91.03 apple bug

March 1991 Edition Volume 10/Number 3 THE 3 i VSERY' GROUP POO LOTHAR CUES Sunday March 17th 10.00am - £1.30am 12,00am start. 3.00pm start. This Meeting Items for Auction: Auction: Committee meeting: March 17th Apple-Q's Mad March Auction... Bring your old cards, games etc. and auction them for cash, or come to pick up a bargain... Sunday April 21st 11.00am - 4.30pm. 12.00am start. 3.00pm start. General meeting: Demonstration: Committee meeting: April 21st A demonstration of the Apple Bubble Jet Printer... and a demonstration of the new InWords OCR package for the Apple //. | Notes... | Things to come.. The Committee tries to set up demonstrations and other events like the auction to cover the many and varied tastes of our members. We are always on the lookout for anyone who might like to help in this area to either run a demo or suggest ideas for future demonstrations or events. It really does not take great computer skills and knowledge to present a demonstration, just a basic knowledge of the topic being are presented. It could be a demonstration of software, for example an art program or music program, or on hardware like a scanner or a video card. If you would like to present a Demonstration or like to see one, let us know. Feedback from club members aids us in planning future meetings. New Members_ Welcome to : #143 Phil Buchanon Karalee #145 Ted Harris Capalaba #153 Geoffrey Cobham — Chapel Hill #154 David Pearce Browns Plains #155 Brice Camiller Clontarf #156 © Andrew Houston Geebung Renewals Thank you for your continued support : #91 Roderick MacLean #100 Graham Wobcke Some Demonstrations / events Planned for 1991 Ultra Macros and Apple Works The Macintosh LC Music and the A pple Scanners and OCR for the Apple II Auctions. Annual General Meeting. Apple-Q Birthday Party. Trading Table Apple-Q has for sale to members blank disks and other items that we buy in bulk in order to save you money and generate more funds for the club. For example: Disks in boxes of 10 5.25 blank disks $8.00 3.5 blank disks $14.00 Mouse Mats $10.00 Printer Ribbons [Various] from $10.00 Note: Prices are subject to change without notice, but are correct at the time of printing. $3.00 per disk. Meeting Format Public Domain Software Apple-Q Inc. has a wide selection of Public Domain, Shareware and Demonstration software available to members. We charge a copying fee so the group can obtain more software to expand the library. The copying fee for 5.25 inch disks is 50 cents a side with a minimum charge of $2.00. For the 3.5 inch disks, the fee is Each month we also try to put out a "Disk of the Month” selection of Public Domain software. On the inside back page you will find a software order form. This form can be filled out if you wish to order by mail or you can order and pick it up at the meeting. For mail orders, remember to add $2.00 for postage and packaging. Executive Committee 11.00 am - 12.00 pm - Informal period Trading table open. Registration of members (new and renewals). Disk of the Month sales. Raffle Tickets sold. Public Domain Software available. 11.45 pm Informal question and answer time 12,00 pm - 1.00 pm - Demonstration Invited speaker to give a demonstration and follow up with organized question and answer session relating to the demonstration. 1,00 pm - 1.30 pm - Lunch,General Computer Lunch and Draw raffle prize and door prize. Start of general computer time once the Guest speaker has finished and continues through SIGs. 1.30 pm - 3.00 pm - Special Interest Groups AppleWorks, New Users (Beginners), Apple /GS Computers, Macintosh Computers Trading Table, Software Library open for business. 3.00 pm - Start Committee Meeting SIGS, Trading Table, Libraries etc. close. General computer time continues. Committee meeting starts. Members welcome. 4.30 pm - Open Day ends. End of the General and Committee meetings. Meeting Venu Ann White President (07) 371-4067 John Finch Vice-President (07) 260-5218 Bob Godbehere Secretary (07) 808-3892 BobGodbehere Treasurer (07) 808-3892 Graham Black —_Registrar (07) 883-1525 Kelvin Saggers Editor Modem / Mail Jeff Sellers Software Librarian (07) 359-1339 Tan Millar Hardcopy Librarian (07) 343-4261 Assisting Vince Crosdale Immediate Past Pres (07) 351-3090 Todd Dixon Sat. mornings only (07) 891-6299 Dale Rodgie Misc / Disk of Month (075) 32-5251 Bulletin Board Name: Apple-Q Inc. BBS Telephone: (07) 851-1711 [24 hrs - Bulletin Board] (07) 351-3090 [7-9 pm- Voice} Baud Rates: 300, 1200/75, 1200 & 2400 (CCITT & Bell) Data Specs: 8 Data bits, 1 Stop bit, No Parity, Full Duplex Sysops: Vince Crosdale, Graham Black Production Information Hooper Education Centre Kuran Street, Wavell Heights. Vistors Welcome. The Apple-Bug was written with AppleWorks. AppleWorks GS was used for the Page Layout and the orginal copy was printed on a LaserWniter. Apple-Bug is printed by the Hooper Education Centre. Thanks to Computer City for the use of the LaserWriter. More Info Membership Fees Adults/Students: $25.00 Corporate Membership: $50.00 Associate Membership: $10.00 (BBS only) Joining Fee: $10.00 (first year only) At the discretion of the Executive Committee Articles for Apple-Bug * The copying of Commercially produced software is not sanctioned by Apple-Q Inc. and members who do so risk expulsion from the group. * No one is allowed behind the Trading Table counter except the Committee members and anyone appointed to work at the Trading Table. Advertising If you would like to contribute to Apple-Bug, please send in your article (on disk if possible) to Apple-Q or bring it along to the meeting. Your disk will be retumed. ‘The deadline for Apple-Bug is the Open Day meeting. Classified advertising is Free to all Financial Members. For non-members, the charges are $18.00 for a Half Page and $30.00 for a Full Page. For more information, contact the Editor . Apple-Bug 4 Help Line Apple II General Bob Godbehere (07) 808-3892 7-9 pm & W/E Kelvin Saggers (07) 800-4660 {Phoenix BBS) Apple IIgs Vince Crosdale (07) 351-3090 7-9 pm Dale Rodgie (075) 32-5251 7-9 pm Apple Macintosh John Finch (07) 260-5218 7-9 pm & W/E AppleWorks Sheryl Mann (071) 96-7401 7-9 pm & W/E AppleWorks (education) Ann White (07) 371-4067 7-9 pm &W/E AppleWorks GS Dale Rodgie (075) 32-5251 7-9 pm Applesoft Graham Black (07) 883-1525 1-6 pm Vince Crosdale (07) 351-3090 7-9 pm Beginners Ann White (07) 371-4067 7-9 pm &W/E Communications Vince Crosdale (07) 351-3090 7-9 pm Kelvin Saggers (07) 800-4660 {Phoenix BBS) Disk of the Month Jeff Sellers (07) 359-1339 7-9 pm Educational Programs Ann White (07) 371-4067 7-9 pm &W/E John Aspland (07) 368-2420 7-9 pm Geoff Galt (07) 355-5161 School hours Machine Language (Ile, gs) Dale Rodgie (075) 32-5251 7-9 pm Modems Vince Crosdale (07) 351-3090 7-9 pm Kelvin Saggers (07) 800-4660 {Phoenix BBS} Software Library Jeff Sellers (07) 359-1339 7-9 pm & W/E If you are free to aid other members and would like your name added to the list, let us know. Please only call between the times listed. WIE stands for weekend. Editorial by Kelvin Saggers It's that time of year again when Apple-Q nuns it's Mad March Auction. So if you have any Software or hardware you don't want or need then here is your chance for a quick sale. It's a chance to clear out unwanted computer related items and help your group at the same time. Remember the doors open early for you to register your goods so avoid the rush & don't arrive at the last minute or you might miss out. Again we owe a debt of thanks to Solutions on the Gold Coast and Dale for producing a Laser printer copy of the newsletter. This time Australia Post also contributed to the delay when the first disk sent down to the coast went missing & so a second disk containing the newsletter had to be posted. In spite of this, thanks to Bob hand delivering the Apple Bug to the Hooper Center for printing, a fair percentage of our local members received their newsletter on the Friday before the meeting, & the rest are in the mail. This should be the last time, I hope, that this problem occurs. This seems to be the month for apologies. The Apple Macintosh LC demonstration by Computer City failed to eventuate. No one from Computer City appeared at the open day meeting, and so the LC demonstration was cancelled. We realize that a lot of members came to the last meeting in order to see the Macintosh LC and the Apple //e card demonstrated, and we apologize for any inconvenience this non event may have caused any Apple-Q members, but we organize and advertise monthly demonstrations in good faith and we felt as let down as anyone else by what happened. If members still would like to see the Apple Macintosh LC and the Apple //e card demonstrated, maybe the committee can again attempt to arrange a demonstration later in the year. At the next meeting an authentic Apple Diary will be handed out as a door-prize. The Apple Diary was sent to the president of our committee by Apple, but Ann has graciously decided to allow the diary to be used as a door-prize. So remember to sign the day book, as both members and guest should do at each and every meeting, as you enter the dcor. Please write down both your name and user number, as latet in the day the names and numbers will be copied from the day book, and a member, drawn at random, will take away the diary. To be in the draw you must be a member of Apple- Q Inc. and also be present at the draw itself. A couple of comments made at the last meeting concerned Apple-Bug. One was that the newsletter contained no letters from members asking for help with problems they might be having with their computer or faults they have found with computer related products or services. The main reason letters of this nature do not appear in Apple Bug is simply that I do not receive any to publish. The other main ‘beef’ revolved around articles. Again I publish any suitable articles handed to me for the newsletter. Articles are originals by, or typed in from other sources by, myself or other committee members & one or two other members. If every member of Apple-Q contributed just one full page article every year I don't think we would ever run out, what do you think? — — — — 5 March 1991 — The Immortal by Kelvin Saggers The Immortal by Will Harvey {Electronic Arts} is a single character role playing game {RPG} that has excellent 3D graphics, animation and sound effects. Will Harvey has produced some excellent software packages for the Apple // over the years, such as The Music Construction Set first for the Apple // {1982}, and then for the Apple //GS (1986), and just prior to this, Marble Madness {1985} for the Apple If and //GS. This was followed by Zany Golf {1987} for the Apple //GS, and now he has released The Immortal {late 1990} also for the Apple //GS. The Immortal inspite of being an excellent example of what the Apple //GS is capable of doing, has some problems which are in the main minor but irksome. The first of which is the fact that you have to use the