Text content (OCR)
_A2-Central’
2
A journal and exchange of Apple Il discoveries
formerly
Open-Apple
October 1989
Vol. 5, No.9
ISSN 0885-4017
newstand price: $2.50
photocopy charge per page: $0.15
Miscellanea
Beagle Bros has ainounced the pricing of StyleWare products
now released under the Beagle banner (see A2-Central, July
1989, page 5.47). According to Beagle, all programs have been updat-
ed and revised and are not copy protected. They are offered with Bea-
gle Bros’ unconditional guarantee.
The fle/Ilc/Ilc Plus programs announced are BeagleWrite (formerly
MultiScribe) at $79.95, BeagleWrite Desk Accessories at $39.95,
BeagleWrite Picture Manager at $39.95, and BeagleWrite Fonipaks
Volume 1 and 2 at $39.95 each.
ligs products are BeagleWrite GS (formerly MultiScribe GS) at $99,
BeagleDraw (formerly TopDraw) at $89.95, Beagle Bros GS Desk
Accessories {formerly DeskWorks) at $59.95, Beagle Bros Clip Art
eee 4 at $49.95, and Beagle Bros Font Library Volume I at
9.95.
Beagle Bros also announced network, lab, site, and district licens-
ing policies for their TimeOut series of AppleWorks applications, and
the addition of an upgraded version of the former Pinpoint telecom-
munications product Point-to-Point to their product line.
Ultra.Invoice from Triad Software Products, 105 E. Second
Street, Papillion, Neb. 68046, (402) 331-7312, works with Apple-
Works {version 2.0 or later) and TimeOut UltraMacros to generate
invoices on your Ile/lic/ligs with a minimum of a 128K AppleWorks
desktop. Triad sells Apple I! products mail-order and uses this system
internally to handle their invoicing, inventory sold records, USPS mail
and UPS shipping calculations, sales tax calculations, and so on.
Working from distinct databases and spreadsheets containing infor-
mation on customers, products, sales, orders, pending orders,
mail/shipping rates and ZIP code information, Ultrainvoice can
assemble the invoice to print using a supplied invoice template. With
a knowledge of UltraMacros programming you can com custom
forms (within the limits of AppleWorks and UltraMacros); if you have
no ability or desire to program, Triad offers a programming service for
a fee. Ultra Invoice is $125.
Chinook offers new Ic products. The $979 CT-40c is a 40
megabyte hard disk drive for use with the Apple IIc and IIc Plus that
can also be connected to the IIgs SmartPort or a UniDisk controller in
an Apple Ile. The drive is supplied as a turn-key system with cables,
program selector, and partitioning software.
Chinook also announced the CT-RAMc RAM memory expansion for
the Apple Ilc (with internal memory expansion connector) and IIc Plus
at an introductory pricing of $149 for a 256K version, $199 for 512K,
and $299 for a 1 megabyte version (normal pricing will be $219,
$289, and $429 respectively after November 30, 1989). The 256K
and 512K configurations can be expanded by the user up to the full
1 megabyte capacity.
Hackers who have been building their own hard disks using the
Apple II SCSI card as an interface can take advantage of the value-
added SCSI formaiting and partitioning utilities that Chinook bundles
with their hard disks. Chinook has decided to also sell these utilities
separately at $29.95. The program will format common embedded
SCSI drives (Seagate ST-2xxN series, Quantum Pro xxS series, and so
on) and allow them to be partitioned without the constraints of
Apple's HDSC utilities. Among the enhancements are the ability to cre-
ate up to 7 partitions, select an interleave for the low-level formatting
of a drive, perform a high4evel (ProDOS) format without exiting the
Program, verify the drive format and lock out bad blocks. The pro-
gram runs on any Apple II under ProDOS and requires an Apple II
SCSI Interface Card with the Rev. C. ROM. Chinook's address is 601
Main Street #635, Longmont, Colo. 80501, (303) 678-5544,
Internal hard disks are popular. First there was the Applied Inge-
nuily InnerDrive, then there was Applied Engineering's Vulcan. Then
we read in the October 1989 issue of InCider about Cirtech’s ‘hard
disk on a card’ for the Apple Il. A2-Centraf is Cirtech’s U.S. distribu-
tor, but we expect the miniature drive mechanism to be expensive
compared to those used in more orthodox drives.
BIX, Byte magazine's information service, has gone to a flat-fee
billing system. For an annual subscription fee of $156 (that works out
to $13 per month) you get unlimited access to basic BIX services
without an hourly charge other than your network connection fee. If
you use Tymnet to connect, the hourly off-peak rate is $2 per hour, or
you can purchase unlimited off-peak access at $15 per month. For
details, including your local Tymnet access number, contact BIX at
One Phoenix Mill Lane, Peterborough, N.H. 05458, (800) 227-2983 or
(603) 924-7681.-DUD
“NAH HE'S NOT THAT SMART. HE WON'T BACK UP HIS HARD DISK, FORGETS 70
CONSISTENTLY NAME HIS FILES, AND DROQLS ALL OVER THE KEYBOARD.”
Ask
(or tell)
Uncle
The lead article in last month's issue of A2-
Central stated that the new ligs would be sup-
plied with an Apple ligs Memory Expansion
card to achieve the new ‘standard 1.125
megabyte RAM memory configuration. The
memory is actually installed on the revised
motherboard. The current Apple memory
expansion card can be used with the new ligs
to augment the total ligs memory available.
Memory cards that use thelr own address
decoding circuitry rather than working soleiy
from the address information supplied at the
ligs's internal memory expansion connector
may not work with the new motherboard, This
includes many current memory cards that use
more than four banks of either 256 kilobit or 1
megabit memory chips. If your old memory
board won't work in a new ligs, contact the
manufacturer to see if that's the problem.
We also addressed a problem with renaming
ligs disk volumes from the Finder in ‘System
Software 5.0 ° (page 5.63) The procedure from
Finder Is to double-click on the name of an
unhilighted icon {if the icon is already highlight-
ed, click on the desktop to remove the high-
light). The pointer should change into the ‘I-
beam’ cursor when you move the pointer over
the highlighted name box, indicating that you
can edit the text within the box. Users without
the System 5.0 manuals who are having trou-
ble renaming files or disks should notice that
you need to actually press the ‘Return’ (or
‘Enter) key to make a name change take
place. If you click the mouse somewhere else
on the desktop, the new highlighted name will
revert to its unhilighted original.
in addition to the Ile/lic/ligs version of
ShrinkIT (‘Checking out ShrinkIT’, page 5.63),
Andy Nicholas has written a separate Il-Flus
(ProDOS) version of his utility to ‘unshrink’ files
and disks, These should be appearing on most
commercial information services. Andy also
mentioned that a special ‘2.1a° version of
is meant only for use in conjunction
with AppleLink-Personal Edition and should not
be uploaded elsewhere.-DJD
lle extensions
‘The Iigs isn't the only Apple that can support
multiple keyboards/monitors. (‘ADB Cable
lenath’, Sept. 1989, page 5.63.)
You can add multiple keyboards to both the
lle and IIc by merely hooking another keyboard
in parallel with the original keyboard on the
machine. There is a distinct distance limitation
though. The keyboard on the Ile and IIc is con-
nected directly to the keyboard encoder. In
practice, a distance of 10-12 feet from the com-
puter to keyboard seems to be the maximum
that will work. Longer lengths usually send the
key encoding into another time dimension, The
result is the same however as reader Bilgrien
reposts, Along with an-auxiliary video output (a
simple modification) the multiple keyboard
option can make one computer do the work, of
two.
