Comments on using PRO-WAM with SuperScripsit - by Lynn P. Sherman

     I have found a way to patch SS to allow access to PRO-WAM. The
patches work by intercepting the error handling for an invalid CTRL key
combination (such as CTRL-Z). When CTRL-Z is pressed within a SS document,
the patched version now pauses for a key input through the DOS driver. At
this time, the SS cursor disappears. If you have previously installed
PRO-WAM, you should now press CTRL-P, or if you have changed the PRO-WAM
entry code to something else, use your modified code. PRO-WAM should now
activate. When you exit PRO-WAM, you will return to the point where you
left -- inside the SS document with no cursor, waiting for a keyboard entry
through the DOS driver. After pressing any key, the SS error message "Press
CONTROL-H to see an index of Scripsit commands" will begin flashing at the
bottom of the screen. If you press BREAK, you will be back in the document and ready to continue editing. If you hit any key sequence other than the
PRO-WAM activation code immediately after pressing CTRL-Z, the SS error
message will begin flashing and BREAK will put you back in the editing mode.

     Although this technique is certainly not very elegant, it has worked
for me, so far, without causing any visible problems. One useful function of
PRO-WAM still will not work with SS. You cannot transport data from PRO-WAM
to your SS document because PRO-WAM @PUTs data bytes to the DOS driver which
is not accessed by SS. You can, however, transfer data from an SS video page
to PRO-WAM.

     As I said, I've had no problems from the patch so far. Of course I
can't guarantee anything. By all means follow standard practice and make the
patches to a backup copy. Test it out on a few small documents before taking
a chance on losing many hours of work.

     The poatch was developed specifically for version 01.00.09 of
SUPERSCRIPSIT, operating under TRSDOS 6.2. I would be surprised if it
did not work for any 01.00.0x version, but I have not tried it out.
I can't say anything about version 01.01.00, but I would think that if
the patch would install, there's a good chance that it would work.

     The first five lines of patches are stuffed into an apparently unused
block of 30 bytes within the SCRIPSIT/CTL file. I really have no way of
knowing that there was no purpose intended for these bytes, but so far they
have never been overwritten by anything I have tried to do while running SS.

     The sixth and seventh lines modify the SS error message routine in
order to transfer control to the 30-byte block if SS is about to access the
error message that results from hitting an invalid key sequence. Any other
error message would be displayed normally with no interruption.

     Within the 30 byte block the code primarily just pauses to debounce the
CTRL-Z keystroke, and then waits for a keystroke input htorugh the DOS.
However, If you hold down the CTRL-Z too long, you will go right to the error
message and miss the opportunity to enter the PRO-WAM activation code. This
could, perhaps, be simplified by changing the PRO-WAM entry code to CTRL-Z
and skipping the debounce phase. At the time, I didn't want to force any
changes to PRO-WAM operation. The code makes use of a SVC calling routine
that is present in SS.

     The patch to SCR17/CTL eliminates some code that disables the break key
when loading SS. Without this patch you can enter PRO-WAM but can't get out
unless you issue a DOS command to enable the break key. I'm not sure what
the purpose was for disabling BREAK. I've not been able to cause any
problems so far by hitting BREAK within SS.