original disks to play the game as they are both copy protected, and cannot be run from a hard drive. If software houses continue to do this sort of thing to software and its users they should say so on the package and supply two sets of disks. I am not against Software houses protecting themselves but not at the expense of the user; the game also has the type of copy protection that Tequires answers hidden in the games booklet and that should have been enough. To play the Immortal on the Apple //GS you need One Megabyte of memory, a 3.5 drive and a two button Joystick. The game must be booted from a 3.5 drive to work, this means that hard drive users must change their control panel settings and then reboot. The game starts to load and then prompts for the graphics disk. Don't make the mistake as I did and assume that if you have two drives the program will look for this disk in the second drive.... it will not do so and in fact hangs up the computer and you must reboot and start Over again. At the prompt you must first remove the play disk and then insert the graphics disk and then follow on from there. As I said before most are minor but irksome. The Immortal's game screen is not unlike that of The Bards Tale as far as the background is concemed. But the main playing area is much more complex. The playing area is basically an isometric view of the room the on-screen character {you} are currently in. Imagine the room you are now sitting in has had the roof removed and someone is peering in over one of the corners and that someone can control your movements via a joystick and you have the basic concept of Immortals game play mode. The scenario is as old as RPG its self and is best described by a quote form the packaging: "The Labyrinth holds many mysteries unfit for mortal eyes. Mysteries of eternal life. Of sudden death. Of sorcery and betrayal. Its shadows hide deadly traps, its puzzles tantalize. And from caverns far below, your lost Master, Mordamir, calls for you (his apprentice) to save him......” The game siarts in a room with a lit candle and a skull Testing on the edge of a well in the center of the room, a door in the wall opposite you leads out of the room. The on- screen character is moved in any of eight directions via the joystick. As the on-screen character approaches the well a ghostly face appears above the candle asking for your help... it is Mordamir your old master... he is still alive and you must try to rescue him, and so starts your quest. As you move about you will encounter many monsters {some of which may help you} and a few allies (some of which may betray you} and you will be forced to fight. Again unlike Bards Tale you don't just click on weapons or spells and then let the game take over, you must really fight the monsters. This can be achieved either by spell casting {make sure your aim is true as some spells have a habit of rebounding back, let alone just missing} or by fighting with a weapon like a sword, Again the movements are made via the joystick you can either jab, slash or parry, and until you get the hang of it, mainly die a bloody, animated death. A few simple hints here to make life a little easier. When you have to use a weapon, try to move your character in a position so you can see what both he and the attacker are doing and that he is not hidden against a wall where you cannot see him at all when combat is joined { I feel combat should have been changed to a closer view with no walls to hinder your view }. For spell casting it is sometimes better to position yourself and wait for the monster to close in and then cast your spell {just don't miss} or use the flagstones and walls to aid you in aiming at your target. Once you have killed a foe his / her / its body remains (in a pool of blood for the most part) on the floor where it died and so can act as a reference point in a maze. The body can also be searched for gold, scrolls and spells and the like. Chests and other such items can also be opened and searched but beware of traps. To read scrolls, use items and activate spells etc. you must first ‘open’ your pack by hitting the <Space Bar> and then click the joystick button once you have positioned the pointer on the item or spell you wish to use and in cases like spells hit the other joystick button to activate them. The game can also be paused from the ‘Pack Menu’. A thin coloured line on the top of the Bards Tale like border shows your vitality and can be restored if you can find a pile of straw and sleep on it. When you sleep not only is some of your vitality restored but your dreams could contain clues to aid you in your quest. Your vitality is of course also linked to how well you do in combat. So the more you fight the weaker you get unless you are very, very good, and the weaker you get the slower your reaction time gets. Pits in the floor and other traps abound so map your way as you go.... it's slower but better in the long run. As in most games of this nature puzzles need to be solved in order to get to other leveis or chambers etc. The problem with this game is that there is no save game option and so you cannot save a position before you try a dangerous or suspect move, This can be a real pain in the rear. On the first level for example, to get to the level below you must solve all the problems and then gain an object and position your self and the object exactly to open the entrance or you find your self very dead, very quickly and have to start all over again. Once you have it right then you are given a password to the 6 - _ — — next level and have to complete it before you get the next one... you can enter this password when you start the game up, and thus start on level two instead of one, for example, but you are starting the level you enter all over again not from where you left off. Reading scrolls and the like can be the difference between life and death. For example on level one there are creatures that cannot be seen except by their shadow on the floor and with out the scroll that hints at this, and a fire spell to light the iorches in the room, you would be dead and not know what happened. To combat the creatures in this room you enter the room, aim a fire spell at the torches, and let loose. Once they light up, shadows appear on the paved floor converging on you ready for the kill, your best bet is to quickly get what you want and dodge the shadows whilst watching for pits and other traps, The Immortal has it's faults but it is a step in the right direction. I think that a format more akin to PowerMonger {not availabie for the Apple // I'm sad to say} would have been a better playing area concept for a game of this nature. I would have liked to have seen close up views of combat and have the ability to revolve the scene around to gain a better view. To have this and the other minor pains, like no game a - —eee §49Apple-Bug save, fixed up would make the Immonal a real winner. The Immortal has much going for it, but J feel that RPG's such as The Bards Tale will still remain the favorite format of many role playing game users. The Immortal is available from Electronic Arts and from mail order dealers for around $US 32.00, and of course all good Apple dealers. The version used for this review was for the Apple //GS and as far as I am aware it is only available for the Apple //GS, Amiga, and Atari computers. Should anyone know of any Queensland / Australian dealer that stocks any of the programs I review then please let me know and we will let our members know. Please note a dealer ‘that will get it in for you’ does not in my books stock that item, and whilst we would be only too happy to let ‘our members know that they can purchase the item from a specific dealer we would also have to let them know that such items are not ‘off the shelf and how long they would have to wait for the item. Also if any of the many dealers that get our newsletter would like to send me review copies of software, hardware or books I would be most happy to Teview it in our newsletter which is sent all around Australia and other parts of the world to our members and other Apple User Groups. Bytes amd Pieces... By Kelvin Saggers A round up of information and news on the Apple // and Apple Macintosh. Taken in part from various newsletters, magazines, catalogs and ads ImageWriter Clone Laser Computer Inc. not only produce an excellent range of Apple He clones they also produce an ImageWriter compatible printer dot matrix printer. The Laser 190a printer comes in two models, a serial version for the Apple //GS, Apple //c, and Apple Macintosh serial port, and any Apple // with a serial printer card, and a parallel version for any Apple // owner with a parallel printer card in their Apple //+, Apple //e, or Apple //GS. Other than the fact the Laser 1902 printer is only a black and white printer, and as far as | am aware is only available with a 110v power supply, it is a true ImageWriter clone and is recognized by software as such, and reacts accordingly. The Laser 190a uses standard Epson LX-80 type printer ribbons, The printer will handle printer paper up to the standard 8.5 inch width, as either single sheets or fanfold. The fanfold type handles better if used with the optional tractor feed, again much like the old Epson LX-80 {I still use one with Auto-Ice's ImageWriter IceCable- Ed}. ‘The Laser 190a printer costs around $US 249.00 for the serial version and $US 199.00 for the parallel version. The Tractor feed is around $US 59.00. Epson ribbons are available just about everywhere. Super Convert. Seven Hills Software has released SuperConvert for the Apple //GS. It is, as the name suggests, a graphics conversion package that will convert graphics stored in any one of 32 different formats to an Apple //GS graphics format. The formats it can handle include Apple //, Macintosh, Ibm, Atari ST, Amiga and CBM64/128 formats. The original file must however be on a ProDOS formatted disk for the program to read it. This means that most files will come from on-line systems, the Apple File Exchange, or via computers linked by programs such as Cross Works. SuperConvert sells for around $US 39.00. For more information contact: Seven Hills Software, 2310 Oxford Road, Tallahassee, Florida. 