On the subject of the Works/Works translator:
the Apple File Exchange version of the
Works/Works translator. comes with MicroSoft
Works version 2.0. Going from Works to Apple-
Works is much harder than from AppleWorks to
Works, If you. have {or can round up) enough
computers, go from Works to DOS to Apple II.
Vern L. Mastel
Mandan, N.D.
Assuming ‘DOS’ means ‘MS-DOS’, the rea-
son for interposing another operating system in
the translation chain is unclear. Are there any
deiails on this?-DJD
AppleShare simplified
Just read your piece on AppleShare and was
particularly interested in. your ‘vision’ of the
AppleShare office. The primary reason for this
interest centers around the fact that | am heavi-
ly involved in establishing an AppleShare net-
work for the School of Education at Georgia
College which is predominantly Apple 1! orient-
ed.
Our decision to adopt the Apple ligs as the
‘standard issue’ computer was a clear one for
us. Our primary constituency is to be found in
the K-12 education community and the Apple II
is the dominant computer in that environment.
We felt that, as teacher educators, we needed to
be familiar with the machines our constituency
was using most frequently. We also decided that
buying just the ligs CPU from Apple and getting
monitors, drives, and memory chips elsewhere
gave us an excellent price-to-performance ratio.
There is an excellent and vastly more power-
ful alternative to the Aristotle interface. Its
called Let's Share and it is a product of Russ
Systems, Inc. Call Curtis Kopple at (408) 458-
5080 or write to him at 1544 Pacific Avenue,
Suite 103, Santa Cruz, CA 95060,
Let's Share is a highly developed descendant
of Lets Talk (a.k.a. MultiTalk, a.k.a. Data
Broadcasting System), one of the most innova-
tive ProDOS BBS systems ever devised. We're
using DBS with three incoming lines running on
a Corvus network with the GC EduNET project.
Lets Share uses virtually the same easily
learned scripting language to collect, organize
and present information as Let's Talk does.
Additionally, Let's Share will launch applica:
tions, search AppleWorks databases without
having to launch AppleWorks, and it will support
CDROM.
Currently, we're trying to convince Russ Sys-
tems to write a telecommunications module for
Let's Share so that we may integrate a wide area
network (soon to be state-wide in Georgia) with
our local area network. Integrating these two
networks (the LAN and the WAN) would mean
that faculty would have access and be accessi-
ble to any other educator in the state, right from
their own desktop.
The WAN currently services over 700
members and the LAN connects over 70 offices
and classrooms. The state-wide WAN will cer-
tainly grow very rapidly in the coming year, per-
haps to 2,000 members. We're using a Macin-
tosh IIx with 160 megabyte internal drive as the
primary file server, Farallon Star Controllers and
PhoneNET wiring link classrooms and offices.
Vol. 5, No. 9
We included classrooms so that our faculty
could use LCD panels with overhead projectors
to present information and demonstrate soft-
ware.
Let's Share is definitely worth looking into.
Another dimension of the interface question
might involve HyperStudio. | have a preliminary
version of this program and, according to the
‘docs | was given, it is AppleShare aware.
HyperStudio could work in concert with Let's
Share or tn it's place. [ll need to investigate fur-
ther to have definite opinions on this aspect of
HyperStudio, but as a stand-alone application,
it's going to be a world-beater in the Apple I
worid if Apple doesnt undercut it by releasing a
ligs HyperCard product that would be bundled
with new systems, | have heard rumors to that
effect.
System 5.0 arrived in our offices without doc-
umentation and less the disk to install it on the
AppleShare network. Our normally very
resourceful dealer has been, so far, unable to
pry any information or disks away from Apple
corporate. Nonetheless, it is an awesome prod-
uct, especially in conjunction with AppleShare. I
boot my system from a hard disk each AM and,
since it remembers‘ my name and password,
all is quick and automatic.The hard disk (could
be a floppy) is like the key disk to a car, if
you've gol it you can ride, if not, you gotta walk.
Finally, let me tell you that we are noticing
that features in 5.0 are presaging features
promised for the Mac Finder. Right now, It's eas-
jer to use a GS WorkStation to change access
than it is to use a Mac workstation. System 7.0
for the Mac will, | predict, handle access and
such in the same ways as GS/OS 5.0 does now.
If you wind up trying Let's Share, | have all
sorts of script files for e-mail, forums, automatic
testing, surveys and electronic product order-
ing. A2-Central might consider taking credit
card orders electronically. Of course, to get this
capability, Russ Systems will have to write that
telecommunications module for Let's Share that
I was talking about.
Dr. Frank Lowney
Assistant Dean
Georgia College
Milledgeville, Ga.
BASIC conversions
Ive just completed a package of programs
for doing high school and college math. I wrote
them in AppleSoft BASIC in DOS 3.3, then used
the Beagle Compiler to compile them under Pro-
DOS. I've no commands in them more esoteric
than POKE 36,N and PEEK(-16384),
Td like to expand my marketing horizon for
this writing them in GW-BASIC, thereby making
them available also for running on MS-DOS. To
do this, I'll need a book which will instruct me
in how to translate commands from AppleSoft
BASIC into GW-BASIC (and which will also tell
me when I can’t}.
Are you aware of any book like this?
Spence Earnshaw
Richmond, B.C.
We don't know of such a book currently
available on the market, but maybe a reader
does. Nominally, we've found it easiest to buy
a copy of the reference manual for each lan-
guage and compare commands ourselves, due
to the complications of converting the PEEKs,
POKEs, and CALLs often found in Applesoft
October 1989
programs. Many reference manuals have a
table listing available commands that can be
used for finding common correlations quick-
ly.-DJD
Pascal conversions
How compatible is ORCA/Pascal with Apple
Pascal {ORCA for the GS, Apple for the Il)? Can |
take programs written for Apple Pascal and
compile them on my GS with ORCA/Pascal?
Shangtul Nigam
Southington, Conn.
By and large, you can translate your Apple
Pascal programs to ORCA/Pascal fairly easily
if they do not use the Apple-specific units such
as APPLESTUFF or TURTLEGRAPHICS, and if
you run them under the ORCA shell environ-
ment rather than as ‘standalone’ applications.
This will likely limit ‘easy’ conversions to appli-
cations that use the text, not graphics, screen.
The primary syntactic differences between
ORCA/Pascal and Apple Pascal come from
the different ‘standards’ on which each version
of the language is based; ORCA is an [SO stan-
dard Pascal, while Apple Pascal follows the
UCSD conventions. Common extensions for
each of these languages (such as strings) may
also be handled slightly differently, though
ORCA/Pascal does support the UCSD string
structure.
The Apple-specific extensions added to
Apple Pascal include high-res drawing rou-
tines, elc., designed for use on (usually) the
64K Apple li &bil ‘base’ machine model.
ORCA/Pascal instead has extensions oriented
toward supporting the ligs toolbox and the
GS/OS environment. As part of this, the device
access for ORCA is very different from that for
Apple Pascal. The ORCA shell, for example,
implements an environment for communicat-
ing with devices and files that ORCA/Pascal
uses in place of the UCSD ‘shell’ of Apple Pas-
cal. if you write programs for ORCA/Pascal
that are not intended to run under the shell,
you'll need to use the ligs tool calis to perform
many functions, such as using the GS/OS Con-
sole Driver to send output to the text screen.
Or you may prefer to update your program to
use the ligs graphics desktop interface as you
make other modifications.-DJD
ProPascal
I recently bought a ilc Plus. The demo disk
which came with it is marked ‘Version 1.0
ProPascal Based’. The disk catalogs like a nor-
mat ProDOS disk, with BASIC.SYSTEM as the
only system program in the root directory.
Two of the subdirectories, AT.WORK and PRE-
SENTING, contain one system program, a bunch
of files with no type, and a number of TXT files.
