AsciiChart
by John Valdes
Version 2.0
1/12/99


AsciiChart is a simple character set and font display utility for
PalmOS devices, such as the 3Com Palm III and the IBM WorkPad.  Use
AsciiChart to view the characters available in each of the PalmOS
built-in fonts or as a reference for the ASCII character set.


INSTALLATION
------------
To install AsciiChart in your PalmOS device, simply download and
decompress the AsciiChart archive appropriate for your system, run the
Palm Desktop application installation utility to mark the AsciiChart
.PRC file for installation, and HotSync your device with your computer
to load AsciiChart into the device.  See the documentation for your
Palm Desktop software for details.

AsciiChart is compatible with PalmOS 1.0 and greater.


HOW TO USE
----------
To view information about a character, simply tap on the character in
the chart.  AsciiChart will display the character's ASCII value in
decimal, octal and hexadecimal, as well as the height and width of the
character.  Use the scroll buttons to scroll the chart up or down; the
hardware scroll buttons scroll by one screen at a time, while the
on-screen scroll arrows scroll by one row at a time.  To quickly
scroll to a given character, simply write the character using
Graffiti.  To quickly find a character by its ASCII value in decimal,
octal or hexadecimal, tap on the currently displayed decimal, octal or
hexadecimal value as appropriate, and enter the value in the dialog
box that appears.  The popup trigger at the upper left of the screen
can be used to change the font of the displayed characters.  Finally,
use the Copy button to copy the currently selected character to the
clipboard; this is useful for pasting "Graffiti-less" characters into
memos or shortcuts (note that the Copy button only copies the
character's value and not its displayed font, so when it is pasted
into another application, the character will be displayed in whatever
font that application uses).  Options are available via the
Preferences dialog for changing the numerical base (decimal, octal or
hexadecimal) of the row labels, for displaying the name abbreviations
of control characters (eg, ESC for the Escape character, decimal value
27), and for appending characters to the clipboard when copied.


HISTORY
-------
Version 2.0, 1/12/99:

 o added display of octal value
 o added option to display control characters in text fonts
 o added ability to find a character by value, in either decimal,
   octal or hexadecimal
 o added support for LargeBold font and a small icon for PalmOS 3.x
 o added option to append character to the clipboard, rather than
   overwrite it, when copied; useful for building a long string of
   characters with AsciiChart
 o added row labels to chart, which can be displayed in decimal, octal
   or hexadecimal
 o tapping the (i) button in the title bar now displays a Tips screen
   (the "About" dialog is now accessible from an Options menu)
 o fixed odd cell selection and highlighting problem

Version 1.0, 4/13/97:

 o character information is now properly updated when changing the
   font while the selected character is scrolled off the screen

 o fixed centering (as much as possible) of Graffiti shift characters
   in the Symbol font in PalmOS 1.0.x (no fix was needed for the
   Graffiti shift characters in PalmOS 2.x)

 o corrected URL in the "About" dialog and added email address

Version 1.0 alpha 3, 3/23/97:

 o initial public release


KNOWN PROBLEMS
--------------
Version 2.0:

 o No known problems.

Version 1.0:

 o Table cell selection and highlighting problem still needs to be
   fixed properly.

Version 1.0 alpha 3:

 o Selecting a character in the table with the stylus only works when
   tapping in the upper 2/3 of the cell; this is due to a "misfeature"
   of the PalmOS table handling code.

 o Table cell highlighting is a bit odd, due to problem mentioned above.

 o Display of the Graffiti shift state characters in the Symbol font
   needs to be cleaned up.


PLANNED ADDITIONS
-----------------
 o Add support for non-PalmOS character sets and encodings (eg,
   EBCDIC, ISO-8859-x, MacOS, DOS) via plug-ins.

 o Perhaps add a "Details" dialog to display additional character and
   font information (eg, character name, Graffiti stroke, ascent and
   descent, etc).


LEGAL STUFF
-----------
AsciiChart is Copyright (C) 1997, 1999 by John Valdes.

AsciiChart is freeware. Permission is given for free use and
distribution of this program. No warranty is made on this software,
nor is the author liable for any damage resulting from the use of this
software.

Any questions, comments or suggestions can be emailed to me at
j-valdes@uchicago.edu. The current version of AsciiChart and source
code can be found with other PalmOS software at
<http://astro.uchicago.edu/home/web/valdes/pilot/>.
