[wxWidgets.git] / demos / poem / wxpoem.txt

wxPoem 1.0
----------

by Julian Smart
---------------

Fancy a little intellectual stimulation after long hours spent staring
at spreadsheets or reports?  Does your brain long for something a little
more fulfilling than Tetris or fiddling with the WIN.INI file?  Then you
could go out and buy a poetry book... or alternatively, if you just
can't drag yourself away from the screen, click on the wxPoem icon.

wxPoem is a simple Windows application which picks poems from a file at
random, or finds poems according to a string criterion, and formats them
nicely in a window.  A displayed poem can be copied to the Windows clipboard
ready for inclusion in that more imaginative report...

It's small, it's free and it's totally harmless, so far as I know.
No responsibility accepted, though, for any problems it might cause with
your setup.

wxPoem was converted to use the wxWindows toolkit, from the original
WinPoem which received a favourable review from Windows Shareware 500.

Since it now uses wxWindows, wxPoem may be compiled on a variety
of platforms such as X (XView or Motif), Windows and NT.

Files
-----

The main data file is winpoem.dat, and an index file winpoem.idx is
supplied or can be (re)built by deleting winpoem.idx and rerunning
wxPoem. Source code is also provided in source.zip, but wxWindows is
required to build it. The original WinPoem is much leaner (40K
instead of 400K!) and can be compiled under Windows without wxWindows.

Installation
------------

  Windows
  =======

    Copy ctl3dv2.dll to windows\system, and delete the original
    ctl3dv2.dll or wxPoem will not run.

    wxPoem can be put in the Startup folder in the Program Manager, so that
    a random poem will pop up every time Windows is run.

  UNIX
  ====

    wxPoem comes in Open Look and Motif versions for the Sun, and a
    Linux Open Look version. For other platforms, you will need to
    recompile the source.


Use
---

Simply run the program, and a random poem will be displayed.
You can optionally give a filename on the command line, without a suffix
(e.g. winpoem).

The simplest way of operating wxPoem is to keep pressing the space bar
for new poems (or pages for multi-page poems).

Clicking the right mouse button (or selecting the wxPoem Options menu
item from the system menu) gives a choice of the following facilities:
Next poem/page   (Page down)   Display next poem (or next page)
Previous page    (Page up)     Display previous page (multi-line poems only)
Search           (S)           Allows user to enter a search string
Next match       (N)           Gives next search match
Copy to clipboard              Allows poems to be pasted into other applications
Bigger text                    Increases text size
Smaller text                   Decreases text size
About wxPoem                   About wxPoem
Exit             (Esc)         Quit wxPoem

When wxPoem is closed, the font, text height and window position are
remembered (stored in WIN.INI) for next time. Under X, the values
are not written (since they are stored in .Xdefaults), so you may
want to edit the following resources by hand:

wxPoem.X         ; X position
wxPoem.Y         ; Y position
wxPoem.FontSize  ; Font size in points (default 12)

The data file
-------------

The winpoem.dat file contains poems separated by a #, with optional
@ codes denoting title (@T) author (@A) and page break (@P).  Any
unrecognized codes will cause the rest of the line to be ignored, so
the user can add lines (e.g. @S for subject) which will be searched on but
not displayed.

The data file contains a mixture of 20th century and earlier poetry,
subject to copyright constraints.  Apologies if any copyrights have
inadvertently been infringed, though I have tried to avoid it.

Implementation
--------------

The original WinPoem program was my `Windows learning application', i.e.
a vehicle for getting stuck into Windows programming, whilst (possibly)
affording others a modicum of amusement. Therefore the code is pretty
ugly. So don't look if you're squeamish!

License
-------

Copyright Julian Smart, released into the public domain, October 1994.

