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READ.ME ==== == March 22, 1992 11:30 PM Well ladies and gentlemen, here is version 2.12 of the FreeZe Dried Terminal. I believe it is the best version to date of the finest terminal program available for the ST. I wish to announce that unless v2.12 has some major flaws, this will be the last version for a few months. I believe that eight versions in seven months is a good record, and has brought FZT to a very nice point. Rest assured that I am continuing developement of FzDSTerm, but it has come to a point were some major rewriting is in order, and I can't do this and still release versions every month or so. There have been a few things that I have wanted to do with FZT for a LONG time, and I now believe I have the opertunity to do so. I want to put in the new user interface that I have been working on, which will take some time in itself. It looks and feels great, to say the least, and will reduce the program size along with the amount of RAM FZT uses. It is resolution independant, uses pure VDI, is fast, attractive, consistant, and will make FZT more fun and easier to work with. There have been a few things nagging me about FZT that I definitely want to change. The scrollback and text editor use a method of storing their text which is slow, buggy, and inefficient. I want to convert them to use something I have come up with. This will be nicer for people with less memory, as they will stay a fixed size. It also is nice for those of us with a bit more RAM, as there will not be a fixed limit on the number of lines that each will store. I want to completely rewrite the protocols, and add Z-modem and CIS B+ to them. Once finished, they will become an internal part of FZT. This will be nicer on floppy users. I will definitely keep the external protocol slots, if you were worried. I want to improve the IGS emulation, one way or another. I should be getting in touch with Larry Mears, the author of the IGS emulator accessory and Interlink .EMU module. I want to figure out a way to have his modules be able to load into FZT, meaning I don't have to update my IGS emulation at all, and the newest version of IGS will always be supported by FZT. I also want to add VT-100, VT-102, VT-200, VT-220, and VT-3xx. I have had many requests for these, and I believe a complete terminal should be able to handle these DEC emulations. I would like to update the script files. I am not sure whether or not I want to keep the .DO compatible format, or create something new and better of my own. Stay tuned for this version of FZT. It should blow everything else off of the planet. I will also be accepting 20 or so people as beta-testers for this upcoming version. If you have had major problems with FZT in the past, have a TT or a weirdo graphics board, or are just a FZT addict, and are a registered user, have free time, are willing to write a lot of bug reports, and can afford calling my support board every once in a while, let me know. I would like to apologize to my registered users. You all have been great to me, and I appreciate it. Many of you have been waiting quite a while for your registered versions and are sick of waiting. Today I read a bunch of back-mail off of the FZT conference on GEnie. I believe that calling FZT "Thiefware" is going a bit too far, though. Please don't start slamming the software for mistakes I have made. This has all been a learning experience for me, I must say. FZT has been spread around the globe by word-of-mouth advertising. It has been built up with a reputation of being some of the finest Shareware ever to appear for the ST. If you have sent in your registration fee, then it seems that you believe this too. It hurts to see people accusing me of "destroying the reputation of all ST shareware." But I believe they are referring to my customer support, not my programming abilities. If you have sent in your registration, and received it in a satifactory period of time, I would hope that you would let others know this. If you have sent in your registration, and are only now getting your registered copy, I would hope that you would let others know that I am not a crook, that the software performs as advertised, and that my customer support leaves a little to be desired. If you have not sent in your registration due to the fact that you have heard other talk about not getting their registration, that is your choice. I hope that you don't hold this against me for all of eternity. If in some point in the future, you hear from satisified customers that you will consider sending in your registration. I am only a guy with a an ST who likes to program, and is has gotten a little behind on sending out registered copies. People have asked me "what's taking so long?". Really, there are a number of things. With version 2.11, I sent out 37 bad .KEYs. Version 2.11 had some major flaws, and I was out a bit of money on materials and postage. With v2.11 went the St. Patricks Day Special, in which I mentioned that I would send out registered copies in 3 days after receiving them. This was a mistake, seeing as with a bad