Text content (OCR)
A2-Central’
Ss
A journal and exchange of Apple Il discoveries
formerly
Open-Apple
June 1991
Vol.7, No.5
ISSN 0885-4017
newstand price: $2.50
photocopy charge per page: $0.15
Apple releases “The Apple Il”
The May 1991 Apple User Group mailing includes a paper
titled The Apple I. The first paragraph of the introduction is the kind
of statement Apple II users like to see from the company: “No compa-
ny is more closely identified with the birth and growth of the personal
computer industry than Apple Computer, Inc. As the company’s first
flagship product, the Apple I set a standard and has since played a
leading role in personal computing, becoming the longest-lived per-
sonal computer line available on the market today.” Now that's a
thought you can base an advertising campaign on.
The paper lists comments from several educators regarding the util-
ity of the Apple 1, comments regarding the original vision of the Apple
Ilas created by Wozniak and Jobs, a timeline of the Apple I's evolu-
tion from its birth in 1977 to the introduction of HyperCard Ilgs at the
end of last year (strangely, AppleWorks was missing from the event
list), a listing of the product family (currently, that is the Apple lle and
IIgs) and their features, a list of support organizations inside and out-
side of Apple (user groups, the new Apple Ii Bulletin Board on
AppleLink, APDA, Apple's Software Guides, and Apple's Office of Spe-
cial Education), a list of some innovative uses of the Apple Il, and a
section on Apple Il and Macintosh coexistence which contained the
statement “Apple’s customers are finding that both the Apple Il and
Macintosh computers provide excellent value, and that in environ-
ments calling for multiple computers, both products work well togeth-
er for complimentary tasks.” (We can attest to that ourselves).
This is the type of mature marketing approach that Apple I! users
would like to see taken to the mass media. Let's hope The Apple Ilis
an omen of things to come. Soon.
A newsletter for Apple Il sysops. “Sysop” is the abbreviation for
the title “system operator’, a person responsible for administering a
computer bulletin board system. Douglas Gramzow is offering one
free issue of a new bi-monthly publication for Apple Il sysops. The
first issue is to be published in June, the cost will be 6 issues (1 year)
for $10, 3 issues for $6, or one issue for $2. Write to I Sysops, c/o
Douglas Granzow, P.O. Box 720, Eldersburg, Md. 21874, 301-549-
2584.
Asphyxia is a monthly Apple 1 publication distributed by
Thomas Mavroudis; the first issue was seen being distributed via on-
line services. If you'd like to know more about Asphyxia or feel you
have something to contribute, write to Asphyxia care of Thomas
Mavroudis, P.O. Box 592, Syosset, N.Y. 11791, America Online
T.MAVROUDIS, GEnie T.MAVROUDIS1.
The Communicator is an Apple Il newsletter compiled by edu-
cators concerned with information regarding aid for the visually
impaired. It’s published every other month at a subscription price of
$10 per year from The Communicator, Rt. 4, Box 265, Hillsville, VA
24343-8047.
Want some BASIC Help? This new program from InSite Software
provides a “help” command for Applesoft (ProDOS) that brings up a
menu page with 18 categories of help (“Applesoft Errors”, “Graphics”,
and so on). Selecting a category takes you to a series of information
Screens containing commands, general information, and tips that you
can page through. When you've found the item you need, make a
note and escape back to the main menu for more searches or to
Applesoft to continue programming,
Can't remember which HCOLOR number corresponds to green? It’s
here. Need to know a CALL to wait for a keypress? It's here. Not
everything in the Applesoft manuals is here, of course, but it may
save you from stopping and hunting for a manual when you'd rather
be programming,
One of the menu options is a search function that lets you specify
an Applesoft keyword or text to search for in the help screens, Once
the item is found, you can jump to the next occurance or the next
page with an occurance, quit to perform another search, or “drop
out” of the search to page through the current section.
Another item will report information about the BASIC program in
memory, including current HIMEM: and LOMEM: settings, the location
of variable tables, program size, and free space.
BASIC Help did load and run with Program Writer's Editor.LC. (You
run BASIC Help first, then Editor.LC.)
This looks like a very useful program for those who are trying to
learn Applesoft interactively or who (like ourselves) can’t always put
their hands on the manual when they need to check the use of an
Applesoft command; a sort of on-line “PEEKs and POKEs"” chart.
BASIC Help is $29.95 plus $2.50 shipping (Arizona residents add 5%
sales tax) from InSite Software, P.O. Box 3778, Flagstaff, Ari. 86003-
3778. it requires an Apple lle, IIc, or ligs with at least 128K of memo-
ry and an 80-column display.
Technology and Learning lists several Apple I programs
among the best of educational software for 1990. Among the top
seven were four programs available for the Apple II: AppleWorks 3.0,
ERLHTESNANT
L
“AND YOURE CLAIMING THAT THE SOURCE CODE USED FOR THE
MICROSOFT CORP GUI, WAS ACTUALLY AUTHORED BY YOU AS THE
GUMBY USER INTERFACE 2!"
7.34 A2-Central
National Geographic Kids Network; Hello! and Acid Rain (llgs), GTV:
A Geographic Perspective on American History (IIgs and Macintosh),
and Scholastic Software’s HyperScreen (Apple II and MS-DOS).
Among other Apple II programs listed in an additional list of 29
Awards of Excellence: Math Blaster Mystery (Davidson and Associ-
ates), Data Insights (Sunburst Communications), Transformations
(Sunburst), Hop To It (Sunburst), Writer’s Helper 3.0 (Conduit), Spell
It Plus! (Davidson), Revolution ‘76 (Britannica Software), Time Pat-
terns Tool Kit (Tom Snyder Productions), The Playroom (Broderbund
Learning),
Vol. 7, No. 5
Software), Bannermania (Broderbund), Color ‘N’ Canvas (Wings for
Peterson’s Financial Aid Services 1990 (Peterson's
Guides), S.M.A.R.T. Choices (Tom Snyder Productions), First Cate-
gories for the Apple ligs (Laureate Learning Systems), Just a Little
Lie (Sunburst), Reading Realities, Elementary Series (Teacher Support
Software), Where in Time is Carmen SanDiego? (Broderbund), USA
Geograph (MECC), International Inspirer (Tom Snyder), Playing with
Science: Motion (Sunburst), Second Voyage of the Mimi (Wings for
Learning), and The New Print Shop (Broderbund).
Ask
(or tell)
Uncle
DOS
Just to reassure anyone who needs it, every
issue of A2-Central is read by at least three
people. Still, mistakes creep past (normally
unintentionally) and for those Murphy doesn’t
reveal to us right after the issue has been
mailed we depend on our readers to point out
any problems,
One of the people | usually try to get a copy
of the newsletter to is Matt Deatherage, who
normally works for Apple II Developer Techni-
cal Support but occasionally spends his own
time reading our material for technical errors.
Being close to Apple, Matt catches the types of
things that we may not see as inherently evil
but that may lead to misunderstandings or
occasionally outright misconceptions. Unfortu-
nately, given our abnormally short lead time
sometimes the newsletter doesn’t make the
cycle from the editor to Matt and back in time.
Twanted to acknowledge Matt's “silent” help,
the type of unselfish contribution to the quality
of the Apple ilthat many people at Apple
make. And also | wanted a sneaky lead-in to a
few comments Matt made about the May issue:
To simplify the issue of termination on the
Apple interfaces: if you have a Rev. C SCSI
interface with one device, that device should
be terminated, If you have more than one
device, the first and last device connected to
the interface should be terminated. If you have
the High Speed SCSI Card, then only the
last device connected (for one or more
devices) should be terminated. In each case, at
least one of the devices on the bus should sup-
ply terminator power. (If you are using a High-
Speed SCSI Card, you may find that an unter-
minated drive on a short (about two foot) SCSI
cable may work; if the drive doesn’t work on
another card, don’t forget to check the termi-
nation.)
