Up to now, you've concentrated on the Editor, Print formatter, and Grade 2 braille translator. While these options form the heart of BEX, there are many other utility functions provided on the Second, Page, and Starting Menus. Before we explore those menus, however, we want to provide you with an overview of how you select chapters in BEX.
Several methods are available for choosing which chapter or chapters to work with. We use the term default data drive to refer to the number that appears as the default when you press D at any menu. When you have a 2-drive system, your default data drive is always drive 2. When you have a 1-drive system, your default data drive is always drive 1. At the Master Level, you can have up to eight drives; knowing your default data drive becomes quite important.
When BEX needs to know which chapter you wish to work
with, it prompts Drive number or chapter name:
When you
receive this prompt, BEX has loaded any program it needs from disk into
the Apple's memory. When you have a 2-drive system, you can now
insert a data disk in drive 1, if you wish.
When presented with the Drive number or chapter
name:
prompt, you have two choices. When you know the name of the
chapter, just type it in and press <CR>. When you want to work with
more than one chapter, or when you're not sure of the chapter's name,
enter the drive number (1 or 2) where your data disk is located, followed
by <CR>. BEX presents a numbered list of the chapters on that disk.
We call this method of specifying chapters scanning the disk.
When you work with the Editor and all of the Page Menu options, you work with just one chapter at a time. In this situation, BEX prompts you to enter the number of the one chapter you want to use.
For all other options, you can work with an entire
disk of chapters. When you scan the disk for chapters, BEX presents a
numbered list of your chapters, and then asks you if you want to use the
entire list in order. The default is N since you usually don't want to
work with the entire list. Enter Y <CR>
when you do
want the whole list of chapters in the order presented. Otherwise, accept
the default by pressing <CR>.
After you get a numbered list of chapters, BEX prompts
you to pick one or more chapters by entering their numbers. After you
enter a number followed by <CR>, BEX responds with the name of the
chapter you've picked. When you want to cancel this chapter, enter a minus
sign (the hyphen) followed by <CR>. BEX announces that the chapter
is canceled. When you're done entering chapter numbers, enter <CR>
alone to the Chapter number:
prompt.
You have just specified a list of source
chapters for BEX to use. What happens next depends on the option.
When the result of the option is writing one or more chapters on disk,
then you have to tell BEX how to name the chapters. BEX prompts
Target chapter naming method:
For an online summary of target
chapter naming methods, press ? <CR>
at the prompt.
Target chapter naming methods are explained in Part 3.
BEX prompts for multiple chapter names with options G
- Grade 2 translation and R - Replace characters on the Main Menu, and
with options A - Adjust size of pages, C - Copy chapters, M - Merge
chapters, N - Name change for chapters and R - Read textfile to chapter,
on the Second Menu. We When the option doesn't involve writing new files on
disk, then after you specify the source chapter list, you're asked for
other information. With option P - Print chapters, the next step is
answering the Many BEX options created modified copies of your
chapters. We refer to these new chapters as target chapters.
Options G - Grade 2 translation and R - Replace characters on the Main
Menu, as well as many of the options on the Second Menu, ask you how you
wish to name the target chapters you create.
When you are only working with one chapter, BEX
prompts for the The rules for naming chapters stated in Section 4,
Part 2 still apply: the chapter names cannot exceed 25 characters; the
first character must be a letter they must never contain periods, commas,
colons, or semicolons; and they must never end with a space.
When you have two disk drives, BEX assumes that all
your chapters are read from and written to drive 2, your default data
drive. You can tell BEX to write your target chapter on drive 1 by
starting your target chapter name with the digit 1, as we did At all BEX menus, you can press number sign
When you specify more than one source chapter, BEX
prompts for you to enter one of the target chapter naming methods, as
shown in the example above. This is a handy shortcut that allows you to
create target chapter names by systematically changing the source chapter
names. Enter When you make your choice, enter the characters
that define your naming method, and press <CR>. You've probably
noticed that the target chapter naming methods all concentrate on changing
the final characters of the source chapter names. At the User Level,
you'll learn how you can use the last character of a chapter name to
select a subset of chapters on the disk.
For example, suppose you want to copy the
We briefly mentioned above that BEX allows you to use
the same name for source and target chapters. This characteristic of BEX
comes in very handy as you advance to the Master Level, but it has its
drawbacks. There's no danger at all when you are simply copying a
chapter from one disk to another, as when you make back-up copies of your
chapters. But when you specify the same name for source and target
chapters) on the same disk, the data in your source chapters is forever
lost to Whenever you instruct BEX to save data on a disk with
a particular name, BEX carries out your instructions to the letter. BEX
doesn't check to see if that name already exists on the disk. For example,
you have a chapter named All the options on the Second Menu allow you to change
how information is saved on disk. Section 12 demonstrates using some of
these options to accomplish a specific task. In this Part we detail the
features of each option. Most of the options allow you to work with many
chapters at once.
The Page Menu allows you to reorganize pages in many,
many ways. Section 12 shows some examples. All the options assume you are
working on one chapter. When you Zip to the Page Menu and choose an
option, you're prompted In Section 2, we explored some items on the Starting
Menu. In Section 3, we discussed two options relevant to configuring. For
your reference, here's a complete list of all Starting Menu options.
To move from the Main Menu to the Starting Menu, insert the Boot side of
BEX in drive 1 and press <space>.
