To create a Web authoring environment under MagiC, the text editor qed is installed as the CAB browser's default viewer for HTM files. OLGA (Object Linking for GEM Applications) is installed so that whenever qed saves a file, CAB automatically updates the page with the changes made. The HTML itself was created by hand, with a great deal of cutting and pasting for consistency. The wonderful book HTML Visual Quick Reference by Que was always at hand, as was a copy of the W3C's HTML 3.2 Reference Specification (although in a few cases I did not adhere to it exactly). WebTech's HTML Validation Service (now defunct) was originally used to check for conformance with other browsers (I now use Doctor HTML and the W3C's Validator). These free services proved invaluable since CAB's built-in validator is more tolerant of bad syntax.

The pages were written to be somewhat compatible with CAB 1.5 -- whose introduction goes back to the inception of this site -- and all were visually checked within Netscape 4. Ideally, the pages are "best viewed" with at least CAB 2.6 because earlier versions do not handle the server-side redirection used on the links page. Besides a small amount of CSS and JavaScript (for the counter), the HTML adheres to CAB 2.x's specification (a local link), so the minimum requirement should be any good HTML 3.2-compliant browser.

Cranach Studio preVision (another local link) was used to create all but one of the graphics (the Milan is not mine). Soft shadowing was achieved by processing a copy of the graphic and then pasting the original overtop of it. In some cases masks were created to prevent stray pixels. All scanning, mostly from Atari magazines, was done on an HP ScanJet 4p driven by Computerinsel's driver purchased from Homa Systems House. To help with anti-aliasing, most of the graphics were scanned and edited at four times their current size.

Calamus was used to help create the textual graphics (side bar, navigation bar, headings, animations, etc.). With its screen resolution set at 1:1, the text was sized as it would appear on the Web page (e.g. 22 points), zoomed in at 800%, converted to a 1-bit image with the Bridge module and exported out. The 1-bit image was then imported into Cranach and converted to 64 greyscales, which created an anti-aliased graphic the exact point size as originally displayed in Calamus. (Performing the same procedure at 400% creates a graphic with 16 greyscales.) Color was then added using Cranach's False Color Display to replace the greyscales with a specified spectrum.

Because Cranach does not support the saving of GIF or 8-bit TIFF formats (its native color mode is always 24-bit), all graphics were reduced to 256 colors and saved as 8-bit IFFs, which were converted to GIF using Imagecopy and then loaded into GrafTool, where they were clipped, the palettes sorted, and resaved as GIFs. GrafTool automatically counts the colors in each GIF and saves them in the bit level to match, creating smaller, more efficient graphics. (The program also has a handy color reduction feature called HalfColors.) TRANSGIF.TTP was then used to set the transparency color, with a final Imagecopy conversion to handle interlacing.

Other TOS software was used to a lesser extent: Focus 3D (331K) created the swirled screenshot on the welcome page; the animated GIFs there and on the links page were assembled in WhirlGIF; Outline Art created the circular text around the CAB logo above; and Imagecopy performed all JPEG conversions, with a little help from the TOS binaries of The Independent JPEG Group (163K).

OCR v1.4 was used to create the text for the TT Overview page. (Note that I was sensitive about reproducing copyrighted material without permission, but Hasbro could probably care less.) First Word Plus' spell-checker was used to find what few errors there were.

Uploading the HTML and graphics to the server was originally done with STalker and a BBS shell account via FTP. All uploads are now done with the TCP/IP stack STinG and client aFTP, which allows files from Magxdesk (or any other AV Protocol-compliant desktop) to be dragged and dropped directly into a server's directory.