Hardcore Volume 5 No. 6 1985 12 BASUG GB

December 1985 Volume5(6) spausezeage ee aie z ac eae eA 2 ea Bauseres: faaaae = Mice td st bs | BRITISH-APPLE: SYSTEMS - USER: GROUP THE ONE MEGABYTE APPLE IS HERE . . . Simply plug in the CIRTECH FLIPPER, our ONE MEGABYTE RAMCARD for the APPLE //e or J[+. Using the latest techniques, CIRTECH have designed the FLIPPER to meet the new Apple Standard for large memory cards, ensuring compatibility with future software. > FULL ONE MEGABYTE OF MEMORY — no need for clumsy add-on's <= NO PATCHING REQUIRED for SelB (including APPLEWORKS), DOS 3,3 or PASCAL 1.3 ACCELERATES APPLE //e and J[+ PERFORMANCE — even on complex software AUTOMATICALLY RECOGNISED by the unique CIRTECH CP/M PLUS System FLIP-FLOP PROGRAM MANAGER — allows switching between programs, even if they run under different operating systems. e\ FITS IN ANY STANDARD SLOT -— you can have up to SIX MEGABYTES in your Apple DON'T TAKE A CHANCE ON FUTURE COMPATIBILITY. At Cirtech, we believe in designing for the future, making the FLIPPER a sound investment. FREE SUPPORT -— ensuring compatibility with early CP/M and PASCAL FULLY COMPATIBLE with other hardware add-ons for //e and 1+ INBUILT SELF-TEST to ensure optimum reliability PAN) FANTASTIC VALUE .... 20.08 - ose only £350.00 DON’T DELAY, CONTACT YOUR LOCAL DEALER OR CIRTECH TODAY CCE E nM Currie Road Industrial Estate, Galashiels, Selkirkshire, Scotland, TD1 2BP (Telephone: (0896) 57790) HARDCORE The Journal of the British Apple Systems User Shale PO Box 177 St. Albans Herts AL22EG @ ii 78 BASUG Ltd. is a non-profit-making company limited by: aimee Basug Committee Jim Panks Chairman Norah Arnold Secretary Irene Flaxman Treasurer Graham Attwood Software Library Richard Boyd The Force Keith Chamberlain Membership Ewen Wannop Special Release William Watson Steering Tom Wright Steering Sheila Hirst Coordinator BASUG phone number, administration Sh Almas (REA) Pai BULLETIN BOARDS: Tony Game: (Hyhmitie ) (18 Mike Jones: {yall 2 Hot Line: New Number SEE INSIDE FOR DETAILS Founder members of the Association of Computer Clubs. © COPYRIGHT The contents of this journal are copyright of the British Apple Systems User Group, and/or the respective authors. However permission is granted for non- commercial reproduction by user groups affiliated to the International Apple Core, provided that the author and source are properly credited. The opinions and views expressed are those of the various contributors, and are not necessarily supported by the British Apple Systems User Group. mn Saar SSS The front cover and HARDCORE logo were designed by Stephen Mucha. HARDCORE — DECEMBER 1985 CONTENTS Club News 2 Editorial 2 Apple I[: Is there an after life ? 5 Close Encounters of a micro kind 6 Profile of a local club - MIDAPPLE 12 Format-80. Hardware Modification 13 Communications without tears 16 Epson LH-80 Review 17 News 20 Games Port Extender 22 DS3 - fin update 24 Letters to the Editor 26 Christmas Prize WordSearch 28 Local Group News 29 Living together -afootineachcamp. 31 MacChat - Mac News and articles 38 Contributors in this issue: N.Arnold, 6.Attwood, A.Boyd, E.Dalton, P.Daiton, 6. Drake, A. Deacon-Smith, P. Eagar, |. Flanman, Rf. Jones, 1. Knezovitch, J. Panks, Q. Reidford, T.J. Ricketts, P. Suh, E. Sausse, E. Wannop, D. Ward, W. Watson, D. Wilshere, T. Wright DE SEER SE Aa BO APPLE is the registered trademark of Apple Computers Inc. TELECOM GOLD is a trademark of British Telecom pic. THE FORCE is a trademark of the British Apple Systems User Group Ltd. The copy for this issue was prepared on a Macintosh, and the artwork prepared on Imagewriter and LaserWriter printers. The headings and other material were prepared on a CRTronic typesetter. Page 1 EDITORIAL | am glad you did not throw your new style Hardcore in the bin, you may have thought that it was just more junk mail. The new size has been re-introduced after nearly two years to make it easier for a better quality journal to be produced. The method of production know and for the near future involves all manner of state - of - the - art processes. Much of the material has been sent to me over the Force (BT Gold) and loaded directly into a Macintosh running MacTerminal. It is then put into Microsoft Word and formatted to the correct widths, | print it on an Imagewriter in a 12 point font for editing . The spelling is checked and then it is printed in 9 point Helvetica (Laserwriter font) on the Imagewriter so that layout can be checked. Finally it is printed on a Laserwriter. The whole thing takes time but | hope you all find the layout and type size easier to read. | would like comments trom our readers, so that any mistakes may be corrected for the next issue. | also hope to be able to use more up-to- date software for the next issue. After the Laserwriting is done it is all pasted up in the normal way - plenty of time and glue | Our journal relies on the articles donated by the membership and therefore | ask all of you to submit articles for future issues. These can be on any related subject - you may have a special use for your Apple - or a useful method of using an application. We need tips, solutions to problems that you may encounter and we are very interested in articles about how YOU use your machine. Remember not everyone knows everything about the Apple - and your knowledge may help someone, somewhere. We have introduced a system of reward for articles - this is on top of the fame you get | | would like to take this opportunity to wish all our readers, contributors and advertisers: A MERRY CHRISTMAS AND & HAPPY NEW YEAR Aw Tears Page 2 CLUB NEWS Welcome to the Club News Spot, this will be a regular article to keep you all up to date on what is happening and what is planned for the future. We are hoping that we can get information to you all in plenty of time to allow you to attend at the various functions that we will be organising either nationally or through your local groups. The first item is the Apple Show 86 organised jointly by BASUG & Apple(UK). This show is the brain-child of a really keen member Ivan Knesovich, Ivan is hard at work making the 1st of March a really historic day for all club members. The whole day is designed to give all Apple Users a day to remember. We are working on a very varied program of events including demonstrations, talks and hands-on-experience of many different aspects of Apple Computing. We intend to make sure that all areas are covered on both the Apple ][ and Macintosh range. We will be inviting a very special person to this major event. The event is by ticket only so therefore to avoid disappointment BOOK NOW. Members with transport difficulties are asked to write now - we will if the demand warrants it arrange for coaches to take members to the show. Costs will depend on the numbers and distances involved. Courses are now well advertised and to help us plan ahead we need your support and suggestions. As you can see from the advert elsewhere we have planned out some course which are run by a qualified lecturer to proper Commercial Standards at a fraction of the Commercial Cost. Members of BASUG are placed in an envious position at having PRIORITY PLACES on these courses, The software library has new disks which cover both DOS and CPM, these disks are very good value and the quality has increased since the dark days when the library was first started. Blank disk prices have been held for the near future, we offer the best price available by dealing direct with Memorex, we can also get superb rates for bulk purchases - so if your business needs DISKS why not write or Ring for a quote NOW. PRICES DOWN ON 3 1/2" DISKS Yes, we have managed to get even lower prices for Memorex 3 1/2" disks - they now cost £29.00 inclusive of V.A.T. & Postage and come packed in a plastic SEE10 box. Order now whilst limited stocks last. The FORCE is being updated to a better system which will make it faster and more interesting. BABBS has now the advantage of both a new operating system and a hard disk - both of these new features make it the best around at the present time. The hotline will change from the ist January 1986, please make sure that you record the new number - you never know when you will need help. Special Release Software is still good value and we are at present looking at some new arrivals with a view to releasing them shortly. WATCH HARDCORE for news of these. The committee are at present involved in the re-organisation of the membership system and hopefully we will be able to announce changes that will make it easier to manage. He gals his progrems thraugh the Nelle, yau knay. HARDCORE — DECEMBER 1985 HARDCORE HELP — NEEDED Question - HOW CAN | BE FAMOUS EARN A FORTUNE AND BE HAPPY ?. Answer - WRITE FOR HARDCORE. Yes, you can be famous - over 1000 people will read your words - you can earn a fortune if someone likes what they tread and hires you - you can be happy knowing you have made me happy. Well now | have come down to earth from having my mid- morning dream, | should get back to real-time thinking, like why | am unable to get rid of the £50 worth of disks for contributions by the membership. Not that | don't want too but how can | judge articles that have not been sent in 7 Question: WHAT DO YOU NEED FOR HARDCORE ? Answer: Any article on Apple related subjects Including - What you use it for, what software you use and how, what bugs you have found, hints, tips, questions, answers, listings, in fact anything about any Apple related subject Question: WHAT STANDARD DO’ YOU EXPECT ? Answer: winners - We do not expect PULTZER PRIZE We will accept any reasonable article, the spelling and grammar can be sorted out. Question: HOW DO | SEND MY MASTERPIECE ? Answer: By using the following methods: 1. Apple ][ - Ill - Mac format disks using any text editor or word processor generally available on the machines. (inc CP/M) 2. Via The FORCE or BABBS 1. Please ensure [C/R] are placed properly. Lines should be between 40 and 80 characters long. 3. By letter - typed, printed or neat handwriting. Please try and double-space these articles for easy reading. + All Items should be sent via the P.O.Box Question: NOW | HAVE SENT MY 100 PAGE NOVEL, WHATS IN IT FOR ME ? Answer: Not a lot - You could be lucky and get up to a box of disks for your trouble - you could have a big publisher read your article and offer you a life time job of writing novels for pensioned off computer personal. SO LETS ALL WRITE AN ARTICLE, LETTER, TIP FOR OUR JOURNAL AND MAKE IT THE BEST. Help Requires Contact required:- Mr F.Warren would like to meet anyone with an Apple J+ in the Euston arear of London with a view to exchanging ideas. Please contact on :- (ffi) 2itid) = 4s HARDCORE — DECEMBER 1985 Micro COMPUTER “ONSULTANTS Lip ALL the APPLE range at BARGAIN PRICES! A FULL APPLE IIC SYSTEM This system includes: Apple lic Monitor lic Stand IIc Ext. Disk llc Mouse llc Apple Works Carry Case Colour Modulator * * * * * * * * FOR ONLY £995.00 (inc. VAT, carriage and insurance) Special Prices For BASUG Members A Challenge to Every businessman cr mel aS MACINTOSH Authorised Apple Dealer w=me Level One Service Centre Call TODAY for further details Ascott House, 227 Elliott St Tyldesley, Manchester M29 8DG Tel: 0942-892818 wwxOVERSEAS ORDERS A SPECIALITY sxx Page 3 COMMITTEE CORNER HARDCORE. THE NEW LOOK - THE FUTURE. | hope, like me, you had to pick yourself up off the floor in amazement after seeing the fantastic ‘newlook’ Hardcore. Why make all these improvements to the trusty old magazine? I think | had better explain a few things .... Those of you that have been reading all the small print over the last year, especially that in the annual report, will have realised that BASUG was not in a financially healthy position this time a year ago. The committee, have had to swallow hard and look at the rather dire situation that had arisen over the previous years. The lead was set by our chairman of the time, Quentin Reidford, and following the trend in the outside world, we had to make some cuts. Some of these hurt in various quarters, but with the re-organisation of the administration, and the shouldering of various tasks by the committee, we began to see a reversal of our fortunes. Irene Flaxman, the treasurer, has mentioned these in her 'mid- term’ report. The one remaining large expenditure left was Hardcore itself. On top of the printing and distribution costs, the editor was paid the advertising revenue to produce the magazine, it was decided that the expense of this method, was a luxury that could no longer be afforded. Happily this coincided with the editor himself deciding that he might give up the job of editing the magazine after the October issue. As a result of the financial situation, we have had to look carefully at what we now do with your subscription, and any income we make from sales to you. First and foremost, BASUG is a ‘club’, and exists to help its members. In fact we are a limited company, this was done some time ago to regularise what had become a rather large organisation, and to faciliate all the paperwork and other offical things that went in train with such an undertaking. BASUG as the committee see it, is there solely for the benefit of its members. We are a self-help organisation, though of course your elected committee, spearhead the whole operation. We think that what you get from BASUG should be at the least some or all of the following: 1. A magazine that covers the whole Apple spectrum, Apple Il, I+, /e, //c, Ill, MAC, ITT2020, Franklin etc. etc. 2. A magazine that is interesting, informative, controversial and value for money. 