When I check the disks which came with my
original IIc three years ago, the AT WORK and
INTRO disks are indeed Pascal disks.
Does this indicate that a new Pascal which
will run under ProDOS 8 is in the works? I
havent heard of a ProPascai, and there is noth-
ing about it in the APDA catalog, nor can | find
any reference to it in your back issues. It would
certainly be nice to have, though.
Richard D. Jay
San Diego, Calif
ProPascal generates files that execute on
an Apple Ii under ProDOS, but the compiler
actually runs on an MS-DOS machine to create
the files, which can then be transported to Pro-
DOS. A compiler that runs on one computer
but generates code for a different system is
called a cross compiler, ProPascal is intend-
ed as a development system to aid in moving
Apple Pascal programs to the ProDOS envi-
ronment for compatibility with the current soft-
ware base, The supplier is Component Soft-
ware, and the address we have is 157 Centre
Street, Mountain View, Calif. 94041 Hang.on to
your hat.,.this is a full professional develop-
ment system (including runtime duplication
licensing and consultant-quality support) and it
goes for (are you ready?) $4200. We tried to
contact Component Software to see if that
included a computer (we doubt it), but the
number was disconnected.~DJD
Lost disassembler
By typing 'F666G" in the monitor on an Apple
I-Plus you used to be able to get into a mini-
assembler.
Was this feature removed in the Apple Ile's or
has the location changed (an enhanced or
unenhanced Ile will just hang)?
Louis Rau
Armidale, N.S.W.
Actually, the miniassembler was originally
part of some utilities in the Integer BASIC
ROMs installed in the original Apple I! (no
Plus’), not the monitor ROM ($F666 is not
within the monitor's address range of $F800-
$FFFF). The Applesoft in KOM on the Apple Il-
Plus took up almost ail of the 12K KOM space
other than the 2K allocated for the monitor
ROM and the miniassembier was not present in
Applesoft. However, the miniassembler
remained in the integer BASIC ROMs and was
also loaded as part of the INTBASIC file under
DOS 3.3 on a 64K Apple Ii system. Integer
BASIC isnt loaded under ProDOS, so the mini-
assembler iNTBASIC contains isn't accessible.
The first Apple He's and lic's did not have
Integer BASIC in the motherboard KOM and
also lacked the miniassembler unless INTBA-
SIC was loaded. As the KOM space for these
computers was later expanded beyond the
original 12K limit (on the enhanced Ile and the
lic motherboards other than the first version)
the miniassembler was added back into the
ROM. To see If it exists in your system, get into
the monitor and type ‘I’. If the computer
responds with a ‘I’ prompt, then the mini-
assembler is present (the one on the lic even
supports 65C02 codes). if the computer beeps
and responds with the monitor's asterisk (‘*’)
prompt, it’s not there.
For information on the Apple I! monitor, see
“A Song Called the System Monitor (February
1985) and ‘A Song Continued* (March 1985).
The ligs has a greatly enhanced monitor and
miniassembler Which handles 65816 code; see
“Verses added to a golden oldie’ in the May
1987 issue.-DJD
Epic modem quest
Our Apple user group heard several rumors
that Epic Technologies had gone out of busi-
ness. We think that their Epic Classic fis the
best Apple Il modem on the market and we
hate to see such a fine product disappear. Will
some other manufacturer take over from Epic?
Glenn Kopraske
Fenton, Mo,
We've also heard Epic is gone. We haven't
heard of another company picking up the prod-
uct line; possibly a reader knows of any sup-
port organizations.-DJD
A2-Central 5.67
BASIC editing
If you write a program in Applesoft BASIC
using ProDOS on an Apple fic and then have the
need to renumber program lines to facilitate
insertion of other program lines, how can you
(a) renumber every line in the listing without
typing line numbers? (b) Put a space of 10 line
numbers between existing consecutive line
numbers without retyping each line number.
Gerald L. Hoffman
Houma, La.
If you have not tried Beagle Bros Program
Writer do it! I've used it to clean up and modify
all my programs, It has to be the neatest thing
since sliced bread.
Barry Choate
Lumberton, Texas
Beagle has released an upgraded version of
Writer with some new features,
including the much needed ability to ‘cut and
paste’ a range of Applesoft lines between pro-
grams. The ProBASIC bonus language (‘BASIC
choices’, Dec. 1987, page 5.88) is no longer
included with the new version, though,
Some Applesoft program editors such as
Program Writer allow you to renumber all or
part of a program, keeping ail GOTO and
GOSUB references to the numbered lines
updated. There are also standalone utilities
that will renumber a program, but we find an
actual editor so useful that we havent used a
standalone version in recent memory.-DJD
OKS MultiKache Card
AppleWorks and Beagle Bros TimeOut series
are my main software - good review of Apple-
Works 3.0. I have recently installed an Ohio
Kache disk controller card with 256K in my Ile.
Im impatiently waiting for an Apple 3.5 drive.
The card really does speed up disk access. It
seemingly hands me the disk menu file card as
if to say ‘Isn't this what you wanted?".
J, Pollard
Mogador, Ohio
Ohio Kache Systems's Multi-Kache board
replaces the functionality of your normal 3.5
and 5.25 drive interfaces and adds intelligent
disk caching.
Like the more common software caching
systems such as Diversi-Cache, the Multi-
Kache retains the most recently accessed disk
information in RAM memory specially reserved
for the process, and uses this readily available
image to supply the information to the comput-
er on subsequent requests the computer
makes for information from the disk. if the
information is already in the cache, it is
accessed without having to physically access
the disk drive again, which gives the appear-
ance and function of having a faster disk drive
in most common situations.
Unlike the more common software methods,
the Multi-Kache contains it's own microproces-
sor and cache RAM to store the disk infonna-
tion it reads. Since the card contains it's own
‘computer’, it can actually work with the disk
drive while the computer is doing other things:
for example, you can insert a new disk and the
Multi-Kache will automatically start to read
and buffer the information. The larger the
amount of cache RAM you have installed on
the card, the more of the disk information it
can read, and the more likely it is that the
5.68 A2-Central
information you request will be in the fast
cache memory. The automatic start/stop of the
disk drive is a bit unnerving, but you get used
to it, and the information comes in blindly fast
from the cache.
There are options available to support SCSI
hard disks , and those offered by Applied Inge-
nuity (InnerDrive) and Applied Engineering
(Vulcan). Ohio Kache also has newer modeis
that work only with the hard disk (no floppy
support) at a lower price than the Multi-Kache
with the hard disk option. Their address is
4162 Little York Road, Suite E, Dayton, Ohio
45414-2566, (800) 338-0050,-DJD
Small Launcher
With RAMKeeper cards, what is the smallest
launcher (ProSel, Squirt, etc.) that will reside in
backed-up RAM and still launch any program?
William Lang
Statesboro, Ga.
Assuming a need to support launching
GS/OS programs, the smallest self-contained
program appears to be the 6K LAUNCHER pro-
gram supplied on Hgs System Disk 3. !.-DJD
Data sharing
I just received Barney Stone's newspaper and
I wish him well. However, my particular situation
isn't precisely reflected in this first issue, and
Im sure my equipment isn't unique. My ‘busi-
ness" (Stetson University) is committed to IBM
and Macintosh equipment. At work | use an IBM
PS/2 Model 50. At home I can use whatever I
want, of course, but before I'm able to choose
Apple two things must be true: (1) I need soft-
ware sophisticated enough to meet my require-
ments, and (2) ] need an efficient way of shar-
ing data.