program and bad key creator, it would take me a bit of time to make sure that there would be no problems with this version. On top of this, I was literally flooded with orders with the St. Patty's Day Special. Soooo many people registered this month that the floor of my room has been covered with stacks of registrations ready to be entered into the registered user database/key creator. And lastly, I believe that I have developed a little bit of computer burnout. For the past month or so, the last thing I have had the energy to do has been to it down with the computer and fix up FZT, answer countless messages and e-mail on the networks, and send out registrations. Anyway, enjoy the latest version of FreeZe Dried Software's greatest creation, the FreeZe Dried Terminal! Aaron Hopkins Author, The FreeZe Dried Terminal The FreeZe Dried Terminal v2.12 --- ------ ----- -------- ----- I. Quick Setup of FzDSTerm to your system ................ [SET] II. New Stuff ............................................. [NEW] III. Use of the New .KEYs .................................. [KEY] IV. What You Might Find in Future Versions ................ [FUT] ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ [SET] - Quick Setup ----- ----- If you have a configuration file from Version 2.03 or below and are either using monochrome or are on a TT, please delete your current config file (FZDSTERM.CFG). Also, if you delete your config, FzT has the new protocols installed as defaults. If you keep your config, you will need to install these protocols by hand. Follow these steps to quickly configure FzDSTerm to your system and create a configuration (FZDSTERM.CFG) file: (Most of the options have presets, if these are not suitable to your tastes or needs, feel free to change them.) 1. If you do not have a Hard Drive, you may wish to use a RAM Disk as a fast drive which FzDSTerm will use to keep the protocols and other temporary files for increased productivity. If you want to use this feature, install a RAM Disk now. (HRAMDISK.PRG is recommended for this.) 2. Run FZDSTERM.PRG 3. It will pop up a fileselector asking you to locate the config file. Since you currently don't have one, click on Cancel. 4. An alert box will appear telling you that it couldn't find the config file and that it will be using defaults. Hit return. 5. Another alert box will ask you what type of modem to set up for. If you have a 300, 1200, or 2400 baud modem click on "Generic 2400". If you have a USR HST or similar high-speed modem click on "USRobotics HST". 6. A Quick Setup menu will appear next. This is where you can set all of your defaults before you begin using FzT: 7. It will default to 2400 baud, 8 bits, No Parity, 1 stop bit, No CTS/RTS, No XON/XOFF, Full Duplex, No Echo, No Linefeeds, Capture Open, VT-52 Emulation. If you need to change any of these, click on RS-232 config and do so. Click on EXIT when you are done.8. a) Click on Default Paths. You may specify specific paths for most different types of files. Click on a path to change it. I prefer to make seperate paths for everything, I like to be organized, but you may leave them all to the default. b) If you are without a Hard Drive and have decided to use a RAM Disk as a fast drive, you will need to install it. Click on "Ramdisk" and when the fileselector appears, move to the path for the RAM Disk in the fileselector, and click on "OK". c) Hit UNDO or the right mouse button when you are done. 9. a) Click on Initialization strings. b) Next, use the arrow keys to move to the Current Area Code. If you are in the US or Canada, enter your current area code. If you are not, LEAVE THIS BLANK! THIS IS IMPORTANT!!! c) If you are in the US or Canada, and your phone number is in the format of (xxx) yyy-zzzz, where (xxx) is your Area Code, you may wish to use the locked format dialing system in FzT. This is best for people who don't dial internationally, and don't need to change modem settings for different BBSes. FzT will default to "Free format", if you feel that the locked format is more suited toward your needs, select "Free Format Phone", and hit Return twice to skip through the conversion dialogs. d) If you want to change any of the preset Init strings, do so. When you are done, click on EXIT. 10. Click on Save Config to write your configuration to the current path, and then EXIT to go on. 11. You will be presented with the Main Menu. Enjoy! ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ [NEW] - Whats New? ----- --- v2.12 ----- o The dialer has been fixed. In v2.11, there was a minor bug in the initialization routines that handled dialing the modem, etc. It would read and send one character past the end of the dial string, meaning it sends one garbage character after the dial command. On some modems, this is not a problem. On others, it recognizes this as an abort, and ends the dial before it begins. This has been fixed. o FzT now works in TT Medium. This is good news for many users of TTs who hate switching down from TT Medium. Along with 16 colors in TT Medium Res comes both benifits and problems. I haven't looked hard enough to discover how to set colors in TT rezes, so FZT won't change any colors there. There also comes something kinda new to Ataris: full color ANSI graphics. To make them look right, you should set your colors to: 1 - Red 2 - Green 3 - Yellow 4 - Blue 5 - Magenta 6 - Cyan with a white foreground(15) and a black background(0). 