Vol. 8 No. 5 June 1988
SPECIAL REPORT:
ay The HP "DeskJet" Ink Jet
Printer
ay GOE—Desktop Environment
for the Atari 8-bit.
In This Issue
Latest ATARI ST and XE News
Magic Sac Update
Small World: Online Battles
The Market for CD-ROM Drives
Small Miracles for your XE
Tips’N’Traps
Product Reviews:
Awardmaker Plus
Bug Hunt and Barnyard Blaster
Cyber Control
Mission Impossible II
Neo Desk
Nite Lite Multiline BBS
Phantasie III
Rambo XL and US Doubler
Superbase Personal
Tempus
WordUp
[ HaM r iftic>nri' ~ *prt f'o,j oim
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Your Monitor on the World of Atari
CN 805
The reviews are in . . .
"‘A Best Buy’ Fm impressed"
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"If you’ve got an Atari, you probably need this program."
Jerry Pournell, Byte Magazine, October 1987
"pc-ditto is a winner."
Charlie Young, ST World, July 1987
'This is the product we have been looking for."
Donna Wesolowski, ST Informer, August 1987
"This truly incredible software emulator really works."
Mike Gibbons, Current Notes, September 1987
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pc-ditto features include:
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o up to 703K usable memory (1040ST)
o not copy-protected -- installable on hard disk
o imitates IBM monochrome and IBM color
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o access to hard disk, if hard disk used
o optionally boots DOS from hard disk
o parallel and serial ports fully supported
o supports 3.5-inch 720K format and 360K single¬
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o supports optional 5.25-inch 40-track drives
System requirements:
> IBM PC-DOS or Compaq MS-DOS version
3.2 or above recommended
> optional 5.25-inch drive is required to use
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) 3.5-inch 720K DOS disks require a double¬
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See pc-ditto today at an Atari dealer near you,
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Page 2
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
June, 1988
S®ftw®[r<g Spsdul ®ff ft® ffitomift
Timeworks Desktop Publisher
for the Atari ST
list price $129.95...with this ad...
09.95
While supplies last_(12 on hand)
(Your Issue of Current Notes must have your mailing label on It, e.g. club members only.)
Works on any ST
Very easy to use
WYSIWYG (what you see Is
what you get)
Full featured
Imports text from Word Writer,
1st Word, others
Imports graphics from Degas,
Neo chrome. Easy Draw, others
Automatic Kearnlng, Hyphenation,
Bulletlng, Text Flow,and Word Wrap
Precision Placement
Supports most 9 pin, 24 pin, and
Laser Printers
This ad was produced with Desktop Publisher ST and was printed with an ordinary, 9 pin, dot-matrix printer.
Diskccvery
Seven Corners Center (Mall)
Inside the Beltway, at the Intersection of Rt. 7 & 50
Hours: 9:30-9:30 Mon-Sat, 12-5 Sun
Call (703) 536-5040
June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 3
Current Notes (ISSN 8750-1937)
is published monthly (excluding
January and August) by Current
Notes, Inc., 122 N. Johnson Rd.,
Sterling, VA 22170 (703) 450-4761.
Direct subscriptions to Current
Notes are available for $20/year
($36/2 years). Second-Class Pos-
tage paid at Sterling, VA. _
POSTMASTER: Send address
changes to Current Notes, Inc.,
122 N. Johnson Rd., Sterling, VA
22170.
Opinions expressed in this pub¬
lication are those of the individual
authors and do not necessarily
represent or reflect the opinions of
Current Notes or any of the partici¬
pating user groups none of which
are affiliated in any way with Atari
Corp.
Advertising Rates:
Ad Size
Full Page
2/3 Page
1/2 Page
1/3 Page
1/4 Page
1/6 Page
Business Card
Once 5 times
$156 $625
$112 $450
$88 $382
$64 $255
$50 $200
$36 $144
$30 $120
Discounts are available for multiple
insertions. All ads must be prepaid.
Send photo-ready copy, by the
15th of the month preceding pub¬
lication, to the publisher.
PUBLISHER: Joe Waters, 122 N.
Johnson Rd, Sterling, VA 22170
(703)450-4761.
ST EDITOR: Frank Sommers,
4624 Langdrum Lane, Chevy
Chase, MD 20815 (301) 656-0719.
XE EDITOR: Len Poggiali, 225
Mosley Dr, Syracuse, NY 13206
(315)437-2456.
Articles or review material and
press releases should be sent
directly to the appropriate editor.
Deadline date for articles is the
10th of the month.
Back Issues: A limited number of
back issues are available: 1985 :
($1) JUL-DEC; 1986 : ($1.50)
FEB.APR-DEC; 1987 : ($2.00)
FEB-DEC; 1988 : ($2.50) FEB,
MAR, APR, MAY, JUN
CURRENT NOTES
Table of Contents
June,1988
CN SPECIAL REPORTS
28 Laser Quality Without A Laser Price,
The HP "DeskJet" inkjet printer is without a doubt
the single most important technological develop¬
ment for desktop publishing to come down the
pike since the laser printer!
— Review by Jim Wallace
33 Graphics Operating Environment
An interview with Shelly Merrill, President of
Merrill Ward. Ward’s new GOE will give the
Atari 8-bit user the visual equivalent of the ST
GEM desktop on their XE/XL.
- Interview by Len Poggiali
DEPARTMENTS
■ SMALL MIRACLES: FLAG, GTIATEST, GTIA DEM 2,
by Joe Russek, 53
• TIPS’N’TRAPS: Dragon Master, Trinity, Space Quest,
Beyond Zork, Police Quest, Lurking Horror, The Pawn, by
Jim Stevenson Jr., 54
■ THE GAME CART : Bug Hunt and Barnyard Blaster, by
Joe Poggiali, 56
■ PD GEMS for the XE/XL: Daisy Dot, Space Lords,
Print Shop Icons, Print Shop Utilities, Adventurer’s Com¬
panion, Genera! Ledger and Smartsheet, by Al Friedman
and Roy Brooks,
WAACE NEWS, 72
CN REGISTERED CLUBS, 74
Page 4
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
VOLUME 8, NO 5 - JUNE, 1988
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NEWS ♦ COMMENTARY PRODUCT REVIEWS
* EDITORIAL ♦ Joe Waters, 6
Atari desktop publishing looking good, but
Atari needs to pay more attention to its
dealers and developers.
□ ST UPDATE ♦ Frank Sommers, 12
All the latest news and developments in
the ST World
■ XE UPDATE ♦ Len Poggiali, 15
Latest XE News: Newsroom comes to the
8-bits, Sons of Liberty Arrives; More on the
XF551 Drive.
□ MAGIC SAC UPDATE ♦ Jeff
Greenblatt, 16
Latest updates to the Magic Hard Disk and
Floppy Disk formatters and news on
Translator problems
• SMALL WORLD ♦ Dave Small, 20
Early online PLATO battles to rival the
current SDI debates, a look at telearguing.
* CD REPORT^ Linda Helgerson, 24
A look at the market for CD-ROM drives-
-sales require applications.
♦ ATARI SCUTTLEBITS ♦ Bob
Kelly, 26
User groups are having a rough time—they
need help from Atari.
KEY:
□ ST-related review or article.
■ XE/XL related review or article.
* Machine independent article.
□ Award maker Plus, Bill Moes, 40
■ Barnyard Blaster,
Len Poggiali, 56
■ Bug Hunt, Len Poggiali, 56
□ Cyber Control, Bill Moes, 46
■ Dropzone, Joe Pietrafeso, 66
□ Fontz! Andrzej Wrotniak, 36
□ Juggler I & II, Donald C. Lyles, 52
□ Mission Impossible II,
Dan Greenblatt, 48
□ Neo Desk, Andrzej Wrotniak, 36
□ Nite Lite Multiline BBS,
Ed Seward, 42
□ Phantasie III, Ray Millard, 50
■ Pirates of the Barbary Coast,
Lincoln Hallen, 63
□ Preschool Kidprogs,
Roger Abram, 49
□ Publisher ST,
Andrzej Wrotniak, 36
■ RamboXL,AI Williams, 58
□ Superbase Personal,
John Barnes, 60
□ Tempus, Andrzej Wrotniak, 36
■ US Doubler, Al Williams, 58
□ WordUp, Milt Creighton, 44
June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 5
EDITORIAL ♦ Joe Waters
This is our second “All-Atari” issue. As you can
see, we have done some more fine-tuning this month.
I don’t know how it will look when it is printed, but the
master copy, rolling off the Atari Laser on special paper
for camera-ready masters (Hammermill Laser Plus),
looks very good indeed. As I flip through these pages, I
am reminded of a recent TV commercial. Perhaps
you’ve seen it.
You and your colleagues have just handed your
final report to a potential new client. (The report looks
amazingly like this issue of Current Notes) The client is
pleased, but at the same time disappointed and
concerned. He says, “Hey, this is great. But you
promised to keep all of our information secret. It’s
obvious that you called in typesetters, artists, printers,
and what have you to produce this report.”
You respond, “But we didn’t call in anyone. That
whole report was produced by Joe, here, sitting at his
desk using his computer.” With a look of astonishment,
they reply, “Wow! What kind of a computer does work
like this?” You coyly reply, “Hire us and we’ll tell you.”
Just imagine their astonishment when they hire you
and you tell them an Atari produced the report!
Yes, an Atari desktop publishing system produced
this issue of Current Notes. It included the Atari Mega
ST4, the Atari SLM804 laser printer, and, the most
important ingredient, Timeworks Publisher. If I had not
committed to Atari hardware, I could have produced a
perfectly good issue of Current Notes months ago by
using the Atari Mega (or 1040ST for that matter),
coupled with a postscript laser printer and Soft Logik’s
Publishing Partner. Again, the key ingredient in that
combination would have been, not the computer, nor
the printer since any postscript printer would do, but
rather the software that made it possible.
If you take away Publisher from my current hard¬
ware configuration, Atari would have no viable desktop
publishing alternative. Indeed, with only the poor Diablo
emulator provided by Atari, the Atari laser can’t even
reliably be used as a printer.
In fact, in every area where the Atari ST computers
are doing fine—music, graphics, word processing,
computer-aided-design, programming languages—
the reason is because of efforts by third party software
vendors. The ST is easily the most versatile computer
on the market. It has a large number of programs
available running under its own GEM interface. If users,
however, prefer a Unix or MS-DOS style environment,
there are shells that run on the ST and simulate those
environments. Only the Atari ST can run its own
programs as well a s Macintosh and IBM programs. The
Macintosh emulation is courtesy of Dave Small. The
IBM emulation is courtesy of Bill Teal. Neither of these
developers had anything to do with Atari, nor did Atari
lend them any assistance.
I’m pointing out what many of you already know is
the obvious. No computer is going to get anywhere in
the market without software, good software. Atari can
manufacture the hardware. They can offer it at an
attractive price (remember their slogan, “Power without
the Price.”) But nobody will buy Atari hardware unless
there are programs available for that hardware.
I know that. You know that. But, does Atari know
that? Jack Tramiel has often been quoted as saying
“Business is War!” The aggressive pricing of the Atari
line is clearly his most potent weapon in that war. But
who is the enemy?
Atari’s reputation among software developers is
dismal at best (have any of you actually seen the ST
“developer’s kit” that Atari provides?). Atari’s marketing
program has been a complete and utter shambles and
few Atari dealers have kind words to say about the
company. Atari’s recent announcement that they will
no longer sell through distributors means that dealers,
who have established credit lines with their local
distributor, now must order direct from Atari. And, since
business is war, Atari demands that everyone pay cash
up front.
Atari owners are perhaps the luckiest of the lot
since they got these wonderful computers at great
prices. But, they’ve gotten their computers from their
local Atari dealers and the software that makes the
machines shine, from third party software developers.
Atari Corporation has yet to evidence any interest in
owners of Atari computers once they have purchased
their machine.
It’s clear that if Atari succeeds, Atari dealers, Atari
software developers, Atari owners, (and Current Notes,
too), will also succeed. But Atari cannot succeed by
itself. It should not declare war on its friends. To do
battle in this chaotic microcomputer marketplace, you
need allies. Atari must strengthen its dealer network
(and it can’t afford to do that by cutting off any of their
current dealers). It must also strengthen ties with
software developers and Atari users. It is not enough
for Atari to make profits. Atari dealers and Atari
developers must also be able to make profits. Other¬
wise both groups will be forced to diversify their risks
and move on to other computers besides Atari.
Well, enough Atari-bashing for awhile. You watch.
With a little help from their friends, Atari will get their
act straight. In the meantime, let’s look at some of the
good news on the Atari front. 8-bit owners will soon
have their own desktop, see the interview with Merrill
Ward (note, by the way, that this breakthrough did not
originate with Atari.) All Atari owners will be interested
in reading about the new HP DeskJet printer—the
"poor" man’s laser printer. There are five pages in this
issue printed with the DeskJet. See if you can find
them. (Answers on page 74, but don’t peek.)
Page 6
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
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LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
More STAR WARS....
Dear Current Notes,
The ‘SDI Computing, Star Wars
and the ST’, by Chris Anderson
made me so mad that I am going
to have to write a letter to com¬
plain. The rest of the April Current
Notes is pretty good, so since I am
writing ... I might as well say some
nice things, too.
First of all, Chris Anderson’s
article. Why are you subjecting me
to such nonsensical mumblings.
What after all does he say? All his
article amounts to is a poorly con¬
ceived political diatribe. I buy your
magazine because it discusses the
far-ranging possibilities of ST com¬
puting, not political indoctrination.
Let’s be honest. Why is Chris
Anderson writing? Because he
thinks artificial intelligence is a dead
end? Because he thinks people are
wasting their time on neural net¬
works? No. He is motivated to write
by political beliefs about high tech
warfare. His comments would go
over fine in a “no nukes” meeting.
He talks in the same condescend¬
ing tone.
What makes him so superior?
Why does he get to tell David Small
and your readers that they are
wasting their time with childish fan¬
tasies? He hasn’t told me anything
new. He hasn’t piqued my interest
about a new line of thought.
What he has done is get a
“can’t be done” article in your
magazine. If you want a real good
“can’t be done” article, go hire a
Macintosh user to write a few
“future of Atari ST” articles.
I am more than a little tired of
putting up with these people who
advise us all to put our heads in the
sand. Intercontinental ballistic mis¬
siles can be intercepted and des¬
troyed. It has been done more than
once by our own scientists. Satel¬
lites can be destroyed in space.
The Russians have long had that
capability. Reduction of a Russian
first strike’s effectiveness can be
accomplished, look at the concern
the Russians show about our SDI
program.
His article is political, not tech¬
nical. It does not belong in your
magazine.
Now, on to more pleasant
topics.
I really enjoyed the TOS/2 arti¬
cle. (Now that is something far
fetched.) There is no doubt in my
mind that the operating system of
the Atari ST needs upgrading.
There are so many improvements
individual programmers have
already created for the ST, i.e.
more colors, better dialog windows,
Turbo ST, etc., etc. Keep pushing
for an operating system upgrade.
More discussion of unix would be
nice, too.
Also, I liked the “Latest News in
the ST World.” I have been reading
stories about the WordPerfect crisis
on the BBS. It was nice to get a
wrap-up story on it.
The OSS article was great. As a
Personal Pascal user, I took a per¬
sonal interest in the comments.
As always, the David Small arti¬
cle was wonderful. I find his articles
worth the price of the magazine
itself. You have a very unique asset
in David. I know of no other deve¬
loper with his literary skills. Give
him a raise. Syndicate his articles.
Now, if you could only get Sam
Tramiel to write a monthly article
with a blow-by-blow account of
the blitter chip fiasco.
I skimmed over the Microsoft
Write and Tang/ewood articles. I
appreciate the articles about things
that don’t work...I drop them from
my list of things to buy, but I don’t
read them.
