Original review published on Steve Litchfield's 3-Lib.

Here's something useful for students - Phil Whiles has come up with an automated 'flash card' revision aid. The idea is that you feed Reviser a database of questions and answers (or english/french words or whatever) and it then fires them at you while you mark off the ones you know. It then intelligently just gives you the ones you don't in the next cycle, and so forth, until you're word perfect on the lot! I was looking at v2.3 for the 3a/3c and v5.22 for the Series 5, downloaded from Phil's web pages.

As you'd expect from a niche application, it does what it claims to do very well once it's set up. I found the process of converting and setting up my own database quite fiddly on the 3a/3c version, though Phil supplies an example database of his own, of Japanese words, with a variety of pre-configured tests, which will give you an idea of how it should be done! The importing process is much easier on the Series 5, and there are now four example databases rather than just the one.

Each test can have different types of entries. For example, in the context of a langauge database, you could have a test of grammar, or numbers, or animals etc., though the Series 5 version makes a bit of a meal of this by requiring you to assign specific numbers to each category and then doing the selection numerically.

Looking at Reviser with my Psion standards hat on, the interface could do with some tweaking. There's no support for the help or menu keys on the 3a/3c version (or any help screens on the '5' version) once you've started a test, which is a shame considering that the menu and help options from the main screen are very good. Operation inside a test could also be improved: on the 16-bit version, the labelling of the buttons was not particularly intuitive; and on the new 32-bit version questions have to be requested and marked using the pen alone (surely single-key equivalents could be found?)...

Phil's included plenty of funtionality on the opening screen's menu. There are options to create new tests or convert existing databases into the required Reviser format. You can even edit or add to database files from within the program without having to quit, start Data, add the record and go back in. A nice touch! The questions are be fired at you in random order, though obviously you can select which way round you want the test to work.

In unregistered form, there are plenty of nag screens to step through plus a restriction on not being able to scroll through your question list using the 'List' menu option. Perhaps a touch over-zealous, Phil, but as this is a niche application and will be invaluable to some I'll let it pass.

I wish I'd had a Psion and this program 20 years ago when I was sitting my 'O' level exams!

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