Stone seems to focus mainly on (1), and
that's clearly important. But for people like me
(2) is the real key. The question has two ‘sub-
considerations’. The first is mostly a matter of
software compatibility. For example, if! spend a
tot of time laying out a syllabus or proposal on
my Apple, | dont want to lose all the formatting
when I transfer the data to the IBM. There are
some good signs here. For example, if I use
WordPerfect at home, the files will be compati-
ble with WordPerfect at the office. If I use
AppleWorks, I can still use SoftSpoken's new
program to translate the files for WordPerfect.
But that's where the second sub-considera-
tion arises. To use CrossWorks, [ have to put
my two computers physically together or to fuss
with modem transmissions. That's a pain. What
| want is to save a file at home on a 3.5" disk,
then to take that disk to the office, stick it into
an MS-DOS or Macintosh drive, and read the file
directly into the other computer.
Again, there are signs, but we are far from
Nirvana, For instance, the MatchPoint controller
is an excellent device, but it won't work in my
MCA bus. Will the next GS use Apple's ‘univer-
sal’ drive? Will it be able to read 720K MS-DOS
disks, More to the point, will it be able to WRITE
them? Those are the kinds of questions that are
crucial for those of us who want to use our
Apples at home for business we have bought
home from the office, Those are. among. the
issues | would like to see addressed both in
A2-Central and in if at Work,
Wayne Dickson
Deland, Fla.
First, let's point a finger at one basic prob-
lem: as long as Apple Computer refuses to
change it's marketing emphasis for the Apple II
to encourage the development of serious (busi-
ness) software, the problems you mention will
be severe (because companies probably won't
worry about Apple I! conversions). A change
depends on Apple's belief in the Macintosh
maturing enough to stop protectionist market-
ing postures opposing its own products and
users,
Second, let's look at some ways to deal with
your specific request from among two options:
hardware and software to carry out the transfer
on a single CPU and facilitating the transfer
between two CPUs.
For transferrals between an Appie il and a
Mac, the file contents of 3.5° (800K) ProDOS
disks can be exchanged with 3.5" (800K) Mac
disks on the Mac using Apple File Exchange,
which is supplied as part of the Mac system
software, Converting the files to and from
forms that the different system's applications
can handle is left to translation utilities that
work with AFE. In most cases, youll need to
Pressure the application's publisher to gener-
ale a translator in both directions (see ‘More
on Works to Works’ in the previous issue).
A Macintosh system that includes the Apple
FDHD drive can also access 3.5 MS-DOS disks
in the 720K and 1.44 megabyte formats. The
Apple PC 5.25 drive enables a Mac to read and
write 360K MS-DOS format disks. In both cases
access and translation is achieved through use
of Apple File Exchange. But at a suggested
retail cost of $629 for the FDHD and $528 for
the Apple PC drive, these are hardly inexpen-
sive solutions. For MS-DOS machines with a
‘standard’ PC bus (this eliminates the Micro-
Channeled Model 50), the Central Point Option
Board Deluxe includes software _ to
import/export Mac files using a PC's 3.5 drive.
No data format conversions are performed,
separate utilities have to be written if your
application can't work with the file format used
for saving the data,
The future Apple ligs solution will probably
involve a GS/OS FST for the Mac HFS and MS-
DOS operating system formats if Apple devel-
ops these tools. The ligs can read Mac disks
directly on the current Apple 3.5 drive (the
missing link is the HFS FST). MS-DOS machines
use a different recording format which may
require a more specialized drive; this might be
a drive like the FDHD or something like a SCSI-
based MS-DOS drive.
If you want to look into a current Apple iI
solution, consider the new reduced pricing on
an Applied Engineering PC Transporter.
Price Total
‘PC Transporter $499 $499
IIgs PCT kit 49 548
PCT TransDrive 259 a7
Apple 3.5 drive 399 1206
These are not the lowest prices. The AE He/tl+
PC Transporter installation kit is $39 instead
of the $49 for the ligs version (though you may
also want to allow for an external PC key-
board). Mail order discounts for the PC Trans-
porter have been seen at $359. Kinson Prod-
ucts advertises a 5.25 (Meiji) drive subsystem
for the PC Transporter at $169. If you have a
ligs, you probably already have the Apple 3.5
drive and can delete it from the list. The PC
Transporter system with both 5.25 and 3.5
drives is only slightly more than the $1157
combination of the Apple FDHD and 5.25
drives, The PC Transporter includes circuitry
Vol. 5, No. 9
and software to allow it to read and write ‘stan-
dard" MS-DOS 720K format 3,5 disks, though
you may need to format the disks on an MS-
DOS machine to insure reliability. (You can
also buy 3.5 disks pre-formatted for MS-DOS if
you don't have the extra CPU lying around.)
Plus you can actually run the original pro-
There's another option. Looking at the older
(higher) PC Trans Prices, | decided to
buy an inexpensive laptop MS-DOS machine
and use CrossWorks to transfer files between
my Apple Il and 3.5 MS-DOS disks. Besides
having the requisite 3.5 720K drives (and an
expansion port for a 5.25 drive), the laptop
has the advantage of being portable and bat-
tery powered for trips. Low-end MS-DOS laptop
Prices are hovering just above the price of the
Apple FDHD, starting in the $700-$800 range.
Not wanting to get.too involved in MS-DOS (I've
used it for several years in relation to various
projects but prefer my Apple Ils, thank you!), 1
picked up Central Point Software's PC Tools
which contains a simple program selector and
file utilities in addition to a small but useable
set of mini-applications (word processor,
database, outliner, appointment scheduler,
and telecommunications software). This gives
me a portable ‘file translator’ which doubles as
remote terminal and simple text editor. Id
rather have a laptop Apple !l and AppleWorks
as the portable system, but Apple hasnt
responded to this ‘niche’-DJD
LaserWriter woes
The printer is down and the kids have
pinched all my pens, so here I write in pencil.
How do you connect a LaserWriter to a He?
(For use with AppleWorks or other programs.)
Brian Noller
Lake Albert, N.S.W.
How come | cant get TimeOut Graph,
SideSpread, and SuperFonts to print from a ligs
over AppleTalk to a LaserWriter? | can get plain
AppleWorks text to go with bold, 15 CPI, etc.,
but when | set up the TimeOut stuff to go, it
won't.
A. Stephen Sockoloski
Mansfield, Conn.
The LaserWriter incorporates two interfaces;
an RS-252/RS-422 serial interface compatible
with most computers, and an AppleTalk inter-
face. The interface to use can be selected via
DIP switches (refer to the LaserWriter Technical
Reference).
When you use the serial interface, the Laser-
Writer supports 2 mode where it emulates a
Diablo 630, a classic Jetter-quality printer. This
Printer was not formerly supported in Apple-
Works's ‘Select Printer’ menu, but AppleWorks
3,0 has a printer installation option for the
command-compatible Juki 6000 series print-
ers. This combination gives high quality output
within the constraints of the Diablo 630 emula-
tion.
For other programs, accessing the LaserWrit-
er in this mode depends on their configuration
options for printing. As far as hardware con-
nectivity, the Diablo emulation will work from
almost any computer. All you need is a RS-232
or RS-422 serial interface that can run at 9600
baud and a printer cable (the receptacles on
the LaserWriter are a female DB-25 and a
female &-pin mini-DIN). The RS-232 interface is
also useable at 1200 baud with a different
October 1989
switch seiting on the LaserWriter.
For the He, the Apple i Workstation card
can also be used to connect the LaserWriter as
an alternative to a serial interface; the Worksta-
tion card contains both a serial and an
AppleTalk interface. In order to print, you
should mun the supplied Chooser program to
select the printer interface you are intending to
use; if you choose AppleTalk, you'll need to
select the printer. You'll also either need a pro-
gram that supports using the LaserWriter in its
Native PostScript mode, or you'll need to let
the Chooser download the ImageWriter Emula-
tor and use the LaserWriter as a very expensive
AppleTalk ImageWriter.
