"Many complain of their computers, but none of their brains." Yiddish proverb, altered
My intention with this site is just to show why and how I use the HP200LX and what programs I found valuable as all days helper. Most of the programs mentioned here are freeware and so this site is my kind of appreciation for their authors. If you are an experienced user stop reading here as I do not publish really new information. I offer only few files for download that are not published elsewhere. But probably you will be disappointed because there is no really genial affair for the connoisseur in here.
Except for the inquisitive.
«TNX4FLX», whomsoever!
That's not all, the Appointment Manager keeps record of your long-term duties too. Well, the expression 'long-term' may be incorrect (What may be done at any time will be done at no time Thomas Fuller), for example a 3 hours work you pushed in your pipeline as nugatory and not urgent may become important and imperatively when it's due date comes closer.
This leads to the necessity to categorise your tasks. For that the Appointment Manager offers a two character 'Priority' field. As first character I use numbers for tasks related to business and the letter 'P' for private aims. That sorts nicely in the ToDo List view. In addition I entered never-ending tasks (w/o due date) as headlines that sort before the real tasks.
0 ===== Business ===== 1A ----- urgent ----- 2A ----- soon ----- 3A ----- upcoming ----- P ===== Private =====The 1A, 1B and 1C items will show up under urgent, the 2A, 2B, and 2C show below soon and so on. As you see I use the second character for an additional classification: a 3-level grading of the task's impact.
For ToDo items and for appointment you may enter up to 32k notes. That should be enough for almost everybody. With this short overview - I did not mention all features - you may understand that I strongly depend on the HP200LX's calendar. Other calendars do more or less the same, so it's not the main reason why I prefer the HP200LX, it's how it works together with the other built-in applications.
One example (a feature that is hardly known): with the Appointment Manager you may start programs at a given time. For instance send and receive e-mails at 3 am (flat rate time!) and/or get some articles from your favourite newspaper (Süddeutsche Zeitung, Die Zeit, FAZ, Le Monde, Sydney Morning Herald). So you may read the breaking news at breakfast, or simply do data backup while you sleep, or make a new index for a full text search. Just a few examples, but they show that the HP200LX is more than a PIM-tool, it's a complete DOS PC on your palmtop.
An other example: 'Smart-Clip' is a way to pre-define sets of data that may be transferred from the database applications (the Calendar is one of the five LX-specific database apps) to other applications. For instance in the Phone Book you may have a smart clip for the full address (that simplifies the transfer to the editor for writing a fax) and an other smart clip for name and mobile number only (what may be suitable to note the time for a date in the Appointment Manager).
At least I have to mention a feature of the HP200LX that's not availabe on the HP100LX. Every morning when you first switch on your LX it shows the relevant entries of the Appointment Manager for the day, the so-called Daily Greeting. There is a file APPTS.INI in D:\_DAT\ or you may define an APPTS.INI of your own in C:\_DAT\ with quotes and randomly picked you get your daily fortune cookie. In such a file I found following advice:
; Written By: Some clever netizen. Submitted by Mitch Hamm mitch@palmtop.net ; Date/Rev: 9 February 1998 / Rev 1.0 ; Platform: HP 200LX ; Language: U.S.A. English ; Software Type: Freeware ; Purpose: The Ferengi Rules of Engagement ; Use: If the ApptBook app is open, please close it. Next, copy ; this file into the C:\_dat directory on your 200LX. Press ; the blue APPT button, press Menu, Options, and Daily ; Greeting. (Make sure Daily Greeting has a check mark by it).The format of the file is described too so I did convert some quotes: APPTS.ZIP contains the a. m. Ferengi Rules, my collection of quotes, and a template to create your own.
The daily greetings may be incommoding if you typically use your HP200LX past midnight and the greeting pops up at midnight instead of the next morning. Or it interferes with the automatic start of programs at night. GREET.COM from A. Garzotto may help in such cases. And for those who like to see the moon phases in the calendar there is an other tool from him: ADBMOON. I assume the times it calculates are for a geocentric view, but accurate enough for any place on earth' surface.
