Being new at WineBerserkers, it seems polite to come bearing gifts. This is the first of two (the second).
From time to time, being more often than medically recommended but less often than wanted, I help organise port tastings. Especially if not blind, it is useful to have a placemat, that elegantly labels which glass is where.
I have written a some software that makes such placemats, and associated tasting-note pages, and foldable pages to ‘label’ the people. The software is open source, written in PostScript, and free: £0 = $0 = €0 = ¥0. The manual is available via www.jdawiseman.com/placemat.html, and the PostScript code itself at www.jdawiseman.com/papers/placemat/placemat.ps.
Regular attendees of our tastings think them excellent. The code took a lot of writing, but takes not much using: it should be used more. Please, share and enjoy. And if you need help, just ask.
Hopefully people won’t object to a gentle bump of this thread. The placemat software is still free (not freemium, completely and utterly zero-cost free), and has been much improved over the last four years. More features; better defaults; output that is more functional and more beautiful.
Indeed, some WB regulars think well of them — you can too. Use and enjoy.
Julian is a good friend and his program is quite easy to use even for my non-computer tech savvy self. For those who’ve been at any of my tastings most likely have seen me use his program.
If you need help using it, just send me a message or an email (contact details). If you want to request features or changes or anything else, the discussion thread is on [www.ThePortForum.com
Hey - aren’t you TPF guys supposed to come to New York so that we can share the bottle of 1978 Nacional that is sitting in my cellar that I bought at auction?
I’ve decided that the code should exist in a proper repository, to allow submission and discussion of issues, to allow others to contribute to the PostScript, and for better death-proofing. Hence ∃ github.com/jdaw1/placemat.
These pork-pie placemats were made by an abuse of the parameters, and there is discussion about whether their production should be regularised. Comment welcome, ideally in issue 153.