The ImageWriter emulator only provides an
ImageWriter | emulation; ImageWriter i! fea-
tures like color printing are not available. Obvi-
ously, imageWriter emulation will be compati-
ble with most software, unless the software
tries to access the WorkStation Card via unsup-
ported hardware methods (Apple recommends
using documented firmware routines; an exam-
ple for the Advanced Interface appears in the
January 1988 issue of A2-Central).
PostScript is a computer language designed
for the description of a graphical ‘page’; the
LaserWriter can print using information sup-
Plied in the form of PostScript instructions. Pro-
grams that support PostScript printing are
much rarer on the Apple Me and lc than those
that work with the ImageWriter emulator. One
we've used is Publish-It! version 2.0; unfortu-
nately, its version of LaserPrep (a Postscript
language file used to initialize the printer for
use) drives some of our other workstations to
distraction, forcing them to re-initialize the
LaserWriter before they can print. Spring-
board Publisher and Berkely Softworkss
GeoPublish also advertise LaserWriter sup-
Port.
Beagle Bros acknowledges that some of the
current TimeOut applications have problems
with the AppleTalk interface on the igs. The
next version of SuperFonts will include a spe-
cial driver for AppleTalk to solve the problem.
The penultimate authority on direct
PostScript programming is Don Lancaster. His
company, Synergetics, Box 809, Thatcher, Ariz.
85552, (602) 428-4075, produces many how-
to books and programming examples. Don
also writes a monthly column for Computer
Shopper with emphasis on PostScript tech-
niques. Don uses a Ile for much of his work
and practices what he preaches, he publishes
books using a LaserWriter.-DJD
TDD info, please
Can you provide me with any information
about TDD's (Telephone Device for the Deaf}
and how I could use my Apple lle to connect
with these devices? My wife works with hearing
impaired people and, currently, the only way
she can talk to them over the phone is to use a
local service (Gryphon Place in Kalamazoo) to
relay messages. Needless to say. this can gel to
be a real pain.
With my Ile, | have a Datalink 1200 modem
and a number of different terminal programs. |
also have an old Micromodem Ile that | could
use, if needed. | havent been able to find out
what the needed baud rate and data format are.
All the telephone company will tell us is that we
should rent a TDD from them. I'm not adverse
to buying a different modem or modifying the
Micromodem, if needed, to be able to operate
at some ‘odd’ baud rate.
A search of your back issues (on disk) does-
nt show that you have ever covered any of this
information. I'm sure that other readers would
also like to know more about being able to use
their computers to communicate with people
using these devices. (I know that it can be
done, but not how.) Any information that you
can provide will be greatly appreciated.
James A. Ketchum
Kalamazoo, Mich.
We dont have any information on TDD our
selves, but passibly a reader can help.
Speed versus speed
I currently am operating with an Applied Engi-
neering enhanced AppleWorks 2.0 on an Apple
Iigs with an AE 2 meg expansion card and CMS
hard disk.
Some operations (such as copy to clipboard)
in AppleWorks's data base, when | enter a docu-
ment of about 2400+ records of 12 fields, have
been slowed to an unacceptable speed, appar-
ently due simply to the document size. | know
this seems like a small gripe but this is used
with almost every records search; we almost
always require five selection rules so we copy to
adummy document made just for this overflow.
What are your suggestions for increasing
speed (even to changing software type, as long
as present records may be transferred without
rekeying)?
1 just added an AE TransWarp GS. It
increased the speed of the operations, but {
forsee this slowdown again in the future when
this data base is increased in size a few more
times.
. Bill Long
Tupelo, Miss.
‘Classic’ AppleWorks may actually run faster
on a Ile or lic accelerated with the newer 8
megatiertz Zip Chip or 10 megatertz Kock-
etChip replacements for the | megattertz
65C02 than it does on a ligs with a 6.25 to-7
megatiertz jigs. We haven't actually compared
benchmarks, though, and the ligs memory
expansion card isn't equivalent to the lle/ilc
memory expansions.
Assuming everything is acceptabie for now,
the TransWarp GS is upgradeable to a faster
clock speed when 65816 chips capable of
working reliably at the higher speed are avail-
able. Applied Engineering’ will certainly
announce any upgrade when this occurs.-DJD
More label options
Concerning the letter in your August 1989
issue from reader M. Nelson regarding Sup
AppleWorks labels: in addition to the methods
you detailed, there is another way to generate
multiple column labels, and this method may
be better for some users.
1 am the author of Listworks, a shareware
program for the Apple H that will print a
database ‘labels style’ report in any number of
multiple columns that you want. Listworks
prints information in a column oriented
sequence, i.e.
hod OG
BoE OE
c oF ft
A2-Central 5.69
I understand from earlier correspondence
with you that AppleWorks 3.0 will print 3-up
labels ONLY with a row oriented sequence, i.e.
ABO
DE Ff
¢ BSI
This is also the sequence that will result. from
your ‘3 into i" AppleWorks 2.x work-around that
you described in the August issue.
Obviously, the sequence may not be impor-
tant for real mailing labels, but for multiple col-
umn printouts of database lists (inventory lists,
rosters, etc.), the row oriented sequence is not
satisfactory, and the column oriented sequence
that Listworks provides is much more desirable.
1 thought this letter would serve to inform
your readers of the row oriented nature of
AppleWorks 3.0 and the Listworks alternative.
Listworks is shareware, and is available from all
major public domain software sources, such as
GEnie, Big Red Computer Club, National Apple-
Works User's Group, etc.
Andrew Mackie
Ottawa, Kan.
Manx Apprentice C
| saw someone's recommendation of Manx’s
Apprentice C compiler a while ago, and went
ahead and bought it for the bargain price of
$19. The letter mentioned that it had ‘lousy
docs; either | have different standards or Manx
has improved them a lot: it has one of the best
manuals | have seen recently, having about 200
pages of introductory material, technical stuff,
etc., all in a 3-ring binder. It also compiles
roughly 8-10 times faster than APW, making it
nice for the beginner (i.e. me). Yes, it's DOS 3.3,
and thus can be only put on a 5.25 disk, and it
has a few quirks, but it's well worth many times
the price.
I thought I had found a bug in AppleWorks
2.1 when I got it a few months ago. When 1
pressed OAH to print the screen, everything
was fine, except the last character of most lines
was missing. After a bit of experimentation, I
found the problem was not AppleWorks (darnt)
but rather a combination or program/-
printer/etc. | was in zoom mode (word proces-
sor), and most of the lines were followed by car-
riage returns. It happens that AppleWorks sends
the blips as ASCH 255, which is the Epson FX
command to purge the last character in the line
buffer, causing my problems. Zooming back out
solved the problem.
Henry Throop
Corvallis, Ore.
Manx has a range of C products for the
Apple i! (and-other) computers. Their Apple Il
products also include DOS 3.5 versions C
Prime ($75) and a DOS 5.5 developer's pack-
age ($199) as well as a ProDOS 8 based devel-
opment system ($299). Contact Manx Software
Systems, One industrial Way, Eatontown N.J.
07724, (201) 542-2121 and (800) 221-0440
for more information on these products.
The two current C compilers for the ligs are
APW C, availabie through APDA, and QRCA/C
from The Byte Works, 4700 Irving Blvd. N.W.,
Albuquerque, NM. 87114, $05-898-
8185.-DUD
AppleWorks 3.0 wishes
Here are some comments on AppleWorks
version 3.0. Overall, it is probably the most
5.70 A2-Central
practical integrated management tool available
anywhere.
