OTHER INFORMATION CONCERNING *SHOW* 1. Did you know if your filename has the extension .TXT, you don't have to type that when using SHOW? Example: You have a ASCII file called MYLIST.TXT. To SHOW it, you could type SHOW MYLIST.TXT ***OR*** You could type SHOW MYLIST --Notice no ".txt"--that's because SHOW automatically appends .txt to any filename it doesn't find. If you DO have a MYLIST and a MYLIST.TXT file, not to worry: SHOW will distinguish between the two. It is only when SHOW does not find the file MYLIST when it will look for a MYLIST.TXT file. 2. You can OVERRIDE the QWICKLOAD feature by using the \n flag after the TEXT FILENAME you wish to display: SHOW text.txt \n WHY WOULD YOU WANT TO DO THIS? Well, the idea behind the .QLD feature is to load a document into memory at a blazing speed, allowing you to jump around and do text searches as if the entire document were in memory. But, perhaps you have several documents with the same filename and different extensions, as with the MYFILE example above: Say you had a MYFILE.1, a MYFILE.2, and a MYFILE.3--*SHOW*, in order to create a .QLD file, removes the file extension and appends a .QLD to the filename. So if you were to display MYFILE.1 and create a Quick-load file for it and you wanted to display MYFILE.2, SHOW will actually make the mistake of reading the MYFILE.1 Quick-load file, and will not display the text properly. In such cases where similar filenames exist, use the "\n" flag to turn the Quick-load option off. Your document, depending on its size, will take longer to be read into SHOW, but you will be displaying the proper file without any fear of confusion--either on your behalf or SHOW's behalf. 3. Standard screen sizes go to 80 horizontal characters. Especially in the case of WINDOWS (TM) files saved as TEXT, many ASCII files go beyond the 80 character line size. This version of SHOW corrects this by limiting each line to 80 characters. Text beyond that will not be visible. 4. SHOW works with STANDARD ASCII FILES, displaying text and NOT wordprocessing files, which contain endless streams of special font and formatting information. The way a line of text ends is also important to SHOW. Many text files from the INTERNET and other places have text lines that end with LINEFEEDS (10/0A) only. SHOW does not LIKE these files and cannot read them. SHOW requires files that end with a CRLF (carriage return [13/0D] and a linefeed [10/0A]). Most text files on MS-DOS compatibles exist in this format. Since many of you "surf the net," there is a chance you will run one of these text files through SHOW. If that is the case, and if SHOW acts strange, use the *FREE* utility TXTCRLF.EXE I have included in this batch of files. HOW TO USE TXTCRLF.EXE: TXTCRLF [oldfile.txt] [newfile.txt] OLDFILE.TXT will be the old file you wish to convert. NEWFILE.TXT will be the NEW file adhering to the CR/LF standard. --You will use NEWFILE.TXT with SHOW. 5. You can extract or CLIP text from the file you are displaying: to do so, write down the line #'s you wish to copy to the CLIP.TXT file and type 'C' while in SHOW. You will be asked for a Starting and an Ending line. Answer appropriately and the text you wish to clip will be stored in the CLIP.TXT file, which will exist until you perform another "clip" operation. Once the CLIP.TXT file has been created, you can rename that file or do whatever you want with it--but understand that is only a TEMPORARY file and will be rewritten once the CLIP function has been invoked again. 6. You can save your reading place and create a Virtual Bookmark: Before you exit SHOW, type 'B' while in SHOW. This will create a .BMK (Bookmark) file. When go into SHOW at some later date or time and view that file, simply press 'P' and SHOW will jump to where you last left off. 7. Show will run on an 80286 CPU or better. The faster the CPU, the better it will perform. Longer files will take longer to load into SHOW, but once you create a QLD file for them, the next time you access those large files, they'll appear instantly before you. You have the benefit of total access to your document without memory concerns. 