PocketBackgammon 2.2 for Newton
(C) 1995/96 Christian Griesbeck

Topics: About, Paying, Notes on playing, Distribution, Disclaimer, History

About:
PocketBackgammon brings the well known board-game on a professional level
to your Newton. You may play human vs. human or against your Newton as
computer opponent. The manual and the rules are included in the program
under the [ i ] - button. If you are new to Backgammon you may read the
rules section on your Newton and look at a newt vs. newt game first.

PocketBackgammon is Shareware. It is provided as is. You may try
PocketBackgammon for four Weeks after that the Sharewarefee is 40 US$
for the full version as you have tried in the first two trail-weeks. If this
is too much for you, there is a lite version for only 25 US$. With the
lite version the maximum computer level is limited to "intermediate", and
there will be neither statistics and nor pip count (You get a password that
switch off these features). In the third and forth trail-week this copy will
run as lite version (so try the expert mode in the first two weeks).

If you register, you receive a password. The password will switch off the
copyright screen at start time and disable the internal lock. If you dont
register, the copyright screen says after your second free trial-week:
>Third Trail-Week  Now only L I T E Version!< - the lite version will run
for a additional two weeks - its time to remove PocketBackgammon from your
Newton or to register it. After four weeks PocketBackgammon says:
>UNREGISTERED - COPY EXPIRED! Register or Remove!< - the program will no
longer allow you to play without the password!

Paying:
Paying for PocketBackgammon is fairly simple. Open the Register program
that accompanies PocketBackgammon on your Mac or Windows PC. Enter your
name, your email address, and the number of single user licenses you desire
for each program you wish to purchase. Save or Copy or Print the data from
the Register program and send the data and payment to Kagi Shareware. More
specifics on the Register program to follow. Kagi Shareware handles my
payment processing.

If paying with Credit Card or First Virtual, you can email or fax the data
to Kagi Shareware. Their email address is shareware@kagi.com and their fax
number is +1 510 652-6589. You can either Copy the data from Register and
paste into the body of an email message or you can Save the data to a file
and you can attach that file to an email message. There is no need to
compress the data file, it's already pretty small. If you have a fax modem,
just Print the data to the Kagi fax number. 

Payments sent via email are processed within 3 to 4 days. You will receive
an email acknowledgement when it is processed. Payments sent via fax take
up to 10 days and if you provide a correct internet email address you will
receive an email acknowledgement. 

If you are paying with Cash or USD Check you should print the data using the
Register application and send it to the address shown on the form, which is:

Kagi Shareware
1442-A Walnut Street #392-CG
Berkeley, California 94709-1405
USA

You can pay with a wide variety of cash from different countries but at
present if you pay via check, it must be a check drawn in US Dollars. Kagi
Shareware cannot accept checks in other currencies, the conversion rate for
non-USD checks is around USD 15 per check and that is just not practical.
If you have a purchasing department, you can enter all the data into the
Register program and then select Invoice as your payment method. Print
three copies of the form and send it to your accounts payable people. You
might want to highlight the line that mentions that they must include a
copy of the form with their payment. 
Kagi Shareware can not invoice your company, you need to act on my behalf
and generate the invoice and handle all the paperwork on your end. 
Please do not fax or email payment forms that indicate Cash, Check or
Invoice as the payment method. As far as we know, there is still no
technology to transfer physical objects via fax or email and without the
payment, the form cannot be processed.
Payments send via postal mail take time to reach Kagi Shareware and then
up to 10 days for processing. Again, if you include a correct email
address, you will hear from Kagi Shareware when the form is processed.

Paying directly from your Newton:
If you want to register PocketBackgammon directly from your Newton, you
can use Register by Flash Sherian for your Newton - it accompanies a lot
of other shareware programs so i dont add it to my distribution. If you
use it, download it to your Newton, press the $ - button inside my
register page, follow the instructions inside the Register program, make
sure you send the email generated by Register to: "shareware@kagi.com".

Protection:
PocketBackgammon has a protection scheme and when you pay, i send you a
code number to tell PocketBackgammon that you have paid the shareware fee.
If you have an email address enter it. Please enter your complete postal
address too, and please remember, i do not know what country you live in
so please enter that into the postal address also. 

Additional notes on playing:
If you play PocketBackgammon using the default preference settings, you
have to click on your dice to to roll them, move your stones by a click
on them or by drawing a line the distance you want to move them, and again
click on your dice to confirm your move.
You can reduce the stress of all that clicking at your Newton by using the
"reduced dice handling" - RDH option in the preference menu:
Auto Confirm will save you from clicking on your dice after your move.
Auto Roll will save you from clicking on your dice to roll them whenever
you cant use the doubling cube.
Prefer moving your stones by soft clicking on them instead of drawing lines.
Change from time to time the colour of your stones in the vs. Newton playing
modes. Keep the surface of your Newton clean. Following that will reduce
stress from your Newtons display and guaranty a longer life of it.
Speed up tips: Turn the pip count and the sound off if you dont need them.
The expert level takes longer to calculate moves (up to 10 seconds on small
doublets on OMP).

Distribution terms:
PocketBackgammon may be distributed freely in its original unmodified and
unregistered form. The distribution have to include all files of my original
distribution ("PBG2.2.pkg", "Register", "PBG-Read.me"). Distributors must
not charge any money for it, while they may charge money for the medium
(online-time, cd-rom etc.).

If you like to bundle PocketBackgammon with other programs,  goods,
services,  etc. you are selling in a registered form please feel free
to contact me at: chrisg@kagi.com to figure out the conditions.

Disclaimer of warranty:
This software is sold "as is" and without warranties whether expressed or
implied. Because of the various software and hardware environments into
which this program may be put, no warranty of fitness for a particular
purpose is offered. Legal domicile is Frankfurt/Main.

History:
Nov, 7. 1996 V2.2
Doubling bug removed causing suspicious doubling offers.
Bug in computer logic removed pretending phantom points if a one was rolled.
Bug allowing human to take very long moves if he rolls doublets removed.
Assist button now uses assist level.
Some new concepts added to he expert level.
Pip-count enhanced now allows clicks.
User interaction disabled if computer moves.
Longer free trail-time.
Manual Proofreaded.

May, 20. 1996 V2.1
Pip count added, some back game features for expert level implemented. 

May, 6. 1996 V2.0
First release of the English version of PocketBackgammon. Full of new features!

Dez., 9. 1995  - Jan. 18. 1996 V1.1 - V1.3
Bug fixes and improvements of the German version.

Dez., 6. 1995 V1.0
First German release.

Thanks to the people (66) who registered PocketBackgammon so far and special
thanks to Manfred Hunkel.
