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Silicon Times Report Issue 0818
*---== ST REPORT INTERNATIONAL ONLINE MAGAZINE ==---*
"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""
"The Original 16/32bit Online Magazine"
from
STR Publishing
""""""""""""""
May 01, 1992 No.8.18
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_____________________________________________________________________
> 05/01/92 STReport 818 "The Original * Independent * Online Magazine!"
- The Editor's Desk - CPU Report - PORTFOLIO NEWS
- IBM INTROS 50Mhz - JUSTICE? - ICD ADSCSI UG
- Delphi Codehead Co. - TOS 306 OVERVIEW - BLUE RIDGE FEST
- CT. ATARIFEST - CHECKMATE! - STR Confidential
-* ATARI LOSES NINTENDO SUIT! *-
-* CODEHEAD ANNOUNCES CALLIGRAPHER! *-
-* SPARROW OVERVIEW! *-
==========================================================================
ST REPORT INTERNATIONAL ONLINE MAGAZINE
The Original * Independent * Online Magazine
-* FEATURING WEEKLY *-
"Accurate UP-TO-DATE News and Information"
Current Events, Original Articles, Tips, Rumors, and Information
Hardware - Software - Corporate - R & D - Imports
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WHAT'S NEW IN THE ATARI FORUMS (May 01)
NEW IN ATARI VENDORS FORUM
""""""""""""""""""""""""""
Oxxi Software announces that registered Atari users of Superbase
Personal/2 and Professional/3 can update to the latest version of the
program. Please read message # 25350 for details.
CodeHead Technologies announces the release of Warp 9, formerly known
as Quick ST. This product has been revamped for usability, speed,
compatibilty, and features. See WARP_9.TXT in Library 16, CODEHEAD
SOFTWARE for a full description, availability, and ordering information.
Oxxi, Inc. has acquired the Atari Product line formerly offered by
Precision Software and has begun development on an upgrade to Superbase
Professional. Oxxi is interested in your comments on new features for
this upgrade. Please read and respond to message # 25112 in the Atari
Vendors Forum (GO ATARIVEN), or send a message to Pat @ Oxxi at User ID
number 76711,457 in Section 4 ("OXXI/Precision") of ATARIVEN.
CONTEST IN APORTFOLIO
"""""""""""""""""""""
We are now running a NEW CONTEST for Portfolio Programmers. You can
submit any program you have written, in any language, in either compiled
or source form. Prizes will include free CompuServe connect time, ROM
cards, and a subscription to "Take it With You." Please read message #
28538 for complete details.
THE ATARI PORTFOLIO FORUM ON COMPUSERVE
HAS BEEN DESIGNATED AN
OFFICIAL SUPPORT SITE BY ATARI CORPORATION
"GO APORTFOLIO TO ACCESS THE ATARI PORTFOLIO FORUM"
***********************************************************************
> CPU STATUS REPORT LATE BREAKING INDUSTRY-WIDE NEWS
=================
Issue #18
Compiled by: Lloyd E. Pulley, Sr.
-- IBM and Time Warner Negotiating
IBM and Time Warner Inc. are negotiating a global alliance to link the
computer makers's technology with Time Warner's vast library of movies
and TV shows as well as its cable TV systems, industry sources said.
A venture between the world's largest computer maker and biggest media
concern could accelerate what many experts see as the coming merger of
home entertainment, computers and communications.
-- Commodore Posts Profits for Third Quarter
Commodore International Ltd. has posted earnings of $4.1 million, or 12
cents per share, on sales of $194.6 million for the third quarter ended
March 31. This compares with net income of $1.4 million, or 4 cents per
share, on sales of $246.3 million a year ago.
Commodore says the decline in sales for the quarter was primarily due to
the discontinuation of the unprofitable low-end MS-DOS range, and a
reduction in C64 sales, due to economic softness in certain markets.
This was partially offset by a 10% increase in unit sales of the Amiga
line along with continued growth in the Professional PC line.
-- IBM to Sell Computers by Mail
In an effort to boost sagging sales, IBM has announced it will begin
selling its personal computers by mail. IBM plans to sell the units for
$1,500 or less through an 800 telephone number. The company said it
would begin mail-order sales of its 80386SX-based PS/2 Models 35 and 40
within the next two or three weeks.
-- PC's No longer Profitable?
Press reports from Tokyo suggest some computer makers are "starting to
say the personal computer business is no longer profitable" in the light
of recent steep declines in PC sales.
According to Tsuyoshi Miura, head of the management policy section of
Laox Co., a mass-marketing shop at Akihabara, the last year-end selling
season was the worst in recent years as far as PCs were concerned.
The Japan Electronics Industry Development Association recently released
figures showing PC shipments in 1991 dropped 8% in volume from the
previous year and 3% in value.
-- Apple-IBM Effort Proceeds
Apple Computer Inc. could be selling a new generation of Mac's based on
the latest in microchip technology by next year, according to infor-
mation supplied by Joseph Graziano, Apple's chief financial officer,
this week. Graziano siad the joint venture with IBM to develope a com-
puter chip set was ahead of schedule.
The computers should be far more powerful than both Apple's current Mac
family and IBM's PC, since the chip set uses a design called RISC (re-
duced instruction set computer) that is faster than conventional sys-
tems.
-- IBM Introduces Powerful PC
IBM Corp. introduced a personal computer (PC) it says is among the most
powerful available for use as a "server" connecting a network of PC's.
The new machine will run at 50 mhz, three times faster than IBM's cur-
rent top-end PC's in computer network uses, the company said.
The PC also features an error-correction system that IBM says protects
users from most memory errors.
-- Microsoft Declares Stock Split
Buoyed by a favorable court ruling, strong sales of a new product and
continued investor confidence, Microsoft Corp. announced a 3-for-2 stock
split this week.
***********************************************************************
:HOW TO GET YOUR OWN GENIE ACCOUNT:
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To sign up for GEnie service:
Set your communications software to Half Duplex (or Local Echo)
Call: (with modem) 800-638-8369.
Upon connection type HHH (RETURN after that).
Wait for the U#= prompt.
Type: XTX99587,CPUREPT then, hit RETURN.
GEnie costs only $4.95 a month for unlimited evening and weekend access to
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MONEY BACK GUARANTEE! Any time during your first month of membership if
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2. The GEnie Faire is on its way. Read on for more info.......
3. HACK & SLASH SALE on Great Games at.........................SIERRA
4. Brand New Computer Books Just Arrived at....................PCBOOKS
5. Mustang Software (Qmodem, Wildcat, OLX) now online..........MUSTANG
6. HOMEBREW-Tasting RTC on 5/2, and How-To-Brew-Your-Own in....FOOD
7. Cure the moving blues - get a FREE Homes & Land Magazine....HOME
8. Get a jump on the NEWS with NEW Stories in the NEW.........*LIVEWIRE
9. RTC 5/3: How to Get ORGANIZED once and for all..............HOSB
10. Found an empire in space FREE this weekend in...............EMPEROR
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12. LA errupts in violence over King verdict. Find out more in.*CALIFORNIA
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14. Atari Explorer Online Magazine Arrives......................*LIBRARY
15. Newsletter Leads New Features For Amiga Owners at the.......STARSHIP
Welcome to the Atari ST Roundtable
-* Use option #7 on page 475 for your latest issue of GENIELAMP. *-
This issue and all monthly ASCII issues will be FREE when using
this option. Your TX2 option will still be available at the usual
download fee. Let us know what you think by sending us mail using
option #6 on page 475. The current issue is dated May 1,1992.
***ATARI EXPLORER ONLINE MAGAZINE PREMIERS FOR FREE***
Due to difficulties, we are unable to offer you your Atari
Explorer Online magazine as a free option on our menu till
Monday but you can STILL download it for free by typing
M1075 and downloading file# 418 called AEO_9201.LZH from the
GEnie practice libraries. Check it out and tell us how you
like it by leaving a message in Category 15 Topic 20, right
here in the ST bulletin board.
GEnie Information copyright (C) 1991 by General Electric
Information Services/GEnie, reprinted by permission
***********************************************************************
> THE FLIP SIDE STR Feature ".... a different viewpoint..."
=========================
A LITTLE OF THIS, A LITTLE OF THAT
==================================
by Michael Lee
----------------
A question on installing TOS 2.06 from Rich Citti - Cat. 14, Topic 8,
Msgs 54-55 -from the ST Roundtable on Genie...
What is the procedure for installing TOS 2.06 in an STe? My local
dealer tried a straight replacement of the TOS chip and just got
bombs. Is there a special adjustment to be made in the jump switches
located next to the TOS chip?
Answer from Frank Bell...
In my machine there are (were) two jumper resisters, one called w102,
the other call w104. Just unsolder the outside pin of both resisters
and resolder it to the other side of the resister.
+-------------------+
| - - - |
| | | |+-----+| | old TOS 1.06
| - - - |
+-------------------+
W104 (W102) before
+-------------------+
| - - - |
| |+-----+| | | | new, better, up-to-date TOS 2.06
| - - - |
+-------------------+
W104 (W102) after
If you're luckly, I wasn't, then all you have to do is switch/move a
jumper. If you break the resister off, I did, then just replace it
with short piece of wire (if you have a DOS PC then take the wire from
there, any wire)
----------------
Looking for an inexpensive MNP modem? From Gordon M. on the Aladin-ST
Roundtable...
...line noise problem is a problem, but its not everyones problem and
its not a problem if you have an MNP modem.
I was just looking throught a copy of computer shopper and there are
many modems for around $100. Here is a suggestion, I have ordered
from them before and got good results,
Midwest Micro-Peripherals 1-800-423-8215
Infotel 2400XP modem with MNP-4 $75.00
Made in USA and has 7 year warrentee
The above modem comes with a plastic case but for another $3 you can
get one with an metal case.
----------------
From Cat. 6, Topic 11, Msgs 104-105 - from the ST Roundtable on Genie...
Question from Ken Olson...
I am looking for a program to maintain Church Membership. I have dBMAN
but would rather not do the programming required.
I could use a program already written in dBMAN. I have heard that
Hyperlink could be used for what I have in mind. Any ideas? Wednesday
need to keep track of members and all the family relationships and
church attendance and skills they have and etc stuff. The program
needs to be in GEM (user Frendly) so that some clerk could use it with
a min of training on a MEGA STe.
Answer from Dorothy Brumleve...
I think HyperLINK might be a good solution for you, but there is at
least one existing application that is designed to do exactly what you
have in mind. It's called Church Manager and it's from HiTech Advisors
in FL. Don't have their address handy, but they are on GEnie.
The program (at least the version I've seen) is _not_ menu-driven
(GEM). It's a dbMan application and has that IBM look and feel. But
it's fairly straight-forward. You press a letter (shown on a menu on
the screen) to call up a certain segment of the database.
HiTech's Church Manager is available in IBM and ST versions; if this
kind of cross-compatibility could come in handy, you ought to
investigate it. Otherwise, a customized database such as HyperLINK
could provide would give you more flexibility to make sure you keep
track of the info you want.
----------------
Hard drive discusion - Cat. 4, Topic 39, Msgs 73-76 - from the ST Round-
table on Genie...
From Rob Glover...
I've heard that Quantums are very hard to find. DC Drives, in Computer
Monthly magazine, had the LPS120S listed for $369. When I called about
it, they'd raised it to $429 because they're hard to get. Nothing like
price gouging. I may just get the Maxtor 7120S instead, as long as it
gets at least the 1025K/sec that someone mentioned they were getting
from their 200 meg unit.
From RANDYB...
Try MegaHaus in Houston, TX. They were about $400 but like everyone
else lately, they have raised their prices. I think they're up to
about $429 now. Phone # is: 800-426-0560.
I also called my usual parts distributor since they also sell Quantums
(I run a repair facility), and they wanted $435 (dealer cost!). I
guess it's just the law of supply and demand.
From D.LIVINGST11...
I got a Maxtor 7120 (7120SCS I think) a couple of months ago. Wanted a
Quantum 105 or 120, but they were hard to get, and they suggested the
Maxtor instead.
The Maxtor works just fine so far. I'm real happy with it.
ICD's RATEHD.PRG says:
Data Rate Av Access
MAXTOR 7120SCS 952 K/s 22 ms
SyQuest SQ555 497 K/s 33 ms
After formatting into 5 partitions, this Maxtor has 124250 clusters
available for data. This is 124.25 Megs, or 127232000 bytes.
The Quantums have a 32 K cache, which makes them faster. I think the
cache helps most if you are frequently reading/writing small files.
That's not really important on the Atari, unlike other systems which
have to read the disk all the time.
----------------
From Wayne Watson - Cat. 28, Topic 10, Msg 32 - from the ST Roundtable
on Genie...
This is from a dealer. According to this dealer, some problems on the
TT with the 1.44 drives can be fixed by taking the power supply out
and on the bottom in the middle is a screw. Remove this screw and
place some tape over it. Now install the power supply back in and give
it a try. You should also make sure the floppy cable is as straight as
it can be and as far away from the power supply as possible.
Supposedly the reason this will work is that the screw in the power
supply causes the power supply to ground through the drive which
causes RF Noise. Take it away and it grounds as it should and not
through the drive.
****** NOTE: Do this at your OWN RISK. I am not responsible for what
you do. I am just passing this along. ******
I did not supply the name of the dealer for obvious resons. I found
this message on the FNET.
----------------
Is there any connection between NeXT and the Falcon? - From Cat. 28,
Topic 3, Msgs 152-153 - from the ST Roundtable on Genie...
From Ed Krimen...
Did I hear something about NeXTStep on the Falcon? :^) I remember this
topic was brought up before on Usenet, but then trounced on and
finally refuted. The following message brings up the issue again:
Article 25284 (2 more) in comp.sys.atari.st:
From: Nick.Smith@f47.n282.z1.tdkt.kksys.com (Nick Smith)
Subject: NeXT & Atari marriage?
Message-ID: <704064906.F00002@tdkt.kksys.com>
Date: 23 Apr 92 16:06:00 GMT
Sender: FredGate@tdkt.kksys.com
Lines: 19
Next and Atari sleeping together is not such a far-fetched idea;
Just got the summer issue of _NextWorld_ magazine and Atari and
other familiar names pop up. First Ditek announces DynaCadd 3.0 for
NeXT at CeBIT, along with AMG debuting Avant Vector and tms Cranach
showing a beta of Cranach Studio for Next...
In Lt. Sullivan's gossip column: re; porting NeXTstep - 'even Atari
are being courted... Did you know that Atari's 68030 is beginning to
nip at the heels of high-end Macintoshes... at half their price?
Did you know as well that 68040 products due this fall will list for
1/3 the price of Apple's Quadra line? Shrinkwrapped NeXTstep for HP
and Atari machines would make sense for markets that are currently
underserved.'
Is it no coincidence that mass storage vendor PLI is the NeXT's
largest 3rd party supplier? That the next generation Atari machine's
are likely to be in black boxes (like PLI's offerings and NeXT
workstations)? That use of a 56001 DSP is rumoured. Added all
together, it doesn't seem so far fetched at all..
