
Animated Text
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Who-done-it:
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Name: Udi Meiri
Date: The Fourth of May, Nineteen Ninety Seven


Quick Start:
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* EXTRACT all files to a directory.
* Make sure you're in plain DOS or a full-screen DOS box (alt-enter for
  Windows, alt-home for OS/2) or you wont see the animations well.
* RUN AT.EXE with no paramaters.
* SEE the command line parameters.
* RUN EXAMPLES.BAT to see some examples.
* EXAMINE the command lines of the examples.
* UNDERSTAND how the hell the damn thing works.
* RUN AT.EXE again.
* MAKE your own animation using your imagination.


What it is:
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Animated Text is a simple program to test and flesh an animated text
specification that I, Udi Meiri, made up (out of my own free will). It was
mainly designed to add a little pep to your otherwise static smileys, though
it can be used for other purposes. It is also designed to be easy to learn,
flexible, and easy to write by hand. The main goal of writing this program
is to see this or a similar specification working in e-mail, IRC, or
possibly even html clients.

Text and animated text shall be viewed in unison!

This has been a result of a spontaneous, stupendous stroke of insipiration.
After about 3 hours of work and playing around with it, I am releasing it.
No one else knows anything about it, but you! I don't really know if ANYONE
wants this (but I hope someone does!). Maybe someone will implement it, I
don't know (but I hope so!).


How to Use:
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The examples.bat and usage (run at.exe without parameters to it) help should
suffice to understand. Note that in order to achieve spaces you may not use
your space bar, use the combination Alt+2+5+5 instead, using the digits on
the keypad.


How the Speeds Work:
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The speed is based on the standard timer chip (8152) that the standard PCs'
motherboard's BIOS'es use in order to update their RTC or Real Time Clock.
It "ticks" every second exactly 18.2 times. It never "talks" (get the pun?
HAR!!! HAR!!! HAR!!!). That wasn't funny. In milliseconds, that's about 55ms
between every "tick".

A-Z = Speeds 1-26; It's really the number of ticks+1. That means that at
speed A, the display will update every 0 ticks - that means without delay,
speed B will delay about 55ms or 1/18.2 of a second, and so on...


Notes:
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A) You may distribute this freely, as long as it is kept in its entirety.
B) This program is freeware. There is to be no charge for the specific use or
   retrival of this program (you should not be paying for this).
B) You may develop a similar program.
C) You may contact me if you implement this in any way as I am interested in
   seeing this implemented in the mediums mentioned above.
D) This version is very limited: one line only (upto 80 chars), command line
   interface means limited size of animation, upto 25 "parts" for the
   animation (no checking is done for more than 25 either!).


How to Contact the Author:
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Mail him at Meiri@IBM.net


Tech Notes:
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 Yes, I know that this program is pretty large considering what it does... :)
 This program was programmed in Turbo Pascal 7.
 About the source code: I've decided to distribute the source code for
those of you wishing to implement the specification (hey, I have my hopes
up!). Anyway, don't pay attention to any of the idiotic comments in there. :)
The source cannot compile by itself since it uses a gigantic unit that I
have developed over the years. Any reasonable coder should be able to
substitute those missing functions with assembler or some ready made stuff...
