CompuServe Messages

#Menu Interface?

    25-Aug-90 08:21:42
Sb: #Menu Interface?
Fm: David Cressey 73230,1665
To: All
After many years of using the command interface, I finally crumbled and wanted a menu interface to my common office work functions like word processing and spreadsheets, and for my kids to access games. What with directories of documents, etc., there was just too much that I didn't want to remember? I didn't see one lying around for the 'Bow, so I wrote one in Turbo Pascal. Actually, I started with Marc E Kenig's TurboMenu-RB and added an indexed file to store the menu data in. I named it AUTOMENU, which was pretty unimaginative. It turns out that there's a shareware goodie for the I*M PC with that name, so I'm shopping for a new name. I'm also shopping for a decent interface for MAINTAINING the menus. Myprogram has a built in menu option for menu database maintenance, but it's so clumsy that I can't use it effectively mysaelf. I have also been too embarrassed by this shortcoming that I haven't wanted to upload the program in its current state. It allows for a hierarchy of menus about 10 deep. My deepest menu is three from the top. It implements options other than submenus by invoking COMMAND.COM and passing the specified command line to it. I bootstrap it from AUTOEXEC.BAT, or return to it by calling it up, if I've been doing commands "A la carte" for a while. Is anybody else interested in a menu interface like this? It's humbler than a window, but it beats banging your head against the wall 🙂 If anyone else IS interested, how would you like to help me design a DECENT interface for menu database maintenance, so I can write it, and upload the package here? I almost forgot, anybody got a good name for such a thing?