* Origin: FlightLine BBS Mpls,MN USRdual 612-544-5118 (1:282/47.0)
From John Townsend (Atari)...
I will state it again.. To my knowledge, Atari has no business re-
lationships with NeXT, Inc. Also, I have no knowledge of any port of
NeXTStep taking place for the Atari line of computers.
Nice rumor, but I know of not one fact in it.
PS. I am not attempting to cast a negative view of NeXT in any way.
Just attempting to keep the rumor mill in check ;-)
----------------
From Ed Krimen - Cat. 4, Topic 34, Msg. 128 - from the ST Roundtable on
Genie...
...I've been through three multisync switchboxes: :^)
Talon Omniswitch: stay as far away from it as possible.
IB Computers MultiSwitch: Not bad, decent box.
Omnimon Peripherals' Omnix3: I'm keeping this one. Doesn't need a power
supply for the STE/MSTE like the Multiswitch did. Output's a bit
brighter in mono than the Multiswitch. Support is here on GEnie. Long
cables that the Multiswitch has aren't necessary, and the Omnix3
thankfully doesn't have them; saves space.
----------------
Question from B.AEIN - Cat. 4, Topic 39, Msgs 125-126 - from the ST
Roundtable on Genie...
My friend took apart his Supra and there's a MiniScribe in there. The
disk shaft spins, but the motor shaft locks up. He can spin it the
other way 2 rotations then it locks up again. He is taking off the
motor to see if a gear has slipped or something that he can repair.
If it is just the motor will he be able to get a replacement motor from
Miniscribe. Does ANYONE have a PHONE NUBER FOR MINISCRIBE?
Answr from Tom (ICD)...
MiniScribe went Bankrupt and was bought by Maxtor 1 year ago or more. I
doubt you will get any warranty work done and anything else is too much
money.
----------------
Some nice info from Leland Dumas - Cat. 14, Topic 3, Msg. 81 - from the
ST Roundtable on Genie...
I was a bit surprised to see in todays paper that the Syracuse school
system had bought a bunch of Atari's and software last year and was
planning to buy another $460,000 worth this year!
----------------
From Chris (DRAGONWARE) - Cat. 13, Topic 4, Msg. 6 - from the ST Round-
table on Genie...
For Immediate release 04-27-1992
DragonWare Software Inc. is proud to announce the introduction in the
U.S.of the FontKit Plus 3.5
Now there is an easy way to import Fonts into the GDOS format from the
Macintosh, IBM, Amiga and other ST/TT formats. FontKit Plus 3.5
includes DragonWare's own G_MAN 3.0 program to install the fonts that
are imported by FontKit.
FontKit is GDOSFSM compatible and will run on all TOS based computers,
including TTand ST.
FontKit Plus includes a font editing program that will allow you to
modify/create your own fonts for GDOS!
FontKit Plus 3.5 will sell for $69.95 U.S. and comes with a two hundred
and eighty page manual and 4 diskettes.
----------------
Until next week.....
***********************************************************************
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=================
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***********************************************************************
> CODEHEAD'S DELPHI CONFERENCE STR FOCUS CALLIGRAPHER ANNOUNCED!
======================================
Transcript of a formal Conference held
Tuesday, April 28th, 1992, with
John Eidsvoog & Charles F. Johnson
collectively known as
the CodeHeads!
.Gordie>
Okay, things look fairly stable. Let's get it started.
Good evening everyone, and welcome to the formal Conference with
the illustrious CodeHeads. Being a formal event, we'll use the
usual signals to let the moderator (me) know when you have a
question. That'd be a ? for anyone who's new tonight. I'll keep
track of who's got questions and call on you in turn.
Before we get into questions, do either Charles or John have an
opening statement of some kind?
.John @ CodeHead>
Yes, I've got one.
.Gordie>
We're all ears!
.John @ CodeHead>
Good evening, folks! I'm John Eidsvoog, one of the owners of
CodeHead Technologies. My partner Charles Johnson and I are here
tonight to talk about our line of products, answer any questions
you might have, and also announce the debut of what is destined
to be the definitive word processor for the Atari line of computers!
More on this in a minute...
We're pleased to say that the newest entry in our catalog, Warp 9
(formerly known as Quick ST from Branch Always Software), has
been very well accepted by Atari users! Warp 9, the software
accelerator, is proving itself to be the most compatible program
of its type _ever_ for the Atari, while maintaining (and in many
cases surpassing) the performance of its predecessor, Quick ST,
and far exceeding the performance of its European counterpart,
NVDI.
For those who don't know about Warp 9 yet, this AUTO folder
utility intercepts GEM screen output and replaces the slow TOS
routines with much faster, highly optimized assembly language
code. The result is a vastly accelerated screen display; windows
snap open, graphics appear instantly, and text literally flies
onto the screen.
We're especially happy tonight to announce that we'll soon be
providing the first update to Warp 9 FREE OF CHARGE, as a token
of our appreciation of your support. This update will be posted
on the major information services, sometime within the next
month.
And now, I know many of you have been waiting for the unveiling
of our rumored new product -- so without further ado, we're very
proud to announce that CodeHead Technologies has made arrangements
for the exclusive representation in the United States and Canada of:
CALLIGRAPHER -- the next-generation document processor that takes
you from first conception to final print!
Calligrapher is the first word processor to meet CodeHead's
exacting standards for user interface excellence and powerful
features. Some of Calligrapher's features include an editable
dictionary and spell checker, a powerful outliner (the first
really useable outliner we've seen!), footnotes and endnotes,
hinted outline fonts for very high quality printed output, the
ability to import both bitmap graphics and GEM metafiles,
built-in graphics tools for drawing lines and shapes, infinite
expandability through the use of "external modules," and a whole
lot more -- way too much to list here. In many ways, Calligrapher
bridges the gap between a desktop publishing application and a word
processor.
Calligrapher Professional includes these basic features plus much
more. Also available will be Calligrapher Gold which includes a
grammar checker, label printer, bar code generation, automatic
indexing, automatic save, mathematical equation editor, Flextext,
Postscript output and more!
Other options that are available are a catalog of 64 disks of
very high quality hinted outline fonts, licensed from URW, a
well-known type foundry and supplemental dictionaries for seven
other languages.
We're very excited to be able to offer Calligrapher, helping to
round out our line of graphic tools which already includes Avant
Vector for auto-tracing, MegaPaint Professional for bitmap and
vector graphics design and the Cherry font collection.
We don't want to forget to mention our full line of powerful
utilities including HotWire, MaxiFile, MultiDesk Deluxe, Codekeys,
LookIt and PopIt, G+Plus, CodeHead Utilities, MIDIMAX, and MIDI Spy.
And last but not least we have the TOS Extension Card (TEC) which
provides a means for everyone to use TOS 2.06, the very latest
version of the Atari operating system, even if they have an older ST
or Mega ST. The TEC has been selling very well and together with
Warp 9 it offers an unbeatable combination for supercharging your
Atari computer.
With all of these product we could probably spend all night in
conference, so we'd better get down to some questions. Thank you
for coming and let's begin.
Whew.
.Gordie>
Well, I've got to say I'm excited! And before anyone else asks,
what kind of pricing are you looking at?
.John @ CodeHead>
Let's say that we're not quite ready to announce the pricing yet,
but the basic Professional version will be well under $200.
.Gordie>
Okay, close enough for me.
PENDZICH>
Yes I purchased the ICD accelerator card, ADspeed that came with
Quick ST and wondered how to get an upgrade without a disk? ga
.John @ CodeHead>
You can send us your AdSpeed disk and if you'd like it returned,
just request that we do so. The upgrade fee is $20.
ATARIPOWER7>
Will Warp 9 have any effect on the ability of some programs,
particularly STalker 3 and to some degree FZDS Term, to handle
higher speed operation at 9600+? GA
.Charles @ CHTech>
Well, yes....because the main factor limiting modem communications
at the higher speeds is how fast the ST can display the incoming
text. So Warp 9 will definitely help the screen display keep up
with the data coming from the modem. ga
.MRAINEY>
How much memory does Warp 9 require compared to Turbo ST, and what
are the hardware requirements for CALLIGRAPHER?
.Charles @ CHTech>
Whoops....looks like John got bumped off. I'll answer that...
I don't know exactly how much memory Turbo ST uses, but Warp 9
uses a roughly equal amount. Calligrapher will run on all Atari
computers with at least 1 Meg of memory. You'll need at least 2
Meg, however, to use the SLM804/605 drivers provided. ga
EIDSVOOG>
I'm back, sorry.
JBEAU>
I have a couple quick questions:
1) Isn't "WARP 9" a Star Trekkie jargon you might get chased a bit
for using?
2) Have the problems with NOTATOR been resolved.
3) How does Warp 9 maintain its maximum possible speed regardless of
its position in the AUTO folder?
That's All. :-)
.John @ CodeHead>
The only problem that exists in Notator is with the display of slur
lines. It has not been fixed yet, but we're working on it.
JBEAU>
Hm...my business is in creating PRINTED sheet music for studio
work...and slurs are of course required...
.John @ CodeHead>
Everything else works fine, so if it doesn't bother you to see the
slurs/ties look a little funny, then you can leave Warp 9 turned on.
JBEAU>
I don't mind...but clients, well......you know!
.John @ CodeHead>
In that case, you can still leave Warp 9 installed, but have it
automatically disabled while in Notator. GA
.Charles @ CHTech>
The printed output of slurs, though, should be unaffected.
.John @ CodeHead>
Oh yeah, that's right. Your printouts will not suffer.
.Charles @ CHTech>
At least I think so -- I have not actually tested it.
JBEAU>
Are you saying the problem is display only? My printouts with QST
had garbage for slurs on printout as well. Is this different for
Warp 9?
.John @ CodeHead>
Hmmm...perhaps not.
.Charles @ CHTech>
From your description, probably not. As I said, I haven't actually
tested this.
.John @ CodeHead>
We will eventually get it ironed out, but at least there's a
workaround.
JBEAU>
I'd be happy to "beta" test that one for you! ;-)
.John @ CodeHead>
Regarding your other questions...
We did a trademark search on "Warp 9" and found only an after shave
lotion <grin>...
You can put Warp 9 anywhere in the AUTO folder, but the earlier you
put it, the faster your bootup will be... The accessory (Warp 9
Control Panel) will tell Warp 9 to regrab its vectors so that it
will run at optimum speed. GA
.Dana@STReport>
Guys, first of all, congratulations on your continued success.
You've both been terrific supporters for the Atari userbase!
_IF_ you both get any time off soon for some rest, what's next from
your little bag of tricks? GA
Charles @ CHTech>
Next is Calligrapher, as we mentioned in our opening statement.
After that....who knows.
.John @ CodeHead>
Well, some day I may actually finish MIDI Spy. :^) ga
.Dana@STReport>
Anything that you've been wanting to do but haven't yet?
Is PinHead necessary with Warp 9?
.John @ CodeHead>
We'd like to cure the world hunger problem, but... who knows.
.Charles @ CHTech>
PinHead and Warp 9 do completely different things. Warp 9 doesn't
replace it.
.John @ CodeHead>
You'll definitely want to continue using Pinhead.
.Dana@STReport>
Great! GA
RMORROW>
Will I be able to dump PageStream 2.1 and WordUp 3.0 in favor of
Calligrapher? I use PageStream for only very basic uses, and WUP
is, well, buggy. Will I be able to import .WUP files? ga
.Charles @ CHTech>
The current version of Calligrapher doesn't explicitly import WUP
files. However, this can be added through its ability to call
external modules. If you do mostly simple DTP kinds of work with
Pagestream, Calligrapher will probably suit your needs just fine.
It's _not_ a DTP program, so if you have very complicated layouts
in mind, you should use Pagestream, but for general text and light
graphics stuff, it's terrific. ga
RMORROW>
No, nothing too detailed being done here. Thanks. ga
.Gordie>
This talk of external modules reminds me of MegaPaint Pro. Is
that a new concept, or is it TommySoft again?
.John @ CodeHead>
Calligrapher comes from England.
.Charles @ CHTech>
Nope....Calligrapher was developed by Working Title in the UK.
.Gordie>
So, it must be a concept that was long overdue.
SSHUSTER>
You mentioned earlier when talking about Calligrapher, the
use of SLM804/605 Driver, I'm rather new to Atari, and was curious
about what this was. ga
.Charles @ CHTech>
The SLM804 and SLM605 are Atari's laser printers. ga
.Gordie>
Steve, they don't have any memory resident, so you need extra in
your computer to handle the page set up, etc.
SSHUSTER>
Thanks
.MRAINEY>
When will Calligrapher be available, and will there be a demo
version for us to play with? ga
.John @ CodeHead>
That's a good question...we don't know, but I assume there'll be
a demo version. Another thing that we didn't mention is that
there is also a Calligrapher Lite version of the program. We
don't have a price on this yet, but it will be under $100.
We should have Calligrapher available within a month's time. GA
MRBURKLEY>
Do you feel that there is a market for extra, beyond 4 meg RAM
upgrades? What with Revolver, programs and all, I could use it!
.John @ CodeHead>
I think that Jim Allen of Fast Technology already has something
like that. GA
MRBURKLEY>
I'll Check. Thanks.
.BobT>
Are you aware of Wes Newells "knockoff" of the TEC board?
.John @ CodeHead>
We've heard about it...
As I understand, it is quite a "hack", requiring that you cut
traces on your motherboard, route wires all over the place, bend
pins on your chips, and all kinds of other unruly things. There
may be those who are willing to do this to their machines, but
this is a far cry from the clean design of the TEC.
.Dana@STReport>
With the arrival of European programs by CodeHead Tech, are you
"essentially" distributors...or are you able to "de-bug", re-work
these programs to enhance existing software?
.Charles @ CHTech>
Absolutely not, Dana! I just spent three months working on Warp 9,
and I'm going to spend more time on it in the near future. As far
as input into the European programs, we're careful to choose only
those programs that are already mature and problem-free. <grin>
No, really.
.Dana@STReport>
Can you "add/change" them at all?
.Charles @ CHTech>
With MegaPaint and Calligrapher, we're able to contribute to the
programs (and we already have) by writing our own external modules.
If you're asking "do we have access to the source code," no, we
don't.
.John @ CodeHead>
We've already done SEVEN modules for MegaPaint, giving it a LOT more
power than it had. We plan to do the same for Calligrapher.
.Dana@STReport>
So you can produce add-ons, but can't alter the programs in any way.
.John @ CodeHead>
If our customers ask for features, we don't have to tell them that
we're at the mercy of the authors...we can do something about it.
.Dana@STReport>
That's what I was getting at, John - thanks.
.John @ CodeHead>
<grin>
.Gordie>
Speaking of modules, are there any in the works for MegaPaint?
(Since it's a little early to ask about Calligrapher?)
.Charles @ CHTech>
We do have some stuff on the drawing board, but nothing imminent
at this moment. ga
.D.Nield>
Charles, does Calligrapher provide drivers for the Deskjet 500?
