Willamette Apple Connection Vol5No4

NVWAABEE Journal A Publication of Willamette Apple Connection, Inc. An Apple I! & Compatible User Education Group April 1991 "The Apple IIGS: What the Mac LC Should Have Been?” by Roger Wagner A review of the Mac LC in the December, 1990 issue of inCider magazine was subtitled “What the Apple lIGS Should Have Been?” The underlying idea was reasonable: If the Mac LC had been introduced in 1986, rather than the IIGS, people would most likely have been fairly happy with this transition machine to the Mac. However, history does not accommodates "what iis", and at this point, one can legitimately ask, "Is the Apple IIGS what the Mac LC should have been?" The unexpected factor today is the world of multimedia, and that the Apple IGS is arguably the ideal multimedia (or hypermedia) machine. Regardless of what term you use, this environment will be more significant in the 90's than desktop publishing was in the 80's, particularly in the classroom. Volume 5 Number 4 The ideal multimedia machine should have good color graphics, excellent sound, and the ability to connect to laserdiscs, CD- ROM, and VCRs. It should be easy and intuitive to use, and as affordable as possible. You should be able to present your work, and easily record and transport it to share with others. The Apple liGS has all this and more. Let's suppose a student creates a multimedia report, and then presents it to the class. With the Apple IIGS, a standard classioom monitor or TV can be used with no special hardware. Although a TV isn't great for displaying 80-column text screens, multimedia presentations with graphics, larger text, and video sequences from a laserdisc will look quite nice. Laserdiscs, combined with a video overlay card, add a very attractive component, and (Continued on page 3) Meeting Notice April 18 Topic is open at this time Contents Roger Wagner Reprint Editor's Notes Teachers' Column Who's Who in WAC. BBS News Classifieds AAARw Willamette Apple Connection,Inc. P.O.Box 7252 Salem, Oregon 97303-0053 Voice phone 585-0811 WAC BBS) 390-9321 Board of Directors: President Lawrence E. Tucker 585-0811 Vice President Neal Layton 393-0263 Treasurer Kirk Gamble 399-7048 Secretary / Editor Bobbi Kirk 838-2205 Director-at-Large David L. Weiss Past President John Moore 838-4966 “ BR « The regular membership meeting is held on the third Thursday of the month, with a start time of 7:00 p.m.. The meeting is held on the Chemeketa Community College campus, in Building 2, Room 113. The general public is invited to attend. The Board of Directors meeting is held before the regular meeting or as otherwise arranged. Individual member $15.00 —~ a Wac Journal The WAC Journal is an independent publication not affiliated or otherwise associated with or sponsored or sanctioned by Apple Computer, Inc. The opinions, statements, positions and views stated herein are those of the author(s) or publisher and are not intended to be the opinions, statements, positions or views of Apple Computer, Inc. Apple, the Apple logo, and other Apple trademarks are the property of Apple Computer, Inc. Authors should submit their articles in hard copy , 3 1/2 inch disk or send it via modem to the editor at the above number by the firet of the month. Copy should be submitted in Appleworks, Appleworks GS or Ascii format. The WAC Journal is published monthly. Contributing writers are needed, especially for the Who's Who column. This is a member written column dealing with what each individual is doing with their computer, what kind of computer and programs you use, and how long you've had your computer. | can accept your article at any time for this column. Call me! €Editor’s Notes By Bobbi Kirk The weather outside today reminds me of the atmosphere around the Apple I! line of computers. The weather has been variable, to say the least. First sunny skies, then rain, then hail and then sunny skies again; it's been quite a day! The rumors and speculation flying around the Apple II have been just as variable. Some seemed to promise sunny skies and just as everyone was relaxing, the hail would hit and we'd all be under dark clouds again. Right now the only bright spot seems to be over the ligs, the only Apple Il still being sold by Apple computer. But as | read the computer magazines and talk to other users it seems that there is a lot of interest in the Apple II by outside developers who are still interested in (and will be for years to come) the massive user base in the schools. Yes, Macs are in the classrooms but so are the Apple II's and they will be there for a long time to come.