Help

If I run the !Help application inside !Boot.RO350Hook.Apps under RISC OS 5.21 (on the Pandaboard), which I note is version 2.36 (9-Aug-2012) rather than the one in the ROM which is 3.20 (8-Aug-2012), the icon bar menu has a grey stripe down each side. Not the most earth-shattering of bugs. I suppose the version number and date is also slightly odd.

!Boot.RO350Hook.Apps under RISC OS 5.21

That’s unlikely to make any sense in itself, since the apps in RO350Hook are by definition to be run on RISC OS 3.50. However, I can explain the different version numbers.

Help 2.xx is written in BASIC and originally appeared in ROM, and the help messages are intimately tied to the ROM apps because they’re generated during the ROM build. To save space RISC OS 3.50 didn’t include it, so to supply it in the universal disc image the older version must be supplied (with corresponding crunched messages) – you get garbled help if you try using any earlier or later version.

Help 3.xx is written in C, it has the “bubble help” popups.

The grey stripes are something that’s changed in the Wimp, I guess it was a typo in the menu definition in Help 2.xx, or some flag bits got redefined or something. Softloading Wimp 5.30 on RISC OS 3.10 shows that the ROM copy of Help from RISC OS 3.10 also had grey sideburns.

It’s written in BASIC, feel free to look for dodgy menu definitions and report back!