Support endnotes? Indexes? Table of Contents? Wordperfect files?
Thanks!
.John @ CodeHead>
There's a DESKJET5.SYS printer driver. I assume that's for the
500, but can't be sure.
.Charles @ CHTech>
Yes, to all of those, except the Word Perfect driver. We expect
to be able to come up with a WP driver rather quickly, though.
.John @ CodeHead>
We have a lot to learn about Calligrapher and its options...but,
if there are requests for features, we'll do our best to make
them available.
.D.Nield>
Great Thanks
.Mike>
OK...back to Warp-9....(sorry for the "reversion" in topics...but))
I have Quick-ST 2.0 and a 1040ST with 1 meg ant TOS 1.0...is the
speed worth the increase in RAM usage???
.Charles @ CHTech>
Yes. :) ga
.Mike>
How much faster IS it?? I havent seen any "hard" numbers. ga
.John @ CodeHead>
"Hard" numbers don't really mean much...what means a lot is how
fast you "perceive" the accelleration when you start using it.
Everyone that's gotten the update is raving about it. Maybe that's
enough for you, maybe not <grin>.
.Mike>
OK..last thing...I have Quick-ST 2.0, Is/are there any "concessions"
if I upgrade? GA
.John @ CodeHead>
Yes, you save $24.95 off the price and only pay $20
.Charles @ CHTech>
Quick ST 3 was faster than Quick ST 2. And Warp 9 is faster still.
.Mike>
I assume I gotta send in my original disk of Quick-ST?
.John @ CodeHead>
That would be a good idea.
.Charles @ CHTech>
That's right....send in the disk and a check for $20.00 to get the
Warp 9 upgrade. ga
More on that faster subject too: the free update we'll be releasing
soon will be even faster....in fact, scrolling in many GEM and non-
GEM programs will be almost 3 times faster!
.Gordie>
As a Warp 9 user, I have to say that things are noticably faster
than the older Quick ST's and Turbo ST.
.Mike>
<grin> I hope ya'll accept money orders, I don't use checks. ;-)
ATARIPOWER7>
Will the CodeHeads perhaps do a Term program right? I'm a bit
peeved, spent over $500 on a spiffy modem, and the software all
fall far short...
Will Calligrapher work well with the new font scaling used in the
newer Epson Printers, I think it's called ESC-P....
.Gordie>
Scrolling is the least enhanced currently, so that will make it
much improved!
.John @ CodeHead>
Maybe we should just give everyone a free copy of everything we
have <grin>.
.Gordie>
Sure, and we'll send you blank signed checks and Visa charge
slips... <G>
.Charles @ CHTech>
Sounds like a fair trade to me, Gordie! :-)
.John @ CodeHead>
We actually got a blank check from a guy yesterday. He said he'd
trust us to fill in the right amount <grin>.
PENDZICH>
Have Codekeys, would love one long macro instead of the several
short ones... could be an easy rewrite any chance? Plus...
How about a group price for all your software? Say $300-400...
.Charles @ CHTech>
You can already chain macros together to make one long one if you
want, in CodeKeys. About a group price, we have talked about this,
and we may do it....but we haven't settled on anything yet.
PENDZICH>
Had most problems in my old copy of Fleet street you guys have
that to test. Version 3.0
For the keys the problem is you have to break and start a new macro
all the time. ga
.Charles @ CHTech>
Right...you do have to start a new macro and it takes some planning.
When I get time to return to CodeKeys, I'll think about this.
About AP7's telecom question --- we don't have a telecom program
in the works right now....but who knows? ga
PENDZICH>
Oh one last thing know I will get blasted but could use you guys
on the IBM, they don't know how to write software there.
.Bruce from MAST>
So are you bringing a truck load of product to the Milwaukee show?
.Charles @ CHTech>
We'll have an ample supply. :) How many people do you expect...?
MRBURKLEY>
Is there a limit on how fast Warp 9 can be (of course there is!).
How close are you now?
.Charles @ CHTech>
We're _very_ close to the limit right now. The new update will
be right about at the edge, and it may not be possible to squeeze
any more cycles out of the machine after that. ga
MRBURKLEY>
Thanks
.John @ CodeHead>
Our efforts have been more geared toward compatibility.
.Charles @ CHTech>
Right.....we're as fast as you can go, while still retaining maximum
compatibility. An important distinction. It would be possible to
make some operations faster, but it would entail breaking rules or
taking shortcuts. We prefer to be solid and dependable, AND as fast
as possible.
.MRAINEY>
Any similar incentive to cash in my copy of Turbo ST in exchange
for Warp 9?
.Charles @ CHTech>
Yes, you can send in your Turbo ST disk and get the same upgrade
deal -- $20.00. ga
.John @ CodeHead>
The regrabbing of the vectors has gone a long way toward getting
every last ounce or speed out of the system.
.MRAINEY>
I'll do it
ATARIPOWER7>
What about the newer Epson printer's ability for font scaling?
.John @ CodeHead>
I don't know.
ATARIPOWER7>
HPGL5? IOW, does it support the high end HP laser driver?
.John @ CodeHead>
Yes, there's a printer driver called HPL150 and one called HPL300
ATARIPOWER7>
The one with variable size dots. Hmmm, shame. PageStream said
they couldn't make a driver for the HPIII taking advantage of HPGL5
.John @ CodeHead>
It's really a bit early for us to know every tiny detail about the
way Calligrpaher will operate with every printer available.
ATARIPOWER7>
As per making a term program, CAN RTS/CTS be fixed, at any cost?
.John @ CodeHead>
Get TOS 2.06
ATARIPOWER7>
I've heard it don't fix it, and since I will be getting a Mega
STe 4, I understand the 1.44 driver dont work.
.John @ CodeHead>
I think you heard wrong.
ATARIPOWER7>
Turbo-ST dont work. Not in TOS 1.2, on my computer. STR had a nice
explanation of the problem.
.John @ CodeHead>
Perhaps you should reconfigure your modem. There are a lot of
factors involved in getting optimum performance at high speed.
.Gordie>
I think there is a hardware problem with the RTS/CTS part. And I
don't think any software will fix it properly.
.John @ CodeHead>
It takes more than just one piece of magic.
Charles and I are sending stuff back and forth daily at high speeds
and have no problems whatsoever.
.MRAINEY>
I use Hotwire, Maxifile, Pinhead, and LGS. What will TOS 2.06 do
for me?
.John @ CodeHead>
Mrainey, TOS 2.06 offers about 10-15% speedup over TOS 1.04 in the
Gem dialog test.
.Gordie>
Anyone else have question about existing CodeHead products, or
Calligrapher?
WAYNEDUNHAM>
I just got here.... Did the CH's leak anything about the new WP?
.John @ CodeHead>
Nope. <grin>
.Charles @ CHTech>
What new word processor?
.John @ CodeHead>
Yes, Wayne, it's Calligrapher.
.Charles @ CHTech>
Oh, THAT one.
.John @ CodeHead>
<grin>
.John @ CodeHead>
Ten demerits, Wayne.
.Gordie>
I won't have them repeat it, but it will be in the transcript.
.John @ CodeHead>
50 pushups...now!
NORMW>
I'll take two!
WAYNEDUNHAM>
Hey, I said I just got here. :-) <off to the corner W/Dunce cap)
.Norm>
Are those SUGAR Free push ups :-)
.John @ CodeHead>
That'll teach you to be late...now get down and give me 50.
WAYNEDUNHAM>
50 pushups? I hope you guys have some time on your hands. :)
.Charles @ CHTech>
Time? Why, we have nothing but free time these days. ...NOT!
.Gordie>
Any chance I could get someone to add the button fix to MaxiFile?
I don't always use MultiDesk Deluxe.
.John @ CodeHead>
That seems to be a common request.
.Gordie>
I suppose I could just run BUTTNFIX, though.
.John @ CodeHead>
We don't feel it's fair to duplicate code in memory for the vast
number of people who do use MultiDesk Deluxe.
.Gordie>
That makes sense, John. I'll add BUTTNFIX back into my AUTO folder.
.D.Nield>
John or Charles, how did you come into contact with the authors
of Calligrapher?...
.John @ CodeHead>
We've been talking with Working Title about Calligrapher for almost
a year now. Plans got pushed back as we took on other products from
Germany, etc.
.Charles @ CHTech>
They originally contacted us, to license G+PLUS. G+PLUS has....
been included with Calligrapher for about 2 years now.
.D.Nield>
Did you aproach them concerning the possibility of an import? or
did they seek you out in hopes you would be interested... because
of your well deserved reputation?
.John @ CodeHead>
We asked them to send us a copy of Calligrapher out of curiosity
about why they wanted to use G+Plus. Charles then suggested we ask
them about importing it.
They didn't want a standard export deal, but rather wanted to
establish a US company specifically for Calligrapher. So we have
formed a division of CodeHead called Working Title US.
.Charles @ CHTech>
Wayne, I haven't been this excited about a word processor in a LONG
time. Calligrapher is an EXCELLENT piece of work.
.MRAINEY>
What are your hours and telephone numbers for tech support?
.John @ CodeHead>
Monday-Friday 9AM to 1PM (213) 386-5735
NORMW>
Those are Pacific times.
.Charles @ CHTech>
And the mailing address (for the sake of completeness) is:
CodeHead Technologies
PO Box 74090
Los Angeles, CA 90004
WAYNEDUNHAM>
I'm not familiar with Calligrapher, but it must be tops for CHTech
to add it to their list of products.
.MRAINEY>
Does Microsoft Word (15 meg on your hard drive) do a whole lot
that Calligrapher doesn't?
.Charles @ CHTech>
I haven't used Word, so I can't really answer that.
NORMW>
I have Word Charles. Come over!
WAYNEDUNHAM>
Is/Will there be a demo version available? I'm curious as to what
would light the CHtechie's fires so much!
.John @ CodeHead>
We will be asking them about a demo...dunno. <grin>
.BobT>
Speaking of disk space, how much does it require?
.John @ CodeHead>
It depends on how many modules you use.
The dictionary and thesaurus take up a lot of disk space. The
program itself is 306K.
.Charles @ CHTech>
It also depends on how many fonts you want to install.
.John @ CodeHead>
A fairly full setup takes about 4 meg.
.D.Nield>
I would think they would be flattered to be associated with the best
looking logo on any platform!!!
.Charles @ CHTech>
You mean our logo, David? Thanks! That's the work of Gregg Rodgers
who wrote the Genus font editor.
.Vic> Yeap....is that 306k on disk space...or operation
And a few more operation details on the wp program...if you would
please...
.John @ CodeHead>
306K of disk space. I'm not sure how much memory it uses.
.Ron <ym>
I came in late, and missed a full description, but briefly, what
does Caligrapher NOT do? (like Mega Paint doesn't do color, etc.)
What feature is NOT included that people may ask for but you will
have to tell them "It isn't in there and probably won't be" ga
.Charles @ CHTech>
That's an odd question -- I don't really have an answer. So far,
Calligrapher has been more than capable of everything I've asked
it to do.
.John @ CodeHead>
Well, it won't allow editing of individual vector points.
It doesn't do 3-D rotation <grin>.
.Charles @ CHTech>
That's true, John. Didn't think of that. It also doesn't know
a good recipe for buttermilk pancakes. ga
.John @ CodeHead>
It's really not a full desktop publishing program, but rather a
high-end word processor. Or should I say, document processor.
It uses outline fonts.
.Ron <ym>
So it's a step up from Regent Word II (which I currently use) but
won't replace PageStream (which I also use). Thanks.
.John @ CodeHead>
And graphics can be integrated...or drawn within. (hmmm...maybe it
does allow vector point editing).
.Gordie>
What kind of output formats will it do? Like full portrait, full
landscape, paginated 5.5x8.5? That kind of thing?
.Charles @ CHTech>
All of that, Gordie.
WAYNEDUNHAM>
Projected price range? For us latecomers.
.John @ CodeHead>
The basic "Professional" version will be well under $200, the
"Gold" version will be over $200, and the "Lite" version will be
under $100. Prices are not yet firmly established.
.Charles @ CHTech>
It's light years beyond Regent Word!
.Norm>
Since Wayne ask half of what I wanted, :-) When will it be availble
and what are the differences to the three versions.
.Charles @ CHTech>
It should be available within a month. John just mentioned our
tentative pricing. ga
.John @ CodeHead>
The Gold version will have Postscript, barcode generation, Flexible
text effects, grammar checking, automatic save, equation editor,
label printer, dictionary, thesaurus...
.Norm>
Grammar checking, that I NEED!
.John @ CodeHead>
Actually, some of that is in the Professional version, too.
BBKBRYAN>
This has probably been asked and answered, but what kind of import/
export modules exist. So that I can edit documents created on other
platforms? GA
.MRAINEY>
Is the documentation up to your usual high standards? Is it written
for the "Brits"?
.John @ CodeHead>
I haven't really fully read the docs <ducking>. It's a British
manual for sure. :^)
.Charles @ CHTech>
It is British....but believe me, that's a lot better than translated
German! The manual is quite good, actually. (I _have_ read parts
of it. Ahem.) :) ga
.MRAINEY>
Portuguese
.D.Nield>
How about the spell checker? You know the British can't spell....
.John @ CodeHead>
There are dictionaries available in French, German, Italian,
Spanish, Catalan, and UK English, and Dutch.
NORMW>
And Charles is Hawaiian spelling champ!
.John @ CodeHead>
As for import/export modules...what does not exist can be added
later as demand dictates.
WAYNEDUNHAM>
Hate to switch streams........
.John @ CodeHead>
......in the middle of the horse.
WAYNEDUNHAM>
What date are you up to with the Warp 9 Updates. ga
.John @ CodeHead>
We are less than a week behind right now. We sent out about a
hundred today, and should completely catch up tomorrow. GA
WAYNEDUNHAM>
Ok, the postman gets mad when I search his vehicle every day. :)
.D.Nield>
You too?
.John @ CodeHead>
We stuck yours in a pie and lobbed it.
WAYNEDUNHAM>
Quite a lob from CA to CT! Sign em up for the Olympic Pie Toss!
.John @ CodeHead>
It's easy at Warp 9!
MRBURKLEY>
I was just looking throught the April issue of ST Informer
Is the review of Calligrapher Professional in there of your new
product?
.John @ CodeHead>
Yes...
MRBURKLEY>
Will it still be distributed through A & D Software?
.John @ CodeHead>
At the time that was written, Rod Mcdonald had taken the initiative
to order some Calligraphers directly from the UK... He didn't
realize we were negotiating directly with Working Title. We've
talked to him since, and the next issue should at least have a
small statement about the fact that it will be available through us.
.MRAINEY>
Just to give me some perspective on the ST market, how many copies
must you sell to consider the project a success?
.John @ CodeHead>
That's a good one...I don't know if there IS such a thing as a
"success"... These days, just about any amount of sales can be
considered a success, although things have definitely been looking
up lately. GA
.Gordie>
It's been a couple of hours now. Dave Shorr, you'll have the last
question.