The Cyber-Paint article was
interesting. My kids use Flicker, so
now I have a reference point for
Cyber-paint. By the way, I like your
open-minded references to other
ST magazines. An article on the
best program published by ST
magazines would be interesting.
The Ultima 4 article made me
want to get a copy. My kids are
working on solving Dungeon Mas¬
ter. After about a month of constant
play they are both down on level 11
or 12. All Dungeon Master hints are
warmly accepted.
Well, this rambling letter has to
end somewhere, so it might as well
be here. Thank you for putting
together such an informative maga¬
zine.
Mark M. Mills
Dallas, Texas
[My first reaction to Chris’s article
was somewhat similar to yours, but
on a second reading i thought there
certain/y was a computer-re/ated
message there (although the con¬
nection to the ST was tenuous at
best). The viability of SDi is, of
course, a hot/y debated issue. Chris
has put forth one view and you
have countered with another, (in¬
deed, even Dave Small has some
words to contribute to the subject,
this month) Now, i am inclined to
follow your suggestion and let that
debate continue in other forums.
Current Notes wi/i keep it’s focus on
Atari.)
April Fool?
Dear Current Notes:
Har de har. Very funny, boys. I
have to admit you guys had me
going there for a few minutes, until I
remembered what month it was.
I always look forward to the
April issues to come out, and the
“gag” articles the editors always try
to sneak in. Last year an ST maga¬
zine (don’t recall which one) had a
picture of a Sony compact disk with
a ribbon cable stuck in the side,
pretending it was the new CD-
ROM. I had some difficulty con¬
vincing some of the local ST’ers
that it was not on the level.
But your April “guest editorial”
had that one all beat! (I did get the
issue kind of late in the month, so it
caught me off guard a little, I
guess.) But imagine a “Computer¬
bashing” article, berating the ST, in
Page 8
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
an ST magazine! And endorsed as
“eloquently expressed” by the edi¬
tor himself!
When I got to the local ST
store, one of the salespeople was
reading it and grousing about this
“attack”. I didn’t get to read it until I
got home; wait till I see him again!
Will I give him a hard time. Can’t
blame him too much, though. I
thought it was serious too, until I
saw some of the comparisons.
First, let’s compare it to the AT.
And the ST’s graphics to 256K EGA
or even the VGA. Never mind that
such a system costs about $2,500
compared to the ST color system at
under $1,000. An “Ultimate EGA
board with monitor” goes for $869
in PC Week. That’s almost as much
as a whole ST color system! Or let’s
compare TOS to OS/2; that’ll be
fun! Who is this “eloquent” edi¬
torialist who doesn’t know that
WordPerfect is available for the ST,
but thinks that OS/2 is available?
My definition of a “real operating
system” includes it being on the
shelves, and as far as I have been
able to determine, OS/2 is still in
the offing.
I got a real chuckle out of the
“multitasking” and Windows issues,
too. The ST hasn’t got either at the
start of the article, but by the
end....well, the current GEM is
“quite suitable for multitasking” and
Megamax’s new Laser C will do
windows after all.
And let’s not forget the state¬
ment that the ST “is roughly at the
same stage IBM was at when it
released the AT”! The XT was
already a stable in the business
community, which was then waiting
for a more powerful version. The ST
is only beginning to be recognized
as the powerful system it is. Atari
would go under in a heartbeat if
they tried to introduce a 25mhz
68020 at this stage. Besides a few
power-hungry hackers with money
to burn (I’d say about $4,000-
$5,000 minimum), who would they
sell them to?
The final howls were at the end,
when he also started berating the
PS/2 models. This is a $12,000+
system with one user (model 80)! I
can see why he might not like
it—he’s probably comparing it to a
Cray 2 ($17+ million)!
I kept waiting for the punchline
and never came across it, but
maybe it was just that understated
humor editors are so good at. But
thanks for all the chuckles anyway,
guys. Man, I can’t wait till next year!
James W. Alder
WordPerfect and
Clocks
Dear Joe,
I just received my March issue
of Current Notes today, and I wan¬
ted to make a couple of comments,
along with ordering from the ST
Library.
First of all, I find I sit down
immediately and read the whole
magazine right through. Of course,
that does not include the XE pages,
since I never owned one, and they
have no meaning for me. Then, I
find that repeatedly over the next
couple of weeks, I am sitting down,
or lying in bed at night re-reading
some of the articles. I subscribe to
a couple of other computer maga¬
zines, but this is the one I find
myself coming back to time and
time again.
Secondly, I have really enjoyed
the various articles over the two
years I have been a subscriber. In
the last couple of issues, I have
particularly enjoyed Dave Small’s
articles. He does a good job of
writing, which is not always true of
computer types.
Thirdly, I hope you will continue
with the sort of magazine that it is. I
hope you will continue to serve the
ST (and the 8-bit) community.
I have been using WordPerfect
for a while now, and find that the
more I use it, the better it becomes.
I have gone through several issues,
and the one I am using at the
present is the 1/29/88 issue. It
seems (to me anyway) that the vast
majority of the bugs have been
ironed out. There is one small one
that bothers me, and that relates to
the clock card I use. I have a
Logikhron cartridge, and WordPer¬
fect only recognizes the correct
date if I use STAccounts first. I have
written to Jeff Wilson about it, and
he said that they are aware of this
little problem. This leads me to the
question I was wanting to ask. Are
you thinking of a short article on
“add-on” clocks for the ST? I know
I would appreciate one, and per¬
haps another dealing with some of
the internal matters, such as the
various locations date and time are
stored, and why.
P.B. Long
Oshawa, Ontario
fiWell, cfocks anyone? fn fact, f’m
sure many of our readers would /ike
more info on hardware tinkering in
genera/. The problem is finding
someone who can handle a key¬
board as well as a soldering iron, if
any of our readers would like to
give it a shot, give Frank Sommers
orLen Poggiaii a cai/.J
Is CN Going to the
Dogs?
Dear Joe,
I would like to make a couple of
comments on Current Notes. Given
the large amount of time you spend
on the publication, and the fact that
it is getting better every year, I
really hesitate to criticize. But I have
finally decided to take pen in hand
(bit bucket in keyboard?) to pass
along some comments and sug¬
gestions. I would point out that I
deal in several computing worlds,
mainframe, super computers,
workstations, pc’s and clones, and
finally my 130XE. So, I see com¬
puters from a variety of aspects.
Clearly Atari is at fault for much
of the complaints that arise about
piracy. Why, one might ask. Well,
they are pushing the low end mar¬
ket where quality doesn’t count.
The article by Frank Sommers
comments that WP suffered loss of
June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 9
revenue due to piracy. Not neces¬
sarily true. People get copies of
programs to try before making a
purchase. But the important dif¬
ference is that for serious users,
information and documentation is
important. Such is virtually never
forthcoming from Atari, and certainly
they do not encourage it of the 3rd
party software vendors. Why?
Because they are still dealing with
the neophytes and other “cheap”
users. To such people, time is free
and if a copy of a program doesn’t
work, so what? To me it is impor¬
tant.
The other side of the coin,
however, is that I expect programs
to work. I am sorely tried by the
disclaimers that the software to be
purchased is not even warranted to
work . Think about it. That’s the
statement on the notice on software
packages. It occurs very frequently
with Atari software. Some com¬
panies won’t even make a refund if
the stuff doesn’t do what it purports
to do. I do pay for software, and I
am offended by this. It also hap¬
pens in the IBM world, but it does
not seem to be as frequent. As a
final insult, one then has to pay for
fixes.
Is “going to Apple Computers”
anything like “going to the dogs?”
This is a quote from Roy Brooks in
the April issue. I use this as an
introduction to English grammar,
spelling and punctuation. Current
Notes does not do very well in this
regard. To be very emphatic about
it, the first sentence in this para¬
graph is punctuated correctly.
Current Notes (you) get this wrong
every time. Current Notes has the
potential for becoming a dominant
magazine in the computer world,
especially if the ST’s sell better and
Atari supports them in a style to
which they should become accus¬
tomed. But it will never be taken
seriously with typos, incorrect
punctuation and spelling errors.
That is the most important function
of an Editor, namely making the
magazine look good.
As a matter of definition, “clean
ASCII text” has a carriage return/iine
feed combination at the end of each
“line.” That is the ANSI definition of
a record!!!! WordPerfect does it
correctly. This is a comment on the
article by Milt Creighton.
Mnemonics is the correct spel¬
ling for that word, not pneumonic as
in the article by John Marable in the
March issue. The latter refers to
control by air.
OK, enough said, keep up the
good work. I don’t really use my
Atari equipment so much anymore,
but I continue to read Current Notes
to keep up on what is happening in
the Atari world. For the present,
Atari computers have no credibility
in the business world. But who
knows, with a working Transputer
and real support miracles could
happen.
Walter W. Jones
Gaithersburg, MD
Bombs Away!
Ever wondered what those TOS
error messages and ‘bombs’ on
your monitor signified? Below is a
letter, originally written by Darryl
May, that John Townsend of Atari
posted on GEnie in January to
provide some answers.
Dear ATARI Customer,
The following is an official list of
the errors that can appear while you
are operating your ST computer.
This first list gives you the GEM
error messages:
GEM Error
OK (No error).0
Fundamental error.1
Drive not ready.2
Unknown command.3
CRC error.4
Bad request.5
Seek error.6
Unknown media.7
Sector not found.8
No paper.9
Write fault....10
Read fault.11
General error.12
Write protect.13
Media change.14
Unknown device.15
Bad sectors on format.16
Insert other disk.17
Invalid function number.32
File not found.33
Path not found.34
No handles left.35
Access denied.36
Invalid handle.37
Insufficient memory.39
Invalid memory block address...40
Invalid drive specified.46
No more files.49
Range error.64
Internal error.65
Invalid program load format.66
Those bombs that appear on
your screen are error messages
from the 68000 micro-processor.
Number
Description of Bombs
Reset: Initial PC2....1
Bus Error.2
Address Error.3
Illegal Instruction.4
Zero Divide..5
CHK Instruction.6
TRAPV Instruction.7
Privilege Violation.8
Trace.9
Line 1010 Emulator.10
Line 1111 Emulator.11
[Unassigned, Reserved].12
[Unassigned, Reserved].13
Format Error.14
Unintialized Interrupt Vector.15
Unassigned, Reserved].16-23
Spurious Interrupt.24
Level 1 Interrupt Autovector.25
Level 2 Interrupt Autovector.26
Level 3 Interrupt Autovector.27
Level 4 Interrupt Autovector.28
Level 5 Interrupt Autovector.29
Level 6 Interrupt Autovector.30
Level 7 Interrupt Autovector.31
Trap Instruction Vectors.32-47
[Unassigned, Reserved].48-63
User Interrupt Vectors.64-255
Darryl May
Tech Specialist
Page 10
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
r ( NEW FEATURES, SAME OLD PRICE: $j^P )
SDLflPflK
For all 520/1040 ST's and MEGA ST's
AN INTEGRATED DESK ACCESSORY OFFERING THE FOLLOWING FEATURES:
- PRINT SPOOLER PRINTS WHILE YOU RUN OTHER PROGRAMS
- RESET TOLERANT RAMDISK SURVIVES PROGRAM CRASHES
- SCREEN SAVER, ACTIVATED BY KEYBOARD, MOUSE, OR MODEM
- SCREEN CLOCK, ULTRA SMALL, WORKS IN ALL RESOLUTIONS
UNLIKE MOST OTHER MULTI-FUNCTION DESK ACCESSORIES, SOLAPAK V3.0
FEATURES A NEW DYNAMIC LOADING TECHNIQUE THAT ALLOWS YOU TO LOAD
ONLY THE FUNCTIONS THAT YOU DESIRE.
PRINT SPOOLER: Up to 8 files queued for printing, each can have different print attributes.
32 user defined print option buttons lets SOLAPAK support nearly every parallel printer.
Setups for dozens of printers are provided along with a utility for making your own custom
printer control buttons. Built-in features exist for producing top, bottom, and left margins as
well as printing double or triple spaced text. Queue controls let you pause and continue
printing or delete individual files from the queue.
New PRINTERCEPTOR feature intercepts printer output from most programs and redirects
it through the spooler. Unlike most spoolers, SOLAPAK does not require a separate spooler
buffer. It "borrows" space from the integrated ramdisk.
RAMDISK: Low overhead, u Itra fast, reset to lera nt, a uto loads user spec if ied f i les o n boot up.
User selected ramdisk size, drive ID, number of files. No size limit. Hard disk compatible.
SCREENSAVER: T urns yo ur mo n itor off d uri ng periods of keyboard a nd mo use i nactiv ity.
Restores screen instantly at the touch of a key or mouse movement. New modem activity
sensor makes it great for BBS's.
+ MORE: SOLAPAK is not copy protected; will automatically install at boot; works in all screen
resolutions; sets time/date; disables disk write verify; sets printer width; includes new screen
clock; 30+ page manual on disk; 4 month warranty. An installation utility makes nearly every
feature optional. SOLAPAK is written entirely in assembly language for the fastest speed and
smallest code: Only 12Kb + ramdisk size with all options installed. As little as 1 Kb overhead
for a ramdisk and screen saver.
Ordering: Send $30 cash, check, or money order made payable to Tim Hunkier.
AZ residents add sales tax. Previous SOLAPAK owners may update by sending
original disk by standard mail along with $3 update fee. Write for more info or
leave your name and address with our phone machine: (602) 899-6992.
jfeii Solar Powered Software 1 807 N.evergreen,chandleraz 85224
ST UPDATE ♦ Frank Sommers
Magic Package
Readers of the last issue of CN
sensed our enthusiasm for Time¬
works Publisher ST. CN’s Publisher
touted it in his editorial. This column
gave it our “Hats Off Award.” As
the last issue went to the printer, a
couple of Hewlett-Packard Desk¬
Jets turned up in the hands of CN
author’s. Jeff Greenblatt, Magic Sac
columnist, began testing it with
Publisher ST and various Macintosh
drawing programs. Jim Wallace, last
months “Whiz-ee-Wig” writer, had
been using it with Easy Draw. Both
authors were enthusiastic.
Our own enthusiasm turned to
excitement when we envisaged a
DTP package that might be as little
as a third the cost of Mac or IBM
setups and of equal or higher qua¬
lity. How was this possible? Well,
the current DTP for the ST costs
about $4,500. That gives you a
Mega ST4, an Atari SLM804 laser
printer, and Timeworks Publisher.
While somewhat limited in font
selection and scaling, the quality is
superb and it is just as fast as
PostScript on a standard laser prin¬
ter.
But at four grand plus, even
though it is half the cost of the
other systems, it isn’t exactly a
magic package. Cut that four back
to less than two and Merlin begins
to appear on the screen. With the
DeskJet, discounting for about
$700, and a straight 1040 ST or a
520 ST upgraded to 1 meg, and
you are well under $2,000. You
don’t need the memory of the
Mega’s because the DeskJet func¬
tions just as a dot matrix printer did
with the ST, but only with an
astounding increase in resolution,
from 180 dots to 300 dots per inch.
And you can't tell the difference
between the quality of the laser and
the DeskJet.
Quick arithmetic tells you that
Hewlett-Packard, already engaged
in a mammoth ad campaign to
establish its printers at or near the
top of the market, will probably sell
200 DJ’s for every Atari laser sold. If
the price and performance are right
and they are, the ST should hook
up with the DeskJet, pick up speed
and get out there and up front with
its rich relatives.
A New Driver
There is one glitch, however,
although it might be rectifiable.
While the Atari laser and the Mega,
using the Mega’s memory and
streaming the data out the DMA
port into the waiting maw of the
printer, can do a page in less than
two minutes, sometimes even 30
seconds, the DJ and Publisher ST
take almost 10 minutes. But it is
using a make shift driver, the one
for the Hewlett-Packard Laser Jet
II. A customized driver could knock
that time down by a third.
