Shareware Solutions II Volume 3 Issue 1 1996 04 Kohn Joe US

Shareware Solutions II An Exciting Apple II Journey Into The Future Volume 3, Issue 1 Spring, 1996 Heard It Through The Grapevine Hard Drive Give Away Everyone whose subscription was current at the end of Febru- ary, 1996 was automatically en- tered into the Hard Drive Give Away Contest, and the winner of that contest is Keith Saga- low, a IIGS owner from Central Valley, New York. Keith is now the proud owner of a 120 Mega- byte Focus Hard Drive. From the time the contest was announced in the last issue un- til the time that Keith received his hard drive, several unexpect- ed developments occurred. Tony Diaz of Alltech Electronics, the sponsor of the contest, informed me that he would be unable to donate the planned 80 Mega- byte Focus Hard Drive, as All- tech was completely sold out of them; instead, Alltech donated a 120 Megabyte drive. In the last issue, no mention was made of the method that Shareware Solutions II planned to use to choose the lucky win- ner. After that issue was com- pleted, I contacted Auri Rahim- zadeh to ask whether he might be able to convince his boss to choose the lucky winner. Auri’s boss, as many of you know, is Steve Wozniak, the inventor of the Apple II computer. Auri was pleased to get Woz involved. On the morning that Woz was going to choose the winner, I generated a text file from the AppleWorks based subscriber database and sent it to Woz, via Auri, and later received the following e-mail message: “The winner of the HD is Keith Saga- low. We threw all of the papers into the air, then we threw a dart at one. There were three names hit by the dart, but only one was legible, so Keith was the winner.” Thanks to Tony Diaz for do- nating the drive. Thanks to Auri for acting as an intermediary to Steve Wozniak. Thanks to Woz for choosing the winner. But most of all, thanks to all of you for supporting Shareware Solu- tions IT. Brutal Deluxe Visit Olivier Zardini of Brutal Deluxe Software recently visited the Shareware Solutions II World- wide Headquarters and we were able to spend five or six enjoy- able and educational days to- gether. Olivier arrived with his homebrew SCSI hard drive and from examining the contents of that drive, it certainly appears as if the Apple IIGS world has a lot to look forward to; two new Brutal Deluxe arcade games should be available before the end of the year During his visit, arrangements were made to conduct a chat session over the GEnie online network, and some of the high- lights of that three hour session included a long question and answer session about Convert 3200, with Olivier announcing that a free update is planned; that update will offer some sup- port for the Second Sight card. There was also quite a bit of dis- cussion about Brutal Deluxe’s System 6.0.2 update, and Oliv- ier admitted that his program- ming partner suffered from a hard drive crash and that much of the work had been lost. The freewheeling online chat session was attended by more than 30 people, and a good time seemed to be had by all. Upon his return to France, Oliv- ier started work on the next Bru- tal Deluxe release, a IIGS game that is inspired by a very popu- lar game that is already availa- ble on other computer platforms. He expects that the game will be completed in the late summer of 1996, and it will be available as a Limited Edition from Share- ware Solutions II for $5, but only to those people who have purchased Convert 3200. Olivier has been sending me a weekly update of the game, and it has been fascinating to watch his programming efforts evolve into a completed game. At this point, it is a work-in-progress that is lovely to behold but it is not yet playable. Given Brutal Deluxe’s history of creating IIGS versions of other popular com- puter games, the next game should prove to be yet another smash hit. As Olivier recently told me, “The new arcade game will be our best program ever.” Stay tuned for details. Magic Eye Graphics If you’ve been in a bookstore in Shareware Solutions II 1 Shareware Solutions II Volume 3, Issue 1 Shareware Solutions II is pub- lished bi-monthly by Joe Kohn, 166 Alpine Street, San Rafael, CA 94901-1008. Publisher/Writer: Joe Kohn Roving Reporter: Cynthia Field Contrib. Writer: Steve Disbrow Proofreader: Jane Kos Entire contents of Shareware Solutions II copyright (©) 1996 by Joe Kohn. All rights are reserved. Nothing may be re- printed or reproduced, in whole or in part, in any media without the prior written consent of Joe ‘Kohn. Available by subscription only, several options are available: |A) The first 18 issues: $55 for US/Canada; $75 elsewhere. 'B) The next 6 issues/Renewal: $25 for US/Canada; $40 else- where. Make all checks payable to Joe Kohn. US Funds Only. No charge cards, purchase orders or COD orders will be accepted. This newsletter was created entirely with an Apple IGS. All articles written in AppleWorks Classic. Page Layout prepared in AppleWorks GS. Printing was done on a Hewlett-Packard ‘LaserJet IIP Plus, connected to the IIGS courtesy of Vitesse’s Harmonie. The use of TrueType fonts is courtesy of WestCode Software’s Pointless. E-mail Addresses: CIS: 76702,565 GENIE: JOE.KOHN INTERNET: joko@crl.com 2 Shareware Solutions IT the last few years, chances are that you've seen the “Magic Eye” series of books. Those books contain graphic images that at first glance look like a jumble of colors, but if you look at them in a certain way and for a certain length of time, they are magi- cally transformed into three di- mensional images that literally come to life and jump off the page. Called random dot stereograms, thousands of images similar to “Magic Eye” graphics can be found on the Internet. Unfortu- nately, those images were cre- ated on computer systems with resolution greater than the IIGS can display on a single screen, and the 3-D effects are com- pletely lost when those images are converted to the 320 x 200 graphic mode that the IIGS displays best. Are Apple IIGS users therefore unable to enjoy random dot stereograms? Not anymore, thanks to Lee Golden, the Man- aging Editor of Softdisk G-S. Lee has granted Shareware Sol- utions II permission to distrib- ute ThreeDer, a program that originally appeared on Issue 67 of Softdisk G-S. ThreeDer will convert any IIGS Super Hi Res graphic into a random dot stere- ogram, and display it on screen or let you print it out. Effective immediately, Three- Der is available from Share- ware Solutions II for $5. De- spite its low cost, ThreeDer is not shareware or freeware; it re- mains copyrighted by Softdisk. EGO Systems The number of products avail- able from EGO Systems just keeps growing and growing. They continue to sell ZipGS ac- celerator cards, back issues of GS+ Magazine and several IIGS software titles that they pub- lish, including Addressed For Success, AutoArk, and Balloon, but their product line now boasts many new additions. EGO Systems was able to track down a former Apple II vendor who had unsold inventory, and was able to secure a limited number of copies of PublishIt v4, the premiere desktop publishing program for the IIe/IIc, and is now offering it for $39.95. Also available in limited quantities is the PaceMark IIGS 4 Mega- byte RAM card for $109. EGO continues to program new IIGS software, and is now of- fering several translators for Seven Hills Software’s Graphic- Writer III desktop publishing program. The RTF Translator ($24.95) allows GWIII to import “Rich Text Format” files into a page layout document with all formatting remaining intact, and their new AWGS Translator ($14.95) allows AppleWorks GS word processing documents to be imported into GWIII with all font information, text, text col- ors, and paragraph justification and indentation remaining in- tact. In addition to their own soft- ware, EGO now carries the en- tire catalog of TimeOut based AppleWorks enhancements from Office Productivity Software, in- cluding About Time ($14.95), ShrinkIt Plus ($29.95) and Statistics ($79.95). If you haven't yet seen EGO Sys- tems brand new 20 page catalog, you owe it to yourself to contact them and request a free copy. Please contact EGO before or- dering any products, as some of them are available only in lim- ited quantities. EGO Systems 7918 Cove Ridge Road Hixson, TN 37343-1808 800-622-3634 (orders only) 423-843-1775 (questions) 423-843-0661 (fax) Basic Screen Blanker Tom Zuchowski of the Eamon Adventurers Guild wrote a sim- ple Applesoft Basic program that blanks his Ile’s computer screen to prevent phosphor burn while his computer is not being used, and he’d like to share that program with you. He suggests that you type it in, save the pro- gram to disk, and then run it whenever you are going to be away from your computer. In order to type the program in, you'll need to run Basic.System, which can be found on your Sys- tem Disk or on many of your self starting ProDOS disks. Once you run Basic.System, you will be deposited at the Applesoft prompt (J). From that prompt, just type in the following short program, pressing your Return key after each line. 10 HGR 20 HOME 30 GET A$: PRINT A$ 40 TEXT 50 END After you have typed it in, type the RUN command and decide whether you like this very basic and simple screen blanker. You can end the program by pressing any key, and you'll be back at the Applesoft Basic prompt. If you’re familiar with Apple- soft’s SAVE and PREFIX com- mands, just save the program to disk and then run it whenever you are away from your comput- er for more than a few minutes. Tf you are unfamiliar with those commands, you may want to set up a self starting disk that au- tomatically runs the program. In order to easily do that, for- mat a ProDOS disk, copy Pro- DOS and Basic.System to that disk, and then startup that disk. Then, enter the above pro- gram and when finished, type SAVE STARTUP to save it to disk. Low Cost Enhancements Dr Steve Buggie continues to offer great deals to Apple II us- ers; his most current hobbyist projects involve connecting IBM- style power supplies to Apple Tle or IIGS systems, and offer- ing customized improvements to Disk II disk drives. IBM-style power supplies gener- ate the same voltages required by the Apple II, but they deliver 150-200 watts of power, more than twice the output of the standard 60 watt Apple II pow- er supply. Problems associated with weak power can be reduced or eliminated by using an IBM- style power supply, and you can safely fill all of your slots or add extra disk drives without over- loading the power source. Dr