Discussing details in the first paragraph shows that there is not much to say about the Phone Book. Only this: the HP700LX (which is somewhat a precursor of the Nokia Communicator) has a feature to dial a phone number stored on the LX directly on the connected 2110. Trying to rebuild that on the 200LX I tested this and that with an IR.EXE from A. Garzotto. Unlucky that way he pointed me to WWW/LX, it has the best IrDA implementation currently available, he told me.
If you own a mobile phone with IrDA just try this (should work even w/o a licence for WWW/LX, sorry Avi).
Instead of going into some more theory I just like to draw your attention to some good examples from others and some nice from me - 195k, and some not so nice here - 99k. Even without an HP200LX you may use those files. See here and there.
I use Quicken on my LX and my wife on hers. With Connectivity Pack I merge our records regularly. For merging I use a ramdisk to keep the files temporarily, it significantly speeds up the process.
Ha - now I know why it's only Pocket Quicken (PQ): it lacks the graphing capability. But there is remedy directly from Intuit: Quicken for DOS V8R3 patched (QDOS8). Don't ask me why they offer R3, not R7 which was the last release sold. There are some hints on using it on a HP100LX, alas I was not able to show graphics in a useful manner on my HP-LX. If you transfer data using File/Export from PQ to QDOS8 you may run in some surprises:
Its conversion includes currency conversion too. To keep it up to date there is a nice macro from Yves Leurquin. I did a little modification what allows updating only seven or 14 reates instead of all.
Sorry if someone gets uptight that I do not mention names here, for more just look further down on this site.
Sorry, some links are still missing.
There are several programmers who felt the MMI could be augmented. Following a short description of those I use.
There is a LXSHIFT.COM (HP LX Shift/Ctrl/Alt/Fn Utility, version 1.01, 18 Jan 1996) from E. Meyer that would do all what's neccesary. But he writes: If you load another TSR that changes the default size/location of the key input buffer, LXSHIFT's CapsLock and PageUp/Dn features should be disabled. Sorry, Eric, but that restriction will probably just half the potential clientele.
The restriction of Eric's LXSHIFT forces me to use Ross A. Alford's FIXKHP.COM albeit it lacks the typewriter-like 'Shift-ends-Capslock' feature of LXSHIFT. On the other hand it has the advantage to make Alt and Menu two different keys. If I remember well, on a bare HP-LX pressing the Alt key in a PIM application pops up the Menu bar. With FIXKHP only the Menu key will do. I regard it as a nice feature.
^Menu Menu : Esc Alt F5 ^F5 ^Alt ! 123GUI RShi Menu : RShi ^RShi Alt F8 ^F8 ^Alt ! X-Finder Menu ^Menu : Menu ^Menu Menu m : m a x u Ente Menu : ^More More : Menu ^Menu A ^A L ^L ! Close all Applications ^More Back : Menu ^Menu A ^A T ^T Ente ^Ente ! Leave the SysMgr ^File Tab : 2 ^2 0 ^0 0 ^0 Enter ^Enter ! Restart SysMgr ^Phon Phon : More ^More . ^. Alt B ^B ^Alt ! LXtel ^Alt Spac : Alt F3 ^F3 ^Alt ! Zoom RShi Ente : F5 ^F5 ^RShi ! Task BarYou need an explanation for that? Well, the '^'-Sign stands for 'not' what means to release that key. So 'not-Menu Menu' is part of a double key press sequence of the Menu key. And on my HP200LX it starts the graphic menu for Lotus-123 which may be startet with Alt+F5 too. (Drawback of assigning a 'doublecklick' on the Menu key: an inadvertent press of Menu must be canceled with Escape.) The second line makes the right Shift+Menu start X-Finder. The last line starts the TaskBar by right Shift+Enter.
So the keys Menu, Enter and Right Shift are something like a fast accessible 'command center' what I key blindly.
