The simplest strategy for creating a Waldo document would be to use your favorite wordprocessor to write, imbedding the formatting characters as you go. With the insertion of 4 simple characters from your keyboard you can create a document, up to 999 pages in length. The document can contain a table on contents, a sub-table of contents and pictures--in XStacks (actually you can have graphics, animation and sound). Any one with a word processor (including an IBM compatible computer) can create a Waldo document--no special program is needed. Waldo will read anyone's writing. But when Waldo loads the text something wonderful happens!
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*Converting Pre-existing Text to a Waldo Document*
Use Pre-existing Text for Creating a Waldo Document. You could use a pre-existing document that you transferred off of a floppy\disk or that you downloaded with a modem and insert the formatting characters yourself to create a Waldo document out of someone else's file.You may want to do this if you want to redistribute the file in a more easily read and referenced form. Some files you may want to do this to are: instructions for programs that are text files, technical or scientific papers, directions for a machine that are in text file form, combinations of text and graphs and spreadsheet data that you want to combine into a report, combine a series of letters and notes from one or more sources as references.
NOTE: It is important that there are no "spaces" at the beginning a line with formatting characters.
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*Greater IBM Compatibility*
There is now a Waldo FreeWare utility called UserWare>Waldo. It will convert plain text files formatted for the IBM compatible HyperText programs from UserWare into Waldo documents. This program will translate "single file" UserWare files into Waldo documents. Currently UserWare>WALDO version 1.1.1 (04/92) will only convert single files that contain UserWare formatted Pages. Some older UserWare files have a single file for each page of text. Currently you must manually merge these Pages into one file before processing. Future versions of UserWare>WALDO will perform this function automatically.
UserWare>WALDO™ is a FreeWare application for converting UserWare files to WALDO documents. UserWare markets several HyperText readers that run on IBM compatibles. UserWare applications read in plain text as does WALDO.
IRIS, PRISM and DART are HyperText programs from Ted Husted and UserWare. They, like WALDO, use a plain ascii text file format.
Ted Husted
UserWare
4 Falcon Lane East, Fairport NY 14450-3312.
(716) 425-3463.
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*|Some New Things In Waldo Version 3.1|*
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*The Notes function of HyperButton*
There is a new function within HyperButtons. You may attach a note to each HyperButton (HB). You may also display a List view of the HB Queue. From the List view you may rearrange the Spots within the Queue and delete Spots. The first part of each note is shown in the List view for identification of individual Notes. There may now be as many as 100 Spots in a single Queue. The Notes may be saved to a file on Disk. When the HB list is saved to disk any Notes are saved along with it and may be reloaded.
I have chose to implement this type of indexing (HB) rather than one which actually "marks" text because marking text would allow for one simple "path" through a document and would not allow for "doubling back" across your "path." HyperButtons does allow you to construct a complex path through the document and make notations along the way. More than one path may be constructed and followed. An author or reader may transfer HB lists electronically to others for inclusion in their copy of the document. Other programs may leave a visible mark by way of highlighting the text with boldfacing or the like but this seriously limits their usefulness.
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*QuickImport--text without Titles*
For those of you who want to quickly want to import preexisting text, you may go through the document using your wordprocessor and marking the end of Pages using the caret symbol. Waldo will import the file using only the end of page marker. From within the Table of Contents you may hold down the Shift key and click on a Page number. A dialogue will appear and ask you to give the Page a Title. This allows you to Title only those Pages of particular interest. (The titles entered this way will be lost and are not added to the document but will be retained as long as the document is loaded into a copy of Waldo.)
If you wish to QuickImport a document and add Folded Pages then you MUST create Folds the normal way and give each Page within the Fold a minimum Title of two asterisks next to one another on a line by themselves followed by a RETURN. Pages outside of the Fold do not have to have any Title. My preference is to give each Page a Title.
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*WaldoTools™ Is Coming*
WaldoTools, an analytical program, is only available direct from ARTWAY. WaldoTools will check a document for proper formatting and create a report on disk which will show any formatting errors and also give the statistics of the document. WaldoTools will provide for automatic formatting of preexisting files into Waldo documents. It allows for a semi-automatic formatting and Titling. (If the original file contains graphics then you should manually go through the document with a compatible wordprocessor and place an XStack formatting character before each graphic and then save the file to disk as plain text.) The graphics may be copied and pasted into a HyperCard stack and displayed as XStacks.
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*More About XStacks--Getting to Center*
On Macs with screens larger that the nine inch screen of a Plus, SE or Classic, when an XStack is displayed, it will always be centered on the display screen even though the copy of Waldo has been moved off center of the screen. This ensures that if an XStack has a window larger than the classic nine inch screen that it will at least be centered on the display if it is displayed in a scrolling window.
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*Transferring Titles to Title List--Now They Go After!*
New in version 3.1 of Waldo is Button Titles transferred to the Title List now go after any old entries in the Title List instead of before andy existing Titles. What this means is that you may build up Title Lists by using matches from the Button List. By transferring the Titles "after" existing Titles you may build a List that proceeds through the document in ascending fashion from the first occurrence to the last in the document. Remember to start looking for matches on the first Page of the Document. Preceding matches should start on the Page "after" the last Page Button marked.