Buggie includes cabling and connector plugs with the power supplies, and has them avail- able in two sizes: 150 watts for $27 or 200 watts for $30. There is an additional $5 required for shipping. Specify whether you plan to use the power supply on a Ile or IGS, and please note that these power supplies are external, and will sit on the floor beneath your Apple Ile or IIGS. As mentioned in the last issue, Dr Buggie continues to tune up Disk II disk drives for $5. But, he now offers to supercharge those drives by adding a front panel three position manual write protection toggle switch or by adding a front panel speed adjust knob. Each of these en- hancements can be added by Dr Buggie for $5, plus $4.50 per drive for shipping and handling. If you don’t want to be bothered by boxing up your old Disk II drive, Dr Buggie will sell you one with both of the enhancements already installed for only $24 plus $4.50 shipping. If you’d prefer to perform the modifications yourself, make sure you attend Dr Buggie’s presentation at KansasFest. Dr Steve Buggie UNM-Gallup 200 College Rd Gallup NM 87301 505-863-7504 (office) 505-863-2390 (home) buggie@unm.edu On The Horizon Dan Crutcher created Check- Works as a checking account program that works from within AppleWorks as a TimeOut mod- ule. He originally released CheckWorks as a shareware program for AppleWorks v3, and when Quality Computers re- leased AppleWorks v4.0, they purchased the rights to Check- Works and re-released it as a commercial program available exclusively from Quality. Unfortunately, by the time AppleWorks v5 was released, Quality had already started to scale back the scope of its Apple II software catalog, and they no longer seemed interested in of- Shareware Solutions IT 3 fering updated AppleWorks v5 compatible TimeOut-based pro- grams. For that reason, Dan is working with Quality to have the copyrights for CheckWorks revert back to him, and he is also working with Shareware Solutions II to re-release all the various versions of CheckWorks. As planned, we will make three different versions of Check- Works available in a single package, so that whether you use AppleWorks v3, 4.x or 5.x, you'll be able to write and print checks, maintain a checkbook register, show current balances, and reconcile accounts without ever having to leave Apple- Works. It’s expected that we’ll have details in the next issue, but if you can’t wait that long, look for an announcement online, or send a self addressed stamped en- velope to Shareware Solutions II, and you'll receive notification when CheckWorks becomes available. @ Lies, Hello Again! After far too long an absence, I am happy to be reporting on Apple II rumors once again. I am especially glad to finally be working with someone who knows the real meaning of jour- nalism. Not only that, but Dr Field is a babe too. Oh, yeah, Joe Kohn is OK too I guess. A Meaningful Relationship If you’ve been wondering why nobody has come out with IIGS software for the QuickTake or QuickCam video devices, you're not alone. But that may change soon if the rumored IIGS Quick- Cam software comes to pass. Yet Another KansasFest In case you haven't heard yet, the committee who put together last year’s successful Kansas- Fest is gearing up to do it again. This year’s show will take place from July 17-21 (Wednesday through Sunday) at Avila Col- lege in Kansas City, Missouri. The cost will be a mere $375 for the whole show, including all room and food fees. So, if you want to go, sign up now! If you know you want to go, and you’ve got an American Express, Visa or MasterCard, you can register 4 Shareware Solutions IT By Professor G.S. Gumby for the show by calling Kellers’ Auto Electric (this year’s KFest sponsor) at 908-775-0371. If you want more information on the show, send an e-mail to kfest.info$@genie.com or write: KFest ’96 c/o Kellers’ Auto Electric PO Box 391 Brielle, NJ 08730 Tangled Up In Hype Just as the rest of the world be- gins to figure out that the World Wide Web is somewhat less thrilling than all the hype would have us believe, rumors are fly- ing about the imminent release of three different web browsers for the IIGS. At this point, there’s no word on when any of these will actually ship, but at least one of them should be ready no later than August. Just You Wait If you bought a Second Sight video card for your IIGS and you've been wondering where all the Second Sight-aware applica- tions are...just wait. Sequential has said that they plan to sup- port the card as fully as possi- ble, but they are having some trouble moving forward with those plans since the card’s soft- Lies, And More Lies ware designer left the company. Is There Anybody Out There? If this fine publicaton is the only Apple II literature that you know of, it might surprise you to find out that there are at least four other periodicals out there for you to latch onto. For exam- ple, II Alive still has four issues left to go before Quality Com- puters pulls the plug on it. Softdisk G-S (318-221-8718 for info) is still going strong and shows no sign of stopping. Juiced GS is a IIGS-specific newsletter that Joe Kohn spoke at length about in our last issue (direct your e-mail message to M.Jones145@genie.com for more information). And finally, there’s even a NEW publication for you to check out. It’s called The AppleBlossom and you can send e-mail to SteveC1021@aol.com for more information. Speaking Of E-Mail If you own an Apple II and you don’t have a Genie account, shame on you! Genie is one of the few online services that still treats Apple II owners like hu- man beings. Best of all, they’ve got new owners and new lower prices! For more info, call them at 800-638-9636. Ask Mr 8-Ball For those of you who aren't familiar with my old column in GS+ Magazine, my good friend Mr 8-Ball is the one source that I can always turn to when I need to get a rumor confirmed. So let’s get right to those rumors! Gumby: Rumor has it that a venerable Apple II company is looking to turn technical sup- port for its Apple II products over to another company. True? 8-Ball: As I see it, yes. Gumby: I’ve heard that Apple is going to be porting its new Copeland operating system over to the IIGS. True? 8-Ball: Better not tell you now. Gumby: A miniscule avian told me that the programming on Wolfenstein 3-D for the IIGS has been done for months. Is it true that legal troubles are the only thing keeping it from being released? 8-Ball: My reply is no. Gumby: I’ve heard that someone out there is working on a Kodak Photo CD viewer application for the IIGS. True? 8-Ball: Yes. Definitely. Gumby: I’ve also heard that there are two separate projects to create an Apple IIGS emu- lator for the PowerMac. Will either of these ever see the light of day? 8-Ball: Very doubtful. @ The Computer That Could Have Changed The World Meet Mark Twain Each year, Apple’s User Group Connection co-sponsors a sum- mer conference and convention for Apple User Group leaders, and it was at the July, 1991 convention that I first learned about Apple’s imminent plans to release a new souped-up Ap- ple IIGS computer, code-named Mark Twain. The 1991 National Apple User Group Convention was held near me at the University of California in Berkeley. Usually the convention is co-sponsored by a local user group, but that year it was co-sponsored by an individual — Raines Cohen — the founder of the Berkeley Macin- tosh User Group. At the time, I was wondering whether there would be anything of interest at the convention for an Apple II User Group officer, so I con- tacted Raines and was some- what dismayed to find out that absolutely no arrangements had yet been made to offer any Apple II sessions. Not being one who is easily dis- couraged when it comes to the Apple II, I asked Raines about the possibility of offering some sessions for Apple II User Group leaders, and he agreed that if I wanted to coordinate all of the Apple II activities, I was welcome to do so. I was off and running. I immediately contacted Tim Swihart, a well-known Apple II programmer who had been hired by Apple to serve in a manageri- al position in the then-Apple II division. Tim agreed to attend the convention and to give a talk. At the time, both Hyper- Card IIGS and System 5.0.4 had recently been released, so I expected that one or both of these would be the subject of his talk. On the day that the convention started, I was surprised to see that Tim Swihart didn’t come alone; all of the top level man- agers of the Apple II division ac- companied him. Besides myself, there were no more than five oth- er Apple II owners in atten- dance. What we heard that day was remarkable in that it was the first time, and possibly the only time, that Apple employees ever spoke to the public about the Mark Twain computer. The Big Picture During the summer of 1991, the Apple IIGS was alive and well, and Apple was still more than 1.5 years away from announcing its discontinuation. System 6.0 hadn’t yet been announced, and the SuperDrive Controller Card was still six months away from being released. Those were hope- ful and optimistic times; not e- ven a year had passed since Ap- ple CEO John Sculley pro- claimed in an open letter to the Apple II community, “Apple’s commitment to its 5 million Apple II users is to continue to create products that improve the functionality and performance of Shareware Solutions II 5 their computers. Apple will sell, service, and support the Apple II line well into the 1990s.” At the 1991 User Group Con- vention, the Apple employees were very excited and they had one item, and one item only, that they wanted to discuss with those in attendance: the soon to be released Mark Twain. They quickly rattled off some basic technical specifications: the machine would have a built- in 3.5" disk drive and a built-in 40 megabyte hard drive, and it would ship with System Soft- ware, AppleWorks GS and Hy- perCard IIGS pre-installed on the hard drive. They stated that the Mark Twain was intended to be sold primarily in the edu- cational marketplace. They waved around a copy of Apple’s most current marketing bro- chure, and it was there that our attention was directed towards the “Educational Bundle” - a package deal for educators that included a ROM 3 IIGS, exter- nal 3.5" and 5.25" disk drives, a 40 megabyte hard drive that came with System 5.0.4 pre- installed, along with HyperCard TIGS and AppleWorks GS. As excited as the Apple employ- ees were about the imminent re- lease of a new model IIGS, they kept trying to point out that the Mark Twain was simply