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LOCATE User's Manual

MicroLink Technologies, Inc.
Copyright (c) 1987, all rights reserved


LOCATE is a program that allows users to get more from their mice
(hand-held pointing devices that you roll around on your
desktop). LOCATE works by translating mouse motion into the
appropriate number of arrow keystrokes.






MicroLink Technologies, Inc.
Post Office Box 2666
Sumter, South Carolina 29151-2666
1-(800)-334-9612 Outside SC
1-(800)-922-5904 Inside SC





This program may be freely distributed. Users are encouraged to
copy and share this program and it's documentation, as long as no
price is charged for either. You may charge a small fee to cover
the cost of the diskette.

If you use this program, and find it useful, you are encouraged
to register your copy of the program by sending a contribution
($20 suggested) to:

MicroLink Technologies, Inc.
Post Office Box 2666
Sumter, South Carolina 29151-2666

Registered users will receive an improved user's manual and
access to toll-free telephone support.

This program is available in both a Tandy 2000 and a PC-
Compatible version. The PC-Compatible version also expands the
size of the keyboard typeahead buffer from 15 to 80 characters.





MicroLink Technologies, Inc. -- Page 1

LOCATE User's Manual


Introduction: LOCATE.COM is a program that allows you to use
your system's mouse in programs that don't ordinarily support the
use of a mouse. A mouse (also called a "rat", or a "rodent") is
a small hand-held pointing device you roll around on your
desktop. If you don't have one of these, LOCATE is useless. If
you do, LOCATE allows you to do several things, including:

Use a mouse in programs that don't support a mouse
Now you can get the cursor-positioning speed of a mouse in
ordinary programs! Move lightning-fast in the Turbo
Languages, WordStar, WordPerfect, Lotus, BASIC, and more!

Control the sensitivity of your mouse
Some mice are either too sensitive ("jittery", like the
Logitech C7), or too slow ("sluggish"). With LOCATE, you
can adjust the sensitivity of your mouse to suit your

personal preferences.

Use the two mouse buttons for the most common keys
With LOCATE, button 1 will produce a carriage-return (just
as if ENTER was struck), and button 2 will produce an F1.
Left handed users, or those who prefer to do so, can swap
these assignments.

The following documentation tells you how to use LOCATE to make
more efficient use of your time at the keyboard.

If you're a registered user, and you run into problems you can
not seem to resolve, technical support is available by contacting
MicroLink at:

MicroLink Technologies, Inc.
Post Office Box 2666
Sumter, SC 29151-2666

1-(800)-334-9612 outside South Carolina
1-(800)-922-5904 inside South Carolina

Lotustm is a trademark of Lotus Development Corporation
Logitechtm is a trademark of Logitech
MS-DOStm is a trademark of MicroSoft Corporation
Turbotm is a trademark of Borland International
Windowstm is a trademark of MicroSoft Corporation
DesqViewtm is a trademark of Quarterdeck Office Systems
WordStartm is a trademark of MicroPro International Corporation
WordPerfecttm is a trademark of WordPerfect Corporation


Copyright (c) 1987, all rights reserved





Page 2 -- LOCATE User's Manual

First time users: Before you do anything else, you should:

Back up your distribution copy
Make sure you always work with a copy of LOCATE, not your
original. Never use the original for any purposes other
than making working copies of the software or distributing
the software. Once you have made a working copy of LOCATE,
you should put the original away in a safe place and work
with the working copy.

If you don't know how to make a duplicate copy of the
software, consult your MS-DOS manual under "BACKUP", "COPY",
"COMPDUPE", or "DISKCOPY" for the details.

Make sure your system can use a mouse
Before you can use a mouse, you must make sure that: you
have a mouse board installed in your computer; you have the
appropriate software drivers on your boot disk, such as
MOUSE.SYS or MOUSE.COM; you have loaded the software (either
via a line in CONFIG.SYS that says Device = MOUSE.SYS or a
line in your AUTOEXEC.BAT file that loads your mouse
software) For more details on how to get your mouse up and
working, consult the manuals that came with your mouse board
and your mouse.

If you use Lotus 1-2-3
If you use Lotus 1-2-3 (release 1A) on a Tandy 2000, you
should copy the KB.DRV file from the distribution disk to
the Lotus directory. This new KB.DRV is identical to the
one supplied with your copy of Lotus, except it fixes a
small bug. If you do not copy this file, Lotus will bomb
when you move the mouse and LOCATE is loaded.



















Copyright (c) 1987, all rights reserved





MicroLink Technologies, Inc. -- Page 3

Operation: Installing and running LOCATE is an easy process, and
you can experiment with the parameters until you find exactly the
"feel" you like.

To install onto your system, copy the file LOCATE.COM to your
boot diskettes (or your hard drive) into the appropriate
directories. On your floppies, you probably want to put it in
the root directory. On you hard drive, you will probably put it
into your program directory (like "\BIN", "\UTILS", or "\DOS"),
or your root directory.