Regarding the use of text page 2 on the Iigs,
the ROM 03 motherboard does support hard-
ware shadowing of page 2; this is enabled
when you select to enable the Alternate Dis-
play Mode in the Control Panel (on the older
ligs, this option activated some code that simu-
lated hardware shadowing by actually moving
the page 2 data from fast RAM in the ligs bank
Downloaded from www.Apple2Online.com
0 memory to the 1 Miz video display memory
in bank $E0).
Given that the answer to “Orphans abroad
(and here)" regarding the UniDisk 3.5 driver for
the original IIc motherboard said the overwrit-
ing of RAM memory used by AppleTalk won't
be a problem on a lic, we should clarify that
that only means that AppleTalk code isn’t likely
to be residing there. It could still be a problem
for Apple since that memory is reserved for
expansion of the ProDOS operating system,
and there might be other things Apple would
like to do with that memory. Programs that
intend to stay compatible with all configura-
tions of ProDOS (a good thing for a ProDOS
program to be) should not be using that mem-
ory. ProDOS 8 Technical Note #26 (“Polite use
of Auxiliary Memory’) does mention that if
/RAM is present when your program starts up,
the “reserved” areas above $800 in auxiliary
memory (including the language card space)
are actually available. If /RAM is not enabled,
that indicates system software may be using
those “reserved” areas (for the same reason,
you shouldn't re-enable /RAM if you find it dis-
connected when your program starts).
Finally, Matt pointed out that you have to be
very careful in changing the access attributes
on your AppleShare network volume if users
may be booting over AppleShare (“Leam to
‘share’, p. 7.31). The USERS directory carries a
subdirectory named for each user that may be
used for INIT files (in a SETUP folder), user
information, and so on; access to this directory
could be stymied by locking access to all fold-
ers except the user's personal folder.
Walker Archer of Quality Computers let us
know there is a way to deal selectively with
preventing AppleWorks users from getting lost
on the network. John Link has written a new
version of SuperPatch designed specifically
for use with the network version of Apple-
Works. Among other options similar to the new
SuperPatch 7.0 ($34.95), it will allow cancel-
ing the use of the open-Apple-< and open-
apple-> keys to move in and out of directories,
thereby locking a user into a specific subdirec-
tory. SuperPatchNet is $79.95 (this includes a
license to use the product on all the file
servers in a single school) from Quality Com-
puters, P.O. Box 665, St. Clair Shores, Mich.
48080, 513-774-7200 or FAX 313-774-2698.
James P. Davis wrote regarding “Questioned
SANE-ity* to point out that (a) line 1250 on
page 7.28 should have ended in GOTO 1390,
(b) the *2*52°in line 1760 on page 7.29
should have been 2*-52 (at least that was only
a REM statement!), (c) the conditional in line
1780 should be “IF ((E) AND (NOT F)” (line
1780 and 1790 use the same test as listed),
and (d) the “24-52” in lines 1780 and 1920
should be *2*52". To add insult to injury, 1
can't locate the original program file | used to
generate that listing. Excuse me while | go flat-
ten my forehead on a wall...—DJD
Keeping tab on HyperCard
1 am very much indebted to you for your
sample scripting on page 7.12 of the March
issue. Up until then I had assumed that text
could not be imported into a HyperCard field, |
figured out that the text file involved must have
a hard return at the end of each line so the
“read until return” loop will copy one line to
build each new card. There were 37 lines in my
text file and when | tried to run your script all |
got were 37 blank cards.
This did not surprise me too much as I did
not understand the “offset (tab, it)” script
(There's a lot about HyperTalk I don’t under-
stand.) However, | modified your script as fol-
lows and got the entire text into one card field:
on ouselp
ask file "File to import?” with “xox”
if it is empty then exit mouselp
pot it into fileane
open file fileKane
repeat with x1 to 37
read fron file filename until retom
ppt it into line x of card field 1 of card 1
Obviously this script is less sophisticated
than yours as it is necessary to predetermine
the number of lines in the text file. However, I
do understand it and it worked for me.
All of the above is just a comment; I do have
a question about HyperTalk which is driving me
up a wall. If you create a card (for example)
with 40 card fields, before any entries are made
the tab key will take you through the fields in
sequence according to their assigned number.
However, when you add a script to a card field,
the tab does not proceed to the next numbered
card field. Example: into card field 14 you enter
“44” and into card field 15 you enter 22, then
in card field 16 you create a script which says
“Put card field 14 + card field 15 into me”. That
part works fine, and card field 16 now contains
the sum “66”, but the cursor has now disap-
peared and the next time you hit “tab” on the
keyboard nothing happens. If you hit “tab”
again the cursor now appears in card field 1
instead of card field 17 where you wanted it.
Perhaps there is some command you can put in
the script for card field 16 which will make the
cursor go to the next card field, but | haven't
been able to find it. HELP!
Also, it is good that they included an anima-
tion feature in HyperTalk but it works so slowly
between cards as to be ludicrous. As far as I
can tell there is no way to speed up the anima-
tion(???).
Barney Woodruff
Camp Springs, Md.
June 1991
is offering a special pre-release purchase price on
peat V2.0. Deskpak is a set ori ligs New Desk Accessories that
includes: SysFX (installs NDA’s, CDA’s Fonts,
drivers and CDEVs without rebooting, where possible; it also allows
you to select which of these, except fonts, are “inactive"), FileTools
(disk and file utilities), Multi-Calc (calculator with functions for scien-
tific, egineering, and programming applications), Reminders (appoint-
Help.
initialization files,
ment calendar and alarm), DeskWrite (word processor), SuperScrap
(clipboard/scrap manager), DataDesk (miniature data base), Blackout
A2-Central 7.35
(modular screen blanker), GoMacro (a macro NDA), and Deskpak
If you order Deskpak (due in midsummer) now, SSSi will give you
almost 50% off the suggested retail of $79.95 and sell v2.0 to you for
$39.95. They'll even throw in free shipping within the U.S. (outside
the U.S., add $5). Contact SSSi, Inc., 4612 North Landing Drive NE,
Marietta, Ga. 30066, 404-928-4388.—DJD
By all means, find your own way to accom-
plish things; in HyperTalk, like Applesoft, there
may be several ways to accomplish a similar
purpose. Being able to work out new solutions
‘on your own Is the indication that you're mak-
ing the computer work the way you want it to,
rather than using it as a toaster (stick in pro-
gram, get out result). When you leam to pro-
gram (be it with macros, HyperTalk, BASIC, C,
or Pascal) you are begninning to control your
destiny. Otherwise, you're confined by the
whims of the programmer.
To clarify what may be a misunderstanding,
the file data you read into a HyperCard field
doesn’t have to be separated by hard carriage
returns; it doesn’t even have to be a text file.
The parser in our example used a tab-delimit-
ed data file created from an AppleWorks 3.0
database; tabs separate fields within a record
and hard carriage returns indicate the end of a
record. But we could have changed the script
to use other methods for a different kind of
file (I've used this to read records from a CD-
ROM file to display in fields in a HyperCard
stack).
‘A HyperCard field can hold up to 50000
characters, but a HyperCard ligs variable can
hold as many characters as will fit into memo-
'y (page 155 of the HyperCard Script Lan-
Guide says you can only read strings
up to 16584 characters; that’s an error). So if
you want to read in the whole file, go for it.
I tried adding two fields into a third field as
you suggested and got the same type of result.
Apparently the selectedChunk (the location of
the selected text or text insertion point in a
field) gets set to “empty” (null) when the script
is executed to assign a value to a field. That's
no big thing; it might even be expected since
you might consider the work in your current
field to be “done” when the script starts exe-
ccuting.