in- tended to replace the “Educa- tional Bundle” then being of- fered for $1,299. Although we never actually saw the new IIGS, we were led to believe that it was just mere weeks or months away from being re- leased and that the last step in the process was to determine the pricing. Although no firm price was announced that day, the Apple employees indicated that the cost would be about $999, which would place it in 6 Shareware Solutions IT the same price range as the first of the “low cost” Macs that had been released in late 1990. That was truly an exciting meeting, and I think all of us were thrilled to be the first Ap- ple users informed of Apple’s upcoming plans. Several weeks later, that same Apple II team traveled to Peterborough, New Hampshire to give employees of inCider/A+ Magazine their own sneak peek at the Mark Twain. Unlike at the User Group con- vention, an actual Mark Twain prototype was shown to the inCider/A+ editors. At the time, inCider/A+ had plans to devote an issue to the Mark Twain; alas, those plans never materi- alized because in the late sum- mer of 1991, inCider/A+ was in- formed that the Mark Twain project had been cancelled. And, nothing more was ever heard from Apple about the project. Fast Forward Five Years After its cancellation, tales of the Mark Twain project took on almost mythic proportions. Sto- ries circulated in the Apple II world about the cancelled proj- ect, and that community re- named the Mark Twain as the ROM 4 computer. Rumors about the capabilities of the Mark Twain circulated for years but nothing was ever heard from Apple, except for a well dis- guised reference to Mark Twain that appeared on the cover of the 1992 edition of Apple’s “The Apple II Guide.” But certainly no outsiders, aside from the inCider/A+ staff, had ever seen a Mark Twain. Until October, 1995, that is. At the end of October, 1995, I was presiding over the monthly meeting of The GravenStein Ap- ple User Group, and was busy answering some technical ques- tions about the Apple II when several Mark Twain computers literally walked themselves into my life. Several days prior to the meet- ing, a fellow club officer received acry for help over the telephone. The call started innocently e- nough: “Help. Something is wrong with my IIGS computer.” The club officer tried to deter- mine which model IIGS the call- er had and tried to get as many details as possible. From the way the caller described her sys- tem, the club officer was unable to determine which model Apple TIGS she had, as there had been several references to a built-in disk drive. So, the caller was in- vited to bring her computer to the next meeting. She did, and when the woman walked into the room, I was in the middle of describing how to convert various foreign format graphics to a IIGS format. I glanced over at her and her com- puter, and my jaw dropped. I in- stantly lost my train of thought, and quite frankly, I was so stunned by what I saw that I was temporarily at a complete loss for words. The computer, at first glance, looked like a standard Apple IIGS. But, I noticed, there really was a built-in 3.5" disk drive. How was that possible? Need- less to say, I no longer cared a- bout explaining how to convert graphics. I wanted to know what that IIGS was. I rushed over and immediately opened the case, and there was a motherboard unlike anything I had ever seen before. It had only five slots, and a square shaped power supply. It had a built-in 3.5" disk drive and a built-in SCSI hard drive sitting just under the 3.5" drive. Upon turning the machine over, I saw, just as plain as day, the notation on the sticker attached to the underside of the case - “Prototype: Mark Twain.” The woman said she had two of them, along with a spare moth- erboard!!! Apparently, she had gotten them from a friend of a friend of a friend’s ex-husband whose former sister-in-law’s cousin used to work for Apple. The woman had absolutely no idea how rare her computers were; to her they were just IIGS computers. On the spot, I of- fered to purchase her Mark Twains, but they were both cur- rently in daily use, and there was no way she was going to part with them. Or, so she said. Wheelin’ And Dealin’ I was so distracted for the rest of the meeting that I never even noticed that the woman with the Mark Twain had left, and much to my dismay, I never even learned her name. While more excited than I’d been in a long time, I was also quite dis- mayed that the secrets which lay within the Mark Twain might really be lost forever. Several days later, I was con- tacted by our user group’s hard- ware wizard, our club’s very own Mr Fix It, Ray MacAnally. Ap- parently, while I was distracted, Ray had made arrangements to take a look at the Mark Twains and to fix them if at all possi- ble. Almost as if to taunt me, he told me that he was going to get the Mark Twains that very day. Upon receipt of the Mark Twains, he reported “the sup- ports for the drives are fabri- cated from metal that have an unfinished look to them, and it is a real bear to disassemble the whole thing.” He noticed that each of the three mother- boards he examined were slight- ly different. He also stated that “the floppy disk will not eject when the button is pushed, and this is due to a problem on the motherboard and not on the drive or switch.” He bypassed that problem by rewiring the eject switch directly to the drive connector. Before returning the Mark Twains to their owner, Ray told me that he planned to wheel and deal and to get one of those machines for himself, and won- dered what it would be worth to me. I blurted out: “What do you want?” The response was: “A full blown, state of the art Macintosh system.” I wondered, “How on earth am I going to be able to get such a system and not go bankrupt?” During the next month, there were many more desperate phone calls made, and I eventu- ally learned the name of the woman who owned the Mark Twains and was able to extract a price from her for the one re- maining Mark Twain. All she wanted was “a full blown, state of the art PC clone.” I wondered, “How on earth am I going to be able to get such a system and not go bankrupt?” I looked at ads in the local newspaper, and saw that mod- ern day Macs and PC clones started at about $1,500, and that putting together two “full blown” systems for trading pur- poses was beyond my means. Who do I know, I wondered, who loves the Apple II but who sells Macs and PC clones? The long list I came up with had exactly one name on it, and that was Tony Diaz of Alltech Electron- ics. If anyone had access to great systems at low cost, it would be Tony. As if on cue, Tony contacted me before I had a chance to contact him; he had al- ready heard the tale of the Mark Twain through the Apple II grapevine. Within just a few days, the deals were concluded, and I was heading off to sunny Southern California, with two Mark Twain computers well packed for the long ride. One of those Mark Twains was destined to be the one this very article was prepared on, and the other was destined to enter Tony Diaz’s unofficial Apple II museum. The Age Of Discovery Tony Diaz and I spent the next four or five days literally im- mersed in the Mark Twain com- puters. We ripped them apart and put them back together again. We connected Focus hard Drives and CD-ROM drives. We tried every piece of software we had at our disposal. We ran Sys- tem 6 and System 6.0.1. We ran diagnostics and dumped the ROMs to disk. We examined and compared the Mark Twain to both the ROM 01 and ROM 3. And, we’ve continued to examine those machines for the past six months. And in all that time, the only software programs we have found that wouldn’t work on the Mark Twain were a few of the early FTA demo programs. We've made quite a few discov- eries, the highlights of which follow. A Guided Tour Let’s first get a perspective; when comparing the innards of a ROM 3 and a ROM 01, for the most part, the motherboards ap- pear to be quite similar. Some more custom chips were added to the ROM 3, a new battery Shareware Solutions IT 7 holder was installed, and the a- mount of RAM on the mother- board was increased. There were also some minor improve- ments in power routing to de- crease the “noise interference” levels that plagued the ROM 01, but to the average Apple IIGS user, the ROM 3 was essentially just a ROM 01 with an extra megabyte of RAM. One look at the motherboard of the Mark Twain leaves no doubt that there were major and re- markable engineering changes made since the ROM 3 had been released. For starters, there is a slot cut into the front of the case where a 3.5" disk can be in- serted. Upon opening the case, it is clear that the motherboard is 1.5" wider than in the two previous models and there are only five slots instead of the customary seven. The built-in 3.5" drive sits above a Quantum LPS 40 megabyte hard drive which in turn is connected to the built-in High Speed SCSI Con- troller which provides daisy chain capabilities, so Slot 7 is no longer needed. Additionally, the new built-in stereo sound circuitry has been improved over the previous models by virtually isolating it electrically from the rest of the motherboard; in es- sence, the entire area sur- rounding where Slot 7 would ap- pear has been taken over by the built-in equivalent to a stereo card. In addition to the 2 megabytes of RAM found on the mother- board, there are two 30 pin SIMM sockets that can each ac- cept 1 megabyte SIMMs; there- fore 4 megabytes are the maxi- mum amount of RAM that can be utilized on the Mark Twain. Among the other new elements found on the motherboard are a Piezo Electric Speaker, the High 8 Shareware Solutions IT Speed SCSI card and a FDHD SuperDrive Controller chip set. To add all of those additional components and still fit the motherboard in the same case, a lot of engineering miracles had to happen. In some ways, the Mark Twain has the perfect motherboard in terms of layout as everything is contained in its own area of the board. The built-in RAM has been moved to the very front edge of the moth- erboard, located near the power LED, and higher density surface mount RAM chips have been used so that only four chips are required to total the 2 mega- bytes of RAM supplied on the motherboard. In comparison, the ROM 01 uses eight chips to equal 256K, and the ROM 3 uses eight chips to equal 1 megabyte. Like both other IIGS models, the Mark Twain has 128K of “slow” RAM to remain compatible with the original de- sign and to insure backward compatibility with the Apple