Path: utzoo!utgpu!attcan!uunet!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!rutgers!gatech!ncsuvx!mcnc!ecsvax!ruslan From: ruslan@ecsvax.UUCP (Robin C. LaPasha) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga Subject: Re: Ultra-Card/Browser Bugs Summary: help via crossover from H*Talk Message-ID: <7471@ecsvax.UUCP> Date: 11 Aug 89 19:40:08 GMT References: <21232@louie.udel.EDU><660@laic.UUCP> Organization: UNC Educational Computing Service Lines: 76 In article <660@laic.UUCP>, darin@nova.laic.uucp (Darin Johnson) writes: > In article portuesi@tweezers.esd.sgi.com (Michael Portuesi) writes: > >[deleted] > I took the plunge and bought UltraCard. It is a lot faster than > the demo version I saw, especially display-wise. Could be lots better, > but a big improvement of the demo. According to the author, the current rev of the browser/demo on Compuserve is 1.11. > > Big drawback - lack of good documentation. The manual is disorganized > and needed some proofreading. It states that better documentation is > in the TheManual stack (since hypertext, etc. is better for documentation). > However, it tells almost nothing new, and is not very big (6 chapters > of 4 topics each - each topic half a screen). Supposedly, if you > read through the help stack fully, etc. you can get more info. The > list of function/commands is available. I assume it is incomplete > since it doesn't discuss ARexx. The only place ARexx is discussed > is in the "more..." frame, and only a tiny bit (enough to get you > going, no examples). No registration card or info found, although > there is a BBS in Monterrey, CA. Also, no docs on how to use the > sample stacks. The address-book was fairly obvious, but the Calendar > isn't (from the source, it appears you can't put notes for dates > in another month but I could be wrong). The Tutorial stack is pretty > good though (tutorial for creating stacks). I gurued a bit too. > 1. Documentation - I mentioned that to Mike Lehman; he said that he was looking at some H*Talk manuals as he was designing things. So, "except for chunk expressions" (which I gather means text strings?) the UltraTalk commands are similar to their analogs (with _similar_ but not identical names) in H*Talk. He said he liked "the Shafer book" (which could be _HyperTalk_Programming_ or _Understanding_HyperTalk_, both by Dan Shafer, ranging from $18-25.) 2. ARexx. Well, I don't know if ARexx is discussed in documentation for other ARexx-hooked programs... Is nothing in ARexx's own docs? (I don't have ARexx yet, but it's one of those important-sounding things I might get to even _before_ 1.4 comes out.) 3. Calendar. Can you perhaps copy the _frame_ so that you can use the date note-objects in another month? I'm just guessing from the browser/demo. I'm a bit new at this hypermedia stuff too. > Also, the manual really tries to push the BBS, saying that many more > sample stacks, etc. are there. Personally, I would rather have an > extra disk with samples, full-fledged manual, etc. This would > be much cheaper to me than the BBS (time-wise too, with only one > phone, I can't download large files when someone might call, 1200 > baud is silly when I get USENET at 19K, BBS's are usually busy, etc.). I would also like some mail-based stack swapping of sorts. Supposedly a collection of stuff is on Compuserve and PeopleLink, (including the current browser/demo), including stacks. I have also sent my own request to Mike Lehman that there be an inexpensive way of getting stacks. > > Of course, I expect it to get better with age. The manual hints on > things to come (compiler), and documentation can only improve. A > second disk would really help though. If you still have questions, it turns out that Mike Lehman's compuserve-via-gateway address is 76164.1764@compuserve.com. Be prepared to wait a few days for an answer, though - they're busy, I guess. > > Darin Johnson (leadsv!laic!darin@pyramid.pyramid.com) > We now return you to your regularly scheduled program. (Oh, durn, I guess I'll be paranoid and say that HyperTalk is a term/trademark/whatever probably owned by somebody connected legally to Apple...you get the idea.) -- =-=-=-=-=-=-=- Robin LaPasha |Deep-Six your ruslan@ecsvax.uncecs.edu |files with VI! ;^) ;^) ;^)