32304. The program sounds very much like the excellent Shareware Package called Super Hires Covert 2.1 to me - Ed. —HyperCard //GS. Apple has finally released it's HyperCard system for the Apple //GS. The package requires a minimum of 1.5 Megabytes of RAM (Apple recommend at least 2 Meg}. If you also own a Macintosh you can use a program called HyperMover to convert old Macintosh {version 1.2.2 and 1.2.5 } stacks into HyperCard //GS stacks but you cannot move Apple //GS stacks to the Mac and HyperCard version 2.0 for the Mac is not compatible with the //GS version. This must be one of those bridges between the Apple // and the Macintosh we hear so much about... pity it is only one way... Must be just an oversight... what do you reckon? March 1991 = — 7 Macintosh Mumblings By John Finch Is this the age of "Placebo-ware"? I know that the Mac is supposed to be the computer for people who do not want to worry about technical matters, and to this end it was designed to be very user friendly. All OK so far, no arguments; but is this theme being taken to absurd lengths so that now the Mac user is being deliberately kept in the dark and fed on "placebo ware"? A while ago my hard disk crashed during a break in the household supply. After recovery I naturally tried to test the disk to reassure myself it was firing on all cylinders. Has anyone out there ever known "Disk First Aid" to do anything? It inevitably said my disk was OK, but then it always says that the disk is OK. Almost every other program I tried also reported the disk as being OK. Almost, unfortunately the software I obtained with the drive (Rodime) told me I had an "Error type 6". The manual did not even mention an error type | let alone type 6. I mean, hard disks do not have errors do they? I proceeded through a dealer, to the distributor, to the manufacturer. All steadfastly maintained there was nothing to worry about. When I continued to press the manufacturer they admitted that the error "type 6" meant that the “bad sector allocation table” was full. Why could they not admit that in the documentation? ‘The point is that almost ALL the software I ran on the disk would not even admit that I had ONE bad sector, let alone enough to fill the bad sector allocation table. The software I ran included Apple Hard disk utility, other hard disk utilities, SUM, etc. I ran every test utility I could get my mouse-paws on. Only one rather obscure public domain program actually admitted that I might have a bad sector or two. However the disk continued to run. A few weeks later my disk crashed again. My Mac is a “‘w/*t-so-humble "plus" plodding along at 8 MHz. | was incautious enough to SCSI connect my hard disk to a Mac fx running at, what, 45 MHz? My hard disk had an instant nervous breakdown! The disk still ran, and software could be copied from it, but it was now write protected. I could not write to the disk without a system crash. ‘The point of this is that I once again ran all the utilities 1 had or could borrow, and this time even ran the new Norton Utilities. All reported that my disk was fine - even though I could not write to it! So what is going on? Is there a plot to keep Mac owners in the dark when it comes to hardware faults? Are we all supposed to be good little consumers and go an buy a new car when the ash tray is full? Are all the nice friendly utility programs only hollow shells that do not actually do anything except reassure the user that everything in the world is rosy? I reformatted my hard disk and it is again firing on the few cylinders it has left, but meanwhile, I cannot help wondering if I should take up mushroom farming! = — The Power Up Software Corporation has released some interesting Macintosh software packages over the last few years. For those that are interested, a brief description of each of their Macintosh products is listed below: Address Book Plus Version 1.0 List Price: $US 89.95 Minimum configuration: MacPlus Suggested configuration: Mac Plus and above, a hard drive. Requires System version 6.0 Began Shipping Nov 30, 1989 Product Description: Address Book Plus gives you a complete, ready-to-use solution for managing your address lists, and for printing that information in a variety of output formats: address book pages, phone lists, rotary-file cards, mailing labels and envelopes. Address Book Plus lets you select specific fields for printing, and change fonts, sizes, and styles on a field- by-field basis. Use the predefined data-entry screen to get you started quickly, You can also import & export data easily. Address Book Plus also provides a handy Desk Accessory for quick searching and automatic dialing. Use it with Letter Writer Plus to solve everyday correspondence needs. Letter Writer Plus Version 1.0 List Price: $US 89.95 Minimum configuration: MacPlus Suggested configuration: Mac Plus and above, a hard drive. Requires System version 6.0 Began Shipping Jan 1990 Product Description: Letter Writer Plus is a handy Desk Accessory that puts powerful, easy-to-use letter-writing and mail-merge tools at your immediate disposal whenever you need them. Now you can quickly compose and print letters, memos, and envelopes while using any Macintosh program. With a simple click of the mouse, you're ready to dash off correspondence without having to exit your spreadsheet or paint program. Letter Writer Plus also complements Power Up’s Address Book Plus to make mailings fast and easy. Paste a single recipient for your letter from an Address Book Plus file, or send your correspondence to the entire Address Book Plus list. Calendar Creator Version 1.0 Minimum configuration: MacPlus Suggested configuration: Mac Plus and above, a hard drive, Requires System version 6.0 Began Shipping Jan 1989 Product Description: Now you can keep any calendar neat, accurate, and up-to- the minute with Calendar Creator. Merge separate schedules into daily, two-day, weekly, two-week, monthly, six-week, & yearly calendars, Calendar Creator handles appointments, birthdays, board meetings, & more. Enter recurring events, such as the first or third Wednesday of the month. Keep separate event lists for work, home, birthdays, and holidays. Add any number of events. if a day fills up, the extra activities print on a separate page. Update calendars easily by simply editing your activities and printing again. Say good-bye to messy conventional calendars full of smudges and erasures! Fast Forms Version 2.0 Minimum configuration: MacPlus Suggested configuration: Mac Plus and above, a hard drive. Requires System version 6.0 Begen Shipping March 30, 1990 Product Description: Now you can use your Macintosh to quickly create, fill, print, and save professional-quality business forms—from simple office memos to complex invoices and order forms. Fast Forms makes it easy to design and fill out forms ee = === Apple-Bug {including pre-printed ones) instantly and accurately. And because it saves, edits, searches, imports, and exports data, Fast Forms swiftly organizes and exchanges the information that makes your business run. With its wide array of drawing and page-layout tools and its key data-tracking capabilities, Fast Forms is the only forms management system that offers all this power at a Teally great value. For more information on any of the Power Up Software Corporation products listed above please contact : Steven C. Schaffer Product Manager - Macintosh Power Up Software Corporation 2929 us Drive San Mateo, CA 94403 (415)345-5900 Macintosh Technical Support: (415) 345-9381 The above Power Up item taken in part from a 1990 MUG News Service disk - Ed. Apple-Q March Auction This meeting (March) will be taken up mainly by the Apple-Q Auction. The March auction will work much like the previous one, held last August. You can contact Apple-Q before the meeting to lodge the items you wish to auction. However, we work on a “first in - first served" basis. The first person to lodge their items and forms with us will goto the top of the auction list.. The doors will open at 10.00 a.m. on the Sunday of the March 17th meeting, so please help by being there early and thus avoid the rush. All items must be booked in by the 11,30 deadline, Should the Auction Form on page 19 prove too small just copy the format onto another piece of paper and hand both in with your items, If possible please take the time to fill in your form before the meeting in order to speed things up on the day. Please remember that items must be lodged before 11.30 a.m, and that the Auction starts at 12.00 p.m. Auction Rules and Notes + The auction starts at 12.00 pm - your items must be lodged before 11.30 am.The doors open at 10.00 am. on the day of the Auction. + All auctioned items must have a Reserve Price of no less than $5.00. « Apple-Q gets a commission of 10 percent of the final auctioned price. * Apple-Q Inc. takes no responsability for software or equipment lodged at this Auction. « You can auction any computer related item - software or hardware. * You must be a member of Apple-Q to bid or place items in the Auction. An application for new membership or renewai can be made on the day of the Auction, « We can not finalize anyones payments until after the auction. If you have to leave early, we will post a cheque to you (minus $1.00 to cover handling). The Games Box... by Kelvin Saggers Pipe Dreams by Lucas Films is a very addictive game where you attempt to piece together random sections of pipe in order to create a pipeline for the ‘Flooze' to flow in. There is a practice mode to allow you to learn the game and you can use a password option to jump to other levels. Pipe Dreams costs $US29.95 for the Apple //GS version and $US34.95 for the Macintosh version, and is distributed by Electronic Arts. If Space Ace by Ready Soft is anything like the Atari and Amiga versions then most users will buy it for the graphics and animation alone. For those who are unaware of Space Ace and Dragon's Lair they are the brain child of Don Bluth an ex-Disney Cartoonist. Don Bluth first converted Dragons Lair from his original Laser disk game onto 3.5 disks and everyone was amazed at the results. Space Ace followed Dragon Lair and then came Dragon Lair II and the just released Dragons Lair III. This will give you some idea of how well they sold in the Amiga and Atari markets. Space Ace for the Apple //GS costs $US 33.00 from most mail order shops and is also available for the Macintosh. —= 9 March 1991 Two Heads Are Better Than One..... By Kelvin Saggers Apples graphic based, Icon, and mouse driven environments, and programs like AppleWorks take up a lot of the processors time with number crunching. That is why Apple places a maths coprocessor in most of it's Macintosh computers in order to take the load off the main processor and speed up calculations, which in turn allows software like Apples desktop environment to become viable proposition. If the software is too slow, no matter how great it looks, or how easy it is to use, people will tend to look for other software, and possibly other systems, to fulfill their needs. Much of the todays graphic orientated software, for example GS/OS, Desk Top Publishing and Art programs, tely heavily on number crunching to create and redraw screens and page layouts, etc. Programs like AppleWorks and the like also tie up the computers main processor, when recalculating a spread sheet for example. Recalculations on complex or large spreadsheets can take quite a bit of time to complete, which is why most spreadsheet users turn recalculate to manual rather than automatic. Worse still whilst processes like recalculations are going on the computer is tied up and cobwebs grow on the keyboard as the user waits to have control handed