This is the Read Me file which is included with Solo Deluxe 2.0 in html
format.

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Contents

   * Welcome
   * Features
   * Installing Solo Deluxe
   * Decompressing Solo Deluxe
   * Game rules
        o Klondike Rules
        o Canfield Rules
        o Pyramid Rules
        o Aces Rules
   * Using the small icons
   * The scoring system
   * How to improve your luck
   * Removing Solo Deluxe
   * Changing your Preferences
        o Displaying the Welcome screen
   * History of changes
   * Feedback
   * Cheating

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Welcome to Solo Deluxe!

Solo Deluxe is a Newton version of four popular Solitaire games. With Solo
Deluxe, you can play Klondike, Canfield, Pyramid and Aces, each with
different playing options. See the end of this file for instructions on how
to play.

Solo Deluxe is Shareware and costs $15. If you like it and use it, please
send your registration fee to the following address:

     Marcela Seguel
     3421 Aubry
     Longueuil, Qubec
     Canada J4M 2W4

I know, Solo Deluxe used to be free, but times change! If you are using
version prior to 2.0, you should still pay the shareware fee, or perhaps $10
if you like, isn't it worth it?

You can contact me at mseguel@scoopnet.ca or you can visit the Solo Deluxe
web page at http://www.scoopnet.ca/solodx

This is version 2.0 and seems stable, but if you find any bugs, please
report them to me. If you have any suggestions on anything, I'll be more
than happy to read them and try to implement them as well (when time permits
and if shareware fees start popping up in my mail box).

Features:

   * Four different games (with multiple options)
   * Many card designs
   * Auto Start in your favorite game
   * Iconizable
   * Fun animation and ending
   * Scoring based on how lucky you are
   * Statistics (games played/won)
   * and more!

Installing Solo Deluxe

When you install Solo Deluxe on your Newton, You have the option of
installing the Help File (SoloHelpII) and Extra Decks (SoloDecks and/or
SoloDecksTwo) as well. These take up a little more RAM, but they're worth
it! The SoloDecks file (not SoloDecksTwo) also contains a couple of sounds
that are used by the game if they are there. SoloDecks (not Two) also
contains Back designs for the cards. If you don't install these, you will
get the default Card and Back design, and you will not get the special
sounds. You may also install these packages on an external storage card,
even if Solo is in your Newton's internal storage memory. SoloHelp and
SoloDecks do not appear in the Extras Drawer, but you can remove them the
regular way.

Decompressing Solo Deluxe

If you are using a Mac, simply decompress the enclosed files with a Stuffit
compatible decompressor.

If you are using a PC, you might need to de-binhex the file first (depending
on where you got it). There is a program called BINHEX that will do that for
you. Then you will need UNSTUFF (make sure you have the latest version) to
unstuff the files. Both of these programs are available almost everywhere,
but if you can't find them let me know. Once this is done, you'll have all
the files you need and you can then install them (using the Windows
Connection Kit).

Game rules

You probably know how to play some form of solitaire, and the specific rules
for each game follows this topic, but here are a few pointers for general
operations.

   * Tap New Game to select the game you wish to play.
   * Tap the deck to get more cards.
   * Tap the Lock icon to enable dragging the Deck, Tap again to lock it and
     resume play.
   * Tap Restart to replay the same game, with or without the same deck.
   * Tap the "i" button for Information and Options

J

     Klondike Rules

     There are three components to the game: the Deck, the four
     Foundations and the seven Columns.

     Place cards in descending order and alternating suites ( i.e. 10
     of Hearts, 9 of Spades, etc.) down the columns, the King being the
     highest value and the only card allowed in an empty column.

     Aces can go to the Foundations at the top. You then build the
     Foundations in ascending order of the same suite.

     Canfield Rules

     Canfield is similar to Klondike, except the Foundation card is
     selected at random. When you build the Foundations, you start with
     the randomly selected value, build up to the King, then you
     continue with the Ace, and so on. When building the columns, you
     go down from the card which comes just before the Foundation card
     (it becomes the highest value card) and build down to the Ace
     which is then followed by the King.

     This game adds a fourth component: the Stock. Only Cards from the
     Stock go to empty columns until it becomes empty, at which time
     you can use cards from the Deck to fill these empty columns.

     Pyramid Rules

     Pyramid is very simple to play, but very hard to finish (the
     reward is good though). The goal is to combine cards whose values
     total 13 i.e. 6 & 7, 8 & 5, single King, etc. Simply tap on the
     cards each in turn to select a pair.

     You go through the Deck once, one card at a time. When playing the
     2 card game, the previously dealt card is fed to a second pile
     from which you may also combine cards. This option makes the game
     somewhat easier

     Aces Rules

     Cards are dealt 4 at a time. Remove all the lowest cards of the
     same suite by tapping on them. Aces have the highest value. For
     example, if you deal the following cards:

     8 (Clubs) 3 (Harts) 10 (Clubs) 4 (Clubs)

     You may remove the 4 and 8 of clubs as they are lower than the 10
     of clubs.

     Either only aces or any card may be played in an empty column (see
     prefs).

     You must end up with only aces on top, and all cards must be
     played. It's even better to end up with only the four aces and no
     other cards underneath.

Using the small icons

   * Lock: To lock the Deck's position, otherwise, you can drag it around
     (or the Flip arrow).
   * Lightning bolt: To clean up the screen.
   * Little Spade: Iconize the game. Tap the button which appears in your
     Notepad to return to a productive game of Solo (interrupted by some
     annoying "real work").

The scoring system

Scoring is based on Luck Points. For every game you play, you lose a little
bit of points, but when you win you get a bunch of points. The harder the
settings, the more points you get. Win twice in a row and get extra points!
Bring your luck to 100% and see what happens! By the way, the Joker card is
good luck too!

