Form Designer
by Kell Gatherer and Lothar Pilz

This application was originally published on the RISC User disc 4:9. This version works with the Epson FX/RX and CPA80 range of printers, which used to cause problems due to a smaller choice of symbols built in to these printers. 

This application facilitates the creation of printed forms on the Epson FX/RX range of printers and the CPA80 printer. It simplifies the insertion of the appropriate codes into a file using a text editor such as Edit.

The Forms application defines the appropriate characters by loading the font file !Forms.FormFont. A window is then opened containing icons for all of the necessary symbols, suitably arranged for form design. In this version the window that opens now has two sets of symbols - use the left-hand side for FX/RX printers and the right-hand side for the CPA80. Also included are icons for some other useful symbols, and for the cursor keys, Delete, Insert and Return.

Clicking Select over a symbol results in the symbol being inserted at the caret position as if by a key press. Note that the  symbol generated by the application is a different character to the keyboard  character.

Closing the window terminates the program. The default RISC OS font can be restored by typing *FX 25 at the command line.

Also included on this disc is the FormPrint application which makes printing forms a lot easier. This will set up IBM mode automatically before printing. See the help text for the Form Printing Application for more help.

The directory !Forms.Examples contains two example documents which can be used with FormPrint or just loaded into Edit. Note that to display the files properly on the screen, the font file !Forms.FormFont should be run first, so that the characters have the correct definitions. Running the Forms application installs this font file automatically.

 RISC User 1992