back. A lot of this can be avoided, if a maths coprocessor is installed in the machine. This will allow the main processor to hand all number crunching {maths} functions over to a processor that was specifically designed for the purpose. This frees up the general purpose main processor for other uses and also speeds up most program execution times. If this is still not enough of a speed increase, an accelerator card used in conjunction with a maths coprocessor will normally satisfy even the most jaded user. Neither of these devices can do much to speed up disk or printer access. All this is well and good but if Apple only builds a maths coprocessor chip into it's Macintosh computers and not the Apple //'s, how can Apple // users gain the benefits that such a device would give them. The solution lies once again with a third party vendor. A maths coprocessor card, called The Floating Point Engine, is available for both the Apple //e and Apple //GS. The Floating Point Engine uses the Motorola MC68881 maths chip, the same maths chip that Apple uses for the Macintosh computers. The card will work in any available general expansion slot inside either an Apple //e or //GS. Once installed however the software must be patched, or in the case of GS/OS a file added, before The Floating Point Engine will be recognized and used. In the case of Apple //GS owners who use GS/OS the solution is simple, just copy a file called FPETOOL.INT into the SYSTEM/SYSTEM.SETUP directory {folder} on your boot disk. Once you reboot your system, any software Tunning under GS/OS that uses Apples built in SANE maths calls will automatically use The Floating Point Engine maths coprocessor card instead. The Floating Point Engine also comes with patches for all versions of AppleWorks and routines by Glen Bredon (the author of ProSel} to allow AppleSoft Basic to use the card. Beagle Bros. Beagle Compiler also recognizes The Floating Point Engine if it is installed. The manual also has notes on how to call up the card from assembly language as well as a copy of Apple's 8 bit SANE tool that accesses the card, The Floating Point Engine costs around $US 250.00 so it's not cheap but then again it is not so dear as to be out of the price range of someone with a genuine use for one. There are other maths coprocessors around that are cheaper like AE's Fast Math for around $US 150.00 that will run on either an Apple //+, an Apple //e, or an Apple //GS. The bottom line will be how well, if at all, the software that is being used can access the maths coprocessor card. No matter what the cost, if a maths coprocessor, or any card for that matter, just sits gathering dust and cobwebs inside your computer it's a waste of an expansion slot and of course money, not to mention an unnecessary burden on the poor old overworked power supply. Apple-Q Survey By Ann White Thank you to those people who have already handed in their responses to the membership needs survey in the February Apple Bug. Please make sure you fill in yours (or a photocopy if you want to keep your magazine in mint condition) and either mail it back (preferably a.s.a.p.) or hand it in to a Committec member at the next meeting. One of the suggestions that has already come in from members has been that we should have a members’ trading table on club days. Essentially this has been done at previous meetings by the mere act of writing up a notice of items for sale or required on the white boards on the walls. The survey responses to date have been strongly in favour of having more computers at club meetings. In case the news has escaped you, the current committee has relaxed the more restrictive policy previously needed to combat piracy of software. Computers can again enjoy the day's outing with their owners and be used during SIGs sessions. There remains, of course, a blanket ban on piracy of commercial software. Apple-3ug Magazine is a publication of Apple-@ Inc. (the Brisbane Apple users group) Postal Address: P.O. Box 721, South Brisbane, Qkd 4101. Meetings Held at: Hooper Education Centre Kuran Street, Wavell Heights 10 Apple-Bug Appie News Edited by Dale Rodgie Notes: For space reasons, this article has been edited down to the following pages. The original transcript was 111k Jong. Copyright (C) 1990 by the Apple II RoundTable of GEnie. All rights reserved. Please Note, the prices listed in this article are in U.S. Dollars. The article aside from covering AppleFest 90 also contains information on new releases and updates on software and hardware for the Apple II, IIGS, and Mac exhibited there. AppleFest 1990 Well, AppleFest Long Beach is over and I can honestly say it was a success. While it is somewhat smaller than the previous AppleFest in San Francisco last year, it nonetheless has all the regular excitement and energy. AppleFest is being held in conjunction with Mac/LA Fest. However, both shows are being held in separate areas in the Conference Center, and have different entrances. Attendees to either can wander into both shows, however, at no cost. First of all, it brought Apple back into "Apple"fest. While I didn’t actually count, it seemed like there were over 30 Apple employees out on the floor of the show . i: fel: rez good to see all of them there like Mati Deatnerage, Tima Swihart, Matt Gulick and Andy Nichoias.... While Apple's booth seemed to be overloaded with Macintoshes, there certainly were enough Apple IIgs's around; and lots of real enthusiastic Apple employees demonstrating features of the new Hypercard Igs and the new System Software 5.04. The show was quite crowded the entire two days. The original estimate of the attendees projected by Exposition Management was 5,000 over the two days the conference was to be held. Well, apparently they miscalculated; as the last figures I heard were somewhere around 12,000. Mac LA/AppleFest will be happening again next year here in Long Beach. The dates were set for December 12-14, and AppleFest will be three days instead of two next year. All in all, it was very successful. Everyone was quite pleased that so many users showed an interest in the Expo. It should show Apple that there is still a big interest in the Apple IT line of computers, especially here in the LA area. HyperCard GS During AppleFest, Ralph Russo introduced Hypercard GS. After a brief demonstration of the Hypercard GS capabilities (he showed off a few of the stacks which come with Hypercard. At the end of the half hour talk, the Hypercard GS team were introduced. It is composed of 6 disks. One disk contains the program and the home stack. Another contains the help stack (the help is quite extensive, and is written in Hypercard GS format). Others contain support files such as XCMDS (external command program files), XFCNS (external function files), an Icon Editor, a sound creator editor. The official product will ship with three reference manuals: 1) Getting Started with Hypercard IIgs, 2) Hypercard IIgs Reference, and 3) HyperTalk Beginners Manual (which gives the user lessons in scripting Hypercard). HyperCard IIgs will not ship with new Ilgs's (The current ROM 3 GS has 1.125 megs, and HyperCard IIgs REQUIRES 1.5 megs). It is ONLY available through the stand-alone product, dealers can not give away copies without manuals. Hypercard GS supports use of multiple media (buzzword: Multimedia) such as video, sound, etc. Unlike the Macintosh version (HA HA HA HA HA!), it supports colour graphics and comes with built-in stacks ready to use. It also comes with the Hypertalk scripting language. Below is Apple's official press release... Apple Introduces Hypercard for the Apple IIgs Long Beach, California -- December 7, 1996 -- Apple Computer, Inc. introduced today HyperCard IIgs, a user- focused toolkit of information management software for the Apple IIgs personal computer. The new product will allow Apple IIgs users to create their own custom software and personalize the way they store, explore and present information. The announcement was made at the AppleFest Conference and Exposition being held today and tomorrow at the Long Beach Convention Center. We oactiiec upout HvperCard IIgs," said Ralph Russo, director ot the Apple II Business Unit at Apple. “Because our Apple II customers are extremely important to us, we continue to look for ways to provide product enhancements that increase the value of their investment in our technology. We believe HyperCard IIgs does just that". Features and Benefits Like the original HyperCard for the Macintosh personal computer, HyperCard IIgs functions much like set of index cards. Users store information in documents called stacks, which are made up of individual units called cards. Cards can contain text, graphics, scanned images, and even sound. Buttons on the cards can be used to link cards and stack. and much more. HyperCard IIgs supports multiple media by letting users work with information in virtually any form, including text, graphics, video, sound and animation. It also takes full advantage of the advanced 16-color graphics capabilities of the Apple IIgs. To allow customers to begin immediately using the software, the program comes with a large collection of ready- to-use stacks -- plus templates and card designs to help individuals create their own stacks. The program's scripting language, HyperTalk, provides buttons, cards, stacks and utilities such as debugging tools to facilitate creation of sophisticated programs and speed the preparation and performance of user-designed HyperCard stacks. With HyperCard Ilgs, Apple IIgs customers have the full functionality of Macintosh HyperCard version 1.2.5 -- plus specific enhancements to improve performance and take advantage of the colour capabilities built into the Apple IIgs. They can also enjoy the additional benefit of accessing the many stacks that already exist for the Macintosh once — — n March 1991 developers convert them for the Apple IIgs. “Now Apple Ilgs users and third-party developers can enjoy the same power, graphic tools, text editing and scripting abilities that Macintosh HyperCard users have had -- but with the added advantage of colour," said Tom Weishaar, editor of the A2-Central and board member of the Apple II Developer Association. "With HyperCard ilgs, Apple is delivering in a big way on its promise to continue supporting the installed base of Apple II customers and developers". Configuration, Price and Availability HyperCard IIgs will be sold only as a stand-alone kit, with six program disks and three manuals. Included will be nine ready-made stacks (programs) for productivity, leaming/games and inspirational/creative applications. To use HyperCard IIgs, customers will need an Apple Iigs with at least 1.5MB of RAM (2 MB are recommended), system software 5.0.4 or subsequent version, one 800K disk drive and a hard disk drive or connection to a network environment. The program will be widely available through authorized Apple dealers at a suggested retail price of $99 in mid-February 