Word Processor: Either Delete or Apple-Delete
should remove a paragraph-ending marker. Ver-
sion 3.0 requires Apple-D and Return to remove
the marker, which makes it awkward to fit para-
graphs and line segments together.
Spelling Checkers: Dictionaries should be
optimized for efficiency, not word count. Over-
all, the dictionary on the 5.25° disk is faster
than the much larger one on the 3.5" disk. Like
QuickSpell, the smaller dictionary wisely omits
‘fro’ (the most common misspelling of ‘for').
Sometimes less is more; in this case you get
beiter error trapping.
Data Base: if you print multi-column labels,
you cannot remove empty lines in those label.
Integration: The data base still has no label
and value typing, but the new intelligent clip-
board avoids the transfer problems of DIF files.
The new Clipboard preserves spreadsheet num-
ber labels that include a hyphen or trailing
space: 353-22-444 for Social Security, 800-333-
444 for telephone, 05555-4444 for ZIP codes.
You can write a five-digit ZIP code with a trailing
space instead of the hyphen.
Robert Ericson
North Providence, R.I.
Still no date
1 would like to: bring to your attention a prob-
Jem with all the versions of AppleWorks includ-
ing 3.0. | found this problem while working on
AppleWorks data bases of planned US space
launches from now until the year 2000. (I have
this data base and many others on space infor-
mation to sell on a shareware basis.)
The problem is in the date format in a data
base in which only the last two digits of the year
are only used so that if you have 3 dates like:
April 3 1989
‘April 2 1989
‘april 1 2089
will be changed to:
Apr 389
Apr 289
der 189
and when sorted chronologically you get:
dor 189
Apr 289
apr 389
which is wrong, since April 3 1889 came before
April 2 1989.
When i saw the new information on Apple-
Works 3.0 which listed four different date for-
mats, two of which have a four digit year (Exp.
MMM DD YYYY), | thought Claris had caught on
and the problem was fixed. It's too bad since
Claris just did a mass mailing for version 3.0,
and the year 2000 is only a decade away.
I hope in any future versions of AppleWorks
this will be solved.
Keith J. Scala
Bridgeport, Conn.
The date format appears to be for the word
processor. Apparently there are still a few ‘wish
list’ items to be ironed out. AppleWorks 3.0's
database also still truncates years ending. in
‘00° ('2/3/2000" becomes ‘Feb 3’).-DJD
Little (irritating?) boxes
The little boxes which have started decorat-
ing most columns do not enhance the readabili-
ty of the articles. I believe most of your readers
will read each article in its entirety without try-
ing to grab the reader's attention with the high-
lighted box. | find the boxes very distracting
and. hope that you leave these to magazines
whose audience is just scanning them at the
doctors or dentist's office.
Keith Belkofske
Cincinnati, Ohio
Objection noted. Just to clarify (and explain
an ‘insiders trick" regarding desktop publish-
We could change the look
of the box so we don't have
to wrap text around it...
ing), the real intention of those boxes is to
break of the solid text content of the page a
bit; this is recommended to improve the ‘aes-
thetics’ of the page when viewed as a whole.
We could change the look of the box so we
don't have to wrap text around it...
..0r maybe we should go back to the wood-
cuts.-DJD
Beyond the ligs
Tam renewing my subscription because A2-
Central is the best available, and | appreciate
what you are doing for Apple II users. This letter
is being written using AppleWorks 3.0 obtained
via your offer. Thanks.
Just one comment- | am much more interest-
ed in learning how to better use what I now
have (a Ile, not a ilgs) than | am in reading
about new products for the ligs. Your first three
years were wonderful, but it seems to me that
the last year you have gone very heavy on the
Iigs and on new product reviews. Could you
provide more coverage for us old timers that
have older systems and are not looking to buy
the very iatest?
Robert L. Carney
Auburn, Wash.
The pro/con ilgs content will probably join
the pro/con AppleWorks and the pro/con “high-
ly technical’ debates as the source of much
mail, We walk a razors edge with each of these
areas; any time we have an issue that ‘breaks’
one way or the other (which most do), we get
complaints. We can only ask that if you feel the
balance is heading too far in one direction,
please let us know before you abandon us.
And we're always open to the suggestion of
topics, though some complicated reasoning
may go into what we select to cover.
The contents of A2-Central are largely
determined by reader mail, which averages
about 50% of our content over time and influ-
ences what we see as ‘salient’ topics. Currently
that mail tends to fall almost overwhelmingly
into three areas: AppleWorks, printer-questions
(most of which we cant answer because we
don't have the printer hardware), and llgs-spe-
cific questions, As an overall trend, the ratio of
‘beginner’ questions compared to ‘advanced’
questions also seems to be increasing; there
has been a strong jump in the last couple of
years.
The Apple li and Hi-Plus were eventually
overwhelmed by the number of products that
required a minimum of a 128K enhanced He to
operate. To allay fears of current Apple Ile and
lic owners, there are still many solid products-
being produced, such as AppleWorks 3.0, that
don't require a ligs.-DJD
Vol. 5, No. 9
ProSel-16 and System 5.0
In the latest issue of A2-Central, you recom-
mend using the supplied Installer for all installa-
tions because file copy utilities like Copy Il Plus
will not copy extended files.
But what about using the Utilities portion of
ProSel-16. it seems to me that since ProSel-16
runs under GS/OS, it should be able to handle
the extended files. Is this true?
John R. Baskwill
York,Pa.
Some utilities will copy the extended files
correctly, but that's only a part of the issue.
There are 93 files on /System.Disk and 74 files
on /System.Tools supplied with System Soft-
ware 5.0. The number of combinations of files
that are possible is large, and trying to debug
errors in installation on a file-by-file basis often
takes longer than using the Installer in the first
Place. There is no compelling reason not to
use the Installer (other than a mild case of
‘disk swap elbow’ on a single-drive system)
unless it is physically incapable of completing
the installation. In that case, Apple should be
notified of the problem so they can resolve it.
The llgs System Software appears to be
approaching (or surpassing?) the complexity of
the Macintosh System Software, and the
Installer is the accepted tool for installation.
Glen Bredon has just released version 7.4 of
ProSel-16, which does handle the extended
format files. The core of ProSel-16 is a START
file containing the main program and utilities
that cover the scope of the 8-bit utilities sup-
plied with ProSel-8 (Backup, Restore,
Cat.Doctor, Mr.Fixit, Beachcomber, and so
on) and more. The ProSel-8 seiector and many
of the ProSel-8 utilities are also included with
ProSel-16, along with utilities to allow you to
switch between the two selectors. ProSel-16s
selector menu is still text-based as an alterna-
tive to the ligs Finder (or adjunct; you can still
run Finder from ProSel-16 or vice-versa). It
also includes a ‘shell interface where you can
type commands in response to a prompt.
ProSel-16 is $60 from Glen at 521 State
Road, Princeton, N.J., 08540. ProSel-8 is still
available at $40; upgrades from ProSel-8 to
ProSel-16 for current ProSel8 owners are
$20.-DJD
ProDOS 8 v1.8 Better Bye
{ unshrunk System 5.0 and tried to update
ProDOS 8 1.8 with Bird's Better Bye, but now it
crashes. is there a new address to joad BBB
into or will it not work with version 1.8 or did I
just mess up? | did notice that the new P8 is
slightly longer than the old, but { am no good at
dissecting ML.
Steven Eric Schwartz
Simi Valley, Calif.