How to improve your luck

Use harder settings and don't cheat.

Hint: flipping 1 card an unlimited number of times is not very good for your
luck.

Using the same deck twice might be fun, but you'll loose a few luck points!

Winning twice in a row is considered the luckiest thing of all!

Seeing a joker card is also lucky!

If you win an average number of games, your luck will stay pretty much the
same (it might improve a bit), if you win more than the average person, your
luck will increase, now this is based on the statistics I (with the help of
my beta testers) managed to compile by playing many games, over time, future
versions of the game will be more fair, especially if you let me know how
many games you've played, which settings you used and how many you've won.
Send me mail!

Removing Solo Deluxe

If you ever decide to remove Solo Deluxe (why?) you might want to be aware
of two things. Solo creates some preferences in your Newton's memory, they
are small, but they are there. There is no way for a programmer to know when
you actually delete an application (there is no difference between removing
an app and removing a card which contains the app). Because of this, you can
end up with some data you do not need, which is why there is an option in
Solo Deluxe's preferences to clear the preferences when you quit Solo
Deluxe. In such a case, the memory is freed from your Newton, and if you
remove Solo Deluxe at that point, no preferences will stay in your Newton's
precious memory.

Changing your Preferences

Tap the "i" button and select "Prefs".

   * Card design: Choose your favorite!
   * Back Design: Many styles to choose from!
   * Specific options: Choose the number of flips of the Deck, the playing
     technique (drag or tap), etc.
   * Auto Startup: Start Solo Deluxe directly into your favorite game!

Displaying the Welcome screen

So you like the Welcome screen eh? But you decided you didn't want to see it
anymore? And now you want to see it again? Well fear no more! You can
display it again by choosing "Show Welcome screen" in the Preferences.

History of changes

     Changes in 2.0

        * Fixed glitch which made the luck points appear in a strange
          place under Netwon OS 2.0. Fixed a bug which caused an error
          to be displayed when launching Solo Deluxe for the first
          time.
        * Added the game Aces.
        * Inverted the position of the Lucky Horseshoe...
        * Made changes to the help file.
        * Changed author info.
        * Changed some interface elements to follow the Newton OS 2.0
          guidelines a little more closely.

     Changes in 1.62

        * Fixed a bug where starting a new game after choosing the
          Restart with same deck function once would not use a new deck
          but always use the same one.
        * Fixed a bug with the options dialog (the text which hides the
          other options when selecting options for Pyramid was
          draggable).

     Changes in 1.61

        * Fixed a bug that stopped the welcome screen to be shown, even
          if it was set to be in the preferences.
        * Fixed the delay until the Jocker appeared when a game was won
          (this might affect performance just a bit).

     Changes in 1.6

        * Finally fixed the bug making Solo Deluxe incompatible with
          Extras Drawer management software (removed the code that
          changed Solo DX's icon during a game).
        * Added an option not to hear Solo's card sounds and surprises
          (useful for playing during long meetings).
        * Added the option to display your current luck score during
          game play.
        * Fixed a bug that made playing using the Tap method a very
          unlucky experience! This was a biggie!
        * Fixed another few bugs
        * Made it impossible to use both the Welcome screen and
          Autostart together since this caused errors.
        * Corrected a spelling mistake in the Help file (if you care,
          replace the one you have).

     Changes in 1.5

        * Jumped to version 1.5 to stop the confusion about the old
          Solo 1.41 (some people thought it was more recent than Solo
          Deluxe 1.1).
        * Better memory management (heap space doesn't get mangled as
          much, especially on MP100s)
        * Fixed a bug that caused problems on Newtons using utilities
          like ExtraExtras (please report any problems).

     Changes in 1.1

        * New optional SoloDecksTwo file for those of you that miss the
          deck used in Solo 1.41... contains another deck as well.
        * Couple of changes to the Help file.
        * A couple of spelling mistakes in the help file and the
          Joker's comments.
        * Bug fix: when undoing a Deck flip, the number of remaining
          flips would not increase.
        * Bug fix: Cannot tap through the Welcome screen anymore
        * Interface: info button now complies with interface guidelines
        * Interface: "How many card flipped" outline dissapears during
          game play.

Solo Deluxe is distributed as a stuffit file. If you do not have the
decompressor for this file format, you can download it from Aladdin System's
web page and other sources. Updates are available on the Solo Deluxe home
page at http://www.scoopnet.ca/solodx

Here a couple of things you should know:

Solo Deluxe takes up quite a bit of RAM (about 140K), especially if you have
the Help book and the extra Deck designs installed (SoloHelpII (19K),
SoloDecks (45K) and SoloDecksTwo (31K)). If this is too much for you, find a
copy of Solo 1.41 (regular version with Klondike only) which takes up less
RAM (58K) and which also comes with Solo Lite , a lighter (35K) version that
supports all the same rules, but without the gadgets. Both of these are
free.

Feedback

Send Registration fee ($15), comments/suggestions/bug reports to:

Marcela Seguel
Internet: mseguel@scoopnet.ca
3421 Aubry
Longueuil, Qubec
Canada J4M 2W4

Thanks to Scott Leapman, Matthiew Dixon Cowles and Jeremy Wyld for beta
testing! And to Scott Fringer for helping out with DOS compression stuff.

Cheating

Playing a card from the Deck or Stock to the Columns, then moving it to
another column (Klondike & Canfield), moving a card from the Foundations
back into play or changing the number of cards flipped half way through the
game

Although these moves are not valid (and illegal!), the game lets you play
them anyway, but beware you may feel guilty after cheating this way (and
your luck points may decrease slightly in some cases)!

J

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