A quick call to Timeworks. With
missionary zeal and smoke curling
out of our nostrils, we thought we
might even talk Timeworks into
designing the driver right now!
After several minutes of explor¬
ing the topic and comparing times,
my magic package began to un¬
ravel. First, Timeworks licenses its
drivers from Digital Research, pri¬
marily so that they will be compat¬
ible with the major printers on the
market and maintainable. Unless
Digital Research felt the project
warranted writing a new driver, or
unless Hewlett-Packard felt they
had part of a winning package and
negotiated with Digital Research or
wrote the driver themselves, it was
not likely to come soon. Would or
could Timeworks energize the
situation? Possibly, but there was
some question of how much faster
a page could be printed. There
were limits to how fast you could
turn out a high resolution bit-map¬
ped page through the normal ports
on an ST or any other printer.
Without PostScript, it was unlikely
the time could be dramatically
reduced. With PostScript, the Magic
Package falls apart at the price
seams (normally a $2,000 licensing
fee per computer is required).
The Dream Fades
So for now, it seems that an
under-$2,000 DTP rig is out, out
that is if you want more than several
pages produced at a sitting; say a
newsletter or a magazine. Publisher
ST'vs, still a standout product. Hew¬
lett-Packard’s DeskJet is equally
remarkable. But our visions of HP
putting DJ, Publisher ST anti a 1040
ST together and showing them off
in color in magazines and on TV as
the Price Worthy Package of the
DTP world fade for the moment.
Software
CEP—Chicago was the scene
in late April of the Corporate Elec¬
tronic Publisher’s Show, where we
suggested last month they might
show a PostScript software clone
for the Atari laser printer. Apparently
they are waiting for a bigger occa¬
sion. No clone.
But Publishing Partner Profes¬
sional was being demonstrated,
with promises that it would be
available in five weeks, circa 1
June. It was described “as worth
every penny they may ask for
it....really astounding...”. When
asked what the most “astounding”
feature was, the reply, “a page of
graphics in 45 seconds, and not
just a pre-cooked demo page”, did
catch our attention. Ca/amus, one
of the other purported DTP marvels,
was doing its pages in 13 seconds,
but they were mostly text and it was
clearly still very much a Beta test of
the program, which will be marke¬
ted by ISD of Canada, the same
people who bring you the spread
sheet, ViP Professional.
Word Perfect Corp. was also
there in ail its finery, announcing
that their support for the ST was
undying and that work was going
forward on WordPerfect version 4.2
(indexing and graphics) and 5.0
(more power with multi-new com¬
mands), but it was unlikely either
would be out before next year.
Page 12
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
UNIX On The ST
Whither Paperclip —Those of
you who waited for the 8 bit wonder
of the word-processing world,
PaperCUp Elite, and who agonized
when Batteries Included was sold
into oblivion, with rights and wareh¬
oused product to Electronic Arts,
hoping PCE might still see the light
of day, wait no more. It will, but for
Commodore 64/128 as PaperCUp
Publisher, and possibly in name
only.
A PD Mighty — Gu/am is a
UNIX shell. It’s distinction is that
without having full blown UNIX on
your ST, Gu/am is as close as you
can get. It also has a built in
MicroEMAC.
A Migraph DJ Driver —While
Data Research and the others may
not, Migraph will, or rather has, put
out a GDOS printer driver for the
HP DeskJet printer and Easy Draw.
Migraph is currently selling the dri¬
ver bundled with its program and
the DeskJet. The driver is also
available separately for $49.95. Per
Jeff Greenblatt, it is “considerably”
faster than DJ and Publisher ST in
turning out a page of graphics and
pretty words.
From 8 TO 16 —Electronic
Arts has stepped forward to help
8-bit’ers cross the bridge to ST
land. 8-bit users can now upgrade
their software to ST use by sending
in the manual cover from the ori¬
ginal 8-bit software and $$ equal¬
ing 1/2 the cost of the 16-bit ver¬
sion (for more info dial 800-562-
1112 weekdays).
Gameware —The pot is still
boiling with new arcade games,
adventures, and flashy graphics for
your ST. A true blue from yes¬
teryear is Battleship, the game we
all played with scratch paper and
pencil, firing our 10 shots at our
opponents ships hidden in a hun¬
dred square grid. It then graduated
to plastic boards and flickering
lights, but now its here in blazing,
blasting color and sound, and well
done, indeed. Jump Jet gets you
off the water and into the air. Tour¬
nament of Death takes you into the
dark castle to fight your way to the
tower room to save the fair damsel,
and fight like a Trojan you must.
Deflector does just what it says,
forcing you to deflect your shots off
mini-reflectors to hit targets. Psyg-
nosis has tried to better its
successful Barbarian, where you
went through cave after descending
cave of stunning graphics to find
and smash “The Crystal”, with a
new version staged in the inter¬
stices of a space ship. The action is
the same and the quality of the
graphics hard to top. Prime Time, a
strategy game, has you running
your own NBC television station, or
maybe CBS, fighting the problems
of prime time scheduling and ad
pricing to make you Mr. Number
One. For the cerebral, Brain Box
and Scrup/es; for the macho,
Leatherneck and inforcer. Music
Studio 88 is out there for the midi
crowd. Impossible Mission // is
reviewed in full in this issue of CN.
Hardware
Comfortable? —That’s what
you ask when you turn your head
away from the small round window
of your airplane on its way to San
Francisco and look down at the
seemingly large backlit super twist
liquid crystal screen of your ST
Laptop Computer. Yes, there it was,
causing a stir of excitement at the
Hannover fair. How soon? Before or
after the Abaq? If we had to guess,
we’d say before, but a guess is all it
would be. Some of you may
remember Tramiel’s venture into
laptops with the Commodore 64. It
apparently was a minor “disaster.”
But “the numbers” now testify that
the demand for laptops is surging.
However, they, too, require chips,
and we all know about that pro¬
blem.
Waiting For Paradox —After
the unfortunate release of the soft¬
ware emulator for the IBM, word
began to circulate that PARADOX
was building a box to end all boxes
for the IBM. That was a year ago or
, so. Now finally, for $450 the box is
almost ready. Expensive? Yes, un¬
less you want to pay several hun¬
dred more for your IBM clone. This
external box is designed to attach
to your ST, accept all IBM cards
and run all IBM software, because,
in fact, it is one. However, given
PARADOX’S previous performance,
we will wait until we see this pro¬
duct in action before placing our
order!
And The Winner Is...
Hacker and Hams —Presum¬
ably all of you ham radio operators
who were seduced by computers,
or those of you who started as
hackers and now also QRX of an
evening, unless you read CQ
Magazine you may not know there
is an Atari ham radio network out
there. The newsletter is AD ASTRA,
c/o Gil Frederick - VE4AG, 130
Maureen St., Winnipeg MB, Canada
R3K 1M2.
Best of ‘87 —Several months
ago, Software Publishers Associa¬
tion gave out its Oscar awards. The
occasion was a black-tie Academy
Awards-style dinner. The awards?
Software Publishers Associa¬
tion’s Excellence in Software,
based in Washington, chose to
have its dinner at the Claremont
Hotel in Oakland, CA. Almost half of
the awards went not to IBM but to
the Mac. For those of you who take
pride in never having “touched” a
game, note that only 33 percent
went to games and entertainment
software. Less than half, but still the
lion’s share went to business soft¬
ware; educational programs gar¬
nered 20 percent of the award
“statues.”
That said, did the ST have any
programs awarded that it could
recognize? How about the “Best
Adventure or Fantasy Role Playing
Program”, Leisure Suit Larry from
Sierra On-Line. (It also runs on the
IBM, Apple II, and Macintosh; inter¬
estingly, the award forgot to men¬
tion that it runs on the ST, first and
foremost, no.)
Did the ST, or software that
runs on it, hit any of the other
awards? Best simulation, best
action, and best technical achieve¬
ment went to Fa/con, a simulation
of F-16 jet fighters from Spectrum
Holobyte. Do you have it? The
“Best Utility” and “Best Add-On”
went to Focal Point, a desktop
June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 13
manager plus by a computer jour¬
nalist, Danny Goodman. Ever heard
of him? “Best User Interface” was
also written by him, a HyperCard
program for the Mac called Busi¬
ness C/ass. The best productivity
program went to Macintax, obvi¬
ously for the Mac, but closely
seconded, in the minds of some of
us, if not the judges, by the ST’s
Tax Advantage. Sadly, the ST music
niche wasn’t recognized either. The
best “entertainment” program
award went to Jam Session from
Broderbund, described as the best
new use of a computer and “best
sound, which turns a Mac into a
music studio, complete with a full
cast of musicians”. “Best of the
Best” went to Adobe Illustrator, a
“powerful” Mac program.
Why the attention to all of this,
beside the large interest in who
won “the Academies?” More than
half of the programs that received
awards have ST counterparts which
equal or surpass the winners, in our
only “slightly prejudiced” opinion.
But the fact is the ST and its
programs are not main-line, not
main-stream. We still have work to
do, all of us, so that when we’re
asked what computer we have, our
explanation can be one word,
understood, and delivered unself¬
consciously, with the other person
commenting, “Oh, yeah, that’s one
of the most powerful computers out
there, isn’t it,” rather than having us
have to protest that it is.
Miscellaneous
Hear Yee! —This is to
announce that Atari has changed its
name. All dealers have been
requested to re-register under the
new name. Seeing that Com¬
modore was having success with
Commodore Business Machines,
Atari has formed a new “conglo¬
merate”, ATARI COMPUTER.
Amiga —Many of you have
been hearing about Amiga pro¬
motions, seeing dealers adding the
Amiga 500 and Amiga 2000 to their
lines and reading in this column
about the apparent success of their
new marketing efforts. Whispers of
caution are swirling about. The
latest promotion involves user
groups, i.e. when a member of a
user group takes you in to buy a
new 500 or a 2000, his group
receives a $50 or $200 software
credit. A nifty idea. Whispers have
it, however, that dealers have not
been paid for Amiga’s last pro¬
motion.
THE ELECTRONIC CLINIC
4916 DEL RAY AVE. BETHESDA, MD 20814
LICENSED & BONDED (301) 656-7983 SINCE 1969
Atari ST Computers and Accessories
1040ST/520ST COLOR/MONO SYSTEMS CALL
SF314/SF354 DISK DRIVES CALL
SHD204 20 MEG HARD DISK DRIVE CALL
ST POWER SUPPLIES CALL
SMARTEAM 1200AT MODEM (HAYES comp)125.00
THOMSON 4120 COMPOSITE, RGB(analog),
& sep.(chroma/luma) COLOR MONITOR 285.00
Atari 8-bit Computers & Accessories
130 XE COMPUTER OR XE GAME SYSTEM 149.99
XETEC GRAPHIC PRINTER INTERFACE 59.95
800/XL/XE/1050 POWER SUPPLIES 25-30.00
Other Products and Accessories
MONITOR SWIVEL STANDS 22.50
6 OUTLET SURGE PROTECTOR W/BREAKER24.50
3.5” DISKETTE CASES, HOLDS 30 10.95
5.25” DISKETTE CASES, HOLDS 50 9.95
3.5” MAXELL DISKETTES 10 FOR 15.00
5.25” NASHUA DISKETTES 10 for 7.50
5.25” “AT” DISKETTES 10 for 26.50
COMPUTER PAPER 9.5”X11” 32.50
Continuous Feed, Smooth Edge, 2,500 sheets.
Panasonic Printers
KX-P1080III DOT MATRIX 224.95
KX-P10911II DOT MATRIX 249.95
We are an ATARI factory repair center. Professional
service on most makes of disk drives, modems, printers &
monitors.
**** MOST SOFTWARE 15-25% OFF ****
We stock the entire CURRENT NOTES ST
Public Domain Library. $4.00 per disk.
We offer complete sales and service on IBM PC’s,
XT’s, AT’s, and Compatibles.
PC Compatible Systems
PC/XT 640K COMPATIBLE CALL
80286 AT 1 MEG COMPATIBLE CALL
80386 AT 1 MEG COMPATIBLE CALL
MONOCHROME TTL MONITOR CALL
Prices are subject to change. Call to inquire
about any product listed.
Page 14
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
XE UPDATE ♦ Len Poggiali
Newsroom Comes to the 8-bits
Due largely to an intensive Atari-user letter writing
campaign, Springboard Software has decided to mar¬
ket an 8-bit version of its classic newsletter program,
The Newsroom. The basic package contains 600
pieces of clip art; a drawing program, which allows the
user to modify existing clip art or to create his/her own;
and a built-in word processor with five fonts. C/ip Art
Collection (CAC) Volume 1 (all-occasion art); CAC
Volume 2 (business art); and CAC Volume 3 (sports
and recreation art) also are available.
To make the entire Newsroom four-program pack¬
age as attractively priced as possible, until July 31 of
this year, Springboard is selling the four together for
$69.80 plus $5.00 shipping. For those who want to try
out the basic program first, that may be ordered for
$39.95, with each clip art package being an additional
$10.00. To order, call Springboard (1-800-445-4780,
ext. 3003), or write (Springboard Software, P.O. Box
141079, Minneapolis, MN 55414-6079).
Sons of Liberty Arrives
Employing an improved version of their own
brilliant play system (Gettysburg: The Turning Point,
Rebel Charge at Chickamauga, Shi/oh: Grant’s Trial in
the West and Battle of Antietarft), David Landrey and
Chuck Kroegel have created a Revolutionary War game
entitled Sons of Liberty for Strategic Simulations, Inc..
Unlike previous Civil War offerings, SOL includes not
one but three battles from this earlier, less complex
conflict. The very small but important Battle of Bunker
Hill serves as an introduction to the system, while the
larger Battles of Monmouth and Saratoga provide
players with more complexity and greater challenges.
As always the game may be played in Basic,
Intermediate, or Advanced modes.
Sons of Liberty sells for $39.95. Anyone wishing to
order directly from SSI may do so by calling (1-
800-443-0100, ext. 335), or by writing (1046 N.
Rengstorff Avenue, Mountain View, CA 94043). Ship¬
ping is $2.00.
More on the Atari XF551 Drive
Released in the fourth quarter of 1987 at a retail
price of $219.95, the Atari XF551 disk drive supports
single-density, enhanced density, and double-density
formats. The newest version of SpartaDOS or the new
Atari DOS (ADOS) is required in order to use the hyper
speed and double-density modes. Presently the XF551
is being shipped with DOS 2.5 until ADOS can be
completed (release date is unknown).
Also built into this drive is the ability to transfer
data back and forth to the computer at one-and-
a-half times the normal rate. According to Atari, the
XF551 will run correctly on any Atari 8-bit, including
the game system. Apparently, however, there is a
major flaw with the XF551—it writes to side two of
one’s disk backwards, causing read/write incompatibi¬
lity problems with all other single-sided drives. As a
result Computer Software Services (P.O. Box 17660,
Rochester, NY 14617, (716) 467-9326) has come out
with XF551 Enhancer ($29.95) which is advertised as
restoring 100% compatibility between all drives while
retaining all of the original design qualities of the
XF551. Some installation is required.
iff T Informer News!
Receive a FREE complimentary
copy of our next monthly news¬
paper. Reviews , News, Columns ,
as well as advice for new users.
Send this coupon today
Name_Phone_
Address_
City_ST_ZIP_
Mail to: ST Informer, Dept CN
909 N.W. Starlite Place
Grants Pass, OR 97526
June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 15
MAGIC SAC UPDATE ♦ Jeff Greenblatt
This month, this column will be
devoted to updating you on the
latest releases of the Magic Hard
Disk and Floppy Disk formatters.
Additionally, if you own a Translator
and are having trouble formatting,
reading and/or writing Mac disks,
the later part of this article will
provide you with some insight as to
what’s wrong, and what can be
done about it.