In Section 11, we detailed all the ways you can
specify source chapters and name target chapters. We also described
several of the options on the Second and Page Menus. In this Section, we
demonstrate how you might combine these features to accomplish a specific
task.
BEX's ability to manipulate information is like a
Swiss army knife: there are many, many tools available. These examples are
neither exhaustive nor prescriptive. As you gain experience, you'll
develop your own work patterns. For example, you'll recognize when it
makes most sense to use Copy chapters and when Adjust pages or Merge
chapters is more efficient. To give yourself a better "feel" for the
possibilities on the Page Menu, use option F - File list on every chapter
you edit.
Option R - Read textfiles to chapters on the Second
Menu allows you to copy information from one type of file into another.
Textfiles are information stored on disk differently than BEX
chapters. Apple software that creates textfiles which can be read by BEX
include AppleWorks, ProTERM, AppleWriter, ASCII Express, and a host of
others. At the User Level, we explain how BEX creates textfiles.
Textfiles have a format different than BEX chapters,
and often require some internal changes before they are workable with BEX.
Option R reads textfiles, which many other Apple programs can manipulate,
into BEX chapters, which are unique to BEX. The EchostCricket Training
Disk contains textfiles full of There are two ways to locate a textfile on disk. In a
DOS catalog, the letter T in the second column of the catalog
indicates a textfile. On the Second Menu, option R - Read textfiles to
chapters lets you scan a disk for textfiles in the same way you scan a
disk for BEX chapters. Instead of prompting When no textfiles are present, BEX responds with
When there are textfiles on the disk, BEX presents a
numbered list. Respond by entering the textfile number as you would with a
numbered list of chapters. After you specify the source textfiles, BEX
prompts for target chapter names; use the same techniques as always.
However, you can't use the S target chapter naming method.
Your new chapter must have a different name than the textfile, even if
it's on a different disk.
After you specify the names, BEX gets to work. The BEX
chapter uses slightly more room on a disk than the textfile it's read
from: it's generally a good idea to read textfiles from one disk to
chapters on another disk.
If you use the Echo synthesizer, you've probably
already explored the EchostCricket Training Disk. Even if you don't use
the Echo, however, there's some useful information on the disk,
stored as textfiles. To examine it with BEX, you must copy the textfiles
to BEX chapters. To do this, you need your EchostCricket Training Disk,
your BEXtras disk, and an Insert the EchostCricket Training Disk in your data
drive. Use option D - Disk catalog at any BEX menu; there are two BEX
chapters named The first step is to change the textfiles into BEX
chapters. Press S to get to the Second Menu, proceed as follows:
When you don't want to use the whole list, you press
<CR> here to accept the default answer. BEX then prompts:
But here we are interested in the whole list, so when
BEX asks You must use different names for the BEX chapters
you're creating. When BEX prompts: Put your BEX disk in drive 1 and your data disk with
the newly created chapters in drive 2. Jump back to the Main Menu, and
edit one of the chapters you've just created.
You'll notice that there aren't any format indicators
or format commands in the text, but there are lots of spaces and hard
returns. This is true of almost all textfiles you encounter: they are
usually formatted as if they had been printed to disk. You could reformat
these chapters by hand, but it would be very dull and time-consuming.
Anyway, one of BEX's most powerful features is option R - Replace
characters on the Main Menu. Replace characters can reformat these
chapters for you automatically.
Quit the Editor and press R for Replace characters:
At this point, you can remove your BEX disk from drive
1 and insert your BEXtras disk.
A transformation chapter is a BEX chapter
that has a list of changes to make. We supply several transformation
chapters on the BEXtras disk. One is named FIX TEXT is on the BEXtras disk in drive 1, so this is
how you proceed:
Now the Apple's speaker starts making all sorts
of noises. Replace characters makes a click for every replacement. One of
the replacements going on is getting rid of extra spaces. There are so
many extra spaces that the clicks turn into a moan.
Notice the target chapter naming method
code of S. As we explained in Section 11, Part 3, this tells BEX to use
the same name for source and target chapters, and to write chapters on
drive 2. This is a good example of when you want your target
chapters to overwrite your source chapters. The reason we're using Replace
characters is because the format in the source chapters is not what you
want to work with. You have no further use for this data. If you use a
different target chapter naming method, you create modified copies with
Replace characters. You would have to use option K - Kill chapters to get
rid of the source chapters at some point. Using the naming method S is a
shortcut.
Replace characters takes some time. When you no longer
hear any clicks, BEX is finished replacing, and you get the Main Menu
prompt.
Now edit one of the transformed chapters, and you see
paragraph ( $p ) indicators and $$c centering commands.
At the User Level, we explain option W - Write
chapters into a textfile. This option enables BEX to print DOS 3.3
textfiles to disk. Raised Dot Computing also distributes a ProDOS utility
called the Quick Textfile Converter, or QTC. This utility copies BEX
chapters into ProDOS textfiles. It has on-line documentation that's
stored as a ProDOS textfile, which you can read into a BEX chapter if you
want. Contact us for further details.
The Page Menu allows you to manipulate individual
pages within a chapter. Because page numbers can easily change as you use
the options available, we recommend you frequently use option F - File
list to keep track of your work. To understand File list, you need to
learn a little bit about the structure of BEX chapters.