1S easy enough to have it your way, since
the selectedChunk is a value that can be
requested from HyperCard. I used mouseEnter
to trigger my script for field 16 (to cause the
addition to take place, you drag the mouse
cursor into field 16) and my script for field 16
looked like this:
on mousefnter
pt the selectodthank into ourSelection
pot card field 14 + card field 15 into me
select ourSelection
end mouselinter
This script saves the selectedChunk to our
variable ourSelection before the “put” com-
mand invalidates the selection, then re-selects
the save selection afterward. So the same text
that was selected before the “put" remains
selected afterward.
It's safe to say that none of us here at A2-
Central consider ourselves to be “experts” on
HyperTalk, though we're trying to get up to
speed. We‘ve found some experts that were
willing to let us talk them into doing a Hyper-
Card ligs publication for us, though, and you'll
see our announcement of the birth of Script-
Central in this month’s catalog.
HyperCard’s animation is on the slow side;
it's intended to allow the addition of move-
ment for display effects, but isn’t intended to
be “animation” in the sense of an arcade
game. If you've seen HyperCard on the Mac,
you'll see that it doesn’t exactly rip along,
either. The only way we know of to speed up
scriptdriven animation beyond the basic
speed of HyperCard’s interpreter is to speed
up the computer's processor.
et (trying to keep up the idea that Hyper-
id HyperStudio do have different fea-
ae it you are interested in fast animation
you may find that HyperStudio is better suited
to that particular task. HyperStudio imple-
ments animation as a specific function within
the program’s button options whereas Hyper-
Card handles it under script control (meaning
the animation control loop can’t proceed faster
than the HyperCard interpeter can push it
along). Such a specialized animation routine
could be added to HyperCard via an XCMD,
but we don’t know of one that is currently
available.—DJD
New address
I typed in your program (Open-Apple, p.2.83
and 2.93) to check my SuperExpanderE which
has 768K. Your programs recognized only
128K. Any fix for this program?
Adalbert Goetz
Waynesboro, Pa.
Try using $CO71 (49265) instead of $CO73
(49267). Jeny Kindall at Quality Computer
tipped us off that the SuperExpanderE uses a
different bank selection address than some of
the other auxiliary memory style expansion
cards.—DJD
Fee paid?
Like most Apple owners, | am bewildered by
Apple’s schizophrenic behavior towards the II
series. | mean, free system software updates,
free tech notes, the Video Overlay Card, the
DMA SCSI card, and now HyperCard on the one
hand; the bald statement that the ligs is the last
Apple I, the lack of Apple 1! promotion, etc., on
the other...
Shareware is another area of concern. It's
wonderful stuff and I love the people who are
publishing it, but are they getting their money?
It has to be obvious that if they don’t the supply
will dry up. We have a severe problem here as
do most non-US users, | imagine, in getting the
money to them. It can cost almost as much, if
not more, to use bank drafts for small amounts
as the shareware costs. Not everybody has a
Visa or MasterCard and most shareware authors
don’t accept it anyway. I hear that AUSOM is
looking at collecting the shareware fees for the
stuff they distribute and sending it on to the
authors. KAOS, the user group for which I am
ligs librarian, intends to do the same. It would
help us if there was a matching organization in
the US to distribute the money on our behalf.
There would be an expense involved but the
increased shareware fees should do more than
cover that. The radio amateurs manage to run
their QSL bureaus; surely computer people can
manage something the same.
Peter Maloney
Hawthorn, Vic.
We're not familiar with how radio amateurs
deal with their similar problems, but it would
be interesting to hear suggestions of how to
deal with this dilemna. We've heard sugges-
tions that a company collect and distribute
fees, but given the normally low amount
requested as tender for shareware fees, addi-
tional transaction costs in a commercial
endeavor to transfer fees may end up dissuad-
ing shareware payments.
‘Many interesting products seem to be
appearing as shareware; paying fees to these
authors is a good way to establish the viability
of the Apple Il market by convincing them (and
even publishers, who may consider better
shareware products to be “competition” in
their markets) that there is money to be made
in developing and improving Apple II prod-
ucts.—DJD
Tool 33
IIgs System Software 5.0.4 includes a Tool
#33; it’s not listed in the Apple Ilgs Toolbox
Reference volumes 1, 2, or 3. Can you tell me
what it is and where I can get more info about
it?
FL, Stewart
Stewart Systems
London, Ont.
Tool 33 is the toolset for the Video Overlay
Card; it’s included with the system software
but only has utility if you have the Video Over-
lay Card installed. The toolset is documented
in the Apple Il Video Overlay Card Develop-
ment Kit v1.1 from APDA (#A0221LL/B, $35);
the kit is a Class 1 (non-beta) product so can
be ordered without a membership fee to
APDA.—DJD
Alternate CD-ROMs
Does the Toshiba CD-ROM drive require a
special driver like the NEC or will it work with
the Apple-supplied ligs drivers?
Is CD-ROM mastering software available for
the Ilgs and Mac platforms?
R. Payne
Noble Park, Vic.
We were told the Trantor driver for the ligs
only supports the NEC drives, though support
of others was being investigated; you may
want to keep in touch with Digital Data Express
7.36 A2-Central
(13656 S. Western Avenue, Suite 28, Blue
Island, Ill, 60406, 708-389-7744) regarding
compatibility with other drives.
‘The RamFast v2.0 ROM update supports
several SCSI CD-ROM drives without the use of
special drivers.
Apple’s technical publication, d e ve 10 p,
had an article about CD-ROM mastering for the
Apple Il and Mac in issue number 3 (July
1990); back issues are available from APDA.
You can also get more information from Apple
Developer Services. If you have a concept for a
product, it would probably be very wise to sub-
mit an application to become an Apple Associ-
ate ($150 for Apple Il; $500 for both Apple 1!
and Macintosh) or Apple Partner ($500 for
Apple Il; $600 for both).—DJD
Praise for Plus Works
I'm writing this on an Apple Il Plus using
AppleWorks 3.0. My Apple fl Plus has a Ramex
128 board (Omega Microware), a Smarterm
board (80 column capability from Advanced
Logic Systems), a Zip Chip, and a Martek key-
board (has open/closed apple keys connected
through the game port connector). The Apple-
Works 3.0 has been modified by Norwich Data
Services’ Plus Works Ill with a patch provided
by Norwich to activate the open/closed apple
keys on the Martek keyboard.
| prefer this Apple il Plus setup for any neces-
sary quick work over my 386SX clone. Perhaps
some of your readers have an older Apple or
Franklin hanging about and don’t realize that it
can be made to run AppleWorks 3.0 (original
keyboards work fine and you don’t need a Zip
Chip but memory must exceed 64K and the
ability to bring up an 80 column screen is
required, as I understand it). | suggest such
readers contact Norwich Data Services Ltd., P.O.
Box 356, East Norwich, N.Y. 11752-0356, 516-
922-9584.
I can only praise Norwich for their help in
making my Apple Il Plus run AppleWorks, partic-
ularly Richard Hajdu, Vice President. A couple
of years ago when trying to get AppleWorks 2.0
up with Plus Works II Richard fielded my several
phone calls with expertise (for example, my
Ramex board had to be moved to slot 0, the
Zip Chip set to not cached for slot 0 and the
Zip Chip set to normal speed for the slot con-
taining the Smarterm board). This time he was
very accomodating in supplying the patch for
the Martek keyboard.
It was a pleasure to do business with Nor-
wich and thus a pleasure to write this. I also
must you at A2-Central for making it with only
7,000 subscribers. You must be honibly effi-
cient.
George Waaser
Wantagh, N.Y.