Julian Smart
Artificial Intelligence Applications Institute
University of Edinburgh
80 South Bridge
Einburgh
EH1 1HN

J.Smart@ed.ac.uk
Commit	Line	Data
3013b6f4 JS	1	wxPoem 1.0
	2	----------
	3
	4	by Julian Smart
	5	---------------
	6
	7	Fancy a little intellectual stimulation after long hours spent staring
	8	at spreadsheets or reports? Does your brain long for something a little
	9	more fulfilling than Tetris or fiddling with the WIN.INI file? Then you
	10	could go out and buy a poetry book... or alternatively, if you just
	11	can't drag yourself away from the screen, click on the wxPoem icon.
	12
	13	wxPoem is a simple Windows application which picks poems from a file at
	14	random, or finds poems according to a string criterion, and formats them
	15	nicely in a window. A displayed poem can be copied to the Windows clipboard
	16	ready for inclusion in that more imaginative report...
	17
	18	It's small, it's free and it's totally harmless, so far as I know.
	19	No responsibility accepted, though, for any problems it might cause with
	20	your setup.
	21
	22	wxPoem was converted to use the wxWindows toolkit, from the original
	23	WinPoem which received a favourable review from Windows Shareware 500.
	24
	25	Since it now uses wxWindows, wxPoem may be compiled on a variety
	26	of platforms such as X (XView or Motif), Windows and NT.
	27
	28	Files
	29	-----
	30
	31	The main data file is winpoem.dat, and an index file winpoem.idx is
	32	supplied or can be (re)built by deleting winpoem.idx and rerunning
	33	wxPoem. Source code is also provided in source.zip, but wxWindows is
	34	required to build it. The original WinPoem is much leaner (40K
	35	instead of 400K!) and can be compiled under Windows without wxWindows.
	36
	37	Installation
	38	------------
	39
	40	Windows
	41	=======
	42
	43	Copy ctl3dv2.dll to windows\system, and delete the original
	44	ctl3dv2.dll or wxPoem will not run.
	45
	46	wxPoem can be put in the Startup folder in the Program Manager, so that
	47	a random poem will pop up every time Windows is run.
	48
	49	UNIX
	50	====
	51
	52	wxPoem comes in Open Look and Motif versions for the Sun, and a
	53	Linux Open Look version. For other platforms, you will need to
	54	recompile the source.
	55
	56
	57	Use
	58	---
	59
	60	Simply run the program, and a random poem will be displayed.
	61	You can optionally give a filename on the command line, without a suffix
	62	(e.g. winpoem).
	63
	64	The simplest way of operating wxPoem is to keep pressing the space bar
65	for new poems (or pages for multi-page poems).
66
67	Clicking the right mouse button (or selecting the wxPoem Options menu
68	item from the system menu) gives a choice of the following facilities:
69	Next poem/page (Page down) Display next poem (or next page)
70	Previous page (Page up) Display previous page (multi-line poems only)
71	Search (S) Allows user to enter a search string
72	Next match (N) Gives next search match
73	Copy to clipboard Allows poems to be pasted into other applications
74	Bigger text Increases text size
75	Smaller text Decreases text size
76	About wxPoem About wxPoem
77	Exit (Esc) Quit wxPoem
78
79	When wxPoem is closed, the font, text height and window position are
80	remembered (stored in WIN.INI) for next time. Under X, the values
81	are not written (since they are stored in .Xdefaults), so you may
82	want to edit the following resources by hand:
83
84	wxPoem.X ; X position
85	wxPoem.Y ; Y position
86	wxPoem.FontSize ; Font size in points (default 12)
87
88	The data file
89	-------------
90
91	The winpoem.dat file contains poems separated by a #, with optional
92	@ codes denoting title (@T) author (@A) and page break (@P). Any
93	unrecognized codes will cause the rest of the line to be ignored, so
94	the user can add lines (e.g. @S for subject) which will be searched on but
95	not displayed.
96
97	The data file contains a mixture of 20th century and earlier poetry,
98	subject to copyright constraints. Apologies if any copyrights have
99	inadvertently been infringed, though I have tried to avoid it.
100
101	Implementation
102	--------------
103
104	The original WinPoem program was my `Windows learning application', i.e.
105	a vehicle for getting stuck into Windows programming, whilst (possibly)
106	affording others a modicum of amusement. Therefore the code is pretty
107	ugly. So don't look if you're squeamish!
108
109	License
110	-------
111
112	Copyright Julian Smart, released into the public domain, October 1994.
113
114	Julian Smart
115	Artificial Intelligence Applications Institute
116	University of Edinburgh
117	80 South Bridge
118	Einburgh
119	EH1 1HN
120
121	J.Smart@ed.ac.uk