TACTS User Guide Startup Splash Screen

The primary function of this form is to introduce features of the application which are available when you register TACTS. Information on contacting me (Robert), the version of the application, and the location of this user guide are shown on the startup splash screen. There are two buttons on the form. The Register Now! button displays a message box indicating my email address and is available as soon as the screen displays. The second button, Continue Unregistered is active only after an initial time period where messages are displayed showing registered features of the application.

There are only a few features of TACTS which are only available when the application is registered. The most important is this splash screen is not displayed after you register the application. The program starts up immediately. I used the application for almost two years before I added these features to the program. They are new and are refinements which I wanted for the way I use the application.

The items which are only available to registered users are:

• No Splash Screen - TACTS starts immediately at the main menu without waiting for the splash screen to complete its processing
• Longer Descriptions - The description for each card series can be up to 200 characters. The unregistered version limits this to 150 characters
• More Search Engine Keywords - The search engine keywords are broken into two sections, those which appear on every card series, and keywords specific to each card series. The registered version allows unlimited keywords in each section. The unregistered version limits the common keywords to 50 characters and the keywords for each page to an additional 25 characters.
• Flexible Update Dates - The registered version of the application allows you to republish a give card series page without updating the last updated date to the date of publishing. This would allow you to change a link withoug updating the date. The unregistered version always sets the last updated date to the date the generation was performed.
• One Button Complete Republication - The registered version allows you to reimport and republish every card series in the entire application with a single button press. The unregistered version restricts you to importing and publishing only one entire spread sheet at a time. Since I currently have 10 or so sheets, it takes 20 button presses (1 to import/1 to publish for each sheet) to publish everything - not a major hardship
• Other Series Information - I haven't started using this yet, but the registered version will allow you to write additional html code which will be inserted after the description for a card series when the web page is published. I will be using this to provide detailed descriptions of each series and show a few sample cards from the series. The unregistered version does not allow you to enter information into this field.
• Scroller Customization - I haven't changed this on my pages, and I won't, but the registered version will allow you to change (or eliminate) the scrolling information that appears on the top of each card page. The unregisted version only allows you to change the background color used by the JAVA applet. Incidentally, I wrote the JAVA applet myself. I was playing around one night and whipped it out!
• Others? - I think this list is complete, but it might not be. Though you can change the information in the tables manually after the application is running, and the pages will publish with the updated information, the next time you start TACTS, it will reset the information to the allowed values if you don't have a registered version.
• ALL other features of the application work with the unregistered version. You can add as many card series as you desire. You can customize card series within the allowable guidelines. The application will NOT time out nor limit features beyond this in any way. I use the program solely for Star Trek card sets, but I see no reason why it wouldn't work for any type of cards.

Caution: If you change your email on a registered version of the application, you MUST contact me for a new registration number. You will have several chances to back out of the program before it truncates fields and resets information to be in line with the unregistered allowable values.