1991. Applied Engineering 3.5" Drives According to Phil Montoya of A.E., one of the two new items they have for us is the AE 3.5" drive and AE High Density Drive. Retail prices are $289 for the AE 3.5" and $339 for the AE HD drive. The upgrade price is $79 to take the AE 3.5 to the new AE HD. The disk loading mechanism seems to work similarly to the MS-DOS 3.5" drives. That is the drive does not grab the disk and pull it in with a ‘kerchunk'. You push the disk in until it clicks in. In order to use the AE HD, a new APPLE3.5 driver is required. This is provided along with the drive, and replaces the APPLE3.5 driver provided with GS/OS. Interestingly, the new driver will also support the Apple brand Apple 3.5 drives, and is supposedly faster, so a mixed drive system should not be a problem. The driver will support ProDOS 8, but will require booting into GS/OS first, so the driver will be available to it. A direct boot into ProDOS 8 will not work with the AE HD drive. If you are using the AE 3.5" drive, then the driver is not required, though it will speed up disk access, according to Mr. Montoya. The bad news is that earlier speculation that the new drives will support other disk formats is in error. The following are the supported formats: ProDOS only - 800K (2:1), 800K (4:1), 400K (4:1), 1600K (2:1) and 1600K (4:1). The AE HD is available only for the Apple IIgs. The 8 bit Apples will not be able to use the new drive. SendFax The other product Applied Engineering is getting ready to ship is their new product SendFax. This will be an Apple IIgs only product. It will consist of a set of chip upgrades to their existing Datalink Express and Datalink GS. Software will also be provided which will allow access to the fax capabilities. Included will be a 'Fax' printer driver which you select to be active though the Modem port. Then you go into your application, compose your Fax message, and do a print, The SendFax configuration window pops up, and this is where you enter the phone number to dial, the name and address of the person you are sending it to (if you wish), and other salient info. You send the fax.by clicking OK. The AE. guys had a fax machine on the table with the Ilgs, connected to an outside phone line. We called that phone number and, voila, about 75 seconds later we had a fax print out. The IIgs took about 30 seconds to format the page (two lines of text). The A.E. rep said that whether the page is full or mostly empty, setup time will remain roughly the same because the entire page (blank space and all) has to be checked and then the bits have to be sent to the I/O port to go ‘on the phone lines. The resolution of the fax output is dependent on the font type used and which font sizes are in the System folder (just like the Imagewriter II), There was no pricing information, but J am told that the product is two chips, and software, so I can't believe it will be that much (certainly less than fax modem capability on the Mac or MS- DOS.) Print Shop Companion llgs Tony Fardella, from Broderbund Software, showed me their latest new products for the Apple II computers. One is Print Shop Companion IIgs. This is more than just another Print Shop IIgs disk with additional graphics and borders, It is a completely new program with some exciting new features that make Print Shop even more exciting than before! Print Shop Companion Iigs can be purchased alone, even if you don't own Print Shop Ilgs. It prints entire libraries of Print Shop graphics to paper for easy reference (so you can locate a graphic easily and quickly by printing them to paper). Ttalso can print envelopes and labels which you can design yourself. One of the more exciting new features is called "Quick Page," where you can design your own flyer by selecting a graphic, dragging is around on the screen, and typing in your text all on a blank screen of paper (not as cumbersome as the Print Shop IIgs version, and you can see everything on the screen at once). This product will also import double high res and super high res pictures and original print shop graphics into Print Shop. Other new features are a built-in editor that edits graphics and fonts. This product lists for $49.95, and is well worth it if you already own Print Shop, or even if you do not. Playroom for the Apple II's The other product on display is Playroom for all Apple II computers. This product is aimed at preschool to kindergarten. Basically, it's a point and click program that includes animation and sound, and operates somewhat like a low level hypermedia program for youngsters. Available from Broderbund. Bannermania for the Apple II's Bannermania is a new product that prints all types of banners. This product is for all Apple IJ's, and is quite versatile; you have a good selection of fonts and styles to 12 a = = — = choose from, and two different lines to work with to print almost any banner imaginable. This product sells for $34.95, Available from Broderbund. Harmonie Printer Drivers Vitesse was demonstrating their new Harmonie printer drivers with the HP PaintJet XL printer. It's really amazing to see the quality of the pictures. One picture I saw which was quite impressive was the infamous “King Tut" colour image from Deluxe Paint li. Besides the HP Deskjet, and Laserjet printers, there is an improved Imagewriter II driver which offers more control over your printer. Harmonie sells for $30. HyperStudio Over at Roger Wagner's booth, it was standing room only for the multimedia demonstration of HyperStudio given by Nick Lenz, using HyperStudio to control the action of Dragon's Lair, an interactive video disk (remember the old arcade game?) with an Apple IIgs and an Apple Video Overlay card. The Apple IIgs never looked so good! Even the Mac people that have drifted over here from the Mac/LA show have been heard to comment how amazed they are to see what can be done with an Apple IIgs! Comments have been heard from Macintosh users that Hypercard IIgs looks even better than their version - colour really makes a difference! Soundsmith Player XCMD - While this is actually justa file, this new XCMD (for use with HyperStudio) will allow the user to import Soundsmith songs into HyperStudio directly. After you create your sound file, you just place it in the same directory with your stack and the XCMD, then active it through HyperStudio. This is freeware. SynthLab XCMD - This XCMD, while not published by Roger Wagner, will be available soon from Mike Nuzzi who will be publishing a disk called “HyperStuff Collection" which will include all kinds of XCMDS and other things. Included in the XCMDS is one that allows users to import SynthLab songs into their HyperStudio stacks. Roger had a setup with a keyboard, and a midi interface connected to his Apple Ilgs. He recorded a simple song using SynthLab; and saved it. When SynthLab and this XCMD become final products, you will be able to use the incredible SynthLab capabilities to compliment your HyperStudio stacks. I don't have pricing information on this, since Roger isn't publishing it, NEC CD-ROM Drives Good news for Apple IIgs users! You can now hook up a NEC 3501 CD-ROM drive to your Apple IIgs. This is a much more economical version of a CD-ROM available from Digital Data Express in Blue Island, Illinois. They are here at AppleFest, and have a special show price of $400.00, plus $59 for the Apple IIgs drivers (however, they will honor this Price for the next 30 days). The NEC portable CD-ROM is similar to the one used in the Turbographix game machine. It also plays audio CD's. Access time is 1,500 milliseconds, which is approximately 1/2 as fast as the Apple CD-ROM Apple-Bug drive; however, the price is a lot less. The also have a NEC 72. CD-ROM which has an access time of 350 msec (which is twice as fast as the Apple version) for sale for $625.00. The CD-ROM drive will also run on a Macintosh, but a separate driver will be required. Zip GS Zip Technology has been generating a lot of excitement with their ZIP GSX Model 1600 accelerator for the Apple IIgs. They've already sold over 100 Zip GSX's just here at the show! Not only is the Zip speeding things up for the Apple Ilgs, but I learned today that there is development being done by a third party for a floating point accelerator (similar to the Floating Point Engine) that can be attached to the Zip GSX and does not require a slot. There is also some thoughts being given to adding a SCSI card attachment to the Zip GSX. There are two other versions of the Zip... the Chip version, which will be shipping sometime in January. They aren't quite as fancy or upgradeable, but the price is considerably lower: $199 for the model 1500 (8 mhz/8k cache); and $249 for the Model 1525 (8 mhz/16k cache). These two models replace the CPU chip, and lie flat and do not take up a slot. Genesys Genesys is a full featured resource editor and generator for the Apple IIgs. This assists the user in generating resources for their own applications or allows modification of Tesources of existing, commercially available software. This means that you can customize the applications you run on your Own computer to your heart's content. You say you don't like the looks of that alert window you keep getting? Re-do it. Don't like the hot-key choice for that menu command? Change it. When you just want to edit the resources of an existing program with Genesys, you don't have to generate source code or do any compiling. This feature is for developers who are trying to write a program from scratch. The editing of resources is done directly to the program and is as easy as using a paint program (heck, even easier). The Genesys user will ‘draw’ what he wants on-screen, and Genesys will produce source code to represent what was drawn in any of various languages. The Orca and APW family of languages are supported, as well as Merlin, Rez, and others. You can build your own menu from scratch, save it as the source code of your choice, compile it, and then link it with the application code you generated under your compiler of choice. The process gives you a stand- alone, finder executable, $16 type file. If you find that later you want to change something, go back to Genesys, re-draw the window (or whatever), re- generate the source code, re- compile the resource code, and re-attach to the application file. Also, anything you do in Genesys will appear on-screen just as it will appear in your application. The latest version of Genesys (1.2) requires version GS/OS 5.0.3 as a minimum. (It will not work under 5.0.2, there were some bugs in the way resources are handled which are March 1991 detrimental to the operation of the current version of Genesys.) Genesys is provided with four 3.5" disks. Two of the disks contain the full GS/OS System 5.0.3. The two other disks contain the program itself as well as a full on-line help system. The manual which comes with Genesys is a loose-leaf binder with about an inch worth of 8.5 x 11 sheets. SuperConvert According to Jason Harper, estimated delivery date for SuperConvert is due to be January '91. Jason said that, barring new bug reports, SuperConvert is finished, but the packaging and documentation guys still need to do their things. The translation features included are impressive. Every major microcomputer was available as a readable source. Most important Apple IIgs versions are also importable, and can be saved in APF, screen, and other formats. Lots of little features and details have also added which make it a much nicer program in general. Seven Hills vill be publishing the new Super Convert for $40.00. World Geography for the Apple II's For those of you with children, or those teens and adults who need some help with their geography, a program by Bobco may be for you (it is also tailor-made for schoo! environments), The program is called ‘World Geography’. This product comes in two flavors, English and Spanish. 