8. *******KEEP IN MIND******* As your TEXT file changes, so must your QLD file, otherwise it will not give SHOW the proper data needed to display your file: Example, you wrote a short story, and it's called STORY.TXT. You've loaded it into SHOW and created a QLD file for it. But, now you've gone back and edited it. Now, when you try to SHOW it with the QLD option, your new file will be going by the OLD QLD file. TO AVOID THIS: CD C:\QLD DEL STORY.QLD CD.. This will remove your old .QLD (Quickload file) and eliminate any discrepancies between your old QLD files and your updated text files. FOR THIS REASON, YOU SHOULD AVOID GENERATING A .QLD FILE *UNTIL* YOUR TEXT FILE IS NOT GOING TO BE ALTERED. Save the QLD feature for an ASCII file you have or have downloaded, one that will not be subject to change. If the file happens to change, be sure to DELETE THE OLD .QLD file and generate a NEW .QLD file from within SHOW. 9. The C:\QLD directory cannot be renamed, nor should it be removed unless another software package actually addesses a directory called QLD, in which case you simply do not use the .QLD option in SHOW. You MAY, however, RD (remove [the] directory) or do a DEL *.QLD from within the C:\QLD directory if you really need the space--but, understand, the .QLD files are VERY SMALL, and, unless they're creating conflicts between same-name text files, it is not a good idea to delete them for other than that reason. By removing the directory, SHOW will not perform correctly. 10. WHAT DOES THE .QLD FILE CONTAIN? *SHOW* can rapidly display a document/textfile because of line character-summations: it adds up the characters in each line and stores them in an array in RAM. When jumping from line to line, it accesses this array and generates a corresponding FILE-POINTER, a place in the text file to jump to. That is why SHOW reads all the textfile's lines into memory--the lines themselves do not enter RAM, they are simply tallied and their line limits are stored in an array, which allows for 2-3 megabyte files (the largest I've tried) to be displayed quickly and without any detectable lapse in display performance. The .QLD file contains this information, which SHOW looks for and, upon finding the right .QLD file, reads the line data from the text file into memory, rather than reading the text file all over again. Once a QLD file is created, even a 1 MEG text file loads in SECONDS because the file itself is not being read--only the QLD file is being read, saving time and defying memory limits. 11. *SHOW* is shareware, which is a software marketting technique beneficial to both the programmer and the user: You get to try out the software for free and register it once you decide it is of use. I, as programmer, gain the luxury of your audience and am allowed to demonstrate my product without any financial obligations on your behalf. Shareware works best when its principles are observed. SHOW IS NOT CRIPPLED OR DISABLED IN ANY WAY--YOU HAVE THE FULL, UNCUT VERSION, unlike many other shareware programs which permit you to do so much and then require a registration fee for any further functionality. I believe in the honesty of users and know if you find this useful you will send your registration in. The "fee" is only $5.00, and what you get is a program you can use often and effectively. Programmers spend endless hours honing code and optimizing routines so their programs do more and occupy less space. While the results can lead to astounding effects and useful programs, the labor often goes uncompensated, other than the "programmer's high" a programmer might attain when his or her program's finally debugged and runs as expected. By supporting shareware authors, you give validity to the cause and ensure a continual development of new ideas, new games, new utilities. Without financial support, shareware authors suffer, and so do you: they will, more than likely, be unable to continue developing quality software because their efforts go unpaid and the expense of time and energy advances to a point where they begin to question, as I have, Is it worth it? My answer would be yes, provided people out there in the computer community verify that worth by registering their shareware products. 12. If you chose to upload SHOW onto other Bulletin Boards, please be sure to upload it in its entirety, together with all the companion files, including this one, in the original .ZIP format. It would be easier if you kept the original .ZIP file pack somewhere on your hard drive or a backup disk so you wouldn't have to re-compress them. It saves you time and keeps the file in their original, intended format, ultimately benefitting any user who wishes to tap the power of SHOW. Thank you for trying *SHOW*