We try to be efficient. 7,000 subscribers
isn’t enough for us to go out and hire 30
employees and several specialists to locate
and test products, but it is enough to swamp
us with other work. That's why we appreciate
having “reports from the field’ like
yours.—DJD
Applied Engineering support
‘A development occurred in the Apple Il com-
munity which | certainly hope will not set a
precedent. Applied Engineering Incorporated
(AE) has made three changes to its customer
support which will adversly affect its customers
and the Apple Il community as a whole. I would
hope the Apple Il community would respond
with letters to its president documenting our
displeasure with his company's new direction. I
would expect an appropriate decrease in AE
sales.
‘Applied Engineering has been a leader in the
Apple II hardware arena for nearly a decade. Its
founder, Dan Pote, built the company from a
garage operation to the position it holds today,
a leader in Apple Il hardware manufacturing. It
is my understanding AE is second in Apple Il
hardware sales only to Apple Computer Inc.
itself. It is the manufacturer of a long list of
favorites such as: Ramfactor, RamWorks, Ram-
Keeper, GS-RAM, GS-RAM Plus, TransWarp,
TransWarp GS, Slot-Mover, PC-Transporter,
DataLink, Serial Pro, TimeMaster H.0., Z80
Plus, Sonic Blaster, Audio Animator, the Vul-
can, and the list goes on and on.
Those of us in the Apple Corps of Dallas
have long been fans of Applied Engineering
because of its great customer support. It car-
ried a 5-year warranty on most of its hardware.
Its local office provided easy access to the tech-
nical staff. Phone calls to the technical support
line were helpful and handled by kowledgeable
technicians. That has apparently come to an
end.
Recently there was a change in management
at AE which has had great impact on customer
support. The first change was the technical sup-
port staff. A great number of the technicians
either left on their own or were laid off. The
telephone number for technical support was
changed to a 1-900 number having a rate of
$1.50 per minute. It is also my understanding
that the standard 5-year warranty has been
reduced to one year. Discussions with past
employees of Applied Engineering indicate
these changes are due in part to increased sup-
port of the Mac and Amiga lines. This business
decision was reported to be in response to the
declining support of the Apple Il line by Apple
Computers Incorporated.
We Apple [I supporters must make our feel-
ings known on this subject. Members of my
user group will be writing letters to Applied
Engineering's new president Bob Carroll, run-
ning editorials in our club newsletter, and most
importantly showing our feelings through prod-
uct sales. Showing this sort of response on a
nationwide basis is also very important. If we
allow one company to do this without suffering
in the profit and loss area, other companies will
follow Applied’s lead. If you are inclined to sup-
port this cause, I recommend you send a letter
expressing your feelings to:
Beb Carroll
President
Applied Engineering, Inc,
P. 0, Box 5100
Carrollton, 1% 75011
Mike Sample
igs SIG leader
Apple Corps of Dallas
Plano, Texas
We'd prefer not to secondguess Applied
Engineering's position on this, so we've
obtained permission to reprint comments they
send to their customers on this subject from
Patrick Gallagher, Vice President of Sales and
Marketing:
“Over the past couple of years, we have
continued to expand the Apple Il Technical
Support organization and still have not been
able to handle the increased volume of calls.
Vol. 7, No. 5
This situation has occurred at a time when
costs continue to increase and Apple Il rev-
enues are diminishing. This is a significant rea-
son why all the other major hardware vendors
have left the Apple II market.
“For 11 years AE has designed, developed,
manufactured, and marketed over 100 prod-
ucts for the Apple Il. We continue to support
the Apple II market and are committed to its
success. However, this would not be possible
if we did not offset the tremendous support
costs and provide a vehicle for customers who
truly have AE technical issues to reach our
technical support staff.
“After several months of research, we decid-
ed to follow a growing trend in the industry
and implement a 900 number. Some of the
major companies who have implemented a
900 program include, Microsoft, Lotus, Com-
aq, and Softwarehouse. Additionally, the big
three distributors in the reseller channel,
Ingram Micro, Merisel, and Tech Data, have ini-
tiated fee-based technical support programs.
“The goal is not to make the Apple I! Techni-
cal Support department a profit center but to
help offset some of the financial burden and
allow us to continue providing support to the
Apple II market. The $1.50 per minute charge
is one of the lowest in the industry and
includes the customer long-distance charges.
“.. recognize that many people who
received free technical consultation over the
years will question fee-related services. We sin-
cerely believe we are doing the right thing to
keep AE financially viable, thus allowing the
Apple Imarket to continue through the
1990's...”
The edited portions of the letter contain sit-
uation-specific advice, and also mentions two
alternative sources of support: the dealer that
sold the product (AE sells 92% of its products
through dealers), or (for modem owners) the
AE Bulletin Board System at 214-241-6677.
The strongest objection we've heard is that
the use of a 900 number is confined to Apple
Il users while Applied Engineering's new prod-
uct lines for the Amiga and Macintosh do not
have this limitation. Mr. Gallagher indicates the
reason for this is that Macintosh sales are cur-
rently strong enough to cover the additional
cost of the non-900 (but also non-800) support
line for their Mac products, where the current
revenue for Apple Il products is not enough to
absorb the amount of Apple II support request-
ed.
The reduction in the warranty term for cur-
rent product sales is another sign that Applied
Engineering may be trying to cut cost over-
head, but realistically we doubt the change will
be felt in most cases. Our experience is that a
product that does not fail in the first year is
unlikely to fail except due to extreme age (we
have some interfaces over ten years old) or
some type of physical damage not covered by
warranty.—DJD
Graphic, sound file formats
I have some questions about file formats.
There seems to be a plethora of graphics file
formats (low-res, high-res, double high-res, $CO,
$C1, Print Shop, etc). Now I’m seeing The New
Print Shop, Print Shop GS, and GIP formats.
Where do these fit in? Are these last compatible
dune 1991
with other Apple Il graphics? If not, can they be
converted using The Graphic Exchange or some
other program?
Along the same lines, what about sound file
formats? I’ve noticed the GEnie Apple Il library
“ACER Sound Files”. What programs are these
compatible with? Are there other filetypes for
sound files?
Bob Allan
Limuru, Kenya
There are generally three ways that file for-
mat standards are defined.
First are standards that arise from a single
popular product. The original Print Shop
graphic format became a “standard” because
many people used the program and exchanged
files.
Next are manufacturer standards that are
documented so that others can use them.
Apple has originated several of these formats
for data types it knows its systems will be
using.
Next are “computer independent” formats
agreed upon for the conversion of data. DIF
was an attempt at this for record-based data
(see “What's the DIF", A2-Central, April 1989,
p. 5.17-20).
‘Apple publishes File Type Notes document-
ing file formats which have been cleared
through Apple Developer Technical Support
(DTS). A developer can document their file for-
mat and request a filetype from DTS; if the file
format is documented and is used in a ship-
(it doesn't have to be commer-
cial, but the program does have to be “real”
and in distribution so a filetype provided for it
isn’t wasted) Apple will include the information
regarding the file format and the originating
company in a File Type Note. This is a wonder-
ful way to consolidate information on file for-
mats for posterity.
Not all manufacturers will go this route; they
may elect to develop a format independently
(sometimes in the desire to maintain a propri-
etary advantage by use of a special, incompati-
ble format). This is thankfully becoming a rare
occurance, But if the file format is not docu-
mented in the Apple II File Type Notes, then it
must be assumed the manufacturer hasn't
sent the file format information to DTS for pub-
lication and assignment.
There are several graphics file formats due
to differing opinions on what the “best” way is
to store a graphic for an intended purpose.
Apple proposed a few itself, and as new (and
possibly better) ways of storing information are
thought up new formats may be added. Right
now, the most popular techniques for storing
Apple ligs graphics images are probably as an
unpacked screen image (type $C1, auxiliary
type $0000) and in Apple Preferred Format
where the picture data can be compressed.