3. Feedback with answers to your problems, through Hardcore, the Hotline, BABBS1, the Force, local meetings, regional meetings etc. 4. A supply of discs and consumables at competitive prices. 5. Short courses organised in the various aspects of all the machines and programs, to further your expertise and knowledge. Page 4 6. A good software library, both of public domain and Special Release discs in both 5 1/4 and 3 1/2 inch formats. This is the bones of the operation, with the committee making the whole thing tick, the flesh is put on by you. After all someone has to write the articles for Hardcore, the regular contributors have only so many articles in them. The local meetings need you to attend, as you help one member, he is helping you. BASUG can attend the shows, only if you attend and help us by buying disks and other things from us. You can help by getting your friends to join. We can expand the facilities we give you, only if you use the ones that are already there and so help us expand in to new ventures. Oh dear, | digressed, we were talking about the ‘newlook' Hardcore. Well you see, the committee, having seen the financial situation become stable, and having decided that the production of Hardcore should be changed, made one more decision. You see the magazine is the one thing that you all have in common, those living in the north of Scotland probably never see another member. So you deserved better for your subscription, but how could we do this, and save money at the same time..... Enter ‘FatMac’, a new page size and layout, and two sets of fingers covered in glue. Up till now, we had produced Hardcore using a daisy-wheel printer and reducing the final copy to AS. This was satisfactory, but did not do justice to the new means that Apple have put at our disposal through the MAC the IMAGEWRITER and the LASERWRITER. First we raised the page size to that of a proper magazine, A4. Next we took all the text files generated all over the country by Applewriter et al. and uploaded them to the FORCE. This saved the envelope and postage (ED. but what about the phone costs ...). Jim Panks pulled out his trusty 'FatMac’, downloaded the files, and taking MS-WORD/MACPAINT etc. molded all the copy and pictures into the sparkling new pages. Then he LASERWRITER'ed most of the pages, some he IMAGEWRITER'‘ed, and finally he and Graham Attwood got the glue pot out, and pasted it all up. | hope you agree it has been worth it, the new magazine is exciting to look at, we hope this will draw more advertising, which will make Hardcore bigger and even better next time round ... look out Apple User ... However, we have still a small problem, we need someone to produce the magazine, all for the love of it, just as the committee is doing now. You see, Jim and Graham, are getting a bit stuck up, with glue that is, and need help. We are committed to producing a magazine of quality for you. We need help, to produce it, and to write articles. We need you, and you need us. Remember, BASUG is a self-help organisation, you can only get out of it what you put in to it... THE COMMITTEE IS WORKING FOR YOU HARDCORE — DECEMBER 1985 From Roger Deacon-Smith comes, this useful information:- I tend to create many text files on a daily basis and use the date as part of the filename to aid identification. | am also lazy and , in order to save myself the effort of typing the date several times each day | use this routine to ‘poke’ the date into the Apple's memory. 0 GOTO 100 20 GOSUB 22: PRINT "WHAT IS THE DATE ? <"; DT$ ; ">"; : INPUT A$ 21 IF A$ <>" " THEN DT$ = A$: GOSUB 24 : RETURN 22 LD= PEEK (919) : IF LD <6 ORLD>8 THEN LD = 0: DT$ =""; RETURN 23 DT$ = "":FOR C = 1 TOLD : DT$ =DT$ + CHR$ (PEEK (919 + C)) : NEXT: RETURN : 24 LD + LEN (DT$) : POKE 919,LD: FOR C= 1 TOLD: POKE 919+C, ASC (MIDS (OT$ , C,1 )) :NEXT : RETURN 100 GOSUB 20: REM GET DATE ROUTINE | have used this location because it appears to be unaffected by the booting of DOS and also still frees most of the space in the area from $300 - $3D0 which is commonly used for short machine code routines. The date is returned as DT$ and the only criteria to be fufilled is that length of DT$ should be from 6 to 8 characters (to cover the range ie 1/1/85 to 31/12/85) but this is readily changed to suit different date formats. Thanks Roger - Another Good idea. Try this listing - it may protect your programmes as well as provide a little amusement and frustration to somebody trying to run a disk or catalog your disk. 10 REM GREETING - 16 PROGRAM 20 POKE 1010, (255) 30 POKE 1011, (105) 40 TEXT:HOME 50 VTAB 10 60 INPUT ".....°,\W$ 70 DS=CHRS (4) 75 REM INSERT YOUR SECRET CODE ON NEXT LINE 80 IF W$= "YOUR SECRET CODE" THEN PRINT D$;"RUN (PROGRAM NAME OR CATALOG) 90 PRINT D$;"RUN HELLO" 100 END Now save the program as HELLO and see what happens. HARDCORE — DECEMBER 1985 APPLE II: IS THERE AN AFTER-LIFE? There was an attempt at the 1985 AGM to study the future possibilities for the Apple ][ range - at least, it got on the programme but somehow it never really got discussed. So | felt someone should raise a few questions here. What are the 2 million owners going to do about their Apples ? And before you can think about that, you too ask why anyone bought an Apple in the first place. Living, as | do, in Europe away from disturbances in Britain, we read that one in ten families own a personal computer there. What do these people do with them ? There is simply nothing like that here. Apart from,the fact that we don't part with our money without a good idea of what we are getting, there is also the supply side. Prices are much higher than in the U.K. or in Germany. | feel that people quickly discover that “getting in on the computer act" is a totally meaningless phrase. The darn things don't work when you wind them up : you have to do lots more. This suggests to me that many people of those one-in-ten (or whatever the meaningless figure really is by now) are sitting quietly in the cupboard, like the train sets and the Lego. But Apple ][ 's are not BBCs or Spectrums : they cost more and they have no 'school- imperitive' so the kids have to be really in it to justify the difference. Sinclairs and BBCs had their day here too, while kids (mainly boys, they were rougher) played games and tried things out. | bought my Apple in 1981 so as to try out various stock market ploys which were available in the U.S.A. and it took me a few years and much intense work to discover that most of my efforts were wasted. You just can't check out traded options that way (and if you don't know what I'm talking about, you must have bought your Apple for another reason) and the stock market operates rather differently. But it taught me quite a lot about my hobby. And now I use it for a lot of correspondence in French and English as well as a number of educational activities - like trying to learn how computers work. A number of people | know use Apples for correspondence, others for teaching children the piano, drawing pictures and so on. The friend who helped me the most early on has changed his ][+ for a Je and I'll never know why. Others have bought a Mac as well but | still don't know what to do. We use Visicalc and all that stuff, but | have Lotus 1-2-3 in the office David Wilshere (HP-150) and that's nicer. The September issue of Apple User talks of coming upgrades for Apple ][e/c owners (at an unknown price) and nothing at all about the J[+ owners. The latter must still be quite a big market (witness the adverts in the American technical papers) and together they may well make a set of markets - people who use ]['s in general office work, people who don't. It seems to me that those of us in the second category have one thing in common: we bought our Apple to do different things and are now satisfied or not, unlikely to buy much more unless our arm is twisted pretty hard. The February 1985 issue of Personal Computing (USA) starts with a picture of the }[e with a screen remark “Reports of my death are greatly exaggerated.” Charles Rubin in "The Life & Death of the Apple][” in that issue remarks that Apple management in 1980 “roundly shunned it's Apple ][ and went for the ill-fated III". But no one seems to have remarked in the two big markets that | see; there are a number of ][+s that | see each week still controlling instruments in laboratories very effectively and much more effectively than quite a lot of the luxury competition. The other part | see is the one | belong to. | bought the thing for a reason | quoted above (and others) and | don't intend to replace it unless it falls to bits or until someone makes me an interesting offer to upgrade. | also suspect that other people have come this way and have decided to use their Apple as a means to learn, having failed to find what else to do with it - the average owner perhaps having less correspondence than | and a range of different interests. After all, you can't stick a disappointed Apple in a wardrobe - there just ain't room ! This is my secret conclusion as to the present location of all those old Sinclairs and BBC's which confused the Great British Population - those who could find no use for their new toys and when the children left school what do you do with the things ? It is not my experience that the British are particularly computer - literate, so there has to be another reason if my observation is right. Continued on page 11 Bossy girls get their disks from BASUG! Page 5 CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE MICRO KIND Tom Wright 1am employed within the Austin-Rover group as an industrial Engineer and have them to thank for my introduction to the Apple ][ microcomputer. Specific details of our computer applications are beyond the scope of this article, but one individuals personal experience of the ‘Hello Apple’ process may interest you. As a computer user working in a flow-line based manufacturing industry my demands on software are based on very simple premises : 1 * Immediate availability. 2+ Easy to understand and remember. 3 + Fast in operation. 