--------------------------- MultiDesk Deluxe - The Demo --------------------------- Program and documentation by Charles F. Johnson Copyright 1991 CodeHead Software Released: September 20, 1991 Welcome to the MultiDesk Deluxe demo! MultiDesk is the award winning program that overcomes GEM's limit of six desk accessories. And now, the new MultiDesk Deluxe even lets you treat ordinary ST desk accessories as if they were CPX modules for Atari's Extensible Control Panel ... which means that they load into memory when you click on them and are wiped out of memory when you close them! Reviewers the world over have acclaimed MultiDesk as a "MUST HAVE" utility. -------------------------------------------------------------------- Files included in this package: MULTDEMO.ACC - The demo version of MultiDesk. MULTDEMO.TXT - You're reading it right now. This demo may be freely distributed as long as all of the above files are included. -------------------------------------------------------------------- MultiDesk lets you load and unload any standard Atari ST desk accessory at ANY time....even while running a program! MultiDesk frees you from the six-accessory limit of GEM; it's similar to products like Suitcase for the Apple Macintosh. When you run MultiDesk as a program (by changing its extension to .PRG) you can run any desk accessory as if IT were a program too, without taking up any permanent memory. (Running as a program is disabled in this demonstration version.) Many flexible configuration options let you customize MultiDesk to your own personal preferences -- and a friendly, intuitive GEM interface makes MultiDesk simple to operate! Setting Up the Demo ------------------- Simply copy the MULTDEMO.ACC file to the main directory of your boot disk. When you reboot your computer, the MultiDesk accessory will be installed in the usual list of GEM DAs, which is available under the "Desk" drop-down menu. The MDX Directory ----------------- But wait! Before rebooting, you'll also want to set up a special directory for your "nonresident" desk accessories. In the root directory of your boot disk, create a folder called MULTDESK.MDX and copy some desk accessories into it. (We'll call this directory the "MDX Directory.") Any DAs at all will do; MultiDesk Deluxe is compatible with just about everything. The DAs in this directory are not loaded into MultiDesk Deluxe immediately; instead MultiDesk just reads their names from the directory and displays them in its scrolling window. When you click on a DA's name in the window, it is loaded into memory _right_then_. When you close it, the memory it used can be reused by another nonresident DA! The MDX Buffer -------------- MultiDesk Deluxe sets aside a special area of memory (called a "buffer" in nerdspeak) where all the nonresident DAs load. This buffer only needs to be big enough to hold the largest DA you might load. You can adjust the size of this buffer by clicking the button labeled "Config" on MultiDesk Deluxe's main screen. This brings you to the "Configuration Editor" screen. Toward the middle right of this box is an adjustable size box labeled "MDX BUFFER"; by clicking on the up or down arrows, you can adjust this number to your liking. The size is shown in kilobytes -- so 0001 equals 1024 bytes of memory. To enter a number more quickly, click on the number itself; then you can type in a new value. Hit Return when you're finished entering the value. To find out how much memory a nonresident DA needs, hold down the Control key while you click on its name in the MultiDesk window. If you try to open a nonresident DA that's too large for the current MDX buffer, MultiDesk will stop and display an alert box that tells you how much memory the DA needs. It is recommended that you adjust the MDX Buffer only while at the GEM Desktop, or from within CodeHead's HotWire desktop alternative, to prevent memory fragmentation. Once you find the size that accommodates your largest nonresident DA, you probably won't adjust it much anyway; so this isn't really a limitation. The Reserve Size ---------------- Some desk accessories need to allocate memory when they start up. Normally, this is no problem -- at bootup time, there's plenty of free memory for a DA to grab. But MultiDesk Deluxe changes the rules, since a nonresident DA can be loaded (started up) at any time ... even while a program is running. Now, what happens if a nonresident DA comes along and tries to allocate some memory, but the running program has already grabbed it all? An unfortunately large number of DAs will simply crash when faced with this situation, usually taking the rest of the system down with them too. To head off this potential disaster, MultiDesk Deluxe has a feature called the "Reserve Size." This feature fools those memory-grabbing programs into grabbing a bit less -- you specify how much less in the "Config" screen. When "Reserve Size" is set to a value greater than zero, programs will leave that much memory free instead of taking it all, allowing nonresident DAs to start up and allocate their memory properly. Resident or Nonresident? ------------------------ Some DAs _must_ be resident in memory to do their jobs. This would include things like screen accelerators, mouse accelerators, ramdisks, print spoolers, or the like. Since the nonresident DAs are wiped out of memory when you close them, anything that needs to stay resident should be loaded with the "Load Acc" button in MultiDesk Deluxe's main screen. DAs loaded this way are loaded into the "Resident Buffer" and remain in memory. You can tell the resident and nonresident DAs apart by the little dot (or "bullet") character that appears before the names of the nonresident ones. Titles for Nonresident DAs -------------------------- The release version of MultiDesk Deluxe also includes a special program that lets you create titles for your nonresident DAs, so you're not looking at a list of filenames. This program is not included with the demonstration version. Other Limits in the Demo Version -------------------------------- Several features are disabled in the demonstration version, including the ability to save and load setups (groups of DAs), the ability to save your configuration, and the ability to run as a program. Also, there is a time limit of ten minutes in effect; after this time expires, you will be unable to open any accessories in the MultiDesk window. Of course, all of the features which are disabled in the demo are fully operative in the release version of MultiDesk Deluxe. Ordering Information -------------------- To order MultiDesk Deluxe, send a check or money order for $49.95 (plus $3.00 shipping/handling, $4 Canada, $6 Europe) to: CodeHead Software P.O. Box 74090 Los Angeles, CA 90004 Voice: (213) 386-5735 Fax: (213) 386-5789 California residents please add 6.5% sales tax. We also accept most major credit cards. Existing owners of MultiDesk can upgrade to MultiDesk Deluxe by sending back your original disk with a check or money order for $20.00 plus shipping/handling as stated above. The manual for MultiDesk Deluxe has been rewritten, expanded, and repackaged in a 3-ring binder format; this new manual is included in the upgrade price. MultiDesk Deluxe is available at any Atari ST dealer that carries CodeHead products. If you don't see CodeHead products at your dealer, ask him/her to carry them! ------------------------------------------------------------------- MultiDesk Deluxe is Copyright 1988,89,90,91 Charles F. Johnson & CodeHead Software. All Rights Reserved.