Most of the “computer independent” graph-
ics formats are pretty inefficient when com-
pared to computer-specific storage techniques,
So it’s unlikely you'll see a standard like Com-
puServe’s GIF (Graphics Interchange Format)
become the “default” standard for a manufac-
turer. But utilities to convert such independent
formats are usually developed for most popu-
lar systems.
Two products that allow converting several
graphics formats are The Graphic Exe
($49.95 from Roger Wagner Publishing, 619-
442-0522), and SuperConvert ($39.95 from
Seven Hills Software, 904-575-0566 or 800-
627-3836). Roger Wagner is currently working
on an enhancement disk to The Graphic
. Exchange (version 4.2 or later) that will pro-
vide converters for several additonal formats
including GIF files; the newest version of
‘Su has GIF support Included.
Sound formats include computerspecific
formats such as MIDISynth records on the ligs,
but there are also independent formats such
as Audio IFF (for digitally “sampled” sounds),
Audio IFF-C (the “C* stands for “compressed’),
and MIDI formats (both formats have been
allocated Apple I! File Type designations). We
know less about this area, and products for
interconversion are not as frequently seen.
Apple does officially recommend that all sound
applications read and write AIFF-C files (file-
type $D8, aux type $0001).
You may have seen the term ACE, which is
an abbreviation for the — Audio
‘Compression/Expansion toolset that has been
supplied with ligs System Software version
5.0.3 and later, ACE provides a standard sys-
tem tool designed specifically for compression
of digitized sound (and, of course, expanding it
again for later use). ACER is a sound utility
application; the name is often used to refer to
files stored in the ACE-comy format the
application uses. However, we didn’t find a file
type assignment for ACER in our current list-
ings—DJD
Block access and interleave
1 want to be able to load a sector, any sector,
from a ProDOS device into memory at, say,
$2000 and be able to manipulate it, all from
within BASIC. The manipulation | can handle,
Dut I don’t know how to load the sector from
disk.
Brian Noller
Wagga Wagga, N.S.W.
All you need to read blocks is to execute a
read block MLI call. A simple routine you can
CALL from Applesoft looks like this:
0300: A #800
0302: ST S031A
0305: UR SERN. Prods MLI entry
0308 CBO" read block function
0309 Ca $031C parameter block
0308; BOC S031. no error returned
0300; ST S03IA save error code
310; cae for Agplesoft.
31; back to BASIC
Ou: 1 byte for error code
Bie: oc WO! parameters in list
03D: DC a2"$2000" buffer address
OsIF; «OC 12"$0000" Dllock to read
The buffer address is the location in memo-
ty of 512 bytes of space to allow reading the
block; | used $2000 since this is unlikely to
interfere with a simple BASIC program even
though it is sitting in the middle of unprotected
memory where various entities (an HGR com-
mand or encroaching variable tables) could
overwrite it. For a more rigourous method
you'd want to protect the buffer by tucking it
under LOMEM: or above HIMEM.
You can POKE your own buffer address or
block number. To change from reading to writ-
ing blocks, POKE the MLI command code with
$81 (the parameter block is the same for read-
ing and writing).
‘As a sample program, I'd like to redo a reply
to “Disk Interleave Info” (A2-Central, January
1991, p. 6.96) regarding the detection of the
A2-Central 7.37
interleave of a 3.5 disk. I discovered an old
message from Dave Lyons (now a member of
the Apple II System Software group) indicating
that on the Ilgs the interleave of a disk can be
found in memory after reading a block from
the disk. This is not documented
or supported; it works on the ROM 0! and
ROM 05 ligs but there is mo guarantee it would
work if there was another ROM revision.
Assuming we take that risk, all we need to
check the interleave (after first verifying we
have a ligs) is our read_block call and another
short routine to grab a byte from the extended
gs memory.
To detect the ligs, we check that $FBBS
(-1101 in decimal) contains 6, which indicates
the computer is a lle, llc, or ligs. Then we use
the following code:
0300: Pa save status
0301: see et ready
0302: sR SPRL Tigs WD routine in RM
0305 RR S030. saves carry in high bit
0308: FIP recover status
0309: Res back to BASIC
(A: BS byte for carry status
The routine at $FEIF in the llgs ROM will
clear the carry (and also returns other informa-
tion such as the ROM version which we don’t
check here); on the other systems it just
returns with the carry unaltered.
The memory location we need to examine
for the interleave is $E1/0F31; we just grab
that byte and put it where BASIC can PEEK it:
0312: MA ELO31
0316: StH $0318
0319: RES.
This routine was tucked in as part of the
“read_block” routine in the Applesoft program
that follows; if the block is read without error,
we now branch to this routine at $312 instead
of the RTS at $311. (In case you're wondering,
the Ilgs’s 65816 doesn’t have to be in “native”
16-bit mode to use long addressing; that par-
ticular operation is available even from the
“65C02 emulation” mode.)
First, we check for the needed computer (a
gs):
1000 REM == get interleave on IIgs =
1010 TEXT ; BOE
1020 TF PHEK ( - 1101) = 6 THEN GOSUB 1220:
CALL 168: 1168 = ( PEBK (178) < 128)
1030 IF WOT I1GS THEN PRINT “Interleave test
‘won't work,”; STOP
Next we install the read_block code, includ-
ing the routine to grab the interleave byte:
1040 GOSUB 1250; REM install our read block routine
Then we loop through instructions that ask
for a disk, reads the block (via CALL 768),
checks for a (non-zero) MLI error code, and (if
no error) grabs the interleave byte and reorts
the interleave found. The byte containing the
interleave also identifies whether the disk is
one- or two-sided, so we might as well report
that, too:
1050 TEXT : OME
1060 INPUT “Insert a disk and press <Retum>:
1070 CALL 768
1080 IF PEEK (794) THEN PRINT “MLI error #";
PERK (794): GOqO 1160
1090 BYTE = PEEK (795)
7.38 A2-Central
1100 IL = BYTE - IMT (BYTE / 16) # 16: REM interleave
1100 DS = Non ( INT (BYTE / 64) #2= IN (BIE /
2): REM double sided?
1120 PRINT
113) PRINT “this disk’s interleave is "IL
1140 TF (08) THEN PRIMT “this is a double-sided
disk": COMO 1160
1150 PRINT “this is a single-sided disk”
1160 PRINT
1270 PRINT “Another? (Y/N) ")
1180 GT AS: PAS < > "Y" AND AS < > "y" AD
3§ <> °W" RD AS < > "x" THEN COMO 1180
1190 PRINT : IF AS = "Y" OR A$ = "y" THEN GOnO 1050
200 BD
There are two short subroutines; one to
install the “check for ligs” code, and another
(which overwrites the first)to perform the
read_block request:
1220 REM — install check for IIgs ML —
1230 FOR BYE = 768 10 778; READ THOMB: PORE EYE, THUMB:
EXT EYE: RETURN
1240 DATA 8, 56,32, 31,254,110, 10, 3,40, 96,0
125) REM — Install read block Ml —
1260 FOR EYE = 768 10 801: READ THUMB: PORE EYE, THOMB:
‘NEXT EYE: RETURN
1270 DATA 169,0,141,26,3, 32, 0,191,128, 28, 3,
144, 5,141, 26,3, 24, 96,175, 49, 15, 225,141,
21,3,%,0,0,3,80,0,32,0,0
If you think you might want to POKE other
routines into the same area, remember that
the READ statement always continues at the
next DATA item following the last one read.