4+ Versatile. | use the term ‘computer user’ in a qualified manner since | am not required to be a computer operator or programmer, just to use whatever produces the best results in the shortest possible time. With the exception of item (1) the premises outlined above are not tanked in any particular order because, dependent on any given situation, their order of priority can change. My first encounter with micro's began with a number of cardboard boxes being deposited in my office accompanied by exhaustive description of their contents “it's an Apple computer mate !". | opened those boxes that evening connected the various wires and cables as instructed by the books of words, and then discovered Visicalc. These events occurred in the now dim and distant past (I think it was September, 1982), the simultaneous arrival of the Apple and Visicale proving to be the biggest single event in my working life in terms of aids to improving my work capacity and productivity (displacing the arrival of the pocket calculator which had previously held that position). At that time | had only limited experience of mainframe applications and knew nothing about micro's or our policy regarding the developement of computer based aids. | have subsequently learned that a number of different makes of machine were bought-in at various times, including several models of 1.B.M., Sirius, Pet, Apple, D.E.C ., and others. Each area that acquired micro's developed its own applications which resulted in some machines being little used while others were overworked. This situation developed against a background of large scale mainframe usage by many departments including my own (Industrial Engineering). During the following two years | made contact Page 6 with a number of people in other departments who were interested in micro’s and we helped each other out in various ways. The few ‘experts’ who were found during this period were in the main mainframe biased, and tended to verge on paranoia at the mention of micro based spreadsheets, they were not much help. Pressure from the ‘users’ areas of the company has recently resulted in the development of a comprehensive micro based system, complete with networking and links to both Mini and Mainframe, things are looking good, but not for Apple. Exsisting Apples will continue in use for some years on stand-alone applications but no more will be purchased, we are standardising on the DEC Rainbow (yes | know it's heresy and somebody ought to be shot, but Apple Inc's own policy meant that they couldn't compete). During the coming years as “micro's” acquire larger memory and storage capacity, as well as faster processors, | expect to see an accelerating move away from Mainframe to Mini-Micro operating systems, But that's still well in the future, large user companies don't change quickly and the computer industry still has a lot of work to do before the right products are available at the right price. Meanwhile back at the beginning, when my departments first Apple arrived it was accompanied by the following: + Two disk drives. = 12” Monitor. * Anadex DP9501 Matrix Printer. » Paddles. + DOS 3.3 System Master. + Basics Disk. + Visicale (13 sector). + Several Games. + Micromodeller. + Various Manuals. The Apple itself was a Europlus, like everything else in the bundle it was second-hand having been passed on from another department. After initial examination Visicalc, Micromodeller and the games were identified as being of immediate interest, within one month this was revised to Visicalc, games and the System Master, Micromodeller was consigned to a filing cabinet from where it is never likely to emerge. Before | am deluged with commercials on behalf of Micromodeller, 1 remind everyone that my basic premises included (and still do) items (2) & (3) and in those terms Micromodeller is a dead duck. While | accept that my range of contacts outside the company does not exceed forty people, | have yet to meet anybody (with our type of requirement) who regularly uses Micromodeller, despite the fact that several people have extolled its virtues. Occasionally as new personnel have transfered into the area, Micromodeller has been taken out and tried, but it is always discarded. The games have proved to be worth their weight in RAM as aids to overcome peoples apprehensions about micro's, not to mention the fact that | have derived a great deal of pleasure from them. Until last year the System Master was of interest to a very small number of people (ie. those who caught the bug), but this is changing since most people have begun to use the companies Open Learning Centre. The centre is equipped with a number od Apples and DEC outfits, and employees using the centre are able to work through various 'hands- on’ courses which include basic introduction to: + Computers . * Programming. + Word Processors. + Special Courses Visicalc was the software package that most people took to from the beginning and it was used on many of our activities, it is still used on a large scale in some areas where high capacity spreadsheets can meet a need. In addition to expansion software we also use VisiSort which enables alpha numeric sorting of Visicalc files, we find this very useful for identifying material handling labour requirements when the location of a range of materials at trackside is changed. A specially written program would have been better in some ways but parameter (1) won the day. 16 sector Visicale replaced the 13 sector version about six months after we started. Apart from the software which was supplied with the original Apple, most subsequent software acquisitions have been selected by the users. Additional hard and firmware has also been chossen by the users. Software purchases by the company have included Supercalc, VisiSort, Flashcalc, VisiPlot, VisiDex, VisiTerm, VisiTrend, DMS, Multiplan and VisiFile. Most of the machines are expanded by at least 128k and all but one include 80 column displays, only one is equipped with a Z80 card. We failed to convince the necessary people that accelerator boards would be a good buy, but then you can't win them all. HARDCORE — DECEMBER 1985 Close encounters of a Micro kind Supercale was purchased when we were told that we couldn't run Visicale with some 8" drives, it has been used on a very limited scale. Of the people who have used it most don't like the display and few find any advantage in it compared to expanded Visicalc/VisiSon. VisiFile emerged from the depths of the Finance department where it had been little used, we have found it useful for a limited number of applications, but it certainly does not meet premise number (3) and will never be used on a large scale. VisiPlot/Trend/Dex/Term arrived as part of a package with some new machines, but they have been little used. VisiPlot caused some excitement for a while but we experienced some difficulty in achieving printer dumps and it has never been used very much (must do something about that one of these days). DMS is used on one machine only and not very often at that, it is not regarded as meeting premises (2) & (3), neither has it impressed us much with regard to (4). Multiplan's arrival caused a great deal of excitement and it is used on a considerable scale. Most people who use it will not touch any 'Calc" if they can help it, although most of them also complain that Multiplan is too cold to catch a cold, and is too limited in memory size. Flashealec initially appeared to be the update that the ‘Calc’ brigade was looking for, it's ability to use whatever RAM the machine has is very useful and it has many of the features which are loved by the ‘Plan’ pundits. However Flashcalc does not have a sort facility and its PRODOS base complicates the use of VisiSort on its files. Our most recent purchase is Practicale ][ which is a combined Spreadsheet / Database ? Word Processor, complete with sort and search functions. The ‘Calc’ brigade have perked up and are busily finding out what Practicalc has to offer in addition to the search and sort, when I've had a chance to try it | will attemp a comparative review. In the near future we will have Lotus 1-2- 3 with the DEC machines as well as a large spreadsheet on the mini part of the new system. Along the way we have written a few programs ourselves (in Applesoft, some compiled, for specialist applications, MIM tutorial, multi-activity charting etc) but those people with the ability to do so HARDCORE — DECEMBER 1985 do not have the time, and it is awkward trying to accomodate three different makes of printer, two models of Apple, various 80 column cards, etc. Spreadsheets still meet most of our local needs and are likely to do so for some time to come. Some ‘experts’ still tell us that we should not be using them for a lot of our applications, but we find that they have the following advantages: 1+ Immediately available. 2+ No queueing at the mainframe. 3+ Access 24 hours, 7 days a week. 4+ Very low cost. 5 - New applications developed within hours (sometimes minutes). 6 « Portability at no extra cost, modems etc 7 + No data loss/corruption due to other people. 8 + No application knowledge gap on the part of programmers. 9» The product is as we want it, not as others would like us to have. Due to the fact that like most professions we use a lot of jargon ( and so does our industry), actual applications are more dificult to describe and can only be generalised. All our applications include calculations and tabulations of identities, time, quantity, and facilities with many permutations of them. Many of you will be familiar with manufacturing conventions in regard to identifying components and assemblies. An assembled product is identified by: + Amodel name which the customer will recognise. + Adesign number. + Apart or assembly number. + Occasionaly a model derivative or sub model name, design and part number. All of our products (ie. assemblies) comprise a number of sub-assemblies each of which has its own identification, some products comprise of dozens of sub - assemblies and in some cases hundereds of parts (thousands when you are dealing with storage areas and systems). Identification and control is further complicated by the series of processes that each part or assembly must pass through, and whether or not a sub - assembly is wholly manufactured by us, or bought - in as a finished or part + finished item. The vast majority of our products are produced in thousands per week, with some sub - assemblies being common usage on a range of finished products, Dependent on the processes involved, at various stages in manufacture there are specific requirements in terms of human skills, as well as tools, equipment, transport and storage. Each of the above is quantified in terms of volume (or number required), time available to produce the volume, work required to achieve the required quality at the volume, and time required to produce, move, sort, store, etc.. As you will realise permutations of the above associated with ‘what if’ questions , require an enormous amount of number crunching so that decisions can be made; computers are our only method of coping with the timescales that we operate under.. Sar] AustinApple MkI¥ ] | could continue to generalise about the type of data that our Apple J[ (and other makes) process, but the above summary has probably given you the general idea. Before the micro, most ‘what if’ questions resulted in hours, sometimes days, of frantic pencil pushing. A 26 week forecast used to take about three days to complete, we can now do it in less than two hours (with more useful detail and greater accuracy). The effect of ongoing changes and modifications is now incorporated into the appropriate control model quickly, and no longer represents a human peak workload. The Apples have been, and are, great. Shame that the season is drawing to a close, | hope the orchard will soon contain a new crop. My own interest in Apples is in no way diminished and, thanks to a very understanding wife, | spend many happy hours on my own machine and in various club activities. | even enjoy the brain aches, although | often wish that the Apple didn't sound so smug when it beeps and announces yet another syntax error. Page 7 APPLE-FEST 4 al APPLE SHOW 86 (I, The Very first combined APPLE II and Macintosh Cultural Show is to be held at the Conference Centre, West Midland Safari Park, Bewdley, Worcs, DY 12 1LP on Saturday Ist March 1986. ee KK This Premier event is dedicated to the thousands of Apple Users in the U.K. For the first time home and business users will have a chance to show other users what they have achieved with their Apple computers. It will be a day to share and exchange ideas, view exhibits, take lecture notes, compete programs and revel in that unique Apple Atmosphere. eR RR RR RO + Private Bar + Program Competition + Bring & Sell Market * Lecture Room + Users Exhibition + Laser Print Service + Full Lunch Buffet + Specialist Lectures + Software Test Drive + Refreshments + Mystery Guest + Latest Hardware Prizes to be won for the categories below in our Program Competition * Best Show Program + Best Spreadsheet Template + Best Game + Best Videoworks + Best Mac Desk Accessory * Best Apple Art Entrance to the show is ticket only, payment to be made before 20th February 1986. Admission is £4.00 and this includes Free Lunch and Lectures. Please