the cursor image is now located in wrong position, then your computer is not strictly following IBM/DOS display standards, or some other program is conflicting. Solid Cursor controls the block image through hardware directly, and it will fail if your computer differs from standard. 7) If your computer displays what is said in 4), then go on with experimenting. Stay in DOS prompt and give some command which makes up more text in the display. For example, give the DIR command. Keep watching the display when your computer displays the directory listing. Keep giving the DIR command so that the display becomes full and scrolling begins. Watch the display when it is scrolling. 8) If the display did not behave correctly when scrolling started, then most probably your computer is not booted with ANSI.SYS. Reboot it with ANSI.SYS. In addition, different versions of ANSI.SYS may behave differently. Try some other version. Solid Cursor may behave correctly when used with application programs, even if it fails at DOS prompt. 9) If everything is correctly at 7), then try different colors and other than 25/80 displays, if you are using such ones. 10) Color of the non-blinking cursor image should be the same as the character color at that location. However, the cursor image color should always be low-intensity. If a character is located inside the cursor, the character color should be same as the background color, but always in high-intensity. Note that the cursor color is always low-intensity. For example, if you are using high-intensity yellow as character color, then the corresponding low-intensity color is brown, and the cursor should be low-intensity brown. 11) If the colors are not as said above or if other than 25/80 displays will not work, then your display adapter is not following IBM/DOS standards, or some other program is conflicting. Solid Cursor will fail in such cases. 12) Hope everything is still working fine at this point. Then you may go into real work and see how it feels to use Solid Cursor. 5. USING THE PROGRAM Solid Cursor Program installs itself resident, when it is invoked with SOLIDCUR command. No parameters are allowed on the command line when installing the program resident. When the program is resident in memory, you can switch it off with command SOLIDCUR OFF. By the same way, you can switch it active again with command SOLIDCUR ON. These commands do not remove the program from memory, they only switch it non-active or active. You can issue the commands any time you want, they will not confuse the program chain in the computer memory. It is recommended that Solid Cursor is the last one of your resident programs. For example, it is recommended to put Solid Cursor last in your AUTOEXEC.BAT. Do not install Solid Cursor resident more than once. Otherwise your computer will slow down, and you will not be able to give ON/OFF commands to the program. If the program is the last one of your residents, you will not be able to install multiple copies in memory. 6. SLOW-DOWN AND INTERFERENCES Solid Cursor will S-L-O-W D-O-W-N your computer. Slowing will happen always when DOS or some application program controls your display through BIOS interrupt 10H. Slowing will not happen in other cases. You can check the slowing for example when you watch the display during DIR listing. Switch SOLIDCUR OFF and SOLIDCUR ON and watch the speed of the DIR listing in both cases. Slowing may be distinct with 8088 computers, but with faster machines it is usually not confusing. NOTE! Slowing may interference with some application programs. If you sometimes notice some unusual, try switching SOLIDCUR OFF and see if slowing was the fault. Solid Cursor may also cause interferences on the display. Interferences usually are some kinds of "ghost cursors" or disappearing cursor image. "Ghost cursors" may sometimes remain on display at locations where cursor no longer exists. These "ghosts" do not affect application programs, they only are confusing to the user. With slow computers, more interferences of this kind will happen than with fast machines. The cursor image may also be unstable. Again, this is more likely to happen with slow machines. Sometimes the cursor image may disappear totally. You will get it visible again when you hit some key that moves the cursor, for example arrow key or space bar. 7. FINAL WORD My personal opinion is that Solid Cursor is at its best in text processing where one has to move quickly from one location to another on the screen. Especially if one uses more than 25 lines on the display, a solid non-blinking image is much easier to see than the usual small blinking underline. 8. BE FREE TO USE The Solid Cursor Program is totally freeware. Be free to use, copy, upload and download it just as you wish. However, I do not permit selling the program for profit. Dan Obstbaum CompuServe 73757,3722