1 played the Spanish version, and even though my Spanish is somewhat rusty, the format is simple enough in concept that the language factor did not detract from the gamx play o learning aspect. Basically, the game consists of a three-part screen. The top right half of the screen contains a colour map of a hemisphere of the Earth. The upper left contains an enlargement of some specific section within that hemisphere. The bottom half of the screen is your question and response section. When you start play, the globe on the right will rotate by, while the Apple randomly picks a country and starts blinking a cursor on the country on which you are to be tested, as well as displaying the flag of the country selected. You are to answer with the name of the country displayed «multiple choice, three selections displayed). The other questions (Capital, Currency, Language, Population) are asked in random order, again with three choices from which to choose. The faster you answer correctly, the higher your score. The game has several difficulty levels. The Bobco folks had their Spanish version running on a IIc, while the English version was running in 8-bit mode on a Ilgs. The programs themselves are 8- bit, and require only 64k to run. They are compatible with the IIc/Ile/Ilgs at least. I do not know if it is compatible with the (64k) II+, but don't see why it shouldn't be. "World Geography’ (English and Spanish versions, list $24.95) Digicard Networking on the Apple || For those looking for Apple II networking solutions, Digicard would like your business, They provide a stand- alone hard disk server system and print sharer solution. The system consists of a box about the size of a large bread box which houses the hard disk (starting at 40 Meg) and network 13 controller. In addition, each computer which is to be on the network requires an interface card, which has its own boot ROM. This allows a diskless installation on the user nodes. The computers supported include the Apple IIgs, Apple Ile, Macintosh, and MS-DOS machines. Up to four printers can be hooked up to this network and shared by the connected nodes. (Nodes = computer). This systems does not interfere with normal disk-based computing, should the need arise. By placing a bootable disk in the floppy drive, you can cause that particular computer to run in a stand-alone mode, as if their were no network at all, and while not interfering with other, connected nodes. According to the rep at the booth, it is possible to run DOS 3.3 as well as ProDOS 8 and GS/OS across the network. Also, Macintosh and MS-DOS disk formats are obviously supported for each respective machine type. Prices start at $4,000 for the server for the 40 Meg hard drive. (80 Meg - $5,495, 150 Meg - $6,495, 310 Meg- $8,995). If you wish a data backup system, add another $1,500. Each node on the network requires its own interface. The Apple IIgs interface goes for $69, Apple Ile is $189, Macintosh is $59, and MS-DOS is $199. Apple lle Co-Processor I had an opportunity to play with the Apple Ile co- processor for the Macintosh LC. Much of what I have been hearing lately appears to be wrong. The following is what I have seen or surmised from the time I played with it. The Apple Ile card can operate out of up to | Meg of the LC's RAM. The reason for this 1 Meg limitation is that 1 Meg is the size of the Apple RAM expansion for the Apple Ile computer itself. When we loaded AppleWorks, it showed a 1 Meg desktop (the LC had 2 Meg installed). The card has switchable speed between 1 mhz and 2 mhz while running in Ile mode. The software which is provided with this card will provide slot simulation while in Ile mode. In addition to the card itself and its interface with the LC bus, there is a three row, 26 pin DB type connector included on the He card. This 26 pin connector is to connect to a special Y-cable which breaks down into a DB-9 game port and Smartport connector. The DB-9 is for connection to a standard joystick. The smartport is for connection to the Apple 5.25 drive, although the Apple 3.5 drive is connectable as well. The only drawbacks | could see are due to the fact that the co-processor is not IIgs based, but Ile- based instead. Also, the monitor used by the Mac LC has a slightly different pixel shape. This can cause some of the Apple Ile graphics displayed on the Macintosh screen to have some ‘jaggies', where there were none earlier. ‘New’ Graphic Exchange This is a totally rewritten version, which is now GS/OS compatible; and has a nice desktop interface with pull-down menus (not as blah as before). You can pass virtually any Apple Il graphics image between different applications programs. It supports Print Shop, Paintworks, 8/16 Paint, and mostly everything else. You can create your own clip art with this program, by extracting portions of any graphic screen. One of the most interesting features is it's conversion 14 Te capabilities between the Apple IIgs and the Macintosh or visa versa. The program comes with an Apple II disk and a Macintosh disk. With Graphic Exchange, you can actually insert a Macintosh disk into the Apple IIgs drive, and the program can convert directly off the disk without having to Tesort to any convoluted systems transferring. This program is the ultimate for graphics users; it's retail price is $49.95. A2FX Mr. A2FX himself, Chan Wilson, showed up for the Fest; and with a semi-completed update on the Apple II File Exchange that reads Macintosh disks on the Apple IIgs. He's squashed some more bugs, and added a couple of interesting new features. One is that you will be able to transfer entire directories instead of just files; another is you can designate a file and aux type for the transferred Mac file. Looks pretty good. Chan is quite busy, but hopes to get it out sometime early next year. Dragonwars for the GS and Apple lle Also, new for the Igs and just shipping is Dragonwars GS . This is a GS-Specific version (make sure you mention Apple IIgs when you order it, or you could end up with the 8- bit Apple Ile version). Dragonwars is similar to a Bards Tale- like game, and if you enjoyed those, you'll really like this one. And remember, if Dragonwars GS sells well, it indicates that there is a market for Apple Ilgs specific software, and we'll get more goodies from Interplay. PC Globe At least four new products will be coming out for our machine from this company. PC Globe is one of the most popular IBM products, and is now being ported over to the Apple Iigs. It's a real great program that gives you maps of the world, and details on every country and even includes their national anthems. I sure hope they can take advantage of Synthlab when this finish this one. PC USA is just specifically for the United States. Both programs have an extensive data base of information and extensive graphical maps; there are even flags for every country and state. Both these products are not finished yet, but are nearing completion. There are two programs that they are shipping, however: Geo Puzzle USA (for all Apple II computers, and a specific IIgs version); and Geo Quiz (which is only for the IIgs). I did check out Geo Puzzle, and it would really make a nice gift for a student or someone who wants to lea more about USA Geography. Geo Quiz looks much more extensive, and covers the entire globe. Both programs had a teal polished look to them, and I'm sure schools that run Apples are going to gobble them up. Geo Puzzle is $39.95 list, and Geo Quiz is $49.95, Outliner for AppleWorks 3.0 Outliner attaches itself to your AppleWorks 3.0 Word Processor. Then, when you are ready to do some outlining, you press OA-+ to activate the Outliner. It is not a TimeOut application, rather it becomes part of the Word Processor. The Outliner supports 6 levels + body text. It supports Apple-Bug several types of labels (Harvard, Roman, Symbol, Legal, and custom). And it uses standard AppleWorks 3.0 files. Platinum Paint The product which seemed to be garnering the most attention was ‘Platinum Paint’. This is a full-function GS- only paint program. In order to run Platinum Paint, you will need a ROM 01 or 03 IIgs, with at least 1 MB of RAM (will use more if you have it). System 5.0.3 or later is required to Tun. An abbreviated System disk is provided, so you can run it right out of the box if you do not already have the latest System. Also required is at least one 3.5" disk drive (two are recommended), and a colour monitor. A quick run-down of the specification sheet reveals: Lasso tool, Blending, shading and smoothing, Bezier curves, Airbrush tool, Nine different brush modes, Colorization of scanned images, Open four documents at same time, Rotate, 2-D perspective, 16 colors out of 4096, Slant, resize, invert, etc., Import and export from/to different graphic formats, Hot-key menu commandy and so forth..... Printing can be accomplished on an Image Writer in colour or black and white, or on a LaserWriter in black and white. The graphics can also be exported into other IIgs applications. Apple Il Enhanced Vision Plus Digitizer A new company, New Concepts, was heavily promoting the Enhanced Vision Plus digitizer card at its booth (a hardware card currently in its third reincarnation in the Apple II world). Formerly the Visionary GS (from Virtual Realities, RIP); and originally the AST digitizer; this new product is light years ahead of its first introduction. Fortunately, someone has recognized its value, and has salvaged it from the ashes. What makes this card something real special is the software that comes with it. Allison, written by Scott Gentry and Jonah Stich, is the colour dithering software that, in conjunction with the Enhanced Vision Plus card, really makes the difference. It allows the Apple Ilgs to shine ir showing off its digitizing capabilities. Allison allows a Person with access to either a video camera, VCR or laser disk to do real time digitizing with their Apple IIgs, in full colour. For example, at the New Concepts booth, Scott had a camcorder set up on a tripod, and was capturing the picture of the cover of a magazine. In a matter of 7 seconds, the picture showed up on the monitor of the computer. The software easily adjusts for colour brightness and intensity; a matter of just toggling three scroll bars. The picture on the magazine and the picture on the screen looked virtually identical, colour and all. More important, the software is very intuitive, and easy to use. Saving the picture is simple. Allison saves in both a $C1, raw image format ($C1 auxtype $8001), and a programmer-oriented preview format (primarily for those who want to use the smaller preview mode picture for animations). As an extra bonus, a program called Allison 3200, comes with the software, which allows you to convert the digitized March 199] at) raw data file to a 3200 colour picture. Jonah Stich, famous for View 3200 and GIF 3200, has also done a superb job with this. You won't believe your eyes when you see how good your pictures come out! The Enhanced Vision Plus card is also being sold by Quality Computers and LRO Computer Sales; both run big ads in InCider. Quality Computers is selling the card for $249.00. 