Insert your BEXtras disk and choose option D - Disk
catalog at any BEX menu:
For every BEX chapter, there is one
directory file and additional page files. The
file named QUANDARY above is the directory The files named QUANDARY.A, QUANDARY.B, QUANDARY.C,
and QUANDARYDDD are the page files. The page files contain the information
in each BEX page. BEX adds a two character extension to each page file as
a label for the directory. The extension is period followed by a letter.
This is why you can't use a period in a chapter name. BEX recognizes page
files by the period and letter extensions in their names.
Every time you choose option F - File list on the Page
Menu you get the page number, the size of the page, and the extension
letter for each page file for the specified chapter.
Here's how to get a file list of the QUANDARY
chapter:
Here's the task: you want to send a friend some
excerpts from the QUANDARY article. You think that what's said is
fine, but feel it could be better stated if the three main points were
rearranged.
Use option C - Copy chapters on the Second Menu to
make a copy of the QUANDARY chapter. You will be typing the name of this
chapter a lot, so make it easy to enter. Here we call it Jump to the Main Menu and edit chapter WC. At this
point it has four pages. From previous examination, you know it has five
headings: the main title, and four sub-titles. The sub-titles are
centered, so you can find them by Locating for the $$c format command.
On page 1, enter control-L $$c control-A. The first
occurrence is the author's names. Enter control-L control-A again,
and you arrive at the first sub-title, Aids Can Play Three
Roles. Enter control-Z control-P to zoom back to the previous
paragraph ( $p ) indicator. Now enter control-C control-P to cut
the page at this point. There's a slight pause while the new, shorter
contents of page 1 is saved to disk. BEX announces Enter control-L control-A again, and you go to the
first subtitle again. Enter control-L control-A once more, and you receive
a high error beep because there are no further centered sub-titles in this
page. Move to the beginning of the next page (page 3) with control-P 3
<space>
Enter control-L control-A and you advance to the next
sub-title, Training. Enter control-Z control-P to zoom back
to the previous paragraph ( $p ) indicator. Enter control-C
control-P to cut the page again. Wait as the new page 3 is saved to disk;
when BEX announces Enter control-L control-A twice to locate the next
sub-title, Expertise Needed for Prescribing Aids. You get the
high error beep, because it's not on page 4. Enter control-P 5
<space> to get to page 5.
Since you have put each of the three main points
(delineated by subheadings) onto separate pages, you can use options M -
Merge pages and R - Rearrange pages to manipulate them. Here's how:
As you created the new pages, BEX automatically
renumbered them, and added the extension letters shown in the third
column. The new page 1 contains just the introduction; pages 2 and 3
contain the Aids Can Play Three Roles discussion; page 4
contains Training; page 5 contains Expertise
Needed; and the summary spans pages 6 and 7.
To make the task of rearranging easier, use option M -
Merge pages to make each topic one BEX page. Merge pages lets you merge
two pages together--the opposite of control-C control-P in the Editor:
When you merge pages, the new page uses the extension
letter of the old first page. Page 2 is still Every, while
B (old page 3) has disappeared. Use Merge pages again to
merge the last 2 pages. The first time you did file list, they were pages
6 and 7, but since you've merged two pages, they are now pages 5 and 6.
Their extension letters are the same however: still G and
D. Enter page 5 as the first page and page 6 as the second
page. Use option F - File list again with this result:
At this point, each page of chapter WC contains one
topic: the Introduction is page 1; Three Roles
is page 2; Training is page 3; Expertise is page
4; and the Summary is page 5. You want to The disk drive whirs as BEX saves these changes. When
you use option F - File list again, here's the result:
Harking back to our original purpose, you want to
include this text in a letter to your friend. You don't want to bother
with the introduction, just the last four pages. This is where option G -
Grab pages from another chapter comes in handy. But first, you must use
option C - Change current chapter. The Page Menu always works with one
chapter as the current chapter, and at this point, it's
chapter WC. You want to clear the current chapter because you want to grab
into a new chapter not yet on disk:
After you have cleared the current chapter, you are
free to use option G - Grab pages from another chapter:
Now you can jump back to the Main Menu and write your
letter by editing the FRIEND chapter.
When you first start out using computers, it's
common to feel that the computer is smarter than you. We want to help
dispel that feeling. It's very hard to break a computer unless you
physically damage it--sit on top of it, pour coffee on the keys, or plug
in a card when the power is on. Just about anything other mistake you make
you can recover from.
When you do something that BEX isn't expecting, it
tells you with an error message. We've tried to make the BEX
error messages self-explanatory, so you know exactly what went wrong and
how to fix it.
But it's also possible for you to do something
that Apple's DOS 3.3 isn't expecting, and the Apple's error
messages can be a little frightening. In this Section, we try to pull
together answers for the basic problems you could encounter as you use
BEX. User Level Section 13 discusses some less likely problems. If you
can't solve the problem by reading this manual, please give us a call at
608-257-8833. We want to help you make the most of BEX.
There are several ways to cancel a BEX activity. Which
method you use depends on what you're doing.
When BEX needs more data to continue, then you cancel
the option by entering <CR> alone. For example, when BEX prompts
Some options supply defaults, so when you press
<CR>, BEX has enough information to continue. As a safety feature,
all options that delete text supply a N default; pressing
<CR> When the unwanted option moves you to another menu,
press the letter that returns to the previous menu. For example, if you
press Z at the Main Menu by mistake, just press J to return from the Page
Menu.