Tle. The two 30 Pin SIMM sockets on the Mark Twain are found in the exact same spot where the ROM 01 and ROM 3 memory ex- pansion slot is located. Directly next to and above the SIMM sockets is the sound area with the Ensoniq chip. The Piezo Electric Speaker is also located above the SIMM sockets. Al- though that speaker actually sounds worse than the speaker found in all other Apple II mod- els, full stereo output is provid- ed via the rear port connection jack, making stereo speakers connected to the back of the GS essentially plug and play. Per- haps Apple never really in- tended for anyone to actually use the Piezo Electric Speaker. Built-in sound digitizing capa- bilities similar to that of the HyperStudio Slotless digitizer have been integrated into this section as well, with the input connector straddled on top of the stereo headphone/speaker jack. The sound hardware stretches over to the inner side of the printer port and immediately next to it is the last slot, slot 6. Despite rumors that the Mark Twain is a speed demon, a stan- dard 65C816-4 CPU running at 2.8 Mhz is found in the same physical location as it is on the other IIGS models; therefore, standard ZIP GS and Trans- Warp GS accelerators can be used on the Mark Twain. To the left of slot 1 is a square shaped higher output half size power supply with two +5 supply wires and a built-in cooling fan. The power supply sits on top of a long metal assembly that ex- tends the full length of the com- puter and attached to that as- sembly, in front of the power supply, is the floppy disk and hard drive unit. In between the power supply and the disk as- sembly is a gap of less than .5", and peering into that gap you can easily see the new location of the floppy controller hard- ware. Directly beneath that is the power supply connector and a 50 pin header for the SCSI/ Floppy daughterboard. Below, and occupying the rest of the board to the lower edge, is the High Speed SCSI controller. The floppy controller consists of a 34480061A chip, which is Ap- ple’s SWIM (Super Woz Inte- grated Machine) chip that is also found on the SuperDrive Controller card and on newer Macintosh models. Despite the fact that the disk drive appears to be capable of handling high density disks, the functionality is limited to 800K due to lack of FDHD firmware. Please note that the FDHD SuperDrive con- troller card wasn’t actually re- leased until November, 1991, several months after the Mark Twain was cancelled. The SCSI hardware is also in a similar unfinished state; it con- sists of hardware similar to a High Speed DMA SCSI card, but it does not operate quite as fast as the High Speed SCSI card. Although the $C700 mem- ory location looks just like there is an Apple High Speed SCSI card attached to Slot 7, none of the standard SCSI utilities aside from ADU work with the built-in SCSI hardware. Located in front of slot 1, and to the right of the SCSI/Floppy daughterboard header, is a 26 pin male header for attaching a ribbon cable that connects to the back of the computer in or- der to permit more SCSI de- vices to be part of a daisy chain. There is only one SCSI bus built-in, so there is a maximum of six additional SCSI devices that can be daisy chained to the SCSI controller. Impressions After discussing for months our Mark Twain discoveries, Tony Diaz and I have reached many of the same conclusions about the computer, and we have both enjoyed speculating on the moti- vations Apple had for designing such a computer and the possi- ble reasons why Apple cancelled the project. Aside from the tech- nical data presented above, all of which was directly observed with our own eyes, our conclu- sions are completely unsubstan- tiated and therefore impossible to prove. But, as long time Ap- ple followers, we like to think that our conclusions are educat- ed guesses. For the past ten years, Apple has desperately been trying to cut manufacturing costs, and we believe that it was cost cutting measures that led to the devel- opment of the Mark Twain. Af- ter all, the Mark Twain bor- rowed several important parts from the Macintosh, including the hard drive/3.5" disk assem- bly and SIMM Sockets. Al- though the Mark Twain was a technological and engineering marvel, we speculate that the machine was dreamed up by Apple’s marketing department as a way to partially reverse IBM’s inroads into the class- room. It seems to us that if Ap- ple offered a complete computer system for less than $1,000 that would run all of the thou- sands of Apple II educational software titles, they’d have a big seller on their hands. As things turned out, in late 1990 Apple did release a com- plete Macintosh computer syst- em for less than $1,000 and in March, 1991 Apple released the Ile card for the Macintosh LC. We speculate that it was the LC/Ile card combination that most probably delivered the 1-2 punch that knocked the Apple II family out of Apple’s product line-up and that was directly responsible for the cancellation of the Mark Twain. Of course, we had several flights of fancy and imagined that the Mark Twain was actually built by several Apple II loyalist en- gineers who were trying to keep the Apple II alive by lowering the manufacturing costs. Or, we even imagined that it was to be Apple’s “swan song,” a parting present to the Apple II world. In any case, the Mark Twain could have been a wonderful computer with amazing capabil- ities that didn’t require lots of expensive add-ons. It could have been the ultimate Apple II. It could have been the second Ap- ple II to change the world. (Note: You are cordially invited to attend a public showing/demo of the Mark Twain prototype on Saturday, June 15, 1996 at 10 AM at the Trinity Community Church, 1675 Grand Avenue, San Rafael, CA. The Mark Twain will be shown as a fund raising benefit for the Graven- Stein Apple User Group; admis- sion for non-members will be $5.) Shareware Solutions II would like to acknowledge the valuable contributions made to this article by Ray MacAnally and Tony Diaz. It would not have been possible without their help.@ Stack Central/Studio City What’s It All About? From 1990 to 1995, Resource Central and its ICON successor published an amazingly crea- tive bi-monthly interactive Hy- perStudio based magazine-on- disk that originally appeared as Stack Central but was later re- named Studio City. During that time, a total of 30 issues were published and Shareware Solu- tions II is pleased to announce that all 30 issues are available once again. HyperStudio, of course, is the easy to use award winning hy- Shareware Solutions IT 9 permedia construction kit for the Apple IIGS that permits non-programmers to create non- linear interactive software that can contain any combination of scrolling text, digitized sounds, animations, or graphics. Each of the 30 issues of Studio City is a veritable work of art that shows off the amazing ca- pabilities of HyperStudio. Each two disk issue serves a dual purpose as both a showcase for the very best HyperStudio gen- erated software ever created, and as an on-going tutorial and resource guide for those who want to learn how to tap the in- credible power of HyperStudio to create inventive and creative software (often called stacks). Each issue contains a potpourri of articles about HyperStudio, interactive tutorials, digitized sounds, beautiful clip art, cus- tom XCMDs (short for External Commands), NBAs (short for New Button Actions), and ex- amples of HyperStudio crea- tions that often include detailed descriptions about how it was created and usually provides in- formation on how you can use similar techniques in your own HyperStudio projects. Although Studio City holds great interest to those who cre- ate their own HyperStudio stacks, there are a lot of won- derfully imaginative and crea- tive stacks included that will be of interest to teachers, students and even small children. You don’t need to be a hypermedia designer to appreciate Studio City. All it takes to enjoy Studio City is a desire to see the best that the Apple IIGS has to offer. Requirements HyperStudio, and Studio City, 10 Shareware Solutions IT require a IIGS, a 3.5" disk drive, 1.25 megabytes of RAM, and System 5.0.2 or later. You do not even need to own the Hyper- Studio program to use Studio City since a HyperStudio “play- er” program is included with all Studio City disks. Ordering Information If you've never experienced the wonders of HyperStudio or seen Studio City before, you can sam- ple those wonders through a three disk Sampler Pack for only $6. Single issues are available for $7 each, which includes ship- ping to anywhere in the world. A six issue combo pack (choose any six issues) is available for $36. Shipping charges are $3 for US destinations or $5 else- where. You can purchase all 30 issues for $120. Shipping charges for the entire set are $6 for US delivery, $10 for delivery to Canada and Mexico, and $20 for Air Mail anywhere else. As always, send checks or mon- ey orders (in US Funds only) made payable to “Joe Kohn” to: Joe Kohn Shareware Solutions II 166 Alpine St San Rafael, CA 94901-1008 The Master Index Issue 1: The premiere issue of Stack Central appeared in Feb- ruary, 1990 and although that first issue may have been a “little rough around the edges,” it did provide a glimpse into the future glories that would evolve. In this issue, there are several newsletter-types of articles in- cluding Future Hype which con- tains a wish list and vision of the uses of hypermedia and the TIGS. Stack Ideas provides guidelines for creating a hyper- media based user interface, and Hypermedia In Use describes a college level Physical Sciences project that uses HyperStudio to control laserdisks. The HyperStudio stacks in this issue include a Question and Answer stack that addresses some elementary HyperStudio concerns. There are two geogra- phy related stacks: Geo Test is a stack that uses the test func- tions of HyperStudio to test your knowledge of countries in North and Central America, and A- cross The USA is the first in- stallment of a group project de- signed to eventually teach about all 50 states. This first portion is a visual almanac about Kan- sas. Included are maps, demo- graphic data, historical informa- tion, and digitized sound files of the state song and the state bird. In addition to the Kansas stack, there is a template for you to use to create a similar stack about your home state. There is also a stack that in- cludes seven sound effects that you can use in your own crea- tions. HyperMagic performs magic tricks