make payment, with name and address, to SHOW 86 (BASUG) and send to BASUG or direct to Apple Show 86, West Midland Safari Park, Bewdley, Worcs, DY12 1LF. We have a limited entry so to avoid disappointment please register early. KK RK K SHOW NOTES Firstly, this is a non profit show, organised by Apple enthusiasts for Apple enthusiasts, with the help and support of BASUG and Apple (U.K.) To ensure its future as a regular event we need your support for this show!! The Program Competition has been organised to hopefully further encourage programming on Apples, especially on the Mac, as very little has been written for it in the U.K. Entrance to the competition is restricted to members registered for the show. Only one entry will be accepted for each category. Prizes will be announced at a later update. Entries are to be sent with your show registration number, program category & name and address to : Apple Show 86, West Midland Safari Park, Bewdley, Worcs, DY12 1LF. " Season Greetings to you all " van Knezovich (Show Organiser) Page 8 HARDCORE — DECEMBER 1985 APPLE-FEST Are you cold, depressed, and wish you could get out and meet other Apple Users ? Well you now have the chance, arrangements are well advanced for a special BRITISH APPLEFEST to be held on Saturday 26th January 1985. The venue, in the picturesge setting of the West Midlands Safari Park at Bewdley, near Kidderminster has been chosen for the expert attention given by the staff to guests and the excellent facilities available. Food in the form of a Finger Buffet is provided in the cost. Members who pre- book will be given priority over casual visiters. We will be holding a seminar in conjunction with the chance to see and try many new products for the Apple J[ and Macintosh range. Many special events have been organised, these include: Apple bring and buy sale. Laserwriter Corner. Competitions. Dealers stands. Seminars on: Communications . Spreadsheets. Hardware. Software. Macintosh Apple ][ & its future. Networking. Publishing on the Mac. We also are able to offer (if the demand is there) transport from the following areas: Route 1: London - Watford - Luton - Milton Keynes - Northampton - Coventry. Route 2: Leeds - Sheffield - Leicester - Birmingham. Route 3: Liverpool - Manchester - Stoke on Trent - Stafford - Wolverhampton . Nottingham - What will it cost 7 Members will receive entrance and food for an inclusive price of £4.00 Entance on the day will be £5.00 for members or non-members. No food will be available without pre-booking. Transport arrangements depend on the number of persons attending and will be notified when arrangements are finalised. If you want transport please let us know a.s.a.p. HARDCORE — DECEMBER 1985 YOU RUN A LOCAL GROUP? eeeeeeeee! then read this! Have you ever started out to a local group meeting thinking that your evening was planned, that you were looking forward to a good demo, only to find that the person who should be doing the demo fails to arrive, perhaps through no fault of his own. | have, several times. The trials of running a local group are many. People who have their computer hooked up to several bits of delicate hardware can be understandably reluctant to pull everything apart and brave the British weather to drag their equipment along to a meeting. Some of the most knowledgeable members of the group are often the most reluctant to speak. But there are also many benefits, new friends made, problems solved, broadening one's view of how the machines can be used, and so on. Several present members, and ex- members of the committee are involved in running groups, but there are some groups with whom we have very little contact. The committee would like this to change. lam sure that there will be benefits from those running local groups getting together and swapping information on good demos, firms willing to bring equipment etc. As a start in the right direction, | would like those running a local groupwho know that they have no committee member regularly visiting their group, to make onkack with me, Norah Arnold, on (#isitit Say Don't forget about it, give me a ring so that we can all get to know each other a little better. ED's Note..... Norah Arnold is the Secretary of BASUG, one of the leading lights at the Herts Local Group and now is taking responsibility for the local groups - | would therefore urge those concerned to contact Norah NOW. PROFILE of the Treasurer Hi,Folks This is your treasurer calling. | have now been on the Committee for the past six months. My nomination may have had something to do with the fact that |am an accountant. | actually work for Royal Insurance Group. My husband and | have been BASUG members for about three years, and finally got roped into doing something for the Club instead of simply benefitting from it. We are Apple Ill and //e users, and tend to use Appleworks for the Club accounts. Ascii Express Professional is used on those occasions when | need to send information to other Committee members, via THE FORCE. | approached the treasurer's job with some trepidation, but need not have worried because it soon became obvious to me that during the previous year, the Committee had made great strides to improve the financial position of BASUG. One example of this was the introduction of a better bookkeeping system. | am pleased to report that the Auditors have recently presented to us the draft accounts for the year 1984/85, and they clearly show a successful year for the Club. Inroads have been made into clearing the previous years’ deficit, and this trend seems likely to continue. | am part of a financial sub-committee. It is our task to look at budgeting and efficiency, and it is hoped that we can continue to contribute to the smooth tunning of the Club. The 1984/85 accounts will be reported in full in your next edition of Hardcore, prior to being presented at the Annual General Meeting. | am optimistic that the future for the Club looks good. Irene Flaxman Treasurer CLUB NEWS The Bristol Apple Users and Dabblers (BAUD), meet once a month. Date and time, and place variable. Enthusiasts on all the machines, meet to swop ideas, problems and then retire to the pub for half an hour before closing time. About a dozen or so attend each meeting. We are looking for a permananent venue, but in the meantime, contact Mike Farmer (Secretary) , Corsham. ot, or Mike Evans 2720141 or Dave Munoz Next meeting -6th Dec, 7.30 Bath Academy of Page 9 The British Apple Systems User Group The Committee on behalf of all members wish to thank the following for the help they habe giden oder the past pear and to say "S Mervcy Christmas and a Happy New Wear” THANK YOU To all Hardcore Contributors. Ann Austin and Julie Panks in distributing disks. Phillip Faber for the Prestel Pages. Tony Game for BABBS1. Mike Jones for BABBS 2. Derek Church and Frank Everett for organising the exhibitions . Stefan Mucha for his design and artwork. Ivan Knesovitch for the MacSIG and the APPLE-FEST 66. Peter Trinder and Geoff Drake for the MacLibrary Disks. Chris Williams for the HOT-LINE. AN OPEN CHRISTMAS CARD CREDIT for your efforts In the past BASUG has issued a series of credit tokens for articles, reviews and other contributions to Hardcore or for programs donated to the Software Library. These tokens were meant to be returned in part payment for either blank disks or Library software. Unfortunately the administration of the system - who was given tokens, and how many, and for what - has become unworkable. some people seemed to save them up and then want to cash in a whole heap at once, and others never bothered to claim their value. So we have decided to discontinue the practice of issuing them, and will in future give prizes in the form of disks for articles printed in Hardcore, to a total of £50 per issue, these will be divided up into categories for the best article, for the best tip/idea, and minor prizes of for other contributions. Each issue will have a list of the winners for the previous edition. Software contributors will be rewarded with disks of their choice from the library, depending on the number of programs donated. Page 10 For those who still have tokens to be redeemed, send them in by 31st January 1986 latest, and they will still count but strictly at the le of £1 plus a token for either a blank disk or a Library disk of your choice. (Mac owners at the rate of £3 + 3 tokens per disk or software). Another member needs comms software for the Ill - also required is a Word Processor if you can help please ring Bernard on Itchen Abbas 619 or Work No 0962 68166. Any member wishing to swap a Ill drive for a new J{ drive contact Bernard on Itchen Abbas 619 or Work No (fititie bitte, HARDCORE — DECEMBER 1985 SPEEDLOADER A ‘ast loading disk' utility that does not require a DOS to operate, it can therefore be used with custom disk systems other than CPM, though it has been optimised for use under DOS 3.3. The Master systems disk may be used to prepare and service ‘custom fast-loading disks’. These will generally load your programmes and run them up to six times. faster than normal. DOS may be included as a file on the prepared disk, and most programmes of about 20k in length will load DOS and run in about 2-3 seconds after the drive has re-calibrated. The disks prepared with Speedioader are under a normal DOS 3.3 environment, and the spare blocks on the disk may be used as normal file space. A Speedioader initialised disk has only the fastloader utility placed on it to start. The loading address may be changed to suit your own application, the loader taking up to 14 pages of memory. A seperate directory is also created for the Speedioader files, and the main VTOC is marked accordingly. Files may be marked in the directory in such a way, that when loaded, they may either be simply loaded, loaded and run, if a DOS file then loaded and started, if APPLESOFT or INTEGER Basic the language may be cold-started and finally, one file is marked as the last ' HELLO’ programme. In this way multiple file loads are possible before execution of the main programme. In addition, an address may be referenced twice before loading allowing for instance the language card to be switched on to allow 64k DOS to be loaded. Utilities are provided to prepare your custom DOS into a suitable file for running, this includes all page 3 vectors. All files other than Text files may be loaded and run, the latter you would normally open and read from BASIC itself. The disk once prepared may be copied using the normal copy programmes, the time spent in preparation is amply rewarded by the subsequent sheer speed and smoothness of loading. It is especially suitable for loading and running games or programs that do not access DOS once they are in memory, as no DOS need be loaded thus saving time. On a test disk using ten HI-RES pictures, we were able to load and display these frames in a continuous cycle of six seconds for the ten pictures. The loader may be recalled from BASIC or MACHINE CODE programmes using the ampersand vector, allowing for instance tables of data to be SPEEDLOADED into memory after execution of the main programme, A full 45 page manual is provided on the back of the disk, in the form of APPLEWRITER TEXT FILES. A simple utility allows the dumping to screen or printer for those that do not have APPLEWRITER ][. Full details on how to use the system are included, and some examples of how to prepare custom disks are also given. The SPEEDLOADER system may be used to prepare commercial fast-loading programme disks, provided only the loader is present on the final disk, and a copyright message is given with details of availability. No licence fee is payable if the following conditions are met. The master SPEEDLOADER disk must have been purchased by the writer of the programme, and the copyright information shown should take the form of either a 3 second display on the streen or be included in the first page of the programme manual. The details will include the name of the authors (Written by Cornelius Bongers and Willem Schouten) and the availability of the programme (i.e BASUG Ltd. ). Available from BASUG NOW !! Price £16 (inc V.A.T. Post and Packing) _OCBWS Productions Amsterdam_ HARDCORE — DECEMBER 1985 APPLE I[: IS THERE AN AFTER-LIFE? This gets us back to the many Apple programmers and the many other