The two subroutines above work because we
only use them once, and in the sequence of
the DATA.—DJD
FORMAT II help
In the January, 1990 issue of A2-Central
(5,95), you had a letter requesting information
on transfering data base records created with
Kensington’s FORMAT II program to Apple-
works. FORMAT II (the DOS 3.5 based version)
uses RWTS directly to store records on disk,
making normal file-based utility programs inef-
fective in dealing with them.
Faced with converting over 30,000 records
myself, | have succeeded in crafting a proce-
dure that will transfer the records.
Fairly simple, it requires 4 pokes in the
BASIC loader program, and a few other ‘minor’
setup procedures. This allows the records to be
‘printed’ to a sequential access text file for
importation into Appleworks, after, of course,
being converted to ProDOS.
[ won't bore you with the particulars (unless
you really want to know), but I would be happy
to share this information with anyone who is
interested, as it is a ‘whale’ of a time saver.
By the way, although I prefer Appleworks
database manager for large record files, the
word processing module of FORMAT Il, for |
and 2 page letters, memos, etc, continues to be
the best I have ever used on any computer, and
I will continue to use it. Although Kensington no
longer publishes it, itis still being sold and sup-
ported by the British company that wrote it. Yes,
there is a ProDOS version available, which we
now use, but, like AppleWriter on the lle, there
is no support for memory greater than 128K.
For that, you need the MS-DOS version. Sound
familiar?
Hugh Hood
Box 154308
Waco, Texas 76715-4308
Time is Money fix
It has come to our attention that there is a
small problem with Time is Money. Since the
original programmers have long since retired to
raising sheep in New Zealand (well, actually
they're still around, but haven't had time to
revise the program) we've asked them for a
work-around to this problem. Here we go:
The problem: When you cany forward from
1989 to 1990, the dates on the new user disk
all say 1991, not 1990. The Oracle informs us
that the mistake was made by the programmers.
in the Master Disk program, not the main Time
is Money user program.
The solution: We hope this is not too compli-
cated, but it does work. You will need your
Time is Money Master Disk, the disk from which
you want to carry forward, and two blank disks
before you start. You should have at least two
backups of the disk from which you want to
cany forward,
We will be juggling 3 user disks here, so we
will call them OLDDISK, NEWDISK, and TEM-
PDISK to help keep things clear, OLDDISK is
your old user disk with your current data (make
sure you have at least two backups of this disk).
NEWDISK is the new user disk to which you will
cary forward. TEMPDISK is a second, tempo-
rary, user disk which you will create that lets
you create the magic of fixing the dates.
Take a deep breath...
1. Make a new user disk (NEWDISK) with
1990 as the start year for Book 1. The start year
for Book 2 can be either 1990 or 1991. The
names for each book can be whatever you
want.
2. Cany forward from your old user disk
(OLDDISK) to Book | on the new user disk
(NEWDISK) that you made in step 1. The carry
forward date must be 01/01/90.
3, Make a second new user disk (TEMPDISK}
where the start year for Book | is 1991. The
start year for Book 2 does not matter. The
names for each book can be whatever you want
them to be.
4. Follow the instructions in this step careful-
ly: Carry forward from Book | on your new data
disk (NEWDISK) to Book 1 on the second new
data disk (TEMPDISK). The cary forward date
must be 01/01/91. As this operation proceeds,
the status line should indicate that you have the
same number of transactions on both the new
user disk (NEWDISK) and the second new user
disk (TEMPDISK). If you don’t have the same
number of transactions on both disks, you have
probably entered the wrong date.
Boot the second new user disk (TEM-
PDISK).
6, Remove the second new user disk (TEM-
PDISK) from the disk drive.
7. Insert the new user disk (NEWDISK) in the
drive from which you just removed the second
new user disk (TEMPDISK).
8. From the main menu, select B (for Backup
and Exit).
9. From the Backup and Exit menu, select S
to save your data to the new user disk
(NEWDISK). DO NOT EXIT FROM TIME IS
MONEY.
10. Remove the new user disk from the drive
(NEWDISK) and turn off your Apple Il. The oper-
ation is now complete. Label this disk appropri-
ately as it is your new user disk.
11. You may destroy (or otherwise reuse) the
second new user disk (TEMPDISK). It is no
longer needed.
Vol. 7, No. 5
12, Remember to make at least two backups
of your new user disk (NEWDISK).
Bruce Rosenblum
‘Turning Point Software, Inc.
230 Western Avenue
Boston, Mass. 02134
(617) 782-4877
The path not taken
Recently | attempted to upgrade the ligs sys-
tem software on my hard drive from version
5.0.2 to 5.0.4. This was reasonably easy to do.
However, it had an effect | did not anticipate. 1
use an 8-bit selector called EasyDrive (from
Quality Computers). When Igo from the selec-
tor to WordPerfect for the llgs, version 2.1, it
overides the default setting for the data file
location. That is, instead of giving me the path
“hard. 1/wp.data” when I go to retrieve a file it
consistently defaults on its own to “hard.2/",
the second partition on my 40 megabyte hard
drive. When | launch WordPerfect from the Find-
er, Iget the correct default prefix for my data
files. It seems obvious to me that the problem
lies in the switch-between the 8-bit selector and
the 16-bit program. What is happening here?
Both the selector and all WordPerfect files
(system and data) reside in the partition
“hard.1". Why does the operating system feel
compelled to look to the second partition for
my data files? How (and why) does the system
override the default data prefix that is part of
the defaults file for the program?
Andrew Klimas
Randalltown, Md.
This was driving many users crazy, and cred-
it for finally tracking it down goes to developer
Shawn Quick. Shawn's explanation mentioned
the normal GS/OS file selection tool Standard
File, but the same type of thing could occur in
other circumstances.
When a device (driver) is restarted by boot-
ing or by re-entering GS/OS from ProDOS 8, it
prepares to send a notification that a new disk
may have been inserted (this is done so that
GS/OS will know that any disk in the drive will
need to be read). If the driver is not called by
another application before Standard File is
called then that notification is left pending.
When Standard File is called it installs its
notification vector and then builds its device
list by calling each device driver, checking for
block devices and those with removable
media. When a device driver for a device that
supports removable media is called, it will
notice that the internal “disk switched" flag is
set and so calls GS/OS to tell it so. GS/OS in
tum calls all the installed notification vectors
so they can react to the disk switched event.
This includes Standard File, which then
assumes something has changed. So Standard
File tries to read the “new” directory from the
“switched” device. If no disk is there, Standard
File grabs the last available device in the
device list, reads its file list, and displays this
instead. In your case, you just got bumped
from hard.1 to hard.2,
Standard File intentionally works this way
(jumping over to check a switched disk) so that
inserting a new 3.5 disk will automatically
cause the new disk’s file list to appear in the
Standard File window (this makes it easier to
check a series of floppies for the file you seek
June 1991
without constantly tabbing through all the on-
line devices). The problem is the initially pend-
ing notification after the driver is first restarted.
You don't see this problem when launching
programs from the Finder since the Finder is
constantly polling removable media devices
and will therefore “clear” the initial notification.
Shawn has written a permanent initialization
file called SF.Fix that...well, let’s let Shawn
explain:
“When a driver is started up, whether by a
cold boot or return to GS/OS from P8, It holds
a pending ‘disk switched’ that can not be
retumed to the operating system, until some of
the driver's code has been executed. What my
INIT does, is simply insert a notification proce-
dure into the system that causes all removable
devices to execute some code (_DStatus |
believe) any time GS/OS is started or restarted.
This causes those devices to tell GS/OS that
the disk has been switched and will ‘eat’ the
pending disk switched. Once this has hap-
pened, everything in the system is back in
‘sync, and SF (and everything else) works prop-
erly. You may also see from this, that my INIT
only is executed on GS/OS starts and
restarts... it is never used again. Some people
had commented to me that they didn’t like the
fact that it was called anytime SF was called or
when an application is launched... it’s really
not, only on start/restart. So you may point
out that the INIT does not patch anything in
the system, nor slow it down, etc. It’s hardly
ever used.”