from within Hyper- Studio, and HyperTubes teaches the notes of the musical scale. Issue 2: The articles in this issue focus on HyperStudio; one describes a course about Hyper- Studio offered on television, while another describes the use of interactive video and multi- media education. The HyperStudio stacks in this issue include two inventive stacks that describe how and when nearly 50 common phrases and cliches worked their way in- to the English language. There’s also a stack with six sound files that you can use with your own stacks. HyperSpace provides a simulated tour of our solar system, complete with factual information about all of the planets. This issue sees the introduction of the first two of many Hyper- Studio add-ons called XCMDs that will appear in Stack Cen- tral and Studio City. Complete with step-by-step instructions on how to implement them in your own stacks, the Border XCMD allows you to easily change the color of the IIGS bor- der, and Dialog XCMD allows you to create a custom dialog box with up to 30 characters and add a button to return the user to the current card. This issue also contains two useful New Desk Accessories that can help you while you are using HyperStudio or any other GS/OS application that sup- ports NDAs. File Manager al- lows you to copy, move, get infor- mation, or delete a file while within a GS/OS application. Write It is a mini-word pro- cessor that can be called up from within GS/OS programs. Issue 3: The articles in this is- sue include yet another one that focuses on interactive video, but this latest article is accompa- nied by a videodisc controller XCMD. There’s also a discus- sion about locking HyperStudio stacks and copyrighting them. There’s a detailed and technical article, provided by the team that created HyperStudio, that serves as an XCMD Reference Guide and includes source code examples in several languages including Orca C, Pascal, and Assembler. There are three more digitized sound files that can be used in other stacks, and an amusing Perplexing Puzzles stack that includes word puzzles, puzzles that involve puns, and picture puzzles that include animated solutions. Issue 4: The articles in this is- sue include detailed instruc- tions on installing and using Stack Central on hard disk drives. There is also an infor- mative tutorial on using differ- ent fonts and text styles in HyperStudio stacks, and as a bonus, eight nice looking bit- mapped fonts in various point sizes are included. Color Stack was created by a six year old (with a little help from Dad) and it helps beginning readers to recognize and pro- nounce colors. Riddle Maze is a stack that was offered as a con- test; subscribers were chal- lenged to try to solve the cryptic word and pictogram puzzle, and were offered a $100 prize if they could crack the code. Issue 5: With this issue, we start to see some evolutionary changes to the basic design and layout of Stack Central, re- sulting in improved stack navi- gation and with less emphasis on newsletter articles and more focus on HyperStudio stacks. There is a short write-up about the HyperStudio related activi- ties at KansasFest ’90, and a continuation of the article about fonts, with special emphasis on explaining the differences be- tween serif and sans serif fonts. To illustrate those differences, six bit mapped fonts in various point sizes are included. Balloons is an informative stack about hot air balloons and the Letter Stack provides in- structions, and beautiful looking examples, that detail how Hy- perStudio can be used to gener- ate elegant hypermedia-based letters and correspondence. Me- lodia, created by a college level music teacher, is designed to as- sist in the practice of correlating musical notation with the sounds it represents in a simple melodic context; unfortunately, only three of the five included melodic samples work correctly. Issue 6: The articles in this is- sue focus on new HyperStudio add-on products, and how to combine graphic elements with text items. In conjunction with the text article, there’s detailed information and a Scroll XCMD that allows you to use scrolling text in your stacks. A second XCMD is included that will al- low you to create stacks that can be easily navigated by people with disabilities who rely on adaptive input devices to control allGS. There are two stacks devoted to Clip Art, and to make it easy for you to use the graphic images in your own stacks, eight Super Hi Res screens of clip art are in- cluded. There’s a fascinating his- torical stack about the world’s first jet aircraft, the Messer- schmidt 109. There’s a stack a- bout various types of whales and in true hypermedia fashion, you can even listen to the song of the Humpback whale. Lastly, there is a Rapid Home Stack which will allow you to easily design a customized replacement for Hy- perStudio’s Home Stack. Issue 7: In addition to news- letter types of articles about Hypercard IGS and AppleFest 1990, there’s a fascinating hy- permedia based interactive ar- ticle about combining various text and graphic elements to cre- Shareware Solutions IT i ate and design a visually stun- ning HyperStudio screen. There are four sound files that can be used in your own stacks, and an early version of Audio- Zap, a full featured GS/OS based sound editing program. The highlight of this issue is a creative stack devoted to Shake- speare’s 55th Sonnet. It is quite detailed and includes every- thing from the anatomy of a sonnet to the history of Shake- speare’s period. You can either read the sonnet or listen to it being read to you. Issue 8: In this issue, there’s a thought provoking article about using hypermedia in education that discusses the advantages of using the non-linear ap- proach, as implemented in Hy- perStudio, over more traditional methods. There’s also a stack based interactive article that introduces the concept of linking text with visual and graphic ex- amples. There’s a HyperDialer stack which allows you to set up a computerized telephone directo- ry with the capability of clicking on an entry and having the stack dial the phone number (if a modem is connected). Much of this issue is devoted to Sound Smith, the now classic Apple IIGS music program. The Sound Smith program is in- cluded, as well as an XCMD and GS/OS Toolset that allows you to add wonderful sounding mu- sic to your own stacks. (Note: Because HyperStudio has been updated since this issue first appeared, there’s a new article written by Joe Kohn that de- scribes how to use these tools with HyperStudio v3.1) Issue 9: With this issue, we 12 Shareware Solutions IT witness a magical transforma- tion as Stack Central undergoes a transition from an infor- mative and educational Hyper- Studio journal into a work of art. A new editor, a new editori- al staff, a new staff artist, a new look, and fresh new ideas have come to Stack Central. In this issue, we find many tu- torials, directed at both ad- vanced stack creators and be- ginners alike, that explain the inner workings of HyperStudio. The articles have been trans- formed into interactive animat- ed tutorials, as best illustrated by Button School, a stack which includes six step-by-step les- sons in creating three dimen- sional animated navigational buttons. In conjunction with the tutorials there are two addi- tional and impressive stacks, Stupid Button Tricks 1 and 2, which show you just how sophis- ticated HyperStudio is when used as an animation studio. There’s also a tutorial stack, written by one of the program- mers who created HyperStudio, that explains everything you could ever possibly want to know about using sound effects in HyperStudio stacks. There are two text related XCMDs: LoadText and Save- Text. LoadText will permit you to easily add any type of disk- based text material to a stack and SaveText permits you to save user input as text, making it possible, for example, to have students take HyperStudio- based tests. The tutorials that explain the use of these XCMDs are excellent, and a stack based word processing program is in- cluded to illustrate just how simple it is to implement these useful XCMDs in your own stacks. There are also five sound files, and seven screens of aviation re- lated clip art. Lastly, there’s a demo version of HyperBole, a HyperStudio based literary and poetry magazine. Issue 10: In this issue, there is a HyperStudio related question and answer stack with many of the answers supplied by Hyper- Studio’s publisher and his staff of programmers. There’s also an excellent article about XCMDs that defines what they are and how to use them, and the article is accompanied by a Scroll XCMD that allows you to easily create animations by scrolling any section of a Super Hi Res screen at any speed. Animation School is a four part tutorial that offers fascinating examples and detailed step-by- step instructions about anima- tion, including how to use clip art to create animations, how to create single image animations that mimic advanced program- ming techniques, and how to cre- ate simple full screen animated special effects. There’s a clip art stack of human faces and a number of Super Hi Res graphic files that are all set up and ready for you to practice animating with your new-found animation skills. Numbers Stack is an education- al stack for pre-schoolers that will help them learn about num- bers. HyperStates is another educational stack that is useful as both a reference guide and a learning tool. Using it, you can learn basic information about every US state and a quiz com- ponent will assist in learning the capitals of each state. Issue 11: More changes are ap- parent with this issue as the new editorial staff settles in. Stack Central has a new look and it seems to have developed a very wild and wacky sense of humor. There’s a very long and fascinating interview with Rog- er Wagner, the publisher of HyperStudio. Additionally, the new resident artist has created his first installment of Pixel- Talk, an interactive and techni- cal, yet humorous, article that explains exactly how the IIGS hardware makes pictures ap- pear on the screen. To comple- ment that article is the new SuperView XCMD that permits 3200 color graphics to be used with HyperStudio. There’s also a program that fixes a bug in HyperStudio v2.1, and a fascinating and well-done puzzle stack that was sub- mitted by a nine year old girl. There’s also a stack that can be used as a replacement Home Stack that will permit you to launch any ProDOS or GS/OS software applications. The title of one stack describes