.John @ CodeHead>
Time's fun when you're having flies. (says Kermit)
.Dave>
PostScript output: does this mean I can print to a file and print it
out on a LaserWriter/LaserJet instead of my nine-pin Atari grafx
printer<g>?
.John @ CodeHead>
Yes, or you can take to a lino service bureau.
.Dave>
Thanks for fixing that CAD-3D problem with Warp 9 so quickly!!! GA.
.Charles @ CHTech>
Dave: yes, exactly. Or you can use Ultrascript. There are
equivalent fonts for most popular Postscript fonts available for
Calligrapher.
.Dave>
Do I have to worry about special font files? Only the Gold
version has this? <grin>
.John @ CodeHead>
Calligrapher can use standard GDOS fonts, or you can outline fonts
by using any of the 64 disks full of fonts available separately.
(use outline fonts)
.Charles @ CHTech>
The Calligrapher font library is of _very_ high quality, by the way.
Many fonts are licensed from the famous URW type foundry.
.D.Nield>
What will the font disks cost? approximately?
.John @ CodeHead>
We don't have a price on the font disks yet.
.Gordie>
Well, I want to thank the CodeHeads for taking the time out of
their busy lives to talk with us this evening. We appreciate it,
and everything else you've done for the Atari market.
Any closing comments?
.John @ CodeHead>
Thank you all for coming and thank you for supporting (and BUYing)
CodeHead Software and Hardware.
NORMW>
Buy?? You want me to buy??
.MRAINEY>
The check's in the mail
MRBURKLEY>
THANK YOU!
.Vic>
merci...!!!!
.Norm>
Thanks for a entertaining evening.
.Terry>
Thanks, gentlemen, keep up the good work.
.D.Nield>
Thank you for being here and for being there....
.Charles @ CHTech>
You're welcome, folks. It's been a pleasure.
.Gordie>
This CO is formally closed!
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Once again, I'd like to thank JBEAU for his work in getting this
transcript into some kind of intelligible shape. This one turned
out to be rather readable. Thanks! --Gordie
*************************************************************************
This conference transcript is the exclusive property of the ST
Advantage on DELPHI. Permission to reprint is granted only if this
notice is included and the transcript is left unchanged.
*************************************************************************
> CALLIGRAPHER STR InfoFile CODEHEAD ANNOUNCES CALLIGRAPHER!
=========================
For immediate release
CodeHeadQuarters
Friday, May 1, 1992
----------------------
CodeHead Technologies is proud to announce our exclusive
representation in
the United States and Canada of:
CALLIGRAPHER -- the next-generation
document processor that takes you from
first conception to final print!
Calligrapher is the first word processor to meet CodeHead's exacting
standards for user interface excellence and powerful features. In many
ways, Calligrapher bridges the gap between a desktop publishing
application and a word processor.
Some of Calligrapher's features include:
o Runs on all versions of TOS in all resolutions except Low.
o Standard GEM interface includes a complete desktop, with moveable
icons for your documents
o Powerful structured online help (one of the nicest help functions
you've ever seen!)
o Pop-up menus for maximum convenience
o Configurable, reassignable keyboard commands
o Editable dictionary and spell checker
o Abbreviations (for example, type "CH" and Calligrapher can
automatically expand it to "CodeHead")
o Tables and formulae
o Mail merge with personalizing and conditional selectivity
o Automatic pagination with selectable style and linked chapters
o Insertable automatically updated date function
o A powerful outliner (the first really useable outliner we've seen!)
o Paragraph style tagging
o Embedded codes can also be affected by search and replace operations
o Headers, footers, and footnotes
o Selectable graphic or text-only modes when printing
o Hinted outline fonts for very high quality printed output
o Import both bitmap graphics and GEM metafiles
o Built-in graphics tools for drawing lines and shapes
o Import .DIF files
o Import 1st Word Plus documents
o Infinite expandability through the use of "external modules"
In addition to these features, Calligrapher contains all of the standard
features expected of a powerful word processor, like search and replace,
global and conditional case conversion, word count, cut, copy, paste, and
cursor control.
Powerful ruler features include indent, outdent, multiple columns, left
align, right align, center align, left tab, right tab, center tab, decimal
tab, leader tabs, line spacing, vertical lines, and justification.
Preview options give you a graphic view of your document as it will look
on the printed page, with single or multiple pages selected from different
parts of the document for comparison.
Calligrapher supports a number of printers, including 9-pin, 24- pin, NEC
P6, HP Laserjet+, Laserjet II, Epson GQ3500, and Atari SLM804/605. A
print-to-disk feature allows you to easily print documents in batch mode.
Calligrapher Gold
-------------------
Also available will be Calligrapher Gold, which includes all of the
features listed above plus:
o Grammar checker
o Powerful thesaurus with word trail and distinction between
verbs, nouns, and antonyms
o Automatic indexing with cross referencing
o Automatic save
o Interactive formula editor
o Flextext text effects for bending text around paths
o PostScript output to disk, or directly to a PostScript device!
o Label printer
o Bar code creation
Calligrapher Extras
---------------------
We will be offering a catalog (64 disks) of professional quality hinted
outline fonts licensed from URW, an internationally renowned type foundry.
We also have supplemental Calligrapher dictionaries for seven other
languages.
We're very excited to be able to offer Calligrapher, helping to round out
our line of graphic tools: Avant Vector for auto-tracing and vector
graphics editing, MegaPaint Professional for bitmap and vector graphics
design, and the Cherry font collection.
Pricing and Availability
--------------------------
Retail prices for Calligrapher will be:
Calligrapher Professional $175
Calligrapher Gold $250
Gold Extension $100
Calligrapher will be available on May 15th. Contact your local dealer or
order directly from CodeHead Technologies at the address below.
Mastercard, Visa, and American Express credit cards are accepted. For
shipping, add $3 US, $4 Canada, and $6 overseas.
CodeHead Technologies
P.O. Box 74090
Los Angeles, CA 90004
Phone: (213) 386-5735
(Mon-Fri 9A-1P Pacific Time)
FAX: (213) 386-5789
BBS: (213) 461-2095
______________________________________________________________
> ADSCSI ROM UG STR InfoFile AdSCSI ROM Upgrade for Amiga Computers
==========================
ADSCSI ROM UPGRADE
==================
For Immediate Release
ICD, Incorporated, designer and manufacturer of innovative
enhancement products for Amiga computers, is pleased to announce the
release of a totally new ROM release of its AdSCSI hard disk driver for
its Amiga 2000 SCSI hard disk interfaces. AdSCSI 3.0 offers these
features:
o The AdSCSI driver has been completely rewritten. The intelligent
buffering that has made the AdSCSI 2000 and AdSCSI 2080 the best
performing host adapters on the market has been notably
improved.
o Faster transfer rates will be seen with all buffer sizes on all
CPUs. Enhanced intelligent buffering yields better results than
before and better over all performance than any other host
adapter on the market.
o Transfers to and from odd addressed buffers have been
dramatically increased. You'll see transfers up to 30 times as
fast as the competition from odd-aligned buffers.
o Free CPU time during disk access has been increased. You'll have
more CPU power for your multi-tasking applications.
o The AdSCSI driver takes advantage of enhanced processors. If you
have a 68030 or 68040 processor with 32 bit RAM, you'll see up to
three times the transfer speeds of a stock 68000-based computer
and even more free CPU time.
o Installing the new driver is simple: just replace the ROM chip on
AdSCSI 2000 or AdSCSI 2080 boards with a new one. No special
tools are needed.
Current owners of AdSCSI 2000 and AdSCSI 2080 host adapters in the United
States can receive an upgrade ROM for the new driver by sending $25 to
AdSCSI ROM Upgrade
ICD, Incorporated
1220 Rock Street
Rockford, IL 61101-1437
It is not necessary to send in old ROM chips for the upgrade.
Installation instructions are included.
For further information, contact:
ICD Customer Service at (815) 968-2228.
_________________________________________________________________
> BLUE RIDGE ATARIFEST STR SHOW NEWS "The Summertime Atari Event!"
==================================
1992 Blue Ridge ATARIFEST
"""""""""""""""""""""""""
Where: Westgate Shopping Center - Asheville, N.C.
Take any major highway into Asheville (US 19-23, US 26 or I-40) to the
I-240 loop, then take the "Westgate/Hilton Inn Drive exit" into the
Westgate Shopping Center parking lot.
When: 18, July 1992
Time: 10:am to 6:pm
Points of contact:
Van Estes, BRACE Pres. Clifford E. Allen, V.Pres.
704-685-8358 GEnie: C.Allen17
INTERNET: callen@UNCA.EDU
704-258-3758
Sheldon Winick
GEnie: S.WINICK
Computer STudio
704-251-0201
Come for the day or come for the weekend,
but do come and enjoy yourself.
Great Smokies Hilton Resort Hilton Inn Drive (704)254-3211
Toll-free reservation phone number 1-800-733-3211
Radisson One Thomas Wolf Plaza (704)252-8211
Rate: $62.00 per room (1-4 people)
====== Additional Hotel / Motel Information ===========
Days Inn I-26 and Airport Road (704)684-2281
I-40 Exit 55 (704)298-5140
Econo Lodge US 70 East, I-40 Exit 55 (704)298-5519
Holiday Inn 275 Smoky Park Hwy (704)667-4501
Toll-free reservation phone number1-800-HOLIDAY
Red Roof Inn I-40 and US 19-23 Exit 44 (704)667-9803
Toll-free reservation phone number1-800-843-7663
Buget Motel I-40 Exit 44 (Enka-Chandler)
West Asheville Exit (704)665-2100
Best
Western Asheville Central 22 Woodfin St (704)253-1851
========= Local Bed & Breakfast lodging Information =========
Aberdeen Inn 64 Linden Ave (704)254-9336
Albemarle Inn 86 Edgemont Road (704)255-0027
Applewood Manor 62 Cumberland Circle (704)254-2244
The Bridle Path Inn Lockout Road (704)252-0035
Cairn Brae B & B 217 Patton Mountain Rd (704)252-9219
Carolina B & B 177 Cumberland Ave (704)254-3608
Cedar Crest Victorian Inn 674 Biltmore Ave (704)252-1289
Corner Oak Manor 53 St. Dunstan (704)253-3525
Cornerstone Inn 230 Pearson Dr (704)253-5644
Flint Street Inn 100 & 116 Flint Street (704)253-6723
The Lion and The Rose 276 Montford Ave (704)255-7673
The Ray House B & B 83 Hillside St (704)252-0106
Reed House 119 Dodge St (704)274-1604
The Wright Inn 235 Pearson Drive (704)251-0789]
(1-800-552-5724)
A more complete listing of Bed & Breakfasts can be obtained through the
Asheville Area Chamber of Commerce.
Reservations should be made immediately, as July is the height of our
tourist season.
=========== CAMP GROUNDS ================
(reservations are a must during this time of season):
Mount Pisgah:
About 20 miles southwest of Asheville on the Blue Ridge Parkway at
mile post 408.6 (National Park Service). 690 acres. Elevation 5000'. One
of the nicest campgrounds in Western North Carolina. 67 tent sites, 70 RV
sites. For reservations: P.O.Box 749, Watnesville, N.C. 28786; phone (704)
235-9109. No showers. Groceries and resturant. Nature program. 14 day
stay limit.
Lake Powhatan:
4 miles south of Asheville on State road 191, 3.5 miles west on FR
806. 30 acres. 98 tent/rv sites. Reservation available thru Mistix
1-800-283-CAMP. Disposal station. No showers. Swimming; lifeguard;
fishing; nature trails; bicycles. 14-day stay limit.
While in the area, you might want to consider a little sightseeing,
and include a visit to the Biltmore House here in Asheville (the largest
single family residence ever built in the U.S.--its a "castle"). A visit
to the Biltmore can be a full-day's activity as you will want to view the
house, visit the winery, and walk some of the grounds and gardens.
Hours:
The House 9 am to 6pm The Gardens 9am to 7pm
Conservatory 9am to 5:30pm
The Winery Monday-Saturday 11am to 7pm Sunday 1pm to 7pm
Other areas of interest include; the Thomas Wolf home (adjacent to the
Raddison), the Blue Ridge Parkway and Folk Art Center. A drive up the Blue
ridge Parkway to enjoy the higher elevations and incredible views of our
mountains. Perhaps a hike up to Mount Pisgah and look back down to
Asheville(you can see Mt. Pisgah from most anywhere in Asheville). A
short drive from Mt. Pisgah will take you to Sliding Rock (for those of
you travelling with kids who are still kids at heart), the Cradle of
Forestry (first forest school in the country), waterfalls, trout hatchery,
etc. For the adventurous, white water rafting on the Natahala River near
Bryson City (approx one and a half hours from here).
There's obviously loads more to see and do around Asheville (in
addition to the Blue Ridge AtariFest and a visit to Computer STudio :-).
If any of y'all would like maps and additional tourist info of the area I
might suggest contacting the Chamber of Commerce:
Asheville Area Chamber of Commerce
151 Haywood Street
P.O. Box 1010
Asheville, NC 28802
704-258-6111 FAX: (704)251-0926
___________________________________________________________________
> TOS 306 STR FOCUS "... the latest and greatest..."
=================
TOS 3.06 & AJAX
===============
by Clemens Chin
I'm the type of person who always wants the latest and greatest when
it comes to hardware. When I heard that Atari had upgraded the TT030's
TOS, floppy controller and floppy drives, I wanted it! However, no one
seemed to have it. I was promised it would appear "next week" for several
weeks by one dealer and got fed up. This was when I decided to give Best
Electronics another try (they didn't have it yet on my first attempt).
They had it! I had it shipped blue label and received it the following
Tuesday (since I placed my order on a Friday night). The UPS delivery man
was looking at me quite bizarrely due to the permanently affixed smile on
my face.
I tore apart the box that it came in to get at TOS 3.06, AJAX and high
density drive. Then I proceeded with taking apart my computer. Having
done these sorts of upgrades many times and examined the TT's mother
board before, I knew exactly what had to be done: remove the old TOS,
drive controller and drive and stick in the new ones. One extra step is
to change one of the DIP switch positions.
Everything was finished in about 20 minutes and naturally, the first
thing I did from there was boot up the system to make sure everything was
working right. The system booted up and I was greeted by the new TOS with
Atari's Fuji in all its glory and a new memory test. When the desktop
came up I immediately tried to format a disk in high density. Everything
was working beautifully, now I wanted to try some software with the new
AJAX controller and HD drive. Magic Shadow came to mind. I .MSA'ed a disk
then tried to un.MSA it and the system returned an error to me! I tried
again and again and it yielded the same result everytime.
After further testing, I realized that while the drive read and wrote
in 360K, 720K and HD, it would only format in HD. I thought perhaps I had
done something wrong in the installation. Back tracking proved I didn't.