To run LOCATE once it has been copied onto your disk(s), simply
type in LOCATE, optionally followed by one or more parameters.
These parameters can be:

On
This parameter turns LOCATE on. In most cases, this
parameter is the default. If you provide this parameter,
and LOCATE is already loaded, the message "Locate is already
loaded" will be displayed.

Off
This parameter is the opposite of "On". If you supply this
parameter, and LOCATE is not loaded, the message "Locate is
not loaded" will be displayed. If LOCATE is loaded,
specifying this parameter will cause LOCATE to be turned off
and unloaded.

Swap
This parameter reverses the action of mouse buttons 1 and 2.
(on a 3-button mouse, button 1 is the left button, 2 is the
right button, and 3 is the middle button) This switch is
useful for left-handed people.

NoSwap
This parameter "undoes" the action of the "Swap" parameter,
restoring the normal action of mouse buttons 1 and 2. This
is the default mode.

Horiz=hhhh
This parameter allows you to set the "damping" in the
horizontal (left-to-right) axis. The number "hhhh"
following the equal sign is a factor setting LOCATE's
damping action. The higher this number, the more damping is
applied, and the less "jittery" the mouse becomes in the
horizontal axis. The default for this parameter is Horiz=8.

Vert=hhhh
This parameter works just like "Horiz=hhhh", except it


Copyright (c) 1987, all rights reserved





Page 4 -- LOCATE User's Manual

applies to the vertical (up-and-down) axis. The default for
this parameter is Vert=8.

Status
This parameter will cause LOCATE to tell you if it is
currently loaded. If you specify this parameter, LOCATE
will not try to load itself, it will simply show you one of
two messages: either "Locate is already loaded" or "Locate
is not loaded", as appropriate.

Help or ?
These parameters, any unrecognized parameter, or a parameter
out of range will cause a help panel to be displayed. This
help panel is a brief description of these parameters.


Examples: The following examples should give you an idea how to
configure LOCATE to work best for you. Remember, you can change
the parameters of LOCATE at any time, just by running LOCATE
again with the new parameters. Also, when you run LOCATE, the
only parameters that are changed are the ones you specify. For
example, if LOCATE were loaded in your machine with SWAP,
HORIZ=20, and VERT=18, and you typed in LOCATE VERT=25, only the
vertical damping would change. Buttons 1 and 2 would still be
swapped, and the horizontal damping would still be 20.

Example 1: If you wanted to simply load LOCATE, you could
simply type in LOCATE. This would load LOCATE with the
default parameters.

Example 2: If you wanted to load LOCATE, but swap the
function of buttons 1 and 2, you would enter LOCATE SWAP.
This would reverse the two buttons, but leave everything
else as-is.

Example 3: If you wanted to lower the mouse's sensitivity,
you could type in LOCATE HORIZ=10 VERT=10. Once this
command was issued, you'd have to move the mouse twice as
far to produce an arrow keypress.












Copyright (c) 1987, all rights reserved





MicroLink Technologies, Inc. -- Page 5

Important notes: There are several important things to keep in
mind when using LOCATE.

Programs that use a mouse normally
If you run a program that normally uses a mouse, LOCATE will
be inactive until told to resume operation. For example,
LOCATE does not work in the MicroSoft Windows environment or
DesqView.

After running a program that uses the mouse normally
After you finish running a program that normally uses a
mouse, you must tell LOCATE to resume operation. To do
this, just type in LOCATE. LOCATE will then resume
operation.

LOCATE and other TSR (terminate and stay resident) programs
LOCATE, in general, should not cause major problems with
other TSR programs. However, should you encounter problems
while running other TSR programs, try changing the order in
which the TSR programs are loaded. The PC-Compatible
version is more susceptible to these contentions than the
Tandy 2000 version.


Error Messages: The following messages indicate something
unexpected is going on in your system:

Mouse driver is not installed
This message means that your mouse driver software is not
installed. Consult your mouse board and mouse manuals for
complete instructions on how to load your mouse driver
software. The most common way the mouse driver software is
loaded is a line in CONFIG.SYS that says Device = MOUSE.SYS.

Locate is not loaded
This message means one of two things: either you have asked
LOCATE to display it's status, and it is not loaded, or you
have tried to turn LOCATE off, even though it is not loaded.
In some cases, you can also get this message if the TSR
programs on your system are fighting amongst themselves.

Locate is already loaded
This message is just telling that LOCATE is already loaded.

usage: locate [horiz=hhhh][vert=hhhh]...
This is a help panel showing you the correct syntax for
running LOCATE, and is displayed whenever you use an
unrecognized parameter, ask for help, or specify a parameter
out of bounds.


Copyright (c) 1987, all rights reserved