it com- pletely: “Clip Art Made Easy, Or How To Use A Quickie And Platinum Paint To Do Clip Art Screens.” There are several more digitized sound effects and two clip art stacks devoted to Halloween and Thanksgiving. The Hallow- een clip art stack also happens to be animated. As usual, the clip art is also included as stan- dard Super Hi Res graphic screens. Issue 12: To reflect all the re- cent changes, the name of the publication has been changed to Studio City. This issue includes the brand new, and as yet unre- leased at the time, HyperStudio v3.0 run-time module. To show subscribers just how advanced HyperStudio 3.0 is over pre- vious versions, there’s a stack that shows off some of the more amazing new capabilities in- cluding the new transitions. It also provides a peek at the new scripting language, offers a demo of New Button Actions, and demonstrates the seamless integration of 320 mode graph- ics and movable graphic items. There’s an amazingly creative stack called Dam Busters that tells the true story of the RAF’s World War II 617 Squadron which used innovative technol- ogy for that time and faced incredible danger in destroying several key German dams. PixelTalk presents an informa- tive look at 640 mode graphics and offers an in-depth explana- tion of how palettes and dith- ering work. The third install- ment of Stupid Button Tricks offers more innovative ani- mated navigational buttons. Noisy Hypermessages illus- trates several animation tech- niques that can be employed as users wait for your stack to load. Additionally, there’s a clip art stack devoted to winter and the holiday season. There’s also Tool Pak, a set of seven powerful XCMDs that provide access to the GS/OS file system from HyperStudio, al- lowing stack designers to per- form such functions from within HyperStudio as create directo- ries, create ASCII text files, or delete files. Issue 13: This issue gives Stu- dio City a brand new and quite unique look. When attempting to describe the new Studio City look, the editor wrote that the graphic artist responsible “has just about totally lost his mar- bles and his good taste.” Per- haps he was just trying to be playful in order to reflect the theme of this issue: kids and their parents. Then again, the new editor quite possibly lost his marbles too; look for hidden buttons to discover the editor’s secret screens. There are some serious stacks in this issue, including a question and answer session with Roger Wagner concerning the recently released HyperStudio v3.0 and a thorough review of DreamGrafix, a 3200 color paint program. For teachers and parents, there is a tutorial about using Simple- Script to create multiple choice tests. The wonder of this stack is that you can simply cut and paste the scripts into your own stacks, meaning that even nov- ices can now create HyperStudio based multiple choice tests. There’s an inspirational stack created by a HyperStudio novice and her children that describes from a novice’s perspective how to create HyperStudio stacks. For kids, there’s a stack that consists of one word scramble puzzle, two wordsearch puzzles, one mixed up quote puzzle, two crossword puzzles, and eight mazes that your youngsters can solve on screen or on a print out. There’s also a bunny stack that features a poem with some fun animations for beginning read- ers and a poetry stack about a little girl and her dragon. For kids of all ages there’s an- other installment of Stupid But- ton Tricks as well as an assort- ment of five sound files and sev- eral screens of lovely seasonal clip art. Issue 14: This issue also con- tains a mixture of information and stacks for both adults and children. The articles discuss Shareware Solutions IT 13 the latest release of Hyper- Studio. There are six sound files, and three screens of clip art that de- pict dinosaurs, flowers and of- fice tools. There’s another in- stallment of Button School that shows how to design navigation- al buttons using animation techniques to create the illusion of movement when clicked. There’s also another stack for hypermedia novices, created by a novice, that describes and in- structs how to add sound effects to your stacks. There are also instructions on how to create a HyperStudio screen saver along with a sample animated exam- ple. There’s a beautiful looking tutorial, with examples, about how to create a three dimen- sional maze using Simple- Script. There’s also a Tarot Card stack that may, or may not, predict your future. Puppy Piano should be loved by all those who laugh during the holidays when they hear dogs on the radio barking to the tune of Jingle Bells. And lastly, there’s a Spelling Quiz stack that can be customized to contain any word list. Issue 15: This issue contains articles and information on the newest v3.1 HyperStudio up- date, HyperStudio animation and graphics conversion. There are two sound files and three screens of clip art focusing on fantasy themes, basic geometric shapes and schematic symbols. The stacks in this issue are quite eclectic. There’s a Dungeon Designer stack that shows how to create eight animated special effects for use in adventure games, and includes clip art and instructions for game designers. First Impressions shows exactly 14 Shareware Solutions IT how to create stacks with eye- catching animated title pages. Shape Games is a game that has pre-schoolers look at a se- quence of shapes or numbers and decide which shape or num- ber should come next. There’s a fascinating stack on the SR-71 Blackbird supersonic aircraft complete with lots of scanned photos. There are five Screen Savers for HyperStudio v3, and a Saudi Arabia stack, written by a member of the US Air Force who had been stationed there. It includes maps, scanned photos and illustrations which help to explain the culture and religion of that country. Issue 16: This is the first issue that comes with an Installer, a utility which permits one-click hard drive installation. This is- sue also sports a brand new “front end” interface. There are articles in this issue dealing with HyperStudio stack design, with hints and tips on making stacks more efficient and take up less disk space. There are three sound files and three screens of clip art that de- pict birds. Project Mercury is a historical stack that provides a glimpse into America’s first manned space program. It includes an overview, biographical data about the original astronauts, information on each flight and a scrapbook of scanned photos. Beatles Songs contains infor- mation on the songs appearing on the Abbey Road and Magical Mystery Tour albums. Mini Surf is a stack about surfing on the South Shore of Oahu, Hawaii. Exploring Simple Script pro- vides a tutorial about using the Combine command, and Mixing Modes provides instructions on how to combine 320 mode graphics with 640 mode text. Issue 17: In the issue, there are articles about recent updates to HyperStudio, six sound effects and five screens of clip art that depict animals, trains, and maps of the Americas. First Impressions shows how to add animation and sounds to title pages of stacks. Painting Stack shows how beautiful art work can be painted on a com- puter screen. Stupid Button Tricks has more wacky ani- mated navigational buttons and it includes the clip art that was used to create the sequences. Flight School explains by exam- ple the concept of using Master/ Slave stacks where the same information can be accessed in many different ways. Finally, In- side The NFL is a quiz to test how well you understand Ameri- can football. Issue 18: In this issue, there are two sound files and six screens of clip art depicting a moon- scape, mountains, people and maps. Flight School continues with the Master/Slave stack technique and introduces the concept of using an auto exit card that allows, for example, stacks to be password protected. HyperTextures shows owners of hand held scanners how to cre- ate textured background screens in stacks by scanning such com- mon objects as carpets, wallpa- per and tin foil. Tic Tac Toe is a game of Tic Tac Toe with infor- mation about how it was cre- ated. The Addition Stack asks 2nd graders to solve six math problems and when the correct answers are supplied, a graphic is displayed. Issue 19: This issue contains some fascinating answers to subscribers’ questions, three sound files and six screens of clip art that depict children, the solar system, rabbits and maps of Africa. Each and every stack in this is- sue contains a detailed descrip- tion of how it was created, with explanations of how its Simple- Script works. There is an Ad- dress Book stack. There’s an amusing stack entitled Ask The Guy/Ask The Kid that will for- ever replace your need to toss a coin to help make a decision. There’s a stack entitled Fire Arms which is a database stack that’s all set up for you to cus- tomize in order to keep track of any collectibles. HyperGolf is a seven hole animated game of golf. HyperHome is yet another Home Stack replacement; it includes a calendar, a program and stack launcher, a calculator and a link to the Address stack. Finally, there’s Memory Helper Game, a children’s game which is similar to Concentration. Issue 20: Easter Eggs are mes- sages that are often hidden in programs or stacks and are dis- played when a particular button is clicked; this issue is filled with them. It also contains several product announcements, four sound effects and three screens of clip art that depict people, ribbons and hand tools. Clipsters contains six 320 mode animations with instructions on how to use them in your own stacks. Current Events is a wonderful tool for teachers, as it will allow them to easily create their own customized daily or weekly stack focusing on the news of the world. Easter Eggs shows how to create hidden messages in a stack using the supplied AppleRead New But- ton Action add-on. Halogens is a presentation about that group of five non-metallic elements found in the periodic chart. Met- amorph contains three fasci- nating animations that show how plants grow from seeds, frogs from tadpoles and butter- flies from eggs. 3-D Studio has to be seen to be believed; it is a stack that allows you to create three dimensional objects using a unique four way perspective. Issue 21: This issue contains quite a few Apple II product an- nouncements and six screens of clip art depicting classic cars, fish, paint brushes and maps. View 32 is a New Button Action that allows you to use 3200 col- or graphics in your stacks. Acad- emy Awards is a database like