I called Best Electronics they told me that my problem may be a product
of RF noise. I did a number of things to eliminate as much possible noise
as I could, still didn't work. Then I thought that maybe it was due to
the drive controller board that is part of my tower case. I disconnected
the controller and connected it directly to the TT mother board, I found
the problem!
I needed to connect my drives to this board because it allows the
connection of two floppies to my tower case. So, I decided to give System
Solutions (the people I bought the tower case from) a call. This was the
first time they'd heard about the problem. Great. We stayed on the phone
trying to talk out the problem and he pointed out that the board didn't
make all the connections of the ribbon cable that connects the drive. We
agreed that it may be a good idea that I try to connect the ones that
aren't there to see if that would alleviate the problem. He suggested Pin
2. Five minutes after hanging up with him I had the system working
perfect harmony.
It took me almost a week and a half to figure out the problem and
about 5 minutes and about 2.5" of wire wrap to fix it... Well, at least
everything is working now and I'm a happy camper. TOS 3.06 is nice, AJAX
and the HD drive are now working great.
Some things to remember if you are planning to upgrade:
1. If only certain programs don't recognize your 1.44 floppy, try
running a program set the correct seek rate, some systems seem to
have problems detecting it correctly. SETSEEK.PRG from Codehead
does this well. Set it at 3 for standard 360K or 720K disks and
6 for 1.44 megs.
2. In some cases, it is required that you flip the ribbon cable that
connects the drive. Otherwise, try to keep the ribbon cable as
flat and neat as possible.
3. On Mega STes and TTs, remember to flick switch 7 on the DIP switches.
Leave the others alone. This will let you format in high density from
the desktop.
4. From what Best Electronics told me, some users are experiencing
problems due to RF noise. Try your best to insulate the drives and
its ribbon cable from the power supply and the power cables. (If you
have an internal hard drive, don't forget its power cables.)
* One possible way to reduce noise, is by removing the screw in
the middle of the underside of the power supply (Mega STes and TTs
only) and covering it up hole with electrical tape. This screw
supposedly causes the power supply ground to goto the floppy, by
removing it, you remove noise.
5. If you've got a Lighthouse tower case, the multi-board needs to have
Pin 2 connected in where the drive ribbon cable is connected. A bit
of wire wrap works like a dream.
__________________________________________________________________
> SPRINGTIME! STR FOCUS "flowers" are sprouting their blossoms
=====================
SPRING IS IN THE AIR
====================
by Dana P. Jacobson
I don't know what the weather is like in your part of the country, but
here in the northeast it certainly doesn't "feel" like a typical New
England Spring. Still, the temperature is slowing climbing to "tolerable"
levels; and the sun even shines brightly on occasion!
Speaking of Spring, it certainly appears that a lot of new "flowers"
are beginning to sprout their blossoms with regard to products for Atari
machines. It's certainly starting to look like a banner year.
Rumors of Atari's new machines are all over the place; and I certainly
hope that these aren't of that vicious "weed" variety that everyone wants
to rid their yards of them. We've heard of the new "030" machines with
various cross-breeding. Will they be in 1040-style cases, or the
"wedding-cake" variety? Will they have detachable keyboards, or one-piece
units? Will they have networking capabilities, UNIX, etc. and become a
new breed of Atari products? It's hard to say, as Atari has taken a
"can't say" profile within their "breeding greenhouse". So, we're left
to our imagination as to what these new machines might look like, but
that's okay. We all prefer to look at a flower in full bloom anyway...
The new Supra 9600 modems are shipping and all I've seen is praise for
them, fax capabilities and all. Flash II is shipping and it seems to be
receiving "middle of the road" feedback so far. By that I mean not great,
not bad. Although I haven't seen it yet, word has it that it's basically
the old program, with a few enhancements. I hope that there's more
discussion on it soon (and perhaps a demo) so "non-Flash user diehards"
can learn more about the program. I hope to see the new Flash receive the
same kind of accolades as its predecessor.
The "flowers" that seemed to discover an early Spring and have bloomed
already are from CodeHead Technologies. That California sunshine must be
a major factor!! Anyway, CodeHead's TOS Extension board seems to be an
incredible success. Warp 9, the new breed of QuickST, is receiving
blue-ribbon treatment everywhere you turn. Charles Johnson really did a
great job going through the old program and improved it. This is all
second-hand knowledge, as I've just recently sent in for my own upgrade.
Can't wait to put it on my own system!!
If you're a Delphi user and happened to log on to the weekly scheduled
conference this past week, you know that both John Eidsvoog and Charles
Johnson were the guests. Not only did they talk about the aforementioned
Warp 9, but they also announced a newly-acquired program from Europe which
will enter CodeHead's growing family of great products. They've been
teasing us about this new program for months, and we've finally heard some
specific info. The product, an impressive word processor program, is
called "Calligrapher". If you were present during that Delphi conference
you were able to learn first-hand some of the capabilities. If not,
you'll see the transcript of that conference in this issue. Check it out
because this sounds like an incredibly impressive and powerful word
processor. It sounds like Calligrapher is going to make Word Perfect look
like an overgrown capture buffer/text editor!! What's even better,
CodeHead has stated that there will be four versions of the program,
depending on how powerful a program you require. That, and additional
modules make Calligrapher a sure-fire success. Read the transcript, and
see what I mean.
While on the subject of CodeHead, these two guys should receive all of
the awards and praise possible. Never have I seen the dedication to
perfection and support that both Charles and John provide. Sure, we've
all seen this kind of support on a short-time basis, or in spurts; but
they always seem to go out of their way to help out in any way possible.
Others should take lessons from these two guys!! We'll learn a lot more
about the CodeHeads in an upcoming issue, so stay tuned!
As you may or may not have learned yet, Z-Net is no longer being
offered. In its place, and making its debut this weekend, will be Atari
Explorer Online Magazine. All of us at STReport wish the folks at AEO the
best of luck in their endeavors and looking forward to the premier issue.
Break a finger, guys!!
So, Spring is here and I apologize for all of the metaphors. I'll just
blame it on Spring fever and hope I can get away with it! It's always a
great time of year; and we all seem to look forward to it arriving. With
all of the portents for Spring in the air in our Atari environment, it
looks like we're going to have a banner year!
Until next time...
_____________________________________________________________
> STAccounts STR InfoFile A DOUBLE-ENTRY INTEGRATED ACCOUNTING PACKAGE.
=======================
STAccounts
==========
STAccounts is a double-entry integrated Accounting Package
STAccounts handles:
Accounts Receivable, Accounts Payable, Inventory Control, and General
Ledger, all totally integrated allowing full and immediate communication
within the program. Batch invoicing and Order Entry for both Sales and
Purchases are handled by the system and all printed output from the
computer can be altered, amended, or entirely reconfigured by the user to
suit their specific needs utilizing the powerful built-in Report
Generator.
STAccounts was designed for the first time user of a business computer
system. It is written totally within the "GEM" Operating Environment
fully utilizing the graphics and mouse capabilities providing on-line Help
in every transaction.
STAccounts is fast, powerful, fully integrated and easy to use.
"STAccounts is a friendly, simple to use, no nonsense integrated
Accounting package and with an Inventory Control it represents Good value
for the money." STUSER
Partial List of Features
Accounts Receivable - Integrated with A/P, G/L and I/C.
* Number of Customers depends entirely on available disk space
* Customer file contains names with bill to and ship to addresses
* Invoicing/Credits
* 10 Tax rates
* Immediate account access
* Backorders
* Reports include: Sales Turnover, Aged Receivables, Customer Statments,
Invoices and Packing Slips.
Accounts Payable - Integrated with A/R, G/L and I/C.
* Number of accounts depends on available disk space
* Supplier file contains name with bill to and ship to addresses
* Check writing
* Remittance advices/statements
* Immediate account access
* Reports include: Purchase Turnover, Aged Payables and Supplier
Mailing List.
Inventory Control - Integrated with A/R, A/P and G/L.
* Number of items depends on available disk space
* 10 product groups
* Turnover by quantity and value
* Items stored alphabetically
* Directly linked to both A/P and A/R
General Ledger - Integrated with A/P, A/R and I/C.
* up top 256 G/L accounts
* Immediate account access
* Account details including budgets
* Variance percentage for budget against actuals
* Period/Year End
* Reports include: Income Statement, Trial Balance, Balance Sheet, List
of Accounts and Audit Trail.
HELP
STAccounts provides you with on-line help throughout the program, no
matter what you are doing. If you become uncertain of your actions during
the course of running the program, just click the left mouse button on
Teddy and a help screen for that particular section of the system will
appear full of useful information for inexperienced users.
REPORT GENERATOR
STAccounts Report Generator is a powerful tool integrated into the
system. It will allow you to reconfigure reports using any of the system
information. Provided with the system are a number of default reports
which can be altered, amended or entirely reconfigured for your individual
company's needs, or create new reports as to your company requirements.
Data fields and heading can be added and moved around the page; under full
mouse control, even printer control codes can be inserted at any position
on the report form.
SYSTEM CONFIGURATION
STAccounts is designed to be used on ST/STE/TT with at least 512K and
either a color or monochrome monitor. STAccounts is hard drive
compatible.
ISD Marketing
2800 John Street Unit #10
Markham, Ontario
Canada L3R 0E2
(416) 479-1880 Telephone
(416) 479-1882 Fax
__________________________________________________________
> CHECKMATE! STR Review CHECKMATE is GEM-based
=====================
CHECKMATE - AN OVERVIEW
=======================
by Kevin Miller
CHECKMATE, distributed by Interplay Productions, is, in my opinion,
one of the most powerful chess programs written for the 68000 series of
microcomputers. The Atari ST version offers many advanced features
unavailable on competing products, and is simple enough to learn to use.
It is also STE-compatible.
The program runs in both color and monochrome, and installs easily
onto hard disk for ease of use. CHECKMATE is not copy-protected, but
requires you to input a particular move from one of ten classic games
included with the CHECKMATE manual before the program will finish loading.
CHECKMATE is GEM-based, with a very comprehensive menu. You may load
and save games, give yourself a name (instead of the generic "HUMAN"), and
print moves. You may also set certain default values, such as 2D/3D
display, board orientation, opening book control, your name, thinking
control, and aggressive/normal play. Once set, each time you load the
program, these default values will be automatically set for you upon
startup.
The default set of chess pieces is of the standard variety, though you
can choose from several different sets available from within the program.
Colors of the board and pieces can also be changed to your liking. If you
wish to play the black pieces, you can set the board orientation to
display the black pieces at the bottom of the board, or even the top or
sides of the board!
Piece movement is rather versatile as well. You have several options
here. You can have the pieces "snap" to their new squares, or you can
opt to have them slide to their new positions. You can also click on the
"TO" square and the program will indicate the piece that it thinks you
want to move to that new square. If it is incorrect (which is rare) you
may click once on the correct piece and that piece will be moved.
You may, of course, swap sides at any point in the game, which is
handy if you find yourself losing and wish to have the computer try to
salvage your game! The program will also play a game against itself,
referee a game between two humans, and replay an entire game. If you're
in a hurry, you can interrupt CHECKMATE's thinking process and have it
move immediately. CHECKMATE will also allow you to take back moves if
necessary. A special "rewind" feature will take back all moves to the
start of the game, and "fast forward" will play moves forward from the
beginning of a game until finished or until you press the Escape key.
CHECKMATE thinks about its next move on your time, thus greatly increasing
its strength, but you also have the option here of turning this feature
off if you wish. Hints are available from CHECKMATE, as well as chess
clock displays, score of the position, move number, and a list of captured
pieces. If you want to set up a specific position for the computer to
analyze, this is easily accomplished through the "alter board" command,
allowing you to clear the board and select and place the pieces you need
for the analysis. You may set an infinite number of strength levels to
have CHECKMATE play at, by setting normal/aggressive play and time
controls, such as 40 moves in 2 hours.
The Opening Book Library is very comprehensive and versatile. Through
compression techniques, the program contains a list of established opening
moves - over 300,000 moves! This compares very favorably with any other
chess program available on the market today. You may set the computer to
choose opening lines at random, or by strength, or by popularity. You may
also force the computer to play the line you want, if it is contained in
its opening library. If it isn't, no problem. CHECKMATE allows you to
add to the opening library by using any word processor in ASCII mode!
If you have the "Learn" option selected, CHECKMATE will add any
opening moves that it discovers and considers to be strong to its own
opening library, thus increasing its own potential strength in future
games.
Two unique features deserve to be mentioned here. The first is a
feature that will allow you to grade your own overall chess strength.
After choosing your time control, you are presented with a series of
twenty-four chess problems, and you are rewarded with an approximate chess
rating based on your performance. You can also use this feature to rate
the computer's chess strength at various time controls. Chess ratings are
given in ELO points, which is an international system used to rate chess
players. In the United States, the United States Chess Federation system
is used. A player's USCF rating is generally 100 - 150 points higher than
his ELO rating would be.
A very innovative piece of programming for use in home computers is in
use here in CHECKMATE. Transposition tables (or hash tables) have been
used in the top-level dedicated mainframe chess monsters for several
years, and now CHECKMATE has this feature incorporated into its program.
Let me get a little technical here. When a computer considers a move, it
looks at literally hundreds of thousands of different lines of play!
However, many of these lines lead to identical positions, and each of
these positions has to be individually evaluated and scored. With
transposition tables, a section of memory is set up to store many of these
"end positions" as the computer continues its search for the best move.
If an identical position is reached, the program merely has to "look it
up" in the table and see what score it had already assigned to the
position. This saves a great deal of wasted time and allows CHECKMATE to
search more deeply in a given amount of time - all of which adds up to
trouble for you! CHECKMATE will configure its transposition size according
to your machine's available memory. On an unexpanded 1040ST, this will
normally be 512K. On my own machine, which has a little over 2 meg
available (ignoring my 1 meg ram disk), a 1 meg table is set up. If I
eliminate my ramdisk, my table size is 2 megabytes!
I have tested CHECKMATE against the Novag Super VIP, which is a
portable dedicated chess computer rated at approximately 1950 USCF rating
points (2000 points is candidate master level). In ten games at 30
seconds per move, with a win counting as one point and a draw as half a
point, CHECKMATE took the match at a score of 7-3, with no losses to the
Novag machine! The makers of CHECKMATE estimate their program's rating at
about 2050 ELO, which, based on my own subsequent testing, seems a
reasonably accurate assessment. This program is no slouch, folks!
CHECKMATE recognizes all the rules of chess, including en passant,
castling, and draw conditions. However, I suspect a bug in the "draw by
repetition" routine, in which a draw is declared if an identical position
occurs three times in the course of a game. It seems to declare a draw
before it should, though in normal play this is rarely a major obstacle.
In summary, CHECKMATE is a very well-written program which
concentrates on chess strength, not just "look and feel." Programs such as
BATTLE CHESS are very cute and pretty, but the actual chess program leaves
a lot to be desired. CHECKMATE is a serious entry into the home
microcomputer chess market. Those of you lucky enough to have accelerated
machines will have an even stronger program in CHECKMATE, since it will be
able to search much further in less time! I have recently had the T25
68000 accelerator board installed in my machine and should reasonably
expect an improvement of around 100 points USCF. I highly recommend
CHECKMATE for serious chess players who also happen to own ST/STEs!
