From: positron@engin.umich.edu (Jonathan Scott Haas)
Subject: MapMaker 0.1B for the Mac
Date: Mon, 16 Nov 92 16:49:32 EST
Organization: University of Michigan Engineering, Ann Arbor

I am making version 0.1 of my Diplomacy mapmaker for the Macintosh
available, if anyone's interested. As you can tell by the version number,
this is extremely primitive... rough... a hack, if you will. Before
it's done, I plan to rewrite it completely. But I'm making this version
available for two reasons: first, it's usable (sort of), and I figure
someone might be able to get some use out of it, and second, I'd like
to see it beta-tested, and get some reactions to it. If you want it,
send me email and I'll send it along... it's about 400K.

By the way, I didn't see an "incoming" directory in u.washington.edu...
could someone with access please put it with the rest of the Diplomacy
stuff?

Here is the 'readme' file... please read it before sending a request, to
make sure you can use it.


README FOR MAPMAKER 0.1B
------------------------

This is ***not*** a finished product! In fact, it's very far from being
finished. It's just a little utility I dashed off in about an hour for
displaying Diplomacy listings from the Diplomacy Adjuciator in graphical
form.

For ease of programming, I created this in MacroMind Director 3.1.
Unfortunately, I learned the hard way that while MMD is great for creating
presentations, it's unbearably slow when used for a purpose like this. It's
also filled with limitations and quirks, and this shows in the program. Future
revisions will be done in the C language instead.

To use this program, save a judge listing to disk. Because of one of the
aforementioned quirks, this listing *must* have type TEXT. Most text files saved
to disk should have this already. If it doesn't, you can load it and save it in
TeachText to get it. Next, run the program. Because of another quirk, desk
accessories will not be accessible. Select "Open" from the File menu and open
your text file. It'll take a few seconds to open. When the menu bar comes back,
select "Display" from the file menu. The map will be drawn (like I said, it's
slow).

This program (for now) requires a color Mac with at least a 640x480 screen.

To be safe, include the entire listing in your text file. However, the only
parts that are absolutely necessary are: the line beginning "Status of the ...
phase", the line containing "Ownership of supply centers", and either a listing
of Unowned supply centers or (if all supply centers are owned) a listing of
Austria's build status.

The colors of the map regions merely denote starting area. The only colors that
matter for game purposes are the colors of the units. Because black and white
wouldn't have looked good, I changed Germany to magenta and Russia to orange.
The other colors remain the same. A five-pointed star is an army, an anchor is
a fleet, and concentric circles are a supply center. Although the program is
slow, quirky, and limited, the output does look pretty good, although the names
of some of the smaller regions are illegible.

Future revisions:

o Support for B&W Macs
o Generation of orders files by dragging units
o A much more legible map
o We'll see where things go from there.

Comments, suggestions, complaints, compliments, flames, death threats, and
large sums of money to

Jonathan S. Haas
1039 Baldwin Ave. #4
Ann Arbor, MI  48104
positron@engin.umich.edu

MapMaker is copyright (c) 1992 Positronic Industries. It is freely
distributable, but please include this README file.


-- 
__/\__  Jonathan S. Haas         | Jake liked his women the way he liked
\    /  University of Michigan   | his kiwi fruit: sweet yet tart, firm-
/_  _\  positron@engin.umich.edu | fleshed yet yielding to the touch, and
  \/                             | covered with short brown fuzzy hair.
Newsgroups: rec.games.diplomacy