Gizmo allows you to have up to ten "presets" which configures Gizmo for each of your communications software applications. Gizmo is shipped already setup for the more popular communications products and should work fine for most configurations, so you probably won't have to concern yourself with the following. However, if you have a faster Macintosh or use baud rates over 2400 baud, you may have to adjust these settings.
The Preset Name, at the top of the dialog window, indicates the name of the currently active presets. It will either indicate Default if the default presets are active, Empty if the preset hasn't been named yet, or the actual name you have given to the preset. On Macintosh 512E or later, the Preset Name will have a shadow box around it. This indicates that it is a pop-up menu - clicking on the shadow box will display a menu of all ten presets. Dragging the pointer and releasing the mouse button will activate the highlighted preset.
Under the Preset Name area are three buttons, "<<", Rename, and ">>". The arrow buttons allow you to move the previous and next preset, respectively. If there is not another preset to select in a particular direction, the button will become dimmed. The Rename button allows you to rename the active preset, except in the case if the Default preset is active. What you need to do is rename the Empty presets to correspond with the name of the communications software in use. Some examples are: Red Ryder, White Knight, America Online, Microphone, etc..
When Gizmo searches for presets, it looks at all the applications currently running (if MultiFinder is in use). If it finds a match between a running application and a presets name, it will activate it. Therefore, if you are running Red Ryder and have a preset with the same name, Gizmo will use the respective preset information when converting GIF pictures.
Below the Preset name area are the control settings that optimize Gizmo. These controls allow you to limit the amount of time Gizmo spends converting the picture, which allows the communications application time to download the picture and, thus, reducing overhead and any extra online fees. The first two items are the limits Line and Data.
The Line limit tells Gizmo the maximum number of lines it can convert before it must relinquish control back to the system. This prevents Gizmo from hogging your system and allows the communications software to continue downloading the picture. The acceptable range for this item is one line to 500 lines (500 lines means decode as much as you can before exceeding the following Data limit).
The Data limit is similar to the line limit, but limits the amount of data that Gizmo can process. A good value to enter for the data limit is the packet size that your communications software uses to download files. For example, the packet size for standard XModem is 128 bytes, so set the Data limit to 128. A few other useful packet sizes are: YModem = 1024, ZModem = 1024, America Online software = 512. You may want to add a little to these numbers to allow Gizmo to "catch up" with the file transfer. The acceptable range for this item is 10 bytes (pieces of information) to 5000 bytes (5000 tells Gizmo to decode as much as you can before exceeding the above Line limit).
Auto-Open Search Time tells Gizmo how often to search for new GIF pictures to automatically open. The number entered here represents seconds, with a minimum of zero seconds (no search) to 60 seconds (one minute). We recommend a value of five seconds for most communications software if you are using a 2400 baud modem. NOTE: Gizmo will not automatically open a GIF picture if more than 5K (5000 bytes) has already been downloaded. This prevents Gizmo from re-opening bad GIF pictures and prevents other circumstances from occurring.
Gizmo Time Delay is used to slow Gizmo down. Usually you will want Gizmo to operate as fast as possible, but sometimes this causes problems. The most noticeable is if you use Red Ryder or White Knight, Gizmo may operate so fast that it doesn't give these applications enough time to download the picture, thus decreasing performance drastically. By slowing Gizmo down (therefore giving more time to the communications software) can increase the file transfer performance. This is also useful when using higher baud rates (4800 or 9600 baud). More time must be given to the communications software so it can handle the large amount of incoming data. This value is given in sixtieths of a second (a value of 30 = 30/60 = 1/2 second). A couple good values to try if you need to slow Gizmo down are 15 and 30. The allowed values you may enter for this item are 0 (zero, no delay) to 60 (one second). Depending on this delay setting and the current Data and Line limits, Gizmo may not be able to "keep up" with the file transfer.
Alternate Name allows you to specify an alternate file name for Gizmo to look at when searching for new pictures to open. If left blank, which indicates no alternate name, Gizmo will only open GIF pictures that match the "Alternate GIF name", if defined, in the Preferences dialog. Since Gizmo always searches for the ".GIF" file name and most GIF pictures have the ".GIF" file name extension, there is no need to use this feature. However, with some communications software (like Red Ryder and White Knight), the file isn't named until after the file has been downloaded. If this is the case, the file is usually named something like "Untitled" or something similar and then when the file is transferred, it is then given it's real name (or you are given the opportunity to name it). This is fine, but how is Gizmo suppose to know that? Gizmo can't automatically open a picture if it can't be found! To overcome this limitation, enter the generic file name your software uses so Gizmo will be able to find the picture. (Upper and lower case isn't important and the search can match anywhere within the file name. For example, entering "Untitled" will match "untitled file", "Untitled #1", and "UNTITLED 10:51:30".) Note that White Knight uses "Untitled" as its generic file name.
Disable time-out warnings does exactly what it states. Gizmo will warn you if it is waiting for more data to convert the picture (i.e. time-out). The first warning will come after 30 seconds, with each successive warning every minute for a particular file. With some online services, this time period is too short and you'll keep getting time-out warnings. If this option is enabled (indicated by an X in the check-box), these time-out warnings will never occur. So far, the only service we know of that requires this option is America Online. It may also be useful when downloading pictures at 1200 or 300 baud with other online services or BBS's.
Save will save all changes made to all presets - not just the preset being displayed. Whereas Cancel will forget all changes made to any presets. And of course, Help displays this help dialog.
Example: The following Preset will decode a picture as fast as possible: Line limit = 500, Data limit = 5000, Auto-Open Search Time doesn't matter, Gizmo Time Delay = 0 (zero).
For further information regarding the use of Gizmo and specific communications software, please consult the documentation.