The lines 3 to 5 make up an arkane protokol for typeing the string 'maxu'. In contradiction to the 'sticky keys' described above 'maxu' appears only when 'm' is hit before Menu is released. It even works when the password protection was activated with On+Enter (see 200LX manual chapter 1).
The other lines cause what is shown as comment after the exclamation mark. Note that Filer as 'double click' is not useful if you shut down filer using TaskBar or other means. I have to explain: Normaly under SysMgr the Filer application is never shut down, only suspendet. To free some storage you may shut down Filer but then the first hit of the Filer key brings it only back to the suspendet status, you need a second hit to pop it up as desired.
Stop dreaming, it exists, A. Garzotto had apparently the same dream. And it works. Look for Quick/LX at D&A-Soft.
One big tool would be Software Carrousel (SC), it's like having several different HP-LX built in one. I have no experience with SC as I assume it works best with enlarged intermal memory. And my LX is only a 2MB one. But consider following hint I received recently by eMail: "Sometimes 2 [HP-LX] are better than one - instant switching <G>". So rethink how you invest your money, in more HP-LX or a license for SC.
To run EXMs they must be registered in Application Manager. Additionaly each EXM is assigned to a start key. But you may only choose Alt+Green, Alt+F1-10, and Shift/Ctrl+F1-10 as start keys. Only few EXMs may be registered in Application Manager. And here helps MoreEXM to overcome this limitation. You may register as many EXMs you need to any keys you like. The tricky MoreEXM assigns 'on the fly' the program you start to a free EXM-"slot" (or socket?) what is normaly done permanent with Application Manager. To make this possible you have to free some slots in AppMan, just move some EXM to MoreEXM.
The only drawback is there are neither ikons nor a list from where you may choose the program to start. You have to remember the start key for all programs registered in MoreEXM. But there comes a little helper I like very much: the Key Manager.
KeyM reads the definition files of System Manager, SETUP.ENV (for macro labels), and MoreEXM and displays all in a functional list. Functional means, you may start an application by selecting it or cancel an open one. Make Quit-&-Launch a default setting with the entry 'QUIT,1' (w/o quotes) as last line in A:\_DAT\KEYM.DAT. So if you start an application from KeyM it first quits and then the selectet application is launched. Thus you have to "free" one EXM-slot less in Application Manager as described above.
As an example here my A:\_DAT\KEYM.DAT
20D0,Fn + d,DOS Line 219F,Fn + f,File Find 2CF4,Fn + z,Mini Dict 2DF8,Fn + x,123cut 2E87,Fn + c,123copy 2FF5,Fn + v,123paste 2591,Fn + k,Key Manager 8100,Alt + 0,Screen Capt QUIT,1
At last I found it! KS.COM is useful for Garzotto's PNS Point-n-Shoot. Yes, I remember now. That was before I used X-Finder. Those realy good programs worked great together. Only the built-in Filer of the HP-LX was not overwhelming. With PNS you point to a file in Filer and press Enter and get a list of possible applications from which you choose the desired one (like a right-click in other systems. PNS is a must if you do not use X-Finder.
Now seriously: With all those a. m. helpers you fill up memory with TSRs. But every now and then you need to run a DOS program that needs more storage than there is currently left free. The only way to run that stoage-hungry program is to unload those TSRs and waive all those helpers at least while that DOS program runs.
But no need to REM out all in CONFIG.SYS and AUTOEXEC.BAT and do a Ctrl-Alt-Del as there is MaxDOS from MeW, an other helper that swaps out all in one and gives you maximum memory for your DOS program. And reinstalls all when you quit it. I use it to go online with WWW/LX.
There is a similar but quite vaster approach with Software Carousel. It uses up to 12 different memory swaps instead of one MaxDOS does "on the fly". But SC is still a comercial product where MasDOS is free.
Unpack KID.LZH to an empty directory and use LXPIC's option V
to get a movie effect on the palmtop in a similar manner like the GIF shown on the left.