New Format Utilities
If you are using HFS hard disk
partitions or HFS floppies, by now
you have probably discovered that
if you copied a file with 23 charac¬
ters or more in its name, strange
things begin to happen. Some of
the symptoms are that files or fol¬
ders are no longer visible in “file
dialog boxes”. This should not be
occurring since HFS has a file
name limit of 31 characters.
Data Pacific has just released
new versions of MCFORMAT (for
floppies) and MAGICHD (for hard
disks). These new files are available
on GEnie in the Data Pacific Round
Table. If you are not a member of
this RT, just type DP at any menu
prompt to join. The file numbers are
182 and 183.
The following is a message
from Dave Small, which was posted
on the GEnie Data Pacific RT. It
explains what the problem was and
how to use the new versions:
Okay, gang, here’s the story.
When we released the “HFS
Formatter”, which stamps informa¬
tion onto the hard disk preparatory
to you using it under HFS, we got a
word wrong. This limited you to 23
character file names. Worse, if you
ran into a filename longer than 23
characters, it damaged whatever
directory information was next on
the disk, starting at the 24th
character. Typically, you’d get “File
xxx could not be copied; cancel/
continue” prompts. At this point
your hard disk is nuked; nuked is
Dan Moore’s favorite word.
You will find odd results. You
can’t delete a file; “The trashcan
cannot be emptied”. You can’t
copy it or rename it. Basically, HFS
is ALL messed up. Even trying to
copy the file may crash the system,
PARTICULARLY with an illegal in¬
struction error, at PC = CEEE. (Just
look on the crash page). This
applies to both HFS floppies and
HFS hard disks.
So, we’ve uploaded a new,
BETA TEST version of MCFORMAT
(for flops) and MAGICHD (for hard
disks), which initializes the word
properly. Now, you can’t just
change it on an already formatted
and in use partition, because
there’s probably already damaged
files out there. So, you need to
re-initialize the partition with this
new MAGICHD under GEM. You do
not need to “reformat” the hard
disk or the partition under GEM.
Now, assume you want to get
your old files from your possibly
bad HFS partition to your new,
good one you just MAGICHD’d. Do
you copy them? NO!!! This is
because just accessing a flawed
HFS disk may crash you (the CEEE
Illegal Instruction crash). If you
crash in the middle of updating the
new HFS’s directory, its history. So
you need a safe way to transfer
files.
The solution is MFS. MFS is
immune to the file name length
problem. So, set up a 5 mbyte
(max allowed size) MFS partition,
copy your bad HFS partition to it. If
you’ve got Big Problems in your
HFS, you’ll find out now — you’ll
crash. This is not the end of the
world, MFS is pretty robust; just
figure out what files are trashed in
the bad HFS directory and don’t
touch them again. (So, copy the
files a few at a time, so if you crash,
you know which ones caused it).
Get all the files over to MFS, THEN
you know they are good and clean.
Then, copy them to the destination
(good) HFS partition — possibly
the bad one that you’ll now go and
make good with MAGICHD?
Be doubly cautious about HFS-
HFS copies. As I said, a bad direc¬
tory in the original HFS can crash
you, and if you crash under HFS, it
can leave your disk a mess. Both
Dan Moore and Mark Booth lost
their drive’s contents this way.
You may want to use Meg-
A-Minute to backup your partitions
before doing this, just in case. It’s
reasonably speedy, (a meg per
minute, get it?) It saves around
800K per double sided disk, so
roughly 1.2 disks per megabyte are
required.
I’m sorry for all the hassle; HFS
is incredibly murky, the documen¬
tation flat lied to us in places, and
the word that caused all this pro¬
blem isn’t even documented! Dan
Moore did a heck of a job just
getting it to 98%, and the last 2%
was a bitch to find. But I know this
means a lot of you will have to go
fix your HFS partitions, and I'm
sorry about that.
With a fixed partition, you need
not fear any more about the file
name length thing. Me, I got zap¬
ped reading in a public domain
library disk, and a SCSI disk for¬
matter off of GEnie. Twang, direc¬
tory damaged. I have to go back
now and think if I even want to use
that hard disk, or just reformat it and
start over., really a joy, right?
(Remember, all these bugs you see,
we get to see too...)
So, quick rundown:
1. The new MAGICHD initializes a
partition (NOT A WHOLE DISK,
your other data is safe) with the
correct word (we hope).
2. Anything coming from MFS is
safe, so copy from a possibly
defective HFS to an MFS to “fil¬
ter out” bad files/folders.
3. MCFORMAT does the same for
floppy HFS disks.
The Translator
As I mentioned earlier, if you’re
having problems with Mac format¬
ted disks, read on!! The following is
Page 16
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
a series of messages from Dave
Small which were also posted on
the GEnie Data Pacific RT. The
messages have been slightly edited,
and were compiled to provide a
single narrative on the subject:
Now that we have the basic
kinks ironed out of the Translator,
we do have one continuing pro¬
blem. I thought I’d mention it, why it
happens, and just generally let you
know what’s going on.
Take a typical Translator con¬
figuration, on a 1040 ST. You have
one internal drive, the Translator,
then an external drive on the “Drive
Chain”. They’re all wired together;
the same 14 pin connector goes to
everybody.
Now, this is fine—the Translator
can sample signals to its heart’s
content, and can send stuff out the
“Write Data” line if it wants to write
something. The drives will respond.
No problems.
Except..
The Translator is really hearty
about writing data. I mean, when it
writes data, it doesn’t mess around-
-the 7416 driver yanks the write
data line down, really hard and
fast,—like it should! That’s the
spec. Disk drives are a lot like
modems—serial data devices. The
better the data, the better every¬
thing works.
So, this whole long cable to the
external drive, and the cable to the
internal drive, and all that wire, is
hooked to the Translator’s Write
Data line. When the Translator
yanks that line from +4 volts to
ground (in far under a microse¬
cond), the whole thing .. well.. from
a non-technical view, it “rings”, just
like banging a gong.
Now, just HOW it rings depends
on many things. Cable length.
Number of disk drives hooked up-
-remember, each drive hooked up
means one more guy pulling the
Write Data line UP to +4 volts.
Whether or not the Translator is at
the “end” of the disk drive chain, or
in the middle.
When the whole mess “rings”, a
glitch can appear in the write data. It
is a very small glitch, and only lasts
a few billionths of a second (nano¬
seconds). But, if a drive is VERY
fast on its feet and sensitive, it will
react to that glitch, and think it’s a
data bit. Boom goes your write
operation—an extra bit just showed
up.
The symptoms are that you can
read Mac disks all day, but can’t
format/write to them properly. When
you write to them, you blow away
whatever sector you write to.
Remember—when you stick a fresh
Mac disk into the drive, an invisible
file named DESKTOP is created,
with sector writes. If you have hard¬
ware troubles, big problems.
The first solution to this was to
add a capacitor to the 7416 driver,
to “soak up” that ringing action, if
you will. The problem was some ST
disk drives are running RIGHT on
the edge, and that added capaci¬
tance broke them—both in ST
mode and in Translator mode. The
drives we see from Atari vary
WILDLY.
The second solution was to add
a small resistor between the 7416
and the write-data line in the out¬
side world. What this does is make
the line not yank down quite so
hard; the whole mess doesn’t ring
as badly; without that gonging
action, the drives write just fine.
Mind you, only about 10% of drives
we see react to the glitch; we are
not talking about the majority of
Translators here.
Okay, but what if you have a
totally shabby disk drive, that needs
every little bit of oomph the 7416
can put out just to write? For in¬
stance, a drive starts writing when
the write voltage gets BELOW about
0.8 volts. But I have a drive in the
office that insists on 0.6 volts or
less; if I put an inline resistor in, the
7416 can’t pull down below 0.7, and
the drive fails (3 other drives work).
In the meantime, the ST works
usually at 0.5 volts—this varies
depending on the number of drives
online.
So, first off. If your Translator
works, don’t mess with it. Your
cable length may be right to not
“twang” on writes. Your disk drives
may righteously reject the transient
noise of the “twang”—heck, they
ought to, it’s only 10 nanoseconds
and 0.2 volts big! I would be a tad
cautious about changing your
Translator’s position in the cable,
though.
If it doesn’t work, try changing
cables, or position in the cable. In
particular, put the Translator on the
end of the chain, dangling off the
last drive—it doesn’t have to be in
the middle at all!, just anywhere on
the chain.
If that doesn’t work, you can
open it up and see if there’s a really
obvious resistor or capacitor sol¬
dered in on top of U2; it’s marked. If
not, there’s a change DP can make
to help your Translator get along
with your disk drives.
There isn’t, unfortunately, any
easy solution. The true problem
resides in the termination of the
write data signal inside the Atari; it’s
causing a “reflection”, or signal
bounceback, that results in ringing.
Changing it would require opening
up your ST.
I estimate this affects about
10% of Translators. You can diag¬
nose it pretty easily with TRNSTEST;
if you’ve got a drive failing, and in
particular if another one works, then
that’s probably it. It’s the write data
ringing.
My hands are tied in terms of
going any particular direction. If I
optimize the Translator one way, a
certain series of Atari drives will fail.
(Say, the voltage problem). If I
optimize the other way, another
series will fail (the ringing problem).
Atari has a wide variety of com¬
pletely different mechanisms inside
those plastic cases; they must buy
at a flea market or something, wha¬
tever is cheap that day.
There may well be no optimal
solution, since we have to work with
internal disk drives, and I can’t
splice into the ST to properly ter¬
minate it. Look, this is high speed
data—one bit every 3 to 4 micro¬
seconds!—and termination is
essential. Atari is darn lucky to be
getting away with it as is; the rise
times are shaky and the pulldown
pretty darn marginal. Fortunately,
the Atari ROMS don’t detect all disk
CRC errors, so a lot of failed writes
go unmentioned ... weird twist of
fate there.
June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 17
The next irritating problem is
drive RPM. When I wrote the
Translator ROM, I assumed 300
RPM—I mean, everyone with 3”
drives runs them at 300 RPM.
There’s not even a speed adjust¬
ment.
This was an error. LOTS of Atari
drives run anywhere from 290 to
310 RPM. My code broke above
305 RPM, and I had lots of unhappy
people.
The problem is like if you
record a cassette tape slowly or
quickly. When you play it back on
another machine, it sounds too fast,
or too slow. Macs are incredibly
sensitive to this speed; just a little
difference makes the Mac reject the
disk.
So, you format a disk on your
Translator, and take it to a Mac. The
Mac rejects it. You’ve just learned
why. The RPM was slightly off.
To complicate this whole mess,
some drives spin at different
speeds when they warm up, or
when the disk inside them warms
up due to friction in the diskette
sleeve (I’m not kidding).
The present Translator on¬
board ROM software, version 15,
does not automatically correct for
speed variation. Remember, we
shipped this back in December,
and I didn’t know Atari drives didn’t
play by the RPM rules — four of
my office drives work at 300 +/-
1%, which is the rated speed.
Anyway, the solution to speed
problems has ALWAYS been, if it
don’t work, format it on the Mac.
Remember this is only a writing
problem; the Translator can READ
disks written anywhere from 250 to
330 RPM, which is amazingly good
tolerance. And fortunately, most
people use Translators to import
software. Finally, remember there
are a lot of disk drives out there
that are deglitched, that are at the
right RPM, and so forth, and people
are not having problems. The other
ones, we hear about...
I will probably be doing a ROM
upgrade to the Translator to help it
dance with disk drives that are
off-spec. There is speculation
about offering a flat fee to field
upgrade the Translator for a new
ROM, the resistor mod to the write
data line, Gl chip instead of HP
chip for MIDI, and so forth—all
mods designed to let the Translator
work with bad ST drives. Honest,
we had no idea the sort of quality
control that Atari was unleashing on
the world! I’ll announce more on
this when there’s something to
announce; dP and I are going
through lots of contortions right
now.
If you are having problems with
Mac formatted disks and your
Translator doesn’t have the internal
modifications that Dave mentioned,
contact Data Pacific for an
upgrade.
Now that you’ve read most of
the story, the last sentence of
From *M51: Word Search
Dave’s message seems to imply
that all is not well at Data Pacific. It
appears that there may be a parting
of the ways, which may impact on
the future development of the
Magic Sac. I’ll try to shed some light
on the situation in the next issue of
Current Notes.
Oh, Yes!!! Congratulations are
in order to Sandy and Dave Small
on the birth of their third child,
James M. Small, on April 19th. I
wonder what the middle initial
stands for? You don’t suppose?
Nah!!!
From # M51: Mac Word Hunt
New Library Disks
This month, two new disks have
been added to the Current Notes
Magic Sac Library. Here is the titles
and what is on each disk:
Disk M50, Fonts #8, contains
10 new fonts in various point sizes.
They are Alderney 9-48 plus Alder¬
ney Docs, Cairo 18, Cyrillic 12,
Greek 10,20, Paint 18, Playbill
12,18,24, Rehovot 10,12,20,24,
Runes 12,24, Washington 12,
Zodiac 18.
Disk M51, Games #11, con¬
tains 6 new games to ammuse. The
titles are Bouncing Balls, Fire Zone,
Mac Word Hunt 2.0, OutFlank, Risk
and WordSearch.
Page 18
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
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SMALL WORLD ♦ Dave Small
Life Gets Stranger...
(c) 1988, Dave Small
This is going too far!
Recently, one of Frank Som¬
mers’ legendary “ST Update” col¬
umns here in CN talked about me
mentioning the Magic Sac in con¬
nection with SDI (“Star Wars”).
Frank said, “Star Wars is a fantasy
... fantasy.. fantasy.”
Now, I thought that was a little
strange. I’d made some brief joking
mention about it in a previous
column. But, you know those CN
editors... have to let them have their
little foibles. [I figured, if I were
Frank, and was doing a column
making predictions about Atari, I’d
be a little irritable too., (grin).]
So, I pick up my April “Current
Notes”, and here’s this article by
one Chris Anderson about SDI and
the Magic Sac — mentioning that
same old column I’d done. Chris,
er, doesn’t like SDI. And is willing to
say so.
Now, I’ve talked with Chris
online on GENIE, and he seems like
a bright enough person (for
someone who disagrees with me).
(grin)
But enough is enough!
When I mentioned the Magic
Sac so long ago, it was in a half
joking way. I was speaking of the
need for reliability in computers; as
an example, I mentioned how
embarrassing it would be to have
the Magic Sac crash while running
“Star Wars.” Honest, that’s ail I said
and meant; remember, this was in
the era when the Magic Sac still
crashed a lot...
Also, please bear in mind I
spent September and October’s
columns talking about Nikola Tesla
and his inventions, which raise
interesting possibilities for SDI. In
the introduction to that column, I
recall mentioning one of the big
problems with SDI is how difficult
developing anything new is, espe¬
cially software.
So, please, enough is enough.
No more letters on this; let’s let my
poor, trampled, ravaged joke about
SDI and Magic Sac die a quiet
death, okay?
Sorry. Dave:In this issue, a rebut¬
tal to Chris' column, about SDI being
impossible.
Aiieee!
That's okay. Dave, we're all wait¬
ing for you to make your next joke in
this column. Something about having
the Contras use Magic Sacs, perhaps?
Yuck, yuck, yuck...
No! No. Frank! No more counter¬
columns about my little jokes! Please!
I'll do anything! I’ll confess! The
invasion begins at 0400 on Omaha
beach! I know where Jimmy Hoffa is
buried!
[An evil chuckle is heard emerging
from Frank's house] Were waiting,
Dave...
Moving Right Along ...
Actually, this whole thing
reminds me a lot of the frequent
misunderstandings that people get
into online. It reminds me a great
deal of the Plato online network I
was on in 1978.
Dave, that's the weakest transition
from an editorial comment to the
“meat” of your column we’ve heard
yet. I mean, Hackercon to SDI was
thin, but this is really squeaking by.
