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Information about “TURBO APPRENTICE”
With TURBO APPRENTICE, the built-in help for Turbo Pascal can be
appended to include prototypes and descriptions of your own functions,
procedures and units. TAP puts references to any routine you've written
one keystroke away. It will build its index without any changes in
source code. TAP can store up to 46 lines of information for each entry
and can even cross reference.
TAP is an excellent tool for any programmer who has a sizeable number of
routines to remember.
File Descriptions:
TAP EXE Main program.
TAPINST EXE Installation tool.
TAP DOC Documentation.
FILE1459.TXT
Disk No: 1459
Program Title: TURBO APPRENTICE version 1.0
PC-SIG version: 1
TURBO APPRENTICE (TAP) is a TSR add-in for the serious Turbo Pascal
programmer.
With TURBO APPRENTICE the built-in help for Turbo Pascal can be appended
to include prototypes and descriptions of your own functions,
procedures, and units. TAP puts references to any routine you've
written one keystroke away. TAP will build its index without any
changes in source code. It will store upto 46 lines of information for
each entry and can even cross reference.
TAP is an excellant tool for any programmer who has a sizable number of
routines to remember.
Usage: Turbo Pascal Utility.
Special Requirements: Turbo Pascal 4.0 or greater.
How to Start: Type GO (press enter).
Suggested Registration: $15.00
File Descriptions:
TAP EXE Main Program.
TAPINST EXE Installation tool.
TAP DOC Documentation.
PC-SIG
1030D E. Duane Avenue
Sunnyvale Ca. 94086
(408) 730-9291
(c) Copyright 1987 PC-SIG, Inc.
GO.TXT
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║ <<<< Disk No 1459 TURBO APPRENTICE >>>> ║
╠═════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════╣
║ To start the program, type TAPINST (press enter) ║
║ ║
║ To look at the documentation on your screen, type VIEW (press enter) ║
║ ║
║ To copy the documentation to your printer, type MANUAL (press enter) ║
╚═════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════╝
TAP.DOC
Welcome to Turbo Apprentice
(Documentation v1.0)
Turbo Apprentice is distributed as shareware by Cypress Systems, Inc. If
you use Turbo Apprentice, please send a $15 registration fee to:
Cypress Systems, Inc.
11693 San Vicente Blvd., Suite 175
Los Angeles, CA 90049
Please include your serial number with your registration fee. If you have
any questions, comments or suggestions, please feel free to include them
with your registration fee or call us at (213) 207-3938 between 9:00 am and
5:00 pm (Pacific Standard Time) Monday through Friday. We can also be
reached on BIX (as cypress) or on CompuServe (as 71631,735).
You are free to distribute Turbo Apprentice as long as you do not charge
a fee for doing so. Please include the following files:
TAP.DOC TAP.ARC
TAPINST.EXE or
TAP.EXE
Introduction
------------
Turbo Apprentice is a Terminate and Stay Resident utility which enables
you to extend Turbo Pascal's context sensitive help system to include
reference information for your own units, procedures and functions.
Apprentice works by creating an index file for each unit used by your
program. Once the index files are completed, pop-up help for any
procedure or function used by your program is a key-stroke away.
Turbo Apprentice requires an IBM PC/XT/AT, PS/2 or 100% compatible, MS-DOS
2.0 or higher, a hard disk drive, and Turbo Pascal 4.0 or higher.
Installation
------------
To install Turbo Apprentice:
- Copy the files TAPINST.EXE and Example:
TAP.EXE to the same subdirectory
on your hard disk. C>COPY A:TAP*.EXE C:\TURBO5\TAP
- Change to that directory and run C>CD \TURBO5\TAP
TAPINST.EXE. C>TAPINST
- TAPINST enables you to install a Primary File, a Help Directory, a
list of Unit Directories, a list of Include Directories, and a Color
Set into the TAP.EXE file. Of these, it is ESSENTIAL that you
provide the Help Directory and Unit/Include Directory lists.
