SNA COLLECTION MANAGER V1.0 --------------------------- Copyright F A Richey 1996 INTRODUCTION ------------ Installation To install the program simply: 1. Put SNACOLL0.APP in your \APP\ directory 2. If you want to use the optional On-Line Help (Highly recommended) put the file SNACOLLH.OVL into an \APP\SNACOLL\ directory. 3. If you want to use the optional Print option put the file SNACOLLP.OVL into the \APP\SNACOLL\ directory and the file SNAPRINT.DYL into an \OPD\ directory (Note that this latter file is common to all my programs, so if you have more than one of them you only need one copy of this file). 4. Install (PSION-I) The program will create an \SNACOLL\ directory on the internal drive for storage of data files. Configuration (and registration) files will be put into the \OPD\ directory of your default drive under the program name. The unregistered version of this shareware program will allow you just 10 Entries/Collection, and 3 Categories to see the capabilities of the program. Following registration you will be allowed 300 Entries/Collection and 25 for each of the 2 Categories. Using the Program Working through the commands will show you the capabilities of the program, but to get the best out of it, the following description takes you through the basic functions and explains some of the finer details of operation. Tutorial: There are 2 ways to run this tutorial. You can either work through it from the start, to generate some data files, or you can skip Part 1 and use the example files contained in DATA.ZIP. If you use these files, put them into a data directory called \SNACOLL\. Then jump to Part 2 of the tutorial. PART 1 - Generating data files. To start the program, highlight 'Collect' under the Icon. Now press (New File) to start a new collection (Alternatively, you could just press and accept 'Collect' as the filename). For the purposes of this tutorial, use 'Records'. When requested select a more descriptive title such as 'Record Collection'. Next define the Titles you want for the various fields. For the purposes of the tutorial, type in 'Title' and 'Artist' as the Names, 'Type' and 'Size' as the Categories and 'Cost' and 'Value' as the Values. Note that you can change these later using , (Set Preferences) and select 'Define Titles'. Once in the main screen, we now need to generate some Categories, so press (New Type) and add 'CD'. Then repeat for 'Vinyl' and 'Cassette'. Now press (New Size) and enter 'Single' and then again for 'Album'. We are now ready to enter some real data. To do this, either use the Menus, or just press . Just fill in an example record, selecting an appropriate set of Names, Categories and Values. Then add a few more, making sure you have a good mix of categories. Don't worry if the fields overlap on the screen, we will sort that out later. Note that you can select 'New' as a category and it will allow you to generate a new category in the middle of entering the data. Now use the same steps to generate a new collection using , and this time use 'Books' as a title, and 'Title' and 'Author' as names, 'Group' and 'Type' as Categories and, as before, 'Cost' and 'Value' as the Value titles. For the 'Group' categories use 'Detective', 'Thriller' and 'Sci-Fi' and for 'Type', just use 'Hardback' and 'Paperback'. Finally enter some representative books. Again, don't worry about any overlaps in the screen display. This completes the generation of the data files. PART 2 - Screen Configuration. Note: This Part demonstrates how to configure the default screen display to your requirement. For those who used the example data files, these have already been configured, but you may wish to follow through the tutorial anyway. First, select the 'Records' Group, from the System Screen. Now go to 'Set Preferences' and 'Screen Display'. For the purposes of the demo select 'No' to the Info window, 'Swiss' to the font', and 'Large' for the size. For future reference, note the 'Reset to Default' option if it all goes horribly wrong. In the second screen, select Title and Artist to be displayed. In the 'Title' dialog, select the Start Point as 10, and the Finish Point as 115. Note the ruler at the top of the screen that can be used as a guide. For the artist dialog use 120 as the start and 235 as the finish. Note that after each selection the screen redraws to show you the effect of your selection. This sets up the screen as shown in the example data file. In your case, you may still have overlaps, in which case you can adjust the settings accordingly. Just remember that you cannot have anything less than 10 pixels from the left of the screen, so that there is room for the screen arrows, and that the total width of the screen is 240 pixels (unless you have an Info Window, in which case it is 204 pixels). In this case, we are probably also interested in the total value of the collection, so use the 'Set Preferences' option and 'Total Window' to select 'Value'. Also, it might be useful to have the display grouped by Artist, so use the 'Sort By' option to sort by Artist. Now select the 'Books' group, either from the System screen, the menu option, , or just the right cursor arrow. Now repeat the operation, using and the 'Screen Display. Set Info window off, small font, Title, Author and Group to be displayed as follows: Title from 10-100 Author from 100-180 Group from 185-235 and this sets up the 'Books' screen display. PART 3 - Menu options: To see the rest of the programs capabilities, just work through the MENUs. FILE New Collection Open Collection Save Collection As Delete Collection Rename Title These functions are self-explanatory. However, it does bring up the important note that you cannot change the filename of a collection from the system screen, as there are a number of other files which need to be renamed. The procedure to be used is to 'Save Collection As', using the new name, and then 'Delete' the original Collection. Note as well, that the left and right arrows will cycle between multiple collections. EDIT Enter Item Update Item Delete Item Move Item Down Sort Items By.. Edit memo Again, these are self explanatory, although you should note that , and have the same effect as the first 3 functions. Also, the 'Move Item Down' option will only be there if the sort option is set to 'None'. Also, to preempt the next obvious question, I did not implement a 'Move Up' option, as all you need to do is select the entry above and use 'Move Down' ! The Edit memo function is the same as the one in Agenda. SEARCH Find Text Find Next Text Find Date Find Next Date These options simply do a text search on the 2 'Names' fields, or a date search, to find an entry. CATEGORIES New... Update... Delete... New... Update... Delete... Set Filter The first 6 options are self-explanatory. To see the filter in operation, use and set an appropriate set of categories. The screen will then display just those entries matching the categories. This also demonstrates the basic difference between the apparently similar 'Name' and 'Category' fields. The 'Name' fields are free text and are searched via the 'Find' option. The 'Categories' are pre- defined and used by the Filter. You need to decide how you are going to use the program before you decide which parameters should be defined as 'Categories' and which should be 'Names'. SPECIAL Set Preferences Define Titles Screen Display Total Window Entry/Update Dialogs Printer Configuration (If Printer Module loaded) Preference Repeat Most of these have been used already. 'The Printer Configuration' allows you to select Parallel, Serial or File, the 'Entry/Update Dialogs' allow you to decide if you want all fields presented, or just those on the display and the 'Preference Repeat' option decides if you keep returning to the 'Set preferences' menu. Register Program Entry Information Print Setup (If Printer Module loaded) Print Preview Print Details About Exit All self explanatory, although the 'Print Setup' includes an extra dialog to specify which fields are printed. Hope all that makes sense. Any comments on the program (and this tutorial), gratefully received. Cheers Al