stack that lists all the winners of major awards from 1928- 1992. Baccarat is a demo of a commercial HyperStudio stack; the demo explains the rules of Baccarat, contains a detailed description of how the stack was created, and allows you to play five hands. Chunk Expressions teaches how to use Simple- Script to grab part of a string variable and manipulate it in various ways. Daffynitions is a word game in which you are pre- sented with a word and you have to choose the correct defini- tion from several choices. Paint Brushes is a tutorial that shows how to use a paint program’s brush tools to create special ef- fects. Quantum Numbers ex- plains how those numbers are used to describe the properties of electrons. Issue 22: There’s lots of news in this issue for Apple II users, as well as four sounds and three screens of clip art that depict animals, sweets and money. Animals, Animals, Animals is a board game for children in which 16 cards cover the picture of an animal; click on the cards to see a portion of the picture and to get a clue as you try to guess which animal is depicted. Hyper Chicago presents a fascinating look at the city of Chicago with a focus on the history, people, cul- ture, architecture, economy and politics of that city. Fossils was created by an Earth Science teacher to demonstrate how liv- ing organisms turn into fossils. HyperStudio 3-D displays stere- oscopic scanned photographs. Radio Buttons And Check Boxes teaches how to create within Hy- perSudio these common types of GS/OS user inputs. Issue 23: This issue provides a sneak peek at 3-D HyperLogo, an add-on programming lan- guage for HyperStudio, as well as three sound files and three screens of clip art that depict reptiles, the classroom and the Space Shuttle. New Frog & Fly is a game de- signed to be played by children with disabilities who use switch input devices. The stack makes use of two included New Button Actions — Scan and AppleRead. Guitar Chords demonstrates how chords are produced on a guitar and instructs proper fin- ger placement to produce those chords. Review Stack, and its companion Test Stack, are won- derful time savers for classroom teachers as they allow them to easily create on-screen reviews and multiple choice tests. The Test Stack can even grade the students’ tests. Lastly, there’s Voyager Stack, a breathtaking stack that teaches about the twin Voyager spacecraft that ex- plored the outer reaches of our solar system and sent back out of this world photos and data on the outer planets. Shareware Solutions II 15 Issue 24: In this issue, long- time Studio City contributor Bill Lynn takes over as editor. Included in this issue is a cumu- lative index of everything that has appeared in the publication since it started, an interview with HyperStudio publisher Roger Wagner, ten sounds of animals, and three screens of clip art that depict Christmas, parties and arrows/icons. There’s a useful New Button Ac- tion, PrintField NBA, that al- lows HyperStudio users to print the contents of any text field by just clicking on a button. An Egyptian Hieroglyphics stack provides an introduction and overview of one of mankind’s earliest forms of written com- munication. Scan and Match Sea Life is a matching game ac- tivity for youngsters with disa- bilities who use switch input de- vices. There are two stacks, Illu- sions and Optical Illusions, that prove that seeing isn’t always believing. COWculate is a stack in which Bossy the Cow teaches youngsters how to add and sub- tract. Finally, the User Group stack can be customized by any user group to include general and specific information about the user group. Issue 25: In this issue, there is HyperStudio news, hints and tips, ten sound files and three screens of clip art that depict birds, state flags and musical instruments. There are also three brand new New Button Actions. RunBasic allows you to run Applesoft Basic and binary files from HyperStudio. Load- Text allows you to load different ASCII Text files into a single text field without using Simple- Script. PopUp allows you to add pop up menus to your stacks. HyperMoney teaches youngsters 16 Shareware Solutions IT about US coins. HS Magic Key is a program that will unlock any locked HyperStudio stack. Magic 8 Ball is an amusing elec- tronic version of the classic for- tune telling Magic 8 Ball. There is a stack about the Roman Em- pire that includes a database of all the Roman emperors. Scan Darts is yet another game for children or adults with disabili- ties who use switch input de- vices. Issue 26: This issue includes a SimpleScript question and an- swer session and an interview with the author of HyperLogo. There are ten sounds, and four screens of clip art that depict state flags, magic and keys. There are three New Button Ac- tions. ClickLine NBA allows a HyperStudio user to click on a line in a read-only text field and it returns the literal contents of that line to a variable. GetLine allows a user to click on a but- ton that overlays a read-only text field and it returns infor- mation about the text field to a variable. DoMenu NBA offers the HyperStudio stack designer access to many HyperStudio menu commands through stack buttons and SimpleScript. Badminton, created by a Phys- ical Education teacher, will an- swer every question you've ever had about the game of Bad- minton. Fantavision GS offers a review of the animation pro- gram Fantavision GS, and also includes an XCMD for running Fantavision movies from within HyperStudio, along with in- structions for using the Mini- Script NBA to trigger that XCMD. Myxstyx is a board game that is similar to Chinese Checkers. Rushmore chronicles the creation of one of the most awe inspiring of our National Monuments; the scanned images in this stack alone are worth the price of admission. Twisted Pine is a lovely children’s story that features all three animation methods available to Hyper- Studio users. Issue 27: In this issue, there is a review of a book that teaches about using HyperStudio. There are also ten sounds and four screens of clip art that depict food, music and state flags. There are also three New Button Actions. LockScreen permits stack designers to invisibly ma- nipulate on-screen objects and reveal the changes all at once with any HyperStudio transi- tion. SetMenubar allows stack designers to hide and/or show the menubar from an invisible button. SetFont allows a new font to be selected from Simple- Script. Shades of Illusion was inspired by the optical illusion stacks in Issue 24, and all of the illusions in this stack are based on the juxtaposition of various shades of gray. The Panama Canal chronicles the history and the construction of the Panama Canal through the use of text, scanned photos, maps, and ani- mations. Issue 28: This issue contains some general Apple II news items, as well as ten sounds and four screens of clip art depicting watches and clocks, state flags, and birthdays and anniversa- ries. There’s also a New Button Action, ClickWord, that allows any word in a read-only text field to be clicked, and that word is then collected into a Simple- Script variable. Big Days helps you keep track of birthdays, anniversaries and other “big days” and it even al- lows you to create and print ap- propriate greeting cards to hon- or those events. Computer Mice provides mouse practice for young children in a number of charming and colorful activities. Jackie is a photo journal that pays homage to Jacqueline Ken- nedy Onassis. Egyptian Pyra- mid provides some very inter- esting information on what is inside of an Egyptian pyramid. Issue 29: This issue includes detailed descriptions of two Ap- ple II related conventions: The HyperStudio Festival and Kan- sasFest. There are ten sounds and four screens of clip art that depict a fantasy theme and state flags. There are also two New Button Actions. GetPath allows the HyperStudio user to determine the active GS/OS pre- fix, and SetPrefix allows the Hy- perStudio designer to set the current GS/OS prefix, thereby avoiding the Standard File dia- logue that pops up whenever HyperStudio can’t locate a de- sired sound, text or graphic file required by a particular stack. Heart explains how the human heart works; it stresses taking care of your heart by decreasing risk factors that lead to heart disease. Veterans’ Day pays tribute to Veterans’ Day with a stirring song and an inspira- tional reading of Colonel John McCrae’s “In Flanders Fields” poem. Voting Machine keeps track of voters, collects balloting information and displays it in the form of election returns; this stack can be modified for your own use at the Moose Lodge or the elementary school. Word Play is an entertaining stack that displays graphic represen- tations of common phrases that you try to decode. Issue 30: In this issue, there is a cumulative index that lists everything that has appeared in all issues. There are six holiday related sounds, and four screens of clip art that depict the holi- days, small animals, the Space Shuttle and Egypt. There are also three New Button Actions and a HyperStudio Extra. Music Player allows you to play Music Studio, Sound Smith, or Synth- Lab music from within Hyper- Studio. Set Sound sets the sys- tem sound volume. HyperText NBA is designed to allow the HyperStudio user to click on a word in a read-only text field and find other instances of that word anywhere in the stack. MousePoint is an Extra that can help the stack designer and Hy- perStudio script writer to locate the screen coordinates of partic- ular points within a stack’s card. Calendar is a useful HyperStu- dio template for building and printing your own custom calen- dars; to customize it, just add your own clip art and highlight the dates that are important to you. Presenting With HyperStu- dio provides tips and a wealth of information on how to put your ideas across effectively in formal presentations. @ Such A Deal! ProSel If there’s just one utility pro- gram that every Apple II hard drive owner should have, it is ProSel! Available in versions for either Apple Ile/IIc or IIGS, ProSel is a combination pro- gram launcher, menu program and comprehensive set of utility programs. As a program launch- er, ProSel allows you to create a customized menu of commonly run programs that can be launched by using the keyboard or a mouse. But, it is ProSel’s utilities that are legendary; it can perform such routine tasks as batch copy files or disks, display the con- tents of any file on a printer or on screen, lock, unlock, hide, un- hide or delete