tomczak@harvard.ARPA (Bill Tomczak) (09/11/85)
31-Aug-85 08:20:37-PDT,10305;000000000005
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Date: Fri, 30 Aug 85 14:29:48 EDT
From: Kent_Flowers%UMich-MTS.Mailnet@MIT-MULTICS.ARPA
To: INFO-MAC@SUMEX-AIM.ARPA
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I noticed earlier that IEdit 1.0 had been uploaded to the net. I have had a
version 1.1 that fixes some of the bugs in 1.0 for several months, but have
avoided uploading it to the net because I didn't think it was of suitable
quality for the net until version 2.0 was finished. However, since someone
thought version 1.0 worthy of passing along, I figured I should at least supply
the latest version I had. For those that have run into the bugs of 1.0 (saving
two icons to the same file that have the same ID for example!) I extend my
apologies for the hack. 1.1 is still a seat-of-the-pants hack, but hopefully
it is a more functional one.
For those who have sent me questions reguarding how to use the beastie, here
are some quick notes:
I have added a quick note at the end of the "Help" menu (which at this time
neither the "Help" or the "Resources & Misc" menus have function other than
their content telling about future additions) to tell folks about the hidden
features that are in the program:
Space = Toggle Flashing -- this will toggle on and off the "police scanner"
menu flashing. Some people find this annoying, so with this it can be
turned off permanently until the space bar is pressed again. The
scanner setting is stored in the resource LITE and is updated on disk
so the setting survives between program runs.
0-9 = Grid Patterns -- pressing the number keys will cause a new grid
pattern to be used the next time the program redraws either editing
window, a different grid pattern associated with that key will be
drawn. 0 is not a pattern but rather turns the grid off. This is
handy for doing extensive shifting or rotating of the image without
being slowed down by grid redrawing.
Shift = XOR Constrain -- by holding down the Shift key while drawing in
an editing window the pixels you move the mouse over are inverted, not
drawn on in the mode that the first pixel was set to as normally
happens. This is handy if you are working on a mask and you want to
draw an exclusive-or line through a detailed image which would show
up when the icon is clicked on. Holding down Shift when doing a
Join command (from the Manipulations menu) will cause an exclusive-or
join of the icon onto the mask to be done--very handy for being able
to edit what you want to see when the icon is clicked instead of
having to guess what the XOR will do. An easy way to get animated
Finder ICNs is to draw the normal display icon in the left window
(the icon window) and the image you want to see when it is clicked in
the right window (the mask window) and then do Command-Shift-J to
convert the image you drew in the right window into the proper XOR
mask that the Finder needs.
Other commands worth mentioning (that I never got around to documenting):
In the Specifics menu...
Copy ICON from PICT -- Ever had a neat picture in the scrapbook you
wanted to have as an ICON or ICN# but didn't want to have to redraw it
by hand in an editor? Well, here you are: a PICT to ICON converter.
Select this option and a file request dialog comes up. Select the
file that contains the PICT you want to rip a piece out of and open it.
A window will come up displaying the first PICT in the file. A row of
buttons at the side allow you to move forward or backward through the
PICTs (please be nice to the program, I don't think I put much checking
on backward bounds so it might crash if you reverse past the first PICT)
or you can hit RETURN to move forward if you're lazy. The Quit button
will remove the window and buttons and return you to the main program.
Make ICON will invert an ICON sized frame (the ICON will completely fit
inside this frame) on the screen. Use the mouse and click to put the
frame where you want to yank the bits from. When you are happy with its
locale, hit RETURN and the image inside the frame will be copied to the
Scrap window. Click Quit to get back to the main program and then
Paste (in the Edit menu) the ICON into either an ICN# or ICON editing
window for touchups if you want. Otherwise, it is saveable as an ICON
from the Scrap immediately if you wish. Oh, yes, I forgot to mention:
The Save option checks the size of the data in the Scrap to determine
whether to save as an ICON or ICN#. The Scrap window changes size to
accomodate either. So, if you want to be sure what you are saving as,
just check the size of the window and see. (Small is ICON [32x32 bits]
and large is ICN# [32x64 bits].)
