
ABOUT AUTORAISE

   AutoRaise is supplied with the Edith Professional system. It is a GEM
   accessory that raises windows for you. It is freeware, but works best
   in combination with Edith.


HISTORY

   The first version  (1.1) of AutoRaise  was released in  1991. It  was
   widely spread partly as it appeared on the cover disk of the  British
   magazine ST User. An enhanced version was posted in march 1993, which
   had a much smarter  way of deciding whether  the user would  actually
   like a window to be topped or not. The early versions were very small
   (around 2K). Starting from version 3.0, the size of the accessory  is
   about 30K. A small price to pay  for the people who asked me to  make
   the update: this version  is specially adapted  for Falcon, WINX  and
   MultiTOS. Why is it that big? Because I was lazy and used the  custom
   ZFC library for building large applications.


COPYING

   AutoRaise is  freeware.  You  may  freely  copy  and  distribute  the
   AutoRaise executable, provided that  this document file is  included,
   and ABSOLUTELY NO  MONEY is  charged for  it. For  distribution as  a
   cover disk issue or PD disk  please contact ZFC. AutoRaise and  these
   documents are (C) 1994 ZFC Computing. All rights reserved.


WHY USE AutoRaise

   1. If you have always had to click on a window to top it,  especially
      with single tasking TOSes, you simply don't know what you've  been
      missing. Try AutoRaise,  and you  will feel  far more  comfortable
      with GEM than you did (it might even prevent you from buying  that
      cheap Pentium you saw in the paper this morning...)

   2. If you  use/have used Double  Click's 'equivalent' DCTOPPER:  this
      program sticks to all conventions and is hence TOS-independent. It
      tops windows less quickly, and hardly ever tops a window when  you
      don't want it to.


HOW TO INSTALL

   Put AUTORAIS.ACC and  AUTORAIS.CFG in  the root folder  of your  boot
   drive. If you are using the Edith Professional system, put this  text
   in the  Edith  help  folder,  and  make  sure  that  a  copy  of  the
   EDITRESS.ENV file is in the same directory as AUTORAIS.ACC.



DESCRIPTION, INSTRUCTIONS

   When AUTORAIS.ACC is installed,  its name appears  in the Desk  menu.
   When you click on the menu item, a control window pops up.

   1. for all TOS versions

      The switches you're interested in are `Auto-Top' and `Save'. These
      are used to switch the AutoRaise function on and off, and to  save
      this in the configuration file AUTORAIS.CFG.

      If Auto-Top is switched ON, you can raise windows by simply moving
      the mouse onto it. However:

      - A window is topped only after the mouse has been stationary  for
         one tenth of a second. So you can still move the mouse across a
         background window without causing it to be topped.

      - Windows will not be  topped when any of  the four shift keys  or
         the mouse buttons are held down. So e.g. when you wish to  drag
         a file out of a background window of the desktop, hold down the
         right button, then move  to the background  window and pick  up
         the file.

      -  AutoRaise  does  not  allow  the  current  top  window  to  get
         completely covered when it tops a window.

      - Any change of the top  window NOT caused by mouse movement  will
         be `respected',  so  you can  open  and close  windows  by  key
         commands without having to worry about getting the mouse on the
         right window.  AutoRaise will  not top  a window  until  you've
         moved the mouse again.



   2. for FALCON, MULTITOS or WINX

      The control window now  also contains a  section for setting  more
      detailed preferences. The scroll widget  on the upper left  always
      contains one item `Default' and may contain the names of a  number
      of GEM applications  and accessories.  The three  switches in  the
      lower  half   of   the   AutoRaise  panel   are   used   to   make
      application-dependent settings. If the name of an application does
      not appear  in  the  widget, the  `default'  settings  apply.  The
      switches are stored per  application. To set  the behaviour for  a
      particular application, click  on its name  and set the  switches.
      Applications can  be added  and removed  from the  list using  the
      `New' and `Delete' buttons. The settings can be saved by  clicking
      on the `Save' buttons.

      The meaning of the three switches is as follows:

      A. Raise windows locally---  if this switch  is ON, the  accessory
         will automatically  switch  between  windows  of  the  selected
         application(s).

      B. Raise windows from this  application--- if this switch is  OFF,
         windows from other  applications will not  be raised when  this
         application owns the top window.

      C. Raise windows  to this  application--- if this  switch is  OFF,
         windows of this application will not be raised when the current
         top window belongs to another application.

      Many programs nowadays make use  of the new features of  MultiTOS.
      Two of these features can be a reason for NOT wanting some windows
      to be raised:

      A. Some windows  receive left  button mouse  clicks in  background
         windows. Therefore it may not be necessary to raise a window at
         all.

      B. More  and  more  state-of-the-art software  packages  (such  as
         Edith, the text  editress) can be  configured to send  keyboard
         information not to the top window, but to the window which  the
         mouse points  to.  It is  then  very annoying  when  background
         windows  are  automatically  topped.   However,  it  is   still
         convenient  to  automatically  switch  to  windows  of  another
         application.

---

   18th September 1994

   ZFC
   P.O.Box 12079
   1100 AB Amsterdam
   The Netherlands

   Phone:      +31 20 695 9901
   Internet:   A.V.Groenink@zfc.nl
   WWW/Mosaic: http://www.nl.net/~zfc/index.html