The location of the ProDOS 8 quit code has
moved again; with version 1.8, its now $100
bytes further into the file. To update version
1.8, use our earlier instructions but substitute
$5A00 for $5900 for the address. Assuming
you have ProDOS 8 in a file named ‘ProDOS’;
BLOAD FRODOS, A$2000, TSYS
Then insert your copy of a disk with ProDOS 8
v. 1.8 and type:
October 1989
BSAVE BBB, A$5900,15300
BLAAD PRODOS,AS2000, TSYS
BLQAD BBB,A$5K00
SAVE PRODOS, $2000, "SYS
(if youre using ProDOS 1.1.1! or earlier substi-
tute $5700" for '$5900* above).-DJD
AppleWorks 3.0 file formats
| would like to obtain the file format for AWP
files for AppleWorks 3.0 so that I can update my
program CHANGE-FILE. Can you tell me the pro-
cedure for obtaining the formats? Thanks.
Harold D. Portnoy
Bloomfield Hills, Mich.
Apple Ii DTS is currently working on describ-
ing the file formats in an upcoming set of
Apple Il File Type Notes; they will hopefully be
ready for the September Apple Il Technical
Notes update release.
Another source reported to us is the Nation-
al AppleWorks Users , Box 87453,
Canton, Mich. 48187. For $10 to NAUG mem-
bers ($12.50 to non-members), NAUG will send
30 pages of information about the AppleWorks
3.0 data and printer files. Additionally, NAUG
has 35 pages of documentation on Appie-
Works 3.0 entry points and ‘hooks’ available
separately for the same price.-DJD
Printer Wishes
Is there a driver (for the IIgs) that gives out-
put on the ImageWriter LQ that is as good as
the LQ can output? (Better than possible with
an ordinary ImageWriter.)
Christine R. Laing
Ann Arbor, Mich.
Along with the writers in your August issue |
would like to see more software which works
with the Hewlett-Packard DeskJet printer. This
printer is compatible with Hewlett-Packard laser
printers and hence software written for them
will also work with the DeskJet (and DeskJet
Plus). The only piece of Apple Il software | have
which uses the full 500 dpi capability of this
printer is Printrix which you reviewed on page
3.59,
Like Ken Mirabella | want to do 500 DPI desk-
top ping and to this end I promise to buy
whichever of Publish-It! or Springboard Publish-
er first includes this ability for the DeskJel print-
ers.
Robert Sheeban
Titirangi, Auckland
We get many, many letters regarding printer
Support, Apple's technical responsibility here is
to provide enough information to allow a com-
pany to create Apple I! compatible products. in
the case of printer support for ProDOS 8 appli-
cations, such responsibility probably ends at
providing a method to send information to the
printer; the problem of creating the image on
the printer falls on the shoulders of the soft-
ware company. For example, Claris has created
drivers for several printers for use in Apple-
Works, and programs such as Printrix dump
graphics to several popular models.
For ligs (GS/OS) applications, the printer
driver software has become part of the operat-
ing system, and Apple's technical responsibility
increases to explaining what that driver sofl-
ware must do to be supported from GS/OS.
In both cases, Apple has met these require-
ments in the Apple manuals and technical
notes. Though it sometimes seems to take a
while for these documents to make it to the
public, developers should be able to obtain
the information if they can demonstrate a need
in relation to a commerciak product.
Hewlett Packard has created an ImageWriter-
compatible high-resolution inkjet printer
named the DeskWriter that advertises Mac,
but not llgs, compatibility. We hope Apple is
making an effort to convince such companies
to support the igs; users should also try to
sway them by letting the companies know
there is a market for their products.
Evangelism beyond Apple
I give up! Ive been converted by your evan-
gelism! I'm leaving Apple and moving over to
IBM.
Tl never upgrade from my IIc to the IIgs. Why
should I? Apple doesn't believe in me as a cus-
tomer, is cynical, and doesnt believe in its own
product. Ah, well, you know all that.
John Logan
San Diego, Calif.
I recently helped start a user group in this
area with the help of a local Apple dealer. He
was shocked to hear that 80% of the group
owned Apple Il's. He immediately started think-
ing of ways to get them to ‘trade up’ to a Macin-
tosh. | was very disappointed to say the least. It
is apparent to me that it is time for the Apple iI
community to get serious about the future. We
need to become evangelists for our computer
of choice if we intend to survive. We need to
organize our efforts to bring about a change in
the attitude of the potential users. Since profit
is the driving factor behind the future develop-
ment of any product, we must somehow be
there before the sale to show the value of the
Apple i family. Only when the potential cus-
tomer is properly informed will more Apple I's
be sold and future development be strength-
ened.
A full time evangelist outside of Apple would
be of some value toward this goal. Someone to
help keep current and potential developers,
dealers, schools, and user groups informed of
what is going on. Barney Stone's li at Work is a
good example of one man's effort. Obviously
this task is too great for one person who is
already busy with development work. The new
association mentioned in the September issue
may be one way to administer an evangelist for
the Apple Il. An employee of a cooperative
group to help keep the lines of communication
open
pen.
In addition, the current Apple Il community
has to grow up. We can not continue to rip off
the software companies for our own benefit. We
must support them by paying for their products.
1 am appalled at the number of members of our
user group who refuse to consider buying a
legitimate copy of AppleWorks. It would help if
software companies would offer discounts to
user groups for their products. This would
reduce the number of pirates and increase the
number of people involved in user groups. The
more people involved, the better the future will
be.
Bill Calhoun
Claysville, Pa.
Sigh...once every few months a letter arrives
from someone who has decided to abandon
the Apple Il due to our ‘pessimism’. Maybe we
Should clarify our view of the situation,
The whole purpose for A2-Central's exis-
tence is evangelism for the Apple 11 through
support of the Apple I user. Any of our com-
A2-Central 5.71
plaints about the state of the Apple ll do not
arise from a belief the computer is failing the
company, but because we believe a dispropor-
tionate pro-Macintosh bias in the company is
failing the computer and therefore’ its cus-
tomers. This bias is almost wholly contained in
the marketing strategy and marketing support
of the Apple II line; in many other ways, the
Apple I! line and Apple's commitment to it has
never been better. It is fair to say that the
Apple Ils of today are the best that have ever
been built.
This isn't to say that the marketing problem
can be overlooked, in fact, the Apple Jl Devel-
opers Association is being formed exactly
because Apple Il developers believe that the
problems with Apple's marketing commitment
to the Apple I! are so ingrained into the compa-
ny that the only solution is to initiate an orga-
nized evangelism effort for the Il outside of
Apple. It is pointless to invest in such an effort
without our belief that the engineers of the cur-
rent Apple Ii models have demonstrated the
committment and talent to keep the machine
competitive.
In light of ‘pessimistic’ comments, it should
not be forgotten that the five millionth Appie II
tolled out of Apple this spring: this is not a
machine that is ‘languishing’ except in the eyes
of Apple's pro-Mac marketing bias. The Apple Ii
has paid for development of the Apple Hil, Lisa,
and Macintosh. With such excellent engineer-
ing achievements as Iigs System Software 5.0;
the problem with Apple developing wider prod-
uct support for the Apple Il series is obviously
not due to any lack of talent for Apple Ii pro-
jects, but rather a purposeful impetus within
the company to take revenue from its Apple I
customers and give priority to investment in
the Macintosh. It's not surprising that the Mac-
intosh is now successful in light of the scope
of this disinvestment of Apple Il revenue; what
is amazing is that Apple can so thoroughly
ignore the 5 million customers that paid for
what Apple blithely refers to as ‘Macintosh’
technology.
If you look at the features that Apple itself
has not elected to support on the Apple Ii and
find it lacking, it seems more sensible to invest
in a non-Apple machine rather than to switch
to a Macintosh and simply start what may be
the same cycle again. Apple's committment to
the Apple Il customer is the barometer by
which the company must be measured; that’s
not ‘pessimism’ but a strict fact of con-
sumerism.
