Dialist's Companion

[Fred Sawyer]

In a recent response to John Carmichael, I referred to some capabilities of the Dialist's Companion program.  It seems that a number of people where unaware of these features.  After checking the Help page, I discovered that we evidently did not document them - so no wonder that they are still a bit mysterious.  This will give a little more detail:   If you are at the main page of the Dialist's Companion, you can toggle the clock on and off by hitting the End key (part of the home, end, PgUp, PgDn, and arrow keys arrangement).  Notice the small box just to the left of the Julian Date on the screen; once you have hit the End key, the rotating line in this box changes to a V - for virtual mode.  When in this mode, the clock is off. You can set the date, latitude, etc. as usual, using the D, T, O keys - or you can change the date and time by using the PgUp, PgDn, Ins, Del and arrow keys to step your way through the hours and days.  Note that with each change in time or date, all the values are recalculated and remain on the screen until you change the time again.  This makes working with calculations much easier.   To start the clock up again, hit End.  Note that the clock progresses again as before - but it picks up where you left off in the calculator mode.  So you can mimic the clock's functioning at any time of the day or year.  The box to the left of the Julian Date will still show V, meaning you are still in virtual - not real, current mode.  To change back to current mode, press Home - this brings you back home to the real world and synchronizes the software with your computer's clock/calendar.  Note that the box now changes from V to the rotating line/arrow you are familiar with.  Be sure to have the clock going when you hit Home - otherwise the program synchronizes with the clock for only a split second - the clock continues but if you have the program still in calculator mode, it will not change.   I hope this helps - and perhaps uncovers capabilities that you didn't know the program had.   Fred Sawyer