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*Sorting Some Lists*
The File List, a function particular to creating files for use with the Second Sight Bulletin Board System, and the Button List items may now be sorted alphabetically. This is an optional aid in organizing the longer lists now available with Waldo version 3.1.
A new era is at hand for the self-published author. The fiction writer,history writer, the science writer, art critic, technical writer, political writer and all others have entered a new age of freedom of expression with Waldo. In our new age of instant change electronic publishing has created a counter balance to instant thought. By means of the fluid distribution of information via online communications and network communications a free exchange of ideas can control the rate of change through informed responses to events. Complex ideas can be expressed through the combined power of the written word, graphics, sound and animation.
No longer are authors restricted to the vagaries of the market place and distribution channels--author/publishers now need only be responsible to the reader.
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*Creating Electronic Magazines (E-mags)*
Creating Electronic Magazines (E-mags)
You may want to publish a E-mag for your company and "mail" it to all employees on your computer network. A parish may want to distribute information to the churches over modem. If you are the systems operator (SYSOP) of a computer Bulletin Board Service (BBS) you may want to publish a E-mag for your subscribers or you may wish to distribute it to other SYSOPS for a subscription fee. If any SYSOP uses FreeSoft's Second Sight BBS software (or Red Ryder Host V 2.0+) they can publish the same E-mag "online" using Waldo's BBS functions (which implements many of Waldo's features online for the BBS reader).
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*More about BBSs and Waldo*
More about BBSs and Waldo
There is no better option available to the Macintosh SYSOP than to combine FreeSoft Company's Second Sight BBS software and Waldo. Waldo gives Second Sight the ability to create online Waldo documents. They can have tables of contents, sub-tables of contents, and gives the reader the ability to create personal tables of contents as he reads. The power to have large amounts of text online in a easy to read format is possible. Waldo allows the reader to quickly find the text he wants to read without scrolling through long documents.
( The FreeSoft Company, 105 McKinley Road, Beaver Falls PA 15010
412-846-2700 )
BBS distribution of news and information is going to grow...
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*And More about BBSs and Waldo*
And More about BBSs and Waldo
Electronic publishing will grow fantastically in the next few years. There are already small entrepreneurs and large national organizations who are distributing news and information to BBS SYSOPS who are in turn republishing that information to their subscribers. It is the beginning of a revolution in electronic publishing.No longer are publishers limited by the traditional means of distribution. You may remember what the Whole Earth Catalogue did to change of way of thinking about information tools--well I believe that new tools like Waldo are going to transform communications. Waldo has had predecessors but Waldo is the first affordable access to electronic documents. Waldo has imitators but no equal!
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*|Publishers Professional Organizations|*
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*Disktop Publishing Association*
PRESS RELEASE
Ron Albright Contact: Ron Albright
Disktop Publishing Association
1160 Huffman Road
Birmingham, AL 35215
Voice: 205-853-8269
FAX: 205-853-8478
BBS: 205-854-1660
NEW ASSOCIATION ANNOUNCED TO PROMOTE ELECTRONIC PUBLISHING
BIRMINGHAM, AL: The "Disktop Publisher's Association" ("DPA") is an association for parties of all levels who share interest in the dissemination of information in electronic ("computer readable") format. Those eligible for membership include authors, publishers, and consumers of on-disk publishing.
"Electronic publishing," in its broadest sense, shall mean the authorship and production for general consumer access of any materials which are primarily read by computer and viewed on computer monitors. Electronic publishing - also synonymous with "paperless," "digital," and "on-disk" publishing - includes fiction and nonfiction works that are stored and distributed on disk or available by modem access on "bulletin board systems" ("BBSs").
Electronic publishing, in this sense, specifically does not include programs (which are sets of instructions used by a computer to perform other tasks) unless these programs are designed to facilitate the reading of written materials. Examples might include hypertext authoring programs or text viewers.
Statement of Purpose
The purpose of the DPA includes:
1. To promote, though improved public awareness, the benefits of electronic publishing. These benefits include availability - often on a 24 hour a day, on demand basis - of electronic publications, faster production time, cheaper cost, easier revision and updating, reduced consumption of natural resources, and - using appropriate reader software - enhanced presentation and readability.
2. To provide a forum for discussing the unique challenges of successfully publishing and marketing disk-based publications. Examples might include matching an author or publisher with the appropriate medium for a proposed project. Would hypertext be best? Plain ASCII? Multimedia?
3. A matching service will be organized to place authors - who may not be interested in complexities of marketing and publishing - with publishers who may be willing to assist in these commercial aspects. "Writers write and publishers publish" is an axiom that applies to electronic publishing as well as traditional formats.
4. To share resources for mass marketing electronic publications. Examples might include sharing of costs of mailing publications to user groups, etc. DPA will also assist new authors and publishers in getting press releases circulated and media coverage. Sharing mailing lists with other publishers is another possibility open to members.
Membership Requirements
The only requirement for membership shall be an interest in the advancement of electronic publishing. No fees will be solicited during the start-up phase.
Interested parties can contact the DPA electronically at:
The DPI BBS - 205-854-1660
Or through electronic mail on CompuServe (75166,2473), MCI Mail (RALBRIGHT), GEnie (R.Albright) or through the mail at the above address.
