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From: ollef@sics.se (Olle Furberg)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.hypercard
Subject: Visual effects, menubar, SysEnv-XFCN
Message-ID: <1989Aug16.214948.8911@sics.se>
Date: 16 Aug 89 21:49:56 GMT
Sender: news@sics.se
Organization: Swedish Institute of Computer Science, Kista
Lines: 53



  Don't hide the menubar if it's not absolutly necessary!

  I have seen several HC-beginners rebooting their Macs when the menubar
disappers: you don't help anyone by hiding the menubar. Without the menubar,
you don't know how to get the message box or how to get help: you don't even
know how to quit! 

  The disappearance of the menubar confuses everybody, even an absolute
Mac-beginner. The first thing I learned on the Mac was to select menuitems!

  The fact that HyperCard contains a way to hide the menubar does not justify
the use of it: As I've understood, Bill Atkinson ((the creator of HC)) has 
never been interested in the Apple desktop-metaphor!! (But without him, we
wouldn't have any HC!!!)

  One interesting question is: should it really be any difference between the
Apple desktop metaphor interface and the HyperCard interface? What's Apple's
official opinion? Will HyperCard and (Multi)Finder be the same program in
system 8.0?


  If you really must hide the menubar (for e.g. cosmetic reasons) check the
environment first: use the SysEnv-XFCN in the TN stack. In my case it gives
the following output:

Macintosh Plus,6.0.2,Motorola 68000,false,false,Macintosh Plus keyboard,0,-32621
1,B&W

  I haven't tried it on my IIx, but the first item tells you what sort of
Mac the stack is running on and the last two items tell you how much color
you have.

  If the first item of SysEnv() contains "II", you don't need to hide the
menubar. On a MacII, HC is just another window on the desktop.



  And here we also have the solution to the other question, about visual
effects: just add the following lines to your "openstack"-handler in the bg
or the stack-script:

 if first item of second line of SysEnv() > 2 then
   answer "If you want visual effects you better turn off the color!"
 end if

NOTE: The SysEnv-XFCN is made by Chris Knepper and copyrighted by Apple!
I don't know if you're allowed to distribute it without license.


   /Olle