16 color ANSI is produced on IBMs by setting each of the above eight colors to high intensity. This effect can't be done on STs or TTs right, but I could use the other 8 colors on the TT to simulate this effect. o The speed of the "Strip" function in the scrollback has been greatly increased. After watching it redraw 22 lines of a single ANSI animation (which took like 20-30 seconds with strip on) I decided to rewrite that code a little. Last night I scrolled through 80 messages in an ANSI animation base with strip on in 28 seconds. This is roughly a 1,000% increase in speed. I like it. o A bug in the line counter routine in the scrollback set the text to black on black every once in a while using FZT in monochrome. This has been fixed. o Autolearn logon has been changed a bit. There were a few bugs which would produce strange results. It should function a little better now. If not, you can always edit the autologs by hand. <g> o FzT should no longer screw up settings in the sound chip (which also controls many ports, such as the serial and parallel). Do to an oversight on my part, FzT reportedly caused some printers to stop functioning correctly along with some accelerator boards. (It would switch them to 8Mhz.) v2.11 ----- o Background dialing has been added. This will allow you to wait for a connection to a number while doing other things in the program. To enable it, simply select the "BackGnd" button in the Autodialer, and begin dialing as usual. It will continue dialing as long as the user interface of the program remains in control. If you jump to a fileselector or an external program, it will be able to dial the next number until you return. (You may use your accessories, as long as they use windows for an interface rather than a dialog box.) o The way that FzDSTerm (and the FzDS Protocols) send to the serial port should be more stable on different versions of TOS. o The modem input processing in the term mode has been completely rewritten. I believe that this is much more stable, and is also much faster. (My quick tests show that it handles about 3 to 3.5k of ANSI a second on my machine. Not bad.) The autologs and automacros should not slow down the system substantially. o When jumping to the fileselector or going back to the desktop from FzDSTerm used to bring strange results. The mouse would act as though the left button was being pressed and released rapidly, causing it to select unwanted items. This has been finally fixed. o Mouse controlled scrolling has been slightly refurbished in both the scrollback and text editor. Control or caps lock selects mouse controlled scrolling in both, but you may now use the mouse pointer to select a block of text when control and caps lock are off. Hold down the mouse button and drag it across a section of text to select it for a block. o The floppy formatter has been fixed, and added something referred to as "FaST" format. Its done by setting the Interleave to 11 instead of 1. Supposedly, doing so increases the reading and writing speed of the floppy drive faster than "Twister", etc. I have not run speed trials on this, but I do believe it works. It now should generate MS-DOS compatible floppies, also. Because of a bug, FZT previously could not format unformatted disks on some systems. (Nice, eh?) This has been fixed. NOTE: "FaST" format only works on 9 sector disks. Also, MS-DOS will only read 9 sector, 80 track disks. o ASCII Send should work a bit better. It now only truncates the lines while sending a "Quoted" block. You should now be able to ASCII send VT-52, ANSI, etc screens now. o The Type Ahead buffer has been expanded to contain the last 10 entries you have typed using it. Use the UP and DOWN arrows to scroll through these. v2.10 ----- o The .KEY system has been adopted. Please read the next section for details. o The Monochrome interface has been completely redone. I believe there will be no more problems with reading or using FzT in monochrome. I'm sorry for any in convience this may have caused any of you. o The scrollback has been redone. Many more options are now included under the text editor style drop down menus. o An "Auto Learn Logon" feature has been included. With it, creating autologon sequences requires only a click of the mouse, and to log on to a BBS by hand one last time. It will fill in rest for you. o The speed of input processing has again been substantially increased. The autologs and automacros should slow down the system much less. o The speed of loading a text file into the text editor should be increased substantially. o An option has been included to disable the 1k Serial port output buffer which FzT usually installs. This seems to solve any problems with uploading using HSTs and Zmodem/Ymodem-G. (In RS-232 Config.) o The maximum size of the text editor and scrollback