(If Apple didn't believe this they wouldn't have bothered making an Apple Il card for the Macs.) There may not be as many new Programs coming out as we've been used to but then we have to ask if that isn't true for all computers. We also have to ask what needs we have that can't be met by existing programs. | also think as long as we have companies like Beagle Bros and Claris and Broderbund and Applied Engineering we're going to be in good shape. I'm looking forward to the next 3-5 years and | see pretty good weather ahead. (Continued from page 1) allow anyone to create very exciting results. On the Apple lIGS, a school can buy a Video Overlay Card for about $400. On the Mac LC (if a card were available), using the slot for a video card would preclude using the lle card. Cards similar to the Video Overlay Card on other Mac models cost around $2500. (By the way, services are now available that will convert your own videotapes to a laserdisc for $200-$300!) On its way to that TV or monitor, the Apple {IGS video can be routed through any common VCR, recording both the audio and video portions of the presentation, so Mom and Dad can see what they did at school, and keep a permanent record of the moment. Presenters can go to conferences with just a video tape, without lugging tons of computer hardware. You heard it here first: The VCR will be the printer of the 90's. How else to record sound, animation, graphics, video and more, and in a form that anyone can view (virtually all homes and schools now have VCRs). Once you're aware of what the GS can do, hearing that another computer can't be recorded with a VCR is like hearing it can't be attached to a printer. An article in the October 15, 1990 issue of BusinessWeek discusses Apple's generation of computers AFTER the Mac: "At least two years off, Jaguar will include extensive video technology and the ability to connect to TVs and VCRs, Apple employees say.” How great for Apple IIGS owners to know that they don't have to wait for the successor to the Mac. They can have all this now! Last of all is the working environment itself. (Continued on page 4) Teachers’ Column By Darrell Robertson and Kirk Gamble The Children's Writing and Publishing Center is a unique piece of software. This is our latest addition to the Middle Grove educational library. The students love it and it challenges them to be more creative. They can type, fix mistakes and add pictures (it is compatible with Print Shop and Public Domain graphics). Then they can save it to work on later and/or print it. There are 8 different styles and sizes of fonts. It has color capabilities, except for imported compatible graphics. They can write stories and reports and make signs and awards. As a teacher, | use it for 2-column newsletters to my parents. It has nice small type and pictures. Headings and borders are an option. Also, if your ribbon is running out of ink, you can choose “BOLD"as a printer option. Middle Grove, with approximately 165 children, Kindergarten through 3rd grade, now has 5 Apple IIE's for student use and one Mac Classic for Staff use. Also we have a DataShow (similar to a PC Viewer - for use with an overhead projector hooked up to a computer). The curriculum is improving and students are gaining in computer knowledge and hands-on experience. {want to thank Kirk for the interesting report on Aumsville and Gervais Schools concerning their progress and future plans. It is personally motivating and inspiring! (Continued from page 3) Stackbuilding on the GS is significantly easier. Thousands of schools are using the Apple IIGS for multimedia right now, and Projects created entirely by 1st graders are by no means unusual. Home users of the Apple IIGS find it perfect for not only the kids, but fun for personal-interest uses from family trees to hobby-related projects. Through user groups, mail-order catalogs, and online services like America Online, CompuServe and GEnie, there are already almost 200 megabytes of existing hypermedia applications (stacks) of every imaginable kind - all for the Apple IIGS. What does the future hold for the Apple IGS? The Apple IGS is not an outdated technology. The Apple lIGS has features that are not currently available in any machine, and offers a solution that couldn't be more relevant to the next revolution in computing. I've personally travelled extensively across the U.S. in the last year, and everywhere I've seen a tremendous amount of interest and enthusiasm for what the Apple IIGS offers. This interest is the result of recognizing a practical and immediate tool. If you haven't yet seen what multimedia and the Apple IIGS are all about, there couldn't be a better time than now to find out what the future holds, and how you can make that future a present reality. If you already have an Apple IGS, then you'll be happy to know you own the best machine possible to enter the 90's! From a letter to inCider/A+ magazine, March, 1991. Permission is hereby given by the author to anyone wishing to reprint this letter. Please include this permission Who’s Who in WAC By Bobbi Kirk I didn’t run fast enough last month to catch anyone to write this column (I almost caught John Moore, but he slipped away from mel) so I'm going to try my hand at it this month. | got my ligs in the summer of 1988 and like Frans Geerlings it was supposed to be for my son to use. Unfortunately, for him, along with Multiscribe (which is now BeagleWrite) and some educational Programs | also bought Paintworks Gold, and the minute | saw what | could do with it, my son's time on the computer was definitely limited. Before | got the ligs | was working with colored pencils and collage but the more | worked with Paintworks Gold, the less | worked with the more traditional mediums. | had read in the paper that there was a gallery in Portland that was showing computer works so | went to see what other people were doing with their computers. | was really excited by the work I saw at the gallery (Abaci) but the most important thing | learned on my first visit was how to get the work from the screen onto the wall. The Imagewriter It printer didn't work well and the other color printers at that time were extremely expensive which was a problem for all computer artists. | found that what most artists were doing was taking a 35mm slide of the screen with a simple 35 mm camera (and | had one of those!) and then having a photograph made (mostly cibachromes) from the slide. The output looked a lot more like what I saw on the screen than anything the Imagewriter could do and was affordable. So | went home and kept working with Paintworks Gold. A year after | started using the ligs | made some slides of my work (by this time | had 13 disks full) and took the slides to the owner of the gallery. She liked the slides and agreed to show my work at the gallery. I'm now using Platinum Paint by Beagle Bros and am on disk 31.My work has been in shows in Portland and Seattle, Washington and Santa Fe, New Mexico and I'm hoping to show it in California by the end of the year. The ligs has been very, very good to me! I'm also using GraphicWriter III and Appleworks GS to put out the newsletter. Until | got an HP laser printer | was using Publish It! 3 and really loved the program but it doesn't have a printer driver for the HP so | can't print with it. | hear Publish It! 4 is coming out and I'm sincerely hoping it will support my laser printer! As good as Appleworks GS and GraphicWriter lll are, | prefer Publish It! 3 for ease of use and speed and features | can't find on any other single program. Although I've had a modem for over a year | haven't used it on a regular basis until fairly recently. There were two reasons for that. One, I had a lot of difficulty using the communications software that came with the modem and two, Salem was long distance and so were all the bulletin board systems (bbs). Then the phone company made Salem a local call from Monmouth and | got a copy of a communications program that was easier to use. Now | use the modem several times a week on the average and more when I'm doing the newsletter. Last month both Larry Tucker and Neal Layton modemed their articles to me. That was fun! | also use America Online carefully (it can get expensive fast, | understand) and have downloaded several fonts which really tickles me. (Continued on page 6) (Continued from page 5) I'm ashamed to say | don't use the spreadsheet module on Appleworks GS at all and t only use the data base to keep a record of WAC members. | use Quicken to keep my checkbook and keep track of some business expenses. | also use Appleworks for most of my word processing and for the research papers | type for some of the students at Western Oregon State College. | also have been working with another local artist on her portfolio. She had a show at a local gallery and | designed the invitations using Appleworks and Appleworks GS and GraphicWriter Ill. The page layout programs are really versatile and templates are available if you don't trust your own design skills. luse some Print Shop graphics and some converted (with Graphics xchange by Roger Wagner) Mac clip art in the newsletter. But mostiy | use art and desktop publishing programs. My next major direction will either be hypermedia (via HyperStudio and maybe HyperCard GS) or animation. All | need is more hours in the day! Classified John Moore would like to hear from anyone having or knowing of a genealogy program for the Ile. He can be reached at 838- 4966. BBS News By Neal Layton WAC BBS Update For those of you that are unable to keep up to date on the WAC BBS online here is the latest news. Our mysterious Krash problem is now gone!!! | believe the problem was due to the fact that in order to get my 1200 baud modem to work with the BBS I had to tell the BBS program it was running ona //c, when in fact it was being run on a //e. All of this was solved when | bought a new 2400 baud modem for the BBS. Which brings us to the next news- WAC BBS now supports 2400 baud!!! The next addition to the BBS is going to be a larger Hard Drive. After 6 weeks of operation the 10 meg Sider is about half full. Hopefully we won't fill it up before | can get a good deal on a replacement. We now have approximately 40 users with only about 25% being apple owners or enthusiasts. The BBS was up and running on March 1st, 1991 and since that day I've had over 200 calls which is and average of about 4-5 a day. The highest number per day was 11. The caller that calls the mostis tied between Larry Tucker & Bobbi Kirk. I've gotten lots of good suggestions from Larry Tucker and Bill Reynolds but I'm always open for some more. If you have any ideas or suggestions for making it a better place let me know. P.S. if you haven't been online yet the number is 390-9321. 4q Membership Application > Willamette Apple Connection An Apple Il & Compatible User Group P.O.Box 7252 Salem, OR 97303-0053 a BBS 390-9321 y, a > Name Address City State Zip \_ Phone J a ~ Please list computer(s) and software you Please list areas of irterest (i.e. DTP, use regularly: graphics, spreadsheets, etc.): N TT y, —~ (~ Membership fee is $15.00 annually. Please make your checks payable to: Willamette Apple Connection, Inc. nN _- Willamette Apple Connection, Inc. P.O.Box 7252 Salem, OR 07303-0053 TO ‘quo meeuppe S30