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Originally printed in the March/April 1997 edition of the GEOS Publication

Getting organized with GEOS
by Bruce Thomas

Computers. Great machines, aren't they? They keep track of all the trivial little things that we need to but can't remember. They work tirelessly to remind us of our obligations. They make our lives more organized and make us better contributors to society as a whole.

What? You say yours doesn't keep you organized. In fact, you forgot your Mother-in-laws birthday last month? How can that be? Advertisements bombard us with images of happy people who get more done once they have a computer. Are these images wrong?

My answer to that is NO. These images aren't wrong although I don't believe computers are the answer to all of life's mysteries either.

The first thing you need to do if you want to get organized with GEOS is arrange your disks in a logical manner. By this I mean separate disks for each application. On your GeoWrite disk, for instance, you would have GeoWrite along with a couple of fonts you use regularly, the Text Grabber and its files, the Text Manager and a text album of font and ruler scraps, the Photo Manager, Toolkit (so you can easily change the fonts and rulers in your 'Write files) and InfoView. I use InfoView (it is a DA) to add the name of any font(s) I use in a document to the file Info Box so I don't have to try and remember them if/when I want to print the file again. You may have some other favorites (like a Word Counter or writing evaluator) but the files I mentioned should allow you to do a lot when GeoWriting.

Once you have your application disks set up you need to have a file disk. Since I put the font names in the Info Box I can keep my files on a disk by themselves and still be able to print them out again. For GeoPublish files you will want to keep the text files and the 'Pub file on the same disk (again with the font info in the box).

The application-disk / file-disk method of using GEOS works very well if you have multiple drives or an REU on your system. If you only have a single drive you will need to have all of your files on the same disk which means, for example, multiple geoPaint disks with one or two files on each.

Now, you say you have been using GEOS for a while and have files everywhere. To switch over to the application-disk / file-disk system you need an easy way to rearrange your files. Once you have copied files to proper disks or made duplicates of your present disks the best program to use is DirMaster V2.0 by Kent Smotherman. This program will work with 3 drives (I don't know if it supports 4) including 1541's, 1571's, 1581's and RAM devices. You can easily rearrange the files anyway you want in the text list provided (or choose an alphabetical sort) without waiting for the graphic screen to redraw. Once you have the directory the way you want it (even compacted to remove empty spaces) you save it back to the device and go to the next disk. All smooth and painless.

As with any task that a computer does it only does what it is told to do. If we want to get organized with GEOS we must tell GEOS what we want to see. In the world of 'real' computers there are lots of programs that fall under the category of Personal Information Manager (PIM's). These programs will remind you of appointments and birthdays, allow you to easily update the information and help keep your life organized (why you bought your computer, right?).

Do we have a PIM for GEOS? No. Is it possible to create our own PIM? Yes.

First off, to keep track of dates and appointments your computer must know the date. GEOS has a nice clock/calendar and it even stamps the date on all of your files. It is, however, up to you to tell GEOS the correct date or all of your files are stamped with 07/22/88 01:22PM or whatever the Berkeley default is.

There are many ways to tell GEOS the date. You can click on the clock once the Desktop comes up and set the time that way (an easy thing to forget to do). If you're lucky, you have a CMD device (FD drive, Hard Drive or SmartMouse) with a built in clock and an Auto-Exec to set the clock. There were other devices around over the years and there are also instructions for handy people to make their own.

If you can't remember to set the clock once GEOS is loaded, or you don't have a built-in clock that automatically sets it for you, you need AutoClock V1.5 by Rick Koch. This handy file is an Auto-Exec so it comes up on its' own before the Desktop and allows you to enter the time and date. This process is so easy that you will always have the correct time stamp on your files. This version also 'remembers' the last time you booted GEOS so displays that when it runs - a handy feature if you can't remember when you moused around last.

OK, we've got the GEOS clock set which is an important first step if we are going to stay organized. Now we need something to track our appointments and important dates. The Calendar DA is very good for this task. Once again we must remember to run the Calendar each time we boot GEOS so that we can check our schedule.

I never worry about running the Calendar. I have a nifty little Auto-Exec, AutoCalendar V1.0 by Michael Landon, that does it for me and works wonders as part of my geoPIM. By placing this file, along with Calendar and my Date Book onto my boot disk I get to see my schedule everytime I boot GEOS.

Now, we run into another little problem. If you don't use a joystick you have no input device once the Calendar loads. An auto-exec that fixes this is MouseUp V3.0 by Greg King. By placing this on your boot disk, your Input Driver gets loaded earlier than normal (it is usually loaded after the Desktop so your device isn't active). This is very handy if you want to use programs that require mouse input, like the Calendar, when GEOS boots.

Wow. That's a lot of files to put on your boot disk! I use a 1571 boot disk with my GEOS 128 system so it has plenty of room for all of these. On my 64 system I use an FD-2000 drive so it also has lots of room. If you aren't so lucky in the drive department you can still manage if you proceed with caution.

First off, never use your original GEOS boot disk. Make a backup copy to work with and the best ways are Maverick V5 from SSI or GeoMakeBoot from CMD. You will want to use TrojanKiller on the disk so that you can easily delete files without fear of ruining your copy.

If you are using a Maverick created 1571 boot disk you will need the auto-exec 1571 Boot Fix that allows more than one auto-exec to run during the boot process.

The next step is to remove all of the files you don't need. All the printer drivers can go except your chosen one. All of the little extra progs can go also. You need a lot of room to put the Calendar and all of these other files if you are using a 1541 disk, plus about 10K free. Once you have the space, copy all of the PIM files over to your boot disk and you're in business.

If you are lucky enough to have two disk drives you can have a PIM a little easier. Copy the Calendar, Date Book and Auto-Calendar to a disk which will go in Drive B every time you boot. Copy onto your boot disk a file called BOOTIE by Kent Smotherman. This auto-exec scours every active drive and will run any auto-exec it finds as GEOS boots. This process works nicely but is very slow when working between two drives.

With three drives you could leave your Calendar disk in the C drive all the time you are using GEOS and activate the Calendar with Jim Collette's DA-Runner or with GeoWizard (if you have an REU). This would allow you quick, easy access to your schedule so you could verify old appointments, or add new ones, as you work.

These are not the only files that you could use to create your own PIM for GEOS but they are ones I have found that work well together and are readily available. If you want GEOS to help organize your life you will need to put in some work to get started but, after you do, the benefits are many - and you'll likely never forget your Mother-in-Laws birthday again either!

Calendar is available on the DeskPack Plus disk from CMD. GeoWizard is available on CMD's Collette Utilities disk and DA-Runner was a type-in from the June/July 1990 RUN magazine.

enGEOy your Commodore!