Text content (OCR)
ple20005
THE NATIONAL APPLE USERS GROUP
ee
FEBRUARY 1987
VOLUME 1(3)
82 == scrapbd
T here’s something very special
about the Computer City Win-
ning Team. Their collective talents
and experience of more than 200
man (and woman!) years in busi-
hess, accounting, engineering (civil
and mechanical), programming,
systems analysis, printing, teaching,
quantity surveying, drafting and
graphic design (to name but a few!),
have been brought together for one
reason only - to give you our cus-
tomer access to a vast pool of know-
ledge and expertise to help you get
the most cost effective and produc-
tive system to fulfill your needs at
the very best price.
For example, we have supplied
many Desktop Publishing Systems,
but none have been identical. The
combination of hardware and
software has been selected to meet
each customer's true requirements.
This part of our business is the key
to our success, as satisfied custom-
ers feel confident enough to recom-
mend Computer City.
The best way to take advantage of
our service is to speak to one of our
team. Call into one of our centres,
fill in the coupon, or just ‘phone.
Our team spirit is quite contageous!
Owen MacHargreaves, Doris MacHargreaves, Irene MacFlaxman, Colin MacFairclough
Danny MacFyne, Gill MacBirch, Bill MacPearce, Neil MacRichardson, Wendy MacStanton
Laurence MacWyche, Brenda MacBrown, Jack MacHargreaves
I leam
There’s something very special about them all!
Business Centre
78 Victoria Road
Widnes
Cheshire
Tel: 051-420 3333
ary
el
University Centre
5 Allsop Arcade
Brownlow Hill
Liverpool
Tel: 051-709 5959
i
(CONTENTS
Editorial 2
Special Offers 3
Local Group News 4 Tom Wright
Getting into Shape Pt 2 6 — A.Broadman / G.Keeler
Certificate Maker 10 Ewen Wannop
Elite 12 Neil Gledhill
‘Omnis News 14 Omnis Technical Staff
Local Group Contacts 16 Tom Wright
New Products for the 1IGS 18 Graham Attwood
Hotline News 20 Dave Ward
BookKeeper II 21 Graham Attwood
News from Apple (UK) 2
Swyftware 24 Roger Larcombe
Power Print 26 Harry Gardiner
Apple Ill Pages 2
Look - No Hands 29 Mervyn Evans
Apples for Visually Handicapped 30 Henry Brugsch
Special Education 31 _L. Roy Stringer
Leuers to Editor 33
‘The Locksmith Version 6.0 36 Richard Wilday
Flipper 41 Dave Ward
Autoworks 43. Graham Attwood
Kidstime II GS 44 Graham Attwood
Special Release Software 46,
MacCHAT 47 Norah Amold
Laserworks 50 John & Norah Amold
Let's Rip open the Mac 54 Cliff Wootton
Macputer 512 Plus 59 Ivan Knezovich
Network News. 62
ZEN 64 Irene Flaxman
Dataframe Endorsement 65 Todd Congdon
Backing up your Hard Disk 6 Kevin Thompson
Mice 87 68
Uninvited 69 Darren Chorley
Mac Library Disks 70
Products News 72 Sim Panks
Make it Snappy 73 Keith Chamberlain
Sales Ledger 74 Dave Dillow
Mac Expo 75 Irene & Dave Flaxman
Tempo 79 Richard Wilday
Back Shas Burblings 80
80 Ivan Knozovich
Advertisers
Please support our advertisers and mention
Apple200 when you do - It can be beneficial.
/a 2:1 February oo
Apple2000
P.O.Box 177, St Albans,
Herts AL2 2EG
wiry? Tee
Apple2000™ is a trading name of BASUG Lid, a non-
profit making independent company limited by guarantee.
The front cover artwork
design are by Stefan Mucha.
The contents of this journal are copyright of BASUG Lid
and/or the respective authors. Permission is granted for
non-commercial reproduction providing the author and
source are properly credited and a copy of the relevant
joumal is sent. The opinions and views expressed are
those of the various contributors, and are not necessarily
supported by BASUG.
‘This journal is published bi-monthly by BASUG Lid as a
benefit of membership in February, April, June, August,
October and December. The copy date is the Sth day of
the month preceding publication. Advertising rates are
available on request.
Apple™ and the Apple logo are trademarks of Apple
Computer Inc. Macintosh™ is a trademark of McIntosh
Laboratory Inc and used with the express permission of
the owner. Telecome Gold™ is a trademark of British
Telecom PLC. The FORCE™ and Apple2000™ are
trademarks of BASUG Lid.
\ Printed by Davies Publications Ltd
and Apple2000 logo
Tel: 0932 229533
Computer City Front Inside 2 y
Apple 5 :
Se cock jo
MGA Microsystems u Coming in the April Issue ‘\
DarkStar Systems 17 |
Didtkuhan Technologies B MICE 87 - A PREVIEW
eae 3an3 APPLE IIGS - WHATS NEW
Tate EG: 28 APPLE IIGS-HOT PRODUCT |
lite Software 40 NEWS
ore Pe APPLE I & MACINTOSH
Glanmire Electronics Lid SS REVIEWS
MICE 87 61
MacSoft — SPECIAL OFFERS
MieSariout Back Cover WORKSHOP NEWS
a & Son Insert /)
Apple2000 - February1987 _——— _ 1
#
(EDITORIAL >
Disabled! Who are they? Who cares?
|
The computer is a help in many areas, you the membership
| will use it to make your working life easier and more
productive, or perhaps you use it to entertain when away from
work, The computer is many things to many people and an
area that is often forgotten is that of the disabled person.
The computer as a tool makes the life of the disabled
person more liveable; it makes communication between the
disabled and able-bodied a reality.
| There are many forms of disability, those that strike you
down permanently, and others that occur at irregular intervals
but because of their crippling nature mean no hope of leading a
normal life. A computer in these circumstances can be a life
| saver.
Take for instance the person who has extreme difficulty in
communicating either by voice or writing, the use of a
computer as an interface can be the only way that he or she can
talk to others. Devices have been developed that now let the
most disabled person communicate - it may be by pointing
with a wand or by means of the head or foot using a switch as
an input device. The computer allows the disabled person to
present themselves in a dignified way, after all the computer
printer does not stamp the letter 1 AM DISABLED on its print-
out.
So where does Apple come into this story ? Well Apple
| have produced one of the easiest machines to interface to - its
the Macintosh at the moment, but I am sure the GS will be
next in line.By making things easy it ensures that the disabled
user Can concentrate on producing the result.
It is a sad fact that most disabled are unable to afford an
Apple. Apple (UK) can help, but pricing policy and the mine
field of deciding who would qualify makes the whole issue a
‘hot-potato'. Hopefully this can be resolved in the near future so
that more of the disabled can benifit from modern technology -.
The 'in machine’ appears to be the Macintosh, so lets see Apple
show how they care, they will win in the end - you should sec
| the publicity that BIT32 have had with the Headstart system!
| [hope you all enjoyed the festive season, roll on summer.
\ ON ec WS
Jim Panks
Xs (— ABOUT...
a
fe
Me
i Contributions
i Please send any Apple related articles, tips cic to The
% Editor at the P.O.Box. or on BT GOLD 84:BSG041
Next Issue.......
Copy Date Sth March 1987
Articles preferred on disk (any Apple format).
_Ask for our ‘Guide for Contributors’
2
)
Settling down to the New Year,
Machines and what-have-you !
Welcome to the New Year with Apple2000 and a brand new
cover, you will also see that this is the largest issue so far.
In the future we will be featuring. April Issue: Mice 87.
June Issue: DTP and Word Processing on all Apple
Machines.
We could do with more help and hope to have a system
where any member can contribute to the common good. We
are setting up a new editing system where we can have a
number of Reviewers, Copy Readers and Sub-Editors all
doing a portion of the total work. This would take the strain
off the present management team and allow them to
organise other events. If you can help, drop us a line if you
haven't already.
Response to the questions on the renewal forms was
overwhelming and | would like to thank all who took the
trouble. As a direct result of the replies received we are re-
inwoducing a workshop programme. If you did not get a
response form last issue, we enclose one this time. Please
complete it so that your voice is heard in our planning for
future activities.
The calendar is filling up quickly; we have the Which
Computer Show in February, followed in March by the
Apple 87 Show at Bewdley. April sees a Mac Expo in
Rotterdam (we are arranging a day-trip) followed by the
MICE 87 Show in May (Sce special offer in this issue).
Expect to see some new Apple products launched in the
first quarter (American term for soon!) of this year. New
machines are expected to be ‘up market’, i.e. pushing the
price of the Mac Plus down and putting a work station like
machine as the Apple flagship. I do not expect the new
machine/s to be cheap, a few years ago Apple launched the
Lisa (Light Years ahead of the rest) and that cost a small
fortune !
I look forward to seeing many of you at the Apple 87
Show on March 21st or the AGM on April 4th, where there
could be some surprises !
The Editorial Team
Editor Jim Panks
Macintosh Editor Norah Amold
Assistant Editors Graham Attwood
Keith Chamberlain
Ivan Knezovich
Photography David Davies
Advertising Julic Panks
2 5 ____ Apple2000 - February1987
h.
et
JRS
Software at US Prices!
Micol Basic
Micol Basic is THE structured, compiled BASIC
for the Apple II range - it also runs on the GS,
if you use BASIC and are thinking of a GS you
can be assured that this is the one for you.
We will be offering an UPGRADE to a new
version especially for the GS native mode in
the early summer,
Order your Micol now at special prices and find
out just how good it is and if you decide to
upgrade to a GS we will ensure that you get the
now version at a very reasonable cost.
Micol Basic £59.80
Micol Assembler
We have a really superb Assembler editor (for
the II series) that will not cost you an arm and
a leg - you can get it for the same price as the
States if you order it quickly. Yes this full
feature editor/assembler will cost you exactly
8 plus £2.00 postage and the usual VAT.
Macintosh Programmers
‘Get the POWER without the
PRICE'
Special Offers. on the following software
packages which are the latest release versions
and include the usual back-up etc.
Lightspeed Pascal (normally £115) £95
Lightspeed C (normally £165 ) £140
‘Mac Nosey V.2 (normally £80) £65
This is a fantastic offer which could save you
your membership fee - remember to add VAT
and we will pay the Postage and Packing.
Please allow 14 days for delivery.
MacPlus Port Conversion with
our new Hardware add-on.
Convert both Printer and Comms from the
new plugs to the old and add a neat Thunderscan
power supply with our special piece of
hardware, Members can save pounds so why not
order now. Price £25.00 inc VAT
Power Supply £7.00 extra inc VAT @
Winter Reading.
Getting the Most from your Apple II
Me He by Graham Keeler
Macintosh User's Handbook by Weber
These popular books now available
Apple2000 members at £6.75 inc P&P
to
Hard Disk Price
DOWN
Move on up to an
‘Apple2000 Hard Drive’
and really start using your
Apple Il, +, e or MacPlus.
A SCSI 20 Meg Hard Drive as used by
this journal. Your's for an amazing price
of £550 + VAT.
The latest version of this British made
Drive is now available and will make
your Apple II* +,e, GS or MacPlus
‘Come Alive’. For less than the the
Price of two 800k external drives you can
have 20 Megabytes of fast disk storage.
Send your order NOW. @
* Il +08 GS requires Apple SCSI
card available at £69 + VAT
Add a 'Megabyte' to your
MacPlus with the 'MacSnap'
Upgrade.
Easy to install IMB cards give you a useful
2MB of RAM and it gives you more ‘Switching’
room. Complete with sofiware to load your
system etc into a RAMDISK and then eject the
internal disk! (As used and reviewed in this
joumal.)
We can offer this excellent POWER USERS
upgrade for only £299.00 + £5.00 Postage +
VAT. Also available 4MB upgrade for
£1299.00 + VAT e
Communications Products
PRICES DOWN
Data Highway: Communications
Software for Apple II £54
Nightingale: 1200/75 300/300
Modem with Data Highway
Mastercard: Serial Card with
Nightingale & Data Higway £195
Palette: Colour Card with Mastercard,
Nightingale & Data Highway £254
Linnet: v21 & V23 speed buffered
auto dial/answer modem £136
Series Four: V21 & V23 modem
upgradeable to V22 & V22bis £259
£146
All above comms prices include VAT &
Postage
Apple2000 - February1987
ACT 3.5 inch Disks at a STEAL
I did not mean to swear in our journal but the
prices are reasonable and the Mac & GS will use
ACT disks - they look nice in orange - only a
limited quantity so order NOW 1!!!
