Hopalong

This is a fractal generator quite different from most programs of that ilk.  It
is fairly self-explanatory, so this file only touches on the non-obvious.

When it is run, it generates fractals randomly, lasting a minute each.  This is
also accessible via the item "Picture Show" in the Generate menu. A mouse click
here moves to the next random picture (else where it just stops the generation
of the picture), unless you click on the menu bar. The latter, in all cases,
stops picture generation and allows menu access.

The other items in the Generate menu are example fractals. Try them out. They
stop generating after a period of one to three minutes; you can tell this from
the change of the watch cursor to the standard arrow cursor.

These fractals depend on three parameters. These are changeable in the Settings
dialog under the Edit menu. Also settable there is the duration in minutes and
the scale (governing the size of the display). (The scale is unpredictable from
the parameters, so some random items might not have an appropriate scale, and
you can adjust that if you want to save the fractal.)

Save Specs in the File menu, just saves the parameters plus the duration and
scale so that the fractal will be repeatable later. (Actually not quite
repeatable since the colors are generated randomly and will differ every time
the fractal is generated.  You can however, save the picture itself with the
Export Picture command in the File menu. This saves the picture in the standard
MacIntosh PICT format. You can look at them in any imaging program; double
clicking them displays them in SimpleText.)

Open Specs lets you access one of the saved specs file and then generates that
fractal. The folder "Hopalong Spec Files" contains a few of these for you to try
out, in addition to the default ones under the Generated menu.

That is about all there is to say about this program, except that it sometimes
generates some truly remarkable pictures. Also, it is FreeWare: copy it and give
it to friends, but don't sell it.

Glen Bredon
bredon@sierratel.com
www.sierratel.com/bredon