CHECKMATE
Interplay Productions
3710 South Susan, Suite 100
Santa Ana, CA 92704
___________________________________________________________
> STR Portfolio News & Information Keeping up to date...
================================
THE ATARI PORTFOLIO FORUM
=========================
On CompuServe
by Judith Hamner 72257,271
The deadline has passed for the Portfolio Programming Contest. Make
sure to check in next week for the announcement of the winners.
Multimedia for the Port? BJ Gleason has uploaded a program found in
England. VOICE.COM brings speech to the Portfolio.
There were some nice application programs written as contest entries.
Tom Showers has submitted LISTER.ZIP. This list processor will create,
save, and retrieve lists for viewing. Text files can be imported into the
program.
One of my favorites is DU1.ZIP, a diary utility. This program links
directly with the Port's diary and allows TODO notes to be included in the
diary. The author is encouraging suggestions for future improvements.
BJ Gleason is back in action with a program to work with the built-in
address book files. FNDADR.EXE will search all address files for a
particular phrase. This was high on the wish list of those who had to
split their data into multiple files due to the file size limit. Our
forum's programmers do an amazing service by turning users wishes into
working software in record time.
Pete Bennett has entered a recipe conversion program into the contest.
RECIPE.ZIP is a Pbasic program to scale a recipe for times when you need
more or fewer servings of your favorite recipe. Another Pbasic program by
Pete translates Roman numberals. Whip out your Port and fire up ROMAN.ZIP
next time you can't decipher a cornerstone. Pbasic by BJ Gleason is also
available in the forum library.
PRTBIB.ZIP is a collection of address file templates by Pete Bennett.
They show you how to collect bibliographic references in standard medline
or psychlit formats for later importing into databases.
Don Thomas has uploaded an enhanced shareware version of Viewport.
VIEW.ZIP contains the file which will allow Port graphics to be displayed
on a PC clone.
In the graphics library we have some new animations. REPORT.EXE is the
Re:Port logo by Dave Stewart. BDAY.EXE is a birthday animation by Dave.
Pete Bennett uploaded DRAGON.PGC which contains (you guessed it!) the
image of a dragon.
GAME OF THE WEEK: Hugh J. Campbell has uploaded GOLF10.ARC. Nine
holes of golf are now available in your Portfolio. Give Hugh a little
encouragement and the back nine will be coming soon. Requires Pbasic to
run.
____________________________________________________________
> THIS WEEK! STR Spotlight A WEEK WE'LL NEVER FORGET!
========================
JUSTICE IS "BLINDFOLDED" ALRIGHT!
=================================
by R. F. Mariano
What a week! Codehead announces they will be bringing in three levels
of Calligrapher, John Eidsvoog becomes an "eyewitness" reporter to the Los
Angeles disgrace.
Speaking of Los Angeles, the "City of Angels", it has a great deal to
be ashamed of. A totally reprehensible verdict was announced in Los
Angeles. I've followed this Rodney King case rather closely and I too, am
absolutely amazed at the audacity of the jurors in coming forward with
such an absurd verdict. I must admit however, I was not surprised. After
watching the superb "legal maneuvering" in getting the case moved (change
of venue) to the little "Bedroom Community" of Simi Valley, whose
population is predominantly made up of LAPD officers, (both retired and
active), their families and many other civil service employees. When the
jury was selected from this environment and overseen by the local "Judge"
the astonishment was complete. The trampling of true justice was never,
ever to be so complete as was perpetrated here.
Thankfully, the US Attorney General's office has reopened the entire
matter. The change of venue is sure to be a focal point of the
investigation. The verdicts themselves are indeed atrocious but the
thought process behind the verdicts is far more important. As a society,
we must discover the true meanings behind these verdicts. Are they merely
the product of "taking care of the boys"? Or, are they indicative of
something many people throughout the USA have been trying to bring to the
forefront of everyone's attention in every State in the Union. That
being; "Those given the authority to govern and enforce are, in many
instances, either allowing and condoning these abuses by non-professional
officers or, the internal problems of this type are deeper and more far
reaching than anyone has ever imagined.
In our lifetimes we have, in this country, been expected to "believe"
without question, the Chappaquidick "accident", the Kennedy Assassinations
(both), the Hostage Release Delays (Sink Carter), the Iran Contra Affair
(The Ollie & Ronnie Show), the stated causes of Desert Storm, not the Real
underlying causes of "Desert Storm" (ask the "early retired" US Iraqi
Diplomat, she was truthful). Of course, now we have the disgraceful
manner in which this verdict in Los Angeles was arrived at, (everything
stated to have been done in an "irreproachable manner"). The stark,
truthful observation is revolting. The "Change of Venue in this case was
a travesty of justice. No, that's too mild a description it was an actual
rape of the justice system and what it stands for. The citizens of this
country have long been looked upon by our political, legislative and
judicial leadership as "gullible sheep", ready willing and able to swallow
anything.
Unfortunately, the real victims of this verdict are all of us. The
level of respect for the justice system in this country is now at an all
time low. The trust of Law Enforcement Organizations all across the
country is virtually non-existent. Police Chiefs and department heads
around the nation have been warning their officers to be very careful
about the manner in which they conduct themselves in public. Once again,
it surfaces that the actions of a few "CowBoys" in Policeman's Uniforms
paints the entire Law Enforcement Community in disgrace with a very wide
brush. Training, Professionalism and pride in one's career is totally
lacking in these cowboys, they must be weeded out and dismissed from all
public service. They are a disgrace to the "TIN".
I know this essay has nothing to do with computers but the bottom line
we are all citizens of this great nation first and computer enthusiasts
second. All that occurs in our country reflects upon all of us. We must
make sure our representatives in government know we are tired of the
course of current action and affairs. The riots throughout the nation and
in particular in Los Angeles are unforgivable. The senseless loss of
lives is, by far, the most tragic by product of the whole affair. Anyone
who would try to veer the revealing light of responsibility for the
current events away from the Rodney King Case, The Change of Venue in the
Rodney King Case and the final insult.. the NOT GUILTY Verdict, is guilty
THEMSELVES of gross irresponsibility.
As an individual, I was very active in the sixties trying to affect
change in government from the 1930's (pre-war) way of thinking and doing
things. After witnessing this "King Travesty", I must admit our
generation wasn't very successful. My heart goes out to every cop out
there, uniformed or plainclothes, who is trying to do the right thing. In
time... the hurt, mistrust and general ill will abate. But not for a very
long time.
_______________________________________________________________
> FIND THE REPS! STR InfoFile
===========================
In light of this being an election year, we at STReport felt we
should bring you a list of our Senators and Representatives along with
their FAX numbers. The Representatives.
From Jim Wells on the Jerry Pournelle Roundtable on Genie...
In consideration of the performance of our Congressmen, I thought a
list of their FAX numbers might be handy...Drop them a line and tell them
_exactly_ what you think of them; good or bad...
-------------------------
* NP means Not Published
CONGRESSIONAL FAX NUMBERS CONGRESSIONAL FAX NUMBERS
----------------------------------------------------------------------
REP ABERCROMBIE =1-202-225-4580 REP ACKERMAN =1-202-225-1589
REP ALEXANDER =1-202-225-6182 REP ALLARD =1-202-225-8630
REP ANDERSON =1-202-225-1597 REP M_ANDREWS =1-202-225-4210
REP R_ANDREWS =1-202-225-6583 REP T_ANDREWS =1-202-225-9065
REP ANNUNZIO =NP REP ANTHONY =1-202-225-3646
REP APPLEGATE =1-202-225-3087 REP ARCHER =1-202-225-4381
REP ARMEY =1-202-225-7614 REP ASPIN =NP
REP ATKINS =1-202-225-5588 REP AUCOIN =1-202-225-2707
REP BACCHUS =1-202-225-9039 REP BAKER =1-202-225-7313
REP BALLENGER =1-202-225-0316 REP BARNARD =1-202-225-1873
REP BARRETT =1-202-225-0207 REP BARTLETT =NP
REP BARTON =1-202-225-3052 REP BATEMAN =1-202-225-4382
REP BEILENSON =NP REP BENNETT =1-202-225-9635
REP BENTLEY =1-202-225-4251 REP BEREUTER =1-202-225-1148
REP BERMEN =1-202-225-5279 REP BEVILL =1-202-225-0842
REP BILBRAY =1-202-225-8808 REP BILIRAKIS =1-202-225-4085
REP BLILEY =1-202-225-0011 REP BOEHLERT =1-202-225-1891
REP BOEHNER =1-202-225-0704 REP BONOIR =1-202-225-1169
REP BORSKI =1-202-225-4628 REP BOUCHER =NP
REP BOXER =1-202-225-1004 REP BREWSTER =1-202-225-9029
REP BROOKS =1-202-225-1584 REP BROOMFIELD =1-202-225-1807
REP BROWDER =1-202-225-9020 REP BROWN =1-202-225-8671
REP BRUCE =1-202-225-9810 REP BRYANT =1-202-225-9721
REP BUNNING =1-202-225-0003 REP BURTON =1-202-225-0016
REP BUSTAMANTE =1-202-225-3849 REP BYRON =1-202-225-6159
REP CALLAHAN =1-202-225-0562 REP CAMP =1-202-225-9679
REP B_CAMPBELL =1-202-225-0228 REP T_CAMPBELL =1-202-225-5944
REP CARDIN =1-202-225-9219 REP CARPER =1-202-225-1912
REP CARR =1-202-225-1260 REP CHANDLER =1-202-225-7762
REP CHAPMAN =1-202-225-7265 REP CLAY =1-202-225-1783
REP CLEMENT =1-202-225-1035 REP CLINGER =1-202-225-4681
REP COBLE =1-202-225-8611 REP T_COLEMAN =1-202-225-4799
REP R_COLEMAN =NP REP B_COLLINS =1-202-225-6645
REP C_COLLINS =1-202-225-8396 REP COMBEST =1-202-225-9615
REP CONDIT =1-202-225-0819 REP CONYERS =1-202-225-0072
REP COOPER =1-202-225-4520 REP COSTELLO =1-202-225-0285
REP COUGHLIN =1-202-225-1238 REP C_COX =1-202-225-9177
REP J_COX =1-202-225-4744 REP COYNE =1-202-225-1844
REP CRAMER =1-202-225-4392 REP CRANE =1-202-225-7830
REP CUNNINGHAM =1-202-225-2558 REP DANNEMEYER =1-202-225-1755
REP DARDEN =NP REP DAVIS =1-202-225-3588
REP DEFAZIO =1-202-225-0694 REP DELAGARZA =1-202-225-2534
REP DELAURO =1-202-225-4890 REP DELAY =1-202-225-5241
REP DELLUMS =1-202-225-9817 REP DERRICK =1-202-225-5383
REP DICKINSON =1-202-225-1916 REP DICKS =1-202-225-1176
REP DINGELL =1-202-225-7426 REP DIXON =1-202-225-4091
REP DONNELLY =1-202-225-5841 REP DOOLEY =1-202-225-9308
REP DOOLITTLE =1-202-225-5444 REP DORGAN =1-202-225-9436
REP DORNAN =1-202-225-3694 REP DOWNEY =1-202-225-1275
REP DREIR =1-202-225-4745 REP DUNCAN =1-202-225-6440
REP DURBIN =1-202-225-0170 REP DWYER =1-202-225-1553
REP DYMALLY =1-202-225-6847 REP EARLY =1-202-225-3181
REP ECKART =1-202-225-1514 REP C_EDWARDS =1-202-225-0353
REP D_EDWARDS =1-202-225-9460 REP M_EDWARDS =1-202-225-1193
REP EMERSON =1-202-225-9621 REP ENGEL =1-202-225-5513
REP ENGLISH =1-202-225-8698 REP ERDREICH =1-202-225-1751
REP ESPY =1-202-225-5898 REP EVANS =1-202-225-5396
REP FASCELL =1-202-225-0724 REP FAWELL =1-202-225-9420
REP FAZIO =1-202-225-0354 REP FEIGHAN =1-202-225-1230
REP FIELDS =1-202-225-6899 REP FISH =1-202-225-0962
REP FLAKE =1-202-225-4169 REP FOGLIETTA =1-202-225-0088
REP FOLEY =1-202-225-7181 REP H_FORD =1-202-225-9215
REP W_FORD =NP REP FRANK =1-202-225-0182
REP FRANKS =1-202-225-5085 REP FROST =1-202-225-4951
REP GALLEGLY =1-202-225-0713 REP GALLO =1-202-225-0658
REP GAYDOS =1-202-225-1335 REP GEJDENSON =1-202-225-4977
REP GEKAS =1-202-225-8440 REP GEPHARDT =1-202-225-7452
REP GEREN =1-202-225-2786 REP GIBBONS =NP
REP GILCHREST =1-202-225-0254 REP GILLMOR =1-202-225-1985
REP GILMAN =1-202-225-9636 REP GINGRICH =1-202-225-4656
REP GLICKMAN =1-202-225-5398 REP GONZALEZ =1-202-225-1915
REP GOODLING =1-202-225-1000 REP GORDON =1-202-225-6887
REP GOSS =1-202-225-6820 REP GRADISON =1-202-225-0758
REP GRANDY =1-202-225-5796 REP GRAY =1-202-225-2995
REP GREEN =1-202-225-0840 REP GUARINI =1-202-225-7023
REP GUNDERSON =1-202-225-6195 REP R_HALL =1-202-225-3332
REP T_HALL =1-202-225-6766 REP HAMILTON =1-202-225-1101
REP HAMMERSCHMIDT =1-202-225-7492
REP HANCOCK =1-202-225-7700
REP HANSEN =1-202-225-5827 REP HARRIS =1-202-225-0175