Look, I’ll tie it in more strongly a
little later. Be patient, okay?
Oh, excuse me. Go right ahead,
[chuckle]
Plato
Plato was an online network run
by Control Data Corporation, a.k.a.
CDC. At the peak of its era, there
were many large mainframes in
Minnesota connected by phone line
to thousands of users.
If this sounds like CompuServe
or GEnie today, you’re right on
track.
(Plato has gradually faded out; I
believe it is still running in a few
places, but nothing like it was in
1978).
Plato began life as an “educa¬
tional computing” system. It fea¬
tured a fine, 512 x 512 bitmap
screen—a resolution close to the
current ST, but achieved in the late
1960’s!—a language called “Tutor”,
and all sorts of “Courseware”-
-Plato Lessons to educate you on
nearly anything. There was a neat
lesson in flying a 747,1 remember.
There were many fantastic
games there as well. There were
excellent role playing games.
People got rich moving these
games to microcomputers, when
micros came out! (Witness “Wizar¬
dry”—Robert Woodhead, an author
of it, was a Plato-ite that had
written several Plato RPG’s before.)
There was an airtight simulator, very
much like Air Warrior on GEnie.
Not seen yet, though, is the
multi-player Star Trek game called
Empire, surely the greatest burner
of Plato CPU hours ever written. I
became an Empire addict, logging
some 2,000 hours on it during
college—and ending up co-com-
manding the “Federation” team on
it. Ah, for the college days spent
locked in a small room, battling up
to 31 other players...
Now along with all these games
were a fascinating set of “notes-
files”, where people could talk
about various subjects. These were
lots like the CompuServe Forums or
GEnie RoundTables. Naturally, the
busiest notesfiles concerned politi¬
cal subjects.
This was my first introduction to
serious debating with other people.
And wow, were there some
serious fights in the Plato notesfiles.
Take the worst “flames” (as they
are called now) from Usenet, CIS,
Page 20
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
Genie, or whereever, and they’re
close to Plato notesfiles.
I was a sophomore in college
when I began on Plato. Many other
colleges were tied into Plato. I’m
sure it’ll surprise you to find out that
there was much ... well ... shall we
say, political opinion on the left in
these Plato notesfiles. I remember
Greg, for instance, up at Evergreen
State College, explaining how he
was a Trotsky-ite, and didn’t
approve of only the current imple¬
mentation of Marxism.
The Plato systems staff partici¬
pated as well, which was quite
dangerous—if you disagreed with
them anyway. I had some bad
experiences here, and learned to
shut up sometimes. This ability has
often stood me in good stead,
particularly when talking with Apple
employees (excuse me).
Well, back in 1978, I thought
this was great. Politics! I showed up
in my usual, subtle-as-a-hand-
grenade way, and began talking.
Big mistake.
My political opinions were
characterized, I recall, as to the right
of the Nazi’s; Greg wanted to know
if all my opinions were straight from
Maggie Thatcher. And so on and so
on and so on ... gun control ... day
care ... abortion ... you name it.
Major political warfare carried out on
a computer.
And I learned two extremely
important lessons from all this.
First, the “debating society” is
alive and well in the computer
networks. It’s like the opinion-edi¬
torial columns in your daily paper,
but with a computer, anyone can
join in (and does), and be heard
instantly. People who think political
debates are dry and dull should try
one on a local computer system.
Second (and most importantly):
These people I was fighting with
were not the idiots I thought they
were.
I had never understood much of
what I’d heard politically that didn’t
agree with my views. For the
longest time, I thought that people
who believed otherwise were, well,
complete idiots. (Let’s be tactful,
right?)
But the people I would debate
with and challenge ... had perfectly
reasonable ideas too. Given the
basic things they believed in, these
opinions and ideas were absolutely
consistent. Many were the times
this was pointed out to me.
I could rattle off a list of impres¬
sive sources for my information.
Experts. Quotable quotes. William F.
Buckley. Robert K. Brown. And so
on.
And they could too. Of course,
it would be people from the more
liberal side, but experts are experts.
Given the basic “world view” of
those sources, the opinions were
inevitable. They could be just as
solid appearing as my opinions
were; I could see the logic and
reason behind their opinions.
... For the longest time,
I thought that people
who believed otherwise
were, well, complete
idiots....
After a while, I came to see that
the “world view” was what mattered
the most, and that given the wide
variety of “experts” and “sources”
on any subject, you could find an
expert to back up any opinion.
The Plato people took delight in
quoting experts that agreed with
them, as I did. But after awhile I
began to see this was nonsense.
At this point, I mellowed out
considerably. These people weren’t
idiots; their basic values were dif¬
ferent than mine. The opinions they
built up out of their basic values
were well reasoned, logical, and
consistent.
It’s all very reminiscent of Niko¬
lai Lobachevsky, who came up with
“non Euclidean geometry”. Geo¬
metry begins with a few basic,
unprovable foundations. For in¬
stance, parallel lines do not inter¬
sect. From those definitions, a
whole geometry is built, and it is
self-consistent.
Lobachevsky’s work was non
Euclidean. He’d start right out by
saying, “parallel lines intersect”-
-and the geometry he would build
up was entirely self-consistent.
Provably correct, from within that
geometry. I know it sounds strange,
but it works.
While I felt that many of the
Plato people’s opinions were
wrong, there was no way to prove it
through attacking their self-consis¬
tency (or just plain attacking them).
As does a non-Euclidean geome¬
try, their opinions held up, given the
basic assumptions.
Finally, I also saw that people’s
world-views, those basic assump¬
tions, were inherently unprovable.
What did they know or I know, for
instance, about Afghanistan? What
we’d read in the papers that day?
Yep, there’s a really consistent,
accurate source. (That was sar¬
casm). Have I ever been there?
Seen it with my own eyes? Nope.
Neither had they. Yet I remember
several good fights about if the
Soviets should have troops in there,
“invading” (me) or “supporting the
native government against rebels”
(them).
There is much that you and I
“know” about the world that we
don’t really know. We’ve not seen it
with our own eyes. Yet we assume
it’s true. (This is also a basic
propaganda tool. Change the
world-view, change the way people
think, automatically. Very useful
stuff.)
In time, I grew to be friends with
... gasp! ... the people I had dis¬
agreed with so strongly. I grew to
value their reasoning ability, and like
them as people. Their opinions ...
well, we didn’t talk about those.
(Although I can recall switching
political roles one April Fool’s Day
with Greg, and horrifying nearly an
entire network.)
So, nowadays I see the same
battles erupting on CompuServe
and Genie and Usenet and...
There’s people who act much the
same way I did in 1978, assuming
that people who disagree with them
are “idiots.” Take for instance the
Atari 16-bit forum on CompuServe;
here, a note sprung up about ban¬
kers being “leeches” that “feed off
the poor.” Many, many political
June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 21
replies followed. Regrettably, one of
the CompuServe part-time Sysops
is a banker. (I thought he showed
remarkable restraint in staying out
of fight.)
They’re going the same way
Plato did. Some are learning to
understand; some never will; some
know better than to get into a fight
about such silliness.
I am going to be very interested
to see if the next development of
Plato occurs on the big networks-
-that’s a computer romance.
Already I’ve seen signs that it does
happen over on GEnie. But, per¬
haps, more on this in another col¬
umn.
Computer political (and other)
forums. Interesting stuff.
The bad thing about them is the
personal nature of the attacks, the
intolerance you’ll run into. Pop your
head up in the Amiga forum and
talk about the Atari ST. Then duck!
There will be incoming fire.
The good thing about all this is
it gives other people a chance to
intensely debate and question other
people’s opinions. You really don’t
get this chance in the outside world
much anymore. And I think many
people will conclude, as I did, that
people that disagree with me aren’t
really idiots; they are just probably
people with different basic feelings
about the world.
Okay, Editor, ready for me to tie
this all up with the introduction?
This I got to see.
So we come to Frank and
Chris’ columns in Current Notes ;
about SDI. They’re not real wild
about it. I happen to support SDI.
But, I just can’t bring myself to
instantly condemn either of them as
“idiots” because they don’t agree
with me. That’s the effect the Plato
experience had on me. Chris can
quote many people, and did in his
article, that seem like “good
sources.” I’m sure the rebuttal to
Chris’ column will quote other
“experts” too.
But heck, I really don’t know
who’s right. Gen. Graham says he
can have a working basic system in
four years, if he’s turned loose to do
it now. The anti-SDI folks say it’s
impossible, forever. Some of them
are competent people who deal
with missiles daily. How should I
know who’s right?
At this point, the Plato teach¬
ings come back to me, and I realize,
I’ve happened to pick the “experts”
whose world view agrees with mine
as my “experts”, as people to
believe in. Chris, he’s picked
someone else. That doesn’t mean
his reasoning, given those experts,
is any different.
(And which is why me writing a
column in disagreement is com¬
pletely futile.)
... Be careful online, if
you ’re being sarcastic,
you have to say so, or
many people won’t
realize it...
Several things here:
♦ For those of you who haven’t got
a modem, spend the fifty or a
hundred dollars to get one.
Check out your local BBS’s;
check out the big nationwide
networks. There’s something
happening there you’re missing
out on! The “latest” ST news is
often the least interesting thing
happening.
♦ It is very valuable to learn just
how much you don’t know about
the world and about what’s going
on. Of course, getting politically
shredded is sort of a hard way to
learn it.
♦ Be very careful online, as I’m try¬
ing to be here. If you’re being
sarcastic, or saying something in
fun, you have to say so, or many
people won’t realize it. Remem¬
ber, the only thing that comes
across are characters; your tone
of voice, facial expression, body
language, and everything else
are lost. You’ve got to be careful
to include them if needed, lest
you be misunderstood.
♦ It is always best to leave yourself
a way out. Many are the times
I’ve seen people paint them¬
selves into corners online.
(Another singularly bad move is
to irritate the Sysops, who run
the whole place). It is best to
(grin), (shrug), and move on. This
is why I keep the Magic Sac
areas online so deliberately light
hearted; it is hard for people to
go into an irritated yowl when
everyone around them is having
fun. With a controversial product,
such as Magic Sac, this is
essential.
♦ Again, if you’ve not got onto the
nationwide networks — do. If
nothing else, check out the
weekly Wednesday night Atari
RoundTable Real Time Con¬
ference discussion on GEnie;
there, 20-40 people get together
and talk about the ST, all in the
same place. Sometimes really
interesting things happen, like
when one of the Tramiels shows
up to chat. I hope this column’s
been interesting for you, and if it
leads you online, I hope it gives
you a few basic starting out rules
to work with. It really is worth¬
while; there’s more going on
around you, on the networks,
than you can possibly know
about unless you’re there.
As usual, if you’d care to write,
I’m available at:
BIX: dsmall
CIS: 76606,666
GEnie: DAVESMALL
Usenet: hplabs!well! dsmall
Or, if you prefer more primitive
communication (stone knives and
bearskins?):
9678-B E. Arapahoe Rd, #133,
Englewood, CO 80112.
Page 22
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
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_ CD REPORT ♦ Linda Helgerson _
A Look at the Market for CD-ROM Drives
The success of a computer
peripheral is most often measured
in terms of number of units sold
(installed base) combined with pro¬
jections of future annual sales. This
method of analysis works for most
computer peripherals. A printer’s a
printer; a modem is a modem; sales
of 80 megabyte hard disk drives
may represent an upgrade. One
can purchase any of these items,
attach them to a computer, and
that’s that. Penetration or percent of
market share of a certain peripheral
can then be measured in relation to
the installed base of computers and
the number of units sold by each
manufacturer.
In theory, the same technique
could be applied to measuring the
degree of success of CD-ROM
drives. In practice, however, it does
not work quite that way. The single
difference is that without appro¬
priate software—CD-ROM titles—
a CD-ROM drive is useless.
Another way of saying the same
thing is, CD-ROM drives are not
sold unless there are suitable appli¬
cations. The difference between
sales of CD-ROM drives and other
microcomputer peripherals is the
dependency on available applica¬
tions. In fact, there is little dif¬
ference between the early years of
microcomputers sales and the need
for a VisiCalc-type application and
the events surrounding sales of
CD-ROM drives during the 1985-88
time frame.
The overall growth of the CD-
ROM industry—as measured in
number of CD-ROM units sold—
was certainly way below expec¬
tations by the end of 1987. For the
United States, the conservative
estimate is 30,000 drives sold, plus
or minus two to three thousand
units. More optimistic bean coun¬
ters estimate fifty, maybe sixty
thousand, but no more. This varies
widely from most all forecasts.
Is CD-ROM doomed? Is CD-
ROM yet another flash in the optical
technology pan? Has the “VisiCalc”
for CD-ROM arrived? The answer
to all three questions is, without a
doubt, “No”.
The estimated number of drives
sales in 1988, and probably for at
least one year after that, will be
totally dependent on whether or
not there are applications ready
and shipping. The difference bet¬
ween the 1987 through 1989 period
and the 1990 and beyond period is
the nature of the applications.
Through 1989, applications will be
targeted to vertical markets. At
about the 1990 point, we will see
broad, horizontal applications for
CD-ROM, and AT THAT POINT, we
can apply the traditional bean
counting approach to analyzing
success of the CD-ROM peripheral
as measured in number of units
sold.
...drive sales in 1988 will
be totally dependent on
whether or not there are
applications ready and
shipping...
In the meantime, how do we
determine whether or not there is a
significant penetration of drives into
those vertical markets that have
“found” CD-ROM. A measure is, of
course, the number ofdrives sold
per market, which is closely guar¬
ded information. Another is the rate
of adoption of CD-ROM products
and services by a vertical market
following a product announcement.
By the end of 1987, there were
essentially three vertical markets for
CD-ROM of any significance—
library, financial, and medical. The
first commercially available title in
January 1985 included Library of
Congress bibliographic records and
was directed to the behind-the-
scenes cataloging section of the
library. This same product is now
used in at least 2,OCX) libraries, and
many other competitive products
are enjoying similar success. From
there, the reference section of the
library was addressed with CD-
ROM discs containing indexes,
abstracts, and full-text of reference
works used most often in the libr¬
ary’s reference section. One vendor
supplying a reference product on
CD-ROM achieved 167% of sales
within the first year. At the last
American Library Association con¬
ference, there were more than sixty
vendors with reference products. In
early 1986, the first CD-ROM based
public access catalog (PACs, for¬
merly card catalog) was introduced.
By mid-1987, seven vendors had
such systems, the majority of which
are overwhelmed by requests for
proposals. Now, the states of
Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Maine,
Virginia and others are installing
such systems in libraries through¬
out their state. CD-ROM drives are
now moving into every niche of the
library market, and in turn, the
penetration sales of CD-ROM
drives is quite high for this market.
One survey of librarians indica¬
ted that 90% of the libraries in the
U.S. would have at least one CD-
ROM drive by the end of 1988. At
last count, this number was
approximately 40,000. Given the
addition of ten CD-ROM PACs and
five reference workstations, for in¬
stance, this number grows easily to
more than 1/2 million drives by
1990 for the library market alone.
Similar scenarios are occurring
for the medical and the financial
markets, and will begin for the
legal, travel & leisure, defense,
architect & construction industry,
and other vertical markets through¬
out 1988-89.
Any estimate of annual sales of
CD-ROM drives for these years will
then be totally dependent upon
whether or not the applications get
to market, are priced reasonably,
and the information on the CD-
ROM disc is considered valuable to
purchasers. Conservative estimates
for 1988 are sales of 90,000 units in
the United States, plus or minus
10-15,000. For 1989, the conserva¬
tive estimate is 150,000. These
numbers reflect natural growth, not
growth based upon the instant
adoption of CD-ROM drives by one
or more markets.