1 spoke with a fellow named Jerry there who knew all about it. It's still listed as a Visionary GS; however, Scott informs me the actual name of the product is now Enhanced Vision Plus. When you purchase the card, the Allison software is included. New Concepts can be reached at: 800- 487-8684, Independence printer drivers Also demonstrated at AppleFest were the Independence printer drivers from Seven Hills Software. These printer drivers work with Hewlett Packard printers much like the ‘armonie drivers from Vitesse, providing support for the printer's full 300 dpi capability. Unlike the Harmonie drivers, however, Independence provides added support for more features, such as full text justification. Demonstration printouts were shown which at least equaled the printouts over at the Vitesse booth. A binder with additional printouts was on hand for perusal, comparing independence and Harmonie printouts of the same files. Besides having fully- justified text, compared to Harmonie's left justified only text, the Independence printouts also appeared to have better reproduction of the shadings in the graphics. I was told that Independence will initially be shipping with expanded size fonts of at least Helvetica and Times. PLI Infinity Turbo-floppy 1.4 I was told by an Apple person that there is a product on the market from Peripheral Land, Inc. (a Mac manufacturer) that can read, write and format 800 and 1.44 MB disks just like Apple's Superdrive drive. It's connects through your SCSI card, and takes advantage of the SCSI high speed data transfer rate. NO SWIM chip necessary. I was told that it snould work. More info when it becomes available. The drive lists for $399, but you can pick it up for $359 from MacWarehouse. I don't know if a special driver is necessary, though. Sounds real interesting, however. Inwords Inwords is the up and coming new OCR software (optical character recognition) that you can use in conjunction with the Quickie hand-scanner from Vitesse, that scans printed text and tums it into text files. Westcode claims it operates at 50 characters per second, with accuracy. Apple Il Achievement Awards Apple Computer Press Release Apple Computer, Inc. is pleased to sponsor the first annual Apple IT Achievement Awards, to be presented Friday, December 7th, as part of the AppleFest trade show and exhibition in Long Beach, California. A prestigious panel of Apple II industry watchers, including magazine and telecommunications representatives, recently voted for awards in a number of categories, designed to recognize excellence in products for the Apple II family of computers in roughly the past year. Those products most widely recognized will be presented with distinctive Achievement Awards at a developer reception Friday evening. "We're proud to sponsor these Achievement Awards for outstanding work in late 1989 and 1990," said Matt Deatherage, an Apple Computer Developer Technical Support engineer involved with the awards. "We're really excited to be able to present the recognition these fine Apple TI products deserve.” The panel included representatives from A+/InCider, A2- Central, Apple Computer, America On-line, CompuServe, GEnie, GS Plus Magazine and Nibble. Awards will be presented to those software or hardware packages recognized as the Best Educational Software, Best Apple II (8-bit) Software, Best Apple IIgs (16-bit) Software, Best Freeware or Shareware Software, Best Innovation, Best Multimedia Achievement, Best Development Tool or Language, Best Debugging Aid, Best Apple II Periodical, Best On-line Service, Hardware of the Year and Software of the Year. Another award will also be presented to an individual selected by the blue- ribbon panel for special recognition for his or her contribution to the Apple II community in 1990, { ~ For Sale Apple IIGS with 1.25 Meg of RAM {plus old 256K card } with an RGB colour monitor, 1 - 3.5 Apple drive, 1 - 5.25 Apple drive and a 20 Meg Applied Ingenuity hard drive. Apple System {5.0} software, AppleWorks IIGS {includes upgrades}, Top Draw, PrintShop GS, Music Construction Set, MultiScribe GS { education edition }, Silent Service, Bard's Tale, Hard Ball, Thexder, Destroyer GS, Mean 18, Deja Vu, 15 GS User group disks, and 20+ PD disks. Also Apple II games and the last five years of Nibble and Incider magazines. Cost over: $5,500 Sell for : $3,300 Phone Mark Piper on 285523 for more information. Please Dont Touch Apple-Q Members are reminded that unless you have permission to do so. No member should handle or use any equipment or software, this includes club property, that is not their own personal property. L y, 1% After the Event... The achievement awards were announced tonight at a fun Apple sponsored party at the Long Beach Muscum of Art. The following were the winners in each category: Best Freeware/Shareware Shrinkit GS by Andy Nicholas Best Educational Software Katie's Farm by Lawrence Productions distributed by Broderbund Special Award Claris for AppleWorks 3.0 Outstanding 8-bit Apple II Software Proterm 2.2 by InSync Outstanding 16-bit Apple II Software HyperStudio 2.1 by Roger Wagner Publishing Best Innovation Ramfast SCSI Card by CV Tech. Best Multimedia HyperStudio 2.1 by Roger Wagner Publishing Best Development Tool or Language Genesys 1.2 by SSSI. Best Debugging Aid GSBug 1.5 by Apple Computer. Best Apple II Periodical A2-Central Best On-line Service America On-Line Best Hardware Apple High Speed DMA SCSI Card by Apple Compater Best Software HyperStudio 2.1 by Roger Wagner Publishing Outstanding Individual Achievement Roger Wagner of Roger Wagner Publishing Permission is hereby granted to not-for-profit user groups to reprint this transcript in its entirety, provided that this notice is included. To sign up for GEnie, follow these simple steps: 1, With your computer and modem, dial 1-800-638-8369. 2. When you connect, type HHH and hit the RETURN key. 3. The computer will type U#=. You respond with XJM11706,GENIE. 4. Now answer the questions and you will be able to use GEnie the next working day. Be sure to have a credit card or checking account number handy when you sign up. See ees §8=ADD/e-BUg Disk of the Month by Kelvin Saggers This month we have two new disks of the month. One for the Apple //e, which should also run on any other Apple //, on a 5.25 disk, and one for the Apple HGS on a 3.5 disk. The 5.25 disk contains but one game, an excellent version of the Monopoly board game. The Apple //GS disk contains a few animations and a viewer, again well worth having. If only to show off what the //GS is capable of. Further animation disks will be released in the near future along with a new disk full of DA's and DA's and a games disk for the GS. ‘The group intends to send away an order to PDE in the near future for new releases as we have their latest catalog. Please remember that your support of the software library in the form of buying disks from the club and not copying those purchased by other members enables us to buy more new disks and updates for the club. If you have any Public Domain software or Shareware yourself, think about donating a copy or the original to the club, most of the new //GS disks have been donated by members. Monopoly The Monopoly game for the Apple //e has good graphics, and will run also on an Apple //GS {I don't know about a ROM 3.0 version}. Just boot the disk and you are away. It plays just like the board game, with the computer taking the role of the banker. Chance and Community chest are all there, but if your lucks anything like mine you will probably spend most of the game behind bars in Jail. Animations The Apple //GS disk contains animations of two planes chasing each other through archways, and a flyby by the Enterprise, a scene from Tron & more. Also on the disk is a viewer that allows you to run the animation files. Just boot up GS/OS and click on the viewer file. The viewer program then allows you to choose which file you wish to run simply by double Clicking on the file name. Library Cleanup The Apple-Q Software Library is undergoing a spring clean by Jeff & the Hardcopy Library is also undergoing a major shake-up by Ian our new Hardcopy Librarian. Tan is also chasing some missing books and magazines 0 please return any you may have out. Anyone who wishes to aid either Jeff or Ian please contact them at the next meeting. March 1991 _ = Vv UniDOS 3.3 Plus By Kelvin Saggers When Apple released it's 3.5 {800k} disk drive for the Apple // range many years ago it gave Apple // users around six times more storage capacity than the old 35 track {140k} 5.25 drives they had been accustomed to. This fact and the advantages that the then new 3.5 diskettes offered (that we take for granted today } over their 5.25 diskette counterparts guaranteed the success of this long awaited (but costly} add on. The only problem was that most people were DOS 3.3 users in those days, when ProDOS was still wet behind the ears, and Apple supported only ProDOS on it's 3.5 drives, so DOS 3.3 users found themselves limited to the old 140k 5.25 drives with almost ail of their existing software. Once again third party vendors had to come to the Apple // users rescue. To be fair DOS 3.3 does not really lend it's self to very large storage capacity usage where as ProDOS was designed for such applications from the start. The fact that DOS 3.3 was not suitable did not mean much to the average Apple // user then however, as most if not all their Apple // software was running under it. It was because of this that products such as UniDOS 3.3 by MicroSparc Inc where created to cater for the DOS 3.3 market that Apple had left high & dry. UniDOS 3.3 allowed DOS 3.3 users to access their 3.5 disks and so for the most part filled the gap Apple had left. The original UniDOS 3.3 had a few problems, many of which MicroSparc tried to fix up when, around 1986, it released