REP HASTERT =1-202-225-0697 REP HATCHER =1-202-225-1117
REP C_HAYES =1-202-225-7571 REP J_HAYES =1-202-225-8976
REP HEFLEY =1-202-225-1942 REP HEFNER =NP
REP HENRY =1-202-225-5144 REP HERGER =1-202-225-0996
REP HERTEL =NP REP HOAGLAND =1-202-225-4684
REP HOBSON =1-202-225-1984
REP HOCHBRUECKNER=1-202-225-0776
REP HOLLOWAY =1-202-225-6252 REP HOPKINS =1-202-225-1413
REP HORN =1-202-225-1378 REP HORTON =1-202-225-5909
REP HOUGHTON =1-202-225-5574 REP HOYER =1-202-225-4300
REP HUBBARD =1-202-225-1662 REP HUCKABY =1-202-225-2387
REP HUGHES =1-202-225-1108 REP HUNTER =1-202-225-0235
REP HUTTO =1-202-225-5785 REP HYDE =1-202-225-1240
REP INHOFE =1-202-225-9187 REP IRELAND =1-202-225-6944
REP JACOBS =NP REP JAMES =1-202-225-1727
REP JEFFERSON =1-202-225-1988 REP JENKINS =NP
REP N_JOHNSON =1-202-225-4488 REP T_JOHNSON =1-202-225-2427
REP JOHNSTON =1-202-225-8791 REP B_JONES =1-202-225-8675
REP W_JONES =NP REP JONTZ =1-202-225-5870
REP KANJORSKI =1-202-225-9024 REP KAPTUR =1-202-225-7711
REP KASICH =NP REP KENNEDY =1-202-225-9322
REP KENNELLY =1-202-225-1031 REP KILDEE =1-202-225-6393
REP KLECZKA =1-202-225-0719 REP KLUG =1-202-225-6942
REP KOLBE =1-202-225-0378 REP KOLTAR =1-202-225-0526
REP KOPETSKI =1-202-225-9477 REP KOSTMAYER =1-202-225-5060
REP KYL =1-202-225-1143 REP LAFALCE =1-202-225-8693
REP LAGOMARSINO =1-202-225-3096 REP LANCASTER =1-202-225-0666
REP LANTOS =1-202-225-3127 REP LAROCCO =1-202-225-1213
REP LAUGHLIN =1-202-225-8943 REP LEACH =1-202-225-1278
REP R_LEHMAN =1-202-225-5274 REP W_LEHMAN =1-202-225-5274
REP LENT =1-202-225-0357 REP LEVIN =1-202-225-1033
REP LEVINE =1-202-225-6975 REP JE_LEWIS =1-202-225-6498
REP JO_LEWIS =1-202-225-0351 REP LIGHTFOOT =1-202-225-6973
REP LIPINSKI =1-202-225-1012 REP LIVINGSTON =1-202-225-0739
REP LLOYD =1-202-225-6974 REP LONG =1-202-225-8810
REP LOWERY =1-202-225-7383 REP LOWEY =1-202-225-0546
REP LUKEN =1-202-225-2293 REP MCCANDLESS =1-202-2251040-
REP MCCLOSKEY =1-202-225-4688 REP MCCOLLUM =1-202-225-0999
REP MCCRERY =1-202-225-8039 REP MCCURDY =1-202-225-7946
REP MCDADE =1-202-225-9594 REP MCDERMOT =1-202-225-9212
REP MCEWEN =1-202-225-0224 REP MCGRATH =1-202-225-3826
REP MBHUGH =1-202-225-1799 REP MCMILLAN =1-202-225-8995
REP MCMILLEN =1-202-225-8099 REP MCNULTY =1-202-225-5077
REP MACHTLEY =1-202-225-4417 REP MANTON =1-202-225-1452
REP MARKEY =1-202-225-8689 REP MARLENEE =1-202-225-1558
REP MARTIN =1-202-225-4614 REP MARTINEZ =1-202-225-5467
REP MATSUI =1-202-225-5467 REP MAVROULES =1-202-225-8023
REP MAZZOLI =NP REP MEYERS =1-202-225-0554
REP MFUME =1-202-225-3178 REP MICHEL =1-202-225-7723
REP C_MILLER =1-202-225-5132 REP G_MILLER =1-202-225-5609
REP J_MILLER =NP REP MINETA =NP
REP MINK =1-202-225-4987 REP MAOKLEY =1-202-225-7804
REP MOLINARI =1-202-225-1272 REP MOLLOHAN =1-202-225-7564
REP MONTGOMERY =1-202-225-3375 REP MOODY =1-202-225-1396
REP MOORHEAD =1-202-225-1279 REP MORAN =1-202-225-0017
REP MORELLA =1-202-225-1389 REP MORRISON =1-202-225-9293
REP MRAZEK =1-202-225-7215 REP MURPHY =1-202-225-4772
REP MURTHA =1-202-225-5709 REP MYERS =1-202-225-1649
REP NAGLE =1-202-225-9104 REP NATCHER =NP
REP R_NEAL =1-202-225-8112 REP S_NEAL =1-202-225-4060
REP NICHOLS =1-202-225-9415 REP NOWAK =1-202-225-3523
REP NUSSLE =1-202-225-9129 REP OAKAR =1-202-225-0663
REP OBERSTAR =1-202-225-0669 REP OBEY =1-202-225-0561
REP OLIN =1-202-225-9623 REP ORTIZ =1-202-225-1134
REP ORTON =1-202-225-1233 REP M_OWENS =1-202-225-0012
REP W_OWENS =1-202-225-3524 REP OXLEY =1-202-225-1160
REP PACKARD =1-202-225-0134 REP PALLONE =1-202-225-9655
REP PANETTA =NP REP PARKER =1-202-225-5866
REP PATTERSON =1-202-225-7664 REP PAXON =1-202-225-5910
REP D_PAYNE =1-202-225-4160 REP L_PAYNE =1-202-226-4160
REP PEASE =1-202-225-0066 REP PELOSI =1-202-225-8259
REP PENNY =1-202-225-0051 REP PERKINS =1-202-225-1411
REP C_PETERSON =1-202-225-1593 REP P_PETERSON =1-202-225-1586
REP PETRI =1-202-225-2356 REP PICKETT =1-202-225-4218
REP PICKLE =1-202-225-1103 REP PORTOR =1-202-225-0157
REP POSHARD =1-202-225-1541 REP PRICE =1-202-225-6314
REP PURSELL =1-202-225-4094 REP QUILLEN =1-202-225-7812
REP RAHALL =1-202-225-9061 REP RAMSTAD =1-202-225-0140
REP RANGEL =1-202-225-0816 REP RAVENEL =1-202-225-4340
REP RAY =1-202-225-1598 REP REED =1-202-225-9580
REP REGULA =1-202-225-3059 REP RHODES =1-202-225-0985
REP RICHARDSON =1-202-225-1950 REP RIDGE =NP
REP RIGGS =1-202-225-5577 REP RINALDO =1-202-225-5679
REP RITTER =1-202-225-5248 REP ROBERTS =1-202-225-5375
REP ROE =1-202-225-3071 REP ROEMER =1-202-225-6798
REP ROGERS =1-202-225-0940 REP ROHRABACHER =1-202-225-0145
REP ROS-LEHTINEN=1-202-225-5620 REP ROSE =1-202-225-2470
REP ROSTENKOWSKI=1-202-406-4225 REP ROTH =1-202-225-0087
REP ROUMEKA =1-202-225-9048 REP ROWLAND =1-202-225-7719
REP ROYBAL =1-202-225-1251 REP RUSSO =1-202-225-0292
REP SABO =NP REP SANDERS =1-202-225-6790
REP SANGMEISTER =1-202-225-4447 REP SANTORUM =1-202-225-7747
REP SARPALIUS =1-202-225-6142 REP SAVAGE =1-202-225-8608
REP SAWYER =1-202-225-5278 REP SAXTON =1-202-225-0778
REP SCHAEFER =1-202-225-7885 REP SCHEUER =1-202-225-9695
REP SCHIFF =1-202-225-4975 REP SCHROEDER =1-202-225-5842
REP SCHULTZE =NP REP SCHUMER =1-202-225-4183
REP SENSENBRENNER=1-202-225-3190 REP SERRANO =1-202-225-6001
REP SHARP =1-202-225-8140 REP SHAW =1-202-225-8398
REP SHAYS =1-202-225-9629 REP SHUSTER =1-202-225-2486
REP SIKORSKY =1-202-225-4347 REP SISISKY =1-202-225-1170
REP SKAGGS =1-202-225-9127 REP SKEEN =1-202-225-9599
REP SKELTON =1-202-225-2695 REP SLATTERY =1-202-225-1455
REP F_SLAUGHTER =1-202-225-1044 REP L_SLAUGHTER =1-202-225-7822
REP C_SMITH =1-202-225-7768 REP LAM_SMITH =1-202-225-8628
REP LAW_SMITH =1-202-225-9816 REP N_SMITH =NP
REP R_SMITH =1-202-225-3129 REP SNOWE =NP
REP SOLARZ =1-202-225-9469 REP SOLOMON =1-202-225-1168
REP SPENCE =1-202-225-2455 REP SPRATT =1-202-225-0464
REP STAGGERS =1-202-225-2962 REP STALLINGS =1-202-225-2393
REP STARK =NP REP STEARNS =1-202-225-3973
REP STENHOLM =1-202-225-2234 REP STOKES =1-202-225-1339
REP STUDDS =1-202-225-2212 REP STUMP =1-202-225-6328
REP SUNDQUIST =1-202-225-2814 REP SWETT =1-202-225-0046
REP SWIFT =1-202-225-2608 REP SYNAR =1-202-225-2796
REP TALLON =1-202-225-2857 REP TANNER =1-202-225-1765
REP TAUZIN =1-202-225-0563 REP C_TAYLOR =1-202-225-0519
REP G_TAYLOR =1-202-225-7074 REP C_THOMAS =1-202-225-0726
REP L_THOMAS =1-202-225-6922 REP W_THOMAS =1-202-225-8798
REP THORTON =1-202-225-9273 REP TORRES =1-202-225-9711
REP TORRICELLI =1-202-225-0843 REP TOWNS =1-202-225-1018
REP TRAFICANT =1-202-225-3719 REP TRAXLER =1-202-225-3046
REP UDALL =1-202-225-1176 REP UNSOELD =1-202-225-1176
REP UPTON =1-202-225-4986 REP VALENTINE =1-202-225-1539
REP JAGT =1-202-225-9058 REP VENTO =1-202-225-1968
REP VISCLOSKY =1-202-225-2493 REP VOLKMER =1-202-225-7834
REP VUCANOVICH =1-202-225-2319 REP WALKER =1-202-225-2484
REP WALSH =1-202-225-4042 REP WASHINGTON =1-202-225-6186
REP WATERS =1-202-225-7854 REP WAXMAN =1-202-225-4099
REP WEBER =1-202-225-0987 REP WEISS =1-202-225-6925
REP WELDON =1-202-225-5990 REP WHEAT =1-202-225-5990
REP WHITTEN =1-202-225-4328 REP WILLIAMS =1-202-225-1257
REP WILSON =1-202-225-1764 REP WISE =1-202-225-5325
REP WOLF =1-202-225-0437 REP WOLPE =1-202-225-8602
REP WYDEN =1-202-225-8941 REP WYLIE =1-202-225-7548
REP YATES =1-202-225-3493 REP YATRON =1-202-225-5548
REP B_YOUNG =1-202-225-9764 REP D_YOUNG =1-202-225-9288
REP ZELIFF =1-202-225-4370 REP ZIMMER =1-202-225-9181
___________________________________________________________
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EDITORIALLY SPEAKING - STR CONFIDENTIAL - MAILCALL
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> STReport's Editorial Page "Saying it like it is."
From the Editor's Desk
----------------------
I guess Spring is finally here... Just think a whole summer of acute
speculation is ahead of us. Ain't that grand? Atari has some neat things
in the wings. Goodies and plans that are tuned to take all the rough
edges off the past. I want to believe it and see it all come to pass.
After all, it is my machine by choice and will remain so. The Sparrow..,
The Falcon and other nifty products are sure to put a gleam in any
Atarian's eye.
Codehead has brought more good NEWS to us check their item elsewhere
in this issue. What Crew! As Jimmy Durante would've said; "DA BEST!!"
"HA CHA CHA!!"
On another front... the $500,000,000 lawsuit against Nintendo was not
decided in Atari's favor. That story is covered in STReport Confidential.
Thanks for all your wonderful support!
Ralph @ STReport International Online Magazine
"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""
STReport's Staff DEDICATED TO SERVING YOU!
----------------
Publisher - Editor
------------------
Ralph F. Mariano
PC DIVISION AMIGA DIVISION MAC DIVISION
----------- -------------- ------------
Roger D. Stevens Charles Hill R. ALBRITTON
STReport Staff Editors:
-----------------------
Lloyd E. Pulley Sr. Dana P. Jacobson Michael Arthur
Lucien Oppler Brad Martin Judith Hamner
John Szczepanik Dan Stidham Joseph Mirando
Steve Spivey Doyle C. Helms
Contributing Correspondents:
----------------------------
Michael Lee Richard Covert John Deegan
Brian Converse Oliver Ste
inmeier Tim Holt
Andrew Learner Norman Boucher Harry Steele
Ben Hamilton Neil Bradley Eric Jerue
Ron Deal Robert Dean Ed Westhusing
James Nolan Vernon W. Smith Bruno Puglia
Clemens Chin
IMPORTANT NOTICE
================
Please, submit letters to the editor, articles, reviews, etc...
via E-Mail to:
Compuserve.................... 70007,4454
GEnie......................... ST.REPORT
Delphi........................ RMARIANO
BIX........................... RMARIANO
FIDONET....................... 112/35
FNET.......................... NODE 350
NEST.......................... 90:19/350.0
____________________________________________________________
> STReport CONFIDENTIAL "Rumors Tidbits Predictions Observations Tips"
=====================
- Sunnyvale, Ca. ATARI LOSES LAWSUIT WITH NINTENDO
--------------
Courtesy San Jose Mercury News
05/01/92 14:47:38
Atari Corp. was unsuccessful in its antitrust suit against Nintendo of
America. The jury found in favor of Nintendo. The jury did however, find
that Nintendo did have monopoly power in the videogame market but that
Nintendo did not monopolize that market. The jury was also unable to
reach a decision on two other points regarding monopolization and
restraint of trade. During the 10 week trial, Nintendo claimed it had
only engaged in vigorous competition and that its exclusive had legitamate
business justifications.
"We are disappointed the jury did not understand the negative impacts
Nintendo's exclusive contracts had on competition because of Nintendo's
power over its suppliers and customers," said William Jaeger, senior
partner, Khourie, Crew & Jaeger, the San Francisco law firm that
specializes in complex business litigation and represents Atari.
"The consumer also loses from this result because the antitrust laws
have worked very effectively to maintain a strong competitive environment
with lower prices and better choices for consumers. This decision will
seriously weaken those vital laws."
"In this case, it was clear that Nintendo's practices violated our
antitrust laws and thwarted Atari's ability to compete. Atari should be
compensated for its substantial damages. This award is also necessary to
send a strong message that our antitrust laws protect and encourage
healthy competition -- no more, no less."
- San Jose CA. POWERHOUSE POWER SUPPLY
------------
Best Electronics is coming out with a replacement power supply for
Mega STe/TT owners. This UL Listed power supply is rated at 64.1 watts
but supposedly, can handle 80 watts. Development was ramped up about a
year because Best Electronics thinks that some of the problems that users
are experiencing from TOS/AJAX/1.44 floppy upgrades are due to the anemic
power supply that ships in certain Mega STe/TTs. It will fit perfectly
where the original power supply was installed. They hope to start
shipping in 4-6 weeks. The power supply should sell for approx. $125.00
- Bridgeport Ct. ATARI USERS ANNOUNCE UPCOMING SHOW
--------------
Local Connecticut Atari computer user groups are joining forces to
stage a spectacular two-day computer show later this year in Hartford,
Conn. An umbrella organization representing Atari users in Fairfield
County and the Danbury and New Haven regions has announced dates and site
for Connecticut AtariFest '92. The event is scheduled for August 15 and
16, 1992 at the Sheraton Hotel at Bradley International Airport, Windsor
Locks, Conn.