Read ICON from Data File -- this is to allow compatability with the ancient
ICON Editor that Apple released in its pre-Resource Editor software
supplements. So, if you have any text files written by the beast,
here's a way to get them into resources where they do some good. Just
select the file to read from, and the first 128 bytes of the data fork
are stuffed into the Scrap.
Write ICON to Data File -- wasn't hard to write, so I figured I'd allow
those insane folks out there to write out the first 128 bytes of the
Scrap to old ICON Editor files if they felt the urge.
Copy from XXXX only -- this allow you to mix-and-match icons and masks
(I use ICON to refer to the resource and icon to refer to just a
32x32 bit image that can either be an ICON or mask--and now back to
our regularly scheduled sentence...) between the ICN# editing window,
the ICON editing window, and the Scrap. (Personally, I never use the
ICON editing window for actual editing--the ICN# window is much handier
since you can use both windows and Join to build an icon. The ICON
editing window is a great storage place, though, because if you don't
close it, you can keep an undisturbed icon around while your ICN#
editing window and Scrap get torn to pieces with all sorts of
manipulations and pastings.) Note: when doing any copying operation,
the Scrap conforms both in size and content to the thing being copied.
So, for example, if you have an ICON in the Scrap and you use the Edit
menu Copy option from the ICN# editing window, the Scrap will expand
and have the whole ICN# in it. But, if you then do a "Copy from mask
only" command, the Scrap will shrink and only contain the mask from
the ICN# editing window. The only place you can merge two icons
together into an ICN# is by pasting ICONs specifically into the icon
and mask positions of the ICN# editing window using the "Paste to
editing icon" and "Paste to editing mask" options. I've gotten very
verbose here and made this sound very complicated. It really isn't
if you play with it and see...
Miscellaneous yap:
Both the ICON and ICN# editing windows can be open at the same time. The
topmost window is the one that all copy and paste operations will
affect.
Pasting an icon to the ICN# editing window will not destroy the mask,
unless you specifically tell it to paste to the mask ("Paste to
editing mask" option), but then the icon part of the window will not
be disturbed.
When opening files that contain massive numbers of ICONs and ICN#s the
program has been known to die. The file usually needs to be over 36K
of pure ICONs and ICN#s, though. On a 128K less would be needed to
make it crash.
The scroll bar in the resource file display window works, now. It will
only be active if you have things that go off the bottom of the window.
This is an icon editor, not a resource mover. I did not put in very many
file-to-file resource moving capabilities. You can have two files open
at the same time, though, for those who do wish to move a few.
Saving a resource under an ID that already exists will ask the user if
they want to overwrite the old resource or cancel. Version 1.0 did
not, even though I thought I told it to...
The "New Resource File" option only creates a blank resource file (and if
you are going to get witty and do it on another drive, you must type
the volume name too--sorry about that poor implementation there) but
does not open that resource file. This will probably change, too.
Sometimes the program will forget what window is currently active. Just
click in it again and the program will get the idea...
Many people have wondered, "what are those displays at the bottom of the
ICN# editing window?" Ok, I guess they aren't very obvious...
In left to right order:
The icon (left window) -- what the Finder displays normally.
The mask -- a reduction of the right window. This is NEVER seen
from the Finder.
The selected icon -- what the Finder displays when the icon is
clicked on. (Using Command-Shift-J, you can swap the mask image
and the selected icon image. See above.)
The dimmed icon -- what the Finder displays when the icon is not
active (on an ejected disk).
The selected and dimmed icon -- what the finder displays when the
icon is not active but clicked on.
-----
The next five icons are the same as above except on a gray background
so that you can see the effects the mask has in blanking out the
background before the icon is stamped onto it.
That's all I can think of for now... Again, if you have any questions or
comments, do let me know. My net path is in the Help menu. (I corrected the
part MIT.ARPA to MIT-MULTICS.ARPA because I'm told that MIT doesn't imply
MIT-MULTICS. I apologize for the mailer errors that any may have gotten if
they tried to get ahold of me earlier.
Kent Flowers
[Archived as [SUMEX]<INFO-MAC>UTILITY-IEDIT.HQX. --RMA]