SS/DD 10 disks £18.50
DS/DD 10 disks £26.00
Apple //e plusRAM
256k card with onboard expansion
to IMB
PlusRAM is made in the U.K. and comes with
256k RAM fitted and sockets to bring it upto a
full Megabyte. Extend your Appleworks desktop
upto 1012k, have over $000 records or very
large word processor files
Fully compatible with all standard Apple Il
programs.Automatically recognised by ProDOS,
CP/M Plus, Pascal - use directly with Pinpoint,
Mouse and PFS series.
Normal Price £99.00 but Apple2000_ members
can save by sending only £80.00 + £2.00
Postage + VAT
Show 87
BEWDLEY |
March 21st 1987 |
BOOK NOW
LIMITED SPACE
‘Hardware at a SOFT
PRICE..."
Clock Card for I+ & //e.
The GE Clock Card comes complete with
Utilities to allow use under Pro-DOS, DOS 3.3
and Pascal, Normally retailing at £95 we can
offer this to members at £29.00 + £2 Postage
and VAT.
64k/80 Column Card for //e
This card emulates the Apple Card and is useful
when using AppleWorks ..... Usually priced at
£69 we offer it at £29.00 + £2 Postage and
VAT. @
640k High Density Disk Drive.
Uses the normal disk controller card and gives
4.5 times the storage of a normal drive, It will
also read low density disks.
Usuall priced at £290 we offer it for a mere
£199.00 + £5.00 Postage and VAT.
S12k Card for the //e
Massive memory available at a stupid price
Yes you can now increase your memory from
64k to 576k and also get an 80 column
display.
With ‘utilities to allow use under DOS 3,3,
ProDOS, Pascal and CP/M. Why pay the normal
price of £249 when we can offer it at £199.00
+ £2.00 Postage and VAT.
3.
‘ Local Group
News
by Tom Wright
\
~
A shorter column this month (who said thank goodness ?), duc
to ‘earning a crust’ taking more of my time, and pressure on
column space.
The number of identified local groups continues to grow and
this month we welcome MacTaff (South Wales Mac Group) and
the Apple If Programmers Club to our circle of friends.
I have managed to visit two groups since writing the last
column, and Ike will have visited another by the time you read
this. Hopefully I'll be able to visit more in the not too distant
future, not just to meet my responsibility as compiler of this
column, but also to find out what help we can all offer each
other and to continue my own education which is helped
enormously by the visits (knew I'd have a selfish motive
somewhere didn't you ).
APPLE Il PROGRAMMERS CLUB
Philip Dixon is based in Hexham so his initiative should be
doubly welcome to all Apple users in that area as it's the first
group opportunity that we've found in Northumberland. The club
Started recently on a basis of four newsletters per year,
concentrating on Assembler and BASIC programming; Philip is
now interested in helping to bring Apple users together with
regular meetings ctc. Please contact Philip to let him know that
you are interested and whether or not you are prepared to help
with club organization (not a demanding task if dutics can be
shared between several people). All Apple users are invited to
join in, Congratulations on the initiative Philip.
MACTAFF - will have held three meetings by the time this
column appears. Lorraine Thornback (group secretary) tells me
that AppleCentre South Wales provides the venue for the group
and that the
group's formation is due to the initiative of people within that
company. The group is the first that we are aware of in Wales
and its formation must be good news for Apple users in range of
Cardiff. All Apple users are welcome.
EAST OF SCOTLAND APPLE USERS
GROUP
- reported in the last column as the Edinburgh group had its first |
meeting in November at Proteus Micro Systems in Edinburgh,
the large number of people attending were rewarded with an
excellent venue and friendly hospitality by Proteus. Didn't waste
any time this lot, committee members were elected during the
first. meeting ! The second meeting in December was also
attended by representatives from two of the other Apple dealers
in Edinburgh who are displaying support for the IIGS in Scotland
as well as a presentation of the new Guide Software for the
Macintosh by Tan Ritchie (Office Workstations Ltd). The
January meeting featured Pagemaker and D.T.P at MacQueen
Systems premi The committee are considering a range of
interesting topics for future meetings, and it is possible that a
competition will be run to provide a name for the group. My
thanks to everybody there for a very enjoyable evening.
Contact Adam Gilinsky to confirm venue before you go along.
GATEWAY COMPUTER CLUB - | managed to attend
their Family Computing day in November and was very
impressed by their organization and friendliness. Anybody in the |
Mildenhall area who doesn't at least try this club "wants their
hammers" as my relations would say, it's a great facility and the
amount of help and advice available there is impressive. Only
problem that I had there was that when I tried to spend money
(yes it does happen occasionally) most people started to talk
about some lady called Dolores Sense, very odd. ‘The
development of Apple machines was very well displayed by the
presence of Apple Il, III, Lisa, Macintosh, and IIGS, a very
interesting experience.
The club's chairman is now known as Bob MacHall since his
fingers became fused to the keyboard of his recently acquired
Macintosh. One of the displays included a video of U.S T.V
commercials for Apple, might sound a bit odd but I found the
range of advertising that it showed not to mention the variety of
Apple Tea shirts fascinating. I strongly recommend that
anybody in the arca gives Bob a call to arrange to go along to a
meeting.
CAMBRIDGE APPLE USER GROUP - this group is
firmly established, the organiser of their original venue has
gone off to dig up another Tootandcars so the meetings are
flexible so be sure to phone Ian Archibald before going to a
meeting. The range of Apple experience between the members is
fairly extensive so it is likely that most people can leam
something from them, as well as contributing to the group.
MIDAPPLE ~- may have produced the first rainbow coloured
newsletter in the U.K in December using a IIGS and an
Imagewriter, The GS was loaned by Apple U.K. We have a steady
growth in membership and have the use of an excellent venue
which is well provided with Apples. Most of the members use
Apple Il models with three of them having acquired the GS,
several members are Macintosh users.
HERTS & BEDS GROUP - continues to provide a varied
range of topics for members and is well worth a look by
anybody in their area.
Out of time and space now so that's it for this issue. We
have plenty to look forward to in 1987 already with the list of
shows beginning to appear, don't miss Ike's Apple Jamboree at
Bewdley it sounds as if it's going to be even better than last
yea. ©
Annual General
Meeting
1330 hours
Saturday 4th April 1987
West Midland Safari Park
Bewdley, Worcestershire.
The time has come once again for the Annual General
Meeting of the Group. This year we hope you will come
along to hear what we have done over the last year and to
hear about what we have planned for the next .
We will hold the meeting at the West Midland Safari Park at
1.30pm. sharp. Prior to the meeting we will be having some
short demos on new software and hardware for the Mac and
IIGS. The latest in music will be shown by Greengate. You
may even have a chance to see first hand how the journal is
put together with a special DTP session.
No charge to get in - just come along
YOU WILL BE WELCOME.
All members will have received the official notification with
the accounts, if you have not received them please write or
phone the Office A.S.A.P.
4 Apple2000 - February1987
~ Introducing
the all singing
all dancing
Apple IIs
his is the second part of our article on shape tables, and
this time we shall describe the use of shape tables, and
give the generator program for creating shape tables
simply.
Drawing the shape
Drawing and manipulating the shapes uses the convenient
commands DRAW, XDRAW, SCALE and ROT. Priefly,
DRAW and XDRAW are the commands which actuaily create
the shape on the screen and they aved corour, rotation and scale
to be set first. They operate as follows:
DRAW n AT x,y
draws, in high resolution graphics, the nth shape from your
shape table with x,y being the position on the screen of the
starting point of the definition of the shape. It is for this
reason that it is often best to start a shape from its centre. The
restrictions are 0 < n < 255 and x,y must be somewhere on the
graphics area, XDRAW n AT x,y performs exactly the same
function as DRAW but in a complementary colour to that
already on the screen; in high resojucion graphics the Apple
colour palette is
Complementary colour |
| Colour
| Black [ White I
|_White ( Black |
| Violet | Green |
[Orange | Blue
| Green | Violet
|. Blue Orange |
There are two uses of XDRAW. If the original shape is
drawn in white on a black background, then XDRAW gives a
simple method of erasure. On the other hand, if the screen
already has a partiy coloured (or white) background, the shape
should be created with XDRAW, and it will show up whatever
the background. For instance, it will appear as a black
silhouette on any portion of white background. A second
XDRAW will then effectively erase the shape, leaving the
background intact. This procedure should always be used if you
want to be able to erase a shape from a multicoloured
background. You cannot draw a specifically coloured shape
with XDRAW - it draws in the inverse of the colour (or
colours) already on the screen (e.g. violet on a green
background).
6 ______ Apple2000 - Felruaryi987_—
GETTING INTO SHAPE WITH YOU
APPLE -
Allan Boardman and Graham Keeler
Department of Pure and Applied Physics, University of Salford
PART 2
The manipulation command ROT=m rotates a shape by an
angle proportional to m where 0 < m < 255, and such that, for
example, m = 16 corresponds to a 90 degree rotation. Thus a
maximum of 64 rotational positions are available and higher
values of m are treated modulo 64. m = 0 corresponds to no
rotation at all, m = 8 is a 45 degree rotation and beyond m = 15
each increase of 16 adds 90 degrees. The command SCALE (to
be discussed in detail below) has an influence on these rotations
and it is very important, at this stage, to state that a ROT
command must be used that is valid for the chosen SCALE
command, otherwise false results can be produced. SCALT = |
allows 4 rotations in steps of 90 degrees (360/4 = 90 degrees),
SCALE = 2 allows 45 degree rotations and so on. The number
of rotations doubles each time and the 64 rotations of 5.625
degrees achieved with SCALE = 5 is the maximum that is
available.
The actual SCALE maniputation command is, at face value,
somewhat deceptive. Its format is:
SCALE = S
with the restriction 0 < S < 255 (n.b. SCALE - 0 gives the
maximum size as if S had the value 256 and is the default
value. This point should be watched for since it is unlikely to
be the vaiue you want. You should always set SCALE before
drawing a shape). The action of this manipulation command is
as follows
one pixe! lit up for each plotting vector
one pixel left unfit for each non-plotting vector
S=2 two pixels lit up for each plotting vecior
two pixels left unlit for each non-plotting vector
S-=n:' n pixels lit up for each plotting vector
n pixels left unlit for each non-plotting vector
A restriction is that the shape must not overflow the screen
size.
The action of the SCALE command is not, as might have
been expected, to plot the shape on a larger scale. The effect is
much more complicated, a fact that, as we shall now see,
makes the SCALE command of somewhat limited use.
Suppose we consider the square again. {t is made up of four
plotting vectors. Each plotting vector, for SCALF =
up one pixel so that the pixel appearance on this, tie lowest
expandable memory
— low
price!
256K to 1 Megabyte from only £99!
plusRAM plugs into any standard slot in your Apple II, I+, //e or //GS for instant memory
expansion. AND IT DOESN’T END THERE!
The cost may be low but the performance is high — just compare plusRAM’s
features with any other RAMcard, then check out the price!
@ plusRAM is fully socketed ready for extra
memory. Expand plusRAM from 256K to
512K, 768K or even 1 Megabyte. 256K
expansion kits are available from Cirtech for
only £20.00.
@ plusRAM is used by all standard Apple II
programs like a super-fast disk drive. Boost the
performance of your software to electronic
speeds!
ULTIMATE APPLEWORKS ENHANCEMENT!
Not only does plusRAM boost your other programs,
it positively supercharges Appleworks 1.3 and 2.0!
@ plusRAM extends the AppleWorks desktop up to
1012K
@ Lets you use your AppleMouse with AppleWorks
@ Automatically divides large files to several disks
™@ Increases the maximum number of database
records and word processor lines to over 6000
(vers. 2.0).
@ Lets you run Appleworks 1.3 on the Ii+.
AND UNIQUE TO plusRAM, AN AMAZING NEW FEATURE:
@ An ON-SCREEN, MULTI-FUNCTION CALCULATOR
which pops up instantly within AppleWorks any
time you need to use it!
FOR PERFORMANCE AND PRICE,
plusRAM CAN’T BE BEATEN
@ No other RAMcard supports more software.
plusRAM is automatically recognised by
ProDOS, Pascal 1.3, Cirtech CP/M Plus and
comes complete with full support for DOS 3.3,
CP/M 2.20b/2.23 and Pascal 1.1/1.2.
l@ Designed to the Apple memory expansion card
standard to guarantee software compatibility.
@ Designed and manufactured by Cirtech in the
UK, plusRAM has a full 12 month warranty.
Disk Disk 1 (Slot 6) MAIN MENU.
Fain Menu
2. Work with one o
3. Save DeskTop ft
4 Remove files fro
5. Other Activities}
6 Quit
(Prices exclude VAT)
CIRTECH (UK) LIMITED, Currie Road Industrial Estate, Galashiels
Selkirkshire, Scotland, TD1 2BP Telephone (0896) 57790
Telex 265871 (Attn. 84:CPD001)-Telecom Gold Source Mailbox -AAH555
(GS, AvoleWorts, AgpleMouse, ProO0S and O0S3.3 ae registered tragemaks of Apple Computer Ine
ciarece
ed trademarks af Digital Reseoich Ine
CPM ae
scale, is
where four adjacent pixels are illuminated. Here the changes in
the inclination of the shading is an attempt to show vector direc-
tion as we go around the square.
