Newsgroups: comp.windows.ms
Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu!hmarvel
From: hmarvel@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (Howard P Marvel)
Subject: Plus for Windows
Message-ID: <1991May7.014635.25623@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu>
Originator: hmarvel@bottom.magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu
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Nntp-Posting-Host: bottom.magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu
Organization: The Ohio State University
Date: Tue, 7 May 1991 01:46:35 GMT
Lines: 46


I am looking for some advice on converting HyperCard stacks to run on
the IBM PC under Windows.  I have converted some HC 1.2.5 stacks to Plus
on the Mac and then shipped them to the PC with AFE, but there are a 
few problems.  In particular, Plus comes with a ready-made collection
of icons, but I see no way to add icons as resources so that Plus 
recognizes them.  The Plus program appears to have only two icons that
are analogous to Macintosh resources.  One is the Plus icon and the
second is a stack icon.  These can appear on the Windows desktop.  So
apparently Plus has its own icon mechanism.  The question is, then, can
I somehow add to this internal set?

A second question regards documentation.  Is there a screen dump utility
for Windows that would permit me to save a screen (or preferably a portion
thereof) as a TIFF file?  I need to retain grays.  The screen dumps will
go into Pagemaker (Mac version) for documentation.

Finally, a few observations.  It appears that Plus and Toolbook on a 25mz
386 machine each run at about the speed of HC on a Mac Plus.  Is this
a consequence of Windows being an inferior substitute for the Mac OS, or
is it due to these programs?  Secondly, is there a new Windows version 
in the offing that will fix some of the UAE problems?  The current version
seems rather unstable.  Third, Plus seems a better choice that Convertit
and Toolbook, as the latter combination seems really slow and unstable.
The Daybook crashed on me, for heaven's sake.  Is this a reasonable position
or is there perhaps a newer version of Toolbook on the way that solves
some of the speed and stability problems?  I've had some strange problems
with Plus, too, like background graphic objects not carrying their bitmaps
from card to card.  They seem to work like background fields (HC 1.x version).
One other Plus problem is the size of converted stacks--they are huge. 
My Mac software is distributed on 4 800K diskettes (plus one more for
HyperCard 2.0.2).  I am looking at twice that amount for the Plus version.
I am not sure that many users will want to devote that kind of disk space
to stackware (in this case, instructional software for intermediate
microeconomics).

I'd really appreciate making contact with other persons working with
any Plus or Toolbook programmers out there, particularly anyone with
experience in converting from the Mac to the PC.  My comments above are not
intended to demean either the PC or Windows.  I actually like PCs (though
Windows is just ok).  No flames, please.  I'd surely prefer help, as
I'm getting frustrated.

Thanks in advance.

hmarvel@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu
