mac week v 2 n 50

Se is Sees, | WORKSTATION NEWS am | | | ae Ne LATEST Linotype to ship new controller HAUPPAUGE, N.Y. — Linotype | Co. will release a new version of its PostScript controller for its line of typesetters in the next few weeks, giving the high-end output devices the ability to print unlimited page Sizes, according to sources close to the company. “[Linotype is] going to ship PostScript Version 49.3 software momentarily,” said Walter Ulrich, product manager. Ulrich declined further comment. The RIP 2, as Linotype's Post- See RIP 2, Page 8 EE) Apple exec goes | to MacroMind CHICAGO — Apple has lost another executive, but MacroMind Inc. has a new president. John Scull, Apple's original desktop publishing and multimedia marketing manager, will take charge of the Chicago com- pany next month. “It's a tremendous opportunity,” said Scull, a five-year Apple veteran. “I see MacroMind as having the technology and expertise to be a leader of the emerging multimedia | market” | Marc Canter, founder and former president of the Chicago-based com- pany, will head development and remain MacroMind’s visionary. The company is known chiefly for its VideoWorks animation products. [3S SIA CERT HyperCard gets minor upgrade CUPERTINO, Calif. — A new “maintenance release” of HyperCard will start rolling out with Macs com ing off the production line within the next month. HyperCard 1.2.2 is being re- leased to provide extended support | for Apple's International Script Man ager, including support for CD-ROM on international platforms. The program also includes some other minor bug fixes, but the up- grade is not required for the majori: ty of users. Upgrade distribution plans have not yet been set, said a | company representative. \X “hoo $2.50 Vol. 2 No. 50 Claris readies new word processor BYJONATHAN PERROW MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif, — Software engineers at Claris Corp. are as busy as Santa's elves putting the finishing touches on a new pro- gram that may bring an end to its own MacWrite’s long domination of the entry-level word processing market, according to sources close to the Apple software spinoff. While Claris officials declined to acknowledge the product, sources close to the company said the new word processor may be unwrapped as early as February 1989. Currently code-named Moonrak- er, the software is expected to carry a list price between $200 and $300. See CLARIS, Page 9 1S THIS THE END OF THE MACWRITE ERA * One file open at a time *'No horizontal scrolling * Font size up to 24 point * Built-in spelling checker ° $125 list price CLARIS "Mesmraker” + Multiple files open at once’ * Typographic controls ‘+ Multiple columns on screen| = Built-in spelling checker + $200-$300 list price a | | Advanced OS, Sculley reflects on future low-end Macs BY RENEE MATHEWS BURLINGAME, Calif. — Apple CEO John Scul- ley took the occasion of the fourth annual Person- al Computer Outlook Forum here to drop some hints about the company's future product plans and to confirm that still-unre- solved engineering prob- lems have delayed the release of a Mac laptop. Addressing an elite crowd of more than 500 industry participants and investors, Sculley said the laptop would be released in 1989 but not in volume quantities. He cited the screen as the key prob- lem holding up production of the much-anticipated portable. “Even with a high-resolution screen, you can't drag a mouse across it quickly. So we've had to go .FERRARE — RENPICTURE GROUP John Sculley dropped hints of Apple's plans at the Personal Computer Outlook Forum. to the next generation of screen technology,” he said. Production yields on the cutting- edge display technology to which See SCULLEY, Page 9 Quark adds XTensions- BY STUART SILVERSTONE PARIS — A tool kit allowing third-party software developers to customize and automate the QuarkXPress layout package See Littman's Notebook, Page 79 and link it directly to other applica- tions was announced by Quark officials here last week. Software developers have been using the tool kit, known as Quark- XTensions, to customize XPress for applications such as database pub- lishing and newspaper advertising production systems, according to Fred Ebrahimi, president of Denver- based Quark. Although not prey ously disclosed in public, the new capabilities were built into Version 2.0 of XPress, which was released this summer. Last week's announce- ment was made abroad first because “E\ more sophisti ing,” Ebrahimi said QuarkXTensions are functions in XPress that can be called by program: mers using Lightspeed C, a widely used profes: sional programming envi- ronment published by Symantec Corp,'s Think Technologies, to automate the import and export of text and graphics; create standard layout formats; or add new menu items, dia- log boxes, tools and win- dows to XPress. See QUARK, Page 8 Apple eyes EIS market BY STUART SILVERSTONE WASHINGTON — Apple wants a piece of the emerging executive information systems’ market, and it proved the point at the EIS '88 conference here last month by showcasing two prototype Hyper- Card applications. Executive Workstation, a stack Apple had developed as a demon- stration but now expects to license to corporate customers, provides electronic mail, calendaring, project. tracking, task delegation and facili- ties scheduling. According to Don Nanneman, Apple's information management marketing manager, See EIS, Page 8 MediaWorks: Enecutive Workstation 11/21490 nt stack for corporate users, may help Apple win a share of the emerging EIS market. Peace on Earth. Thank you for making 1988.a very special year €¥ Jasmine 1740 Army Street San Francisco, California 94124 415-282-111] FAX: 415-648-1625 Photo: Baron Wolman eS NEWS EE This promotion was no bomb HOUSTON — Response to Sum- mus Computer Systems’ latest pro- motional campaign turned out to be more than the company bar- gained for. A manufacturer of com- puter data storage devices, Houston- based Summus recently sent 500 high-volume retailers a promotional mailing that included a sample video Cassette promoting the company’s GigaTape 2-Gbyte tape backup. But apparently one retailer in Miami took the unsolicited mailing a little too seriously. Having received 4 series of threats on his life, the unidentified dealer had reason to believe the package contained life- threatening materials and proceed- €d to call in the Dade County, Fla, bomb squad to remove the package. Following standard procedures, the Squad took the package to a bomb disposal site where it was destroyed. ‘The company was later informed of the incident by a detective from the bomb squad who had spent sev- eral hours piecing together the rem- nants of the cassette. “He traced us by the Pitney Bowes code on the Postage stamp,” said Phil McCut- ‘chen, communications director. “Since [the GigaTape systems] Sell for about $5,000 a piece, I don't think we'll be sending any to our friend in Miami for review." Mac meets Christmas deadline BY STEPHEN HANNAFORD HUNTSVILLE, Ala. — The peo- ple at United Technologies’ Space Flight Systems division (UTC/SFS) thought they had seen deadlines before. That is, until the office ser- vices department was given less than two weeks to produce a high- quality, glossy, 16-page, four-color brochure, complete with 1989 calen- der and poster insert. So the compa- ny, which designs spacecraft for the nation’s space program, turned to a Mac to get the job done. The promotional and educational brochure was for UTC/SFS’ Shuttle C, an expendable, unmanned heavy- lift cargo version of the space shuttle. ‘The design and pre-press work for the project had to be completed To our readers MacWEEK is not published for two weeks at the end of the year, ‘The next issue will appear Jan. 3, 1989. During our two-week hiatus, we will be working on bringing you expanded coverage of the Macintosh market in 1989, includ- ing several new sections and a monthly GA Supplement. The staff at MacWEEK wishes you a happy holiday. within 10 calender days, and as with ‘any major corporate job, a number of people had to approve the content and design every step of the way. And the brochure had to be in the mail for Christmas. UTC/SFS got in touch with Barry Rickert, founder of Image South Inc. of Atlanta, a design company and ser- vice bureau with extensive color preparation experience. UTC/SFS supplied copy, illustra- tions and a rough Aldus PageMaker layout in Mac format. Image South designed and laid out the poster and brochure in PageMaker and created color separations with its propri- etary software. Comps at every stage were sent back and forth using a high-speed modem, cutting delivery lag times and allowing new versions and mod- ifications to illustrations and copy to be incorporated rapidly. “Due to the high-end design and its complexity, most companies would want 60 to 90 days to do this work,” Rickert said. The chief prob- Jem was the detailed airbrush-style illustrations, some almost 1 Mbyte in size, which were created in Adobe Illustrator 88 by UTC/SFS lead illustrator, T. Kre! Shults. “To create the same graphics and charts conventionally, you would need a month or more just to get the airbrush work done,” Rickert said. Becky Bur- roughs, UTS/SFS office services man- ager and the em- ployee in charge of coordinating the effort, said, “I've been in the graphics business for more than 15 years and involved in many such productions, but my initial re- action to the scope of this project, given the time allocated for design, illustra- tions, pre-press and Production was ‘You want it when? Get real.’ This brochure would not have been possible utilizing conventional graph- ics and production processes.” 0 This Mac-created image of the cargo-carrying Shuttle-C decorat- ed a calendar to be distributed by UTC/ SFS. 25 Emerald City plans NeXT program DisplayTatk extends Interface Builder for PostScript programmers. 26 Smalltalk library released Knowledge Systems collects utilities, code for object-oriented language. B OPINION 28 Editorials HyperCard work alikes can enhance the Mac's position; Apple's low-key 60 Acta Advantage adds refinements Outliner upgrade maintains its good Features, adds nice touches. 61 QuickBASIC 1.0 is a solid value Microsoft's BASIC Interpreter and compiler for the Mac is a must-have upgrade for MS BASIC users. 66 Microsoft File 2.0 a minor upgrade Simplicity, speed give File an edge, but features are limited. HGA 40 Gallery of Macintosh art Readers contribute stunning work. 41 Boldface Ezra Shapiro awards year-end orchids and onions to developers. @ WINDOW ON 42 Laser printer competition heats up SS | eee Thirpary venders erative | WH BUSINESS WATCH ~ Sense. ss . Real soon: WingZ about to take off, in | 79 Apple's chief financial officer steps down ‘see Page 10. Letters Health, personal considerations | a So a 28 Mac Soapbox prompt Coleman's sabbatical. 79 Littman’s notebook: The color of money Companies woo venture capitalists. 82 Mixed loyalties among Apple dealers Survey shows ambivalence. 84 Claris starts training programs 84 Small colleges feel snubbed by Apple 4 Works 2.0 gets new spelling options Add-in spell checker available. 5 PowerPoint gets link to Genigraphics Users can E-mail slide service bureau. Paul Beard wonders why IBM has taken so long to realize that computer users like things easy. 30 Visible Results Steve Rosenthal explores a touchy- Seely topic; touch screens for the Mac. 30 Round Robin/Industry Lawrence Magid looks at the implica- | 6 New offerings build CAD momentum PictoCRAPH, Dreams released. 14 First gay Mac users group established tions of networking and employer Fun and games with the Mac, see 68 Ad Showcase 14 MaclnTouch lantrol Page48. 11 Ad Index 16 Obstacles confront CD-ROM developers | g5 Mac the Knife fons User Cone 72 Classified : Copyrights, viruses and distribution. i) Sd es mae TT Career Opportunities D)) 16 StackWEEK @ IN PROFILE technical questions Bas Focal Point updated. 34 Mugging for the Mac Users can create composite faces with the Mac, a function that police off- tion on TCP/IP networks cers and psychologists find valuable. 21 Device transfers RGB signals into video | 96 sac. a mode D) 22 Assessing the NeXT environment Ben & Jerrys thinks the Mac has a Object-oriented tools speed software sweet touch for tracking ice cream development for NeXT machine. manufacture. | @ REVIEWS 56 ArchiCAD a fullfeatured 3-D program Effective, satisfying environment for architects. 20 InterCon offers Mac TCP/IP product of Apple Macintosh SEs and Mac Is: Laser- TCP/Connect allows Macs to func- Writer, Varityper VT-600 and QMS ColorSenpt 100 printers networked on Farallon PhoneNet, a Linotroxic 300; an Abaton Scanner; RasterOps, E-Machines and SuperMac monitors: and soft- ware including QuarkXPress, Aldus PageMaker, ‘Adobe Iitustrator, Aldus FreeHaxd, SuperPaint, Microsoft Word, LaserPain!, PicelPaixt ond Cricket Draws | MacWEEK is produced using aw in-house sytem 56 The week in reviews Open It! simplifies sharing files and elements. 13 December 1988/MacWEEK 3 Hs NEWS New spelling options for Microsoft Works 2.0 BY HENRY NORR ALAMEDA, Calif. — Lundeen & Associ- ates, developer of the WorksPlus Spell add-in spelling checker for Microsoft Works, has announced the release of an updated version compatible with the new Works 2.0 as well as previous releases of the popular integrated program. Works 2.0 incorporates its own spelling checker, but Janice James, a spokeswoman for Lundeen, called the new Version 2.0 of her company’s $79.95 product “the fastest and smartest spelling checker available” for the Microsoft program. Written by Tim Lundeen, one of the original authors of Works, Works- Plus Spell installs directly into the main pro- gram’s menu structure. Getting graphics to the Mac from IBM mainframes BY JON SWARTZ ALPHARETTA, Ga. — Digital Communica- tions Associates Inc. changed the face of Mac- toIBM mainframe connectivity last week with the introduction of software that lets Mac users display, edit and incorporate graphics generated on IBM mainframes into their desk- top applications. DCA’s MacIRMA Graphics package, priced at $1,295, lets a Mac Ilx, II or SE access IBM mainframe computer graphics through DCA’s MacIRMA line of IBM 3270 terminal-emula- tion products. MacIRMA Graphics is sched- uled to ship next spring. According to DCA, a key feature of Mac- IRMA Graphics is a copy-and-paste function that enables users to move a graphic from a mainframe application and insert it into a Mac application such as MacDraw for modification. Additionally, MacIRMA Graphics lets users store mainframe graphics on their Mac in sev- eral file formats, including PICT and Picture Information Format (PIF), a spokeswoman for the Alpharetta, Ga, company said. Peter Cheung, vice president and general manager of DCA’s Macintosh communications products, said the product brings “platform independence” to IBM mainframe graphics. Kirk Loevner, director of Apple developer group, said MacIRMA Graphics represents another magnet for Fortune 1,000 companies considering large Mac purchases. “I think it will have very broad appeal,” he said. “It pro- vides full access to all Mac facilities, including Laser Writer printing.” Peter Lisker, a connectivity consultant based in Oakland, Calif, said the product would simplify the procedure for generating graphics from data stored in mainframe databases or spreadsheets. Previously, Mac users downloaded the raw data to the Mac and then charted it in a Mac graphics application. With MacIRMA Graphics, however, users can access the data file on the mainframe, send the information to the mainframe graph- ics application to create the chart or image desired, and then move it to the Mac for edit- ing, printing or local storage. By the time MacIRMA Graphics ships, DCA may not be the only company with a Mac-to-IBM mainframe graphics package Sources at Apple, Avatar Corp. of Hopkinton, Mass.; and Novell Inc, of Provo, Utah; all have indicated they are working on similar products, DCA is located at 1000 Alderman Drive, Alpharetta, Ga. 30201; (404) 442-4000. 4 MacWEEK/13 December 1988 Meanwhile, Working Software Inc. of Monterey, Calif, which developed the spelling checker already built into Works 2.0, is offering an expanded dictionary with 103,000 words. Priced at $14.95 plus $4 shipping, the product is available by mail or phone order from Working Software. Microsoft ships a 60,000-word dictio- nary in the Works 2.0 package. James said the Lundeen program is “ten times faster than the builtin Works checker” and typically processes more than a page a second. Unlike the built-in function, Works- Plus Spell can be configured to work either interactively or in batch mode. ‘The latest version of WorksPlus Spell adds a new feature called Smart Spelling, which boosts speed by remembering which text has already been checked. Other enhancements include checking for repeated words and the ability to view the entire 73,000-word dictio- nary shipped with the program or words added to a document's personal dictionary. Upgrades to WorksPlus Spell 2.0 will be free to those who purchased earlier versions after Aug. 1. For previous buyers the upgrade charge is $15, including shipping and han within the United States. 3 ‘A new version of Lundeen’s other Works add-in, the WorksPlus Command macro recorder and programming environment, ¥ be released next month, James said. In addition to several new built-in macros, the new version will feature compatibility with Works 2.0, come pilation of macros to speed loading and save memory, and a completely rewritten manual. Lundeen & Associates is located at 1000 Atlantic Ave., Suite 107, Alameda, Calif: 94501; (415) 769-7701. Working Software can be reached at P.O. Box 1844, Santa Cruz, Calif. 95061-1844; (408) 423-5696. 0 personal computing. Avision, it tuned out, But one did. years later, we suspect the ing themselves. We, on the other hand, still pushing ourselves. inside learn In 1981, Apple approached several major software developers with a radical vision of radical for most to even accept. To this day, over seven other developers are still kick- too are Apple and Microsoft not only shared t} vision, we shared the same timetable: the end seven years le and you 9 or (Wo. computer in history. To give Macintosh users all the functionality, flexibility and power to push productivity to unheard- of limits. And to do it with acombination of hardware and software that's somehow embarrassingly simple to use. Tt happens to be a vision we still share. Passionately. Which is why we've cre- ated Macintosh applications day Macintosh shipped, our software shipped. that have changed the way ‘At Microsoft, we shared in Apples vision _ today’s businesses do business. to make Macintosh’ the most corporately powerful, yet disarmingly friendly, business Case in point: Microsoft® Word, quite lit- erally the best-selling Macintosh application a ELS PowerPoint update allows modem access to Genigraphics BY CONNIE GUGLIELMO REDMOND, Wash. — Delivering on a 9- month-old promise, Microsoft Corp. has com- pleted the software that will give PowerPoint users electronic access to Genigraphics, the largest slide service bureau in the United States. The Redmond, Wash., company last week announced a new version of the $395 desktop Presentation program that lets users transmit their slide designs by modem to any one of 22 Genigraphics Service Centers, said Lewis Levin, group product manager for Microsoft's Graphics Business Unit in Menlo Park, Calif. Version 2.01 will be sent free at the end of this month to registered owners of Power- Point 2.0, which was released in May. Until now, PowerPoint 2.0 users have had to mail or fax their slide designs to Genigraph- ics. Graphic artists at the service bureau would then re-create the slide designs on a DEC VAX computer for output on a Geni- graphics slide maker. PowerPoint 2.01 contains new Genigraph- ics Driver and GraphicsLink software. Users select the Chooser-level driver to “print” the PowerPoint-generated images as a file on disk. A form is displayed prompting users for name, address, billing information and the type of output desired: 35mm color slides, overheads, prints or transparencies. The file is then sent via modem with the GraphicsLink telecommunications program to a selected service bureau, according to Levin. Users without modems can mail or deliver files on disk to their local service bureau. ‘The average cost is $13 per slide for the normal 24-hour turnaround. Microsoft Corp. is located at 16011 N.E. 36th Way, Box 97017, Redmond, Wash. 98073; (206) 882-8080. 0 MacFacsimile connects Mac to Canon Fax ever created. Now, with the new version 4.0, Word users can enjoy true WYSIWYG and sheets, a database, drawing, even a commu- BY EMILY BROWER nications tool—all in one versatile package. SARATOGA, Calif — A California graphics even easier table generation. For the developing developer? We cre- iRise Cre Microsoft Wnite gives the casual usera _ ated Microsoft QuickBASIC, which basically gram that allows Macs o Send and reeive ac - = FES < 5 ; { similes via Canon stand-alone fax machines. tt deal of word processing capabilities— gives you everything you need for quick, effi BEN orem for not a great deal of money. cient programming, testing and execution. users to transmit files directly to the Canon _ And of course, theres Microsoft Excel. Allof which brings us to Microsoft Mail Nene Bec ereuet i te Right now, eight out of B Aldus PageMaker, Microsoft Word, Claris’ i MacDraw and MacPaint, and nearly all other every ten Macintosh Mac applications can be transmitted with fonts spreadsheet users are and graphics intact. The software also allows using Microsoft Excel. the Canon machines to be used as scanners or The simple truth is, parextrerine Fircweal i ly graphics for years its actually : machines, just like the Mac. They are both Nobody sells more Macintosh applications than we do. And the only thing more sa patie Meee ae a been the most power- : impressive than using them alone, is using them together. : Bee At Hecke Gene Kine h ean ful argument for buying a Macintosh. and the concept of workgroup computing. Airetor of marketing and sales for Vivitek. ; | And speaking of power, until Microsoft Mail actually lets you share data, graphics, erat ato gars Galil Ncompany.s igor | PowerPoint” was created, desktop presenta- | tions didnt exist. Now the person making the presentation can actually generate it—from overheads to 35mm color slides. Best of all, only PowerPoint has built-in color schemes. ware provides a built-in phone directory and tracks transmissions from the Mac. Multiple documents can be stored on the computer for unattended transmission during low- rate hours. For receiving faxes, MacFacsimile offers two options: Users can choose to receive mes- thoughts, whatever—Mac’ to Mac, or even Mac to PC. For more about our Macintosh applica- tions and what they can do for you stand- | alone, and working together, call us at (800) | sages as hard copy printed by the fax For impact like you've never seen. 5411261, Dept. 185. ; Pee ene And with Microsoft File as your econom- It’s inside information we think you'll later, Incoming documents can be saved in ical database, creating professional-quality __ find extremely useful. MacPaint or TIFF for viewing and editing in business forms and mailing labels has never A . been eras Or aoe gl tiadi Microsc fi As for Microsoft Works, just think of itas Making r the Swiss army knife of business software. gone itall make sense. Works integrates word processing, spread- Stem.tistsr7i Mac graphics or layout programs. MacFacsimile also works over AppleTalk networks, allowing networked Macintoshes to share one Canon Fax machine. A Canon Fax can be connected to an AppleTalk network using a peripheral-sharing device such as the NetSerial from Shiva Corp. of Cambridge, FEIN extide North America, 206) KE2.8561 © Coprigh L588 Miron three ng a Pe Pon ar rssred radars and Meh el Coren ration Maratha Alto regurd iraemarh of Appr Compe fa Mass. MacFacsimile runs on a Mac Plus, SE or IL. It requires a Mac-to-modem cable with a standard null-modem adapter. Vivitek sells the cable and adapter for $25. Released in September, MacFacsimile 1.1, costs $495, The Canon Fax-L920, which sells for $8,392, combines a 400-dpi laser printer with a variable-resolution flatbed halftone scanner that can capture 16 levels of gray. The Canon Fax-730 uses standard thermalprinting technology and costs $4,695. Vivitek also markets MacFacsimile 350, which allows another Canon model, the Canon Fax-350, to be used as a scanner and printer for the Mac. That model, however, cannot be used to transmit Mac files to remote fax machines. The Canon Fax-350, priced at $2,995, prints and copies on plain paper. MacFacsimile 350, priced at $295, does not interfere with the Canon Fax-350's ability to function as a stand-alone fax machine, accord- ing to Vivitek. Vivitek is located at 12493 Brookglen Drive, Saratoga, Calif 95070, (408) 252-6082, Canon U.S.A. Inc. is located at One Canon Plaza, Lake Success, N.Y. 11042; (516) 488-6700.) 13 December 1988/MacWEEK 5 [0 NEWS Ee ee More CAD offerings arrive PictorDRAFT, Dreams ship BY CONNIE GUGLIELMO RICHARDSON, Texas — Innova- tive Data Design Inc. and Pictor Graphics Inc. are anticipating a prosperous new year now that their CAD packages for the Macintosh are shipping. Pictor Graphics of Richardson, Texas, last month released its $495 PictorDRAFT program, while IDD said its long-delayed $500 Dreams package should reach dealers’ shelves this week. “With Dreams, we are breaking out of the CAD pack and moving into a new category of software,” said Peter Hewitt, director of marketing for Concord, Calif.-based IDD. “Because of the blending of drawing and CAD features, Dreams will be used in desktop publishing, fashion designing and textile designing as well as in engineering.” Announced in January, Dreams boasts an elegant and intuitive user interface with a full complement of drawing, text and shape tools on floating palettes. In addition to full- color support on the Mac II, the pro- gram offers advanced features such as the ability to rotate drawings in fractional degrees and automatic dimensioning of objects. IDD has also developed a series of architectural symbol libraries for vertical-market applications. Volume 1, called Residential Construction, is priced at $249 and is available now. Pricing and availability for Volume 2, Light Commercial Construction, and Volume 3, Preliminary Design, have not yet been determined. A pioneer in the CAD field on the Mac, IDD released MacDraft in 1985. Registered owners of Mac- Draft can upgrade to Dreams for $200 until Mar. 31, according to Hewitt. Dreams requires a Mac Plus or SE with 1 Mbyte of RAM and a hard disk or a Mac Il with a recommend- ed 2 Mbytes of RAM. Under development for the past two years, PictorDRAFT is a two- dimensional design and drafting program that offers high-end CAD 8 s ULey ae Ca TA NEE ARSE Innovative Data Design's Dreams is a CAD program with drawing capabilities. features to Mac users for the first time, said John Phipps, company president. Each drawing can be composed of up to 256 layers. To minimize confusion when working with com- plex, multilayer documents, users can then completely hide layers or fade out layers so they are dim but visible. PictorDRAFT also lets users open multiple windows on the same drawing, with each window having 68030 boards accelerate Mac II BY JONATHAN PERROW FLOWERY BRANCH, Ga. — Macintosh owners shopping for the latest and fastest accelerator tech- nology now can choose between a variety of Motorola 68030-based models for the Mac II, with others in the offing. DayStar Digital of Flowery Branch, Ga., last month announced shipment of its 33/030 Accelerator II, a $6,000 board based on a 33-MHz Motorola 68030. The board promises between two and four times the speed of an off-the-shelf Mac IIx. “Our competition is not the Mac IIx,” said DayStar President Andrew Lewis. “It's workstation vendors like Apollo and Sun. With this board the Mac will perform better than workstations costing well over $25,000." One month earlier, Dove Comput- er Corp. of Wilmington, N.C., began Just-released Virex updated to fight new nVIR strain BY EMILY BROWER DURHAM, N.C. — Proving its commitment to protect users from the latest virus, HJC Software has already released a new version of Virex, its new $99.95 virus detection and eradication program. “HJC is very serious. If some- thing new comes out, we intend to stomp on it quickly,” said Robert Woodhead, Virex programmer, Virex was updated to Version 1.1 only two days after the first copies of the original program 6 MacWEEK/13 December 1988 shipped, when Woodhead learned of a second strain of the widespread nVIR virus. “I've expanded the nVIR check- ing so that it will get new strains. ‘The original check was more specif- ic,” Woodhead said. The 100 purchasers of Virex 1.0 have already been sent an upgrade, and all packages now on shelves include Version 1.1, according to Woodhead. HJC Software can be reached at P.O. Box 51816, Durham, N.C, 27717; (919) 490-1277. C its own scale. When a change is made in one window, the change is automati- cally reflected in all other windows. For users tired of repeatedly pulling down menus, Pictor- DRAFT offers a user interface made up of floating windows as well as pop-up and tear-off tool palettes and menus. In addi- tion to on-line help and full keyboard support, the pro- gram includes a unique Co-Pilot prompting feature that helps users learn Shift-Option-key and Com- mand-key combinations, PictorDRAFT runs on any Mac Plus, SE or II with a minimum 1 Mbyte of RAM. IDD is located at 2280 Bates Ave., Suite A, Concord, Calif. 94520; (415) 680-6818. Pictor Graphics Inc. is at 800 E. Campbell Road, Suite 199, Richardson, Texas 75081; (214) 437-9043. 0 shipping the $1,599 MaraThon 030, a 32- MHz board for the Mac II, Like the DayStar product, the MaraThon 030 plugs directly into the slot normally occupied by the Motorola 68020 processor. But there is no provision Farallon to ship ScreenRecorder, network extender BERKELEY, Calif. — Screen- Recorder, a $195 point-and-shoot desk accessory that lets users re- cord and replay screen activity, was one of two products scheduled for released this week by Farallon Com- puting Inc. Designed primarily for training and presentations, ScreenRecorder includes a HyperCard external com- mand (XCMD) that allows users who don't have the DA to view “tapes” from stacks. Tom Rielly, Farallon mar- keting director, said the company is granting royalty-free licenses to devel- opers who wish to distribute the XCMD with ScreenRecorder. ‘The Berkeley, Calif, communica- tions company this week also released PhoneNET Relay, a $495 reclocking repeater that extends the cabling distance of Farallon’s PhoneNET System to twice its cur- rent 3,000-foot limit. Farallon Computing is located at 2150 Kittredge St, Berkeley, Calif. 94704; (415) 849-2331. for static RAM cache Pwancenng | or additional RAM on the board. The board contains just Daystar’s Accelerator Il CPU board mounts directly onto the Mac motherboard. The Accelerator II Cache Board is then mounted directly onto the CPU board. three chips: a crystal, the 68030 and a programmable logic device (see MacWEEK, Sept. 29). This daughterboard design allows the Mac to access the 68030 chip without plugging it into one of the Mac Il slots and running it over the 10-MHz NuBus. Besides the faster clock rate, add- itional speed increases are achieved using the 68030's built-in data and instruction caches and its “burst mode” memory-access feature, A 68030-based accelerator also con- tains built-in memory management capabilities for running A/UX. Rated at more than 7 million instructions per second (Mips) — more than three times the speed of the Mac II — the DayStar 33/030 board contains 32 Kbytes of 25- nanosecond static RAM allowing the CPU to run at zero wail states. An optional Motorola 68882 math coprocessor is available from DayStar for $1,000, although the Mac II's 16-MHz 68881 math chip can also be used with the board. Looking ahead, SiCLONE Sales & Engineering Corp. of Sunnyvale, Calif., said it is close to shipping the $i3033, a 33-MHz 68030 accelerator with a 64-Kbyte on-board static RAM cache for $3,999. DayStar Digital is located at 5556 Atlanta Highway, Flowery Branch, Ga. 30542; (404) 967-2077. Dove Computer Corp. is located at 1200 N. 23 St, Wilmington, N.C. 28405; (800) 622-7627. SiCLONE Sales and Engineering is at 1169 Borregas Ave., Sunnyvale, Calif. 94089; (408) 734-9151. 3) FOR THE RECORD ‘The Noy. 29 issue listed an out- of-date price for upgrading to T/Maker's WriteNow 2.0. The charge is $50, but the new release will be free to those who purchased the earlier version after Jan. 15, The phone number listed in the Nov. 29 issue for Software for Recog- nition Technologies was incorrect. ‘The number is (716) 359-3024, ‘The Nov. 22 issue listed an incor- rect price for LaCie Ltd.’s external hard drive kits. The price is $249, The phone number given in the Nov. | issue for the XTree Co. was incorrect. The correct number is (805) 541-0604. MacWeEEK | PUBLISHER/Michael Tchong, EDITORIAL EDITOR/Daniel Ruby EXECUTIVE EDITOR/Daniel Farber MANAGING EDITOR/Brenda Benner ‘SECTION EDITORS/Henry Norr (News). Rochelle Garner (Opinion), Bernard Ohaaian (Features), Anita Malnig (GA, Widow On), Rebecca Waring (Reviews) EDITOR AT LARGE/Dale Coleman TECHWICAL EDITOR/Ric Ford (Boston) TECHNICAL ART DIRECTOR/Laslo Vespremi ‘SENIOR WRITERS /Connie Guglielmo, Rick LePage (Boston) ASSOCIATE EDITORS /Eric , Adams (News), Richard Rawles (Window On) INFORMATION DIRECTOR/E:ily Brower ‘STAFF REPORTERS/Elinor Craig, Cli Lehman, Rence Mathews, Will McClatchy (Boston); Jonathan Perro, Jonathan Swartz, Chir Whiter [ASSISTANT EDITORS/Steptien Howard (Review): Suzanne Weber COPY EDITORS (Charles Lenatt (Copy Chie) John Battelle (Desktop Publishing Chie), ‘Janice Maloney, Carolyn Said, Sue Troy EDITORIAL ASSISTANT/Mitzi Waltz CONTRIBUTING EDITORS/Eric Alderman, Als Brody, Don Crabb, John Edwards, Vernon Kees Dennis Klatzkin, Jonathan Littman, Lawrence Magid, Steve Michel, Steve Rosenthal, Ea Sbapie ART & PRODUCTION ART DIRECTOR/Eleanor Leishman ASSOCIATE ART DIRECTOR/L aura Stoll PHOTO EDITOR/onathan Hornstein [GRAPHICS TECHAICIAN/Henr Froissrt STAFF ARTIST/Tamara Gargus AAD COOROINATOR/Michelie Gants PRODUCTION COORDINATOR/Carolyn Be. West ‘ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER (MANUFACTURING Barri Klingaman, ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER/Ted Welch [ADVERTISING MANAGERS/Nancy Carter, Jeff Cohen, Jane Fitzwilliam, Michael Bill Peck, Peter Stange! ‘ACCOUNT EXECUTIVES/Carla Daiss, Leslie Hupp, Lee Kerr, Kathy Kottenbach, JoAnn Sturtridge ADVERTISING ADMINISTRATOR/Mary Siepp SENIOR ADVERTISING COORDIMATOR/Lihi Pow ‘SENIOR CIRCULATION MAMAGER/ Agnes Vanck CIRCULATION ASSISTANT /Georganne Stohr PROMOTION DIRECTOR/Cynthia Ahart [RESEARCH DIRECTOR/GrifGn Dix PROMOTION ART DIRECTOR/Gary Suen PROMOTION & RESEARCH ‘COORDINATOR / Caroline Kwok BUSINESS MANAGER/Karen Brannan ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANTS /Eizabeth (Carney, Chris Vybaalek COASTAL ASSOCIATES PUBLISHING PRESIDENT/Kenneth HI. Koppel VICE PRESIDENT/J, Scott Brigrs VICE PRESIDENT/Willam Lohse VICE PRESIDENT COKTROLLER/Joho Viachos VICE PRESIDENT OPERATIONS Baird Davis TREASURER/Wiliam Philips EDITORIAL AMD : 525 ‘Brannan St, San Francisce, Call 94107418) {842:7370. Beaton editorial office: One Kendall ‘Square, Cambridge, Mass. 02139; (617) 577-1033 [MACWEEK (ISSN’ 08928118) is published week- Only $199. OR THE WHOLE MAINFRAME, JUST $999. Once you see the power of ORACLE for Macintosh, we think you'll want all the data on all the computers. ORACLE for Macintosh, with The number-one database from the number- one database company is now available for the number-one user environment. Introducing ORACLE for Macintosh. From HyperCard or your C program, ORACLE will give your Macintosh its first SQL database—for only $199°. Better yet, you can give your Macintosh all the data from all your computers for only $999. MAINFRAME POWER, $199 The ORACLE® relational database manage- Ment system is 100% SQL, the industry standard data-manipulation language first introduced by _ Oracle in 1979. It has made Oracle Corporation the world’s largest database company. Now, with ORACLE for Macintosh, the first and only SQL for Macintosh, the same database runs on every computer in your organization. Licensed espe- cially for developers at $199, it’s the bargain of the century. IBM Mainframe Sun Workstation full networking and licensed for general use, is only $999. Data on all your other computers will be as accessible as the data on your Macintosh. How? ORACLE’s SQL'Star connectivity archi- tecture gives your HyperCard application The #1 SQL Database. ORACLE for Macintosh. transparent access to all your computers. Over all major networks. This means your HyperCard applications will be able to access existing ORACLE PC, mini and mainframe databases DEC VAX IBM PS2 as well as other SQL-based DBMS products such as IBM’s DB2 and SQLS. Isn't it about time you merged the number- one database with the number-one user interface to get all the data in your enterprise? Call today. Or fill out and send the attached coupon. ORACLE COMPATIBILITY - PORTABILITY » CONNECTABILITY Call 1-800-ORACLE1, ext. 7702 today. Dear Oracle Macintesh Team 20 Davis Drive, Belmont, CA 94002 Ipwant to give my Macintosh ORACLE. Enclosed is my O) check] VISA 1] MC 1) AmEX credit card authorization for: $___ ORACLE for Macintosh developers at $199, or the full, network version for $999. Oracle pays shipping $ ——. Please add appropriate sales tax. $ Sas Total (Price valid in US only) Name =| tl Cee Company AS Eran Street (no PO boxes, Please) = saeenrae ee City _State___Zip Telephone _ Soe Credit Card Number (if applicable) Credit Card Expiration Date Signature Date MACWEEX {Licensed only for developers. Prices valid in US only Requires Macintosh Plus. ‘Sor LI with 2 Megabytes of KAM. § Megabytes hard disk space. doppy disk drive, 4adliyperCard& ncaa $y ination sport ORACLE dase, Nyper*Sal MyperCard interface), SQL Plus, Pro*€ OCI. Database Uuliics, System Stackware and Example Stack ware. Full actwurking version Is 1999, Conyriph © 1988 by Orace Corporation ORACLE and SQL*Pls arc regstcted trademarks of Oracle. HyperCard and Maciniosh are rely of Apple Compatet Teas ELS NWS Xie EEE Je Lio Continued from Page 1 the stack already has a working interface to CL/1, the database connectivity language being developed by Apple subsidiary Network Innovations. An interface to PROFS, IBM's proprietary mail system, is also under construction, he said. Executive Workstation should be com- pleted this month and available for licensing “in the February-March [1989] time frame,” Nanneman said. ‘Approximately 275 government and corpo- rate information managers attending the two- day event also got a look at a HyperCard- based system already in use at General Telephone and Electronics in Stamford, Conn. The developers of the system, which supports 300 GTE executives, have launched a develop- ment company called Decision Technology to build similar software for other corporations. They also plan to make the utilities used in their system available for licensing. Called the Probus Toolkit, the package is expected to be available for licensing in February 1989 for about $40,000. According to Kirk Scott, vice president of the start-up developer, GTE brought him in as a consultant to help develop the HyperCard application together with an inside MIS group. “In less than two months,” Apple's Nanneman said, “they created a prototype that provides much of the same functionality as many main- frame commercial EIS system: Apple’s presence at the conference marked the start of a major push into the EIS field. “This market has become crucial in corporate computing,” Nanneman said. “I think we will make it one of our top marketing priori- ties. Our customers are pushing us so hard in this direction it would be difficult to ignore them.” About 65 percent of Fortune 1,000 compa- nies use EIS systems, according to Steve Wendler, program director for the Gartner Group, a Stamford, Conn.-based research company. “On average, it costs $100,000 a month to maintain the hardware, software and staff,” he said. “If Apple can succeed in bring- ing the software cost down considerably, then it has the potential of expanding the present $60 million market to hundreds of millions.” Nanneman said he thinks that is possible. “With HyperCard, the company owns the application. It doesn't need some systems-con- sulting vendor to maintain it,” he said. “And they can freely distribute it within their organi- zation. Rather than spending in excess of $250,000, the traditional price for a mainframe EIS, it costs about $30,000.” Besides cost savings, Apple is counting on the ease of use of the Mac and HyperCard to give it an entree to the EIS market. who are usually older and unfamiliar with the technology have not been inclined to use com- puters,” Nanneman said. “That's why Hyper Card is an ideal tool. They point at what they want, and they get an immediate response.” The stack Decision Technologies demon: strated at the conference offers execulive users immediate access to reports on compa ny balances and financial ratios. It uses type styles as an interface tool. Words in italics on the balance sheet, for instance, can be clicked on to access a pop-up menu of additional options, while boldface indicates that a click will bring up supporting data Although not a regular Mac user, Alan Paller, co-chairman of the conference, said he is impressed with HyperCard’s potential in the EIS arena. In the current issue of EIS Confer- ence Report, a newsletter he edits, Paller wrote, “It is hard to imagine a better environ- ment than HyperCard in which to create EIS systems. Such a fertile atmosphere may lead to EIS capabilities that will set the standard for IBM PC-based systems to follow.” 8 MacWEEK/13 December 1988 Diy QUARI 0 Urn Continued from Page 1 The newly announced capabilities are intended primarily for developers and systems consultants creating vertical-market applica- tions. An application built around XPress could, for example, automatically translate a text file generated by a word processor or database running on a Mac, an MS-DOS machine or a mainframe into classified ad lay- outs, a product catalog or a complete book. In addition, programmers could integrate modules such as a spreadsheet or drawing program within XPress. “You could always create a layout manual- ly; it would just take longer,” said David King, a San Diego-based consultant who is develop- ing a database publishing tool using Quark- XTensions. “If you want to organize a docu- meat in a consistent layout, a page might take 20 seconds [using a too} based on QuarkXTen- sions] rather than 20 to 30 minutes [with XPress alone].” With commands based on QuarkXTen- sions, a user “could control text, with kerning, leading, style, point size and centering, then crop a graphic and resize it, all on the fly,” King said Scitex able to integrate XPress with its high-end Visionary pre-press system in a new layout package called HandshakeXPress through QuarkXTen- sions, and the new functions will allow other developers to create links to other high-end electronic publishing systems Filters added to XPress with QuarkXTensions would allow files pro- duced in an Atex pub- lishing system, for instance, to be read and placed in XPress with full geometry (the positions of graphics, text and rules on the page). Electronic Publish- ers Inc., a publishing developer in Excelsior Springs, Mo., is using QuarkXTensions, along with an Omnis 3 cus- tom database and a HyperCard front end, to help greeting-card maker Hallmark produce its in-store catalog. EPI also plans to use QuarkXTensions for developing a classified and display advertising production system for the newspaper industry. Odesta Corp., the Northbrook, IIl., soft- ware publisher that introduced a document- management package in September, is using QuarkXTensions to develop network-based database publishing applications. Using QuarkXTensions, XPress programmers can automate publishing production, such as this advertising layout. “The tool kit will make XPress an even more viable and powerful product, bringing it into the publications-generation process rather than just pasting together text and graphics,” said Daniel Cheifetz, Odesta’s president. : The tool kit, which has been available to 4 few developers on a limited beta test basis, will be released in next month for an a yetundetermined fee, according to 4 Qu official. ; Quark is at 2300 S, Jackson St, Suite 100, Denver, Colo. 80209; (303) 934-2211. nnn emmemmmmmmmeeeeeseeeeeeeeeeeee Continued from Page 1 Script controller is called, has until now been limited to handling 11-inch-by-17-inch pages in 1,270-dpi resolution mode and to 1Linch-by-12 inch pages in 2,540-dpi resolution mode. With the upgrade the RIP 2 will be able to handle any page size, limited only by film size and available memory, according to Barry Rickert, president and owner of Image South Inc., an electronic design and pre-press shop in Atlanta. Rickert has an early copy of the RIP 2 upgrade. “Theoretically it's possible to draw a line 200 feet long,” Rickert said. “That capacity is a big advantage for people who need to print larger-size posters or pro- duce high-resolution output in tabloid size,” Rickert said. In addition, Version 49.3 will expand the RIP 2's virtual memory capability from 270 Kbytes to 1 Mbyte, Rickert said “That will dramatically improve the ability {to use the Lino} by people who run programs that require a lot of virtual memory such as Quarkeiiress and Adobe Illustrator,” Rickert sai Virtual memory uses the hard disk as if it were RAM. The expansion to 1 Mbyte will, for example, allow users to output complex fill patterns created in Illustrator that were not possible before, Rickert said. These two drives are identical. But there are five differences. “One of the major bugs in PostScript still not fixed by Adobe is inaccurate frequen and angles in line screens,” Rickert said. “We still get moire patterns, which we have to Co™ rect by correcting the artwork.” k The upgrade will not be free, according © Rickert. “Lino is evidently going to charge one price for those with a service contract an¢ another for those without a service contrac he said Linotype’s RIP 2 is based on the Atlas ver sion of Adobe's PostScript interpreter. The company was the first manufacturer of high- resolution PostScript equipment. Linotype Co. is located at 425 Oser AYE» Hauppauge, N.Y. 11788; (516) 434-2000. — BY Cliff Lehman Quantum ProDrive CLARIS Continued from Page 1 Sources familiar with the software said it would present a serious challenge to mid- range word processors for the Mac, including T/Maker's WriteNow and Microsoft Write. After ClarisCAD, Moonraker will be the second complete program to be developed in- house at Claris. The Mountain View, Calif.- based company was spun off from Apple in April 1987 to market and support applications that previously carried the Apple label, includ: ing MacPaint, MacDraw and MacWnite. “If Claris has truly written a word proces- sor from scratch, it means it can't find a way to enhance MacWrite,” said Ashok Jain, presi- dent of Irvine Resource Group, the Irvine, Calif-based publisher of the Macintosh Mar- ket Report. Bundled free with the Mac from 1984 to 1986, MacWrite has never been displaced as the leader among entry-level word processors for the Mac. For the first nine months of 1988 the $125 program commanded a 66-percent market share in the under $200 word Processor category, according to a study con- ducted by the Computer Markets division of IMS America Ltd., a Plymouth Meeting, Pa- based market research company. T/Maker’s WriteNow ($195) and Microsoft Write ($175) have each carved a 15 percent Slice of that same market, according to the Study. MacWrite was written entirely in assembly language to run on Apple's first 128-Kbyte Macintosh. Even Randy Wigginton, the pro- gram’s author, agrees it may be time to cash in the MacWnite chips “I offered [Claris] multiple file support and horizontal scrolling for MacWrite, but they didn't take it,” Wigginton said. “MacWrite has been around for a long time, I would think this means MacWrite will finally go away. It deserves a rest.” Since acquiring the program almost two years ago, Claris has provided only one major upgrade to the program, giving it compatibility with the Mac IJ and building in a spelling checker licensed from Microlytics Inc Wigginton said he hopes that Claris will provide an upgrade path for current MacWrite owners. Some sources close to the company have suggested that Claris will do so, while continuing to support both products. When it released MacDraw II earlier this year, Claris offered upgrades to the higher-powered prod- uct but kept the original on the market. A partial list of Moonraker’s features includes multiple columns, automatic foot- notes, variable leading, kerning, the ability to find and change styles as well as text strings, headers and footers, time and date stamping on the page, a menu listing each font in its own typeface, strikethrough and double- underline styles, graphics scaling using a dia- log box, stationery pad templates and spell checking. The program incorporates a text engine purchased for a rumored $3 million from Quark Inc. of Denver. It is expected to support WriteNow, FullWrite, MacWrite, text, and Microsoft Word, Write and Works file formats ‘as well as its own stationery format. Noticeably absent from the list are capabili- lies such as macros, outlining, integrated graphics capabilities, multiple undos, style sheets and other features found in such high- end word processors as Ashton-Tate’s Full- Write Professional, Microsoft Word, and WordPerfect Corp.’s WordPerfect. “Claris wants to strengthen its product lines in key areas,” said William Higgs, vice president and director of software research at InfoCorp, a Cupertino, Calif-based market research company. “It want to move away from entry-level products.” (1 SCULLEY Continued from Page 1 Sculley alluded, reportedly flat-panel active matrix LCD, remain low and “out of our hands,” according to Sculley. He added that Apple will introduce several Mac systems featuring the 68030 processor and SuperDrive floppy disk drives. He also said that more hardware and software connec- tivity products — what he called “open system deliverables” — would be forthcoming in 1989. “You'll see more products from us for the IBM world, the Digital world and also Unix.” The Apple CEO emphasized HyperCard's growing role in opening new doors for the Macintosh. “We think HyperCard is going to be an even bigger trump card for us in '89,” Sculley said. “And you'll see some other inter- esting things such as HyperTV, which will offer a way to build a new market for training and presentations.” HyperTY, an Apple-developed stack the company has been showcasing at recent trade shows, displays full-motion video drawn from a laser videodisc player within a HyperCard window (see MacWEEK, Nov. 22) In his remarks Sculley also explained Apple's strategy for evolving the Macintosh Operating System into an advanced system capable of carrying Apple into the mid-1990s. “We are making good progress on it. The complex part is making it fit in with what's already there, We have the luxury of time on it — more time than people think. Get- ting it in place correctly is more important than getting it out fast. By 1991 or 1992 we'll have what we want.” Sculley said that the design of the new operating software will allow Apple to bring out modules that incre- mentally add functionality to the Mac system over the next few years. In addition, he indicated that Apple would be placing more emphasis on the low end of the Macintosh product line. “We now have Apple positioned as a credible player at the high end, which was a very focused effort,” he said. “And now we see a real opportunity to give greater attention to the lower end of the Macintosh product line. It’s reasonable to expect over the next few years that we'll have a design center which will focus on the low end as well as on the higher end.” The Personal Computer Outlook Forum, co-sponsored by Technologic Partners and Merrill Lynch Capital Markets, addressed a variety of issues ranging from Apple's ability to differentiate itself from other computer manu facturers to mainstream interest in OS/2 and Presentation Manager. The two-day event fea- tured individual presentations by the manage. ment of about 60 companies. The hard drive with the Apple label is a Quantum ProDrive™, shipped by Apple Computer. ) The other is ours, also a Quantum ProDrive™, but with Maxcess label. 4. Maxcess is 50% less expensive. Compare buying a Mac Il and adding Maxcess, to buying a Mac Il stock with Apple's drive, Our warranty is 2-years; Apple's is 90-days. We have a toll-free technical support line; Apple has dealer support, Maxes floppy drives; Apple's drive mounts by replac: y We add FWB's Hard Disk Partition™ and Hard Disk Deadbolt™ software; Apple uses system software common to all Macs. Identical drives have never been so different. ‘Tech Spec: 19m: avg. access-timo, Maxcess-40 $647 Maxcess-80 $977 30-day money-back guarantee ProOnve is a Vademars of Quantum Corperaion, Panton ard Hard Dich Deadocit are wademams of PID, ec Marcess is « crear of Har mb/sec. transfer-rate, 50,000 MTBF, a. s can be mounted in the SE while keeping both ig a floppy. head park MAXCESS AO Mastat Strexd Prilaceighia. PA 19104 (ets 3 ze a regatared Vademark of Acie Computes, Ine. Hard Dad rimare Mowe, ine. NEWS ia DA dedicated to writing a quick letter BY CLIFF LEHMAN SANTA CRUZ, Calif. — Working Software Inc, last week shipped a new desk accessory word processor designed specifically for let- ters and envelopes. ‘The $124.95 program includes a search- able address book where names, addresses, salutations and other data can be stored. With one click the appropriate data is pasted direct- ly into a letter or envelope. ‘The copy on the first page of a letter is auto- matically centered vertically, but the user can easily modify the layout by dragging the text in a Print Preview window or by changing verti- cal as well as horizontal margins from a ruler. Graphics can be pasted at the top of the page to create or simulate letterhead. A check box in the Print Preview window lets the user specify whether or not the image should be printed. Templates can be saved as “sta- tionery,” and the user can select a default tem- plate that appears when a new file is created. QuickLetter's MacWritelike word process- ing options include standard options for font, style, size and justification of type; decimal and regular tabs; variable line spacing in half- line increments; search and replace; and time and date stamping. The program can read MacWrite and text files as well as its own doc- uments and stationery, and can open multiple files simultaneously. Envelopes can be of any size. In addition to the recipient's and the sender's address, the program allows text or graphics to be placed in two message areas on the envelope “QuickLetter is for everyone who writes letters and memos,” said Mark Galvin, market- ing coordinator for Working Software. “It's for anyone who doesn’t want to use a full-featured word processor to crank out a two-paragraph letter or anyone who has to address a lot of envelopes. We have reduced the task of letter writing to just writing.” Command-key equivalents for all menu options can be added or changed through the Preferences menu. QuickLetter, which is being distributed by Mediagenic of Menlo Park, Calif., includes a free copy of Spellswell, Working Software's $74.95 spelling-checker application, and a 60,000-word dictionary. A new 103,000-word Expanded Dictionary is available from the Santa Cruz, Calif-based developer for $14.95. Legal and medical dictionaries are also avail- able at $99.95 each, QuickLetter will work on any Mac with a minimum of 512 Kbytes of RAM, according to the company. Working Software is at Box 1844, Santa Cruz, Calif. 95061-1184; (408) 423-5696. 0 Liaison ships PORTLAND, Ore. — Liaison, Infosphere Inc.'s universal software bridge announced in January, began shipping last week. Priced at $295 per bridge, Liaison serves as a LocalTalk-to-LocalTalk and LocalTalk-to- Ethernet bridge and lets remote users with any Hayes-compatible modem dial into and connect to LocalTalk and Ethernet LANs. Infosphere of Portland, Ore., first dis- played Liaison at the Macworld Expo in Boston in August. The company is located at 4730 SW. Macadam Ave., Portland, Ore. 97201; (503) 226-3515, 9 13 December 1988/MacWEEK § Mas NEWS Informix to test its WingZ Spreadsheet wars heating up BY RICK LEPAGE The heat has been turned up in the Mac spreadsheet market with the release of such products as Full Impact from Ashton-Tate and Trapeze 2.1 from REAL Access Technolo- gy. These pro- grams are aimed directly at the heart of the mar- ket held by Microsoft Excel, the longtime king of the spreadsheet hill. In an attempt to woo new customers and existing Excel users, the new breed of spreadsheet programs offer improved calculation abilities and presentation graphics features that go beyond the simple chart creation to which spreadsheets have general- ly been tied. The latest entrant into the mar- ket is Informix Software's WingZ, which will not only be gunning for Excel when it is released early next year, but will attempt to fly past the rest of the competition as well. In our first look at a beta version of WingZ, we found the program has nearly all the features users have come to expect when looking at a spreadsheet, but Informix has designed WingZ to be more than just another spreadsheet. Billed as a “spreadsheet program with a graphics engine attached,” WingZ has an unbelievable amount of power under its hood. Virtually every aspect of the program can be customized — right down to the order of the menu commands — with HyperScript, WingZ’s event- driven programming language. Super spreadsheet. The spread- sheet engine of WingZ is impres- sive. A WingZ work sheet has a max- imum 32,768 columns and 32,768 rows for a total of 1,073,741,824 available cells, which means that you will run out of memory or data long before you run out of room in a WingZ work sheet. There are more than 140 builtin financial, statistical, logical, time, text and numerical functions, The program can create frequency distributions and can per- form matrix calculations such as multiple linear regression and the solution of multiple variables in simultaneous equations. In addition, custom functions can be created and used via HyperScript. WingZ offers a built-in auditing feature that is useful for checking cell references and debugging for- mulas. Other features include sheet- level password protection and encryption, adjustable width and height of rows and columns, and the use of multiple fonts and styles in a work sheet. WingZ’s charting capability is as complete as its spreadsheet func- tions, with 20 basic chart types avail- able in full color. Charts are created and saved in the current work sheet and can be resized or modified easi- ly. Legends, borders, titles, arrows and other graphic elements are avail- able to spruce up charts. Included in the chart types are the standard bar, area, pie and line formats, which can be combined in a single chart. These types can be viewed in either two-dimensional or 3-D format. Rotation, elevation and perspective of any 3-D chart can be modified with ease. Other WingZ chart types include hilo (used for stock charts), scatter, polar, surface, contour and wire frame. The surface, contour and wire-frame charts will be especially useful for cartographers, engineers and scientists, who have not had these features in a Mac spreadsheet before. WingZ can plot more than 32,000 data points per series in a chart, which should be satisfactory for all but hard-core number crunch- ers accustomed to working with mainframes. Like most spreadsheets, WingZ has a database capability. It will not Stack navigates through Mac magazine information BY CLAIR WHITMER ROSWELL, Ga. — If you know you have read about that important Mac-related tidbit but can't remem- ber where, Pointer Publications has a new HyperCard stack for you. Hyper Mac Subjects provides a subject and name index to articles, letters, reviews and Macintosh prod- uct information from approximately 20 Mac publications. These include: MacWEEK, Mac- world, MacTutor, MacUser, MAC- azine, Macintosh Buyer's Guide, MacGuide, Macintosh Business Journal, the BMUG Newsletter, Dr. Dobb's Macintosh, MacTimes, nibble Mac, Macintosh Horizons, Publish!, HyperAge, HyperLink, The Open Stack and the now- 10 MacWEEK/73 December 1988 defunct Macintosh Today. The stack is available in both bimonthly and biannual versions. The bimonthly stack is already in its third release and back issues start- ing from November-December 1987 are available. Bimonthly subscrip- tions are priced at $50 per year, Pointer President Bob Stevens said the index has sparked interest from MIS managers of large corpora- tions and university computing departments and libraries. ‘The biannual stack, called Hyper Mac Subjects Combined Index, is $45 per issue or $15 with a subscrip- tion to the bimonthly release. The first issue covers January-June 1988. Pointer Publications is located at 935 Brooksglen Drive, Roswell, Ga. 30075; (404) 587-1844 rival dedicated database programs, but it should be serviceable for limit- ed needs. WingZ can sort a database on up to 256 fields, and finding and extracting data is done in a manner similar to the one Excel uses: by creating selection criteria for the fields you want to search on. WingZ includes a number of database-specific functions, including the calculation of averages, standard deviation and variance. As mentioned earlier, if your database needs are complex, you will be better served with a dedicated program. The presentation. Informix at- tempts to place WingZ beyond the spreadsheet class by adding a num- ber of tools to manipulate and cre- ate graphics and text objects in a work sheet. These include tools for creating boxes, ovals, lines and arcs. Objects can be grouped together, which makes placement of complex images easier. Graphics can be imported through the Clipboard, although there is no provision for direct import or placement of graphics files. It would be nice to see the abil- ity to use PostScript images, espe- cially in Encapsulated PostScript format, given Wing?’s positioning as a presentation product. WingZ can also create text fields that work like a limited word pro- cessor. Multiple fonts, sizes and styles can be used in a text field, and the field can be resized or freely moved around a work sheet. You can even add a scroll bar to a text field; set paragraph indents and tabs; and with HyperScript, create variables that pull in data from cells in the work sheet. One other important aspect of WingZ is that any of the different object types and work sheet elements — headings, graphs, text fields, scroll bars and the contents of cells —can be turned on or off at any time with a menu command or through HyperScript. This feature increases WingZ’s flexibility and allows presen- tations to be truly interactive; charts and text fields can appear or disap- pear at the click of a button. HyperScript. Wing2’s internal pro- gramming language is the corner- stone of the application. With HyperScript, you can design interac- five presentations from your work sheets or create macros as in Full Impact or Excel. At a simple level, you can per- form a series of actions with WingZ while HyperScript records them in Learn mode. You can edit the Hyper- Script text of the procedure and com- pile it when you are finished. HyperScript goes beyond straight macro recording by offer- ing commands that monitor events (such as clicking the mouse in a certain spot); creating windows, buttons and dialog boxes; and setling up new menus. Every menu item has a corresponding HyperScript command, which means that you can rearrange and edit the menu bar to your liking, either for the global WingZ environ- © file Fait Go Format sheet Title fave Series 30 Into General Orin; Send Group Ungroup color. Script 30 step. 30 Combination Horizontal Bar Pie 30 Pie 4 tute 4 KY Seatter Poter Contour |Aurtace Wiretrame Wing?’s basic graph types can be shown in three dimensions and in ai Tar ooeag8s © File fait Go Format sheet _Graph_Script_Window Financial Nighlights Financial Highlights Deters tn towns ee per sare date 1987 % Chango On-screen buttons and charts can add functionality to the traditional spreadsheet format. ment or for specific work sheets. The name “HyperScript” con- jures up Apple's HyperCard, and there are similarities, although programming in WingZ’s Hyper- Script is still a bit more complex than in HyperCard’s programming language, HyperTalk. HyperScript has an English-like syntax, which means that it will not be as hard to learn as a more formal language like Pascal or C. HyperScript com- mands can be entered into a work sheet’s formula bar, which is nice for performing quick and dirty oper- ations. Scripts can also be linked to on-screen buttons. Conclusions. Informix has gone to great lengths to make WingZ as flexible as it could be, and it appears that it will succeed. The core of that flexibility is HyperScript, which allows you to fine-tune the WingZ environment. However, it might be a bit overwhelming or unnecessary for the casual spreadsheet user or the person who is interested more in numbers than graphics. The ability to customize the pro- gram would not matter if it was at the expense of power, and WingZ is built upon a solid spreadsheet base. Its graphing features alone will make it appealing to many people, and it appears that WingZ will crunch num- bers as well as any of its competitors. The presentation aspects of WingZ are good, but the program will not really threaten dedicated presentation products like Cricket Software’s Cricket Presents... oF Symantec’s MORE II. Most profes- sionals will probably do what they have always done: assemble pieces of a presentation from different applications and bring them togeth- er ina dedicated program. The only real problem we had with WingZ was cosmetic. While Informix clearly followed Apple's interface guidelines in developi WingZ, it is also clear that the grammers didn’t use much of tht Mac Toolbox to help with creating dialog boxes and other common él ments within the WingZ enviro! ment. Many people will find that” things like buttons and scroll) look different enough to be noticed in WingZ. To the company’s. x though, we did not find an: that worked in a manner wi what a typical Mac user woul expect. ¥ ‘The look of the program is sidiary to its functionality, and that, Informix should rate marks, It will be interesting to sé how the market responds to a gram like WingZ. Excel ing for more out of their: sheets might find solace in they are willing to spend. delve deeply into it. FS WingZ will be priced at is scheduled to ship in Informix Software is 16011 College Blyd., 66219, (913) 492-3800. a 7 INEXPENSIVE LASER PRINTER CAN PRINT THIS STATEMENT. At $1999, our dom in reducing and’enlarg-- costly additional hardware. 5 Personal LaserPrinter 4 ing. documents (critical for But theres another reason the PLP (PLP) costs about ~[t applications such as Excel performs better: ithas to. $800 less-than. and PageMaker’), Afterall, in a market saturated Apples. Laser- di - “eg The LaserWriter |l_ with laser printers, there are plenty of Whiter* Il SC* But 3 a = SC doesnt. Opportunities to compare price and that's the least of “ With the PLP italics performance. The PLP simply provides ~ Many good reasons » are true /talics and a higher standard of comparison. why you should buy one. » bolds are true bolds For a PLP. demonstration—or in- One of the best is demonstrated, —because the PlPuses true outline formation on our ImageWriter* trade-in in rich and varied prose, above. fonts. The LaserWriter Il SC doesnt program—see your authorized GCC The PLP is the only laser printer in A\l this begs an obvious question: Technologies dealer. For the one near- its Category that lets you print in any how can we offer so much functional- — est you, call (617) 890-0880 4 number of point sizes, even fractionals. ity and still charge less for it? | oe The LaserWriter Il SC, by contrast, lets The answer is software—soft- iN KS oe ge yOu print in any number of point sizes ware that enables your Maciesh oo 3 _-aS long as the number is six use Its own resources to do the pro- — Z The PLP gives you unlimited free- cessing that would otherwise require ===. TECHNOLOGIES © *Based on a Comparison of manufacturers suggested retal prices. 'In Canada, (800)263-1405 © 1988 GCC Technologies, Inc. GOC Technologies is a radémark of GCC Technologes, Inc’ The GCC Technologies & , « t0go is aregistered vadernark of GCC Technologies, Inc. Pertonal LaserPrinter and PLP are vademarks of GCC Nedvonoen Inc. Macintosh is a trademark of Apple Computer. inc. Laser Writer and ImageWniter a g_ (eaistered trademarks of Apple Computer, inc. PageMaker is a registered trademark of Aldus Corp. Tha dacument above was created with PageMaker 30 and pened an » GOC Technologes ecsonal Laser Printer \ Radius Full Page Display” tool which will dramatically increase your daily productivity. A Radius Display. Radius offers displays for every type of Macintosh user and every type of Macintosh software application. If you're involved primarily in intensive word processing and database management, we heartily recommend our FPD. The Radius Full Page Display”shows you an entire 84"x 11" paper-like page. With a refresh rate of 69 Hz, you have Radius Two Page Display” FOUR CLEAR YOU SHOULD BUY Y oneers A RADIUS AUT a virtually flicker-free display ideally suited for working with software like Microsoft Word and 4th Dimension. If you're incorporating your word processing into page lay- out and design, we suggest that the Radius Two Page Display” is clearly the more appropriate choice. For these reasons: You have the same flicker- free resolution of the FPD and a full two-page horizontal layout. The ideal environment for view- ing a magazine spread created in PageMaker or architectural plans drafted in MacDraft. Or, if you're putting photo- graphs into your Macintosh, our Radius Gray Scale Display“lets Hea create and manipulate life- ike images in 256 shades of gray across the same expansive TPD. Scan your photographs, then do your own retouching using Image Studio or Digital Darkroom. When you're ready, just print out on a LaserWriter © 1988 Rodius Inc Radius, the Radius Logo, Intelligent Hardware, Radius Full Page Display, Radius Two Page Display Radius Gray Scale Display and Radius Color Display are irademarks of Radaas tne TT Radius Color Display” FASONS WHY UR MACINTOSH II AT DRIZED DEALER ocztttemtet: or download toa pagel You'll get startling results. For professional publishers and engineering designers, the Radius Color Display” offers you the latest in digital design and Trinitron color technology. You can work with 256 brilliant colors at one time from a palette of 16.7 million. Create layouts with color photos. Draw dynamic 3D color illustrations. Design a new cir- cuit ees, Or seins and x Corpor and Quark, Inc. All other brand and product names ate trademarks 0 direct your own presentations. Allin vivid, living color. And should you need it, our Color Dis lay is more than willing to work in gray scale. Best of all, no matter which Radius display you do choose, you get all the see Radius firmware features. All of our displays offer you Tear-off Menus that can be positioned anywhere on the screen. As well as adjustable menu and menu phe nie size. * map screen dumps. And our Gray Scale and Color Displays allow you to save any portion of your screen ina PICT file. So before you buy your Macintosh II anywhere else, call 1-408-434-1010 for a brochure and the name of your nearest Radius Authorized Dealer. It's clearly the thing to do. radus Intelligent Hardware™ (EIN S Ca Gay Mac users group formed Skills bank to benefit AIDS BY CLIFF LEHMAN SAN FRANCISCO — The estab- lishment of the country’s first Mac users group for gay men and les. bians was announced early this month in San Francisco. GMUG (Gay Macintosh Users Group) evolved out of a yearlong series of informal meetings of gay Mac users in San Francisco. The group, like users groups elsewhere, decided that a formal structure could better provide mem- bers with a range of services and opportunities. The new users group will pro- vide typical users group services, such as newsletters, public domain and shareware libraries, and special- interest groups (SIGs). Jay Hodgson, president of GMUG and a programmer and research scientist at Genentech of South San Francisco, Calif., said the group’s members want to share their computer knowledge and expertise with each other in a user- friendly environment. GMUG also plans to establish a skills bank for the benefit of non- profit- AIDS/ARC organizations. The skills bank will be administered by GMUG, but it will not be Mac-speci- fic because many AIDS/ARC organiza- tions use DOSbased personal computers. “We encourage people with comput- ing skills in all envi- ronments to donate their time and talent to the skills bank and assist the groups doing the front-line work in the fight against AIDS/ARC,” said Michael Wright, coordinator of the skills bank. Skills needed range from data entry and program- specific trouble- shooting to systems design and consult- ing, he said. Skills bank volunteers do not need to be GMUG members. Although GMUG’s focus is the Mac, the group plans to support all graphics-based computer systems, including the NeXT machine. CMS introduces storage BY RENEE MATHEWS: TUSTIN, Calif. — Updating and expanding its storage lineup, CMS Enhancements Inc. recently intro- duced more than 20 new and enhanced products for the Mac, including high-capacity tape and WORM devices and hard drives ranging in capacity up to 600 Mbytes. The "latest members of CMS’ ProSeries of internal drives include updated versions of the Pro-40/i for the SE and the Pro-40 SE/r, a rear- mount SE model, and new Pro-90 II/i, Pro-170 II/i and Pro-600 II/i models for the Mac II. The latest ProSeries models will ship this month, according to the company. CMS also added eight products NEW CMS ENHANCEMENT STORAGE PRODUCTS | Model | capacity | Type Average Price | (Mbytes) access time s020U | 2 external drive 32ms $249 s080U 0 external drive 19ms $1,895 SD90U » external drive 18.ms $1,995 | SD150U 150 external drive 165ms $3,045 SD170U 170 extemal drive 16ms $3,545 ‘$0300U 300 external drive 165 ms 14245 SDB00U 00 | external drive 165 ms $6,295 | SD4sRM 4 removable cartridge drive | NA $1,895 | Pro-40/ 0 internal drive ms $2,045 | Pro-40sen | 40 rear-mount drive forSe | 25ms $2,045 | Pro-90 Ii/i ” | internal drive for 1! 18 ms $1,795 | Pro-1601I/ 180 internal drive for I 18.ms $2,945 Pro-600 Ii 600 internal drive for It 16.5 ms $6245 | 18150 150 150-Mbyle tape drive NA NA Laser WORM600 | 600 optical WORM drive NA $5,645 $PS18 1,800 expandable tower model 16.5 ms $19,145, SPS1.8/1S 1,800 expandable tower model 16,5 ms NA with tape drive SPS2.4 2,400 expandable tower model 165ms $24,845 SX18 600 expandable desktop model | 16,5ms $18,595 $x1.8/1S 800 expandable desktop model | 16.5ms NA with tape drive sx24 2,400 expandable desktop model | 16.5ms $24,395 SPD600 600 add-on drive for expandable | 165ms $5,845 | series GY a] 14 MacWEEK/13 December 1988 Michael Wright (left) and Jay Hodgson of GMUG in San Francisco's Castro district. The group welcomes mem of all levels of expertise from begi ners to professional programmers. GMUG can be reached at PO. Box 648, San Francisco, Calif. 94101; (415) 864-6305. products to its MacStack line of external drives, offering capacities ranging from 20 Mbytes to 600 Mbytes. The 20-Mbyte SD20U features an aver- age access time of 32 milliseconds. Other new MacStack products include the SD80U, SD90U, SD150U, SD170U, SN300U and SD600U. The SD45RM, an external drive that uses removable 5.25-inch data cartridges storing 44 Mbytes, was also introduced as part of the series. It will be available in the first quarter of 1989 at a suggested retail price of $1,895. The latest addition to CMS’ TapeStack family of backup sys- tems is a 150-Mbyte model called the TS150. Scheduled to ship dur- ing the first quarter of 1989, it will back up data to DC-600 tape car- tridges at a rate of 5 Mbytes per minute. The company’s Expandable series of subsystems now includes a 1.8-Gbyte system and a 2.4-Gbyte unit. The drives are housed in either an expandable tower cabinet or an expandable desktop model. The tower models are called the SPS1.8 and SPS2.4, and the desktop models are the SX1.8 and SX2.4. CMS will also offer the Expandable drives in configurations that include the S150 tape drive. The SPD600, a 600-Mbyte drive designed to be installed in the Expandable systems, was also released. Finally, CMS's Laser WORM600, a 600-Mbyte WORM drive, is sched- uled to begin shipping Dec, 15, CMS Enhancements Inc. is locat- ed at 1372 Valencia Ave., Tustin, Calif. 92680; (714) 259-9555. MacinTouch BY RIC FORD AND RICK LEPAGE Wi Bugs & Tips Lino tricks. According to Greg Bastug, a Lino user, printing to a Linotronic typesetter from QuarkXPress can sometimes be a frustrating exercise. When more than a few downloadable fonts are used, the Lino can run out of virtual memory and crash, possibly even scrambling the password on older (RIP 1) machines, according to others. Typesetting hacker Paul Freedman has a patch for XPress that boosts the memory allocation to alleviate the situation. On a copy of XPress 2.0, use ResEdit to change the first string of STR# resource ID=1002 from this: /fc{vmstatus exch sub 10000 1t{fc)if pop)bdf to this: /f£c{vmstatus exch sub 50000 1t{fc)if pop}bdf Freedman said that an excellent source of information for professional | Linotronic users is Charles Collier's Lino Users Group bulletin board sys- tem in Berkeley, Calif. The modem number is (415) 841-6302. Collier builds special, high-capacity spoolers for Linotronic machines by hand. PageMaker timeouts. If you encounter problems with PageMaker timing out before it has finished printing all the pages in a document, another patch from Freedman should help. This patch increases the timeout period from 300 to 2,500. On a copy of the APD file for your printer, change this line: @AldusPatchFile: "statusdict /waittimeout 2500 put" Desktop Manager redux. We have discussed at length the advantages and disadvantages of using Apple's Desktop Manager to speed up systems with large hard disks (see MacInTouch, Jan 12, Nov. 8). One of the drawbacks of using Desktop Manager is that it keeps invisible Desktop DB and DF files ‘open on all mounted disk volumes, which prohibits you from ejecting or unmounting those volumes. With the increased use of removable cartridge drives and partitioning software, this has become a bigger problem. Harry Starr of Jasik Designs has developed a remedy. His application DM_FIX, patch- es the Finder so that disks can be unmounted with ease when using the Desk- top Manager. The program is available in Data Library 5 of CompuServe's MacPro. section as DMFIX.SIT. Dust bugs. We have inspect- ed quite a few Mac SEs while upgrading memory and installing or removing expansion cards. What we're finding is that dust accumu- lates rapidly inside these computers, more so than in Mac IIs or Mac Pluses. Given dust’s effects on cooling and tiny floppy drive mechanical parts and static electricity, it may be a good idea to open up your SE once in a while for a gentle cleaning. An even better idea would be for Apple or a third-party vendor to offer dust filters for Macs like those used by Jasmine Technolo- gies in its hard disks, Screen speed. [f you haven't actually timed screen operations in different modes, you may not be aware of the penalty you pay for setting the Control Panel to 256 colors on a Mac II. Text scrolling and other operations can easily take three to four times longer with 256 colors than with two colors despite the QuickDraw optimizations incorporated into System 6.0.2. Pyro! correction. In our mention of the Pyro! 3.1 update (MacInTouch, Nov, 29), we incorrectly stated that it was bundled with Fifth Generation Systems’ Suitcase IT. Pyro! is sold by the company as a separate program and is bundled with PowerStation. We welcome your comments and questions on MaclnTouch at MacWEEK, One Kendall Square, Suite 326, Cambridge, Mass, 02139; (617) 577-1033. Electronic mail: MCI Mail: MACWEEKBOSTON, RICFORD, RLEPAGE; CIS: 75056,1225 (Rie Ford), 75016,350 (Rick LePage); Delphi/PAN: MACWEEKBOS; AppleLink (address to “MacInTouch” in Subject): XO702; MacNET: RICFORD, RICKLEPAGE; GEnie: MACWEEKBOS; Internet: RICFORD@CUPPORTAL COM, TURBOBRIDGE HAS APPLES TALKING. FASTER. Now you can organize your Apple- Talk* network and have everyone communicating faster, farther, easier and more economically than ever before. Nuvotech’s TurboBridge™ can extend, expand and increase your network's performance virtually overnight. It lets you easily partition your large network into smaller, faster and less congested intercon- nected local work groups. Plus its built-in repeater amplifier and noise filter lets you extend that network to nearly any length. While still allowing you to efficiently com- municate with anyone in another work group—wherever they are. It’s like building little networks within your large network. Though 8 to 10 nodes is usually ideal, you can add another TurboBridge for each additional work group of up to 82 AppleTalk nodes. Plus TurboBridge includes two of our own TurboNet ST™ connectors built-in, making the expense of additional connectors unnecessary. NOW EVERYONE CAN BE WELL CONNECTED. In addition to TurboBridge, Nuvotech also offers two reliable AppleTalk network connectors—TurboNet™ and TurboNet ST. Use them to net- work any Macintosh} PC or periph- eral that supports AppleTalk, as well as the new high-speed FlashTalk™ and DaynaTalk™ networks. All you need is ordinary telephone wire. TurboBridge is backed by Nuvotech’s one-year warranty. TurboNet and TurboNet ST carry our lifetime war- ranty, And all are backed by a nationwide dealer support network. The next time your Apple* network shows signs of slowing down, call Nuvotech. We'll have everyone talk- ing before you know it. Faster, far- ther, easier and more economically than ever before. Call toll-free for more information and the name of your local Nuvotech dealer. 800-232-9922 (Inside Calif., 415-331-7815) REFINING THE ART OF NETWORKING. Nuvotech. Nuvotech, Inc. 2015 Bridgeway, Suite 204 Sausalito, CA 94965 ‘TurboBridge, TurboNet, TurboNet ST and Nuvotech are trademarks of Nuvotech, Inc. Apple, AppleTulk and Macintosh are registered trademarks of Apple Computer, Inc. FlashTulk is a trademark of Sun Microsystems, Inc, DaynaTulk is a trademark of Dayna Communications, Inc. © 1988 Nuvotech, Inc. a NEWS What’s holding back CD-ROM Copyrights, viruses, distribution hurdles BY STEVE ROSENTHAL AN FRANCISCO — It is fortu- S nate that optical CD-ROM drives can read data discs through a fine coating of blood, sweat and tears, because that’s what publishers say it took to create the first generation of these capacious data discs for the Macintosh. The theory of making CD-ROMs was well understood before Apple announced a drive earlier this year. But from organizing data to navigat- ing copyright restrictions, developing distribution strategies and warding off viruses, CD-ROM publishers have found the transition from Mac demonstration projects to commer- Gal reality to be quite a learning pro- cess. “It's certainly not like putting Angela Foster of Quantum Access noted that her company had a hard time tracking down copyrights on material it wanted to use. 18 MacWEEK/13 December 1988 Len Kaltman of the Comstock photo agency: “I’ve seen copyrighted photos on discs of shareware. Someone is asking for a copyright sul together a five-disk set of data,” said Stuart Sharpe, project manager for The VideoWorks CD-ROM from MacroMind Inc. of Chicago. he primary organizational Testien for Mac CD-ROM publishers is the sheer mass of data that goes onto a CD-ROM. Methods of organizing data that worked well with smaller volumes don’t necessarily translate to CD- ROM sizes that can top 600 Mbytes. “We initially thought we could take what we were doing with flop- pies, consolidate it and scale it up,” said Raines Cohen of Berkeley, Calif.-based BMUG. Cohen's group gave up that idea in favor of a hierar- chical category system when it pub- lished its PD ROM disc in August. But several other public distribution publishers, such as EduComp and the Boston Computer Society (BCS), have based their systems partially or entirely on arrange- ments of existing floppy collections, often supple menting that organization with HyperCard front ends and other organiza- tional aids. “If you don't have a lot of the same kind of data, it’s a navigational nightmare,” said Greg Kolodziejzyk, president of Image Club Graphics Inc. of Alberta, Canada. Kolodziejzyk added that he foresees “a lot of soph- isticated programs in the future” to aid with CD- ROM organization. In the meantime, changes from the first edition of Image Club's Art Room CD- ROM, published in April, to the second, published in August, included more help files and some added navigational aids. The increased de- mands of the massive CD- ROM data collections ROR have also revealed unexpected limi- tations in some standard system pro- grams. According to Cohen, it was only by exceeding the limit that his group discovered that the then-cur- rent version of the Finder program that creates the Mac's desktop dis- play could deal with only about 3,200 different file types and creators per volume. On the copyright front, publish- crs of anthology collections said they find that obtaining and keeping track of permissions for so many files can be a problem, “We just had to keep reading files and files and files, but there's no way that we would know all of the copyrighted programs,” said Angela Foster of Quantum Access Inc. of Houston. That, and a series of oversights, caused her company’s ClubMac disc to end up with two unwanted copyrighted programs in the first pressing in August. Publishers of other collections have reported similar problems with permission from authors of share- ware. “We've had a real problem with fonts because often they have no identifying characteristics,” said Vahe Guzel, president of Educorp Computer Services of Solana Beach, Calif., and publisher of the Educorp CD-ROM. Artwork may be still more prob- lematic. “I've seen copyrighted pho- tos on discs of shareware,” said Len Kaltman, director of marketing for the Comstock photo agency of New York, marketer of a disc that includes more than 400 images with clearly stated reproduction rights. Even though many publishers use uncopyrighted material unwittingly, Kaltman said, “someone is asking for a copyright suit.” eanwhile, computer viruses M have proven to be an unbid- den guest on some early CD- ROMs. First pressings of both the BCS PD-CD and the BMUG PD ROM were found to be infected and had to be destroyed. Joel Nagy, vice president of Discovery Systems of Dublin, Ohio, which pressed the discs, recalled the story all too clearly. “We were ready to ship discs, and two days before Macworld Expo in August, we ran Interferon [a viruschecking program] in a rou- tine check on a disc. We found a virus in HyperCard 1,2.1,” Nagy said. “There were discs in the hands of Apple, in the hands of sales- | people, and out as samples. We got all of them back except one that went into the HyperCard time cap- sule.” Now, both Discovery's cus- tomers and Discovery routinely test for viruses before the data is loaded into its system, and the actual CD mastering system has been discon- nected from the company's Macin- tosh network. In cases when data organization or safety wasn't a problem for pub- lishers, matching data size to disc See CD-ROM, Page 18 StackWi BY ERIC ALDERMAN AND STEVE MICHEL 3 @ Products TENpointO has released the new version of Focal Point, the firstand probably most successful commercial HyperCard application. While keeping the same basic functionality as the original, Focal Point Iladds many new features and capabilities. 4 One of the more interesting of these is Focal Point II's ability to allow users on a network to exchange memos and electronic mail. While we haven't tested this function in detail, it looks fairly powerful: You can send’ messages from within Focal Point II to other network users, and when managing projects you can automatically delegate sub-tasks to others. While it requires some effort to set up Focal Point II to work on a net work server, this new feature should increase the popularity of the prod- uct in work groups. a Danny Goodman and TENpointO faced several problems in enhanc ing Focal Point. First, they wanted to provide easier access to more of Focal Point's features. To achieve this, they used Chris Knepper’s fpMenu XFCN to simulate Macintosh pull-down menus at the top of the screen. This solution works, but has a couple of drawbacks. First, it can’ get confusing for the user trying to distinguish between HyperCard’s normal menu bar and Focal Point's custom bar. We experienced some disorientation as we repeatedly typed Command-space bar to hide the menu bar, but it didn’t appear to go away. To be fair, however, we would have found this out soon enough by reading the manual. Focal Point II also is inconsistent in that it sometimes hides the standard menu bar automatically for you, but at other times it doesn't. Asecond annoyance with using the pop-up-like menu XFCN is that File Edit Go Stacks Launch (in and ‘out of Focal Point) to be inciuded in Compact All menut command. FPZeclionty FP20Deily FP2evirectory fda Delete FPZeDocuments ‘© Automatic prompt for setting alarms ‘With each Daly Appointment entry. © Gheck Electronic Messages for new incoming messages. L S a 5 = O LJ Focal Point II supports network servers and includes a number of useful functions, including auto compacting of Its stacks. you can't just slide the mouse horizontally across the menu titles as you can with normal menus. You must individually click on each one. Another problem encountered in developing Focal Point II is common to all developers of complex stacks, and we have dealt with it before. ‘There are a number of resources — sounds, XCMDs and XFCNs — that all of Focal Point II's stacks need to use. To save disk space, the Install button places all of these resources into the Home stack. Although this is not the fault of the creators of Focal Point II, there are a few things that do bother us. First of all, there is no detailed expla- nation of this process in the manual: It doesn't warn you that if you get a new copy of your Home stack, for example, you will have to reinstall the Focal Point II resources. Second, there is no deinstall button to remove these resources from your Home stack, nor is there a complete list of these resources. While tampering with users’ Home stacks is a necessary evil for the present, developers should provide users with all the informa- tion and tools needed to later remove those resources. Of course, one of the nicest features of Focal Point Il is its customiz- ability, This is enhanced with a set of Preferences cards, which allow you to record some standard information in a central place, For example, the Preferences cards include a list of all the stacks that comprise Focal Point II, to which you can add other stacks. Focal Point Il uses this list for auto- matic compacting of all its stacks, This handy, thoughtful feature that should be copied by other developers. — S.M. Reference TENpoint0, 3885 Bohannon Drive, Menlo Park, Calif. 94025; (415) 329-0800, Ifyou have questions, comments or tips, contact us by E-mail at: MCI: STACKWEEK; AppleLink: D1507 (Steve) or D1577 (Eric). DRIVE INTO THE FUTURE server technology. magine the capacity of a 650 Mbyte’ removable optical disk combined with the flexibility to erase and rewrite files up to a million times. This major achievement in Magneto Be Optical Technology represents Pinnacle's commitment to the future. | REO-650™ software drives your ; Macintosh” on LAN, in two ; directions MAG/OS or A/UX. ae SL ee Take your drive into the future by calling or writing. Pinnacle Micro Inc., 15265 Alton Parkway Irvine, CA 92718, USA. in CA (714) 727-3300 FAX (714) 727-1913 (800) 553-7070 Read-It! upgrade to cost $24 BY CLIFF LEHMAN SOUTH MIAMI, Fla. — Better late than never, but better free than priced at $: Olduvai Software Inc. announced recently in a letter to registered users thal a long-promised upgrade to the company’s Read-It! optical char- acter recognition program will not be free, as previously planned, but will cost $24 The primary reason for the change was the unexpected high cost of writing and produc ing the new manual, according to James PowerStation. First among critics for desktop organization. Pyro! First in screen saving entertainment. SUITCASE I is the perfect utility for desktop publishers. It now allows unlimited access to fonts, desk accessories, FKEYs and sounds. Plus, now you can display fonts in their own typefaces right in the menu. FASTBACK FOR THE MACINTOSH makes backing up a dam: To receive more information on these products call 800 873-4384 breeze for every hard disk user. Its incredible speed, automatic for- matting and reliability assure feats backup. PYR for every Macintosh owner. A nifty, resi- dent program that pre- vents screen burn-in ge. POWERSTATION is ideal for hard disk Erlich, vice president of sales. According to a company source, the letter resulted in a deluge of customer complaints. “I can understand why people would be upset, but there hasn't been any kind of major problem,” Erlich said “Customers have a right to be upset,” Erlich said. “People at Olduvai are upset too. I am one of them. But we still pride ourselves on customer support and the upgrade is well worth the $24.” Erlich also blamed the upgrade price hike The new Suitcase Il. First in utility sales from the moment it was introduced. Suitcase IT Po‘terStation !is a must sories. on the fact that development on the new ver- sion of Read-It! went into overtime. This hap- pened, he said, because the company opened itself to suggestions from its entire registered user base and tried to incorporate as many of the suggestions as possible. “We got good advice and wanted to show users we listened and cared about their sug- gestions,” Erlich said, “The bottom line is there is no profit being made on the upgrade. The $24 is just to get it out the door.” The upgrade began shipping early this month. Olduvai Corp. is located at 7520 Red Road, Suite A, South Miami, Fla, 33143; (305) 665-4665. @ FastBack. First in speed among all Macintosh ——_ backup programs. users who regularly work with multiple applications. It helps to organize the disk for quick, easy access to applications, docu: ments and desk acces- Generation SYSTEMS, INC. To get the most out of their Macs, more and more users are choosing these four firsts from Fifth. 11200 Industnplex Blvd. Baton Rouge, LA 70809 (604) 291-7221 at MacWorld booth # 1447 an pHi Cl U-RUIV Continued from Page 16 capacity was a learning experience all its own. Most of the public domain and shareware disks are about 300 Mbytes, but other projects range from 30 to more than 500 Mbytes per disc, “We did tests at different resolutions,” Kalt- man said. “I was concerned about how long any file would take to load in a desktop pub- lishing program. We decided to base our first product on our existing [paper] catalog. We could have gone at a higher resolution and filled the disc.” “There's no reason to have to fill the thing,” said Peter Black, president of Xiphias in Marina Del Rey, Calif., whose company’s The Time Table of Science and Innovation takes up only 35 Mbytes on a disc. “The issue isn't how many megabytes, but how much value is in the applications.” For the developers with large data colle tions, though, finding a place to put all the data during the CD development stage some times proved to be a challenge. While some data collections could be segmented into smaller parts during development, others required the complete data image of hundreds of megabytes on-line at once. “No question about it: Beg, borrow or steal a big hard disk,” advised Robert Hafer, direc tor of software exchange at BCS and project manager for the BCS* Mac CD-ROM disc. His group used a massive Racet 600-Mbyte system to create a CD-ROM image. Other developers with smaller drives, he said, have had prob- lems with partitioning and combining their data sets. Once the disc is ready, marketing and dis- tribution problems come to the fore. Xiphias’ Black complained that dealers are reluctant to carry CD-ROMs, and noted that it would be easier for him to add titles and expand the market if there were a distribution system that guaranteed a certain level of sales. Most developers share Black's desire to build a market in computer stores, but some: have other ideas. “When we start putting our CD-ROM together in the way we want, when it is more menu-driven and more sound-driven, then it’s more entertainment,” said Macro- Mind's Sharpe. “Then there are a lot of outlets we haven't tapped yet. It will be more like putting out a laser [video] disc or a record.” | espite the problems, CD-ROM develop- ers didn’t express any regrets about ® their decision to dive into a new market with a relatively untested technology. Most said, however, that they would now make a test disc to try out interfaces, and they’d want better software tools for aiding in the develop- ment process. Several companies, in fact, already have plans for further discs, either as new projects or part of a series or subscription service. “That's part of the reason we went sub- scription,” said Quantum Access’ Foster. “We knew it would take a lot of fine-tuning.” With only a small number of CD drives for the Macintosh in place so far, and typical sales per CD-ROM disc title in the hundreds rather than millions, Macintosh CD-ROM can still be characterized as very much a developmental and specially market. While some of these companies say