has been increased to 32,000 lines. Although I do NOT recommend taking them up that far, it is there if you need it. o A change has been made in the way FzT uses its memory. This SHOULD solve any problems with bombing. o An option has been added to ASCII send. If you select "Begin Send", it will not include the Prefix. If you select "Send Quoted", it will. (Previously to disable the Prefix, you had to delete the Prefix.) o After selecting the path for the ramdisk, you will now be asked if you wish to copy the Protocols, the Archivers, or both in the RamDisk at startup. (To conserve space in the ramdisk and time.) o Mouse controlled scrolling has been added to both the scrollback and text editor. o The editors for the Autodialer and Init Strings have been (finally!) redone. You may now use the arrow keys to go back into a line. (Instead of backspacing over the line to change something.) A button ("Edit") has been added to the autodialer which selects whether the cursor keys control the red selection bar or the edit cursor. o The Jump to Accessories feature has been improved. A small oversight on my part has in the past caused the mouse cursor to behave very strangely when selecting options under the menu bar. o In Init Strings, there is a button labelled "Char Delay", which allows you to specify a pause between characters when sending a dial command or init string to the modem. This should help some modems recognise commands sent by FzT. o When you have the "Auto Change Baud" option turned off and "No Dial While CD" selected, FzT will now connect when carrier detect goes on while dialing. For some modems (HSTs), the CD goes on much in advance of the "CONNECT ..." response. This will keep FzT from aborting the dial before the modem sends the "CONNECT". o A Print feature has been added to the autodialer, and might come in handy. o A new font has been put in, and the way FzT handles the fonts has been changed. You may now use the selected font in any menu that uses the TOS font. o Quite a few bug fixes, and I'm sure there are features which I have left out. v2.04 Demo ----- ---- o A Beta-Test version of the FreeZe Dried Protocols has been included, and the default setup is included in FzDSTerm. (These protocols will eventually become an internal part of FzDSTerm, once perfected.) See FZDSXFER.DOC for more information. o In the autodialer, an option has been added to allow you to enter any combination of characters in the Phone Number field. This should fix any problems regarding the autodialer and international calling. (You may toggle this feature in the Init Strings/Dialer Setup menu.) o The speed of the ANSI processing has been improved somewhat. Through my (inaccurate) speed tests, I calculate that FzDSTerm should be able to process between 1,700 and 2,300 bytes of ANSI per second, depending upon what is being displayed. (This is with no other options enabled, besides autostart ZModem, using Turbo ST v1.84.) o Many cosmetic bugs have been fixed in Monochrome. Also, the color sliders have been replaced in mono with a large button allowing you to switch the foreground and background colors. o A bug in the default paths/ramdisk initialization made putting the protocols and archive tools in anything but the main directory not function if a ramdisk was not installed. o For TT Users: I have found some TTs where the carrier detect status is reversed from normal, and some where it is not. When first creating a config file, FzT will ask you the current status of your modem's carrier detect. From this, it will determine whether or not your TT's CD is reversed. (If anyone can offer a reason or explaination for this, let me know.) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ [KEY] - The New .KEY System --- --- --- ------ I have completely changed the way in which FzT checks for registration. Previously, the registration information was an internal part of the program. This meant that all updates had to come from me, and also that to generate a registered copy, it was quite a hassle for both the users and myself. As of the registered version of 2.04 (not the demo version), this has changed. Now the registration info is kept in a seperate file, called a Key. This is the "key" to "unlock" the features of FzT. This key is loaded upon each bootup of FzDSTerm and its format is checked. If it is valid, all of the features which are disabled in the demo are available to you. This makes it much easier for you to get and use the latest version. All you have to do is download it from your local BBS and put it in the same directory as your .KEY. Starting with version 2.10, the demo and registered versions of the program for everyone will be exactly the same. The main advantage of this is that I can distribute the registered version everywhere, and only the people who have the .KEYs (who have paid) may use some of the features. I will send you the .KEY, and when the next version comes out instead of having to get it from me, you can use your current .KEY on the new version. This is faster for you, and less of a headache for me. The .KEY contains your name, address, phone number, serial number, etc. Much of this information is displayed when you first load FzT and when you click on the FzDS symbol on the main menu. I advise you to not give out your .KEY as it can easily be traced back to you by anyone. Its easy for you to check who a particular .KEY belongs to, and if its not yours, you are expected not to use it. How to set up the .KEY for FzDSTerm versions 2.04 Rel and above: 1. Rename your .KEY to FZDSTERM.KEY, if it is not already. 