If a larger scale, say SCALE = 3, is specified the effect on
each vector, plotting or non-plotting, is TO GENERATE 3
LIT OR UNLIT PIXELS IN THE PLOTTING DIRECTOR
OF THAT VECTOR. The original square shape then becomes
This shape is, of course, still a square. What then is
happening in terms of pixels? The SCALE = 1 effect is the
one that we were assuming at the beginning of this article, but
for example, with SCALE = 3
ee -
where we now see that with SCALE = N the plotting vector
moves on and leaves a trail of N lit pixels behind it. Similarly
a non-plotting vector leaves a trail of unlit pixels behind it.
The situation becomes less satisfactory with a more complex
initial shape such as
==
If the origin is at the centre of the shape this is really the set of
vectors
Here if this shape is plotted in the same position but with,
successively, SCALE = 1 and SCALE = 2 the following figure
will be produced:
==
The limitation of the SCALE command is perhaps most
vividly shown with a diagonal line. Suppose that a line is
plotted by the vectors:
ti
hs
=
The operation of the SCALE command is such that for
SCALE = 1 the line appears as
whereas with SCALE = 3 its appearance is
—___B
]
We see that for SCALE = 1 this gives the required diagonal
line, but for SCALE = 3 the shape is turned into a series of
horizontal lines. Thus the use of the SCALE command is
extremely limited, especially for a beginner, unless a great deal
of time and effort is expended. The main immediate use of
shape tables, and their great flexibility, is in defining a SCALE
= 1 shape that can be plotted repeatedly, or at any chosen point
on the screen,
8 Apple2000 - February1987
Using the shape table generator program
You can now try your hand by using the program listed here
to generate any shape that you desire. This program was first
published in Graham Keeler's book, ‘Getting the Most from
your Apple Il/Ie/IIc’, published by Addison Wesley, and is
reproduced with their permission.
The program can be used in either of two ways. If you draw
out your shape on squared paper, it can be entered by specifying
each plotting vector in turn, Alternatively, you can enter a
shape and watch it drawn directly on to the screen. In this case
you must specify the starting position, but this can of course
be changed when you draw the shape later.
With either method, mistakes can be cancelled, any number
of shapes can be drawn, and when completed they are entered,
complete with the pointer at $E8 and $E9, and are also saved to
disc if required. The problem of upward non-plotting vectors is
dealt with. The shape table is also listed to the screen in case
you wish to enter it by hand.
Remember that if you reload the shape table at a later date,
the pointer to the shape table must be set again.
The graphics method will also help you understand better
just how the plotting and non-plotting vectors work - you will
see the flashing cursor moving about the screen, leaving its
trail of lit (or unlit) pixels behind it.
Finally, to demonstrate the use of shape tables, a small
program is given that enters our second shape into memory at
address $300 by a series of POKE commands, sets the pointers
and demonstrates the plotting of shapes by plotting repeatedly
with different values of SCALE to produce an attractive pattern
on the screen.
Shape Table Generator ——
5 LOMEM: 17000
10 ‘TEXT : HOME :NX - 0
20 DIM X(2000), ¥ (1000)
30 PRINT "THIS PROGRAM GENERATES A SHAPE TABLE": PRINT
40 PRINT “IN HEXADECIMAL FORM.“: PRINT
50 PRINT “DO YOU WISH TO:": PRINT ‘
60 PRINT 1) SPECIFY PLOTTING VECTORS": PRINT
70 PRINT "2) DRAW SHAPE ON THE SCREEN": PRINT ; PRINT
80 PRINT "PRESS 1 OR 2:- "7: GET CH
90 IF CH <1 OR CH > 2 THEN PRINT “RESPONSE NOT RECOCNIZED";
HOME : GOTO 50
95 HOME
100 1 CH = 1 THEN GOTO 300
105 VTAB 8
110 PRINT "WHERE WOULD YOU LIKE THE STARTING POINT*: PRINT
120 PRINT "ON THE SCREEN2": PRINT
130 INPUT “X COORDINATE? (0-279) "7X: PRINT
140 INPUT *Y COORDINATE? (0-159) “:¥
145 KOLD ~ X:YOLD ~ ¥
150 HOME
155 PRINT "MOVE THE CURSOR WITH THE DIRECTIONAL": PRINT
160 PRINT “KEYPAD KEYS, I, J, K, M"z PRINT
165 PRINT "TO PLOT FUTURE MOVES, TYPE P“: PRINT
170 PRINT “TO MOVE WITHOUT PLOTTING, TYPE N*: PRINT
178 PRINT "TO PLOT THE PREVIOUS MOVE ONLY, TYPE S*: PRINT
180 PRINT "TO CANCEL A CURSOR MOVE, TYPE C": PRINT
190 PRINT “TO END THE TABLE, TYPE Q*
195 PRINT : PRINT 3 PRINT
200 PRINT "PRESS ANY KEY TO CONTINUE": GET AS
210 HOME ; HGR : HCOLOR~ 3: VTAB 22
220 GOTO 400
300 PRINT “FOR EACH VECTOR, SPECIFY VECTOR MOTION“: PRINT
310 PRINT “BY THE INITIAL LETTER, AS FOLLOWS:": PRINT
320 INVERSE : PRINT “U";: NORMAL : PRINT "B/";: INVERSE
PRINT "D":: NORMAL : PRINT “OWN/";: INVERSE ; PRINT “L*;:
NORMAL : PRINT "EPT/";: INVERSE : PRINT "R";: NORMAL : PRINT
“IGHT"
325 PRINT
330 PRINT “THEN SPECIFY WHETHER VECTOR IS TO BE": PRINT
340 PRINT "PLOTTED": PRINT : PRINT
350 PRINT "TO CANCEL AN ENTRY, TYPE C": PRINT
360 PRINT "TO END THE TABLE, TYPE Q*
370 PRINT : PRINT : PRINT
400 1-0
410 ON CH GOSUB 1000, 2000
420 IF LEPTS (PS,1) ~ "Q" THEN GOTO 430
425 IF I> = 0 THEN X(I) - F
428 I - 1 + 1: COTO 410
430 TEXT : HOME
500 PRINT : PRINT "CALCULATING - PLEASE WAIT" ©
5059-0
510 FORV=0 TOT
$20 IF A~ 2 AND (X(V) = 0 OR X{V) > 3) THEN A = 0:0 = 0+ 1
525 IF X(V) > 0 THEN GOTO 550
530 IF X(V +1) > 0 AND X(v + 1) < 4 THEN GOTO 550
535 IFA +1 THEN A= 0:0-Q+1
$40 IF X(V + 2) > 0 AND X(V + 2) < 4 THEN GOTO 550
542 REM CAN'T END BYTE WITH UP NON PLOTTING VECTORS, AS THEY
WILT, BE TGNORED
544 ¥(Q) = 128:Q = Q + 1: GOTO 580
546 REM 2 UPS AND 1 DOWN FOR 1 UP
550 Y(Q) = ¥(Q) + X(V) * (8 * A)
560A = As 1
$70 IF A> 2 THEN A= 0:0=Q+1
$80 NEXT V
585 IF Y(0) > 0 THENQ - Q + 1:¥(Q) - 0
588 HOME
$90 PRINT“ SHAPE TABLE": PRINT
600 PRINT “BYTE NO."; SPC( 6);"VALUE": PRINT
610 FORV = 0 T0Q
620 HIGHS = Y(V) / 16
630 LOWS = Y(V) - HIGHS * 16
640 IF HIGHS > 9 THEN HIGHS ~ HIGHS + 7
650 IF LOWS > 9 THEN LOWS = LOWS + 7
660 PRINT SPC( 3)7Vs SPC( 16 - POS (0)); CHRS (HIGHS + 176);
CHRS (LOWS + 176)
665 IF INT ({V + 1) / 18) * 18 = V + 1 THEN PRINT : PRINT
"PRESS ANY KEY TO CONTINUE LISTING GET AS: PRINT : PRINT
670 NEXT V
672 PRINT :
675 IF NX >
680 PRINT :
690 PRINT
PRINT "PRESS ANY KEY TO CONTINUE
0 THEN GOTO 600
PRINT “DO YOU WANT TO LOAD SHAPE TABLE”
3: PRINT “INTO MEMORY? (Y/N) “ys: GET AS
700 If AS = “N" THEN END
710 IF AS < > "¥" THEN COTO 680
720 PRINT : PRINT
730 INPUT “HOW MANY SHAPES TO GO INTO TABLE? ":NX
740 PRINT : INPUT “TYPE START ADDRESS IN DECIMAL: "7AD
750 Al = AD + 2: REM ADDRESS FOR ADDRESSES
GET AS: HOME
760 HI8 = AD / 256:LO¥ ~ AD - HI€ * 256: POKE 232,LO¥: POKE
233,H1®
770 POKE AD, NX
780 POKE AD + 1,0
190 AO = AD + 2.* NX + 2: REM START OF TABLES PROPER
800 HIS = (AO - AD) / 256:LO¥ ~ (AQ - AD) - HI® * 256
810 POKE A1,LOt: POKE Al + 1,HIS:Al = Al + 2
820 FORV= 0 TOQ
830 POKE AO,Y(V)7A0 = AO + 1
840 NEXT V
860 NX = NX - 1: IF NX> 0 THEN COTO 870
861 HOME : VTAB 10: HTAB 1: PRINT “DO YOU WANT TO SAVE SHAPE
TABLE”
862 PRINT : PRINT “TO DISC? (¥/N) “7: GET AS
863 IF AS = "N" THEN END
864 IF A9 < > “Y" THEN PRINT CHRS (7);: COTO 861
865 PRINT : PRINT : INPUT “TYPE FILE NAME FOR TABLE: “;NMS
066 PRINT CHRS (4);"BSAVE ";NMS:",A"ZAD;",L"7A0 - AD + 1: END
870 FOR V = 0 TO Q:¥(V) ~ 0: NEXT V
880 FOR V = 0 TO I:x(v) = O: NEXT V
890 HOME ; GOTO SO
1000 PRINT “VECTOR ";I + 1;
1010 PRINT "VECTOR MOTION: U/D/L/R OR C OR QO ?
2
4
om
o
Apple2000 - February1987 9
1015 PRINT
1020 F- -12
1030 IF LEFTS (FS,1) = “U* THEN F = 0
1040 IF LEFTS (F$,1) = "RY THEN F = 1
0 IF LEPTS (FS,1) = "D" THEN F = 2
IF LEETS (FS,1) = "L" THEN F = 3
IP LEPTS (FS,1) - “Q" THEN RETURN
IF LEFTS (FS,1) = "C” THEN T = I = 1: GOTO 1000
IF F <0 THEN PRINT "RESPONSE NOT RECOGNIZED “: COTO
PRINT “PLOT
PRINT
IF LEFTS (PS,1) = "Y* THEN F « F + 4: RETURN
IP LEPTS (P$,1) ~ "N" THEN RETURN
PRINT “RESPONSE NOT RECOGNIZED “: GOTO 1100
VTAB 22: HTAB I
INVERSE z PRINT “I,J,K,M MOVE CURSOR <P> PLOT <N>
oPLoT”
PRINT “<S> SINGLE PT <C> CANCEL MOVE <Q> QUI’
PRINT *
VTAB 24: HTAB 1
T “CURSOR MOVE:
HCOLOR= 0: HPLO
IF 2 < 128 THEN HCOLOR=
HTAB 14
PRINT CHRS (2)7
CHRS (2 - 126)
PEEK (49168): REM
Tf FS = “Q* THEN RETURN
VECTOR? {¥/N) ";: GET PS
NORMAL
HTAB 1
: FLASH ; PRINT “ “;: NORMAL
EEK (99132)
HPLOT X,¥: GOTO 2030
CLEAR KEYBOARD FLAC
2 IF FS = "1" THEN YOLO = Y:y = ¥ = 1:X0ID = %:F = 044 *
PL: HCOLOR~ 3 * PL: HPLOT XOLD,YOLD: HCOLOR- 0: RETURN
2105 IF FS = "J* THEN XOLD = X:X = X - 1:YOID = YiF = 3+ 4%
3* PL: HPLOT XOLD,YOLD: HCOLOR= 0: RETURN
= “KY THEN XOLD - X:X - X + 1:YOLD = ¥:F = 1+ 4 *
3." PL: HPLOT XOLD,YOLD: HCOLOR= 0:
= "M" THEN YOLD = ¥:¥ = ¥ + 1:XOLD te
3.* PL: HPLOT XOLD,YOLD: HCOLOR= 0: RETURN
- THEN PL = = I - 1: RETURN
- THEN PL = = I - 1: RETURN
- AND I > 2 AND PL = 0 THEN = F + 4:1 = 1 -
LOT MOLD, YOLD; HCOLOR~ 0: RETURN
AND T > 1 THEN T = T = 1: RETURN
“C” THEN GOSUB 3000: COTO 2000
HTAB 1: PRINT “RESPONSE NOT RECOGNI7FO";: FOR W
NEXT : GOTO 2000
= 0 THEN RETURN
1 = 1: HCOLOR= 0: HPLOT x,¥
> 3 THEN X(Z) = X{I) - 4
=O THENY = ¥ +
~ 1 THEN X= x -
a
2THENY =Y-1
IF X(I) = 3 THENX = X41
RETURN
Shape Demo Program
12 POKE 768,2: POKE 769,0: POKE 770.4: POKE 771,0: REM SHAPE
DIRECTORY
20 POKE 772,18: POKE 773,31; POKE 774,32: POKE 775,68; REM
SHAPE TABLE PROPER
POKE 776,109: POKE 777,50: POXE 778,214: POKE 779,7
KE 780,0: REM NULL BYTE TO END TABLE
KE 232,0: POKE 233,3: REM SET POINTER TO SHAPE TABLE
30
60 HGR
10 HCOLOR= 3
80 ROT= 0
90 FOR
M=1 70 30
™
AT 140,80
. —¢
For those that dislike typing.
