Bible Grand Slam 3.0 Tech Notes & Tips From Sunday Software Tech Notes: In Vista or Windows 7, if you get an "error 339" message, it means you need to RIGHT click the desktop shortcut and select "Run as Administrator."  In Vista or Windows 7, if you get an error message when trying to install the question editor, exit the installation, navigate to the CD itself and look for the Question editor executable. Right click it and select "Run as Administrator" to install. Tips on Working with Question Sets: Important things to know: 1. Keep this in mind when you're looking for files and trying to move files. The Question Editor installs to the folder c:\program files\house on the rock software. But the Grand Slam game itself installs in c:\program files\biblegrandslam).   (the two parts of the program were built by two different developers. Wish they had given them the same folder, but hey). So here's my suggestion to you techies out there.... use Windows Explorer to MOVE the Question Editor folder into the BibleGrandSlam folder so it's all together, and then remember to change the installed shortcut to the Editor to reflect the new location. That way six months later when you don't remember any of this, and you go to search for a question set, you know to drill down in the game's folder and don't have to remember that question sets were saved in the "house on the rock" folder.  Alternately, you can change the Question Editor's folder name to "Question Editor" instead of "House on the Rock Software."  The point is that when you want to play Grand Slam with a set of your own making, the file dialog boxes will ask you "where to find sets" and you need to know where you saved them. Keeping it all in the same folder with the game is easy to remember. 2. When you open the Question Editor, if you want to edit the MAIN question set that came with the game, you need to select OPEN, then look in c:\ program files \ biblegrandslam to find the Bible.qus file. 3. The editor is divided into two sections. The upper section contains the Toolbar and Icons, plus a grid with all the numbered questions in the file. Highlighting one of these questions will cause the details of that question to appear in the lower section, where you can edit them if you wish.  The icons will at first appear greyed-out until you select either an existing file, or create a new one --by clicking the FILE menu and selecting either Open or New. 4.  To edit a question, simply locate and highlight it, then make the necessary changes in the lower section. Your changes will be saved when you move to another row in the grid. There is no "Save" button when you are editing an existing question. When a question has been modified since the file was last saved, a "M" will appear in the third column of the grid. 4.  To add a new question. Click the "New" button on the toolbar or select Actions|Add from the menu. At this point, the user must fill in all the fields in the lower section. To save the new question, the user MUST click the Save New button. (Note: The Save New button only appears in Add mode.) 5. To create a new Question set: 1. Open the Grand Slam Question Editor 2. Click File on the Editor taskbar and select "New." The editor is now ready for your first question. 3. Type your first question in the Question Field. Complete the Answer fields and Book/Reference/Level/Correct fields.  Don't worry, if you don't complete a field the editor will prompt you. Remember to use numbers in the Reference field, or you'll get an error message about it. 4. Once you've created one question, click SAVE NEW, then click the "Add Question" icon to add another. 6. To Edit an already created question: 1. Click File, then Open to open up that question file. 2. Highlight the Question on the list and click the "Edit this Question" icon on the top taskbar. Now go ahead and make your changes. 3. Now click the SAVE icon on the top taskbar. If you forget this step, the editor will ask you to save the file. If you try to Edit another question, the editor will automatically save the one you were working on. Alternate way of editing the stock question set that comes with the program: Some people have asked if they can edit the stock question set (Bible.qus). The answer is yes, you can pull it up in the Question Editor. But if you want to pull questions from it into your own groups of files, or want to delete whole sections of questions (or make a lot of quick changes, there is an ALTERNATE way to edit the stock set of questions. Here it is: 1. Navigate through Windows Explorer to the program’s default installation folder -- c:\Program Files \ GrandSlam    2. RIGHT CLICK the Bible.qus file.  3.  Select “open” and click the “select from list” option. 4.  Select NOTEPAD and click OK. This will bring up all the questions and allow you to edit them manually. This approach is only recommended for those with some computer/file knowledge. Note about the Computer Teams you can play against: If you choose to play against the computer....Each computer team has its own strengths and weaknesses. For instance, the “Patriarchs” will do real well on questions from the beginning of the Old Testament, but they won’t do very well on New Testament questions. “Adam and Eve” were not around when the Bible was written, so they won’t do real well on questions from any area of the Bible. But watch out for the “Angels”, because they have been around the whole time! Tips on Teaching with Quizzes Good teachers know that every question and every set of possible answers, is an opportunity for discussion. Write questions and answers that make kids read carefully and think. Encourage kids to discuss answers before clicking (some kids take over and answer too quickly). Best to rotate who gets to click the screen. Include quiz questions that promote reflection, and not just trivia. For example, ask "Which of the following answers summarizes what the story of the Prodigal Son teaches..."   Or, "If you were the Older Son, what do you think he should have done in the story?" Keep your questions and answers short. Include a question asking the Book/Chapter/Verse of the passage you are quizzing them about. How to create a question set, then copy it to diskette/cd/flashdrive and install on another computer where GSlam is also installed. 1. Open the Bible Grand Slam Question Editor and create your set. 2. Select "Save As" from the file menu. 3. Name it something like "Myset.qus"     Note: type the file extension 'qus' to identify it as a question file. The game will recognize it without that, but it helps you or the kids identify the question sets for selection. 4. Save it to Diskette or USB flash or CD. 5. Take it to the other computer and copy it into the BibleGrandSlam folder at c:\programs\BibleGrandSlam.   You might even make a new folder there titled "my-sets" to keep things obvious. Please Note: The default folder is the question editor folder. See my notes below why you probably don't want to save it there.   Please also note: The Question Editor resides in a different folder than the game does. They also gave the Question Editor folder a big long hairy name:  "c:\programs\House on the Rock Software" Shouldn't have done that but they did.   See Tip #1 at the top of this page for how you can change that and make it easier to find your question sets. Related Tech Tip:  Use Windows Explorer to MOVE the Question Editor "house on the rock" folder into the BibleGrandSlam folder so it's all together, and then remember to change the installed desktop shortcut to the Editor to reflect the new location. That way six months later when you don't remember any of this, and you go to search for a question set, you'll see the Question Editor folder when you select "Use Alternate Question Set" in the game and be able to drill down in the game folder for the questions. You can even change the Question Editor's folder name to "Question Editor" instead of "House on the Rock Software." <>< Neil The HELP FILE in the Question Editor is rather helpful.  These graphics are to...