Other applications would need to follow this
model; Glen Bredon has already modifed
ProSel-8 (which can launch GS/OS applica-
tions if GS/OS was booted) to take this into
account.
We've also been frustrated by the use of the
data prefix (GS/OS prefix #8) in that we sel-
dom seem to leave it set where we want for
certain applications like AppleWorks GS. For
some of these programs, we'd like the program
to use the same path by default each time we
enter the program (such as classic AppleWorks
“default disk”). We've seen a new shareware
utility called DataPath NDA that allows you to
specify a default data path for your applica-
tions; it’s $10 from Bill Tudor, 1220 Gerling
Street, Schenectady, N.Y. 12308.—DJD
SCSI-2 and you
I'm in the process of putting together a hard
drive for my Iigs. I thought all | needed to look
for was a SCSI drive and I'd be fine. Now, how-
ever, I'm seeing drive mechanisms advertised
as SCSI, SCSI-2, and Mac compatible SCSI.
What's the difference? Is there anything else I
have to be careful of in making the decision?
Daryl C. Morgan
Turlock, Calif.
The word “standard” in the computer indus-
try has historically seemed to mean a set of
design criteria that looked absolute in theory
but that was often modified (some manufactur-
ers say “enhanced*) in practice. Like many
other standards, the SCSI specification was
supposed to define a set of rules that would
allow manufacturers to design equipment that
would “plug and play’ with each other's prod-
ucts. In practice, either non-conformance to
the standard or non-conformance within the
standard (sometimes it’s hard to nail the lid
down on creativity) would keep two devices
from working together.
The reference work on SCSI is the Small
Computer System Interface (SCSI) Specifica-
tion (ANSI X3.131-1986), available from the
American National Standards Institute, 1430
Broadway, New York, N.Y. 10018, (202) 642-
4900 (sales deptartment). Manufacturer's refer-
ences we've seen are pricey (we've seen a
Fujitsu manual that hovers around the $45
mark), but we did pick up an NCR pamphlet
titled SCSI: Unde the Small Com-
puter System Interface (ISBN 0-13-79855-8)
which “only” ran $19.95 for about 70 pages of
information. Sarcasm aside, it appears to be a
very concise, useful technical overview of the
SCSI standard (it does not include specific
information such as descriptions of individual
commands). It also lists general proposals for
extensions of the current standard to SCSI-2
and SCSI-3,
The original SCSI standard has actually
worked pretty well; it is relatively unusual to
hear of compatibility problems that keep two
SCSI devices from working together. Some-
times differences in the exact implementation
do cause problems, though, so as SCSI is
becoming more widely used the impetus to
insure compatibility is becoming more promi-
nent.
SCSI-2 attempts to remove some of the
“design options” that could allow incompatibili-
ty among devices from different vendors fol-
lowing the original specification. We asked
Chris Adams at Chinook Technology and Matt
Gulick at Apple Computer about the newer
standards; they confirmed that they shouldn’t
‘hurt (and should help, by confirming the adher-
ence to standards) compatibility with true SCSI
interfaces which are currently available for the
Apple Il. There are also some enhancements
(such as provisions for higherspeed transfer
methods) which don’t benefit current Apple Il
systems.
“Macintosh SCSI” could indicate a couple of
things that would not be likely to interfere with
use of the drive on a ligs. First would be that
the drive has been tested on and works on a
Macintosh. It may also indicate that the drive
includes the new terminators required for the
high-speed SCSI bus of the Mac Iifx (see Macin-
tosh Technical Note #273). But a third possibil-
ity is that the disk requires a Mac
driver to simulate full SCSI compatibility, and
that will keep the drive from working on a
Iigs..—DJD
A different view
In regard to the letter in A2-Central, p. 7.30,
your readers may be interested in knowing that
the View routine in Change-aFile (found on
GEnie) will read control characters in a file or
directory.
Harold D. Portnoy
Bloomfield Hills, Mich.
Change-a-File is a shareware utility that
allows converting AppleWorks 3.0 word proces-
sor files to AppleWorks 2.x format, intercon-
verting AppleWorks word processor files and
standard ProDOS text files, filtering line feeds
from text files, adding line feeds after carriage
returns, massaging AWP and ADB files whose
internal structure has been damaged so that
they can be loaded into AppleWorks (the
extent of the recovery depends on the extent
of the damage), changing file types and auxil-
iary types, and viewing the contents of files.
The View option is useful for checking the
A2-Central 7.39
contents of text or AppleWorks files before
using the conversion utilities, but it can be
used to view nearly any type of file (we ran into
a few types of files, such as DIR files, where
nothing appeared on the screen).
The recovery options work by verifying the
header for the damaged AppleWorks file; if the
can recover from any detected errors
it will rebuild the file, otherwise options are
Provided to try and extract as much informa-
tion as possible and place it in a new file. The
can deal with bad data blocks within a
file, but cannot recover a file with a damaged
directory or index blocks (index blocks indi-
cate where the file is stored on disk). Harold
recommends using another utility in such a
case; his own Ressui program is
designed to try to recover files where the direc-
tory has been damaged. After processing with
Ressurrection, you can try feeding the
“restored” files to Change-a-File’s data recov-
ery options.
Harold has been spreading these files by
BBS; after you download them, you will find
that some options in the programs are not
available. Payment of a $10 fee gets you the
password to unlock the files for full functionali-
ty.—DUD
Apple’s StyleWriter printer
OK, the situation is like this: Apple goes and
creates a new and affordable inkjet printer-the
StyleWriter. It connects to the standard serial
printer port and is driven by TrueType (Apple's
own idea of PostScript-incompatible, of
course), It (the printer) costs about $500, and
its printouts look just as good (with text at least)
as those done with a LaserWriter Il. The prob-
lem? According to my local unfriendly Autho-
rized Apple Dealer, this printer only works with
the Mac. If | wanted to use the printer with the
Ilgs I would need a GS/OS device driver, of
which Apple has yet to announce or make avail-
able.
1 have snooped around the various BBS‘s and
found many assorted printer drivers that have
been written, I guess what I am asking you guys
is this: if you see any StyleWriter/TrueType driv-
er around, should it be commercial or other-
wise, please let us know.
We (the Apple II community) have the com-
puter, the page layout software, and the fonts.
Give us a TrueType driver, and we will have
what we have been waiting for: laser quality
printouts at a dot matrix price.
Gregory J. Betzel
River Falls, Wisc.
The StyleWriter is not a panacea; it’s quoted
print speed is half a page per minute. Also,
the StyleWriter does not use a page description
language like PostScript; that means graphics
images would be rendered as bitmaps, not as
the smooth graphics that can be rendered on
the PostScript LaserWriters,
The StyleWriter’s print engine specifications
sound suspiciously similar to those for the
Canon BubbleJet printers: thermal ink jet
technology with a print resolution of 360 dots
per inch (that’s slightly higher than the 300 dpi
of many common ink jet and laser printers).
We checked with Vitesse’s John Pothier, who
says they have had some reports of good
results using Harmonie’s Epson LQ-series
7.40 A2-Central
driver with the BubbleJet 10e which has an
LQ emulation mode.
The StyleWriter’s major advantage would be
the support of TrueType font technology. True-
‘Type fonts are scalable like the LaserWriter's
Adobe PostScript fonts, but have the advan-
tage (to Apple) of representing a standard that
Apple, in conjunction with Microsoft, controls.
‘TrueType is not yet supported by the ligs
printer drivers, so let's grapple with that. Apple
had not released the complete technical speci-
fications of the StyleWriter yet, so it was not
possible for a third party company to develop
drivers prior to it’s release. If Apple wants to
keep TrueType under proprietary control, the
only source for a driver may be Apple.
