Stand-Up
Tutorial



Introduction

This page tells you what to do after performing the Installation. It provides a step-by-step demonstration of the basic functions you need to get started.

This page provides information on.


Validating Installation

This section assumes that you have successfully extracted the files in the ZIP or self-extracting EXE distribution into the following directory on a Windows computer:
C:\Program Files\Standup
This is described in the Installation section. For Linux and Mac users, I assume you have done the local equivalent for your operating system:

If you now use Windows Explorer to examine the install directory, you should see something similar to the following directories and files have been extracted:

The important file is standup.jar. You can see that the file type is listed as Executable Jar File. This shows that the Java Runtime Environment (JRE) has been correctly installed, and is registered for .jar files.


Running The Program

You should now be able to double-click on standup.jar to start the Standup program. You can of course the standard Windows methods to create a shortcut on the desktop, or in your "Start Menu", or on your "Quick Access" toolbar (Win98/Win2k). An icon file, standup.ico is provided, to help make your shortcut look pretty.

A splash screen should appear for a second or two, and then the main screen. The main screen should automatically open the index for the default sample data which is provided with the installation kit.

The sample data contains one Collection, named Independents. That is the collection which you can see on the screen. The collection contains two Cards, named Concave Up and ARBBH. The first card refers to one Title, and the second refers to two titles.


Exploring The Sample Data

Now we will use the Index management dialog.

Choose the Collections -> Index option, or Ctrl-I from the keyboard.

The Index Dialog appears. Click on the open/close latch next to Independents. The structure of the index is shown. This dialog allows you to add/rename/delete Collections and Cards.

Close the dialog now, and in the main screen, double-click on the third row on the Concave Up tag (Issue #2). The following Issue Edit Dialog will appear.

This dialog displays and modifies the information for this particular issue. Along the top, from left to right, it shows that my collection includes this issue in Near Mint, that I have not assigned a value to this copy, and that I have not entered the cover date.

The template contains a note that this issue features the story Cushions In A Bathtub. My personal note indicates that I possess three copies of this comic.

The up and down arrows allow you to easily move to the next, or the preceeding row in the grid.


Creating Your Own Data

As a final step, we will create a new Card and also create two new titles Titles for the card.

First, select Cards -> New Card option, or Ctrl-N from the keyboard.

The Card Dialog will appear, as follows.

The name of the card is New Card. The list on the right indicates all the titles which are referenced by the card... none at the moment.

The list on the left shows all the titles which are available to be referenced by this card, i.e. all the titles which are not currently on the card. There are three titles in our templates directory.

The text box at the bottom right is where we create a new title. Type space_ranger in this title (with an underscore "_" character, since spaces are not permitted). This is the file name for our new title.

Then click Create, and the Title Dialog will appear.

This shows the information for the Space Ranger title. The title is taken from the filename which you entered. This title currently contains only one issue - Issue #1. Let's assume that the title was a little more successful than that... Click on 1 in the list.

The Numeric Range option will be enabled. Change the second number to 12, and then click Apply. Click Done on the Title Edit.

You will be returned to the Card Edit dialog, where you will see that the name of the card has been set to match the new Title which it references. Click Done on the Card Edit, and we return to the main window.

Now, we see the new card Space Ranger, which references the new title. Twelve issues are present. Double-click issue #1, and set it to Near Mint. Then use File -> Save or Ctrl-S to save your new title and your index changes.

Note: If the Issue Edit dialog does not appear, then you may have forgotton to close it from last time. Use Alt-Tab to cycle through your windows until you it appears.


More Basic Tasks

Here's a couple more things to try:

  1. To quickly modify the grade for a title, use Ctrl-1, Ctrl-2, etc. to access the most common grades.

  2. Try adding a second title reference to a card. Use Ctrl-E to edit an existing card, instead of creating a new one. Create a title with filename space_ranger_annual and put it on the same card as the main Space Ranger title. Give it issue numbers in the range 1995 to 2001.

  3. Try using the Issues -> Append New menu item to extend Space Ranger to 13 issues, instead of 12.

If you want to learn more, then try the Basic Concepts section.


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