The following files in this directory are copyrighted freeware created by SciTech Software. CONSOLE.C CONSOLE.H DEBUG.H PMODE.H PMPRO.H VESAVBE.C VESAVBE.H PMODE\MODEL.MAC PMODE\PMLITE.C PMODE\PMPRO.C PMODE\VFLAT.C PMODE\_PMLITE.ASM PMODE\_PMPRO.ASM PMODE\_VFLAT.ASM ZTIMER.H ZTIMER\ULZTIMER.C ZTIMER\LZTIMER.ASM ZTIMER\ZTIMER.CPP PMODE.LIB (various versions found in compiler-specific directories) ZTIMER.LIB The POV-Ray Team has been given explicit permission to include these files in the MS-Dos version of POV-Ray. Here is an overview of what the files do. CONSOLE.C and CONSOLE.H provide functions to display and manipulate text on the console using fast routines that directly access video memory. These routines are required for our module MSDOSTXT.C. If for some reason you don't want the fancy text, undefine FANCY_TEXT in CONFIG.H and recompile. You will get the generic "fprintf(stderr,...)" output from POV-Ray. PMODE.H and PMODE.LIB provide a compiler-independent way to do interrupts, access real-mode DOS memory or DOS BIOS areas or video memory. Every 32-bit protected mode compiler does these things differently but PMODE insulates you from those differences. In each of the compiler-specific directories you will find a file called PMODE.LIB but each of these files is different. Each is tailored to that specific compiler. It is supplied as a pre-compiled .LIB because part of the code is written in assembly language and is designed to be assembled with Borland's TASM 4.0 which you might not have. VESAVBE.C and VESAVBE.H provide generic VESA Video BIOS Extensions support functions, and provide a plug in module for interfacing with VBE graphics cards. This module calls upon the PMODE.C files to perform DOS extender specific tasks, and insulates the remaining modules of the details about interfacing correctly with VBE graphics cards. Note that although the MSDOSVID.C file calls upon this module, it is important to keep it separate so that the VESA support can be updated simply by pluggin in the latest version of this module from SciTech Software's SuperVGA Kit. In keeping with POV-Ray's philosophy of full source code availability, we have included the source to the Zen Timer libraries and the PM/Pro libraries which will allow you to re-assemble and recompile if you have TASM available. Note that these three files are not necessary if you plan to use the already compiled PMODE.LIB and ZTIMER.LIB files. DEBUG.H is an additional header that is used by CONSOLE.H and PMODE.H and is required to compile POV-Ray for MS-Dos. ZTIMER.H and ZTIMER.LIB are an interrupt driven routine to provide timing functions for POV-Ray speed profiling histogram option. Like PMODE.LIB, the ZTIMER.LIB exists in different versions for different compilers. Therefore ZTIMER.LIB is not in SOURCE\MSDOS but is in a compiler specific directory. UZLTIMER.C and LZTIMER.ASM are the source code to ZTIMER.LIB but you will probably not need them. The POV-Ray Team knows just enough about SciTech's modules to make them work for our limited purposes. We cannot provide technical support for them. More details on these SciTech modules is available in their full packages. The latest releases of all SciTech Software products are always uploaded to the Simtel-20 MSDOS internet archives (oak.oakland.edu) and to various areas on CompuServe and America Online. However to obtain the absolute latest release of all SciTech Software products, you can ftp them from their home site or from their web page: ftp.scitechsoft.com www.scitechsoft.com If you wish to contact SciTech Software for feedback or bug reports on their products, you can do so as follows: SciTech Software, Inc. 5 Governors Lane, Suite D Chico, CA 95926 USA Phone: 916-894-8400 Fax: 916-894-9069 Internet: support@scitechsoft.com Compuserve: >INTERNET:support@scitechsoft.com