D R I V E I F F ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Lattice C V5.0 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ DriveIFF is basically another driving simulator, yes, I know how common these are, so deduct 10 points now if you wish! But where driveIFF falls down as an over exploited idea it makes up with its ability to incorporate IFF picture files as the courses you race over. The advantage is that you bypass all of those classic restrictions such as compromised speed for detail and track editors that limit you to using bits of geometrical road and genetically identical trees. Loading Instructions ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Due to heavy memory requirements driveIFF cannot be loaded from the Workbench unless you have at least 1 megabyte of RAM. For those with a memory expansion, simply double-click on the driveIFF icon. However, those with a 512K machine should follow the below steps which make the program executable upon boot-up. ------------------------------------------------------------ 1) Load Workbench and format a fresh disk (called "Empty"). 2) Double-click on "Empty" to open its window. 3) Insert the coverdisk and double-click on its icon. 4) Drag the driveIFF drawer from the coverdisk window to the "Empty" window and obey requests as the files are copied. 5) Insert the Workbench disk and open its window, then double-click on the "Shell" icon and type... makedir Empty:s copy * Empty:s/startup-sequence driveIFF/driveIFF [ctrl] \ All that is left to do is reset the computer and insert "Empty" (which you may wish to relabel) into DF0: ------------------------------------------------------------ CLI users must make sure that the driveIFF drawer is in the current directory when invoking the program so that the support files "driveIFF.dash" and "audio.dat" can be found. Eg: If the coverdisk is in the external drive DF1: type... cd df1:driveIFF driveIFF Also, an IFF filename can be supplied as an argument... driveIFF AnyOldPic Playing Instructions ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ DriveIFF uses icons for input. Left to right they are... 1) Loading icon. Lets you load an IFF picture file as a track. Initially, click on the "Show Devices" heading. Then click on the appropriate device (DF0: RAM: etc). The program will search the path (displayed at the top) looking for directories and IFF picture files. If none are found the display will go blank. To load an IFF file or search further subdirectories, click on the appropriate item. 2) Track Editor icon. Presents 2 bar graphs, each allowing for its bars to be re-sized via the mouse while the left button is down. Each of the 8 bars relate to a colour on the track. Low bar values represent low ground level and slight inertia, while high values represent high ground level and strong inertia. 4) Drive icon. Returns you back to driving mode. Control of the car is by joystick. Left and right will turn the vehicle while forward/back will accelerate/brake - reverse. 5) Timer icon. Activates the stopwatch. Your current position will be marked by a grid which will also be the finishing point to end the race. Accelerate to start the clock. If the time taken to complete the race was faster than the record (shown on the right hand side) it will be acknowledged and the record updated. Failure is not rewarded! If at any time you wish to stop the clock, just click on this icon again. 6) Home icon. Returns your vehicle to the centre of the track. 7) Exit icon. Leaves the program. THE MAP: On the left of the screen is a VDU showing a condensed version of the IFF picture. On it will be a small flashing "blip" indicating your position. DIRECTION: Near the centre is a square with 4 arrows in the corners along with 4 lights which flash in relation to your bearing. Eg: the left light will be on if you are facing east. Tips ~~~~ You'll soon find out that you can explore outside the boundaries of the track into some wierd land where roads lead to nowhere and the ground changes. Don't fret, all you're looking at is the Amiga's memory contents. Yes, a monitor program you can drive through too! Be warned though, driving here can crash the machine. DriveIFF can only display 8 colour files, so those using more might look strange when loaded. If so, you can reduce the palette by replacing similar colours with a compromised colour (red, orange, yellow, compromise = orange) thus allowing, say a 16 colour file to be reduced to 8. Deluxe Paint owners can use the stencil function to perform this... 1) Access the Effects menu, select Stencil->Make then decide which colours can be replaced by one. Lock (select) all OTHER colours then click on "make" to return. 2) Access the palette, decide which of these similar colours makes the best compromise then turn the others black. 3) Select the compromised colour and paste a filled box over the whole screen. 4) Repeat from 1 until the picture uses only 8 colours. These further steps must be taken on remaining colours that do not lie in the first 8 palette boxes (first left column). 5) Copy the colour into one of the first 8 palette boxes. 6) Access Stencil->Make and lock all except these two identical colours then click on "make". 7) Select the copy then paste a filled box over the screen. 8) Access the palette and turn the original colour black. 9) Repeat from 5 until all 8 colours fill the first column. 10) Convert the screen format to 8 colours and re-save your picture as something new. Distribution ~~~~~~~~~~~~ DriveIFF is _____ware (affix letters where necessary). Needless to say, you can act on this as you wish. All I ask is that the files remain intact and that no charges are made for its distribution. Correspondence of any nature warmly welcomed. Jonathan Harris 2 Leigh Road Walsall West Mids WS4 2DS England 21 March 1991