<ESC> allows you to cancel three BEX options in
progress. When you are using option R - Replace characters or option G -
Grade 2 translator, you are generally creating target chapter
copies of your original chapters. When you press <ESC> before BEX
announces that's the chapters) done, BEX does not finish writing
the target chapters. The partially-finished chapters take up room on the
disk, but they do not appear in a BEX disk catalog. Part 7 explains how
you can delete these partial chapters from disk.
When you press <ESC> during printing, your
printer may not stop immediately. Many printers and printer interface
cards have a buffer that stores text waiting to be printed.
Buffers are usually very handy; BEX can send the text to be printed to the
buffer, and then BEX is free to do other tasks. But when you want to
cancel a printout, you have to know how to clear the text in the printer
or interface card buffer--check out their manuals.
Many BEX activities consist mainly of reading and
writing to disk. Because BEX chapters are stored as several files, your
chapters won't be complete if you cancel this sort of option in the
middle. When you press D for a Disk catalog, they won't appear in the list
of chapters located. In fact, this sometimes happens if your disk gets
full in the middle of writing a chapter--Part 7 explains how you handle
this situation.
Most of the time, when something goes wrong, BEX can
recognize the problem. For example, when you place an uninitialized disk
in the drive, BEX can't save data on it. When you have an uninitialized
disk and you try to move between pages in the Editor, BEX realizes that it
can't save the current page, so it tells you what to do next. (Details in
Part 5).
When BEX can't cope gracefully, it crashes. While
crash is a dramatic word, it's not something to be
afraid of. In computer jargon, crash just means that the program stops.
There are some times you intentionally crash BEX by pressing
Control-Reset; we discuss this further in Part 4.
Other times, BEX crashes by itself. Here's how
you recognize a crash: Whatever BEX was doing stops. You hear a high beep,
and then you hear an Apple error message, a short phrase like
Whenever you are at the BASIC prompt, you return to
BEX by depressing the Caps Lock key, then typing Even though the Apple says break, your
BEX disk is not broken! When BEX crashes, the Apple is
running a program. Whenever a program stops unexpectedly, the Apple says
While the This error message mean that there is not enough room
left on the disk to save a file. Get a different,
initialized disk that has some room and try again. You can
find out how much room is available on disk by pressing # at any BEX menu.
When you crash with I/O is the abbreviation for
input/output. (A more detailed discussion of I/O is
presented in User Level Section 2.) This error message means that BEX is
having trouble writing to disk, which can be caused by a variety of
problems, some trivial and some serious. The following problems are easy
to fix:
When you try these solutions and you still get an
I/O error, there's something seriously wrong with your disk. You may
be able to salvage the chapters on the disk by using option C - Copy disks
on the Starting Menu.
With audio tapes, a copy usually degrades the quality.
But a disk copy can actually improve your data. When you get an As we discussed in Section 12, Part 3, each BEX
chapter is composed of page files and a directory file. BEX makes sure
that the directory file describes the correct order for the page files.
Usually, you never worry about these issues. But when you start having
problems with your data, it becomes important to understand what's
going on. When you get a Hanging is another piece of computer
jargon that sounds more serious than it really is. When a program
hangs it doesn't do anything. You don't hear any beeps or
error messages--the computer is unresponsive.
When you're in the Editor and BEX seems to hang, press
<CR>. Chances are you typed control-E for an Echo command. Once you
type control-E, TEXTALKER grabs control of the keyboard, waiting for you
to finish the Echo command. When you press <CR>, TEXTALKER
relinquishes control of the keyboard to BEX.
When BEX hangs during Replace characters, then
there's something wrong with the transformation chapter you specified
from disk. When you read User Level Section 8, you find out how to
diagnose and solve this problem.
When you tell BEX to print, but the printer is not
ready to receive text, then BEX hangs. Your printer has an
on-line or select button that switches its
attention between the printer control buttons and the computer. When you
press the button that makes it ready to print, BEX starts printing.
Many printers require special software, called
drivers. BEX large print on dot-matrix printers and the
Cranmer Brailler are two common examples. When you tell BEX to print to
one of these devices, it has to read the driver software from the program
disk. When the program disk is not in drive 1, BEX hangs.
There are times when you choose to induce a program
crash to stop BEX. While you can press <ESC> to stop printing,
replacing, or translating, you can crash BEX in almost every situation.
To crash BEX, you press Control-Reset. Whatever BEX
was doing stops, and you hear a high beep. You temporarily lose Echo and
large print output. The screen clears, and the BASIC prompt appears at the
top. You have to issue some DOS instructions, so you must depress your
Caps Lock. To get back to BEX, enter four keystrokes: If you want to issue DOS commands without losing the
Echo or large print, don't crash. Use option Q - Quit on the Starting or
Main Menus.
You can intentionally crash BEX whenever you don't
want to do something except when you are writing to disk. For
example, you tell BEX to edit a chapter, and BEX tells you As you use the Editor, you are always working in the
page buffer. When you edit an existing chapter, you copy the data from the
page file on disk to the page buffer. When you enter control-Q or
control-P 0 <space> or move to a different page, all changes you
make are saved back to the page file on disk.
When you don't want to save the changes you made,
crash out of the Editor by pressing Control-Reset. Because you leave the
Editor without saving the current page, the original material on disk is
unchanged.