Progam listings are placed on a disk in'the library
or can be downloaded from
The Force < or > BABBS 1.
Certificate
Maker
By Ewen Wannop
From the makers of Newsroom, we have an addition to their
growing range of software. Like the former, this has a jokey
feel to the whole package, using a particular kind of graphics
that I am personally not fond of. However there is a serious
side to the program that will find many uses. The entire and
only purpose of the program is to make certificates of various
kinds.
‘The program comes on two double sided protected discs, and
is housed in a plastic book sized box, with a 72 page manual.
The program is so easy to use, that in fact the manual is nearly
all taken up with an index to the 220 templates provided. This
is very necessary, as most of the four sides of the discs are
filled with the templates. The templates range from the funny
to the useful and serious, from the 'Mr. Know-It-All Award’ to
a range of Certificates suitable for school or club use. To fully
use these templates, you can setup a ‘Name’ file to in effect
mail-merge into the prepared certificate from a list of names.
The program is workmanlike, and is menu driven in the form
of Newsroom or Printshop. You will be asked various
questions as you proceed, allowing you to select from the 220
blank certificates. You then select from a range of 24 borders
and 5 fonts the style you want. Depending on the blank you
have chosen, you now enter the title and choose once again the
font for the body text. Finally you enter any details for a ‘Date’
line and a 'Signature' line. The certificate is now printed out on
a standard 11 * 8 sheet of paper.
Many printers are supported, many I have not even heard of.
An editor is provided to build and service the Name files, and
finally 36 coloured stickers are provided to give the certificate
that individual look.
This is a workmanlike program which is ideal for school or
club use.
Certificate Maker requires a 64K Il+ or a//e or //c. @
Review Copy supplied by: MGA MicroSystems,
140 High Sueet, Tenterden, Kent TN30 GHT. Price £44.99
3 THE
WORDSMITH |
The creative writer's magazine.
Published bi-monthly and costing only £6.75 per
annum, The Wordsmith allows writer's to
keep up with the ‘electronic age’.
Send your cheque for £6.75 to:
The Wordsmith, The Old House, Church Road,
Kennington, Ashford, Kent TN24 9DQ
10
Apple2000 - February1987_
oe = yy
AMEROPROSE iS NEW PRODUCTS
ELECTHONIC ARTS
KeyPlayer (AppleWorks 2.0 Macros) 44.99
aN bl 4 NewsRoom Clip Art Disk 3 25.99
ENTERTAINMENT Print Shop - New Enchanced 64K version 39,99
— wipreview design, save design, colour print reverse print.
MGA Game Packs 1-11 each 9.99 Print Shop Sports Library (Epyx) 19,99
any 2 for 14.99 / any 4 for 24.99 Print Shop Holidays Library (Broderbund) 19.99
(incls. 10 new fonts/14 new borders + 12 full-screen greenies)
Ghostbusters/Startrek-Kobiashi each 29.99 Print Shop “Off the Wall” Library (Epyx)
Capt. GoodnighVKarateka/Championship Print Shop MiniPix 2/3 (Beagle) cach oi =
Lode Runner/Startrek-Prometheus (All MiniPix packages include an screen-capture editor to make
your own Print Shop logos from standard hi-res screens)
Hacker I/Colossus 4 Chess each 26.09 Print Shop Lover's Utility Set (BRAC) 23.99
Beagle Screens (hi-res screens plus fonts) 29.99
Hackerl/NATO Commander each 21.70 Beagle Compiler (ProDOS AppleSott Compiler) 64,99
Silent Service/Conflict in Vietnam MGA GamoPack 1239 (122 great games) 24.99
Crusade in Europe ArcticFox (Electronic Arts) - SkyFox follow-up 28.99
Webster's Spell-Checker (ProDOS) 54,99
F-15. Strike Eagle 19.09 AirHeart (Broderbund) The first of a new 29.99
breed of 128K double hi-res 3-D action games
Solo Flight (Simulator)/Elite each 17.35 Science Toolkit Earthquake Lab (Broderbund) 34.99
Standing Stones/The Bard's Tale Build-a-Book (Scarborough) 23,99
Movie Maker/Music Construction Set 3.5" Disk Drive Head loaner (CKC) 9.95
Adventure Construction Set i
Pinball Constraction Sev/Archon II PRICES EXCLUDE PP2VAT EOE
Skyfox 15.61 : ,
>)
Archon I: The Light & the Dark each 14.95 MGS Products
‘Super Boulder Dash (original + BD 1)
Age of Adventure (The return of Heracles, Please ask for our 20% page Info-pack detalling
i Baba & the Fi i
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PRICES EXCLUDE PPIVAT E&OE J becoming available for IIGS J
MGA MICROSYSTEMS ~ ASK FOR OUR EXTENSIVE CATALOGUE.
nike - ACCESS ORDERS WELCOME. Tel: 05806 4278
140 HIGH STREET, TENTERDEN, Software Postage: UK - £1.50 + 50p/Extra Item
KENT, TN30 6HT ENGLAND To max. £3.50 + 15% VAT. Overseas just £5,00
Hrs: 11.00 - 1900. Callers by Appt any size (Not Paper) for Air Mail. E.&O.E.
‘ VC
SPECIAL OFFERS COLOUR SUPPLIES
PAPER - 11 14x9.5" micropert
Bee ume Clock Pius ated i nee PAPER PACK - $0 wach
it ML
AppleWorks/ThunderClock compatible battery-backed clock card ee rgero het pea 8 SIAR rb al OO
RAM Speech Synthesizer Card 29.99 ESD 3-COLOUR RAINBOW PASTEL PACK - 40 each Won ein pu 25 anveps
SAM Compatible -Why pay 70.00 or more? ih each colour
PlusRAM 256K memory expansion card 84.99 RE ON co TEN
PrintMaster - low cost PrintShop clone 94.99 MGA SINGLE COLOUR PASTEL BOX{000) £20.09
NewsRoom-NewsLetter printer w/graphies 34.74 aici ae ee :
RIBBONS - RED/GREEN/BLUE/BROWN/BLACK
Golour(1)
Blank Disks DS/DD 48tpi 5.25" (per 10) _ 10/6.89 fenueeeee Pin
25/6.39 ; 50/5.89: 100/5.39 : 200/5.20 : 300/4.89 Epson LX/GX-80 £3.99
4000/4.49 Epson MX/RX.FK-100 £5.99
Panasonic Diab A a ed
Blank Disks - DS 3.5" (per 10) 10/25.99 Shinwa CP-80/Epson LO-800 5:
25/24.99 :50/23.99 :100/22.99 : 250/19.99 seannagsoeen fe
Disk Drive Head Cleaner (5.25") 3.49 pooped = Coreen ~—
Disk Storage Box - 40x3.5" Locking 9.95 Epson MX/RX/FX £8.99
as Epson MX/RX/FX-100/1.0-800 £12.95
‘Star/OW Twinspoo!
Panasonic KX-P1080 (Epson RX-80 compatible) 189.00 meee eete y
80 columns (132 in compressed/100cps (20 in NLO)/Friction & trac- Epson JX-80/JukI-5520 £7.49 \ ING
tor feeds standard/Draft-NLQ-Compressed easily selected from RIBBONS - HEAT TRANSFER FOR T-SHIRT PRINTING ” porters
front-panel switch/Coloured ribbons now easily available [esmoenrs on mecha acta dada d = a
Epeon 0-800 £12.95 £13.98
Miracle WS-4000 Hayes Modem 139,00 Star/OW Twinspoo! £9.95 £8.95
At last, a Hayes-Compatible Auto-Dial/Auto-Answer BT-Approved
V21/V23 bulletin board/Prestel modem for less than 150.00 —_
doors Aid 1/00 «0p ona orm (3.00 max) + 15% VAT in UK
Home Connection - Comms software (not Prestel) a 99 bone: Aad £1.00) fi SS eee seal VAT.
One-to-One - Toloxlectronio Mail systom 4,99 Cee ee cr aa reenae ey ate Onin Out plea a Ina i des
not apply to paper which wo do not ship ovorsoas.
PRICES EXCLUDE p&p/VAT E&OE. 26/1/87
X ae Z
By NEIL GLEDHILL of MIDAPPLE
bout a month ago I was asked if I would review the game
"Elite" which had recently been translated onto the Apple
Jl series by Firebird Licencees Inc., a division of British
Telecom. I thought "Well OK, this shouldn't be too difficult.
I've played this game before on both BBC and Spectrum”. So
I agreed to do the article and was given a black box measuring
about 9 x 6 x 1" emblazoned with the Glorious Golden Elite
Logo. On close examination the box contained a disk, a space
trader's flight training manual, a short novel, a quick control
key reference card and several other bits of paper.
A brief reading of the manual introduces a new player to the
game. Put simply, the idea of the game is to make money and
become competent in combat by trading between the 250
planets in each of the 8 galaxies in the Galactic Co-operative,
or by other means,
A new player starts his or her trading life with a Cora mk.III
trading/combat craft with 20 tonnes of cargo space, a single
front laser (the Cobra can carry four), 7.0 light years of fuel,
100 credits, a clean legal record and a rating of "Harmless".
Control of the craft is via the keyboard, but a joystick can be
used for directional control (I would recommend the use of a
joystick in combat). Most keys on the keyboard are used.
The player"s rating is, as the manual says, a dispassionate
assessment of the player"s performance in combat. Ratings
Progress from Harmless to Mostly Harmless, Poor, Average,
Above Average, Competent, Dangerous, Deadly and finally to
Elite (hence the game's tide). The number of "kills" that have
to te made to progress through ratings increases with the
ratings, so although it .nay be easy to go from harmless to
mostly harmless. it becomes more difficult to move up after
this,
As I mentioned earlier legal wade is not the only way of
making money. It is certainly not the quickest way of
procuring cash. As well as trade (which means goods have to
be paid for !) players can resort to bounty hunting ie. killing
pirates (who can be distinguished from harmless traders because
they shoot at you !) as a bounty is paid for every "baddie"
killed.
Piracy itself is also very profitable because if you owa a
Fuel Scoop (a device for picking up bits of debris from spice)
you can kill innocent traders and collect the cargo from the
wreckage of their ship.This pastime can quickly change your
legal record from "clean" to "fugitive" (which simply means
that you are permanently chased by the Galactic Police).
Trading takes place among space stations orbiting around
planets, Each planet falls into one of eight political
backgrounds. This determines the relative safety of their
airspace (ic. the number of pirates likely to be present when
approaching the planet). In order of safety these governments
are: Corporate States, Democracies, Confederacies, Communist
States, Dictatorships, Multi-govt. Feudal Worlds and
Anarchies, Each planet is cither industrial or agricultural.
Information on the planet's economic background is given by
its gross productivity. Each planet also has a Tech-level which
shows how technologically advanced that world is,
These factors work together to set which products the planet
produces, which it needs, and ihe prices of these products.
Some information is also given on the planet's background, but
often this is of no use at all. The planet Arexe, for example, is
“fabled for it's sit-coms and it's inhabitants ancient loathing for
sit-coms.". These space stations also sell vital fuel and
equipment for your Cobra mkIII - equipment such as exta
lasers, missiles for use against other ships, ECM systems for
use against missiles, escape pods for use in high-risk on-going
death situations, fuel scoops (for use as I said earlier, or to
skim the outer layer of a planet's sun to pick up fuel), cargo
bay extensions (updates your ships capability from 20 to 34
tonnes) and other bits and pieces.
