[NTLK] More dumb mac/newt questions: packtype, dock, and newtonbooks

From: Rhonda Hyslop (0x7ff00025_at_paradox.homeip.net)
Date: Fri Apr 30 2004 - 14:59:28 PDT


Hi, it's me again, the linux geek with dumb questions about the mac (and
they're all newton-related, too!) :-)

First question:

So anyhow, I have NCU installed, packtype has done its magic on some of
the .pkg files, but I don't get the nice little package icons - which
makes it really hard for me to tell which package files will show up in
NCU when I go to install them, and which won't. What's missing? As I
understand it, the programs are supposed to say what file types they
"own" and supply icons for them. (My mac-geek other half, whose LC I
have appropriated for my attempts at book-making and newton programming,
has already had me rebuild the desktop file. That didn't seem to do
anything, and he doesn't know what else to suggest.)

The files are sitting on my linux computer; I set up netatalk so the Mac
could have a network drive mounted to take the strain off its 250Mb hard
drive. Looking at the file info through resedit the type and creator
seem to be set properly... and if I do run the package through packtype
NCU will find it, so I know it's getting set... (I installed some
programs after running them through packtype - before, NCU wouldn't see
them, and after, they installed just fine - so I know for sure packtype
works.)

Second question:

I finally got the right dongle for my ethernet card and after a few
tries it managed to find my printer (appletalk aware network laserjet)
and print a note, then after a few more tries and some frustration with
remembering all the settings in all the different places on both the mac
and the newt, managed to find the LC and connect to NCU via appletalk.
Then just on a whim, to make sure the connection was stable, I hit the
"backup" button on the newt and wandered away. The newton complained
that it had lost connection with the mac, so I look at the mac and ...
mouse frozen. Completely unresponsive. I killed the power, and on
reboot ... no happy mac. I got the disk with the question mark (can't
find system disk, I think that means). Tried rebooting again, no dice.

The next day I powered it up so I could stick the system install cd in,
to see if the hard drive was screwed or if it was just the system file -
and it booted up just fine.

Colour me confused :-)

So anybody know what I did wrong? Should I not press the backup button
in Dock but use the one in NCU instead? Or was it something entirely
different? I know I've had problems trying to install packages browsing
from the newt, and that should be initiated from the desktop, but I'd
never tried initiating a backup from the newt.

Third question:

I've been trying to convert _Don Quixote_ into a NewtonBook using Newton
Book Maker. I reformatted all the paragraphs and added the dot commands
in vim, because I like vim ;-p (also, the trouble with the simple
replace-double-newlines-with-code, remove-single-newlines,
replace-code-with-double-newlines to reformat a Gutenberg etext is that
it doesn't work too well when you have the characters quoting poetry at
each other... as Don Quixote was wont to do)

Then I loaded the text file into ClarisWorks and put in the font, size,
etc on it, and saved it as RTF. The plain text file is 2.2Mb, and the
RTF is 2.7Mb. (huge... that surprised me, but glancing through it, it
appears that _Don Quixote_ is two books of 50-70 chapters each...
rather large for a first project, but I've always been one to jump in
with both feet) I then tried to run it through Newton Book Maker, and
hung the mac, both the real one and the one running in Basilisk II
(Basilisk went to something like 99% CPU usage and stayed there, so I
killed it). I'm assuming that file is too big? What's the best way to
deal with it to make a NewtonBook out of it? Or did I just not wait long
enough? (I let the LC sit for several hours, since I didn't need it for
anything else.)

I did test Newton Book Maker with a small file (a few pages copied from
_Don Quixote_) just to make sure I had the process right, and it worked
like a charm. So at least I know that the book maker isn't broken :-)

====

So anyhow, those were rather meandering questions. To summarize:

1) how do I get package icons to show up?
2) any clue what I did to crash the mac?
3) is my newton book too big?

Any help would be appreciated...

-Rhonda

-- 
 www.write-on.indy || www.write-on.org   \/  http://history.ubcengineers.ca/
  Discuss the art and craft of writing   /\   UBC Engineers History Project
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-- 
This is the NewtonTalk list - http://www.newtontalk.net/ for all inquiries
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