After you issue a delete command, the text you delete
no longer appears on the screen. However, the characters may still be in
the page buffer. The delete command does not actually place blank
characters in the page buffer; it simply changes the pointers BEX uses to
know where the real text is. An example: you have a 3000 character page,
move the cursor to position 2000, then enter control-D control-A. BEX's
pointers say real text is between 0 and 2000, but the characters from 2001
to 3000 have not been erased until you save that page. When you crash at
this point, you can recover using Depress the control key, then press and release the
Reset key. Just to make things interesting, the Reset key is located in a
different place for each model Apple, as follows:
Because each BEX chapter is divided into pages, and
you always work one page at a time, the worst thing that can happen if
your power suddenly dies is you lose the text in one page. As you move
between pages in the Editor, BEX always writes the current page to disk.
If BEX can't write a page to disk for any reason, it performs a rescue
routine called Every time you or BEX uses In addition to BEX automatically using From this point on, follow the 12 steps outlined
previously.
Some mistakes are impossible to correct; others you
can recover from. Once you understand the basic BEX chapter structure of
directory and page files, you have insight into how to cope with problem
chapters.
We don't want to alarm you about the safety of your
data. When you follow our suggestions for disk management, you probably
won't ever run into trouble. However, we provide this information for the
unfortunate few who encounter problems.
When the page and directory files for a BEX chapter
don't match, you can have problems. To identify a chapter on disk, BEX
must be able to find a directory file. To access all the pages in a
chapter, all the page files must be referenced in the directory file. You
can encounter three types of problems:
Option F - Fix chapters on the Second Menu
reconstructs the chapter directory file. When you are encountering any of
the When you use Fix chapters, you must have some free
space on your "problem" disk. First, use option C - Copy chapters to copy
all the good chapters from the problem disk to another disk. Then use
option K - Kill chapters to delete the good chapters from the problem
disk. Catalog the problem disk: you probably won't see any chapters
located, so press <space> when prompted. Make a note of the chapter
name as it appears in the DOS catalog.
When you get the Second Menu prompt, press F for Fix
chapters. As BEX reminds you, you must type the exact chapter name. Once
you do, BEX goes about reconstructing the directory file. When it's
finished, BEX announces how many pages it has found for the fixed chapter.
Some of these pages may contain zero characters; this is normal. (We
explore exactly why this happens in User Level Section 13.) Once the
chapter is fixed, you should edit it and check to make sure that your page
files are in order.
As we explained in Section 11, BEX starts out
lettering page files alphabetically. When you cut pages in the Editor or
move pages with the Page Menu, the page numbers can change, but the letter
extensions stay the same. When you cut pages in the Editor, BEX uses the
next available letter of the alphabet for the new page you create.
When you first create a three-page chapter, page 1 has
an Before you use option N - Name change for chapters,
you should always catalog the disk. You never want to change a chapter to
a name that's already used on that disk. If you change the name of a
chapter to a name that's already taken, your chapter seems to have
had a nervous breakdown. (The official term for this in computerese is
data salad.) It's possible to recover your data using
Fix chapters.
Here's an example of what you shouldn't do: you
have a three-page chapter named If you find yourself in this situation, here's
how you recover. Copy the confused chapter, in this case HOMEWORK, to a
completely different name, like In Section 2, Parts 5, 6, and 7, we lectured you about
using high-quality disks. We won't repeat that lecture here, but what we
said there is still true. Don't be surprised if you have trouble
initializing or copying on to a disk that you've notched. Don't
Many people are startled at the noise the Apple makes
the first time they copy or initialize a disk. This gronking
sound seems to be a symptom of total disaster, but it really is normal.
If you encounter problems making a working backup of
your BEX Master disk, don't panic. Do save all the disks you
have created. Call our Technical Support hotline at 608-257-8833 for
advice on what to do next.
Your BEX binder contains a When BEX refuses to initialize or copy any disk, this
can be a symptom of disk drive trouble. We use our disk drives all day
long here at RDC, so we take them in for preventive maintenance every six
months. Disk drives are the trickiest mechanism in your computer system,
and the part of your computer system that's most prone to wear and
tear. When BEX balks at all disk initializing and copying, and you're sure
that you have high-quality disks, try using DiversiCOPY. While DiversiCOPY
copies, it displays the speed of your disk drives; if your drives are too
fast or too slow, DiversiCOPY tells you. Take your entire computer
system in for repair when you have disk drive problems, as the
source of the trouble can be a combination of problems with the drive
itself and the disk controller card in the Apple.
Every program has limits. Some BEX operations are
irreversible. The following are also discussed in detail in their
appropriate Sections. We compile them here to warn you!
Which printer:
prompt. When you aren't sure of
the printer number, you can press ? <CR>
at this prompt
for a list of printers you have in your configuration. A sample of this
dialogue appears in Section 5. For option D - Disk catalog, the next
questions is Which drive?
Again, you can press ?
<CR>
after this prompt for further help. With option K - Kill
chapters, the next question is OK to Proceed? N
Part 3: Target Chapter Naming Methods
Working with One Chapter
Target chapter name:
You must type in a new
name for the chapter that is created. If you use the name of a chapter
that's already on the disk, then the text in the new target chapter
overwrites the existing chapter, and you lose whatever text you had in the
existing chapter.
() Caution! When you use an option that creates a
target chapter, you must consider if there's enough room on your disk
for it.
#
to get the number of sectors free on the disk. If there
isn't enough room when BEX is creating a new chapter, BEX crashes with a
DISK FULL
error. This is much less serious than it sounds.
Full details on how to recover are in Section 13.