The display shows a cockp.i view from the spaceship wii
all flight instruments in t.. boitom quarter of the screen. Gn
the left are the front and rear shield indicators, fuel level, cabis
temperature (used when collecting fuel from the sus}, iaser
temperature and altitude above planets. Te the right are the
speed indicator, roll and dive and energy incicators. In the
middle of these is the 3-D aes display. This ingenious
glance) the positions relative
is, cargo canisters and space
apass which is useful in
ither black and white or co!our as
» convert red warning signals to red/white
The main cockpit display can be switched to
backward and to left or right (useful when
if a space station or looking for baddies during
This display is mostly in black and white although
e shown in red. To give an idea of movement dots
radiate from the centre of the screen . These are not stars but
bits of dust and debris. These are helpful when manoeuvring the
spaceship as they give points of reference for judging angles of
roll.
There are facilities to save and load positions. This feature
can only be used when docked. Without this facility one could
not expect to get very far in the game. | found that I started to
save the game at every space station hecause when transporting
large amounts of valuable cargo attack from pirates can happen
at any time. The Galactic Police (who will defend any trader
being attacked in their space stations safe zone)cannot always
be relied upon on low tech level planets.
There are 19 different kinds of space craft. These are
represented in wire-frame on screen with hidden line removal.
Considering the complexity of some of the shapes they mo
very quickly on screen. The display does, however, slow down
when there are a lot of spacecraft around.
The manual provided with the program is very good. It gives
more than adequate information on all the aspects of the game
and also makes quite interesting reading.
The only problem I found with Elite was that it was difficult
to "get into" the game. As a beginner I found myself being
destroyed very often which was very frustrating. The only way
to get over this is practice as after a while you become used to
the controls and even docking (which is perhaps the most
difficult manoeuvre) seems relatively simple.
Although Elite is called a game, its complexity makes it
more akin to being called a space trading/combat simulator.
Experienced Elite combateers seem to think the program is not
so much a game more a way of life. @
Elite is available from: FIREBIRD LICENCEES INC
WELLINGTON HOUSE 6-9 UPPER ST MARTINS LANE
LONDON WC2H 9DL or by ringing 01 836 3179
12
“ Apple2000 - February1987
.@- dms Spring Sale
for a limited period only
dms 20SHD for the Macintosh Plus Computer
The 20 MByte SCSI hard disk for the Macintosh Plus Computer
Fast , Reliable & Sturdy No Pre-Boot Disks Needed
Uses HFS (or MFS) Simply plug in and use it
Only £550 or £720 including MacServe £10 P&P
dims 20SHD for the Apple ][GS
The same disk as above. No Pre-Boot Disks, simply plug it into the Apple ][GS SCSI interface for 20
MByte. Use on PRODOS or Pascal 1.3. Sold throughout the UK. There is no other to compare in price and
performance. Only £550 £10 P&P
The Apple ][GS SCSI Interface for the dms 20SHD SCSI Hard Disk. £65 £3 P&P
Barcodes read into the Macintosh - keep up with today's technology!
dms SABRU Barcode Reader with Mac Adaptor
This plugs into the Mac keyboard and allows all worldwide barcodes to
be read into any software automatically, without modifications - Software
such as Omnis, Excel, Jazz. It allows the Macintosh user to compete with
the larger mainframes as barcodes are now appearing on most stock items.
£500 including Wand £3 P&P
a
dms SEALER, the sealer for the dealer!
Ideal for all businesses. Use it to shrink wrap and professionally seal
your products in polythene film. Roll of shrink film available separately.
£169 including 1 Roll of 14" wide Film £15 P&P
Quik Circuit PCB design on the Macintosh computer, Multilayer and Plate Through. £525 £3 P&P
Do not forget our full range of RGB Colour Cards which has been the standard for years.
dms C12 at £39 & dms C30 at £69 for Apple If & //e. Peacock at £36 for Apple //c
Other products include the dms ROM/RAM Card at £49 & dms IO Card at £32 £3 P&P
We stock the complete range of Apple Macintosh, Desk Top
Publishing and Apple ][GS equipment. We are the North's
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off the M1 motorway. Contact our Sales Department who
will be pleased to discuss your requirements.
PAYMENT BY CHEQUE OR ACCESS
Please add the appropriate P&P * All prices are plus VAT for UK orders * Send SAE for Further Details
DMS Electronics Ltd Manber af the CAT
Bretton Court, Manor Road, Wales Village, ost 1973 &
Sheffield, S31 8PD, England.
Telephone:Worksop (0909) 773399
Sheffield Chamber
of Commerce
Omnis SIG News
OMNIS
NEWS
New Technical Support Services Announced
or this issue we have decided to update on the range of
software and services which are available to our users.
Please do remember, whenever you change or upgrade
your hardware, you can do the same with the Omnis programme
that you are using. The most important consideration is of
course your data. All your data can also be transfered to the new
hardware, by using the Omnis utility program. If you have any
doubts on how this is done, talk to your dealer or give us a ring.
USER SERVICES
Unlimited telephone technical support
Program updates
Omnis User News
‘Technical notes with hints and tips on setting up
and enhancing Omnis applications
+ Access to our other business services
When you buy Omnis, you automatically become a member of
an Exclusive Omnis Club. Buying the ‘Rolls Royce’ of
databases means you also have a range of services available to
you, such as those mentioned above which are FREE of charge.
Your membership (registration) card is supplied with the
Omnis program and your membership number is the serial
number shown on the Omnis system disk. Please make sure you
have sent in your card and quote the serial number whenever you
write or call us, This is the only means of ensuring that our
services are available to the Club members only. If you are not
certain of your registration, call Mandy Reekie and she will
check for you.
The one year unlimited telephone support starts from the date
of purchase. Whilst our invoicing system tells us when a dealer
supplied you with the Omnis program, it is particularly
important for you to send in the registration card
within seven days of the date of purchase.
Existing users carry on receiving free support for one year or
until Ist January 1987, whichever is the longer. For example, if
you purchased your Omnis over a year ago, services are free until
January 1987. From then on you can subscribe for a nominal
fee of £35 per annum. To do this, simply write to us quoting
your serial number and enclose the subscription fee.
Acknowledgement will be sent to you confirming the free
services available.
In situations where you need advice or assistance regarding
the general database design or techniques in developing your
tumkey systems, the Sales Office can help by recommending an
Omnis Programmer or Specialist Dealer.
Technical Support Services
Library transfers i.c. Apple //e to IBM disk
Installing Pascal 1.3 wo boot disk £10
Replacement boot disk (if due to user error) £25
Enlarging Blyth ledgers (Apple II) £25 each ledger
Blyth's Technical Support Team.
Our Technical Support Department help with technical queries
which may occur from time to time. Sometimes it is simply
impossible to respond immediately, supporting thousands of
users is no easy task, but everyone does their best.
Pammle Merlot, the ‘Technical Manager (designate),
delegates the daily support tasks to her team. As well as
handling the administration and correspondence, Pammie
oversees the department ensuring the best possible services from
Blyth Software for both dealers and end users.
David Winnup is a new member of the technical support
team, currently working his way through the various Omnis
programs. He is enthusiastic and keen to start answering your
queries.
Simon Cole. Simon's role in technical suppon is to
encourage dealers to become more involved in customising
Omnis. Simon sees his role within the company as being one of
a "Good Samaritan". When users phone him in desperation
tearing their hair out because they cannot solve a problem, they
usually end their conversation satisfied, with all their problems
behind them. In addition to being a good samaritan, Simon has
been involved in preparing documentation, training courses and
trade shows and exhibitions.
Peter Fisk. Peter is one of Blyth Software's longest serving
members of staff. Peter also sorts out users’ problems by
telephone and written communication. He is also involved in
the testing of new hardware and assisting with testing and
development of new software.
What is Multi-user?
A multi-user program allows simultaneous access by more
than one person to a database. The key element in Omnis multi-
user is the aspect of sharing with top security built in.
Obviously when two people require access to the same
information, they must be careful that the dala remains
valid. Therefore Omnis only allows one user at a time to change
a certain record.Other users must wait until the update is
completed before they can view the result. Data which is not
being edited is still accessible by any other user on the system.
Omnis has nine levels of passwords, which means that the
person who creates the system has total control over which
members of staff are able to access any part of the program.
Omnis 3 Plus and MacServe™
This special development allows users to invest in a multi
user system at a lower cost than what has been possible.You can
now do this by using a hard disk (Macintosh compatible) as a
file server.
In order to share the hard disk, communications software is
ai This is where MacServe™ is being used by Omnis 3
Plus.
Blyth Software and Infosphere, the manufacturers of
MacServe™, have combined their knowledge to produce the
Omnis 3 Plus - MacServe™ multi-user system,
Shared volumes on MacServe™ are normally locked. Since no
changes are allowed, others can simultaneously use it without
confusing their Macintoshes. Omnis 3 Plus -MacServe™ knows
how to temporarily unlock a volume and then automatically
replace the protection, thereby allowing a user to update the data
whilst the volume is being shared. So what you get is up to five
users accessing the same data file with jis 3Plus -
MacServe™ for £995 plus V.A.T.
Upgrading from Apple II to Unidisk
A Unidisk is a 3.5" disk drive that an Apple II computer is
able to read. In order to do this, the system disk should be sent
back to Blyth to be upgraded to Pascal 1.3. for a cost of only
£10 plus V.A.T.
4 ; Apple2000 - February1987__
BLYTH SOFTWARE PRODUCT
PORTFOLIO
OMNIS 2
(version 2.1) Macintosh £295
Apple II Family £145
OMNIS 3
(version 3.10) Apple II Family £295
OMNIS 3 MULTI-USER
(version 3.10) Apple Il Family
2-5 users £590
6-10 users £885
11-20 users £1180
21+ users £1475
Networks: Corvus Omninet, SymBNet, ICE, Hal
OMNIS 3 PLUS
(version 3.23) Macintosh £445
OMNIS 3 PLUS MULTI-USER
(version 3.23) Macintosh
2-5 users £890
6-10 users £1335
11-20 users £1780
21+ users £2225
Networks: 3COM, Hypemet, Corvus Omninet/Talk,
SymbTalk, Sunol, ICE
OMNIS ACCOUNTS
(version 1.1) Macintosh
Nominal Ledger from £345
Sales, Purchase, Invoicing
& Stock from £245
MAILMASTER
«
Omnis SIG
Technical
Support.
If you have any good tips - questions or
unique uses for Omnis let us know by
contacting Apple2000 Omnis SIG
With thanks to Pammie and the
Support team at Blyth.
Here are a few letters which are typical of the kinds of enquiry
we receive every day at Blyth Technical Support :
J.Hayes,
Cirencester.
I have linked a customer file and a transaction file t print a
report. The transactions have been successfully linked to the
correct customers name, but they are in the wrong date order on
the report. I can not understand this, as I thought correct date
ordering was automatic. We have spent some time recently
entering up the details of transactions which took place before
we bought Omnis 3; there were already details in the database of
more recent work done for the same customers.
ANSWER : The sequence numbers which were assigned when
the individual wansaction data was entered i.e. when the entries
were actually made, are out of date order. Initially, the solution
seems to be to sort the transactions into date order before
printing out the report, but as this involves a new sort before
cach report, here is a permanent solution.
. Index the date field.
Re-organise the data.
Go to Utilities.
Perform a Dif export using a search format for a date
greater than 0.
Go to Data File management in Utilities.
Delete the file from the data sct.
Perform an input from the Dif file.
Naw SYD
June Wright
Milton Keynes.
I have used the invoice example on your examples disc, as a
basis for my own invoices. When the invoice entry is greater
than the unscrolled page, the final total does not appear in the
total box on the screen. It is the total of only those items on
the first page. The final total does appear when going back to
edit, but not when inspecting an invoice.
ANSWER : In the example, the total is calculated only on the
screen, and reflects just what is on the screen. To remedy this, a
further command needs to be inserted in the sequence for ‘Load
items’.
1. Go to sequence 49 - ‘Load Items’
2. Insert
Calculate #2 as #1*Insell (2dps)
so that the 8th to 10th lines of the sequence read :-
Calculate #1 as ITQNTY (Odps)
Calculate #2 as #1*Insell (2dps)
Calculate #3 as ITSEQN (Odps)
P Mainwaring,
Runcom,
Cheshire.
I have had to rename my image-writer, used in conjunction with
a Mac+, serial writer, to provide a solution to some printing
problems since I upgraded to Omnis 3 plus. Now I am getting a
$ sign instead of a £ sign. What can I do ?