Most complaints we hear are in terms of the
lack of certain types of hardware or software
support. For Apple products such as the Apple-
FAX modem, SCSI tape backup, FDHD drive,
Apple Scanner, etc., the finger has to be point-
ed squarely at Apple. Apple should also not be
let off the hook for providing software features
equivalent to those that are provided for the
Macintosh where possible; for example, the
Mac System Software includes a hard disk
backup utility thal is much better than the
Backup II program Apple provides for ProDOS
8 (Apple currently has no backup program
compatible with ilgs System Software 5.0). If
you see shortcomings then make it a point to
write Apple and complain; Apple cannot fix
shortcomings that it doesn't know about. And if
features don't seem to be arriving in a timely
manner, dont scream at the technical people;
October 1989
our experience is that they are working as hard
as they can. Instead pointedly ask Apple's
upper-level management (such as John Sculley
and Jean-Louis Gassee) why the company is
not directing more resources into the Apple Il
line.
For third-party products the process is more
complicated, and we'll use the example of
Printer support from the previous ‘Printer Wish-
es’ letters,. If Apple is bombarded with as
many of these types of complaints as we are,
someone from Apple should undoubtably be
beating on Hewlett-Packard's (as an example)
door asking them to develop a ligs driver.
Assuming Apple is tying to convince these
companies to develop Apple I products and
failing, it may be because the Apple il user
base has not convinced the third-party compa-
ny that there .is interest in such a product.
Although we like to know what readers are
interested in and usually echo such requests
when talking to the companies, we are only
one voice in the wildemess; we also can't
Serve as a Clearing house for ail such ‘wish
lists* if we're going to get a newsletter out each
month. For a company to be interested in
developing a product, they must know that
there is a market for it, and the only way they
will.realize this is if a large number of people
write and request it. Also send a copy to Apple
to let them know that you want Apple to aid
the company in bringing the product to mar-
ket. This is how the Macintosh population finai-
ly started getting products equivalent to (or
even better than) those for the MS-DOS world.
A2-Central’
ri
© Copyright 1989 by
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The same general rule applies to software
products; companies tend to allocate
resources based on what markets they believe
will generate the most revenue. Unless you can
convince a company that an Apple II program
will generate more revenue than one for the
Amiga, al! other things being equal, the compa-
ny will probably work to bring the Amiga prod-
uct to market first. When the ‘Apple I's time
comes up, if the company believes the market
is ‘soft’, then an Apple Il version may remain
‘on hold’ indefinitely.
The differences in hardware for the Apple I!
and !L-Plus, Apple lle/lic, and the Apple Hgs
may make the. implementations of the software
different, or may prevent certain types of soft-
ware from being developed for all computers.
For example, full-featured compilers for some
computer languages have appeared for the ligs
but not other Apple I! systems. However, appli-
cations such as AppleWorks 3.0, Publish-It!,
and DB Master Professional do exist for the
ile/lic, and in some cases ligs users actually
prefer to work with the same products, so qual-
ity applications are feasible across the product
line. in some cases, applications for the Apple
HI are leaner, meaner, and more productive
than their bloated MS-DOS, Macintosh, etc.
cousins. The ligs has the advantage of being
able to run either these ‘lean and mean’ pro-
grams or the more powerful (and possibly per-
ceptibly more lethargic) Desktop-based applica-
tions. if you see something for another com-
puter that you want, write the company and
ask for an Apple Il (or ligs) version, and ask
Apple.to taik to the company about co-market-
ing support (‘Co-marketing’ refers to two com-
panies exchanging promotion for each other's
products in their advertising campaigns). A par-
ticularly good target for Iigs products should be
Macintosh companies since Apple does have
ample information (and even tools) for trans-
porting such products. Ask the company if
Apple has suggested a ligs version.
Finally, no company is going to continue
making products if it doesn't make money, and
software theft through piracy definitely can
convince a company to look for greener mar-
kets, There are more MS-DOS machines than
either Macs or Apple lls, and if we assume the
percentage of theft in each market to be equal
then the nod will probably go to getting the MS-
DOS product to market first. If theft is rampant
enough, machines with a relatively small share
of the market may never see a version. The
Profit on the number of legitimate copies that
are sold will not be perceived as justifying the
development expense. This is one factor quot-
ed in the current dearth of certain Apple ligs
products.
Apple has finally made the discouragement
of copy protection official by refusing to sup-
port it in their products; this is a decision that
puts a great deal of faith in the honesty of the
user Community. The greatest weapons against
theft are a refusal to accept any justification or
rationalization for it, and a concerted effort to
educate other users as to its ultimate implica-
tions. One thing we'd like to see is a clear sum-
mary of the implications prominently placed in
all Apple user manuals. Some new users
assume that because a disk is copyable that it
is free to distribute. The reasons for copyright
and the legal ramifications of its violation
should be made apparent to every computer
owner before he first starts using the system.
And maybe we'd better end on a decidedly
Open-Apple 5.72
optimistic note!...-DJD
Speed no problem
Will Apple Computer ever make a faster (8-10
MHz) GS?!?
Ron Bassett
Pompano Beach, Fla.
All together now: ‘Apple does not comment
on unannounced products‘, But, the Apple If
marketing people and evangelists we met at
the A2-Central Developer's Conference noted
the interest in a faster machine, and did not
dismiss it. We choose to interpret their release
of the revised ligs as an indication that they
will continue to improve the line. What form
any future improvements will take is in Apple's
hands, and they don't discuss such things in
advance,
A plentiful supply of fast 65816 micropro-
cessor chips will be needed for the jump to
faster ligs hardware. Apple has to think in
terms of hundreds of thousands of these chips
in order to be prepared for possible demand.
Applied Engineering has even had trouble get-
ting its hands on enough 7 MHz chips to satiate
its TransWarp GS customers, and had to sub-
Stitute slightly slower 6.25 MHz versions. Bill
Mensch, designer of the 65816 and president
and founder of Westem Design Center, which
licenses the technology to manufacture the
chips, may be able to provide some insight
into solutions for this problem. He'll be on-line
in GEnie's A2PRO seal time conference on
October 9th at 9:30 EST. Weil report on any
pertinent discussions.
Trying to compare benchmarks for different
architectures of processors is an art. Bill Heine-
man, who re-wrote Crystal Quest (A2-Cen-
tral, September 1989} for the ligs, had this to
Say on GEnie about his experience:
‘Answering an earlier message, | thank you
for the compliment on Crystal Quest GS, |
had a hard time convincing the people at
Casady & Greene that the GS has the horse-
power to do the game. They said that Crystal
Quest slowed to a crawl on the Mac Il at 16
Mhz so how could a lIGS with a 2.8 mhz speed
even come Close to the speed of a Mac.
“The basic problem is that the 65816 is NOT
a 68000! To get a rough speed comparison
you can use the following. Assume the 65816
has a clock of 1 Mhz. This is the same speed
as a 4Mhz 68000 or 68020, 4Mhz Z80, {or)
4Mhz 8086 and only the 6809 would be |
Mhz.
‘So your Mac-Plus at 7.1 Mhz is actually run-
ning effectively at 1.8 Mhz, Mac II's at 16 Mhz
are running at 4 Mhz.
"So all | had to do was improve the code just
alittle to make a 4Mhz Mac II program run fast
on a 2.8 Mhz GS.
“Moral: the clock speed you see only tells
you the base speed of the processor in ques-
tion but has no bearing on speeds between dif
ferent processors. Otherwise how in the world
can Crystal Quest GS even hope to keep up
with the Mac Il version if | had a machine
which ran 7 times slower?
‘Food for thought."
Indeed.-DJD