Lee_Robert_Willis@cup.portal.com (01/08/91)
Topic for discussion: I was reading a rather long READ.ME file when it occured to me that it would be mighty nice to have a standard text display utility that was a whole lot smarter than "MORE". Something that would allow you to display a Table of Contents, and go directly to a chapter. Something that would have an index, or cross-reference links. Mixing text and graphics would definitely be a plus. Sounds like a full fledged word-processor, doesn't it? Well what I'm thinking of is more like a word-processor browser. A program that displays a file, allows the user to page through it, print it, but does NOT support any editing. Do any of the Amiga word processors supply freely distributable browsers? I'm not aware of any, but I think it would be a good idea. It's beneficial to the users, because it would make on-line documentation a lot more convenient. Its beneficial to the word-processor vendor, because its free advertising to a wide potential-customer base. Every person who reads my READ.ME file with the FOOBAR browser gets a taste of what the FOOBAR word-processor can do. The hypertext program THINKER, by Poor Person Software is one possibility. It would be almost ideal for this. (NOTE: I don't own THINKER, I only have the demo disk.) It can do a table-of-contents, index, cross-referencing. It does text and graphics, and there is a freely-distributable demo version to use as a browser. I say 'ALMOST' because: THINKER does not handle fonts, styles, or pen colors. As a minimum I would want Styles, fonts and pen colors can be an added luxury. The demo is a crippled version of the actual program, i.e. it does everything the actual program does, except save the file to disk. The ideal browser would have only the code necessary to browse. A browser should not have menus, gadgets, etc. which are used for editing, paginating, spell checking, etc... That's just visual noise the user has to screen out. The demo does not print. The demo is intended to be just that, a demonstration of the capabilities of Thinker, i.e. an advertisement. It is not intended to be a browser for other peoples work. While I didn't find anything explicitly forbidding its use as such, I feel it violates the spirit of the release notes. Comments? Lee Lee_Robert_Willis@cup.portal.com