The World of Cichlids CD
Ad Konings is worldwide known as one of the biggest cichlid's expert and mostly among Malawi enthusiast his name is highly regarded. Once the CD is loaded in its drive (and an "autorun" feature launches the program automatically and a start program shows all the "credits" that have to be given) You're ready to go: this Cd (whose title, simply, means "The World of Cichlids") has a multilingual layout offering a three way choice (English/French/German).
Aquarium: by mean of some awesome pictures and some graphicss the minimal technical requisite of a "real" Malawi tanks are discussed. This matter should be well known by every clever cichlid keeper but, just in case … Technical data are shown in "european" measures which means Celcius degrees and metric lenghts. A minimal bibliography is also offered but, strangely enough, only books by Ad Konings are suggested …
Fish: this section hosts the maximum amout of data AND pictures (not that strange, after all!) with a huge array of seach options. Among the "odd" things is worth remembering the option allowing You to identify (and search) a fish, choosing among given "icons", my mean of his shape (mouth, fins, tail and so on), colours and/or melanic pattern. Selecting one, or more, of them all fishes sharing that given carachter(s) are shown.
By means of a "Click" on a name it's possible to get directly a pic (at least) of the needed species and a short data-sheet including, among others, data such as: maximum attained size, temperament, feeding and spawning behaviour, minimal tank size and so on. In my (humble) opinion the minimal tank size is always, roughly, understimated.
Full screen: this option allows to stretch pics to the maximum size of your monitor, to enjoy all details.
Slideshow: this option allows a continuous viewing of all (or only the selected ones) available pics.
Video: Contains two long "videos" ("above" and "below" the lake). Viewing these videos requires a lot of computer resources and average image quality isn't, always, the best possible. Any way they are really interesting - mainly the "underwater" section offeringing to the viewer a lot of suggestions on his own tank aquascaping.
Exit: allows you to stop the program and return to main menu.
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