files, exhume a deleted file, verify the integrity of a file, perform an alphabeti- cal sort of a directory or sub- directory, compare directories or files, change file dates, move files, locate a string or a file anywhere on disk, or add pass- word protection to files. In addition to that suite of rou- tine utilities, ProSel’s greatest strengths lie in its ability to back up a hard drive, restore corrupted files or disks and op- timize fragmented disks. The disk repair component is often successful in fixing disks that have damaged directory struc- tures or bad blocks. But, they are so powerful that they can even retrieve information on a disk that has been formatted. Despite the fact that ProSel has often been recommended and en- dorsed within these pages, not everyone owns it yet. For that reason, Shareware Solutions II has entered into an agreement with ProSel’s publisher that al- lows us to distribute ProSel for the lowest price ever offered. ProSel-8 for the Ile/IIc is nor- mally sold for $40, and ProSel- 16 for the IIGS is normally sold for $90, but you can now take advantage of a special “Such A Deal” offer that slashes the price of ProSel. You can now ac- quire these exceptional pro- grams directly from Shareware Shareware Solutions IT 7 Solutions II for $25 for ProSel-8 or $50 for ProSel-16, plus $5 shipping to anywhere in the world. (Note: A preview/demo disk of ProSel-16 is now available from Shareware Solutions II for $3.) The Gate And Space Fox Shareware Solutions II is very pleased to announce that it has been named by Seven Hills Software as the exclusive dis- tributor of Bright Software's IIGS arcade games: The Gate and Space Fox. The Gate blends action, adven- ture, aesthetic pleasure and in- tellectual challenges to create a stimulating adventure game for the IIGS. You must battle ene- mies and solve puzzles to es- cape a castle’s prison. Ultimate- ly, your goal is to find and de- feat your captor and bring peace to the land. The Gate features brain-teasing challenges, lots of action in smooth, synchronized animations plus exciting stereo music and sound effects. The Gate requires a IIGS with 1 megabyte of RAM. The Gate is not copy protected, but it cannot be installed on a hard drive. Space Fox is an exciting arcade game where you are an ace pilot who must guide your space ship through nine levels of assorted bad guys. Your mission is to de- stroy The Brain at level ten but you'll need to collect fuel, shield power and new weapons as you destroy your enemies. Skill and a bit of luck are needed to com- plete your mission because the higher the level, the harder it is to survive. Space Fox features fast action, smooth, synchro- nized animations and a stereo musical soundtrack. 18 Shareware Solutions IT Space Fox requires a IIGS with 1 megabyte of RAM and one 3.5" disk drive. The Gate and Space Fox are now available from Shareware Solutions II for $20 each, plus $3 for shipping per order. (Note: A preview/demo disk that allows you to play Level 1 of The Gate is now available from Shareware Solutions II for $3.) NAUG-On-Disk Bundle In an attempt to make all the disks from the National Apple- Works User Group (NAUG) even more affordable than ever before, Shareware Solutions II has reached an agreement with NAUG Founder Warren Wil- liams that now permits the dis- tribution of all 65 issues of NAUG-On-Disk as a bundled package for a new lower price. Originally available only from NAUG for $10 per issue, you can now purchase the entire 65 disk collection, spanning six years worth of AppleWorks related in- formation, for $150 plus ship- ping charges of $6 for US deliv- ery, $10 for delivery to Canada or Mexico, or $20 for Air Mail delivery anywhere else. Each 3.5" issue of NAUG-On- Disk contains the complete text of all of the articles that ap- peared in NAUG’s AppleWorks Forum newsletter, as well as all of the AppleWorks templates and TimeOut modules that were described in that issue, and all of the latest AppleWorks re- source disks that were added to the NAUG Library in that issue. A complete database of every- thing in this amazing and com- prehensive collection of Apple- Works materials is included as part of the NAUG catalog and disk supplement that was of- fered in the last issue for $5. @ Shareware Solutions He/IIc/IIgs A2 Disks Of The Month The February and March 1996 issues of the GEnie A2 Disk of the Month have been combined. Informative text files included on this disk are the January issue of GenieLamp for pro- grammers, the February issue of GenieLamp for end users, a detailed list of new features found in the recent Graphic- Writer III v2 update, an expla- nation of how PMPFax prints images, and a mid-January is- sue of the weekly Apple II oriented freeware II Something newsletter. Software for the Ile/IIc on this disk includes DOS 3.3 Launcher, a utility that allows you to in- stall DOS 3.3 programs or disks on a ProDOS formatted hard drive or 3.5" disk, and launch those programs via your favorite program launcher, such as the Finder on a IIGS or ProSel-8 on a Ile/IIc. Also included is a utili- ty, Imunger, that allows you to convert disk image files, gener- ally used with Apple II emu- lators, back to 5.25" disks, and Treasure, a game whose object is to discover six hidden treas- ures that are randomly placed within a 13x13 grid. Software for the IIGS on the February/March A2 DOM in- cludes 10 Super Hi Res graphics which demonstrate most of the advanced features offered by Platinum Paint. Micro Word is a HyperStudio-based word pro- cessor. ScreenPrint is a New Desk Accessory that allows you to print the Super Hi Res screen or to save a screen image to disk. Screen Saver New Desk Accessory is a screen blanker that operates from within GS/OS applications. The April, 1996 GEnie A2 Disk of the Month includes the Genie- Lamp newsletter for both March and April. Software for the Apple Ie/IIc includes a begin- ner’s guide to the HyperText Markup Language (html), the computer language which is the cornerstone of the Internet’s World Wide Web. Also included is Co-Pilot-8, an offline reader for Genie subscribers who ac- cess Genie with ProTerm v3.1. Software for the IIGS on the April A2 DOM includes Anime, a New Desk Accessory that helps you to create animations using any of the major IIGS paint programs. Daleks is a IIGS strategy board game. rPacker is a Finder Extra that compacts GS/OS files with re- source forks. wInflate is a New Desk Accessory which allows you to collapse a window to just the title bar, which is quite use- ful if you have a crowded desk- top and want to see the contents of another window. Chronos II allows you to place a clock in your menu bar that displays the date and time. The A2 Disks of the Month are available from the Shareware Solutions II library, on 3.5" disk only, for $5 each or $8 for both disks. EnviroWorks Dr Cynthia Field’s EnviroWorks is an earth-saving and money- saving AppleWorks resource disk that can help you to be- come an environmentally aware “green” consumer. The disk in- cludes an expandable database of dozens of companies that of- fer earthwise consumer prod- ucts like reusable grocery bags, herbal flea collars, and compact fluorescent light bulbs. Also included is an EcoBibliography of books and magazines, recipes for natural nontoxic alterna- tives to harmful household prod- ucts, a checklist of 101 tips for saving money while you help to save the planet, and even ten tips that computer users can follow to conserve resources. EnviroWorks is available from Shareware Solutions II on either 5.25" or 3.5" disk for $5. In- cluded as a bonus on the 3.5" disk version is an AppleWorks GS version of EnviroWorks. To use EnviroWorks, you must own AppleWorks Classic (v3 or later) or AppleWorks GS. @ Shareware Solutions IIGS Games ’96 Although there appears to be somewhat of a slow down in the amount of new Apple IIGS free- ware and shareware being re- leased, two of the most enjoy- able and addictive IIGS free- ware games ever released have appeared so far this year. Diamonds, by Richard Bennett, is quite possibly the most chal- lenging and fun game ever writ- ten for the IIGS. It shares simi- larities to the classic games of Break Out and Arkanoid, in which you maneuver a bouncing ball in an effort to remove as many bricks from the board as possible. Unlike those older games, Diamonds has many dif- ferent types of bricks that can only be removed by a corre- sponding colored ball, and it has a number of bricks that, when hit, result in instant death. There are 30 levels to clear, and each one becomes significantly more complex and involved as the game goes on. As the game progresses, you may find that it will take you several days just to figure out how to avoid stra- tegically placed death bricks, yet that’s what makes Diamonds so challenging; it calls you back, again and again, as you try to win just one more time. There’s also an editor that al- lows you to create your own Dia- monds’ levels, and included as a bonus is a second set of nearly impossible to clear levels. Diamonds includes an Easter Egg photo of the author, lots of sound effects, colorful screens, and fast action. It’s a thinking person’s strategy arcade game that is sure to be one of the most popular games ever created for the Apple IIGS. PuyoPuyo is another thinking person’s fast action strategy arcade game. Created by Bret Victor (aka Slixter), PuyoPuyo shares lots of similarities to Tetris and the Tetris spin-off Columns. It’s a game where multi-colored pieces fall from the top of the screen, and you have to manipulate them, by moving or rotating them, so that Shareware Solutions IT 19 at least four pieces of the same color are touching each other. When four pieces do touch, they disappear and your score goes up. If you can’t manipulate the falling pieces fast enough, they pile up, and when they reach the top of the screen, the game is over. There is also a two player mode, where the object is to wreak as much havoc as you possibly can upon your opponent’s side of the board to make his or her pieces reach the top of the screen be- fore yours do. PuyoPuyo is played using the keyboard, and its action is so fast and furious, you'll find your- self banging on your keyboard. There’s music and sound effects, but above all, there’s challenge. Games ’96, which includes both available from the Shareware Diamonds and PuyoPuyo, is now Solutions II Library for $5. @ Coming Soon From Brutal Deluxe! Joe Kohn Shareware Solutions II 166 Alpine Street San Rafael, CA 94901-1008 FIRST CLASS - AIR MAIL