ANSWER : As a short term solution to this problem, the
control characters which represent the required sign can be
written in to the field description before printing. They are
entered into the entry layout for the report. These can be found
in the manual for your printer.
G. Porter
Edinburgh
In a multi-user system, I get a " Too many users " message on
the screen even when only one work station is being used. What
can I do about this ?
ANSWER: If you are certain that the message does not occur
because there are too many users, then deleting Workfile 999 in
the Library Utilities seems to be the answer. Be sure that all
users except the one doing the deletion have logged off.
Apple2000 - February1987 ; 15
ff
' LOCAL GROUP CONTACTS
This list is compiled by Tom Wright - Please notify him of any errors.
\ Are your local group details here ? - If not contact Tom and let him know.
| Updated Sth January 1987
APPLE II POGRAMMERS CLUB
CONTACT _ - Phillip Dixon Ted \jiiit) wilieaillll
VENUE = None yet
MEETS - No venue - operates through postal newsletter.
BENTWATERS APPLE USER GROUP
CONTACT — = John Thomas Tel : HRHH-E7/IM))
VENUE - RAF. Woodbridge
MEETS = 7.00pm first Tuesday of each month
BRISTOL GROUP ( B.A.U.D )
CONTACT — - MIKE FARMER Tel : 0272-61076
VENUE - Bristol Maternity Hospital
MEETS = Tih day of each month, or the Friday nearest.
CAMBRIDGE APPLE USERS GROUP
CONTACT — = Tan Archibald Tel » (i228-49)i0797
VENUE ~ Lloyd Room, Christ's College, Cambridge
MEETS - Fortnightly
CROYDON APPLE USERS GROUP
CONTACT - Graham Attwood Tel : 01-850-5622 BSGOO8
VENUE - 515, Limpsfield Road, Warlingham, Surrey
MEETS 7.30pm on the third Thursday of every month
EAST MIDLANDS MAC USER GROUP
CONTACT — - Nick Helm ‘Tel isii-20017/%8
VENUE - Wilford Cricket & Rugby Club, Nottingham
MEETS = 8.00pm on the Ist & 3rd Wednesday each month.
EDINBURGH GROUP
CONTACT — - Adam Gilinsky Tel : (fit attain)
VENUE - Proteus Micro Systems, 55, Frederick Street,
Edinburgh, FH2 1LH
MEETS ~ Monthly after that. Check with Adam.
ESSEX GROUP
CONTACT —— - Pat Bermingham ‘Tel : ifh-titi3it
VENUE - The YMCA, Victoria Road, Chelmsford
MEETS > Third Friday of every month
FURNESS AREA
CONTACT = Alan Curtiss Tel : 0229-56110
Check with Alan for future meetings.
GATEWAY COMPUTER CLUB
CONTACT ~ Robert D Hall Tel : SRS P77
VENUE ~- Bob Hope Recreation Centre, R.A.F Mildenhall
MEETS - Variable, CHECK with Bob for time & date.
GLASGOW GROUP
CONTACT — = Donald Davidson Tel : (fittest
VENUE ~ Proteus Micro Systems, 17, Park Circus Place,
Glasgow
MEETS ~ Three or four times per year, CHECK with Donald
HANTS & BERKS
CONTACT ~ Mike Hollyficld Tel : (Fu) 7tW/RiNt
VENUE - Thames Valley Systems ,128 High Street,
Maidenhead.
MEETS - 7.00pm on the second Monday of every month
HARROGATE AREA
CONTACT = Peter Sutton Tel : HiT
No active organised group in this area but there are a number of keen
Apple users in contact with each other.
HERTS & BEDS GROUP
CONTACT -Norah Amold Tel :
VENUE - The Old School, 1, Branch Road, Park Street
Village, St Albans, Herts.
MEETS = 8.00pm on the first Tuesday of each month
KENT GROUP
CONTACT — - Richard Daniels Tel : 0303-58349
VENUE ~ AppleCentre 5-11 London Road, Maidstone.
MEETS - 7.30 p.m. Last Monday of each Month
LEICESTER GROUP
CONTACT — - Bob Bown Tel : (hf
VENUE = Shakespeare Pub, Braunstone Lane, Leicester
MEETS = 7.30pm to 10.0pm on Ist Wednesday of month
LIVERPOOL GROUP
CONTACT — Irene Flaxman Tel : ffl ilies’ BSGO21
VENUE ~ 78, Victoria Road, Widness, Cheshire, WA8 7AR
MEETS - Second Monday of every month.
LONDON APPLE Il GROUP
CONTACT ~ Chris Williams Tel : #1) stitssenttey
VENUE ~ St Brides Institute
MEETS + Check with Chris
LONDON MACINTOSH GROUP
CONTACT - Maureen de Saxe Tel : (fi}ffitietfiil)
VENUE ~ Room 683, London University Instinute of
Education, Bedford Way, London, WC1
MEETS ~ 6.00pm on the second ‘Tuesday of every month,
MACINTOSH USER GROUP
CONTACT = Patrick Winterson Tel : (188 diiie Siti
VENUE ~ Cambridge Area.
MEETS ~ Every three months. Check with Patrick.
MIDAPPLE
CONTACT — - Tom Wright Tel : itis? “AHHH _BSGO19
VENUE - LT.E.C,, Tildasley Street, West Bromwich.
MEETS - 7.00pm on the second Friday of every month
THE MIDLAND MAC GROUP
CONTACT ~Ivan Knezovich ‘Tel : ##t#Hull#HEh BSGO14
VENUE - Spring Grove House, Safari Park, Bewdley.
MEETS = 7.00pm on the first Tuesday of every month
THE NORTH WEST APPLE COMPUTER CLUB
CONTACT ~ Jim Rosco Tel : /iHiith-tifititi
VENUE ~ Horse & Jockey Pub., Winwick Road, Warrington
MEETS ~ First Monday of every month
THE NORTH WEST APPLE USERS GROUP
CONTACT —- Max Parrot Tel : iil-Ziie-8i, aig Siem
daytime : 061-432-3487 evenings
VENUE - Staff House ( 2nd floor ), University of
Manchester - Institute of Science & Technology,
P.O Box 88, Sackville Street, Manchester
MEETS = 8.00pm on the last Thursday of each month.
MACTAFF - S.WALES MAC GROUP
CONTACT — - Lorrain Thornback Thstiisssts-reniftina}
VENUE - AppleCentre , 47 Newport Road, Cardiff.
MEETS = 7.00pm on the 1st Thursday of each month,
“16 ‘Apple2000 - February1987
Mr J. Hardcastle,
Lytham St Annes,
Lanes,
When I copy data files from one hard disc to another, I can't
Tesel the sequence numbers when I put the records back in. The
sequence numbers just increase by the number of records used
before. What can I do about this ?
ANSWER : Each record is given a record sequencing number
when it is inserted into the file. The number is unique to that
record, and will never be re-assigned during the life of that
particular data file. To get round this, use your Dif files to take
the data out and put it back in. Remember, though, to create a
new data file to take the re-inserted data , and to delete the old
data file, after the data has been removed.
Mrs A. Joct,
London,
S.W.10.
I have upgraded from Omnis 2 to Omnis 3 and I am really
pleased with it so far. My only problem has been that , with
Omnis 2, I frequently used the multiple update and multiple delete
command and now, with Omnis 3, they are not provided.
ANSWER : Omnis 2 initially uses a search format, like Omnis
3, to pick out the records to be updated. Omnis 2 then has a
multiple update format screen into which the user inserts the
jields to be updated and the calculations to be applied. The user
then asks for the update command window, and is prompted for
confirmation before proceeding with the update. In Omnis 3,
both the format screen and the command window have been
superceded by steps which lie within the gencral Omnis system.
Once the search format has been defined, the user writes his own
multiple update sequence in the sequences window of the entry
layout and creates the command button he needs, say UPDATE
to perform the operation.
David Union,
Lanarkshire.
We would like to have a "summary" print-out of just the totals of
our main report. The trouble is, | can suppress all the visible
records on the report by giving all the fields in the detail
section the attribute ‘invisible’, but when I print out, I still get
the full number of pages I would have done had I wanted a full
report, the only difference being they are blank ! I had thought
that printing to screen would be the answer, but somebody still
has to sit at the screen clicking on NEXT PAGE , and as the
Teport runs to some hundred pages , it's just not practical.
ANSWER : If you set the repeat factor in Parameters to 1, you
will get a full report printed, regardless of whether the records
are visible or not. If you set the repeat factor to 0, as it effects
only the information in the detail section, no records in the
detail section will be printed. The result will be just headings
and totals, which will be instantly accessible on the first page
on the screen, and the first page from your printer.
edeSERRad
(i =o
[Ferryyees| [[pyraverra
STE TETE
PUT
Express, etc, Don't despair :
printing features of a Grappler Plus.
to add full graphics printing capabilities.
options, take a look at MousePrintz.
and supports the Apple //c and 128K //e.
GRAPHICS YOU CREATE
possible.
features of Mouseprintz.
ScreenSnapper on-screen utilities.
| eR Ee TY,
DARKSTAR SYSTEMS Ltd.
78 Robin Hood Way
Greenford Mddx. UB6 7QW
IS YOUR EPSON PRINTER CARD A
PROBLEM?
If you have an Epson 8132 printer card, you know that
it won't work with AppleWorks, CP/M, Pascal, Ascii
The ImageMaker EPROM replaces the ROM chip
on the Epson 8132 card to make it compatible with every-
thing, and in addition gives your Epson card the graphics
We also make ImageMaker EPROMs for the
Super Serial and Cirtech (pre-Champion) Printer Cards,
ImageMaker EPROM £25 + VAT
NOW MOUSEPAINT CAN PRINT TO ANY
PRINTER!
When MousePaint’s ‘Print a File’ leaves you few
With MousePrintz, you can magnify, stretch, crop,
invert, flip, rotate, and shade your MousePaint screen
image to your own specifications, then print it on
virtually any dot-matrix printer, What could be simpler?
MousePrintz is a straight-forward patch program,
designed specifically to enhance MousePaint's limited
printing facilities. MousePrintz is fully documented
If you've ever been disappointed with your MousePaint
graphic printout, MousePrintz is your saving grace.
MousePrintz £25 + VAT
SCREENSNAPPER - TO PRINT THE
ScreenSnapper offers not only sophisticated text and
graphics printing but adds new features to your Apple
Il+, //e and //c, that you would never have thought
ScreenSnapper Icts you interrupt your program,
print the screen, and resume running the program.
Intended primarily for use with your own Applesoft and
machine code programs (or other unprotected software)
Ttunning under DOS, ScreenSnapper is compatible
with virtually all interface cards and dot-matrix printers,
rendering the purchase of an expensive graphics printer
card unnecessary. It includes all the screen-editing
ScreenSnapper adds an extremely useful extension
to Applesoft Basic that provides graphics programmers
with a complete set of commands for double hi-res
plotting plus additional commands which access the
ScreenSnapper £30 + VAT
SYSTEMS
Phone (01)-900 0104 MicroLink ID: MAG20297
Apple2000 - February1967
17
NEW PRODUCTS FOR THE IIGS
There is a lot of activity by manufacturers of new products for the IIGS, and we should soon see these in the dealers' showrooms.
Below I have compiled a list of the packages which are being promoted for sale. Many will not be available in the UK just yet
but you will be informed of what is actually available as soon as the IIGS Product Selector is published,
Graham Attwood,
Title Publisher Notes
E FirstShapes Elementary geometry program
E KidTalk Beginning creative-writing software
€ = MathTalk Inc, Boginning math-skills software
E SpellerBee First Byte, Inc. Alphabet and spelling tutor
E KidsTime Il Great Wave Software Typing and musical tutorial
E — Explore-a-Story Leamingways, Inc. Creative-writing software
E Silent Service MicroProse, Inc. Submarine simulation
E Conflict in Vietnam MicroProse, Inc. War gaming
E F415 Strike Eagle MicroProse, Inc. Flight simulation
— Nato Commander MicroProse, Inc. War gaming
E Talking Text Writer ‘Scholastic, Inc. Creative-wniting software
€ Puppy Love Tom Snyder Productions Artificial intelligence simulation
H — GS-RAM, GS-RAM Plus. Applied Engineering 1.5Mb and 6Mb RAM cards
H AST VisionPlus AST Research, Inc. Graphics digitiser
H — AST-20Mb hard disk AST Research, Inc. SCSI hard disk drive
H RamStack AST Research, Inc. Memory expansion card.
H — SprintDisk 1Mb AST Research, Inc. RAMdisk card
H Kurta Graphic System Kurta Digitising tablet (mouse alternative)
H_ Phoenix Board MacNifty Central Modular multi-functional card
H = -Conserver MDideas Monitor platform with surge supprossor
H OctoRam MDideas Memory expansion board
H — SuperSonic MDideas Stereo board and amplifier board
H_ — ProGrappler Orange Micro, Inc. Parallel printer interface
H RamPak 4GS. Orange Micro, Inc. Ram card 512K to 4Mb
H = Plus20 Peak Systems, Inc. ‘SCSI hard drive 20Mb and tape back-up.