individuals of my acquaintance who are so reactionary that they go back to assembler for their own masochistic pleasure, while my employer is in the fourth generation languages and all our professionals laugh like a drain when the two parties meet. But do possessors of Tandies, Commodores and other such do this ? | don't think that this is so but | hope you will write and say that my observations do not accord with your experience. That interesting article by Charles Rubin discusses what people buy and the reasons why ; it appears however to be assumed that buy they will. But is this not the main question ? Steve Jobs, in this same article, is quoted as saying "Our future in the long run is totally Macintosh...". Of course, we probably ail agree that we would accept paying a modest price to make the exchange but at todays price...... who still believes in Santa Claus ?. Is the * sealed box " a big factor ? It may be for some, but some of us could survive as we do without looking into car engine. Generation Gap ? No, rather a desire to have out-grown these teenage feelings and to be ready to face twentieth century technology. The summary of this article is that | suggest there is a series of Apple )[ markets, which Apple has decided - in desperation - to investigate, but that there is a large impecunious sub-market which will have to be tempted to do anything to upgrade, that another is in laboratory and plant instrument control and a third in the "mechanic" philospher who enjoys machine or assembler languages but we all hope that Apple will bear us in mind. We also feel that the sort of articles by John Sharp and others who precede him will still have a big audience from us still struggling far behind. Perhaps more assembler or some simpler things in memory mapping and manipulations are needed and which are soon forgotten when we don''t use the Apple for a while. Editors note: David Wilshere lives in Switzerland and has obviously thought about Apple J[ and its exsistence in the future. | have published the whole article as sent because | believe that it may interest you and generate some replies. | would welcome any response to t! article . Page 11 LOCAL GROUPS PROFILE OF A LOCAL CLUB by William G Watson MIDAPPLE The Apple Computer Users’ Club in the West Midlands meets on the second Friday in each month at 7 pm at I.T.E.C. Tildasley Street, West Bromwich Some two years ago, a group of enthusiasts decided that it would be a good idea to found a club for like-minded people. After one or two abortive attempts MIDAPPLE emerged as a very successful, well supported and well organised club. In the early days it was necessary to take our machines along to clubnights but for a variety of reasons this proved unsatisfactory. We decided to seek a venue where APPLE computers were already installed. We were very fortunate to meet with at ‘one of the computer shows John Cooper of I.T.E.C. At LT.E.C. we have available to us: 16 APPLE //e 1 APPLE //+ 1 MaciNTOSH. The club is run entirely by its members; and we decided at the outset that each meeting should be programmed and structured. The meetings start promptly at seven o'clock by which time machines are booted showing graphic displays of that evening's events and details of forthcoming meetings. This creates an ambience of welcome to the members and creates the opportunity for discussion among us. An eye is kept out for new members and they are introduced to some-one who will be responsible for them for the evening. At 7.20pm we group together and notices are given out and a forum is provided for members to ask questions and exchange news and/or gossip. "Have you heard the latest on Steve Jobs...". That sort of thing. At 7.30pm the evening's speaker is introduced and the following hour is set aside for a demonstration relating to an APPLE computer topic. At 8.30pm self-help coffee is available followed by a machine code class for those interested or free time for members to do as they wish until 10pm. It is a challenging task to provide a demonstration or speaker each month but apart from an unplanned snowstorm last February we have been able to provide a full, diverse and we hope interesting program. Page 12 We have drawn largely on our members’ talents to speak about such interests as spreadsheets, DOS, graphics, music and word processing. On occasions we have invited other people to give us demonstrations of their particular interests or products. For example we have gone online to America, thanks to Richard Boyd (BASUG committee member) and met the author of MacAUTHOR, Mike Glover (Leicester Computer Centre). The club is simply financed. No charge is levied to us by |.T.E.C. for use of the facilities. An annual subsciption of £3.50 is paid by members to meet running expenses. In addition each member contributes 50p to cover the cost of coffee and a monthly newsletter. Every effort is made to make members feel part of the club. We have a hardcore membership of 30. Children and young people are very welcome provided a parent is a member who will be responsible for them. In general our members are hobbyists, with a sprinkling of small business users. The Newsletter is in its seventh edition and is produced entirely on an APPLE by two of the club members. It is well worth the time spent on it as it is an excellent medium for ensuring dissemination of information and membership involvement. Contributions from members are what make it tick and many different aspects of computer usage obtain coverage. If you would like to come along to one of our meetings you would be very welcome. Why not telephone : Tom Wright Secretary. - @i27 Beis Harry Gardiner Information Officer = - Cura oes They will give you more information about MIDAPPLE and arrange a personal introduction for you. We have a great club and enjoy meeting fellow enthusiasts. UA ANOTHER GOOD IDEA by WILLIAM G WATSON GAMES - iu candi APPLE //e Many games do not have the facility to store high scores to disk. However depending on the way the program has been written it may be possible to download the graphic screen that shows the high score to disk without a knowledge of machine code or a hardware utility such as SNAPSHOT. What | do is this. When the HIRES screen which shows the high score | want to preserve is visible | flip up the disk drive gate and hit CONTROL-RESET ( It's always best to use a BACK-UP and not the original because if you should accidently do this during a WRITE operation you are going to run the risk of losing your program). If you are lucky (unlikely) and you are left with an operable DOS then try saving the last graphic screen to disk. Although no graphic is on-screen it may still be in memory at the conventional memory location and so may be saved. You will need a DOS 3.3 initialised slave diskette for this. Insert it in ie drive instead of the game disk and ty BSAVE HIGHSCORE, "$2000, L$2000 and press < RETURN > To check if you saved the highscore screen type : - POKE - 16302,0 and < RETURN > You got it | Good. Now let's go back to the point where you hit CONTROL- RESET and you were not left with an operable DOS. All is not lost. What you do is this. DO NOT SWITCH OFF THE APPLE because hopefully (definitely not guaranteed) your graphic screen is still in memory and it's a matter of getting it out. Take out your game disk and insert a DOS 3.3 initiallised slave diskette and hit OPEN APPLE CONTROL - RESET. This will load DOS into your APPLE's memory but will not overwrite memory location $2000 onwards where you are hoping your screen is stored. At the Applesoft cursor type : BSAVE HIGHSCORE, ‘$2000, LS2000 and < RETURN >. Now try out the check above to see if you have got it. It you have an APPLE //+ you may be able to do as above providing you can use RESET or CONTROL RESET to either leave you in DOS or to boot in DOS from another disk. Currently | am saving the highscore on MR DO at level 18 with a score of 178300. HARDCORE — DECEMBER 1985 FORMAT-80. HARDWARE MODIFICATION As a recent arrival within BASUG's ranks | have been deriving considerable pleasure from reading through back issues of Hardcore which were loaned to me by a friend, while doing so | came across Chester Kemp's excellent review of Format-80 in the June 1984 issue. At the end of his review Chester mentioned a snag with the Apple ][+ * if it is installed and co-resides with game paddles with a two-way adapter (such as EZ-Port), then your arcade games will not function properly if they use the triggers *. | recently contributed the following notes to the MIDAPPLE (thats Apple nuts in the Birmingham area folks !) newsletter after obtaining a lot of guidance from one of our scientific types ( good shower in the clubs aren't they 7). The notes are offered to Hardcore in case they are of assistance to anyone who thinks Format-80 is wonderful (which it is) but has to have regular fixes of Lode Runner etc (guilty yer honour). The following notes are intended to help you to achieve improved operating convenience with very little effort, no technical knowledge is required and you will not have to do any soldering. The most effective way of simplifying the change between Joystick and Format-80 includes the installation of an EZ-Pont or similar device. EZ-Ports consist of a ribbon cable with a DIP header on one end (to fit into internal games socket), and a ZIF (zero insertion force) game socket on the other end. Installation of an EZ-Port allows you to effectively have your games socket mounted on the outside of the machine (eg adjacent to the keyboard). My EZ-Port cost me £7.00 secondhand and you could make your own version for less than half the advertised cost. Avoiding the need for any change of plugs requires the introduction of switching capability : + For the shift key / lock functions + + For the joystick. + As well as continuous connection of the shift key and shift lock functions, the joystick can still be removed if required. Shift Key Functions | chose to start from scratch with this and replaced the Format-80 adaptor complete (the old adaptor can go into the useful bits and thingies box). Components required include : +4 mini-test clips. + * 2 lengths 20-gauge stranded test-probe wire (l used Red and Black). + + 2 single-pole, single-throw switches (SPST). + HARDCORE — DECEMBER 1985 You will need something to mount the switches on, or in (1 don't like drilling holes in my Apple cos it lets the worms in). 1. + Remove the lid from your ][+. + 2. + Disconnect and Format - 80 adaptor. + remove the old 3. + Decide where your switches are to be mounted and cut two lengths of wire (ie 1 red & 1 black), each length to be equal to twice the distance from underneath the keyboard to the switch location. + 4.+ Attach a mini-clip to each end of each length of wire by pulling the end cap off and inserting the wire through the aperture in the side of the cap and attaching it to the connector. Knot the wire to it or if all else fails solder it |. Replace the end cap on the clip. You can simplify this process by using a Tandy Part Number 278-016 which is a pair of mini-clips with 20" of wire already attached. + 5. + Cut each wire at its mid-point. + 6. + Clip one of the black wires to keyboard wire number 3. « 7. + Clip one of the red wires to keyboard wire number 24. 8.+ Identify chip number 74LS251 on the motherboard right hand side of row H, immediately in front of the game connector. + 9. + Clip the second length of red wire to pin number 1 of the 74LS251 (drawing 1)+ 10.* Clip the second length of black wire to pin number 2 of the 74LS251 (drawing 1). it used EZ Port ribbon goes to the right side. Color Trim Wy Drawing 1 11. + Take all the loose ends of wire through a ventilation slot or the rear slots, depending on where you are going to mount the switches. - 12.* If you are mounting your switches in a box (eg a Tandy project box), push the wires through the access hole(s) in the back of the box. + 13,* Connect both red wires to an SPST switch. 14.* Connect both black wires to an SPST switch. + 15.* Ensure that both switches are securely mounted. + 16.* Check that mini-clips are still securely attached to their locations.+ 17.* Replace the Apples lid. + Switches are included in the shift key connections because those connections can interfere with the operation of some software if left permanently connected, now that we can switch them off when Format-80 is not in use they should give no trouble. Edge of each pin location to be cut away on one side of each Low Profile Socket gti 4n3) 1 Drawing 3 Although the introduction of switches into the shift key functions prevents Format-80 from interferring with the joystick, when the joystick is left continuously connected it will interfere with Format-80 unless we provide another switching facility. ‘Continued on next page Page 13 FORMAT-80. HARDWARE MODIFICATION Joystick Switching. The following method can be used regardless of whether or not you have an EZ-Port (if you plug the ‘switches’ into the internal game socket you will of course have to remove the Apple's lid each time you operate the switches) . Items required include: a. * Two 16-Pin Low-Profile DIP Sockets. b. + One 8-Position SPST DIP Switch Block. I have mentioned the Tandy Low-Profile sockets in the guide list of prices at the end of these notes, they will do the job, but the type that has a removable cover plate is really easiest to work with and is the type covered in the following method. 1. + Remove the cover plate from the low- profile sockets and cut the sides from tne row of pin locations (drawing 3). This is done to provide better clearance for the Switch Block's pins. If you have got sockets without removable covers you can probably manage without doing this. 2. * Replace the covers on the sockets. 3. + Cut pins number 3 and 8 from one of the sockets (on the side that has had the pin locations in the cover cut). 4. + Bend both rows of pins on the DIP Switch Block down (drawing 4). 5. + Seat the switch block's top row of pins in the side of the socket that has had pins 3 & 8 removed (you should find that the blocks's bottom row of pins will be in contact with the socket's pins). 6. + Seat the switch block's bottom row of pins together with the upper socket's pins into the second socket (drawing 4). switch” <= ier 16 pin _-— sockets ez-port 7. * Locate the Joystick into the top low- profile socket and press the assembly firmly. 8. + Locate the assembly into your EZ- Port or game socket (drawing 5). When in use switch settings will be as follows; a. + Format-80 in use - Shift functions ON. + Joystick switches 3 & 8 OFF. b. + Joystick in use - Shift functions OFF. « Joystick switches 3 & 8 ON. Drawing 2 is provided for identification of pin locations 3 & 4, in case anybody who has an EZ-Port and has broken the original Format-80 connector block's pins simply wants to lock the wires into the EZ-Port until they have achieved a more permanent repair. Ewe View or Te Soexer/Swiren Sanbwicn op T Lwaten ‘alee age Pests Socner Pus 3 28 or top Secast To be Ben UustA ob cur ore —— Switen Biace Bint a Bors Rows of Pus on MP ir Low Paorut DOMNWAEAS To EwbALE WIT Socnat Socker Pr Leenrrews Be caer! Paws cam cntny Bk SWAPPED. You could obviously save money by using a single wire colour, and use a smaller switch than the toggle switch mentioned above. An 8-Position DIP switch block was used for two reasons: a.» it's easy to line up on the sockets. b. » you have now got switches installed on one side of the sockets in case you decide to introduce another modification. That's about it for Format-80 , | have not yet made an "EZ-Port" but will get round to it one of these days, it would be useful to have more than one socket and switching between the sockets, | must talk with our technical type. By the way, | have also installed a volume control which has solved the late night / early morning problem. Maplins were the people who had a suitable potentiometer, | covered miles looking for one before | found them in Perry Barr on the north side of Birmingham. COMPONENT PRICES Components used or referred to include the following: 1. + EZ-Port, Pace Software, £16.10. 2. + EZ-Port ll, Pace Software, £26.45. 3. + Mini-Clip leads, per pair 20” wires, 278-016 £2.49. 4, « Micro-Test Clips, per pair 270-370 £2.99. 5. + 16-Pin Low-Profile DIP sockets, 279-1998 £0.69. 6. + 8-Position SPST DIP Switch Block, 275-1301 £1.59. 7. * Test-Probe Wire (25'), 20-gauge Red 278-553 £2.19 Black 278-554 £2.19 8. « Standard Toggles (switches), 3 amp & 125 VAC, SPST 275-602 £0.79. 9. + Variety of project boxes, various prices. Page 14 Tom Wright HARDCORE — DECEMBER 1985 THE ULTIMATE APPLE lic OPERATING SYSTEM? AN OPEN AND SHUT CASE! The Cirtech //c CP/M PLUS System consists of a Z80 Module (which fits totally inside your //c) and version of the CP/M PLUS operatin PERFORMANCE uper-fast ZBOH (8 din an Apr combined n handling (ur er than the € d rout c) bringing r al ports and lincl cha alle ga the text display to be printed optional blink 1 and does the normal operation of the //c. CP/M PLUS is compatible with C APPLICATIONS The system THE MOST ADVANCED OPERATING SYSTEM AVAILABLE FOR ANY 8-BIT MICRO £195.00 Prices exclude carriage and VAT CIRTECH (UK) Ltd., Currie Road Industrial Estate, Galashiels, Selkirkshire, Scotland, TD1 2BP. Telephone (0896) 57790 APPL PPLE //c are regi ademarks of APPLE COMPUTER INC CPIM and CP/M PLUS are registered trademarks of DIGITAL RESEARCH INC, odemé SOFTCARD is a registered trademark of MICROSOFT CORPORATION, 280 tered trademark of ZILOG INC. COMMUNICATIONS WITHOUT TEARS Ewen Wannop Well, you've unpacked the little black box, struggled with the cables, hooked it all up, booted your terminal programme, dialled the number ..... and then nothing, not even a bleep from your trusty Applemac. Take a large slug of Apple juice, sit down and contemplate the problem properly. It is only then you notice that slogan you hung in your Appleroom one day many moons ago « ‘If all else fails, read the MANUAL' Well and you thought communications was going to be easy, you have to be able to read as well! Still you pick up the manual, and look at the index. ‘How to setup your System’, Chap 1, it says. Looks like you may get somewhere here .... First plug in the Serial card’. Serial card, you did remember to get one didn't you? Or are you lucky and have a //c, or horror of horrors forgive me for mentioning it, a MAC. ‘Next check that your modem/serial card cable is correctly wired’. This can be a nightmare, there are female plugs, male plugs, 25way D plugs, 5 pin domino plugs, DCE ends, DTE ends and goodness knows what else. Get help if you are in trouble here, it is the most common cause of modem problems. Once you have the right connection, you can forget about it from then on. ‘Plug your modem into the BT socket'. Hang on, is that a red sticker there, what does it say ... ‘Sorry, you have bought an unapproved modem, connecting this apparatus to any BT phone system will land you in deep trouble and a big fine’ ... Oh dear, but just a minute, it wasn't red at all, itis a green one and says ... ‘Well done, you bought an approved modem, go ahead and plug it in’. You did remember to get sockets fitted by Telecom, didn't you? You sent back your old phone to save its rental, and now you have a brand spanking Page 16 new memory phone with nice buttons, to do all your dialling for you. In the modem lead goes to the wall socket, and there on the back of the modem is a nice convenient socket to park the phone in, so you don't have to unplug to use it normally. ‘Boot your disc and dial the service you require’, OH dear it still does not work, what have you done wrong this time. Back to Chap 1... ‘Configure the disc for your system’ ... Ah well | suppose it does need to know which slot everything is in, and it would be an idea to tell it what baud rate you are going to use, and it seems reasonable to tell it what bit format the other end wants. 8N1 gets you by in most situations. Off we go again, that Bulletin Board in Timbuctoo is said to be a good one, lets dial it up. Engaged! How dare it. Still | suppose other people use it as well, but we have auto- redial on our phone, so try again. Typically up to half an hour later, and three more Apple juices, we get the ringing tone. Give it about four tings, if it doesn't answer in that time, then it is not a normal computer service, hang up and spare the person at the other end please. But it answers, a tone whistles at you, what do we do now. Ah well having started on Chap 1, you were wise and read on, found out what you should do next, so you are prepared. You switch on your modem and put it into Originate mode. The carrier light comes on, and suddenly you hear a flight of starlings coming down the phone at you. Don't panic, it is the bulletin board sending you its header page, put the phone down so you keep the line clean from your nervous coughing, the modem will hang onto the line for you. Ah we have something now on the screen ... Well | hope it was like that, if not, you may have had the modem set to Bell tones, or you may have been ringing the States, and were still on CCITT tones. The other end may have been on Originate tones, which means you should be on Answer tones, there are two complementary sets of tones, and you must be on the other set to the computer you are calling. You must have the same baud rate as the other end, or the complementary in the case of 1200/75. In that case you must be on 75/1200 if he is on 1200/75. You got all that right, and you see a message on the screen, ‘FIRST NAME: what do we do here, put it in | suppose. If you must hide your proper identity, please respect the system and use a sensible pseudonym. Remember BT can do nasty things to you if you use obscene words on the phone line, it is an offence to send any, even by computer! In goes your name, but a hint here, if this is not your first time on the system, you can usually enter your name by spacing first and last with a semicolon. Like this JOE} ‘LAST NAME; will come next. If you have been there before, it will now say where it thinks you are from, and if that is correct, ‘FROM LONDON ?' Just answer 'Y' here, no <CR>. But this is your first time, so you will need to put in where it is you live, no semicolons here, but you can usually put in more than one word , So ‘LONDON ENGLAND sounds good. Again, if you have been here before, you will now see 'PASSWORD:’, but if this is your first time, it will then ask you for your phone number, and a Password that you will use next time you log on. The menus from now on, vary from one board to another, but if in doubt usually pressing <CR> will bring you up a more detailed description of the menu. You may want to find the ‘Utility’ area first, and set the system up for your computer. Most bulletin boards will assume, at first, that you do not have lower case, and can only display 40 Continued on page 18 HARDCORE — DECEMBER 1985 EPSON LX-80 REVIEW by Patrick Eagar. In 1982 I spent nearly £400 on an Epson MX-80 FT (Mk1). To Epson's credit, | was subsequently able to update this printer to a FT (Mk3) by the simple substitution of three chips, for a total cost of around £30. A delightful example of planned unobsolescence. One disadvantage of the MX-80 and the majority of dot matrix printers is that the characters still have that “dotty" look. Only at the miniscule (condensed subscript level) do the dots join up. The announcement of the LX-80 was most welcome; the specification and the price seemed too good to be true. However | had a considerable amount of software ranging from an involved suite of home produced programs (mainly compiled in Basic, running under DOS 3.3 / Diversi-DOS and Pro-DOS) to Appleworks and Mousepaint - the latest things in Pro-DOS. The MX-80 was connected to the Apple J[e via a Pkaso parallel (Centronics) interface. | took the plunge and bought one, after all £190 plus V.A.T. is less than half the amount | paid for my original printer. All credit to Epson, and somewhat to my surprise, compatibility appears to be 100%. All that | had to do was unplug the MX-80, plug in the LX-80 and switch on. Everything from my software and Appleworks to the graphic dumps from Mousepaint worked perfectly first time. Those with experience of the RX-80 and the FX-80 will have already come across italic and elite type faces. | am amazed that for half the cost of my original printer, |can expand my variation of type faces three- or four- fold. The near letter quality output is superb, especially with a new ribbon - which brings me to one of the snags concerning the Epson LX-80. The ribbon cartridge is of a different construction and holds considerable