ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN LIMA NEWSLETTER APRIL 1991 TI-WRITER v 4.2 ^Review by: Andy Frueh, Lima UG This review is similar to the one that appeared in MICROpendium. Those that have read it may feel that this is a rehash of that review, and will probably wish to skip this article. Those that may not get MICROpendium, here is my review! TI-Writer 4.2 is a program from RAG Software. It is advanced over previous TI-Writer "updates" in that it actually is a GREAT improvement over the original TI-Writer. There is much more speed, and extra Formatter commands. All the other features are basically unchanged, just speeded. There are three things that Funnelweb's TI-Writer clone can do that this version doesn't have. I hope that later version may include these. The first one is the beep that sounds when you are almost at the end of the line. This helps a lot when word wrap is off, so that you don't accidentaly lose text. The bottom of the screen ruler is also missed. However, the one feature that I'd really like to see added is Funnelweb's improvement in the ShowDirectory. TI-Writer v 4.2 has a catalog much like Disk Manager, instead of the extra features found in Funnelweb's catalog. For those who don't want to purchase an 80-column card, or a GENEVE, this version is for you. It loads either out of Extended BASIC, or out of the Editor/Assembler. You can load a neat configuration program in E/A. It lets you select tabs, margins, colors, and whether line numbers are on or off. It also looks for a CHARA1 file on the disk, and actually merges it with the TI-Writer program! This eliminates the need to have a seperate file. Even the actual program files have been shortened to a degree. There is also a configuration file for the Formatter. This does such things as setting up the default printer name, ect. Now, I'll give a brief description of the added Formatter commands. These aid greatly in using TI-Writer, and are all things that Texas Instruments should have included in their original version. PC n1 n2... (Printer Control) This sends printer control codes without having to transliterate them. DU n, DB n, DM n, DR n (Define Underscore, Define Boldface, Define Mail list, Define Required space) This command allows you to reprogram the characters used to get these commands. For example you can replace the & for underscore with ~. AI (As Is text) Actually, this is the same as the NF command with the exception that it leaves the left margin alone. The FI command will set up regular formatting. CP n (Conditional Page eject) If you have only a few more lines on a page, this command will hold the page break. CF filename (Chain File) This command will allow you to link several files, and waits for you to insert a new disk. This means that you can print out text of any length you want, and is limited only to the number of disks you own! QQ (Quit) If you enter this in the command mode, you can quit directly instead of using Q to quit and then press E to exit. CTRL , and . These two will allow you to jump to opposite ends of your text. CTRL, will jump to line one and CTRL. will jump to the end. In the Formatter, at the "Pause at end of page?" prompt, you can enter "L" and the Formatter won't put any line feeds in at the top of the page. This is useful for letter heads and when you are writing text that should take less than one page. According to Harry Barshear, who reviewed this program in MICROpendium (April 89), he couldn't get the AI command to work with his NX-1000. This program is available from R. A. Green of RAG Software for a mere $10. Of course, you don't get the complete TI-Writer manual. You do get the configuration programs, loaders, and explanations of the expanded Formatting commands. Compare that to the cost of the original TI-Writer ($10 to $20) and you see that you have nothing to lose (but definately something to gain)! Send your money to: RAG Software/Mr. R. A. Green 1032 Chantenay Dr. Gloucester, Ontario Canada K1C 2K9 .PL 1