H_ — ProAPP 10, ProAPP20 ProAPP, Inc. SCSI hard drives 10/20Mb
H_ Echo lib Street Electronics ‘Speech synthesizer
S Music Studio Activision, Inc. Music composition and educational software
S__ PaintWorks Plus Activision, Inc. Colour graphics package like MacPaint.
S Writers Choice elite Activision, Inc. Wordprocessor like MacWrite with colour
S Bookkeeper I Advanced Micro Products Simple bookkeeping system for small business
S — Appleworks V2.0 Appie inc, Updatod vorsion of the popular package
S Omnis3 Blyth Software Multi-File Data Base Management System
S Omnis2 Blyth Software Data Base Management System
S Drawing Table Broderbund Software Graphics drawing program like MacDraw
S_ FantaVision Broderbund Software ‘Combined graphics animation and sound
S NewsMaker Broderbund Software Desktop publishing and page layout
S__ Print Shop liGS. Broderbund Software Like old Print Shop but menu driven
S Copy Il Plus Central Point Software Program back-up, and disk utility
S CSL Marks Chancery Software School grades marking program
S__ Ragsto Riches Chang Labs Accounting package
S Deluxe Music Set Electronic Arts, Inc. Music composition, editing and playing package
S Deluxe Paint Electronic Arts, Inc. Painting program
S Boams Analysis Lancashire Computing Engineering Application
S__ Bill of Quantities Lancashire Computing Engineering Application
S$ Cashflow Lancashire Computing Business Application
S__ Drains analysis Lancashire Computing Engineering Application
$ Managing Your Money MEGA Personal-finance software
S — PageWorks MegaHaus, Inc. Desktop publishing and page layout software
S Dollars and Sense Monogram Personal-finance software
S Color Paint Orange Micro, Inc. Painting program
S — CommWorks 16 PBI Software, Inc. Telecommunications
S Visualizer PBI Software, Inc Business-graphics package
S DTPsoftware Quark, Inc, Desktop publishing and page layout software
S Merlin 16 Roger Wagner Publishing Assembler for 65816 processor
S MouseWrite Roger Wagner Publishing Wordprocessor using mouse
S — SoftSwitch Roger Wagner Publishing Program like Mac's Switcher
S Sensible Grammar Sensible Software, Inc. Grammar checker for wordprocessors
S Sensible Speller Sensible Software, Inc. Spelling checker for wordprocessors.
S ‘draw program’ StyleWare, Inc. Drawing program like MacDraw™
S MultiScribe GS StyleWare, Inc. Wordprocessor with colour text
S AutoWorks The Software Touch Enhancement for AppleWorks
S — FontWorks The Software Touch Printing of AppleWorks files in choice of fonts
S TML Pascal TML Systems, Inc. IIGS version of TML Pascal for Mac
$ ASCII Express MouseTalk United Software Extensive Telecommunications package.
S__ VIP Professional VIP Technologies, Inc. Mouse driven Lotus 1-2-3 look-alike
Key: E = Entertainment H = Hardware S = Software
18
‘Apple2000 - February1987
WHY IS THERE A PICTURE OF
A GULL IN THIS AD?
FIRST CORRECT ANSWER WINS A PRIZE
(ANSWERS ON A POST CARD PLEASE)
‘eltip
omputers
Campion House, Franchise Street,
Kidderminster, Worcs, DY11 6RE
Tel:(0562) 744377, One to One Mailbox 1501 4001
HOT LINE
NEWS
Dave Ward - #88 9) 2192
During the last 12 months (my first year) we have received
some 234 enquiries from about 180 members; it has been
pleasant chatting to you all. I have been able to answer about
40% of enquiries directly but have found it necessary to pass
the other enquiries to other HOTLINE volunteers. With such a
diversity of questions it is impossible for one person to be able
to answer them all and fortunately a few members have offered
their assistance. May I take this opportunity to thank them all -
even if I have not passed any enquiries their way.
If any members reading this article feel they are able to
assist in answering HOTLINE problems will they please get in
touch - either with Tom Wright or myself. The HOTLINE is at
present voluntary and is therefore only available between 1900
and 2100 hours on weekdays.
If you have contacted us and we were, for any reason unable
to solve your problem completely please let us know, as we
want to do our best to help. Naturally we may from time to
time make inadvertent slips - so do tell us if we failed to give
the advice we promised. Some problems may not be solvable
and if so we'll try to tell you.
Here are some of the enquiries that we have had during the
last few months:
1} Many old programs such as VisiCalc and PFS do not work
properly on the Apple //c or Apple //e enhanced computers due
to inverse characters appearing as ‘gibberish’. This is due to the
software authors having not followed the Apple rules and
inverse characters appear as mouse characters. For most
commercial programs this is not user solvable and the updated
version of the program will have to be obtained. For BASIC
programs make sure that you switch off the mouse characters
with a chr$(24) before printing inverse characters,
2} Apple disk }[ drives have a ribbon connector to the card and
so cannot be used directly with an Apple //c computer which
uses a DB19 connector. This problem will also apply to
purchasers of the Apple IIGS who have these drives. MGA
Microsystems of Tenterden, Kent supply an adaptor.
3} What happens if you download text files say that are too
large to fit on your AppleWorks desktop? Well you could get
somebody with a large enough desktop to split it into
manageable chunks. The other way is to BLOAD sections of
the textfile in Applesoft under ProDOS. This ‘margin’ is too
small to contain the description of the method but anyone
interested should contact me.
Il GS HOTLINERS
With the recent introduction of the Apple IIGS I am sure
that many members will be purchasing one during 1987 and
with good reason, I would like to make a few comments
regarding the GS - the first is rather frivolous, but the rest are
serious.
1} I can assure you that an Apple IIGS will fit down a
chimney!
2} Owners of Apple //e computers who purchase the Apple
IIGS may find difficulty in using the control + open-apple +
reset key sequence to do a cold boot. It is important to hold
down the open-apple + control keys with the fingers of the left
hand and then press and release the reset key, but let your
fingers tarry on the other keys. This is mentioned in the
prolix manuals and was pointed out by Graham Attwood in his
recent review.
3} When you wanted to enter Applesoft on the Apple //e and
Apple //c computers you simply pressed the aforementioned
Reset sequence followed by smartly pressing the control + reset
keys. If you try that on the Apple IIGS you will restart the
reset cycle and you won't get into Applesoft before the 10 year
battery runs out. Here's how:
After pressing the reset key sequence wait until the BOOT disk
light comes on or you are politely informed that there is no
device connected! + Then and only then, press control + reset.
4} An interesting point about the Apple IIGS is that its super
high resolution graphics mode has a palette of 256 colours with
16 shades making the total of 4096! Therefore, monochrome
users will get grey shading without the loss of resolution that
Macintosh users or older Apples got.
5} Applesoft on the Apple IIGS will not at present be able to
make use of the extra memory or super high resolution
graphics. No doubt some third party software house will take
care of that problem, @
port
C.1.CAYMAN
NUMERIC KEYPAD FOR /i
latest design, plugs directly into
on //o mother board, 16 keys +-*/=. ENTER £19
16k RAM CARD J[, [+ £29
128k RAMCARD Jf, ][+,/e £69
Apple compatible half height disc drive
(pancake motor mechanism). £89
13/16 sector controller for above. £25
64/80 COLUMN CARD //e £25
80 COLUMN Videx compatible with built in 40/80
softswitch for }[+ £35
7280 CP/M board. £29
RS232 serlal; £29
Serial plus card (software selection of protocol,
suitable for use with a modem). £49
Printer Interfaces: Parallel (Centronics -Epson) £29
Parallel Grappler compatible. £39
Parallel Grappler with 64k printer buffer, £79
7.5A HD POWER SUPPLY for }[+ and //e £49
Replacement Keyboard for [+ £49
Fan ][+,/0 £29
Reconditioned Apple //e systems, all have been
brought to ‘as new’ condition, offered with our standard £225
12 month warranty (including 64k/80 column textcard). — (+VAT)
All prices exe VAT, postal carriage £3 under £100, £5 over £100.
Apple Repairs - phone for quote.
021 - 705 7097
C1 Cayman Ltd. P.O.Box 77, Solihull, West Mids,
B91 3LX
20
Apple2000 - February1987
Accounting Software
BOOKKEEPER II
Bookkeeper II is the answer to the small business’ perpetual
problem of trying to keep track of the company's accounts. It is
designed to run on the Apple II machines and has been launched
to coincide with the introduction of the IIGS, to which it is
very suited.
The program is supplied on both 5.25" and 3.5" disks and
comes with a comprehensive operators’ manual. You need to
have at least a rudimentary idea of simple cash book accounting
to run any accounts system, but once you have grasped the
basic principles this program is easy to get on with. It does not
pretend to be a full accounting package but it will take care of
Cash and Bank accounts and will monitor Purchase and Sales
control accounts so that debtors and creditors can be seen at a
glance.
The first job you must do after reading the manual and
running through the tutorial example is to make yourself a plan
of the cash movements within your business. Work out how
many ways cash is received; how you pay suppliers, or pay for
services; how many bank accounts are used.
Book, entering cash in and out to the Bank and Petty cash
accounts. Used fully it produces Trial Balance report to keep a
check on your profitability, and gives a detailed VAT report
which is essential for filling in the VAT returns. All reports
can be viewed on the screen as well as output to the printer.
Transactions are entered against particular accounts (you need
that account number list), specifying where the money is to go
to, or to come from, The amount can be Nett plus a standard
VAT rate, or the Total can be entered and the computer back-
calculates Nett and VAT for you.
The only limitation on the amount of data that can be
stored is the size of the data disk, and this determines how often
you have to run a Period End report. This report consolidates
all the ‘live’ data into a Brought Forward balance situation, and
then clears down the files freeing-up space for the next Period.
All historical detail is lost at this point, so it is a good idea to
run off a hard copy report just prior to the period end. If you
have enough space, say on a hard disk drive, you could leave
By Graham Attwood
From this plan you can then set up the right =
number and type of Sales, Purchase, Control fr PURCHASE OND. OUZGOING “ENTRIES
and Bank account numbers in the program so Account the entry is going to - (500-999) : 500
that accounts are arranged in sensible
groupings. PURCHASES Balance: 0.00
All references to these accounts are made
by account number so it is as well to get | pat. + 12.12.86 Folio/Ref No.: 1235
them right from the start, and it will make it
easier to put transactions into the correct Description : Apple Goodies VAT Code : 1
account if they are logically arranged. There
are up to 1000 accounts available which you Amount : 865.40 VAT : 129.81 Total : 995.21
can designate how you like within the limits
of 7 - 99 for cash, 100 - 499 for sales and
income, and 500 - 999 for purchases and Amount Paid : 995.21
outgoings. Within the cash accounts, 1 to 6 Account the payment is coming from - (1) Petty Cash (2) Bank : 1
are preset to Petty cash, Bank, Sales control,
Purchase control, VAT, and Brought Forward. petalinccomece. we OY
A. useful addition is the ability to handle up
to 30 Standing Orders, and the program Last Transaction 10 Folio/Ref Description Account
1234 Cash to Bank 678.00
prompts you when you boot up if a payment
is due so that the transaction can be entered.
Having set up the account numbers you can first enter any
opening balance figures you may have, and then run a Period
End to put them into a Brought Forward balance. The system is
now ready for the day-to-day transactions to be entered. Cash
figures are automatically converted to two decimal places on
entry. As a check on your progress, the previous transaction is
displayed in summary form on the bottom two lines of the
screen,
At its simplest you can use the program just as a Cash
the data active for 6 or 12 months, but on smaller systems it is
probably better to work to a monthly accounting period.
A useful program - very easy to use and it will save hours of
manual book-keeping for the small business user. I would
recommend it.
Bookkeeper was loaned for review by Advanced Micro
Products, 200 Court Road, Eltham, London SE9.
é
Apple2000 - February1987
21.
NEWS from
APPLE (UK)
As announced at the recent User Group Council.
APPLE DEVELOPERS GROUP (ADG)
Those of you who are involved in serious programming and
software development on Apple computers (Mac and Apple II)
will have access to a single centralised source of technical data
in the UK,
In the USA there has been in existence for some time the
Apple Programmer's and Developer's Association (APDA)
which is an independant company set up by Apple, Inc. to
handle all aspects of technical support for writers of Apple
Software.
To meet the needs of the UK, particularly with the new open-
architecture machines in mind, Apple (UK) have formed the
Apple Developers Group (ADG) to provide a service to the
serious developer, which will operate in a similar way to
APDA.