The bottom line is this. To
estimate CD-ROM sales in this
decade, one must know the degree
to which any single vertical market
suffers presently from the ineffi¬
ciencies and costs of acquiring and
using data distributed on paper,
microfiche or via online services,
Page 24
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
the tendencies of vendors supply¬
ing informationto those markets to
move to CD-ROM as an informa¬
tion distribution device, and how
soon such products will be shipped.
There are many exciting CD-
ROM applications under develop¬
ment and ready for shipping in
1988. West Publishing has announ¬
ced its entry into distributing all
necessary legal documents on CD-
ROM. McGraw-Hill’s Information
Systems Division will introduce its
Electronic Sweet’s indexing system
on CD-ROM to accompany the
hardcopy edition that is normally
distributed to 34,000 architects and
construction engineers. Under the
CALS (Computer-Aided Logistics
Support) initiative, all branches of
the military have been ordered to
move all paperwork to electronic
form, and CD-ROM is the obvious
dissemination mechanism. Many
CD-ROM projects have already
begun in the Army, Navy and Air
Force.
Computer manufacturers
should not be overlooked. All the
majors have announced some effort
dealing with CD-ROM. Apple Com¬
puter will begin shipping its new
CD-ROM drive, the AppleCD SC,
this spring. Digital Equipment Cor¬
poration uses CD-ROM drives as
file servers for distribution of in-
house, stable information and for
delivering operating system and
networking software to customers.
Hewlett-Packard will begin the
delivery of all user support informa¬
tion and later all documentation on
CD-ROM to purchasers of HP’s
... Buyers—as well as
dealers and distributors-
-need to experience
what CD-ROM is all
about...
Vectra or MS-DOS compatible
equipment. Tandy Corporation
announced in March the sales and
marketing of Hitachi’s 1503 SUY
drive via its express ordering
mechanism. Atari Corporation has
announced a drive, ready for ship¬
ment in mid-Summer. Even IBM
openly demonstrates prototype
applications on CD-ROM at trade
shows.
In the short history of CD-ROM,
it is easy to see the pattern. First, a
single highly visible product is in¬
troduced at a trade show. One year
later, there are twenty products.
CD-ROM drives are then sold along
with these applications to seed the
market or purchased from other
sources with an accompanying
horizontal-type product.
The message to retail dealers
and distributors is clear. Off-the-
shelf sales are not yet feasible.
Supplying drives to specific markets
in tandem with applications is. In
the meantime, becoming familiar
with CD-ROM, having a unit with an
appropriate demonstration of a
relevant application in full public
view, is mandatory. Buyers—as
well as dealers and distributors—
need to experience what CD-ROM
is all about. A database on CD-
ROM represents mainframe storage
on a microcomputer. This concept
is meaningless without an appro¬
priate application. If an application
is appropriate to a customer, the
sale of the CD-ROM drive follows.
Atari ST Public Domain Disks • Just $2.95
Here's just a few of our many disks to choose from. You can assume all disks are single sided (average of 250K per disk)
and work with both color and monochrome 520 or 1040 ST’s unless noted as follows:
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108 Ramdisks and Print Spoolers (many types of each). Also a beginner's guide to using ramdisks. Our most popular disk.
134 ST Writer Elite 2.3 - very popular and easy to use word processor (optional GEM/mouse interface).
135 A fantastic clone of the game Monopoly - you’ll love the graphics. One human plays 1-3 computer opponents (COLOR).
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155 DGDB - "The Great German Videogame" - An excellent game with sharp graphics (Joystick; COLOR).
162 Stoneage Deluxe - A fantastic Boulderdash-type game. Can design your own screens. (Joystick; COLOR).
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223 Speech #1 - Hear your ST speak what you type, or even read your own text files out loud. Other speech examples...
237 A fantastic C Compiler by Mark Johnson. Includes source code for a spreadsheet and some Unix tools.
252 Assembly Programming #1 - Two working 68000 assemblers, a disassembler, a monitor program, sample ASM source.
255 Business - Visicalc Spreadsheet clone with doc, plus over 100 business form letters. Very popular disk!
292 Misc. Utilities #8 - Fantastic monitor program TEMPLMON (edits, disassembles, prints,...). Also format, copy, etc.
294 DeskPac Plus - An powerful all-in-one desk acc: alarm clock, notebook, phonebook, programmable calculator, and more.
300 Monochrome programs - fantastic demo, "QiX"-like game. Also MONOWARE - lets color ST emulate monochrome system!
301 Uniterm 2.0 - Tremendous modem program! GEM interface, emulates MANY terminals, macros, up/download, doc.
315 Two database programs (First Base & Free Base); a nice working PD spreadsheet; sample Will; mortgage calculator,...
334 JILCAD 2D - A fully working shareware CAD program! Tons of features! Somewhat useable in color. (DBL/MEG/MONO)
336 AIM 2.3 - Digital Image Processor - fantastic! See how pros alter and improve digitized pictures (MEG).
337 Cyberscape Animation. The BEST ANIMATION (w/sound, too) for the ST. See a disk come alive! (DBL/MEG/COLOR).
359 Music Studio #6 - Many songs, plus several programs to play them over your ST's speakers or on a Midi system.
P01 PC Ditto Info - Numerous valuable tips and hints. Sample AUTOEXEC.BAT and CONFIG.SYS files. Requires PC Ditto.
CAT Catalog disk. Describes all our 300-plus PD disks (including ones for Magic Sac and PC Ditto). Over 90 pages of listings!
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AccuSoft • P.O. Box 02214 • Columbus, OH 43202
June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 25
ATARI SCUTTLEBITS ♦ Bob Kelly
USER GROUPS
It was a cold, damp night in
Sunnyvale. The unusual weather had
moved down from San Francisco,
adding to the discomfort of the men
sitting in the sumptuous living room. In
one corner was Jack Tramiel, staring
out the window as the ocean waves
pounded against the beach.
Sitting close to Tramiel, on a floor
cushion not 10 feet away was Neil
Harris with a copy of the Wall Street
Journal in his lap. The headlines read
“Tramiel buys Atari from Warner’'.
Harris spoke rapidly in the fashion of a
young reporter, “Gee whiz boss, we
sure got some good press!"
Jack Tramiel turned momentarily,
smiled, nodded and continued looking
out the window engrossed in his
thoughts. Surely his thoughts were on
the risk to his fortune now that he had
bought Atari? How was he going to
keep this company going until the still
secret 16 bit line was out next year?
Everything he had worked for was at
stake but nothing appeared right at the
moment.
Across the room sat Sig Hartmann
who had been with Jack Tramiel a
long time. He was Vice President at
Commodore and who knows what else
where else. Sig put down his copy of
Der Spiegel and said, “Jack, we're
planning to cut costs as you ordered.
Corporate employment will be reduced
to only a few hundred people. Of
course, a reduction in personnel creates
other problems. Namely, who is to
service the products we sell? The
planned cutbacks eliminate what little
customer support Warner provided to
Atari owners. Further, there is no
dealer network."
Going over to his favorite easy
chair, Jack Tramiel suggested it would
be nice if someone could get some
sandwiches as he had not eaten since
writing the check. Harris immediately-
volunteered, took the order and walked
out the door toward the waiting limo
headed for Metropolis and the sub shop.
Back in the house, Sig was alone
with Jack and son Sam Tramiel.
Nothing much was said for 20 minutes
or so. Suddenly, an idea came to Sig.
He broke the silence, “One way we
can keep people buying Atari products
even though we have no customer
service network is to utilize the exist¬
ing Atari user groups."
Jack turned in his chair, dropping
hot cigar ashes on his pants. Sig went
on ignoring Jack's smoldering trousers,
“User groups have been galvanized
through opposition to policies adopted
by Warner. They have repeatedly
stressed the versatility and power of
the 8-bit computer with the public. We
must sell the 8-bit inventory inherited
from Warner to stay alive. Further, by
gaining their support, we can move
away from just a game machine com¬
pany in the public’s mind."
Jack Tramiel continued to stare
out the window but now thoughts
raced through his mind. After about
two minutes, he bolted from the chair
dropping his cigar in his bourbon and
water. He was belly to belly with Sig
and shouting, “Yes, the user groups
can help us sell the inventory of 8-bit
products while Shiv has time to bring
on the new 16-bit ST computer line. In
fact, even after we start selling the 16-
bit computers in the U.S., we can tell
everyone to go to the local user group
for support".
Jack was now into it. He turned
and said to number one son, “This
arrangement will reduce our financial
requirement to service the products we
sell while at the same time advertising
how user groups are providing enhan¬
ced customer support to the new buyer.
It's free except for some minimal outlay
for a user group representative here at
corporate headquarters. It will and
must work!"
Both men congratulated each
other on the beauty of such a system.
It was all so simple—service the public
through involving the public. This was
the answer to the liquidity trap. A
greater share of Atari’s financial
resources could now be allocated to
develop the next generation of 16-bit
computers.
Sam Tramiel had been quiet up to
this point. He looked at both men and
said, “This will work for a couple of
years, then it will be time to pay the
piper. In other words Dad, sooner or
later, the user groups may need help as
our corporate policies change and we
move away from the 8-bit computer.
What do we do then? They will
expect our support
While the conversation above is, of course, fictious
and events compressed, the corporate plan imple¬
mented by Atari was fairly close to what has been
depicted. User groups did everything in their power to
aid Atari’s resurgence. User groups promoted the 8-bit
computer line, explained to the public how Atari’s
corporate outlook had changed, and took on the task
of being de facto customer representatives for Atari.
After one year, inventory declined, cash flow improved,
and everyone awaited the imminent arrival of the ST. In
retrospect, one might say that 8-bit sales bought Atari
the financial time it needed and user groups contribu¬
ted to the success of this strategy.
However, with the advent of the ST computer,
corporate policies indeed changed, just as Sam
Tramiel might have said. Atari has all but ignored 8-bit
users and, for the last year or so, the priority of U.S. ST
purchasers has declined. Atari’s focus is the European
market where ST sales are strong. But in Europe, there
are few old-time users who remember the early days.
The lack of attention on the part of Atari over the
past year or more has taken its toll on U.S. user
groups. Some have gone completely out of existence,
some are just a shell, and others have witnessed a
decline in numbers and/or participation. It is in Atari’s
Page 26
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
interest to reverse this trend. What can Atari do? Well,
there are two reoccurring themes in the responses to
my queries of user group representatives:
• Atari could make user groups the initial beneficiary
of insider information on new product releases,
bug fixes, and general hardware/software support.
This could be accomplished through bulletins and
technical fact sheets made available to the
designated officer of a user group. Another
suggestion would be for Atari to provide technical
summaries of GEnie files concerning important
hardware/software modifications. Simply put, con¬
sistent communications creates a rationale for a
user group - the transmittal of technical and
product information to users.
• Atari could develop a road show. Thousands turn
out in selected cities when Apple technical types
visit to show-off the new wares to the users in the
provinces. Why can’t Atari schedule one or two
people for “a-month-on-the-road” each year
with user groups demonstrating new hardware/
software as well as third party contributions. This
might be much more cost effective in the long run
than appearances at various Atarifests.
One of the persons I asked for suggestions was
the President of the Northern Virginia Atari Users
Group, Georgia Weatherhead. While she was writing a
response to my questions, the mailman deposited at
her door a new Atari publication to be issued monthly.
(This really happened, one day prior to submission of
this column!)
She immediately called Atari and found out that
one copy will be distributed to each user group and the
person responsible at Atari is Ms. Elizabeth Shook. The
publication is located within the new computer division
at Atari and Chuck Babbitt is its President. The initial
issue is concerned solely with 16-bit computer infor¬
mation. I hope this publication will also recognize the
needs of the Atari, non-games, 8-bit community. A
substantial portion of the membership in the Washing¬
ton, D.C. area operates 8-bit machines.
In any event, assuming this new publication
continues and the content is expanded incorporating
more technical information, it will help user groups lure
back old members as well as the needed new blood.
Ultimate success depends on word being spread on
club events to local Atari dealers, user group members
actively recruiting, and even in some cases innovative
publicity. After the shake down period for the Atari
newsletter, the ball is in the user’s group court. They
better get ready. THIS IS AN EXCELLENT START BY
ATARI. Congratulations.
Most of the users felt strongly the “travelling road
show” would be of immense value. This statement is
qualified, of course, by the assumption that adequate
local publicity precedes any visit by Atari officials. The
road show has a number of advantages. It demon¬
strates to existing members the concern of corporate
Atari. It has the potential for significant, immediate
increments to user group membership rolls. It
generates local media publicity favorable to Atari and,
by implication, shows its concern for users to potential
computer buyers.
Needless to say I do not have all the answers nor
even all the right questions. If Atari would like to join the
dialogue, I would be willing to surrender all the space
necessary for a response and/or alternative proposal(s).
It’s their call! User groups and Atari must have a better
working relationship.
That’s all for now folks.
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June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 27
CN SPECIAL
LASER QUALITY WITHOUT A
LASER PRICE
The HP "DeskJet" inkjet printer is without a doubt the single most
important technological development for desktop publishing to come
down the pike since the laser printer!
By Jim Wallace
For many of you who have
been anxiously ‘‘wishing and hop¬
ing” for an alternative to a laser
printer and expensive memory
upgrades for quality desktop pub¬
lishing—the wait is finally over!
Now, thanks to Hewlett Packard,
you can get real “laser quality”
output WITHOUT a laser printer!
This is a review of the new, HP
“DeskJet” INKJET printer that
offers real “power without the
price” for desktop publishers, and
is without a doubt the single most
important technological develop¬
ment for desktop publishing to
come down the pike since the laser
printer!
Weighing Your Options...
It was rumored for some time
that Atari might introduce a low
cost, high resolution printer that
would run with relatively low
memory. Instead, they introduced a
laser printer for $1,995 retail that
requires a minimum of two mega¬
bytes of memory to operate. This
means that on top of the expense
of the printer itself, you must either
purchase a new Mega ST with at
least two megs of memory for
about $1,500, or upgrade the
memory of your present ST com¬
puter to at least two megabytes.
And since the required one meg
memory chips have recently
skyrocketed to around $40. each,
you will spend about $700. for a
memory board and the required 16
chips it takes to get a 1040ST to 2
1/2 megs. This is because most
boards require that you go to 2 1/2
megs instead of just two megs.
Again, adding this required 1 1/2
meg to a 1040ST to get it to 2 1/2
megs requires 16 one megaBIT
chips since these are measured in
“bits”—not “bytes”.
Besides buying an Atari laser
printer, there are of course other
alternatives available. You could
purchase a Hewlett Packard Laser¬
Jet printer or compatible. Unlike the
“Atari solution,” you won’t be
required to upgrade your computer
memory to run these printers—but,
you’ll have to upgrade your prin¬
ter’s memory, and this will cost
about the same as upgrading your
Atari computer’s memory.
You can of course, also pur¬
chase an expensive “Postscript”
printer, but this will run you at least
$3,500 for one of the “cheap”
models! “Souped up” units with
more memory and more fonts, fas¬
ter output, etc. will cost you even
more.
Bits, Bytes and Bucks...
This extra memory, by the way,
is needed because a laser printer
must print the whole page “at
once.” And for quality desktop
publishing, you’ll need 300 dpi
(dots-per-inch) resolution which
interprets into 90,000 bits per
square inch that the printer must
deal with. For a typical 8 1/2x11
inch page, your image area is
about 8x10, and 8 times 10 equals
80, and 80 square inches times
90,000 bits comes to a whopping
7,200,000 BITS of image, which in
turn translates into almost 1 mega-
BYTE! What all this means is that a
typical laser printer MUST have
about 1 meg just to create and
hold the page for printing. Addi¬
tional memory is required for fonts
and other files.
In short folks, there’s a BIG
“gotcha” anyway you go if you
want a laser printer for desktop
publishing. In the near future, per¬
haps as early as late this summer,
when memory chips have hopefully
come down in price, and Atari in¬
troduces a rumored “Postscript
compatible software driver” for
their laser printer, things should be
different. But, if you’re like me, and
are tired of almost endless “real
soon now” promises, and must get
things done NOW, an answer has
ALREADY arrived.