less ribbon, perhaps only a quarter (or less) of that in the MX-80 and FX-80 cartridges. Consequently the ribbon wears out much more quickly, but at least the cost of a cartridge is less. Typically | have paid £3.50 to £3.95 for an LX-80 cartridge as against £5 to £8 for one for an MX-80 (BASUG price £6.30). No doubt other members will have found wider variations, and | haven't done a comprehensive price survey. But it would seem that running costs are likely to be quite a lot higher on the new LX-80 as compared with the MX- and FX- series. HARDCORE — DECEMBER 1985 The standard output is a claimed 100 characters per second (cps.); under NLQ it drops to something nearer 12 cps. NLQ can be selected either through software control, the sequence is ESC "x" 1, or through a ‘select’ and ‘set’ sequence using the traditional three Epson switches (ON-LINE, FF, LF) on the top of the printer. This is probably the best way of switching to NLQ if you use Appleworks and miss all the flexibility of embedded Applewriter commands. The basic machine comes without a tractor feed unit; and can take only hand-fed single sheets. The alternative extras are a tractor feed unit (for around £20 + VAT) and a single sheet feeder (for around £45 + VAT). | have bought the tractor unit, which is easy enough to use, and remove and replace for single sheet use. | do miss a simple way of tearing off the fanfold sheets. There seems no alternative to either winding on a whole sheet and tearing at the perforations, or holding a tuler (or other straight edge) against the unit and tearing mid sheet - not too bad with practice | The sheet-fed unit appears to be well designed, but | have had no experience with it so far. Another limitation is that there is no adjustment possible for thickness of paper. The instructions advise two sheets (original and one copy, presumably with carbon) as maximum. There are a number of international character sets, which can be set permanently using dip switches or under software control. For a low price printer with Near Letter Quality capability the LX-80 would appear to offer a lot. How near ‘NLQ' is would depend on personal taste. The LX-80 is closer than anything before from Epson at this price. EPSON® ANOTHER GOOD IDEA by William G Watson Awhile ago | came across a book called "WHATS THE NUMBER (1000 quiz questions)” by Frank Smith / lan Messiter published by Foulsham (1982) Within it there are 1000 questions which have only one constant numeric answer to each question. It gave me the idea for writing a simple quiz program that may be useful to teachers and others. The listing given is the bare bones.No attempt has been made at error-trapping or screen-formatting, etc. so that the principles may be clearly identified with a minimum knowledge of B.A.S.1.C. This type of quiz overcomes the problem of the end-user giving valid but unexpected answers as is experienced by spelling or syntaxical problems. For instance imagine the difficulty of writing a routine to differentiate between ‘Apple’ : APPLE’ : ‘apple’. Apart from being a development tool in teaching B.A.S.I.C., an end-product may be used in a variety of environments such as history, mathematics or physics. 10 PRINT "QUIZ" 50 READ BS 60 INPUT "MY ANSWER IS ";C$ 70 IF C$ = B$ THEN PRINT “CORRECT” : SC =SC+1 80 IF C$ <> BS THEN PRINT "WRONG" : PRINT "THE ANSWER IS "; B$7 90 NEXTA 100 PRINT "SCORE IS "; SC: END 200 DATA BATTLE OF HASTINGS, 1066, OLD PENNIES IN A NEW PENNY, 2.4, VALUE OF PI (TO 4 DECIMAL PLACES),3.1416 This program would then be expanded to give, for example, percentage scores or user retries. Once the program is complete all you need to recreate another quiz is type in suitable data lines and alter the length of the loop in line 20. get their disks from BASUG! Cute girls Page 17 COMMUNICATIONS WITHOUT TEARS columns. If you are new to the system, you may find that you can only get access to a limited area within the board, but as you prove yourself, the SYSOP will open up more areas for you. The bulletin board is an interactive thing, please contribute to it, don't just log on and read messages, put some in yourself, help it work. There must be something you can say, or some problem you want answered or someone you would like to contact. If you are adventurous, you often find phone numbers of other bulletin boards, some are on the continent and they even go as far as Australia. Though | suggest a large glass of the amber nectar before you contemplate how much that might cost in phone bills! When you log off the system, do say Goodbye properly, the system will feel happier if you do, and it will reset more quickly for the next caller. If it is your first time on, leave a message for the SYSOP (the SYStem OPerator) telling him something about yourself and your machine, it all helps the system be more useful to you, and for him to put you onto new parts of the system. Well now that was successful, now for something completely different. You have been given the phone number of your local PRESTEL computer. Setting yourself up for 1200/75, you boot your PRESTEL emulation program (You will not get any sort of meaningful display unless you have such a program), and dial the number. Ah we have the tone, and when you switch on your modem, you get the characteristic low tone from your end. The carrier light comes on, down with the phone, and the screen comes to life. But what is this, 'CUSTOMER IDENTITY PLEASE’. Oh dear, you forgot to join PRESTEL didn't you, still never mind, all is not lost. Enter '4444444444', this is the identity for non-members, it then asks for your '"PASSWORD:’, well we shall try '4444', it works, and we are greeted by the demonstration database. Of course if you had joined PRESTEL or one of Page 18 the CUG's, then we would be into PRESTEL properly. If you get your identity/password wrong, it will let you try to put it in three times, and then hang you up. The system is pretty easy to use, as most pages have menus that simply need a one or two key press to proceed, but Prestel however is funny, and asks for page numbers the rest of the time if you want to jump about. To enter one, you must first enter a ‘then the page number and then finish with a key you would not expect to have to press. It will also ask you at other times to press this key. It calls it '#', but it is not really a hash as we know it, and so Prestel emulation programmes will change one of its keys to a Prestel ‘# to make life easier for you. Vicom for instance uses the normal '#’ key, but Data Highway, assuming this is a key you are going to use often, and as it is really Prestel's 'ENTER' key, reconfigures the <CR> key to '#’. Well that was enough of that, lets hang up. No don't just hang up the phone, sign off properly with “90#, you don't want to be left paying any charges after you have rung off do you? We seem to be getting quite bold now, so lets try The FORCE, or as lesser users know it, BT GOLD. We have been learning fast, and have subscribed to it already. The SYSOP has sent us our manual and welcome pack, and off we go. We need the normal terminal programme for this, so in it goes. We are getting good at this, and have remembered to change the modem to the baud rate we want. First time this should be 300 baud, till you get used to the ‘Sytsem'. We dial up the GOLD directly, or PSS if we live outside London. PSS is a funny thing at times, and downright unfriendly at first sight. Nothing appears on the screen, we have a carrier, the light on the modem says so, but nothing. Back to the manual. Ah we have to ‘wake’ it up. So we_ type <CR><CR>D1<CR>, if this does not work immediately, try again and Continued on page 19 THE HOTLINE Make your mind up time. | hope that | can reach you, the reluctant BASUG member, the one that joined during an exhibition because you were still trying, almost without hope, to find a way to stirring your Apple Computer into productive life. Your only contact with the club is it's magazine but your not really sure if it's monthly or bi-monthly. | am hoping to catch your eye before you put the magazine on to the "I will read it another time” pile. Should you dig into your pocket and find this next years membership fee ? The answer is YES. Don't miss out as | nearly did by giving up because the club seems only for dedicated enthusiasts who appear to be able to pull their machines apart and put them together again in their sleep, who make up programmes - that run - like we fill in our season ticket forms, who talk in a language we only two-thirds understand. Of course these people exsist in the club -a voluntary group could not exsist without them, but it is for folk like you and |. lf you have problems phone the HOT LINE - Monday to Friday between 7p.m. and 9p.m. It works, they actually follow up, answer your questions, find you the answers if they don't know, point you in the right direction before you give up, ask for the help you hoped for by ringing the hotline, you will be surprised, it will prove well worth this years membership fee. T.J.Ricketts. Member 1020 ANOTHER GOOD IDEA by Willlam G Watson MOUSEPAINT ONE Use the PRODOS USERS' KIT to convert your DOS 3.3 graphic files to PRODOS so that they may be loaded into MOUSEPAINT and edited. Two Convert your PRODOS based mousepaint graphic files to DOS 3.3 with the PRODOS USERS’ KIT and use PRINTOGRAPHER , ZOOM GRAFIX, of similar to dump them to your printer. THREE A program is now available called TRIPLE DUMP which is under PRODOS and is similar to the printer dump programs mentioned above. This will enable you to print out in a variety of densities and sizes by directly accessing the MOUSEPAINT data disk graphic files. HARDCORE — DECEMBER 1985 COMMUNICATIONS WITHOUT TEARS again. At last it comes back with a message. Bit of gobbledook that, but never mind must mean the port we have entered, but it says NUI?. That means you must now enter your PSS Identity. You seem to remember it was 'NTLGOLD123XYZ or something like that, it is all in your welcome pack so you copy it on to the screen. What now, it says NUA? what on earth is that, if the NUI? was the identity, this must be the address of GOLD, so you type in A2190987654321 (| must learn it off by heart sometime). Success, we have the title page of BT GOLD, but it is now asking for your personal password. What was it again, ah yes, BSGOO5. In it goes (Ed. Phew ... at least that one is not secret). Now it want's still more, never ending this it seems, so in goes your personal password, and you had remembered not to use your first name, your wife's first name, your birthdate, the name of your cat etc. Don't give a hacker an even break! At last, your there, what a performance that was. Joe Clever Cloggs, got there ahead of you though, he used a 'MACRO'. A MAGRO, what is that? Then you remember that manual, it told you all about it in chapter 5. All he did was load the macro, press one key and all that question/answer performance automatically happened before his very eyes. Looks easy, and even if it did take time to understand how the macros are constructed, was worth it, as they only need to be prepared the once. If a macro 'sticks' on PSS at the start however, entering <CR><CR>D1<CR> from the keyboard, usually starts it off again. The FORCE tells us there is a message ‘Unread’ waiting for us, so remembering from our FORCE manual that MAIL READ UNREAD<CR> will bring it up. We try, and there we are, a welcome message from the SYSOP. We ‘REPLY’ to thank him, and then 'DEL’ to remove it, we don't want to keep paying storage charges on that one HARDCORE — DECEMBER 1985 .. Now we SEND a message to our friend BSG999, and when done we QUIT the message area, and the system. But wait, we still have the '>' prompt, how on earth do we get off the System? QUIT doesn't work, BYE doesn't work ... of course, the manual again, it is quite simply OFF. However all that does is give us a message saying how long we have been on the FORCE, we still have the carrier light on, we still seem to be on line. PSS thinks we might want to go on to someother database, so it leaves us connected, we must ‘hangup’ the programme or the modem or the phone, that will do it. These notes should help you over some of the complexities of the various systems, they can be rather daunting first time you encounter them, especially as they all seem to work