The StyleWriter also doesn’t just accept and
print ASCII data; characters are printed in con-
junction with the TrueType technology of ren-
dering scalable fonts, and graphics are imaged-
within the host computer and sent to the
printer as compressed bitmaps. Given that the
printer does not accept ASCII data, using it
with 8-bit software such as AppleWorks may be
out of the question. Even the ligs System Soft-
ware is currently not prepared to deal with all
of this.
We expect Apple to be committed to the use
of TrueType fonts in the future, so TrueType
may be supported on the ligs in some future
system software update. No specific future ilgs
System Software features have been dis-
cussed, but we hope this is under considera-
tion; the cost of the StyleWriter is certainly low
enough to be competitive with third-party alter-
a
© Copyright 1991 by
Resource-Central, Inc.
programs pbished in AZ-Central 20 pubic
doa ay be cpt ahd rue wine Cage, Ae et ons
‘ad sgnicart hers may obtan pein o epi aris to ie one
by sect ween request
Pubiser: Edt:
‘Tom Weishaar Dennis Doms
wit eip rom:
Sally Dwyer Dean Esmay Joyce Hammond
Jay Jennings JetfNeuer_Ellen Rosenberg
Denise Shaffer ‘Tom Vanderpool Jean Weishaar
Az Centra Open ple tg src ns bmn
January 1965. Work vade pres (n US. colars; smal
‘su an index forth prx volume is included wit the February sve
The ful ext of each ssuo of A2-Centralis available on 3§ disks, along
wit a selection ofthe best new puble domain and shareware fles and pro-
rs 8 ye frat ae at mb See 30 $0
al coespandence to:
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‘A2-Ceattal is oid in an unprotected format for yout convenience. You
‘copies for your own use without charge. You may also copy A2-Central for
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tibuled,
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the information in A2-Ceatral's useful and covet, although tive and
mistakes ae included from fe ote, usvay uintnonaly, Unsatsiod
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telurd of ther ast subscription payment. The ufiled orion of any pad
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‘OUR LIABLITY FOR ERROAS AND ONISSIONS IS LIMITED TO THIS
PUBLICATIONS PURCHASE PRICE n no case shal our company rout
contbutos be Fable fo any nena or consequent damages, nor for
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Apple Il vs. Mac
| was a charter subscriber to Open-Apple
and have been a faithful subscriber ever since
(taking the disk version since it was released).
However, despite your cute little post card and
numerous reminders, | have pretty well made
my mind up not to renew my subscription when
it expired with the April issue.
Well, I've thought about it some more, and
have decided to stick with it another year. But I
wanted to convey to you why I was finally going
to let it die.
I am really rather sick of hearing very vocal
members of the Apple I user family constantly
screaming about the death of the Apple II line
and how Apple has maligned them by trying to
kill it. It was bad enough having to wade
through that dung here on GEnie (until I finally
permanently ignored all of the categories which
contained such tripe to cut my bill) trying to
capture the few true gems of messages inter-
spersed. It was a final straw, though, to have to
read it in A2-Central. I've been associated with
the Apple I for many years (not as long as you,
though) and in my honest opinion, the comput-
er’s biggest enemy has been this group of
lamenters, standing at the wailing wall, crying
and shredding their garments for the past few
years.
Even though Apple did not actively and pub-
licly push the I line (and the Iigs in particular),
this lack of attention really did it relatively little
harm. New stuff was slow for the ligs, but it did
come faster than it ever did for the Mac. It was
just taking time for us “die-hard” CLI (command
line interpreter) users to get over the GUI
(graphics user interface) prejudice and start
learning how to use the new capabilities of the
family. Major manufacturers were not deserting
the series. Then the wailing started, and contin-
ued, and continued, and ... Everywhere a soft-
ware or hardware developer turned, they were
told that the Apple Il (and specifically the IIgs)
was dying or dead. Constantly. They soon start-
ed to conclude that it must be true and then
they started abandoning the machine and the
series. Who was telling them this? Not Apple, it
was the hard core, chest beating, mostly
respected independent programmers, hackers,
and “gurus” who were telling them this. So, it
must be true. These attitudes and actions by
outstanding community leaders such as yourself
(and/or your organization) have done more
damage and chased away more developers than
Apple could ever have wished for. The lament
has become a self-fulfilling prophecy. | think it’s
time for a major attitude adjustment on the part
of the “Apple {1 community’. That is why I've
decided to go another year with A2-Central,
because there seemed to be a more positive
and constructive approach in the last two issues
or so (like the A2-Central Catalog of
March—though that banner could have been
done in a much more positive way).
There are a lot of Apple Il owners like me out
there. (I know, | run a BBS and have been a
“community leader and guru’ on the local
scene for many years.) 1 own multiple units of
multiple versions of this great computer. I also
have Macintosh’s (from a laptop up through the
fx) either of my own or at my office. I also
extensively use MS-DOS machines. They’re not
mutually exclusive! I “like” them all (well, I tol-
erate the Messy-DOS stuff). I'm not tired of the
Il computers, especially the ligs which | have
Vol. 7, No. 5
found superior to the low-end Macs and | can’t
afford lfx's for my home. But, | am sick and
tired of the attitudes being preached by the
“user community” leaders and so are a lot of
other owners. People don't go to user group
meetings and conventions or pay hard earned
money for subscriptions and online services
just to sit around and hear the “pros” tell them
how bad they and their computer of choice
have it. They want the positive. Many Apple Il
series owners out there never realized how mis-
erable and unhappy they were until some
friendly newsletter editor or online guru enlight-
ened them. Up until that point, they mistakenly
believed that the computer they owned and
loved was meeting their needs! How about
accentuating the positive for a few years? You
may be surprised at the level of hardware and
software support that still exists and might even
be regenerated! There are several other brands
of computers which are much “deader” than the
Apple Il series, which have fewer deployed
units, which may not even be in production any
more much less enjoy manufacturer's support,
and yet which enjoy extremely good after-mar-
ket support. The only clear difference that | see
with them Is that their users aren‘t running
around telling the world what fools they are and
how terrible their computers are.
Well, | hope I've said enough on the subject
to maybe start an attitude adjustment process.
Thanks for reading this and for all of your past
positive contributions to the growth and matur-
ing of the Apple II line. I sincerely hope you'll
be able to help extend its “life” even further.
Scott Galbraith
Monrovia, Md.
There's a wide varity of opinion on this issue
in the Apple II community, and several people
here, including our publisher Tom Weishaar
and our head GEnie sysop, Chet Day, are
cheerleaders for your point of view. They've
felt for months that we should stop expending
emotional energy worrying about what Apple
did or didn’t do and get on with enjoying our
computers.
Do Apple il owners dwell overly much on
their problems with Apple Computer? Probably
so. Users seem to expect Apple to do every-
thing, and Apple is not that large a company.
There are many aspects in which the Apple If
user community has not rallied to support the
machine. Apple Il engineers have generally
given us great tools to make the ligs useful and
there are some immensely useful products on
the market that are not being exploited to their
full potential. Mac users took HyperCard and
wrote their own small business software; Apple
has now given similar opportunities to us.
The success of accentuating the positive
does depend on Apple’s visible commitment
to promote and support the Apple Il. User
evangelism can’t succeed when the parent
company invests heavily in advertising that
works against them, and it is important to
make others understand Apple's contribution
to the weakening of the Apple II market. Apple
expended massive corporate resources, includ-
ing a lot of Apple II dollars, to entrench the
Macintosh in the public's mind. Apple Il users
have a right to expect more from the company
than it has done for the Apple II and especially
the Iigs,—DJD