A Dream Come True...
Just introduced in the first
quarter of 1988, the amazing Hew¬
lett Packard “DeskJet” printer has
solved the output problem for most
of us. So finally, the “rest of us”
have a relatively inexpensive, prac¬
tical, and viable answer to high
quality output on the Atari ST com¬
puter. In short, the DeskJet is “A
DREAM COME TRUE”—and in
more ways than one!
Comparing the Technology
As most of you know, “laser”
printers apply their image to paper
the same way as most “dry” toner
photocopiers. In fact, the only dif¬
ference between a “copier” and a
“laser printer” is what FORM the
“original” is in—a “digital stream of
bits” or a visible, tangible image on
paper. (Note that the new breed of
“digital copiers” like the Canon
Color Laser Copier, also use lasers
to image the drum, yet cannot be
connected to a computer).
A “conventional” photocopier
uses optics and “normal” reflected
light to expose an electrostaticly
charged drum with a mirrored
image of the original.
Page 28
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
A laser printer or laser copier,
on the other hand, uses optics
which reflect a high intensity laser
beam onto the drum which pro¬
duces “rasterized” rows of dots
which mirror the original, digital
computer image.
In either case, after the drum
has been charged by light, both
technologies produce the image
onto paper in exactly the same
way. This is done by using a dry,
powdered “toner” that clings to
either the image, or non-image
areas of the drum (depending on
whether “write black” or “write
white” technology is used) and is
then deposited onto the paper. This
toner, which is basically composed
of black carbon and plastic resin, is
then “fused” (literally melted, or
“glued”) to the paper surface by
heat and pressure. There is no
“ink” involved, and the toner is left
“stuck” to the surface of the paper.
I’ve simplified this process a bit for
brevity, but I think you get the
general idea.
Back to the Future...
As someone who has been
involved in printing and “graphic
arts” for many years, I have a
“special affection” for the HP
DeskJet. This is because it uses a
unique “inkjet” technology to put
images on paper. Specifically, this
unique print method is described
as “plain paper drop-on-demand
thermal inkjet printing.” Much like
an actual printing press, the HP
DeskJet uses real, liquid INK and
literally “sprays” this directly onto
(and into) the paper, much like one
of those robotic arms which auto¬
matically spray paint products on
an assembly line.
Although inkjet technology has
been used for the past few years
for high-speed addressing and
other low quality “imprinting”
applications, Hewlett Packard is
probably the first to apply this in¬
novative, high tech process to high
quality output for personal com¬
puters.
The DeskJet uses a unique,
replaceable ink cartridge/print head
that produces an image by blowing
ink through tiny, microscopic holes
in its patented print head. The print
head travels down the page in
horizontal “passes” from left to
right, across the sheet, much like
other printers.
Unlike printers which use rib¬
bons, an inkjet printer produces
perfectly inked images without the
annoying white lines, faded areas,
and other imperfections produced
by even the best dot matrix “im¬
pact” ribbon printers. Note that in¬
kjet, wire impact, and iaser printers
are all dot matrix printers. The only
difference is HOW they put the
dots on the paper.
In fact, large-scale inkjet print¬
ing technology may someday be
used instead of printing presses to
print just about everything—in¬
cluding your daily newspaper! The
equipment just needs to be built
large enough and fast enough to
be able to move more paper
through the machine.
Performance?. ..It’s
“BAD!”
And just to prove how “bad” it
really is, the HP DeskJet is not
afraid to print large, perfectly prin¬
ted black solid areas and even fine
screens. In fact, fine screens look
so good you can’t tell whether they
were produced by inkjet or by off¬
set printing. You see nothing but a
solid gray, no lines or streaks wha¬
tever—but that’s not all folks! While
producing perfect solid blacks, it
also produces the finest hair lines.
Pages produced by this amazing
printer are picture perfect, and are
as good (and in some cases better)
than anything you can print on
even the Atari laser printer. And I
use the Atari laser printer for com¬
parison because it produces pro¬
bably the best image quality of any
laser printer on the market today.
And yes, it is virtually impossible to
distinguish the difference between
the same pages produced on both
the Atari laser printer and the HP
DeskJet. The DeskJet is normally
slower, but the quality is the same.
And since the DeskJet can be pur¬
chased for much less than $1,000,
combined with the fact that it
operates just fine on one megabyte
of memory, this makes it a real
“power without the price” product!
In fact, the DeskJet is to printer
price/performance what the Atari
ST is to computer price/perfor¬
mance.
As you may have already
guessed, I’m really sold on the
Hewlett Packard DeskJet! But to
put this opinion in perspective, I've
been in the graphic arts industry for
many years. I’ve set REAL metal
and wood type by hand, and I’ve
also set type on some of the lead¬
ing photo and digital typesetters
used in commercial typesetting, in
other words, I’m into desktop pub¬
lishing “from the top down,” in¬
stead of from the “bottom up.” And
because of my background in
printing and advertising, it takes
quite a lot just to get my attention,
let alone my “admiration.”
Since purchasing the DeskJet,
June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 29
I’ve really “put it through its paces.”
I’ve tried the “hard stuff:” large
black solids, fine screens, and I’ve
looked through a jewelers “loup” to
see if the fine “serifs” are printing
well. I’ve also tried printing both
very small, and very large digitized
photographs scanned on a
Navarone scanner at 300 dpi.
Comparing output from the
DeskJet with even a great laser
printer like “Atari’s own,” I’ve yet to
see anything that is not equal in
quality. In fact, I’ve even made a
“game” of it. By printing the same
pages on both the Atari laser prin¬
ter and the DeskJet, I have given
these to people just to see if they
can tell “which-is-which.” And so
far, no one has been able to tell the
difference!
However, don’t get me wrong,
there IS a way to tell the difference.
But the “secret” is to look at the
BACK of the sheet! Yep, because
inkjet printing uses real INK, it nor¬
mally “wrinkles” the paper ever-
so—slightly wherever it deposits the
ink. This is not a “problem” howe¬
ver, it is simply one of those subtle
little differences that are a part of
any printing process. For instance,
experienced printers can easily dif¬
ferentiate between sheets which
have been printed by offset, let¬
terpress, gravure, silk screen, and
other printing processes by simply
knowing what “clues” to look for.
Feed the Kitty...
Besides outstanding print qua¬
lity, another advantage to using the
DeskJet is that it uses cut sheet,
plain paper. And while some paper
prints better than others, almost
anything works. The convenient
paper tray holds up to 100 sheets,
and the automatic paper feed
mechanism functions perfectly and
is very easy to use.
Another major advantage to
using cut sheet paper is that paper
alignment is no longer a problem.
For instance, if your software was
set for a half inch margin all the
way around the page, then that’s
EXACTLY what you will get! No
more wasted time trying toalign the
horizontal and vertical position of
tractor feed paper!
Although any decent “bond”
type paper works fine for most
work, I’ve discovered by trial and
error that for the finest reproduction
possible you should use “Ham-
mermill Laser Plus.” It even has a
special “wax hold out coating” on
the back for paste-up of camera
ready masters. For the finest
“reproduction proofs” this premium
paper is tops. For a free sample
pack of this fine paper and a Ham-
mermill dealer near you, you can
call them toll-free at 1-800-621-
8272.
The DeskJet not only feeds
paper sizes up to 8 1/2 x 14, but
will also feed envelopes! But
because the paper must wrap
around a roller (called a “platen”)
much like a typewriter, this limits
the paper thickness to about 60 lb.
stock. It cannot feed “thick” post¬
cards, and mailing labels are not
recommended. Small, die cut
labels might possibly come off and
stick inside the machine which
could cause problems.
...The DeskJet is to
printer price/perfor¬
mance what the Atari
ST is to computer
price/performance...
When printing envelopes, these
must be fed by hand. The envelope
feature is included for people who
don’t have a typewriter and simply
want to print simple addresses and
the like on standard sizes up to a
#10 size business envelope. You
can print on these by using almost
any word processor, but the pro¬
cess is slow and is only included as
a “convenience feature.”
Personally, I simply use my
now “almost obsolete” dot matrix
printer to print labels the “old fash¬
ioned way.” And for postcards and
other thick stock, I just create an
original on the DeskJet and then
photocopy this on 8 1/2 x 11 inch
“postcard stock” and cut out the
cards as needed. But shucks, not
even laser printers can feed
EVERYTHING!
Since having the DeskJet, I
really haven’t used the old dot
matrix much—but it’s not yet
totally obsolete. It has now found a
“new career” as a scanner, using
the “IMG Scan” attachment.
Compatibility Assured...
Surprisingly, compatibility is
fortunately a “non-issue” with the
HP DeskJet printer since it uses
some of the most popular printer
languages in use today. The Desk¬
Jet comes with the HP PCL (level
3) printer language built-in and an
optional Epson FX-80 emulation
cartridge is now available for about
$75.
Next to Epson and Postscript,
the popular HP PCL printer
language is supported by more
software than you can imagine.
Practically EVERY serious software
program for both the IBM and the
Atari ST supports this very popular
language. This is mainly due to the
immense popularity of the HP
LaserJet printers. In fact, there are
more HP laser printers and com¬
patibles around than any other type
of laser printer, and this includes
the Apple LaserWriter. What this
means to you is that since the HP
LaserJet and DeskJet both use vir¬
tually the same language, you can
use the popular HP LaserJet drivers
for your DeskJet! Note that the
DeskJet doesn’t need to be “com¬
patible” with the LaserJet—it
simply uses virtually the SAME
language! I’ve used my DeskJet
with HP 150 dpi and 300 dpi Laser¬
Jet drivers with programs like Pub¬
lishing Partner and Drafix / with no
problems whatever.
NOTE: Specifically, the DeskJet
uses HP PCL “level 3” and the HP
LaserJet uses HP PCL “level 4.”
But the subtle difference shows up
only when doing justified, “micro¬
spacing” in TEXT mode when using
the DeskJet’s internal ROM fonts.
Currently, WordPerfect is the only
program supporting this feature in
conjunction with HP’s optional font
cartridges which are almost identi¬
cal to those used by the LaserJet.
GDOS Output: GDOS output
is already a reality from programs
like Easy-Draw, Athena CAD,
Microsoft Write, and TimeWorks
Publisher, thanks to the folks at
Migraph, who have brought you
great, useful programs like Easy-
Draw. Migraph has already written
special DeskJet GDOS drivers
which have been “tweaked” to give
somewhat better performance than
the LaserJet drivers. Also included
with the 150 dpi and 300 dpi drivers
are matching fonts for these reso¬
lutions. In addition, you get a
“screen dump” program which
allows you to do an “alternate/
help” screen printout in the normal
fashion. This is especially useful if
Page 30
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
you don’t have the optional Epson
cartridge.
A disk containing all of these
goodies is now available from
Migraph for about $40. In fact,
Migraph also sells the DeskJet
printer. I’ve used the GDOS drivers
extensively and they work without a
hitch. Note that to use these new
drivers and fonts you must have
the latest versions of both Easy-
Draw and it’s accompanying “Out-
print” program. Since Migraph is
also selling the DeskJet printer and
has taken the time to write custom
drivers for it, they are supporting it
very well. You can call Migraph for
additional information toll-free at
1-800-223-3729. And don’t forget
to mention that you heard about it
in Current Notes'.
Epson Emulation: While the
Epson emulation cartridge works
great, and even adds some special
features of it’s own, you must
remember that the word “emula¬
tion” means “to work like some¬
thing else.” So don’t expect that
with Epson emulation that your
output from Epson drivers will
magically print at 300 dpi—not so!
It’s true that your printouts will look
much better all around, but the
resolution will be the SAME as with
an Epson or compatible printer. It
works this way on a laser printer,
and it works this way on the Desk¬
Jet.
Incidentally, since there is still
no Epson emulator available for the
Atari laser printer, DeskJet owners
currently have another big com¬
patibility advantage. And, unlike the
Atari laser printer which can only be
used with an Atari computer, the
HP DeskJet, because of it’s built-
in, industry-standard serial and
parallel ports, can be used with
ANY personal computer.
Want to Race?...
While the HP DeskJet won’t
normally beat a laser printer in the
quarter mile, it does produce
exceptional print quality that equals
any laser printer.
Speed is a relative thing on any
printer, and the DeskJet is no
exception. Printouts can take from
30 seconds to about 20 minutes,
depending on many factors.
Text Mode: Like other prin¬
ters, the DeskJet uses built-in
ROM fonts for fast, text-only out¬
put. The printer’s rated print speed
for such “default fonts” is 120 cps
at 10 cpi in letter-quality mode,
and 240 cps at 10 cpi in draft
mode. The printer can use the
built-in Courier font, more than a
dozen optional font cartridges
which even include big-gun “type¬
set quality” fonts like Times Roman
and Helvetica, or “soft (download¬
able) fonts” used with optional
printer RAM. You can expect to
print a respectable two pages per
minute when using the “built-in”
fonts.
Draft mode prints at 150 dpi
while letter quality mode prints at
300 dpi. Print quality is indis¬
tinguishable from even a daisy
wheel, and the normal print fea¬
tures like variable pitch, bold, italic,
etc. are obviously supported. A
friendly printer control panel and
easy-to-use, plug-in cartridges
with bright green LED’s, make
using this whisper quiet printer a
breeze.
... The printer’s rated
speed is 120 cps at 10
cpi in letter-quality
mode, and 240 cps at 10
cpi in draft mode...
Graphics: Here is where the
DeskJet really shines! It does full-
page bit-maped graphics at 75,
100, 150, and 300 dpi. Margin
space around your page at 300 dpi
is the same as for a laser printer.
You can print as close as a quar¬
ter-inch from the edges of the
sheet which gives you an effective
image area of about 8 x 10 1/2 for
a letter size sheet.
The time it takes to print a full
page of graphics depends on many
factors. These include: the program
used to create the page, the type
and efficiency of the drivers used,
what printer language is used, the
amount of computer memory avail¬
able, print buffer size (the DeskJet
comes with a built-in 16K buffer
and an optional 128K RAM car¬
tridge is available), whether serial
or parallel is used (parallel is much
faster), the make-up of your page
(text and high resolution bitmaps
like photos normally take longer to
print than simple “objects” like
lines, boxes and polygons), and
still other variables.
In general, graphic files which
can use GEM output—like Easy-
Draw —print much faster than pro¬
grams like Publishing Partner which
currently doesn’t have fast, optim¬
ized drivers. The latest release of
Publishing Partner Professional
(which may not be out till summer)
is supposed to ship with “enhan¬
ced” drivers for the HP LaserJet/
DeskJet printers that reportedly will
speed up the current version by as
much as 40%.
Average times for Easy-Draw
at 300 dpi run about 3-5 minutes
per full page. While Publishing
Partner averages about 10 minutes
per full page. But “small” layouts in
Publishing Partner have printed out
in as little as one minute, while
“heavy” full-page layouts have
taken as long as 20 minutes. (The
150 dpi drivers are used for fast
proofing, and print out in about half
the time).
Note that the DeskJet only has
to make one pass per line regard¬
less of resolution or mode. For 300
dpi it just “blows” more dots onto
the paper in the same pass. This is
a far cry from my “old” dot matrix
impact printer that must make as
many as three passes for so-called
“high rez” output.
Zapping A “Myth:” Most
people probably think that laser
printers are always “lightning fast,”
but this is simply not always the
case. This probably has to do with
the word “laser,” which conjures
up images of instantaneous light
beams shooting everywhere. It’s
true laser beams are fast, the pro¬
blem is that they must first be given
the “directions” to know where to
go. Laser printers (just like the
DeskJet and dot matrix impact
printers) must first change the prin¬
ter language used by the software
into a bitmap (this process is called
“RIP,” or “raster image process¬
ing”). This is a complicated pro¬
cess which can take a long time to
accomplish, since at 300 dpi, the
computer must map over 7 million
pixels for a full-page graphic!
