Category : Display Utilities
Archive   : ASCIIHEB.ZIP
Filename : ASCIIHEB.DOC

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** ASCIIHEB (c) 1989,91 by Joel M. Hoffman **
/** Ver. 1.0 **\
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/ ** ** \
/ ** ....an EXCELSIOR product.... ** \
/ ** ** \
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** _| | | \ ./ _| | __| ___| _| | **
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** |~~| ~| ~| ~~~| ~~| | | |~~| ~| ~| |~~| ~| \ ; **
** _| | | | __|_ \; _| | | _| | | (`. **
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OVERVIEW
~~~~~~~~

ASCIIHEB is a utility for including Hebrew in any situation confined to
ASCII characters. It creates text documents with Hebrew letters that
can be viewed with any monitor that supports standard ASCII coding, from
mono. up to SuperDuperVGA+++.

ASCIIHEB automatically converts left-to-right text to right-to-left, for
convenient reading without a mirror.

The author uses this program for including Hebrew in E-mail, text
documents to be printed on an unknown printer, and for displaying Hebrew
with a minimum of fuss on any screen.

This program is Shareware. IT IS NOT FREE. Please see the last section
for information on registering your copy of ASCIIHEB.


USAGE
~~~~~

ASCIIHEB is a filter; it reads from STDIN and writes to STDOUT. It
terminates when it sees a blank line. If you just type:

ASCIIHEB

at a DOS prompt, ASCIIHEB will read lines one at a time from the
keyboard, converting the letters it sees to Hebrew (see the section
below on ``Keyboard Layout''). You can use

ASCIIHEB < file1 > file2

to convert file1 into Hebrew, storing the Hebrew in file2. If you type

ECHO gcrh, | ASCIIHEB

the program will respond with

|~~| ~| ~~~| ~~| | |
_| | | __|_ \;
~~



KEYBOARD LAYOUT
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The keyboard layout is the standard layout used in Israel. Here is
where the letters are located:

\~~~~~~\~~~~~~\~~~~~~\~~~~~~\~~~~~~\~~~~~~\~~~~~~\~~~~~~\~~~~~~\
\ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \
\ 2 \ 3 \ 4 \ 5 \ 6 \ 7 \ 8 \ 9 \ 0 \
\------\------\------\------\------\------\------\------\------\
\ W \ E \ R \ T \ Y \ U \ I \ O \ P \
\ \ koof \ resh \ aleph\ tet \ vav \ NUN \ MEM \ peh \
\------\------\------\------\------\------\------\------\------\------\
\ A \ S \ D \ F \ G \ H \ J \ K \ L \ ; \
\ shin \ dalet\ gimel\ kaf \ ayin \ yud \ chet \ lamed\ CHAF \ FEH \
\------\------\------\------\------\------\------\------\-------------
\ Z \ X \ C \ V \ B \ N \ M \ , \
\ zayin\samech\ bet \ heh \ nun \ mem \ tzadi\ taf \
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
o This is the standard Israeli keyboard layout.
o Letters in CAPS are final letters.
o Only lower-case letters are converted.



THE FONT
~~~~~~~~

The characters are proportionally-spaced, varying from 2 to 6 units wide
by up to 3 units tall and sometimes one unit deep. A variety of ASCII
characters is used to create the letters.



BUGS
~~~~

o The user must know the Israeli keyboard layout. Future versions may
support other transcriptions.

o There is no punctuation.

o Some of the letters, while not actually illegible, are ugly.



REGISTRATION
~~~~~~~~~~~~

This program is not expensive, but it's also not free. If you like
ASCIIHEB, the author is only asking for $10 as a registration fee. If
this is a financial hardship for you, and you still want to use the
program, contact the author.



Please send payment to: Joel M. Hoffman
c/o Excelsior Computer Services
19 Hillcrest Lane
Rye, NY 10580


Comments and suggestions, as well as bug reports, are welcome!

You can contact the author at the above address, or via email. No phone
calls please.

[email protected] <-- BITNET
[email protected] <-- Internet
[72700,402] <-- CompuServe