Working with More than One Chapter
? <CR>
to receive a summary of your
options. In the following list, the letters X,
Y, and Z, stand for any characters of your
choosing.
LETTERHEAD
and JOAN
chapters on the BEXtras disk
onto your data disk, so that you can experiment with format commands with
those chapters. You go to the Second Menu and proceed like this:
Second Menu
Enter Option: C
Copy chapters
Drive number or chapter name: 2 <CR>
BEX presents you with a numbered list of the
chapters, then asks:
Use entire list? N <CR>
Select chapters by number
Chapter number:
Enter the number of the LETTERHEAD chapter. BEX
confirms your choice by repeating the name of the chapter. Then BEX
prompts again:
Chapter number:
Enter the number for the JOAN chapter. Again, BEX
confirms your choice, and asks for a chapter number. Press <CR> when
you are finished specifying chapters:
(enter question mark for choices)
Target chapter naming method: ? <CR>
Naming methods are:
S = Same name as source chapters
I = Individually name target chapters
AX = Add letter X to make target names
LX = Last character changes to X
Precede naming method letters with 1 for drive 1
(enter question mark for choices)
Target chapter naming method:
You want to make the target chapter names slightly
different so you know which are the unaltered chapters and which are your
experimentation chapters. You use the A target chapter naming method, with
the letter B added to the end of the chapter names. You have
your BEXtras disk in drive 2, so you put your data disk into drive 1, and
add the digit 1 to the beginning of the target chapter naming
method, to write the chapters onto that drive:
(enter question mark for choices)
Target chapter naming method: 1AB <CR>
The disk drives whir as the copies are being made.
BEX tells you when the copies are finished:
Chapter LETTERHEAD done
Chapter JOAN done
Using the Same Names for Source and Target
Chapters
CONTRACT
and you use option G -
Grade 2 translator to translate it into braille. You use the A2 target
chapter naming method to make CONTRACT2
the target chapter.
If CONTRACT2 is already on the disk, the new data replaces the old. While
this feature saves a lot of time killing chapters, it's your
responsibility to use option D - Disk catalog periodically so you know
what chapter names are already used on a disk.
Part 4: Manipulating Chapters with the Second
Menu
Second Menu Options
OK to proceed? N
prompt. You must enter Y <CR>
to start the deletion.
Any other response cancels the option and returns you to the Second Menu
prompt.
Part 5: Manipulating Pages with the Page
Menu
Drive number or chapter name:
to
specify which chapter you want to concentrate on. The Page Menu
"remembers" this chapter until you use option C - Change current chapter
or leave the Page Menu.
Grab into
Drive number or chapter name:
When you type a name that's not
on the disk, you can create a new chapter. Next you're asked for the name
of the chapter you're copying pages from. You can enter the drive number
for a numbered list of chapters, or type in the chapter name directly. BEX
gives you the number of pages in that chapter, then prompts for the range
of pages you wish to grab. When you only want to grab one page, you
specify a range of one. The grabbed pages are placed at the end of the
current chapter. The source chapter is not altered by the
grab. A detailed example appears in Section 12, Part 3.
OK to Proceed?
N.
You must enter Y <CR>
for the deletion to
occur.
Move a range of pages?
N
is the first prompt. When you accept the N default by pressing
<CR>, you rearrange the pages by specifying the old page numbers in
the new order desired. This is appropriate for relatively short chapters.
When you change the default to You, you get to specify a range of pages
and then indicate where that range goes. Rearranging by range is faster
when the chapter has more than eight pages.
Part 6: Starting Menu Utilities
() One Disk Drive: While BEX has many features that
let you reformat information, they are pretty clumsy to use with just one
drive. The following discussion assumes you have two drives. You can still
do these things with one drive, but all the manipulations have to fit on
one disk. Only option C - Copy chapters on the Second Menu allows you to
swap between two data disks with a one-drive system.
Part 1: Dealing with Textfiles
Drive number or chapter
name:
BEX simply prompts Textfile:
Enter the drive
number followed by <CR>.
There are 0 textfiles
Textfile:
You can insert another disk and enter the drive
number here, or press <CR> to get back to the Second Menu prompt.
Part 2: Transforming a Textfile into a BEX
Chapter: An Example
MENU
and LESSONS
that contain
what their names imply. Press <space>, and you are presented with a
very full disk. There are three type T (for Textfile) files
on the disk, but it's hard to pick them out from such a full catalog.
Using Option R - Read Textfile to Chapter
Second Menu
Enter Option R
Read textfile to chapter
Textfile: 2 <CR>
There are 3 textfiles:
1 HELP TEXT
2 ECHO COMMANDS
3 APPLE RESOURCES
Use entire list? N
Select textfiles by number
Textfile:
At this point, you can remove your BEX disk from
drive 1, and insert your initialized data disk in drive 1. Enter the
numbers of the textfiles you want. When you choose only one textfile, BEX
prompts: Target chapter name:
and you must type in the target
chapter name.
Use entire list? N
change the default answer to Y
and press <CR>.
Target chapter naming
method:
enter 1A-C <CR>
to add the characters
-C to the end of the target chapter names. Because you
precede the Reformat the BEX Chapters with Option R -
Replace characters
Replace
Drive number or chapter name: 2 <CR>
There are 3 chapters:
1 HELP TEXT-C
2 ECHO COMMANDS-C
3 APPLE RESOURCES-C
Use entire list? N Y <CR>
Target chapter naming method: S <CR>
Enter transformation chapter name:
FIX TEXT
and
it's designed to reformat textfiles for print-oriented BEX chapters.