The show is being sponsored by the ACT Group [Affiliated Connecticut
(CT) Groups], an umbrella organization comprised of these Atari user
groups: F.A.C.E. (Fairfield County); S.T.A.R.R. (New Haven area) and D-BUG
(Danbury area). To date, the following exhibitors have agreed to
participate in Connecticut AtariFest '92: Atari Computer Corporation,
Atari Explorer magazine, the Boston Computer Society, GEnie, Gribnif
Software, GFA Basic, Joppa Computer Products, Sam Ash Music Inc., Step
Ahead Software, Soft-Logik-Publishing, Tidbit Software, Toad Computers,
and ICD Inc. Organizers say the show will showcase the latest Atari
products and services, and will include seminars on desktop publishing and
video production, hands-on instruction from manufacturers and software
developers, MIDI demonstrations, giveaways, a swap room and much more.
The ACT Group has just announced that there will be an exciting dinner
dance Saturday evening featuring luminaries from the Atari market. The
core band will be composed of Atari Explorer's John Jainschigg and Peter
Donoso, as well as Sam Ash's Fadi Hayek. Interested musicians are invited
to sit in. At the cocktail hour, during the buffet, and between the live
sets, pre-recorded Atari produced synthesized music will be played for
your listening pleasure. With a spacious dance floor, cash bar and plenty
of room for schmoozing, this should be a wonderful and fun evening.
With a spacious dance floor, cash bar and plenty of room for
schmoozing, this should be a wonderful and fun evening. With some of the
best names, latest products, and top vendors in the Atari market, we think
you'll find the CT Fest to be both thrilling and educational. With a major
emphasis on the musical side of the ST/TT (via major vendors like Sam Ash
and Manny's Music). we'll have non-stop performances by live and studio
musicians both days. Of course, other aspects like DTP, graphics, video,
telecomm, etc. will be equally represented. Raffles, door prizes, swap
rooms, hands on DTP classes, desktop video classes and more! Smack dab
between New York and Boston, this may be the highlight of the summer!
For more information about attending or exhibiting at:
CONNECTICUT ATARIFEST '92
Please contact:
Brian Gockley Chairperson
18 Elmwood Avenue
Bridgeport, CT 06605
[Phone (203) 332-1721]
or,
Doug Finch, Chairperson
203-637-1034
- Vancouver, Wa. SPARROW SPECULATIONS
--------------
Among Atarians, the guesswork and speculation about new and exciting
machines has always been a "fun thing". The latest info about the
Sparrow, a new machine coming in the Fall, is here for you to enjoy.
_Multi-Tos_ will be for all machines.
- Uses Ram Cards 512-5mb - Super small motherboard
- Operates @ 16-20Mhz - Has VGA Quality Rez
- Will have Standard Joystick Ports - Possibly No RF Adapter
- VME Port (possible) - Integrated Keyboard
- NO DMA Port - SCSI 2 Port
- 2.5" Built-in Hard Disk 40-50mb - 1.44 mb floppy
- Internal connections provided for third party goodies
MSRP: 1199.00 -- Anticipated retail cost 700.00 - 900.00
- San Francisco Ca. AJAX HAS ACHILLES HEEL?
-----------------
According to sources close to BEST Electronics, the Ajax upgrades are
not in stock and they will not stock any more of 3.06/AJAX/1.44Meg
upgrades until a recently discovered problem is found and corrected. When
a SCSI internal Hard drive is installed in the TT030 and access to the
1.44meg is attempted, the system does not acknowledge the Floppy.
However, if one uses a different power supply for the SCSI drive, all is
fine. They said. Also, they said there may be a problem with the AJAX
chip.
- Jacksonville, Fl READER SURVEY -> DETACHED OR ATTACHED KEYBOARD??
----------------
Since STREPORT reaches many private BBS systems, we decided to participate
in a joint survey with CIS and will publish the final results. To keep
things extremely simple, it was decided to have the survey address one and
ONLY one issue;
THE ATTACHED/DETACHED KEYBOARD ISSUE
""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""
The Keyboard Survey questions are:
1 - Would you prefer a single case (1040 style) unit or a Mega ST/TT style
unit with detached keyboard? (pick one or the other only)
2 - If price were a consideration, how much more would you spend for a
detached keyboard:
A- $50.00 or less
B- $100.00 (approx)
C- $150.00 (or if price is no object)
3 - Would you prefer a connector like that used on the Mega/TT series of
computers on the new machine to allow connecting a keyboard if so
desired?
Thats it for the first survey. Just 3 SIMPLE questions with EASY
limited responses. We will add up the online responses and comments pro
or con, along with all the BBS responses and pass the results on to you
and Atari Corp. If the survey is a success, we can come up with more
questions in subsequent information gathering surveys.
The reason for the survey is to see just what the users feel about the
new machine coming along with only an integrated keyboard. Fifty million
clones have been sold successfully worldwide, the Mega/TT series of Atari
computers have been widely acclaimed as having very comfortable keyboards
that have a good "feel". Now Atari is going back to a "1040 style" case
and keyboard? Let's hear from you!
- Sunnyvale, Ca . ATARI VOICE MAIL HITS THE REVOLVING DOOR!
--------------
In an apparent attempt at streamlining communications, the "infamous"
Atari voice mail system has been shut down. User abuse (storing too much)
has been cited as the cause for abandonment of the system. As fate would
have it, most folks around the country were caught off guard and many of
Atari's callers found themselves listening to many rings and an unanswered
phone call. The old answering machines are slowing coming back online.
____________________________________________________
STReport's "EDITORIAL CARTOON"
""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""
> A "Quotable Quote" "The cat's outta da bag!"
==================
"WHEN THE FANCY_FACADE_FADES WITH TIME...
YOU WILL KNOW THE TRUE, UNDENIABLE NATURE OF THE BEAST!"
....ZIGGY "LIVINGSTONE" ZAGNUT
(The Long Lost Cousin)
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> ABCO SPECIALS! STR InfoFile * NEW 1992 Prices! MORE Products! *
=========================== --------------------------------
****** SPRINGTIME SPECIAL!! TAKE 10% OFF _ANY_ PACKAGE!! *****
"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""
** EFFECTIVE IMMEDIATELY! **
NOTICE: ABCO will BEAT OR MATCH * ANY *
Advertised or Invoiced price * WE WILL NOT BE UNDERSOLD!
ABCO COMPUTER CONSULTANTS
P.O. Box 6672 Jacksonville, Florida 32236-6672
Est. 1985
_________________________________________
Voice: 904-783-3319 10 AM - 4 PM EDT
BBS: 904-786-4176 12-24-96 HST
FAX: 904-783-3319 12 PM - 6 AM EDT
_________________________________________
HARD DISK SYSTEMS TO FIT EVERY BUDGET
_________________________________________
All systems are complete and ready to use, included at NO EXTRA COST
are clock/calendar and cooling blower(s).
*-ALL ABCO HARD DISK SYSTEMS ARE FULLY EXPANDABLE-*
(you are NOT limited to two drives)
(all cables and connectors installed)
- Available for all Platforms -
* ICD HOST ADAPTERS USED EXCLUSIVELY * OMTI HIGH SPEED CONTROLLERS *
* ICD ADSCSI+ HOST ADAPTERS * FULL SCSI COMMAND SET SUPPORTED *
* SCSI EMBEDDED CONTROLLER MECHANISMS *
* MAXTOR - SEAGATE - QUANTUM *
WE PAY SHIPPING & INSURANCE!!! >UPS!<
(Cont. USA)
VISA - MASTERCARD - NO SURCHARGE!
*** NEW!!! ULTRA MODERN "SUPER STYLE" CABINET ***
DELUXE 2 bay Cabinet W/65w Auto PS & Blower
*** 90 DAY LIMITED OFFER!! ***
- AT NO EXTRA COST! -
Cabinet & ADSCSI Plus Host [Hard Disk Ready] $259.95
Model Description Autopark Price
==================================================
SGN4951 51Mb 3.5" Y 439.00
SGN1096 85Mb 5.25" Y 519.00
SQN1055 105mb 3.5" Y 534.95
SQN1065 120mb 3.5" Y 584.00
SQN2055 170mb 3.5" Y 689.00
SQN3055 240mb 3.5" Y 839.00
SQN4055 426mb 3.5" Y 1310.00
==================================================
Standard "Shoebox Cabinet style is also available
FULLY ASSEMBLED SCSI DRIVES DEDUCT $60.00
ADD $35.00 for 4 BAY "SUPER CABINET" w/250+w PS
MODERN TOWER CABINETS AVAILABLE Call for Info!
PLEASE NOTE: The above is partial listing only!
NOTICE - NOTICE - NOTICE - NOTICE
"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""
SPECIAL PURCHASE! * LPS 120 - 240 * Hard Disk Mechanisms
Call for SUPER PRICING!! Limited Time Only!!
FULLY ASSEMBLED SCSI DRIVES DEDUCT $60.00
ADD $35.00 for 4 BAY SUPER CABINET w/250+w PS
EXOTIC TOWER CABINETS AVAILABLE Call for Info!
PLEASE NOTE: The above is partial listing only!
FAST TECHNOLOGY ACCELERATOR UPGRADES AVAILABLE & INSTALLED
*****
>> ABCO proudly offers ATARI PRODUCTS <<
Call for ABCO's * HIGHLY COMPETITIVE PRICING! *
ATARI COMPUTERS * STILL THE BEST VALUE!
*****
Original Atari Mouse replacement: $35.00 NEW!
If you don't see what you want listed here, call us.
Odds are, we either have it or, can get it for you!
* GUARANTEED * AT THE BEST POSSIBLE PRICE! *
** 800-562-4037 **
"WE SERVICE WHAT WE SELL"
****** SPECIAL - SPECIAL ******
* SYQUEST 44MB (#555) >> ABCOFILE "44" << REMOVABLE MEDIA DRIVE *
- SYQUEST 44 MB DRIVE - ICD ST ADSCSI PLUS H/A
- ICD Utility Software - 3' DMA Cable
- Fan & Clock - Multi-Unit Power Supply
(1) 44 MB Syquest Cart.
--->> SPECIAL! NOW ONLY __$ 589.00__ <<---
**** SCSI UNITS -> ONLY $519.00 ****
WE PAY SHIPPING & INSURANCE! >UPS!<
(Cont. USA)
COMPLETELY ASSEMBLED AND READY TO RUN!
Cart and Utility Software Included!
EXTRA CARTS: $ 69.50
DRIVE MECH ONLY: $ 339.95
****** SPECIAL - SPECIAL ******
* TWIN SYQUEST 44MB REMOVABLE MEDIA DRIVES ... PROGRAMMER'S DELIGHT *
SPECIALLY PRICED ** $895.95.00 **
Includes: * TWO * cartridges!
* SYQUEST 44MB REMOVABLE MEDIA DRIVE AND HARD DRIVE COMBINATIONS *
- Syquest 44 Model [555] and the following hard drives -
** 50mb SQG51S $759.00 105mb SQG105S $959.00 **
Or, YOUR choice of Hard Disk Mechanism!
LOWBOY - STANDARD - DUAL BLOWER CABINETS
CUSTOM CONFIGURATIONS AVAILABLE
** ANNOUNCING THE NEW! -> ABCO CD-ROM! **
:Special Introductory offer:
ABCO CD-ROM $359.95 (limited time only)
Listed above are a sampling of the systems available.
Prices also reflect various cabinet/power supply configurations
(over sixty configurations are available, flexibility is unlimited)
* IBM - MSDOS - AMIGA - ATARI - APPLE - MACINTOSH *
ALL UNITS COMPATIBLE WITH --> SUPERCHARGER - AT/PC SPEED - GCR
LARGER units are available - (Custom Configurations)
*>> NO REPACKS OR REFURBS USED! <<*
- Custom Walnut WOODEN Cabinets - TOWER - AT - XT Cabinets -
Atari SLM 804, SLM 804PCV Laser Toner Kits
Memorex 2108, 5287
Oasys Laserpro 5287, 5308, Express 830, Express Series II
Silver Express, Gold Express
** $41.95 shipping Included **
Atari SLM 605 Laser Toner Kits
AT&T 593, CAF Laser, DSI Laser, DTP Systems, Epson EPL-6000
Facit P6060, Fontx Syslaser, Harris3M 2006, M-Tally MT905
Microtek Turbo PS, OAS Laserpro Executive, Packard Bell 9500
TEC LB 1305, Toshiba PageLaser 6
** $41.95 shipping included **
(TWO Toner Carts Incl.)
Panasonic Laser Toner Kits
Panasonic KX -P 400 series, Panafax UF-750 Facsimile
** $41.95 shipping included **
-- ALL TONER KITS * IN STOCK * --
* Toner Starter Kits-$62.95 *
* Replacement (804) Drums-$186.95 *
ABCO is PROUD to announce the acquisition of
the exclusive U.S.A. distribution rights for
** Bitblit Software's; ///Turbo Board BBS. **
This fine Atari ST BBS system software and
user support is available through ABCO to all
Turbo customers in the USA. Call for current
pricing.
>> MANY other ATARI related products STOCKED <<
ALL POWER SUPPLIES UL APPROVED
-* 12 month FULL Guarantee *-
(A FULL YEAR of COVERAGE)
WE PAY SHIPPING & INSURANCE! >UPS!<
(Cont. USA)
QUANTITY & USERGROUP DISCOUNTS AVAILABLE!
_________________________________________
DEALERS and DISTRIBUTORS WANTED!
please, call for details
VISA - MASTERCARD - NO SURCHARGE!
Personal and Company Checks accepted.
ORDER YOUR NEW UNIT TODAY!
CALL: 1-800-562-4037 -=**=- CALL: 1-904-783-3319
Customer Orders ONLY Customer Service
9am - 8pm EDT
Tues thru Sat
ABCO is EXPANDING!! CALL FOR INFORMATION!
SEND FOR YOUR NEW ABCO CATALOG TODAY!
""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""
STReport International Online Magazine
[S]ilicon [T]imes [R]eport
Available through more than 10,000 Private BBS systems WorldWide!
""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""
STR Online "YOUR INDEPENDENT NEWS SOURCE" May 01, 1992
Since 1987 copyright 1987-92 No.8.18
""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""
Views, Opinions and Articles Presented herein are not necessarily those of
the editors/staff, PCReport, STReport, AMReport, MCReport. Permission to
reprint articles is hereby granted, unless otherwise noted. Each reprint
must include the name of the publication, date, issue # and the author's
name. The entire publication and/or portions therein may not be edited in
any way without prior written permission. The entire contents, at the
time of publication, are believed to be reasonably accurate. The STR
editors, contributors and or staff are not responsible for the use or
misuse of information contained herein or the results obtained therefrom.
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