IntraDOS Help File
The topics in yellow below are covered in this help file. To view
a topic, click on the topic with a mouse or Tab to it and press Enter.
Using the menu at the top.
Keystroke support.
"Surfing" the Intranet:
Customizing IntraDOS. |
Remember!
You can use the "Search" menu to find particular terms in this file. |
The Readme.HTM file that comes with IntraDOS
contains further information on the program, and the
Setup.HTM file contains more information on launching
configuring it and setting it up on a network.
How to use the IntraDOS menu
Menu entries at the top of the screen control the operation of
IntraDOS. You can make selections on the menu by a mouse or the keyboard.
Using the mouse, simply click on selections with the left mouse
button as in typical MS-Windows programs.
Using the keyboard, you can press the Alt key to activate the
menu. Menu entries will have one letter (the "accelerator key")
that stands out in a different color. You can either press that key to
activate a particular menu selection or use the left, right, up, and
down arrow keys to move to a menu selection, which is then activated by
pressing Enter.
Some of the more important menu selections and the keystroke shortcuts are:
Get help: ..................................................... F1
Go back to the next earliest page you looked at: .............. Alt+b
Fo ahead to the next more recent page you looked at: .......... Alt+a
Go to your start-up "home" page: .............................. Alt+o
Show all contents of the current directory: ................... F5
Manually choose a file to open from a diolog box: ............. Ctrl+o
Take a look at the history of pages you've surfed: ............ Ctrl+h
View a bookmarked file ........................................ Alt+v
Bookmark the current file ..................................... Ctrl+b
View the Table of Contents .................................... Alt+c
Create a Table of Contents .................................... Ctrl+C
Find (search for) particular text somewhere in the document: .. Ctrl+f
Look for more of the same text without retyping: .............. F3
Get out of (exit) IntraDOS: ................................... Alt+x
Surfing the Intranet
"Surfing" the intranet involves movement within the document on screen
and using links to jump to other documents.
Movement within the document on screen
You can scroll through the document on screen with the up, down, left,
and right cursor keys and the PageUp and PageDown keys, as well as
using the mouse to click on the ends of scrollbars. You can also use
other keys as follows:
Home: .......... Moves to the left-hand side of the page
End: ........... Moves to the right-hand side of the page
Ctrl+Home: ..... Moves to the beginning (top) of the page
Ctrl+End: ...... Moves to the end (bottom) of the page
Additionally, you can search for particular text by pressing Ctrl+F, and
to repeat the search without retyping the text you're looking for, you
can press F3.
"Hypertext": Jumping to other documents by links
As with other browsers, a user can move through the information system
by activating links. In IntraDOS, the links generally appear in yellow,
but the currently active link appears in red. The user can navigate by the
following means:
- Mouse
- A user may follow hypertext links by clicking on them with a
mouse.
- TAB Key
- IntraDOS also allows a user to follow a link without a mouse by
means of the TAB key. To select a link, press TAB until the desired
link is highlighted (or Shift+TAB to cycle through the links in the
reverse direction). Then, the user presses ENTER to activate the link.
If you scroll so that the active link is out of view, IntraDOS
interprets a TAB as calling for the first link on the screen rather
than the next link in order.
- Type first letter of link on the screen
- The user may select a link by typing the first character of the
link until the desired link is highlighted. Then, the user presses
ENTER to activate the link.
- Back, Ahead and Home Menu Items
- These menu items function as they do with Windows browsers.
"Back" (alt+b) takes the user to the immediately preceding link (even
in the same document), "Ahead" (alt+a) to the one immediately next, and
"Home" (alt+o) to the first one.
- Browsing the File System
- When the user presses F5 (or Alt+f, i), IntraDOS creates a page of
hyperlinks to every file in the current directory, to subdirectories, and
to the parent directory. There is an ultimate limit to the number of files
that can be displayed in this way, but I have seen a directory of 1,300
files displayed correctly.
- File Open Dialog Box
- When the user presses Control+O (or Alt+f, o), IntraDOS provides a
dialog box for selecting a file to be opened.
- History
- When the user presses Control+H (or Alt+v, h), IntraDOS provides a
list of all links from the first to the last. The user can revisit
any of those documents by selecting the appropriate link and clicking
OK.
- Bookmarks
- The user can save the current document as a "Bookmark" or "Favorite" by
pressing Control+B. Doing so will cause IntraDOS to show the file as a
menu item at the bottom of the "View" menu, thus allowing the user to
return to the same file by using the menu rather than navigating through
the system. The bookmark can be used in later IntraDOS sessions. (It
can be changed by editing the user's configuration file.)
- Table of Contents
- By pressing Control+C, the user can also automatically store every
link in the current page as an entry in the "Table of Contents." The
menu item "Contents" will appear, and by activating it (by alt+c)
a list of links will appear below. The links can be used until the
user exits IntraDOS or supersedes those links by loading others. This
feature is most useful when the current document has been written as
an index or table of contents of related documents.
Customizing IntraDOS
Users can configure IntraDOS in several respects.
Colors
By using the File, Setup, Colors menu selection, users can
experiment to find the color arrangements that work best
for them. This menu will display a form showing all the
current color selections. To change the background, normal,
bold, italics, or heading colors, use the Change menu and
select the item you wish to change. You will then have an
array of choices, and as you make changes, the form's display
will show you your current selections. You can exit this
form without saving your changes, or you can save the changes
by pressing the Save button (or typing Alt+s) and then
exiting. If you save changes, those changes will appear on
the main form immediately.
Startup File and Help File
You can change the default start-up file by the menu item under
File, Setup, Startup File. You can also specify a different
help file (or this one if it is not in the current directory)
by File, Setup, Help File. For more advanced setup options,
see the Setup.HTM file that comes
with the program.
Speed - Stockpiling Files
To display a web (HTML) page properly, IntraDOS must interpret
(parse) it, and this takes some time depending on the size of
the file and the number and length of tables in the file.
Parsing the same file over and over again can be avoided, and
therefore system speed can be increased, by saving the file
in a stockpile of pre-parsed files. If a file has been saved
in this stockpile, it can be viewed almost instantaneously,
even on slower machines. Stockpililng can be done for each
file individually by the File, Stockpile Permanently menu
item. Alternatively, you can setup IntraDOS to stockpile
each file automatically or to force you to make a decision
on each file under File, Setup.
Bookmarks
Users can store particularly useful places on the intranet as
permanent "Bookmarks" or "Favorites," as explained
above.