2. Rename the program to FZDSTERM.PRG. 3. Put the .KEY in the same path as your FZDSTERM.CFG (usually also with the FZDSTERM.PRG.) 4. Run FzDSTerm If for some reason it tells you "KEY Not Valid! Please obtain a new one.", your KEY is not valid with that version of FzT. Contact me to get a new one. (You may either send for the $5 upgrade or call Hitchhiker's Guide To the Galaxy, the main FzDSTerm support board, and I will F-mail it to you.) I will try to make your .KEY work with all future versions, but I may be forced to change the format if some people don't follow the rules. I would like you to adhere to a few simple rules regarding .KEYs: 1. One .KEY may either be used by one user on multiple systems, or by multiple users on one system. Under no circumstances is a single key to be used by multiple users on multiple systems. 2. Under no circumstances may a .KEY be copied or archived except for backup purposes and to set FzT up on another system you SOLELY will be using. Transmitting (uploading) a .KEY anywhere for any reason is not allowed, except from me and to me on Hitchhiker's Guide. You may copy, archive, or transmit all other files except the .KEY and the registered versions of FZDSTERM.PRG v2.04 and below. 3. If I EVER find or hear about a "cracked" .KEY (one not generated by me, containing bogus registration info), I reserve the right to either: a. Immediately change the format of the .KEYs, causing all registered users to have to get new .KEYs. b. Go back to the old method, taking away this great way of operation. If people can't repect my right to only allow people to use all parts of FzT only if they've registered, I don't see why I should make it any easier for them. 4. If I ever find someone giving out their .KEY to other people, I will cancel their registration and make their .KEY invalid for future versions of FzDSTerm. If they want to be eligible for upgrades, they will have to pay again. If I feel that their .KEY has been spread around too much, I may choose to do any of the following under #3. NOTE: If you ever come across a .KEY that is not yours; send it to me, and I will make it worth your while. I would like to know if a key is being spread around. Either print a Hex dump of it and mail it to me, or send it to me on Hitchhikers.a ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ [FUT] - What You Might Find in Future Versions: ---- --- ----- ---- -- ------ -------- On the continual quest to perfect the FreeZe Dried Terminal, I plan to slowly add and change it to be able to handle everyone's needs. The following is a list of features which you might see later on: o Much improved documentation. I realize that the main documentation (FZDSTERM.DOC) in its present form does not help many people out with the complicated features of FzT. I have had several offers by people to write documentation for me, and I am having them submit a sample of the rewritten docs for me to compare. I am willing to offer a bit in return for this, if you are interested in trying out. o A new user interface is in the works. It should make FzT smaller, more consistant, easier to use, and resolution independant. If you have any gripes with or suggestions for the current user interface, please say so now, or it may harder to add to or change later. o VT-100, VT-102, VT-2xx, and VT-3xx emulations. I have had many requests for these. I have limited documentation on VT-100, but am looking for more. Please send me and documentation you may have on them! o If you like the FZDSXFER.TTP protocols, you should look forward to their improvement. We plan on adding Zmodem, among other things to the list of protocols. If they get to a point where I no longer include XYZ.TTP in the distribution, I will make them an internal part of FzT. (Extra slots for external protocols will always be available.) Please send me any documentation you may have on any protocols you would like to see added. (Such as Z-Modem, J-Modem, Compuserve B+, etc.) o Look forward the Instant Graphics emulation being improved. At the moment, the IGS in FzT is faster, but does only the graphics at the moment. Many of the extended commands and sounds are not currently supported. o The .DO Script files can be added to. If you would like to see them improved or a command added, let me know. (And send a list of commands you want to see!) o Background Transfers. We have been optimising the protocols for efficiency, and once we get them done, I will be willing to make them an .ACC, and run in the background. I believe this should be a nice addition, but I can give no guarantees on this one. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------