Dieta

Personal Computer News

Mike Gerrard

Unnamed Nurse

GOOD HEALTH! Two health and diet packages get a thorough check-up from Mike Gerrard and a nurse. Cycle Planner/Growth Tracker (£7.25), Medidata, [redacted] Dieta (£5), LC Dunbar, [redacted] Diet Master (£6.95), Delta 7 Software, [redacted] We've been accustomed to thinking of home software in terms of games and adventures, with a smattering of programs of a more or less educational nature thrown in for good measure, but there is a range of totally different material now becoming available for the more popular home micros, as indicated by the recent batch of health and diet programs for the 48K Spectrum that came PCN's way. Now an ability to get a high score at Manic Miner is all very well for a games reviewer, but it wouldn't get him very far with this type of software, so I also consulted a friend, an experienced nurse. Her comments are in italics throughout [ZXSR - these are indicated by [NURSE] and [/NURSE] to indicate the start/end of her comments]. Cycle Planner/Growth Tracker comes as those two separate programs, the first helping a woman keep track of her periods and the second a guide to the health and growth of a baby. Growth Tracker has a database of information for a week-by-week guide to a typical 40-week pregnancy and a monthly guide to development over the first two years of life, each entry comprising just two or three sentences. Each entry can be displayed separately, or you can see a range of entries or the whole database. There are both virtues and vices in simplifying things in this manner, and while the publishers do point out that their information is only based on averages, it seems to me that the vices outweigh the virtues. It could be worrying for a parent to read, for instance, that at 12 months the child 'can walk unaided', and at 20 months it 'can use 10-12 words'. Such are the variations in child growth that these assessments might not be true of a perfectly normal child, and parents would surely be better advised to consult a more comprehensive book than rely on such brief unexpanded information. [NURSE] I would question some of the information the program gives on childhood illnesses. In the symptoms for measles it says that tiny white spots called Koplik Spots are seen in the mouth. That is a very rare occurrence, and some one reading that might see there were no spots in the child's mouth and not realise it was developing measles. I can't really see this program as being much more than a novelty. Why buy it when you could get comprehensive books at half the price? [/NURSE] I assumed from the title that Dieta would be one of those handy guides helping weight-watchers to calculate their daily calorie intake, but in fact it is much more complicated than that. It works out the calorie and fiber content of cooked meals from the ingredients that you input, and will suggest possible modifications to the recipe to reduce the calories. It didn't get off to a good start as the pages of information in the program were full of punctuation mistakes. The menu offers eight options, so I selected 'Entering Ingredients' to see how it worked. I got my favourite rice pudding recipe to see how it might be made less fattening. After entering the name of the recipe and the number of people it serves, you enter the number of ingredients. Any eggs? it asks. No. Any cooking fat? I hope not. There was a worrying note at the top of the screen: 'Remember to use calories per oz units if your weight is in oz and calories per grams if your weight is in grams.' This was getting complicated. 'Enter name of next ingredients,' I was told, which puzzled me as I hadn't entered any yet. I tried the first ingredient, milk, which seemed to satisfy the program. 'Enter weight of ingredient.' Obviously pints and tablespoons were not going to be accepted, and I wondered why the program didn't include a weights and measures guide. My cookbook said that one pint was 20 fluid ounces, so I entered that, only to be asked: 'Enter calorie per unit weight for ingredient .' But I've no idea. Aren't you meant to be telling me information like that, dear program? In other words, you need a calorie counting book in order to make Dieta work, though to be fair to the program it does do what it claims to do and works out the calories per person for a recipe and suggests possible alterations. Some of them seem rather obvious, though, such as using smaller size eggs or sugar substitutes instead of sugar. [NURSE] The calories you'll save are hardly worth the effort. Most people know what to eat and what not to eat if they want to lose weight, and you can work out your daily intake on the back of of an envelope with the help of a calorie book without going through all this performance. [/NURSE] A more substantial program is Diet Master, one of a planned series to include Exercise Master and Heart Master, and comes with a 32-page booklet. This one 'is designed to help you and members of your family learn how to manage your diet, so that you receive a balanced intake of nutrients according to your needs.' The program begins by asking your sex, age, and type of occupation, it then prints out for you your RDA (Recommended Daily Allowances) of various nutrients: vitamins, calcium, iron etc. You then have three options, the first being to locate your weight range, provided you're 18 or over. You could also elect to plan your day's food intake, or simply start the program afresh. The first option draws a graph showing whether your weight is in the desired range. When I 'accidentally' told it I weighed 1500 lb it informed me that I would have to refer to the booklet. Nothing further appeared on the screen, so there was nothing for it but to reload. The second option is allows you to input food and drink from a three-page list in the booklet, the computer calculating the nutrients contained in the amounts you state. Bar graphs are then drawn to show how this measures up to your RDA As with Dieta, this seemed to me to be a needlessly complicated way of doing things. [NURSE] I wasn't sure if the program was meant to be about losing weight, or about nutrition. If it's about nutrition why does it specifically exclude the most important categories: pregnant women, lactating mothers, babies and growing children? Why does it say it's designed 'to help you and your family' when it points out a few paragraphs later that babies and children under nine are excluded, and calculating the weight range is not for anyone under 18? The range of foods the booklet covers is also very limited. You'd be much better off buying a calorie counting book that tells you how many calories in a tin of Heinz baked beans compared to other brands etc. - something really comprehensive. Dieters would be better advised to get calorie counting books or free leaflets from Health Clinics or get free expert advice from dieticians and health visitors. [/NURSE] This batch of software doesn't come up to scratch, then, from either a programming or health point of view. Can you do it better with pen and paper? If you throw in a visit to a bookshop, Health Clinic or your GP, the answer is definitely Yes, you can, and at a fraction of the cost.