At the User Level, you learn how to write a transformation
Enter transformation chapter name: 1FIX TEXT <CR>
The last prompt allows you to load a transformation
chapter from disk, then remove that disk and insert a data disk:
Continue? Y <CR>
() Large Print Screen: When BEX uses a
transformation chapter from disk, you temporarily lose large print screen
display at this point. As soon as Replace chapters is finished, BEX
returns to large print display. The last prompt,
Continue? Y
is shown in 40-column screen, so you will have to assume its there, and
respond accordingly.
Part 3: Manipulating Pages
How BEX Keeps Track of Pages
Enter Option: D
Which drive? 2 <CR>
Chapters located:
BEX lists the chapters on the BEXtras disk, including
the QUANDARY
chapter. BEX then prompts:
Press space for DOS catalog: <space>
There are many files on the disk, including the five
files that make up the QUANDARY chapter:
B 013 QUANDARY.A
B 014 QUANDARY.B
B 014 QUANDARY.C
B 010 QUANDARY.D
B 003 QUANDARY
Use File List To Keep Track of BEX Pages
Page Menu
Enter Option: F
File list
Drive number or chapter name: QUANDARY <CR>
Chapter QUANDARY
4 Pages
Page 1 Size 3064 A
Page 2 Size 3281 B
Page 3 Size 3307 C
Page 4 Size 2223 D
Total of 11875
There are three columns: page number, size, and the
letter in the extension. You can easily change the page number; the letter
extension stays the same.
Manipulating Pages: An Example
WC
for Working Copy.
Chop the pages into logical units
page 2
and
your cursor is at character position 0 of new page 2.
page 4
your cursor is at character
position 0 of that page.
Rearranging the pages
Page Menu
Enter Option: F
File list
Drive number or chapter name: WC <CR>
Chapter WC
7 pages
Page 1 size 795 A
Page 2 size 2269 E
Page 3 size 908 B
Page 4 size 2373 F
Page 5 size 2316 C
Page 6 size 991 G
Page 7 size 2223 D
Total of 11875
Merge pages into topics
Enter Option: M <CR>
Merge pages
Enter first Page: 2 <CR>
Enter second Page: 3 <CR>
BEX reads the contents of both pages into the page
buffer and then writes them to disk as one page. Next, press F for File
list:
Chapter WC
6 pages
Page 1 size 795 A
Page 2 size 3177 E
Page 3 size 2373 F
Page 4 size 2316 C
Page 5 size 991 G
Page 6 size 2223 D
Total of 11875
Chapter WC
5 pages
Page 1 size 795 A
Page 2 size 3177 E
Page 3 size 2373 F
Page 4 size 2316 C
Page 5 size 3214 G
Total of 11875
The last step: rearrange the pages
Page Menu
Enter Option: R
Rearrange pages
Move a range of pages? N <CR>
List the new order of the pages
For new page 1 use old Page: 1 <CR>
For new page 2 use old Page: 4 <CR>
For new page 3 use old Page: 3 <CR>
For new page 4 use old Page: 2 <CR>
For new page 5 use old Page: 5 <CR>
Chapter WC
5 pages
Page 1 size 795 A
Page 2 size 2316 C
Page 3 size 2373 F
Page 4 size 3177 E
Page 5 size 3214 G
Total of 11875
Incorporate this text into another chapter
Enter Option: C
Change current chapter
Drive number or chapter name: <CR>
Pressing <CR> at this point clears the current
chapter. You cannot specify a new current chapter because the chapter you
want is not yet on disk. If you type the name of a chapter that's not
on disk, BEX gives an error message.
Page Menu
Enter Option: G
Grab pages from another chapter
Grab into Drive number or chapter name: FRIEND
<CR>
Want to start a new chapter? Y <CR>
Grab from Drive number or chapter name: WC <CR>
BEX now lets you specify which pages to copy from WC
into FRIEND:
There are 5 pages in chapter WC
Select pages from chapter WC
From page: 2 <CR>
Through page: 5 <CR>
Part 1: Cancelling Gracefully
Cancel an Option During the Prompts
Drive number or chapter name:
it's expecting a digit or
some letters. Enter just <CR>, and BEX returns you to the menu
prompt. When BEX prompts Which printer:
it's expecting a
number or letters; enter <CR> alone and you cancel printing.
Which drive? 2
so pressing
<CR> supplies BEX with enough information to continue. You get a
catalog of the disk in drive 2.
The Escape Key
Can't cancel disk activities
Symptoms of a Crash
FILE NOT FOUND
or DISK FULL
Next, there's
another high beep and the Apple says BREAK IN LINE
followed
by a four-digit number. Finally, the Apple displays the BASIC
prompt: the right bracket ]
on the screen. (The Echo
says ready, because ]
means the Apple is ready
to accept your commands.)
RUN
<CR>
BREAK
and then the program line number where it stopped.
It's safe to ignore a message like BREAK IN LINE
followed by a four-digit number.
BREAK IN LINE
message is not
particularly informative, the first Apple error message can help you
pinpoint the problem. Here are some causes and solutions for common error
messages:
DISK FULL
in the middle of creating a
chapter in the Editor, BEX swings into action to rescue your current page
buffer--Part 5 explains what happens.