in a different way. But are not too difficult. Persevere, and do ask the SYSOP for help if you get stuck. Also the Hotline can help, or ring myself if you are a member of BASUG. We are a self-help group, and we can spread the expertise where it is needed to give help over problems that arise, and to give us all more from our machines. One final thing | should mention, PRESTEL has a lot of information on holidays and travel. It might be advisable to look at their pages and to book yourself a long holiday in the sun. You see, you will not be too shocked at your bill from the FORCE. But when you have paid that, you might wish to leave the country before you get your BT bill. They have a nasty habit of going beserk when you get a modem. MUD addicts note (that's another subject .. come on someone write about It!), if your bill goes over £130 or so a quarter, and your an insomniac, join NIGHTLINE. For £125 to install, and £95 a quarter, all your phone calls wherever in the world they may be, are free ... as long as they are made between 12 midnight and 6 am. This may sound drastic, but | did hear of one addict that got a quarterly bill from BT for £900 ......... P. ike TPRABKE RS. xcctt heve / ardered thase disks Tram BASUG? ay Small As Free to members For sale or swap Apple Ill, Profile and software. Wanted Apple J[e & Drives. Contact :- Jim Watson on Margate PETE For sale. Ormbeta Accounting Package. Hardly used, cost £472. Reasonable offers to:- Mr Brooke on (OR) ae, For Sale. Centronics 737 Printer with Interface £135. Hitachi 9" monitor £25, All in excellent condition. Can be demonstrated.Contact Mr Skipp on Loxwood (/fwitit)) asia Required:- Access Ill communications software for Apple Ill. Alternatively any other suitable comms software. Contact Paul Grundy on (fii#s)) 4Hiinaie For Sale:- ProDos Users Kit, inc Manual. Used once - as new - could arrange swap. £30. Wanted:- Basic Programming with ProDos manual & Disk. ProDos Tech Ref Manual. Beneath Apple ProDos Book. Contact:- Phil King on Wisi a For Sale:- ITT 2020 48k Machine in good order with manuals £120. Wanted :- Videx 80 column card manual. Fortran 80 Manual, Nibble Vol 3 No 1. For further info phone: Gi HHH Page 19 NEWS Berrie’ f2|" ea os Apple have announced new hardware and software products for the Apple II range, they include : 1. THE UNIDISK 3.5" floppy disk drive with a storage capacity of 800k, offering five times the capacity of the old Apple 5.25" drive this must surely be exciting news to Apple Il, Il+, and lle users, provided that Apple's pricing policy is sensible. n.b., DOS 3.3 programs will not work with UNIDISK. 2. APPLE Il memory expansion card to provide in excess of imbyte internal memory on the Il, Il+ and Ile. The card is said to be designed to automatically accept data or programs as soon as the machine is turned on. Modified versions of ProDos and DOS 3.3 can use the card as a RAM disk. n.b., modified Pascal programs will utilise the card and UNIDISK. 3. COLOR MONITOR lic is a hi-res colour or monochrome monitor. 4, MOUSEDESK is a utility program and operating system which utilises the mouse to switch between programs which have been loaded into the UNIDISK or expansion card. File movement, deletion, renaming and copying can be done via the mouse. (nb Mousedesk is not an Apple product ). Price reductions announced by Apple have cut £705.00 from the price of a llc outfit ( comprising 128k IIc, carrying case, two disk drives, monitor and stand. color modulator, Mouse llc, Mousepaint Graphics software, and Appleworks ). The Ile liquid crystal display can be added to the package with a price adjustment to £1,395.00. The 512k Macintosh is reduced by £600.00 to £1,995.00, while the 128k Mac receives a cut of £100.00 ( to £1695) Laser Writer printers are subject to a cut ‘of £1000.00 bringing them to £5,995.00. All very good news and hopefully a sign that Apple's pricing policy will be more realistic in future. More gossip indicates that Apple's price cuts are causing some software houses to think twice before giving the Amiga a lot of their time. So Jobs has finally gone from Apple's organisation, pity that his departure looks as if it will be accompanied by various kinds of legal nastiness ( $5 million lawsuit filed against him by Appl Apple's battle with the Taiwan pirates continues and has resulted in sentences of six months jail for six Taiwanese “businessmen ", unfortunately Taiwanese justice allows the sentences to be converted into fines which work out to about £30.00 equivalent for a six month sentence. PCW's Yankee Doodles quotes Bill Gates as saying " we once thought Macintosh would account for half of our retail application software sales, but that was based on the assumption that Apple would do a good job ". Microsoft are making less than anticipated from their commitment to the Macintosh. A software author, Dave Winer of Living Videotext, has stated that Commodore's support for their development machine compares badly with that provided by Apple's support of the development Macintosh. Although he says that the development Macintosh didn't work either he adds that Apple provided the support of five engineers during development, the Amiga is not supported in the same way. Digital Research have had their hand smacked by Apple over the GEM Macintosh look-alike. Digital have guaranteed that they will immediately . | modify the GEM program so that it will be “substantially different from the Mac environment in both operation and screen appearance ". Digital will have to satisty Apple that their programs will not ape Apple in future, and to disclaim any compatibility between Apple's products and theirs. EPSON® Epson's catalogue for 1986 contains a printer which should be on sale for about £200.00 while producing better print quality than a daisywheel. The printer is said to have a maximum printing speed of 200cps and has graphics capability. Should be a lot of very good bargains in the near future as current models of printer are cleared out. A new publication called " Warehouse Computing " is to be launched by Turret- Wheatland Ltd ( the people who publish Storage Handling and Distribution ). Anyone interested should contact them at Penn House, Penn Place, Rickmansworth, Herts., WD3 1SN. Jazz sales which rocketed in June have slumped badly, said by dealers to be the combined effect of its cumbrous lack of speed. / int gat enul Yingers rar Hes. Haw ebhoul using your teeth, as Well? Page 20 HARDCORE — DECEMBER 1985 British Apple Systems User Group Memorex Blank Disk Prices 5 1/4 inch Double Density ic with Plastic Case. £12.00 3 1/2 inch Quad Density if m@ with Plastic Case. £ 29.00 LOOK NEW LOW PRICE ON 3 1/2" All disks are genuine Memorex Disk with a 5 year Guarantee. Prices above include V.AT&P&P Memorex Cleaning Kits. Disk Drive Head Cleaning Kit (5 1/4)....£7.00 VDU /tv Screen Cleaning Kit Case & Keyboard Cleaning Kit Epson MX/FX 80 ribbon refills... Epson MX/FX100 ribbons. Lower Case Chip Kits. Blank Tapes (C12’s).. Please send all orders to: BASUG,P.0.Box 177, St Albans, Herts AL2 2EG Cheques should be made payable to BASUG Ltd - Access Accepted Ring 0727 73990 for Access or queries Offer of Help to:- All ITT 2020 & Basis 108 Owners If you own an ITT (still) and ever more Indeed, there are very few things that Further more, if there is sufficient convinced that you should change your your machine cannot do! So do write in response | will put a disk together for the machine for an Apple, you need to know explaining any problem, hinderance you Software Library for all interested that your reasons are probably based on are encountering and | wil do my best to _ parties. lack of information. give you the answers. Please reply to |.Zaneboni clo BASUG HARDCORE — DECEMBER 1985 Page 21 GAMES PORT EXTENDER We are all wary of opening up our favourite machine and plugging things into the sockets. | myself have had a few disasters after enthusiastically removing a card while the machine was still switched on. Applesoft ROM's don't come cheap! If you play any games extensively, or use any of the graphic packages, you don't want to be constantly changing your paddles or joysticks from inside the machine, as you can so easily bend the pins or damage the socket poking about in that corner of the motherboard. Enter the 'Game Socket Extender’. These have been obtainable for some time, but are now getting increasingly difficult to find, and they are very expensive! So why not make your own. It is quite easy, and you don't need many bits and pieces to do _ it. For the simplest one, you will need a) 2 X 16 pin DIL sockets. b) 2X 16 pin IDC plugs. ¢)1 X piece of Veroboard. d) 1 length of 16 way ribbon cable. If you want the pukka job, then you will need a 16 pin ZIF socket instead of one of the 16 pin DIL sockets, and you could add some more pieces as well. All we are trying to do, is to extend the socket from the inside of the Apple to the outside. How far away you want to put it will govern how long a piece of ribbon cable you will need, but a piece 24 inches long, should be ample for most people. The cable must have a DIL plug fitted at each end. You can buy the cable like this at some shops, but they are easily fitted yourself. Take one of the two 16 pin sockets (you could use an old socket for this), carefully take apart the DIL plug, fit the plug into the socket to protect the the pins and place the clean cut end of the 16 way ribbon cable (you can split wider cable with a pair of scissors) across the plug. Put the top back on the plug, and using a flat piece of wood to spread the load, hammer the plug top in position till the cable is home. Do the same to the other end making sure that you have the two plugs the same way round, that is pin 1 of each should be to the same side of the cable, this is often marked by a colour strip. Now take the piece of Veroboard. This should be at least 8 tracks wide by 12 holes long, enough to take the 16 pin socket and one of the 16 pin DIL plugs with at least one row of holes between the two. Drill or cut out the interconnecting strip from under the socket and plug and between the plug and the socket. Page 22 Solder both of them, side by side to the board leaving at least two holes between the pair, and with the tracks running across the board between the two. You will now need to wire all of the pins up so that the each hole on the new socket corresponds to the pin on the Apple socket. This simply means pin 1 of the plug must be connected to hole 1 on the socket and so on for all the 16 pins, though remember to look at them both the same way up! Use thin wire, or self fluxing enamel wire to connect the pins. Plug the free end of the ribbon cable with its new plug into the Apple games socket and close the lid. You did remember to switch off first didn't you? Mark the free socket so that you know which way round to put in the paddle/joystick plug, and stick the whole device on the side of your Apple with a piece of double sided sticky foam pad. This also protects the wires from accidentally touching any metal and shorting out. For the real pukka job, you should use a ZIF (Zero Insertion Force) socket instead of a 16 pin DIL socket. These cost between £4-£5 pounds each, but make it easier and safer to remove and insert the plug of your paddle/joystick. The whole thing can be mounted in a box, to give you a wandering socket, and you could make the cable up to 4 feet long if you wanted. Those adventurous souls amongst us, may like to make a neater job of the extender, by etching their own board, and thus avoid the messy wiring problem. You will need a piece of clean single sided copper board, and some PCB transfers to do the actual wiring. These transfers come in various styles, some with the pads already laid out in rows, and you can get interconnecting strips as well. You will need the type that allow a strip to be led through between the pins. It is quite easy to lay out the tracks to link between the pins, remember pin 1 to hole 1 etc. Next you must etch the board with Ferric Chloride, and then drill out the holes before soldering the sockets into place. PCB etching kits are available with full instructions from some shops. Parts are available from many shops or commercial component firms, such as Maplin, RS Components and Farnell. Maplin has retail shops in London, Southend, M