Collection of Education/collectionofeducationcarat1997.iso/COMPUSCI/BERTDA32.ZIP/BD32.DOC

Text File | 1994-04-15 | 20KB | 408 lines

                            Bert's Dinosaurs
              (Including All the Bert's Coloring Programs)
                   A Coloring Program For Introducing
                     Young Children to the Computer

                  Unregistered Version 3.2 User's Guide

                              Introduction


    This instruction manual was produced for use with the Bert's
Dinosaurs program. Several other Bert's coloring programs are also
available and these instructions are for use with these programs as
well.

    Bert's Dinosaurs is an enjoyable coloring program for children of
all ages, but is especially useful for introducing young children to the
computer. Bert's Dinosaurs was designed by educators to be used by young
children with a minimum of assistance by adults. As a coloring program
Bert's Dinosaurs is superior to many other children's coloring programs
in that it allows the user to place the various dinosaurs, all in four
different sizes, on a variety of backgrounds. This allows children to
easily create their own picture before coloring. The opportunity to
create their own picture will allow children to take pride in their
unique creation. Bert's Dinosaurs also has a voice feature, which can be
turned on or off, allowing the dinosaurs to speak their names, much to
the delight of children.

    When first started Bert's Dinosaurs displays a title screen and then
the drawing surface with eight buttons on the left. Children can operate
the program with the mouse alone. A window is provided which allows
children to write a short story about their picture using the keyboard.
The fact that they created the picture will help provide the motivation
to write about it. One of the best ways for children to learn to read is
to write, even if their initial attempts include phonetic spelling which
is not always correct. If your child is not ready to attempt writing
his/her story, then another good strategy is for you to type in your
child's story as he/she dictates it to you. Then have your child read
back the story he/she created. This is another very effective beginning
reading strategy. They will love creating a setting, writing or
dictating their own story and printing out a copy.

                              Installation

    Bert's Dinosaurs requires an IBM compatible computer with at least
512K of memory, a VGA display and a Microsoft compatible mouse. A Sound
Blaster card will improve the voice quality considerably. The computer's
speaker will be used if a Sound Blaster card and driver are not found.
The program installation process is quite easy.

    First, make a backup copy of your Bert's Dinosaurs program disk. If
necessary consult your PC-DOS/MS-DOS manual for a description of the
DISKCOPY command. Save the original program disk in a safe place and use
the copy as the working program disk.



Bert's Dinosaurs Version 3.2                                Page 1 of 7
    Second, while it is possible to use Bert's Dinosaurs on a floppy
disk system, a hard disk system is a necessity for reasonable speed and
storing a number of pictures your child has created. To install Bert's
Dinosaurs on a hard disk use the following steps:

    1. Insert the floppy disk in your computer in drive A. (or B if
necessary)
    2. Type A: (or B:)
    3. Type INSTALL A C

    Any hard drive letters can be used, for example INSTALL B D will
install the program from floppy drive B to hard drive D. The
installation will create a directory called BERT3 on your hard drive and
you will need to enter a CD\BERT3 to change to the Bert's Dinosaurs
directory before running the program. Once installed just type BERT to
start the program. If your computer gives a series of beeps when you run
Bert's Dinosaurs it is probably because it cannot find the image files
it needs to run, and other problems are showing up as well. All the
files for Bert's Dinosaurs need to be in the same directory for the
program to operate successfully. You should not mix the .DOT image files
from Bert's Dinosaurs with those of versions previous to 3.0 as they are
in a different format.

    If you are installing more than one copy of the Bert's coloring
programs, ie. - Bert's Dinosaurs, Bert's African Animals, Bert's
Prehistoric Animals, Bert's Whales and Dolphins - you will get warning
messages during installation such as the following:

PKSFX: (W18) Warning! c:/bert3/BERT.EXE already exists. Overwrite (y/n)?

    You should type a letter N in response to this message, which will
speed up installation. Actually, typing a Y will not hurt anything, it
simply writes over the file with an identical copy.

    Users with a Sound Blaster card must copy the driver file CT-
VOICE.DRV, which comes with your Sound Blaster card, into the BERT3
directory. This file is usually found in the DRV subdirectory which is
in the Sound Blaster directory. The Sound Blaster directory has
different names depending on the model you have, for example SB16 for
the Sound Blaster 16 ASP. To copy the driver file you would type:

                  COPY  \SB16\DRV\CT-VOICE.DRV  \BERT3

    You should change the directory name SB16 in the example above to
whatever is appropriate for your Sound Blaster software. If the CT-
DRIVE.DRV file is not found in the BERT3 directory the program will use
the computer's speaker for voice output. For computers with normal
speakers the voice is quite recognizable. However, many of the new PC
computers are using cheap piezoelectric devices which makes the voice
sound like a duck. Users with piezoelectric devices or parents tired of
listening to dinosaur names may wish to turn the voice off.

   If sound is not coming through the PC speaker or the Sound Blaster
output, then you have the CT-VOICE.DRV file in the BERT3 directory, but
have other problems. It is possible that your current Sound Blaster
setup is incorrect. First, check your AUTOEXEC.BAT file in the root

Bert's Dinosaurs Version 3.2                                Page 2 of 7
directory. It should have some lines that look something like this:

    SET BLASTER=A220 I5 D1 H5 P330 T6
    SET SOUND=C:\SB16
    C:\SB16\SB16SET /M:220 /VOC:220 /CD:220 /MIDI:220 /TREBLE:0
    C:\SB16\SBCONFIG.EXE /S

    Your parameters may very well be different, depending on what I/O
port address, interrupt number and DMA channel your system is using. You
can check the SET's by just typing SET from the C:> prompt.

    You can also try reinstalling CT-VOICE.DRV by using the INST-DRV
program with DRV as a parameter, ie. type INST-DRV DRV. This install
program can have different names or a different parameter like \SB\DRV,
depending on the card you have. Check your manuals for details. You can
check your Sound Blaster card with the program TEST-SBC or TEST-SBP.

    If these items all appear to be in place you might want to try
reinstalling the Sound Blaster software from scratch. Be sure to install
everything. The Bert's coloring programs are DOS programs and having the
Sound Blaster work with a Windows program does not mean the DOS Sound
Blaster environment is OK.

    Operation of Bert's Dinosaurs is quite easy. The eight buttons are
configured to do the following when the left mouse button is clicked on
them:

                           The Command Buttons

    SELECT A DINOSAUR

    When beginning a new picture six small backgrounds are displayed.
The user clicks with the mouse on the selected scene to have it drawn on
the screen full size.
    Next, a group of six dinosaurs are displayed. Clicking the mouse on
any one of the dinosaurs will select it. If the stop sign is clicked on,
no dinosaur will be selected and you are returned to the drawing
surface.
    Clicking the mouse on the box between the stop sign and the green
arrows sets the voice status. Voice can be set to on, off or voice only
- meaning the dinosaurs only say their name through the computer's
internal speaker. T