I/O ERROR
I/O ERROR
message when you try to
save to a totally blank disk, or to a disk that's formatted for
ProDOS. See Section 2, Part 5 for how to initialize disks.
I/O
ERROR
Apple error message, immediately make a copy of the disk.
Toss the disk that failed straight into the trash. Some people feel that
inexpensive disks are a good way to keep the FILE NOT FOUND
FILE NOT FOUND
message, then the
directory file claims a page file exists, but the page file is not on the
disk. Use option F - Fix chapters on the Second Menu to create a new
directory file--details in Part 7.
Part 3: When BEX Hangs
Part 4: When You Make BEX Crash
RUN
<CR>
and you're back at the menu you crashed from.
() Warning! Never press Control-Reset when the Apple
is writing to disk. You can permanently damage your disk by
doing this. It's not harmful to enter Control-Reset when the Apple is
reading from disk.
Good Times to Crash
There are
4 pages Edit on page 1
and pauses. You realize you must have
specified the wrong chapter, as the one you wanted RUN <CR>
and you're back at
the Main Menu prompt.
Exit the Editor without saving the page
() Echo: BEX temporarily disables two Echo commands
when you use the Editor: control-L and control-X. When you quit the Editor
normally with control-Q, BEX returns control-L and control-X to their
regular Echo functions. When you crash out of the Editor, control-L and
control-X are still disabled. This means you can't shut up the Echo and
you can't use screen review. The solution is to edit any chapter; then
quit normally with control-Q. Control-L and control-X are then back to
normal.
Crashing can recover material deleted in error
RUN 999
discussed below.
RUN 999
can't
recover them. BEX's pointers always start at 0, so the old text from 1000
to 2000 has overwritten the 0 to 1000 text.
Typing Control-Reset
() Warning! Control-Reset is a safe way to stop
BEX. Many other programs are not as resilient as BEX. When you enter
Control-Reset with other programs, you may lose data.
() Caution! Do not confuse Control-Reset with
Open-Apple-Control-Reset. Control-Reset crashes BEX.
Open-Apple-Control-Reset reboots the Apple.
Part 5: Recovering the Page Buffer with RUN 999
RUN 999
SAVE
on the disk in drive 1. When you don't have a good data
disk handy, you can use your BEX disk in a pinch--there's usually
enough room for the SAVE chapter. Once BEX has created the SAVE chapter,
you are at the BASIC prompt. Here's exactly what happens with
RUN 999
Cannot write to disk. Insert a data disk in drive 1 and
press any key
The page buffer is now saved in a 1-page chapter named
SAVE on drive 1
RUN <CR>
1SAVE <CR>
at
the Drive number or chapter name:
prompt.
Grab into Drive number or chapter
name:
type the name of your problem chapter. When BEX prompts
Grab from Drive number or chapter name:
type 1SAVE
<CR>
RUN 999
any SAVE chapter already on the program disk is overwritten by the new
one. Don't put off salvaging the SAVE chapter until after it's too
late!
Using RUN 999 by choice
RUN
999
you can choose to use it yourself. RUN 999
lets
you recover the information in the most recent page buffer. As mentioned
in Part 4, you press Control-Reset to exit the Editor without saving your
changes. At this point, you can use RUN 999
to recover the
new text that is not yet on disk. Follow these two steps whenever you use
RUN 999
PR#0 <CR>
]
prompt, type RUN 999
<CR>
Part 6: Recovering Missing Text with Fix
chapters
FILE NOT FOUND
error
message during any manipulation of a chapter. This means a page file that
is referenced in the directory is not on disk.
DISK FULL
error message before BEX has finished writing a
chapter to disk. BEX always saves the directory file last, so the full
disk contains some number of page files, but no directory file.
.A
extension, page 2 has an .B
extension, and
page 3 has an .C
extension. When you have a three-page
chapter and enter control-C control-P on page 2, the new page 3 gets the
.D
extension. After you Exchange pages 1 and 2 with the Page
Menu, page 1 ends with .B
and page 2 has the .A
extension.
.A
always becomes page 1. That's why you may need to use
the Page Menu to rearrange the pages after you Fix chapters.
Name Change Follies
HOMEWORK
on a disk. You also
have a chapter named SCHOOLWORK
on the same disk. You ask BEX
to change the name of chapter SCHOOLWORK to HOMEWORK. When you print the
HOMEWORK chapter, the first three pages contain the information from the
old HOMEWORK chapter; the last two pages contain the information from the
last two pages of SCHOOLWORK.
RED
for instance. Now, delete
HOMEWORK with option K - Kill chapters. Then, use option F - Fix chapters,
and specify HOMEWORK as your target chapter. Finally, copy the fixed
HOMEWORK to a totally different name, GREEN
for instance. The
RED chapter now has the same data as the old SCHOOLWORK; the GREEN chapter
is just like the old HOMEWORK.
Part 7: Problems with Copying Disks
Take advantage of DiversiCOPY
DiversiCOPY
program disk. This is a shareware utility that copies disks
faster than anything else. Shareware means that you can try the program
out for 45 days; if you like it, you send $30 to the program's
author. DiversiCOPY is fast because it uses every scrap of the
Apple's memory; it is not compatible with Echo speech or large print.
However, it does provide enough beeps and boops for a visually impaired
person to keep track of what's going on. There's a BEX chapter
on the DiversiCOPY disk that explains how to use it, and where to send the
shareware payment.