                     A little faq about BETATRON:
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------


Q:    I tried to read the documentation and i cannot understand a word.
      Is it so hard to use BETATRON ?

A:    No, not at all. Maybe the documentation is not written well.
      Try starting from example program 1 in the directory examples.
      You can always drop me an email message at liouros@hotmail.com

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Q:    I have written a simple program that uses BETATRON and it
      crashes. What can be wrong ?

A:    If your program crashes the first thing you have to do is to
      check what every function ,you call, returns. If you find a
      function that returns an error code then you may be able to
      correct this error. The most of the times you will propably have
      forgotten to call some other function.
      For example:
      You tried to call TOworld::makelayer() without first calling
      TOworld::setdimensions();
      For fast and easy debugging use the macro CHECK().
      See example program 1 to see a correct order for calling the
      various methods of BETATRON and how to use CHECK().

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Q:    I tried to use BETATRON with a VESA 2.00 mode, and it hanged my
      computer although it worked nice in mode-X 320x200. Is this a bug?

A:    This is not a problem of BETATRON. This is a problem of your VESA2
      driver. BETATRON needs a linear frame buffer to work, but the address
      of the buffer is not always accecible by your VESA2 driver or your
      hardware. Consult the documentation of your VESA2 driver for details.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Q:    In some high resolution VESA 2.00 modes the horizontal scrolling is not
      smooth. Why that happens?

A:    You are trying to scroll in steps which are not multiples of 4.
      Unfortunately in some VESA 2.00 video modes, especially high resolution
      ones like 640x480, the horizontal pel panning register does not work so
      there is no way to scroll in steps of 1,2 or 3 pixels at a time. Prefer
      using horizontal scrolling steps that are multiples of 4; if you want
      to have smooth scrolling. The vertical scrolling steps are not a problem
      since the HPEL register is not used for this kind of scrolling. This
      note applies to my S3 card with UNIVBE as VBE2.00 driver. I have not
      checked this problem in other systems.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Q:    I want to display a nice picture at the start of my game and then
      a menu. Or i want to display a menu in the middle of the game.
      How do i do that?

A:    It is possible to write directly to the screen by using the functions
      TOworld::M2Vsolid() and TOworld::M2Vthru(). Store your picture as a
      bitmap in TOworld::bitmaps array (use TOworld::setbitmap() ) and then
      use the functions above to blit your picture to the screen.
      I admit that BETATRON lacks in many areas but it is still in version
      1.00 beta.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Q:    What about parallax scrolling and transparency effects?

A:    BETATRON does not support either parallax scrolling or
      transparency effects in its current version. Parallax scrolling will
      propably never be implemented because it would decrease the efficiency
      of the game engine. (The scrolling algorithm would have to be changed)
      Transparency effects can be easily embedded in BETATRON and they will
      propably be in a future version.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Q:    I want to create a World Data Description file (.WDD). What tools are
      available?

A:    Unfortunately none. A level editor for WDD files would be a really
      useful tool. Does anybody care to write one ?

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Q:    The view window is too big for my game. How can i reduce its size ?

A:    You can't. The view window always covers the whole screen.