Here is an explanation of what each item means:
Primary File - The full path name you provide here will be used
as the default primary program file each time
TAP.EXE is run.
Help Directory - The directory path you provide here tells
Apprentice where to keep the index files it
will create.
Unit Directories - The list of directories you provide here tells
Apprentice where to look for your unit source
files. This list should be identical to the
"Unit Directories" you must provide for Turbo
Pascal.
Include Directories - The list of directories you provide here tells
Apprentice where to look for your include files.
This list should be identical to the "Include
Directories" you must provide for Turbo Pascal.
Colors - The color set you choose will be the one used
by TAP.EXE. The various sets correspond to those
used by Turbo Pascal 4.0 and 5.0.
- Once you have set the various TAPINST options, choose "Quit/save" and
you will be prompted to verify saving the changes to TAP.EXE. Once
you have installed any options into TAP.EXE, you can change them again
by running TAPINST.EXE at any time.
Using Turbo Apprentice
----------------------
To load Apprentice into memory, simply enter "TAP" at the DOS prompt.
Apprentice will display a message telling you if it loaded successfully,
and take you back to the DOS prompt. You may now invoke Turbo Pascal,
and Apprentice will be waiting in the background for you. Since
Apprentice is virtually useless alone, you will want to remove it from
memory after you leave Turbo Pascal. To do this, enter "TAP /r" at
the DOS prompt.
Preparing your source files:
The quickest way to get Apprentice up and running is to make no changes
to your source files. Using this approach means that when you call upon
Apprentice to provide pop-up reference information on a procedure or
function, it will display only the procedure or function header (the name
and parameter information for that procedure or function) and the name
of the unit it is in. This may be enough for most of your purposes.
However, Apprentice does provide a way for you to view any comments you
may wish to include along with the procedure or function header. By
including your comments in your source file directly following the
procedure or function header declaration, and surrounding the comments
by {* and *} or (** and **), you will be telling Apprentice to include
those comments in the help window. For example, the following piece of
code:
procedure GetAddress(var theAddress : string);
{*
This procedure prompts the user for the employee's address and returns
the address in the parameter "theAddress".
*}
will cause the following information to be popped-up:
+------------------------------ Apprentice ------------------------------+
| Unit: Entry |
| |
| procedure GetAddress(var theAddress : string); |
| |
| |
| This procedure prompts the user for the employee's address and returns |
| the address in the parameter "theAddress". |
| |
| |
| |
+------------------------------------------------------------------------+
NOTE: For procedure and function declarations that appear in the
INTERFACE section of a unit, you must include your comments with
the interface declaration if you want them to be recognized by
Apprentice.
An additional feature of Apprentice is its "hot keywords". In the above
help window, the unit name "Entry" would be highlighted as a hot keyword.
Pressing <Enter> while "Entry" is highlighted would bring up the help
information for the Entry unit. (Unit help information is provided auto-
matically by Apprentice).
You can include hot keyword references to other units, procedures and
functions in your own comments by surrounding each keyword with the
vertical bar character (|). Here's an example:
procedure GetAddress(var theAddress : string);
{*
This procedure prompts the user for the employee's address and returns
the address in the parameter "theAddress".
See also: |GetCity| |GetState| |GetZip|
*}
would cause the following information to be popped-up:
+------------------------------ Apprentice ------------------------------+
| Unit: Entry |
| |
| procedure GetAddress(var theAddress : string); |
| |
| |
| This procedure prompts the user for the employee's address and returns |
| the address in the parameter "theAddress". |
| |
| See also: GetCity GetState GetZip |
| |
+------------------------------------------------------------------------+
where "Entry", "GetCity", "GetState" and "GetZip" would all be displayed
as hot keywords.
The Turbo Apprentice menu:
To bring up the Apprentice menu while in the Turbo Pascal editor, press
<Alt><A>. The Apprentice menu contains four options: Primary file,
Directories, Make index file(s), and Build index file(s).