UniDOS 3.3 Plus. UniDOS is however a modified version of the old DOS 3.3 and so it does have some compatibility problems most of which can be minimized once the user is aware of them. Remember DOS 3.3 was never designed for 3.5 {800k} drives and so some modification to the original had to made. These modifications have been programed in such a manner as to make UniDOS 3.3 Plus as compatible as possible to DOS 3.3 and any variations away from the norm have been listed in the manual so that the user has some chance of working around any incompatibly problems that may arise. When a 3.5 disk is formatted with UniDOS it divides the 800k disk into two 400k volumes with 50 tracks of 32 sectors each {with a 31 sector catalog). The first volume of which is the front side of the disk and is accessed as drive one, the second volume is the back and is accessed as drive three. For example if the 3.5 disk drive is in slot 5 then the first 400k volume is accessed as slot 5 drive 1 and the second volume {on the same 3.5 disk} is accessed as slot 5 drive 3. If you have a second 3.5 disk drive daisy chained off the back of the first drive then the volumes on it would be {first volume} drive 2 and {second volume} drive 4. A UniDOS diskette is self booting and reacts much like a standard DOS 3,3 diskette in that once it has loaded the DOS image it will look for and run your HELLO program. Please note that you cannot read 3.5 UniDOS diskettes if you boot standard DOS 3.3 you can only read the 5.25 drives that have standard DOS 3.3 diskettes in them, but you can read normal DOS 3.3 diskettes and UniDOS diskettes if you boot froma 3.5 disk with UniDOS 3.3 Plus on it. The UniDOS image is written on, and thus read from the first two tracks of the first volume only. Once UniDOS is booted and loaded, it recognizes, with a few exceptions, all standard DOS 3.3 commands, all of which are identical to the originals. These exceptions are the INIT, INT and CATALOG commands and whilst they are not identical {mainly in their usage) their functions are the same, The Syntax for the INIT command under UniDOS is: INIT filename [, S slot ] for example: INIT HELLO,SS,D1 [, D drive ] Tf no slot and drive is defined then the last accessed drive is used. UniDOS will read the UniDOS image off a UniDOS disk and assume that the Hello program is in memory. The process is simplified by prompts which lead you through the disk initialization procedure. The UniDOS INIT command will initialize both 3.5 and 5.25 diskettes but will not place a DOS image onto a 5.25 diskette unless the ADD.DOS utility program that comes with UniDOS 3.3 plus is used. The CATALOG command functions the same as the old DOS 3.3 command, but the DOS 3.3 CATALOG command will not list the correct file lengths in sectors if the files are over 255 sectors {64k} long. UniDOS however corrects this failing, but is its self limited to files under 999 sectors {250k} long, and will simply place a ‘in the first character of the file length number for any files that are longer. UniDOS 3.3 Plus does not allow access to Integer Basic and so does not recognize the INT command. If you wish to tun Integer Basic under UniDOS you can modify the standard UniDOS by running the INT.MOD program file supplied with UniDOS 3.3 Plus. This program removes the CAT command from UniDOS and replaces it with the INT command, So you can have one but not both commands active on the same disk. The CAT command is a new UniDOS 3.3 Command that is a more powerful version of the CATALOG command, It's basic syntax is: CAT filename |, S slot } [, D drive } For example: CAT $5,D1 All the parameters following the CAT command are optional. If the example above was used then UniDOS would correctly list all the files in the directory up to 9999 sectors long, if any files are longer the file lengths will contain a ‘?" and be incorrect. The filename parameter can be used in three different ways: [a] A specific filename [b] A filename with a wildcard [c] A two letter filename starting with '@' If a specific filename is used then normally only one name will be returned, but since UniDOS is not case sensitive it 8 = — ——————— could return more than one name. For example TEST, Test. If a filename contains the * * ' character then only those files that start with the text preceding the '“' character and end with the text (if any) that followed it would be listed. For example CAT ASHK will list any files ending with SHK. The filename parameter can also be used to list catalogs of a specified order or file type if a two character command code is used. The first character of the code must be '@ ' which must be followed by either an A, B, 1, R, S, T or @. For example: CAT @@ Toggles alphabetizing on and off. CAT@A List only AppleSoft file types. CAT @B List only Binary file types. UniDOS also comes with various utility programs some of which have already been talked about. Other utilities include a COPY3.5 UTILITY which enables users with at least 128k of = =memz Apple-Bug memory to make quick 3.5 disk copies e.g. UniDOS 3.3. It is faster than Apple's copy programs as it only copies those sectors being used. The UniDOS 3,3 Plus disk also contains a modified version of FID which can work with either ‘UniDOS 3.3 or DOS 3.3 diskettes. ‘UniDOS 3.3 Plus works on the Apple //+, the Apple //e, the Apple //c, and the Apple //GS. UniDOS 3.3 Plus version 2.0 was used as the basis for the information in this article and was purchased when it was first released. UniDOS was then marketed by Micro Sparc Inc but it is now marketed by MindCraft for $US 39.95 and might be a little different than version 2.0. For more information check out the latest Nibble magazine or contact: MindCraft Publishing 52 Domino Drive, Concord, MA 01742 Connecting Drives to the Apple lIGS... By Dale Rodgie The Apple IGS is capable of using all drives available for the Apple Ile, as well as drives built for the Apple IIGS, including the Disk II, Duodisk, Uni- disk, Unidisk 3.5, Profile, Apple 3.5 Drive, Apple 5.25 Drive, and SCSI-20. Some of these drives may be plugged directly into the SmartPort on the back of the IIGS, while others require an interface card in one of the expansion I/O slots. The following drives may be plugged into the SmartPort's DB-19 connector: + one Duodisk * two Unidisk 5.25 drives * two Unidisk 3.5 drives two Apple 5.25 drives two Apple 3.5 drives Only under Prodos 16 may a combination of up to six drives be daisy-chained to the SmartPort. The chain MUST occur in the order given below and may include up to two (excepting the DuoDisk) in each of the following three categories: + Nearest to IGS (maximum of two): 1, Apple 3.5 Drives 2. Unidisk 3.5 drives » Farthest from IIGS (maximum of two): 3. 5.25 disk drives: Disk II's, Unidisk 5.25 drives, Apple 5.25 drives or ONE Duodisk drive Under Prodos 8 (also known as Prodos 1.2 {now ProDOS 1.9 - Edj ), four drives are accessible through the SmartPort. These may be a combination of Apple 3.5 drives, Unidisk 3.5 drives, a RAM disk, and a ROM disk, under the same order restrictions as above. The SmartPort is mapped to slot 5, so drives connected directly to the port are accessed as slot 5, drive 1 and slot 5, drive 2, When more than two drives are used under Prodos 8, or if the RAM disk is active, "phantom slots" are assigned. To be used on the Apple IIGS, the Disk II requires a Disk TI Controller Card, just as on the Apple Il or Apple Ile. The drive may be accessed through the slot used for the card, most likely slot 6, in which case the two possible drives are teferred to as slot 6, drive 1 and slot 6, drive 2. A SCSI Interface Card is needed to use the Apple Hard Disk 20SC on the Apple IIGS. A Profile Interface Card must be used with a 5 or 10 Megabyte Profile,accessible by referencing the slot where the interface card resides or by the ProFile's ProDOS pathname. See the January back issue of Apple Bug for the modifications needed to be made to ProFile hard drive controler cards in order for them to work correctly on the Apple lIGS - Ed. The Apple IIGS control panel allows you to select the slot from which the computer will be booted, or you may choose to scan slots on bootup to find a device that is ready. { User Listing Update Graham Black, the clubs registrar, requests that all Apple-Q members take the time to send him their current system's details in order for him to update the new membership listing he has been working on for the club. If you have in fact supplied this information with your name on last months survey form, then we have all the information we need from you. Thank you for you time and help, The club will soon print it's membership listing (by suburb) if you have any problems with your name and phone number appearing in the newsletter please let us know so we can leave it out. The idea is to let you know who lives nearby from the club & maybe help each other. ane y, March 1991 — wv | Membership and or Renewal Form ] Please fil in this form, tick the appropiate boxes and send the form to Apple-Q Inc, P.O. Box 721, South Brisbane, Queensland 4101, Please enclose your remittance with this form. Q Membership Application Q Renewal of Membership Membership Number: Membership Fees Q $10.00 Joining Fee (first year only) OQ $25.00 Adults, Family & Students Q $10.00 Associate Membership (BBS only) Q $50.00 Corporate Membership (Schools/Business Houses) Member's Details Post Code: ... Home Phone: Business Phone: (. ‘A membership lis is published every year in the Newsletter. Only your Name, Suburb and Phone number, ae listed. Do you require exemption from this list? Q Yes Q xo System Information Q Apple // Q Apple //+ Q Apple fe Q Apple le QO Apple /igs Q Apple /i/ Q Macintosh Q Other: .... Members arc reminded that the copying of commercial software is not santioned by the Apple-Q Inc., and that members who do so, risk expulsion from the group. Thereby declare that the above details are true and correct, and agree to bide by the Rules and Regulations of the Group. Signed: [ For Official Use Only J Receipt Number: Dat Status: ... Paid: Exp. Date: ...... Apple-Q Inc. Auction Form Members Name: .. Item Description 01)... (02) (03) ... (04) (05) .... (06) .... Please fill in this form and hand it over at the Trading Table with the items you wish to auction. If you wish, you can use a photocopy of this form. All items for auction must be handed over at the Trading Table by 11.30 am. . Membership Number: . Reserve Price | Auction No. eee HF w Apple-Q Inc. takes no responsability for computer equipment or software left in it's care. Apple-Bug The Newsletter of APPLE-Q Inc. (the Brisbane Users' Group) If not claimed within 7 days, please return to: P.O. Box 721, South Brisbane, Queensiand 4101, Australia. Please deliver to Registered by Australia Post - Publication No. QBG 3485 SURFACE MAIL POSTAGE PAID AUSTRALIA Changing Address? fso, fl in this slip and send it jn as soon as possible. ple-Q P.O. Box 721, South Brisbane, Qld 4101