They will make available a range of tools, technical notes,
manual drafts and Beta test versions of Apple languages, and
these will be listed in a quarterly newsletter. Developers can
purchase items at reasonable prices and will be advised of
updates and revisions from time to time. This is not, however,
a cheap source of new programs; they will be supplied ‘as is’
complete with known (and unknown bugs) and are provided so
that programmers can test the interfacing and compatibility
with their own software.
‘There are two levels of service:
SUBSCRIBER
Subscribers receive the newsletter and can purchase items, but
get no direct technical support. This is seen as the small
developer and end user area of the scheme, It will ensure that
the wealth of material coming from the USA will be available
quicker than at present.
Annual subscriptions are likely to be about £30 for Subscribers
although the exact cost is not know just yet.
REGISTERED MEMBER
Registered Members have, in addition, access to a hotline, a
bulletin board, and a technical help service is available. This is
the arca where serious developers and large companies will be
involved, the cost is expected to be SUBSTANTIAL.
All contact with ADG at present will be through:
Chris Calvert (Macintosh Product Manager)
Apple (UK) Ltd,
Eastman Way, Hemel Hempstead.
Please WRITE if you want more information on ADG.
DO NOT PHONE Chris as ya will be disappointed !
Lisa - Macintosh Migration
Those members who have the Lisa and wish to migrate along
the Macintosh path, should note that the software and manuals
are available from Apple (UK).
To obtain this software you must apply in writing to the
Technical Support Department at Apple (UK) and enclose three
diskettes. é
Pixel Fix f isa
Limited supplies of the screen modification kits (Pixel Fix)
will shortly be available from your local Apple Dealer. This kit
is not manufactured now, so you should order one quickly. @
LisaTalk Report
The quarterly U.S. Report entitled ‘LisaTalk' is being
distributed in the United Kingdom by MacEurope. The annual
subscription rate is £32,00 and you should write to:
Stefan Youngs, MacEurope, 9a Lynee Court, Church Lane,
London NW9. Tel 01-200-3981 &
Apple (UK) Customer Bulletin Board
During the coming year Apple (UK) will be launching a
customer bulletin board in the United Kingdom. The exact
format is not yet finalised.
Some of the things planned are:
It will have 16 lines and will operate at local call charges.
COMPUSERVE download files area, Third Party product
information, Apple Technical Information and User Group
Communications with Apple Management.
Further details will be announced in the next few months. @
AppleWorks
Version 2.0
Apple (UK) have announced that AppleWorks
Users can upgrade to the new version for £50.00
+ VAT.
The new version has many new features
including a mailmerge facility, GS Compatability
and support of large memory cards. It is not
mouse driven at present.
If you wish to upgrade. You will have to send the
money and either the original Master Disk or the
front cover of your old AppleWorks manual.
In return you will receive Version 2.0. with a
new manual.
The upgrades are available from:
Copeland Sales,
Little Gaddesden,
Nr Berkhampstead,
HP4 1QL
Tel: 044284 2387
22
Apple2000 - February1987
TRANSWARP
Your tle can run faster than a GS - with TransWarp.
‘TraneWarp Is the accelerator which beats all others out of eight. With 256K of fast
memory on board, TransWarp can accelerate auxiliary as well as motherboard
memory which is why it runs 30% faster than other accelerators. And no problems
with caching tachniques.
Results of Byte magazine “sieve benchmark, in seconds:
ia - 245 secs;
Mac Plus -96 secs: IGS - 96 secs;
He + TransWarp - 00 sece.
Source: "“Open-Apple'Decombor1986
'BM-PC-191 secs; Macintosh - 125 secs;
IBM-PCAT(6MHZ)-80secs;
Compatible with lle/il+ only, Not GS compatible.
Price: £279.00 (ex Vat).
~ )
( GS-RAM |
GS-Ram (256K to 1.5 Meg) - fits GS memory slot
‘extra memory (up to 1.5
aeore 2.0 Internal bre 0 ovr EE iecodein ite in the Tisebase and
bas 1d processor and 10 2000 linas/r the clipboard.
payne rasecsonte AppleWorks. Sceon ans goes barra ial
ihe dalabasw,
auto-loads AppleWorks for even taster operation; has a variable-size printer
beter and aue-copmerts inrgs lon vo they Gan be naved on two or are Os.
se ony
GS-RAM is not the memary_ard for the GS but dose much, much
‘more than ANY other card. sane PLUS a ity f ansured as fom the makers of
the world boating RamWorks
A 1 Meg GS-RAM or larger includes free Pinpoint 2.0.
Prices: (ex Vat)
256K £169.00
512K £219.00
1 Meg £299.00 - includes free Pinpoint 2.0
4.5 Meg £970.00 - includes free Pinpoint 2.0
GS-Ram Plus es Meg to 8 Meg) - fits GS memory slot
aNCOMeNts as to 6M main card Pi
fate Neg seat Wop Ham Snips ar atl ry pons, i bo
come cheaper. CALL a eee pie
XY
( PINPOINT 2.0
This new enhanced version of Pinpoint, Pinpoint 2.0, works on the new
Apple IGS and works with Version 2.0 of AppleWorks. Pinpoint 2.0 can
also be integrated into AppleWriter as well as AppleWorks, BASIC and
other selected ProDos programs. Pinpoint applications include Ap-
pointment Diary and Calendar, Calculator, CommunicationsWindow,
GraphMerge, Notepad, Quicklabel and Typewriter. Other integrated
applications such as SpollingChecker, Macros (Keyplayer) or pro-
grammers tools (Toolkit) can be added later.
Prices: (ex Vat)
Pinpoint 2.0: £89.00
Spelling Checker: £49.00
KeyPlayor Macros: £49.00
Toolkit (includes RunRun Desktop manager): £69.00
[Ranta (Deokion Menager): £49.00
_S
(PRO-APP HARD DISKS
For ALL Apple Computers
GSle/e/+/Mac/Macs
Pro-App 20 Mb Hard-Disk (Also 10Mb)
The only hard-deh which plugs dict into the Smart pot ot tho GS or the
ama! dk ove por ofa Nc or ne back ot a5 inch cg civ ths Sang
a a voneate fone scsi ly A This.
Gate cive te unique in that tfte te onto go - oven ile. Siyiod 10
atch tha new apoia stying and suppons Macintosh sytem, Prodos (Nc ® 5
16), Pascal 1.3 and Dos ai ma oak is used as the hard-disk for the
UniShare network which links GS/Iie/II
Prices: (ex Vat): 20 Mb: £995.00
10 Mb: £795.00
Compatibility: IGS/leMle/lls MacMacs
Pro-App 40 Mb Hard-Disk
Fast SCSI drive, (Sub 30 msec. avg access time)
Daiey-chain up to 280 Mb.
Compatibilty: GS/Mac Plusiile (Note: GS and lle need SCS! card)
Price (ex Vat): £1795.00
Note: Tape-streamer for Pro-App avaliable February.
. /
(‘VIP = Professional |
The am must vie with AppioWorks lor the tia of "Boe! program vor
fori Appia sot ee
VIP Professional is a super-powortul sproadshoot, database & graphics program.
VIP Professional Is a Lotus 1-2-3 clone which adds a ‘ull Mac-style Interface and
pots ad une onthe le and iol Urbefoveble but tue (Seperate version aval
(9 for IGS.)
VIP Professional provides up to 8192 rows and 256 columns and requires at least
256K of Ram (RamWorks of Z-Ram), (512K on GS), and can directly adeross up
to4 Megs.
VIP Profescional has all the functions and powor of Lotus 1.2.3 and can oven uso
Lotus macros, tamplates and workshoats. (Transfer via a Comms program),
Prices: (ex Vat)
VIP Professional te
VIP Profeasional- GS: £279.00
(Aiso available "bundled" wth GS-Ram, RamWorks and Z-RAM)
NS of
SPECIAL OFFER
New GS-RAM including FREE Pinpoint 2.0 and Spelling Chockor.
Applies to 1 Meg and 1.5 Meg sizes only.
1 Meg GS-RAM: £299.00 - With FREE Pinpoint 2.0 and Speiler
1.5 Meg GS-RAM: £379.00 - With FREE Pinpoint 2.0 and Spellor
Order your GS now and specify GS-RAM!!
Prices exclude VAT. Offer subject to avaltabiity.
We can only mention a tow products in this advert, $0 sand tor our ull lsting
‘and priogs on other pawertul hardware and software for the Apple I! series.
‘That's 1IGS, Hie, He and I.
We are adding new products ail the time « vest
beput cna eo alg tt HarsWorka now Mark is and st
‘momory card Works brine os RAMS now Mark it" Qa your fe 2
Mogae of macy and Ue amazed.
L J
ATEN-DAY NO-
QUIBBLE "MONEY
DELIGHTED" OFFER
PLUS ONE YEAR
GUARANTEE.
(uirrouctscamy BIOMUTHIN TECHNOLOGIES +’
P.O.BOX 264, HARROW, MIDDX. HA3 9AY
BACK IF NOT Tel: 01907 8516 Telex:
G (Ref: 22554001)
Also available from your Local Dealer
ORDERING
INFORMATION
8950511 ONEONE
Add £1.00 P&P per order.
‘Add VAT at 15%
Software on the IT
Swyftware
A Review
wyftware is an operating system and an environment for
text processing where a large amount of data resides in
memory at one time and can be easily accessed by moving
around within it, Although the manuals describe it as an
information retrieval system, this is not strictly true as all data
is held in memory as text and the program simply allows easy
finding of target strings within it. This is done by ‘leaping’ or
‘creeping’ around the text using the special keys.
The system comes as a card for the Apple Ile to go in slot 3
or on a disk for apple Ile or IIc, it is not known whether it will
run on a Ilgs at this time. If you have an apple Ile and don't
want to buy the card you can use the Swyftdisk provided you
have an extended 80 column board.
The package requires you to adopt new meanings for some
keys, e.g. open and closed apples, escape,tab control and some
Jeter keys and for this reason comes complete with a set of neat
and professional stickers for fixing on the front of your existing
keys so that you can easily identify the special functions for
moving around the text and performing commands etc.
First experiences with Swyftware are in the familiar tutorial
method now adopted by most software houses. The tutorial is
disk based and there is an accompanying brief introduction to
this in the manual which stresses the fact that if you get into
trouble you can easily switch off and re-boot.
The tutorial contains over 60 screens of information to teach
you how to use the system and this is reinforced by detailed
instructions of each and every idea in the manual itself, but I
found the tutorial so good that I hardly used the manual until I
got onto advanced printer setups. The tutorial shows very
clearly how quickly a suring of text can be found within a
memory full of document(s), with a maximum search time of
about 2 seconds !! In practice this is normally far less and
appears to be instantancous.
The open and closed @ keys become the leap/creep reverse
and forward keys respectively, when you press down one of
these keys and simultaneously type a target string, the
Swyftware searches for the next occurrence of the string and
moves the cursor to it. This is known as leaping as you can
leap through a whole memory full of information to find your
target. Of course there may be many occurrences of some
targets such as ‘th’, but as you type each character of the target
the cursor jumps to the next exclusive match of the complete
string typed so far, so the more target you enter the more likely
you are to find the right occurrence.
There is also a leap again key which can be used to repeatedly
search for a given target which occurs many times in the text.
To browse through the text paragraph by paragraph you would
initially search for a target of two returns, then.you press leap
forward and leap again and the cursor moves to the next pair of
returns and so on. similarly you can search through sentence by
sentence by searching for full stops or word by word using
space as the target.
By Roger Larcombe.
The cursor has two parts, when text is typed it splits into an
insert cursor (blinking checkerboard as per basic) and a high
light (solid block), both move together when leaping and
creeping, but as soon as text is typed they split with the
highlight showing what will be deleted and the insert cursor
showing where the next typed character will appear. These two
states are called the narrow and wide cursors respectively, and
deleting is carried out to the left when in wide cursor or to the
right in narrow cursor. Fortunately the program determines
which cursor and delete direction you are most likely to want at
any time and sorts it out for you, however you can override this
if you want. I actually found this rather confusing as I am so
used to delete always working in one direction but to the novice
it would probably be more logical and easily learned.
Blocks of text are easily highlighted for later use by one of
the functions of the software by simply leaping to the first
character required, then leap to the last character, then press
both leap (#6) keys at the same time. This causes the whole of
the text in between to go to inverse display ready for use. This
method can also be used to delete large chunks of text as
pressing the delete key will now cause the whole block to be
copied off the screen into a buffer area. The insert function can
now be used to put the block somewhere else in the text or if
you don't want it, then it will be lost when you next delete a
block.
There are only a few commands with Swyftware, the leap and
creep keys for cursor movement, and the contro
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