Here is an explanation of what each item will do:
Primary file - The full path name you provide here will be used as
the primary file when generating index files. When
Apprentice attempts to provide pop-up help, this
file's corresponding index file will be used as
the primary index file.
Directories - Choosing this option will display the Help
Directory, Unit Directories and Include Directories
that were installed into the currently running copy
of TAP.EXE.
Make index file(s), - Choosing these options will tell Apprentice to begin
Build index file(s) generating the index files, in which are kept your
procedure and function names and their positions in
your source files. One index file (with the file
extension ".TAP") is created for each unit that your
program uses (directly or indirectly), and it is
kept in the Help Directory you have specified. If
an error occurs during index file generation, the
process will be aborted. The best way to avoid this
is to make sure all of your source code compiles
with Turbo Pascal before trying to make or build
with Apprentice. NOTE: You must save the file
currently being edited for Apprentice to recognize
your latest changes to that file.
Analogous to Turbo Pascal's Make and Build compile
options, "Make index file(s)" will scan only those
units that have been changed since the last index
generation, while "Build index file(s)" will scan
all units used by your program.
Getting Pop-Up Help:
Apprentice's pop-up help is very similiar to the built-in context
sensitive help feature of Turbo Pascal's integrated environment. While you
are in the editor, place the cursor on the procedure or function name for
which you need help and press <Shift><F1>. Apprentice will search the
index files for that name and, upon finding it, will pop up a help window.
The window will display the name of the unit containing the procedure or
function and the reference information for that procedure or function.
If the information does not all fit within the bounds of the help window,
you can scroll around using the four cursor movement keys. Use <Tab> and
<Shift><Tab> to highlight the next and previous hot keywords, respectively.
While a hot keyword is highlighted, pressing <Enter> will cause Apprentice
to search its indexes for that keyword and display the new information
if it is found. Pressing <Esc> will take you back to the Turbo Pascal
editor.
Tips, notes, etc.
-----------------
- Because Apprentice is meant to be used with Turbo Pascal's integrated
environment and is not very useful otherwise, you may wish make up a
batch file that installs Apprentice in memory, runs Turbo Pascal, and
then removes Apprentice from memory. For example, the file "TP5.BAT"
might contain the following:
TAP
TURBO
TAP /R
Assuming DOS could find TAP.EXE and TURBO.EXE on the path, this batch
file would load and remove Apprentice automatically, and Apprentice
won't be sitting around in memory wasting RAM when you don't need it.
- The Apprentice help window uses a "virtual window" to let you scroll
around in case your code/comments do not fit within the boundary of
the physical window. Because the dimensions of this virtual window
are 126 characters by 48 lines, this limits the amount of comments
you can include. If you exceed these limits in your source file, you
will not encounter any Apprentice errors -- you just won't be able
to view the extra information.
Trademarks
----------
IBM PC/XT/AT and PS/2 are registered trademarks of the International
Business Machines Corporation.
MS-DOS is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corporation.
Borland and Turbo Pascal are registered trademarks of Borland International.
Copyright information
---------------------
Copyright (c) 1988 Cypress Systems, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
This program is provided AS IS without any warranty, expressed or implied,
including but not limited to fitness for a particular purpose.
Directory of PC-SIG Library Disk #1459
Volume in drive A has no label
Directory of A:\
FILE1459 TXT 1038 6-13-89 12:47p
GO BAT 38 4-24-89 4:39p
GO TXT 694 6-13-89 1:30p
MANUAL BAT 149 6-13-89 1:43p
PAGE COM 325 1-06-87 4:21p
TAP DOC 13517 2-22-89 1:00a
TAP EXE 57248 3-07-89 1:00a
TAPINST EXE 48656 2-22-89 1:00a
VIEW BAT 39 6-13-89 1:40p
9 file(s) 121704 bytes
35328 bytes free