Frequently Asked Questions

1. Q: Is there a WWW-site for Wildfire ?
   A: In work!

2. Q: How to contact the author ?
   A: epgbc@cluster1.urz.Uni-Halle.DE
      (ONLY for very SERIOUS problems, answers will take SOME DAYS!
       The best way is to contact:  eksec@eure.de for everything
       concerning Wildfire)

3. Q: The demo-version I have installed isn't capable to convert
      large animations because of ''eating'' too much memory.
      Is this only a ''feature'' of the Demo-version ?
   A: Yes, of course !
      Wildfire has an own memory handler to simplify and speed up
      memory-allocations. The Demo-version has no free()-function,
      only the freeall()-function (which cleans up after program-exit)
      is available.

4. Q: I've tried out the demo-version and it crashes after a while.
      I can't convert animations with it because I haven't enough
      memory to finish any operation.
      In may opinion you are loosing potential customers using such
      a way of restricting the unregistered program version.
      It would be much better to print your logo to every generated
      image - nobody could use the program seriously without registering.
   A: This is no bad idea. In fact I had implemented this "feature"
      in a previous version. The problem is that it's too easy to
      patch for "sunday-crackers".
      The way I currently use requires much more knowledge than
      simply replacing code-lines of the disassembled binary
      with "nop"-statements.
      Another point is that I think that's not necessary to create
      complete animations to decide if Wildfire is worth registering
      or not. Many working features of the unregistered version
      are missing in much more expensive "commercial" software.

5. Q: Why did you release Wildfire as shareware ? It looks very
      professional.
   A: Well, Wildfire *IS* a professional piece of software.
      The main reason is the fact that Wildfire released as shareware
      is one of the programs with the best price/performance-ratio.
      If you release a program as "commercial product" a lot of money
      is spent for any other purpose than the program-development.
      A printed manual for example is very expensive to produce but
      the most people doesn't read manuals.
      Another advantage is the fast availability of free updates.
      Finally we couldn't find a distributor here in Germany because
      most of them sell their own gfx-software and the remaining ones
      are not professional.

6. Q: Wildfire asks for amigaguide.library V37 at startup - but I
      have installed it !!!
   A: Be sure your startup-sequence contains the following lines:

       assign libs: hd0:classes add
       adddatatypes flush                   (since OS3.1)

      This is necessary because the amigaguide.datatype and maybe some
      other components will be initialized while opening the system-
      libraries. (This means that the error-message which is produced 
      by the startup-code I use is wrong.)

7. Q: Which assigns etc. are necessary to run your program ?
   A: Wildfire works after booting without startup-sequence
      if you enter the following lines:

       setpatch
       assign libs: hd0:classes add
       adddatatypes flush
       stack 10000
       wf

      After that the most parts of the program (converting, processing
      images, playing animations) work without problems.
      The only "bad" thing I found is the online-help which
      is displayed as plain text.

8. Q: After installing the new main-program I get lots of
      "initialization errors" while loading the PlugIns - 
      but SnoopDos doesn't display any LoadSeg-failure or similar.
   A: The "initialization error" occurs if version-number of
      the current PlugIn doesn't fit the version-number
      of the PlugIn-loader of the main-program.
      This means that all PlugIns you use are too old and 
      cannot be used any more.
      The reason for this "nasty" behaviour is the fact that
      the internal "PlugIn-structure" has to be extended sometimes.

9. Q: I have a GFX-card and Wildfire hangs up while opening
      the screen. Why?
   A: If no config file is found Wildfire tries to open an pal
      screen. Just copy the file
      wildfire/envarc/gfx-card/wildfire.config
      into your envarc: directory and Wildfire will start on
      the default public sreen.
      In the next version of Wildfire this problem will be fixed.