Q. Will the program
run on Windows Vista?
A. Yes, it will also run on Windows 95,
98,
98SE, Windows ME, Windows 2000, Windows XP , Vista, Windows 7 and as
far as I
know most
versions of Windows NT. When installing to Vista or Windows 7, the
program should be installed to the root of the hard drive such as
C:\Show, which is the installation default, and not in the
Program Files folder. You may also have to
install the program as the administrator.
Q. Are the breeds and
varieties pre entered or must I enter them?
A. No they are not pre entered. Most clubs
have their
own way of entering breed names plus I know I would miss a few.
But, once they are entered, you do not have to delete this list
of breeds each time you start a new show. The list can be used
again and if you do not enter birds for a particular breed, the breed
name will be ignored when printing Judging Sheets, Coop Tag Labels etc.
Varieties of breeds should be entered as separate breeds.
For example, Gazzi Modena, Schetti Modena and Argent Modena.
Q. Will the program work on
my printer?
A. I have tested the program on one Dot Matrix,
several
ink jet and two Laser printer and all worked fine.
Q. Can the program accept more than
20 different clubs for the Mail File?
A. No, that would require major programing changes
and would also make the file incompatible with earlier versions.
My suggestion has been to combine some clubs into one if 20 club
names aren't enough.
Q. Will the program print the
coop tag information to preprinted coop cards?
A. No, but it will print to a comma delimited file
if you
want. With this file, you can use the data in a word processor to
print to a different size label, change the font etc. If you can
make
a template for your coop cards, you could then print to them.
There are too many different styles of preprinted coop cards to
ever entertain printing directly from the program. Our
club placed the labels printed by the program on the back of the card
because they were easier to read. Eventually, we had blank cards
made up which were a lot cheaper. Included with the program is a
Word document with instructions for Word 2000 which will guide you
through printing to labels other than used by the program or you can
print to your own Coop cards. You can use this information with
other word processors.
Q. What does the coop tag label look like?
A. The labels are either 15/16" x 3 1/2", 1" x 2 5/8", 1" x 4
" or 2" x 4"
depending on the kind of printer you have. The format
for the labels is as follows:
Coop # 3
Exhib # 8
Breed BERN LARK
Color YELLOW CHECK
Band # 1234 Age-Sex: OH
Your Club Name
Also see the Print
Samples.
Q. Can the program sort the coop numbers to correspond to the sex and color for each breed?
A. Yes. The program first sorts each breed by
the largest color class first. It then sorts by age and sex and
then by exhibitor number.
Pigeon shows are sorted by YH, YC, YRH, YRC, OH, and OC.
Poultry shows are sorted by C, H, K, P, OTR and YTR (for old and
young trios) for chickens, OGA,
OGO, YGA and YGO for geese and ODR, ODU, YDR and YDU for ducks.
Then the coop numbers are assigned. There is a feature
which allows any selected breed to be sorted by Exhibitor number first
then by color, age and sex. This keeps all of one
exhibitors birds in one place and is usually used for Fantails and
Jacobins. If you don't want the colors sorted by largest color
class, you will have to print the Judging Sheets to a text file and cut
and paste the way you want them. There is an option to sort the
breeds alphabetically by color before assigning coop numbers but you
can't use the sort by exhibitor number and sort alphabetically by color
together.
Q. Will the program sort certain breeds in a specific color
order.
A. No. That would require customizing the
program to suit each club. However, the program will allow you to
print all printouts including the judging sheets to a text file which
you can open in any word processor and then cut and paste the colors in
what ever order you want and print from there.
Q. Can the program be set up for poultry?
A. Most definitely. The program maintains a
directory for pigeons and one for poultry and all files are separate.
Plus,
it changes the Age Sex designations from pigeons to poultry. See
the above answer for these Age and Sex designations.
Q. Can I have a show with both poultry and pigeons at the
same time and have consecutive coop numbers?
A. Yes. The program allows you to use what
ever starting coop number you wish. Wherever the first group
ends, just start assigning coop numbers to the next group with the
starting coop number incremented by one.
Q. How do I enter large fowl and bantams?
A. You would enter into the breed list, RHODE
ISLAND RED LARGE and RHODE ISLAND RED BANTAM. You can
expand
this for 4H birds to RHODE ISLAND RED LARGE 4H and RHODE ISLAND RED
BANT._4H or you can use the Class names to define which are large fowl
and bantams.
Q. Will the program
accept different class names for poultry?
A. Yes, you can select a Class name to
prefix the breed name when entering the breed names in the Show - Breed
List Add or Change option. There is also a reference file
from the
APA on which breeds to enter under which Classes.
Q. Will the program
accept Trios for poultry?
A. Yes, both Old and Young Trios.
Even though an entry for a trio is counted as one entry, the coop tag
labels for the trios will be identified when printed as A, B and
C. The judging sheets for the trios will have the coop number
marked as an example 109 A,B&C.
Q. Can I have more than one
show at a time?
A. Yes. Just install the program again but use
a different folder than the default when installing. This way,
you can have two pigeon or two poultry shows going at one time.
You
will, however, have to add a new shortcut to the first copy as the
short
cuts will be changed to the second copy.
Q. How does
the program work?
A. What
follows is a short explanation of how the Show Secretary program
works. The program creates a number of files for both pigeons and
poultry as you enter data. The Mail File holds the names,
addresses, telephone number and up to 20 specialty clubs that a
potential exhibitor may belong to. This file can be edited
in a variety of ways including updating from a current Exhibitor
List. You can also print mailing labels or a hard copy from this
file with a selection or all of the specialty clubs.
When it is time to
create a show, exhibitor information will be entered into the Exhibitor
File. If a name is already in the Mail File, clicking on the name
in the Mail File list box will fill in all the exhibitor
information. You only need to enter the number of birds at each
cost, meals, catalogs, sale cages, membership dues paid and dollar
amount tendered. An Exhibitor Number will be assigned by the
program at this time.
Next you need to enter
the breed names into the Breed List. These names can be anything
you want, and it always best to enter breed names and varieties such as
Gazzi Modena, Schetti Modena and Argent Modena. When entering
poultry breeds, there is a series of radio buttons which you can
optionally use. For example, you can check radio button ASIATIC
and the breed name line will show ASIATIC~ and then you type in COCHIN,
LANGSHAN or BRAHMA. If there is no radio button, for a poultry
breed, just type in the breed name as you want it to appear.
Once this breed list is created, it is not necessary to delete it for
each show. When you delete the show files, all the other lists
will be deleted but you can allow the Breed List to remain for use in
your next show. If a breed has no entries, it will be skipped
when assigning coop numbers etc.
When it is time to
enter actual entries, you will select an exhibitor from the Exhibitor
list box, then a breed from the Breed list box then a color from the
Color list box. If the color doesn't exist in the list box, type
in a new color. That color will now appear in the Color list
box. Next you type in a band number, check the Junior Entry box
if this a junior entry and click a radio button to select the age-sex
designation. When you add the bird, an Entry File will be created
using the breed name. Each breed will have it's own Entry File
and all entries for the same breed will go into this file.
After you have checked
that all entries are correct with the Show Check function, there is a
function which will allow you to arrange the breeds in the order that
you want the coop numbers assigned. Then you use the Assign Coop
Numbers function. At this point, all the data necessary to print
all the show options has been created and you can print all the
paperwork required for the show.
