NB M&Q

[Michael Norman mn2@xxxxxxxx]

Herewith some NB (SWS) miscellany and questions.

Their tech support is indeed somewhat lacking. The tech I spoke with today did not know much about
XyDos. A second call was never returned. E-mails have waited many days without answer. Here's what I
did find out on a first call: No, you can not control screen colors, save making wholesale changes
in all your Win programs. Yes, you are stuck with courier 12 in draft and what we call expanded
views. Yes, they have had many requests and questions on this score and they plan (no date) to
address these issues.

Questions still pending.

1. When you boot up the program, how do you get a directory on the screen instead of a blank,
untitled document. Put the following in my NBSTART.INT:
BX LOAD C:\XY\PERS.SPLÿQ2;*;
BXÿLDSGT C:\XY\MIKE.SGTÿQ2;*;
BXÿLOAD C:\XY\XYWWWEB.U2ÿQ2;*;
BXÿDSORT F,EÿQ2;*;
BX DIR Q2 ;*;

Everything works save the last line. When I change it to BC DIR XC, I get the beginning of a
directory in the command box, not on the screen. If I leave off the XC I get the letters D I R in
the command box and when I hit F9 (I loaded my Xy keyboard) I do get a directory.

2. Can't get the auto-spell to activate no matter what I check, uncheck.

3. Get no indication when CAPS lock is on. Should be, if they followed Win conventions, on the
status line (those long boxes at the bottom of the screen).

4. Changed cursor using preferences to non-blinking, solid (0 setting). Now every 60 seconds, the
cursor simply disappears. Vanishes. Very strange.

Added up, this isn't much for a new program. But...if we did not have one another on this list, we'd
be downstream without a way to stop. And after years of tinkering with Xy and inheriting some
incredible work from XyWeeb.U2 folks (Distafano and company) the lack of support and documentation
does take a bit of patience, if not forbearance. Still it's a Win version of XY that seems to work,
or suit, some folks better than the last, and the SWS has some very nice bib and database modules.

Of course any help on any matter would be most appreciated.

Michael Norman
PS: No, I am not abandoning XyDos4, but I agree with Leslie on looking to the future.