Depending of course on which
printing language is used, and
other factors, it can take even a
$5,000 Apple LaserWriter using
Postscript (no speed demon itself)
over 15 minutes to create a raster¬
ized image in memory. So, as you
June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 31
can see, it always takes additional
time for each different page to print
on a laser printer. Once the image
is created however, a laser printer
can then print copies of this “ori¬
ginal” image as fast as the printer
can physically operate. And for
most laser printers, this is about
eight sheets per minute.
What all of this means is that
while both the laser and DeskJet
printer need additional time to pro¬
cess the first page, the laser printer
is capable of pumping out addi¬
tional copies of each page much
faster, while the DeskJet takes
almost as long to print each copy
as it does to print the original. But
this applies only to graphics.
All text pages produced with
any printer with built-in fonts will
print at the maximum speed of the
device. Text pages produced with
built-in fonts do not need to be
processed as bitmaps since the
mapping for the character sets
already reside in ROM.
To sum up folks, the DeskJet
will print, on average, much faster
than a “dot matrix” printer, but
slower than an average laser prin¬
ter. Remember that when the
DeskJet is printing at 300 dpi, it’s
printing 90,000 dots (or “pixels”)
per square inch!
As laser printers go, the Atari
laser printer, which uses the very
fast “DMA” port, is probably the
fastest laser printer around. In fact,
it can easily print a full-page from
Easy-Drawn less than one minute!
But don’t expect to get this same
speed from a HP Laser printer or
compatible. Like the DeskJet, these
printers cannot be connected to
Atari’s own proprietary DMA port
and must therefore use either the
slow serial port or the relatively fast
parallel port. Perhaps surprisingly, I
have found that in many cases the
DeskJet has actually been faster
than some laser printers!
I’ve Always Said: “That if I
only had a printer that would give
me beautiful typeset quality, I
wouldn’t care so much about how
long it took to print out.” Well, the
DeskJet is just that. Since I use it
strictly for commercial typesetting,
I’m only concerned about getting
ONE, good, “camera-ready” page
for later reproduction by offset or
copy machine. If you need a printer
for a large office where each sheet
must be printed in multiples, or you
need a printer that can be connec¬
ted to a network of users at the
same time, then the DeskJet may
not be for you. But if you’re like me
and just want to produce fine “ori¬
ginals” and will be using the printer
just yourself, then the DeskJet may
be just the ticket. The DeskJet is
advertised as a “personal printer,”
and for that purpose it is well sui¬
ted.
Dots of a Different Color...
It is important to understand
that the “dots-per-inch” produced
on low resolution, dot matrix ribbon
printers OVERLAP. So even though
your printer may be rated at “240
dots-per-inch,” this is not really
accurate. All high resolution
devices like the DeskJet, laser
printers, and higher output devices
like the Linotype digital typesetters
produce dots which are SIDE-BY-
SIDE, and these dots do NOT
overlap! The DeskJet, like other
“high-end” printers, produces
clean, sharp, and accurately posi¬
tioned dots. If you wish to check
this out for yourself, just use a
good magnifying glass or jeweler’s
“loop” and compare the output
... Practically no other
company supports their
products as well as
Hewlett Packard ...
from different types of printers. To
some of you, this may sound like a
minor issue, but the print quality
from these different printers “speak
for themselves.”
Incidentals...
Easy Set-Up: The DeskJet
comes attractively packaged and
easily sets up in a few minutes. In
fact, you probably won’t even need
to look at the beautifully printed
documentation that comes with the
unit! Just unpack it, plug your ST
into the parallel port, pop in an ink
cartridge, flip the switch, and start
producing beautiful, whisper quiet
output that rivals anything you may
have seen before. The DeskJet is
the easiest printer I’ve ever set-up
and used!
Excellent Support: Practi¬
cally no other company supports
their products as well as Hewlett
Packard. From the moment you
open the first-class packaging that
surrounds your DeskJet, you are
literally “awash” with support from
toll-free phone numbers and local
and international sen/ice personnel
available around-the-clock.
Reliability: The DeskJet has
an excellent reliability and estima¬
ted usage rating (“MTBF”—mean
time between failures) of 20,000
hours. 2,000 hours power-on and
12,000 printed pages per year, or
about 50 pages per day average
use. Replaceable, non-clogging
print cartridges cost about $17
each and are fully guaranteed. The
printer comes with a 1-year “no-
nonsense” guarantee against parts
and labor.
The Bottom Line...
The DeskJet has the same
resolution and virtually the same
ability to accurately print “dots”
onto paper as a laser printer. Thus,
the DeskJet’s true potential to pro¬
duce top quality output is virtually
dependent upon the capabilities of
the software to generate and pro¬
duce precise fonts and graphics.
This is made especially evident by
closely comparing pages printed
on various laser printers that use
Postscript, HP PCL, GEM “meta
files,” and “proprietary” schemes
used by programs like Publishing
Partner and Apple’s own “Quick-
draw.” While all of these methods
are capable of great output, they
ALL have their own strengths and
weaknesses. An in-depth compari¬
son of these methods may become
a future article, but for now I think
that it’s sufficient to simply say that
all of these methods—whether
used on laser printers or the Desk¬
Jet, are capable of superior output.
In short, IF you think that laser
output looks better than DeskJet
output, then perhaps you should
blame the software —not the
DeskJet!
But enough said! If you would
like a free color brochure and addi¬
tional information about the new
HP2276A DeskJet inkjet printer, you
can call HP toll-free at 1-800-
752-0900.
Happy Printing!
Page 32
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
CN SPECIAL
Graphics Operating Environment
Merrill Ward’s New "ST Junior"
An interview with Shelly Merrill, President of Merrill Ward
By Len Poggiali
Recently / had the opportunity to
speak with Shelly Merrill, president
of Merrill Ward, about his com¬
pany’s new Graphics Operating
Environment. This desktop program
for Atari 8-bits, which may be
operated by using an ST mouse, by
joystick, or by keyboard, makes our
8-bits look and function very much
like STs (but without compatibility,
of course).
in the following interview, Mr. Merrill
not on/y gave his impressions of
GOE but a/so of the first externa/
program to be developed for it-
-Ce/ebrity Cookbook. Mr. Merrill
began the interview with an open¬
ing statement. -LP
The primary reason the cookbook
was programmed in that manner
within the GOE environment was to
show everyone that we do have a
developers’ package, and that our
desktop will be of such a nature
that external programs for the 8-
bits can be done in this manner.
No one believed that a desktop for
the 8-bits would ever be done. The
primary myth we want to address-
-that everyone has given up, and it
is alarming. This is why we took the
time to put our desktop on our
cookbook program. We were not
initially going to do that. We were
just going to give you an 8-bit
version. It resulted in a three-
month delay, finalizing our compiler
just for that program. We finished
our developers’ package before we
finished our desktop package.
What specifically is your back¬
ground?
I came from t.v. I was president and
chairman of the board of Delaware
Public Television. I built their station
in cooperation with WHYY, Channel
12 in Philadelphia. My other asso¬
ciates have been in advertising and
public relations for some time now.
We do the Bob Hope Theatre
Program here in Palm Desert,
which is our equivalent of your
Kennedy Center back East. We
also publish three or four maga¬
zines, and we license materials that
we feel would be appropriate for
the home computer market that
have not been done before, and
that had been successful in maga¬
zine print in terms of wide public
interest material rather than just the
gamey-type stuff that had been
associated with home computers.
The Celebrity Cookbook was put
together by my partner, Diane
Ward, who used to write for news¬
papers and magazines, and still
does from time to time. She felt
there was a definite need, that
there was not a comprehensive
catering program for the home for
individuals to try materials to throw
successful dinner parties. The
celebrity recipes are unique in that
they are collected by the celebrities
from all over the world, and they
are their favorite recipes, and the
recipes that they use when they
areholding dinner parties. We also
have a wine guide and a bar guide
and party tips on there.
How did you go about getting their
recipes?
There have been several celebrity
cookbooks written over the years in
various areas, and we simply
licensed their materials from press
agents and so forth. A lot are
donated to us from the celebrities,
something they wanted to do in
terms of their own interests.
What is your experience with the
Atari computer?
The Atari is interesting in that our
company was born of IBM and
Commodore. We left-handedly
walked into the Atari field as we
went through the process of gath¬
ering about us different program¬
mers. We gathered several pretty
top-notch Atari programmers that
are also doing IBM and other things
for us, and they suggested that we
support the Atari market. Of course,
we support the ST with the cook¬
book program because we produce
the fastest word processor for the
ST on that editor. And then we
decided we would get into the
8-bit area. We would been toying
around with the desktop for some
time on other machines, and we
looked into putting it onto Atari
because there was a definite lack
of one there. It is kind of been a
hobby/tragedy/full-time endeavor.
Te/i me a little about the history of
that.
That program had been under
development since 1986. We would
work on it and work on it and then
go work on something else and
then come back to it.
Was this in your offices in Pa/m
Springs?
Merrill Ward and our associates are
a consortium, a little like Electronic
June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 33
Arts. What we have is a group of
people involved with us with their
own separate companies, and we
are in charge of the consortium.
Everything funnels through Merrill
Ward: the development, the design,
we all get together and decide
what it is going to look like and
agonize over whatever comprom¬
ises we have to make to meet our
standards, which border on perfec¬
tion.
How many people are we talking
about?
We have got roughly ten separate
organizations involved. Some pre¬
fer to remain anonymous. I can not
tell you who provides the venture
capital. The programmers come
and go. We own the copyrights.
We are ultimately the ones pub¬
lishing, developing, and generating
the projects.
You were talking about skepticism
out there.
This is the result of a poll. We have
as part of our organization a tele¬
marketing organ, and we retained
them to conduct a telephone poll
of users groups, retailers, and in¬
dividuals. I have done a lot of
personal polling to ascertain
exactly what the state of the Atari
8-bit is in the eyes of the user. We
already have an idea of what some
of the bigger companies are saying
about it. It ranges from, “We will do
it reluctantly,” or, “We will not
support it at all,” to companies like
ours who say, “We are going to
support it”. It is alarming to us that
the user appears to have given up,
and we found a lot of occasions
where they would not even go back
into the retail outlets because the
software support does not seem to
be there. There are no new titles;
nothing is happening; it has lost its
energy. We believe firmly that this
need not be the case. That is why
we are going forward with our
desktop, even though we chose a
catering program to introduce it
with.
Are there any special reasons you
decided to start with a catering
program?
Ronald Reagan 1 s Coffee Blanc Mange
HEXT
mt mu i mmu iittttttttttttttittttttttt
ft Ronald Reagan's tt
mi u n » n » mi n ttnltwitwwttnwttw
Ingredients
1 package (si chocolate
Cor vanillal pudding
1 cup nilk
: into a paste
1 cup strong coffee
I. Bring to a boil, stirring
The reason we did that is because
of the text-based involvement with
that program. The data bases are
enormous on that program—about
1/2 million individual characters if
not more. For any 8-bit computer
to be worth its salt in this market of
changing times it has to be able to
manipulate vast amounts of text. Of
course, our desktop has to be able
to do that as well. So the cook¬
book, given the enormity of the
program, was the perfect chal¬
lenge. It is very important to us that
our programs run on 48K
machines. The program and the
desktop will run on everything,
even the game machine . So we
are not leaving out anybody. We do
not like the word “orphan”.
What will the desktop do?
We call it a Graphics Operating
Environment. It gives you a visual
display rather than something cal¬
led DOS. Once a lady told me, “I
do not speak DOS-ee. I speak
English. I do not type either.” 65
percent of America does not type.
The mouse-driven desktop is
designed to allow for everyone to
use a computer system without the
necessity of learning how to type.
What programs will be in the basic
package?
The basic package will include a
desktop program that will give you
all DOS functions that you have
now. It will be Atari ADOS, the new
DOS which we hope will be hard-
drive supported. The program is
being written on a hard drive,
though we can not support a hard
drive right now. The cartridge will fit
on the back of the computer. It is
intended to stay there to allow
users to use their disk drives to
load all existing external programs.
Generally what it is is an environ¬
ment to run softwarein. It is also an
environment to utilize all the DOS
functions that you are now using.
We also have sorting programs
designed for it. We have fonts, an
icon editor, paint program, word
processor, and a calculator; it is a
complete disk.
Suppose you want to load a non-
GOEprogram?
If you load in a piece of software
and click on the disk icon twice,
you will get a directory, and you
can boot it from there. It is just like
the ST, only it is an 8-bit version.
Also, we are not robbing the
memory of the computer in any
way because the program’s on
cartridge.
How does Atari, inc. fee/ about a/i
this?
Atari is very eager for us to com¬
plete the project. We are very
eager. At this point I expect full
cooperation.
Page 34
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
How would you compare GOE with
GEOS?
From the standpoint of the Com¬
modore 64, GEOS is an excellent
program. GEOS does not support
the VIC-20, though. What we have
done, since Atari elected to put out
a 48K machine as well as 64K and
128K machines, is to run on all of
them. We also think it is better
because it is not a disk program. I
think it is cleaner and more con¬
venient to do it that way. Also, we
have better memory management
on ours. When you load GEOS on
the 64, you are real close to being
out of memory.
How sophisticated compared to
some other programs on the mar¬
ket are your word processor and
paint program going to be?
Extremely sophisticated. The recipe
filer on the cookbook is a good
example. If you go into the editor,
you will see that we windowed
everything. You will see that you
are clicking on files to load them, to
delete them, to rename them, to
whatever you want to do to them.
You are reading them off disk
without loading them, which is a
form of multi-tasking. If you have a
file in our editor of that filer, and
someone comes in and says,
“Remember that letter you wrote to
Joe Blow?” you can say, “Just a
moment, let me get it for you,” and
you can click on the list feature,
which will list it out, and you can
print it and go right back to the
editor and continue typing. So we
have done a lot of things on there.
Just as a word processor it is state
of the art. We have cut-and-paste,
search-and replace. And we have
simplified it. We have line center¬
ing. We have create columns. You
can set your margins with your
tabs. As long as you do not press
Return, it continues to stay in the
same spot. The only thing we did
not finish on the 8-bit cookbook,
because it is the recipe filer (simply
recipes and short letters), was to
disable the wordwrap on insert, but
that is real easy to work with.
That’s for the cookbook but not for
the word processor on the desk¬
top?
The actual word processor is a
full-functioned word processor with
everything: left-right margin set¬
tings; about eight different fonts to
choose from, different styles and
sizes; bold face and underlining;
the whole nine yards. I mean
everything that Paperclip had on it
and then some. We believe that it
will be one of the best ever pro¬
duced on the Atari, if not the best.
We are going for the best.
The Celebrity Cookbook has been
out for awhile?
Nope—January. We’ve only ship¬
ped the 8-bit as of mid-January.
The new Mega-ST version is out
now.
Are you into Volume 2 in any of
your systems yet?
On Volume 2 we are well on our
way. On Atari they’ll be a delay
because you cannot run Volume 2
without Volume 1. That’s why the
price is so much cheaper on
Volume 2—$19.99. $34.99 on
Volume 1. You get your editor, your
wine guide, bar guide, party tips,
and celebrity diets. On Vol 2 we
have our sorter where you tell the
program what you have available in
your cupboard, and it gives you a
recipe if it has one on the disk
that’s suitable for it. We also have a
weight and substitutions table. If
you buy all six volumes, you will
have every piece of information
anyone would ever need to cook
(101 uses of salt, for instance). Our
researchers have been hard at
work at everything. Of course, in
Volume 1 we tried to put in the
programs most commonly used.
Each program will have 50 celebrity
recipes divided as Volume 1 is. We
are moving right along.
Anything e/se you would like to
add?
I know that there’s a lot of interest
for this desktop. We are more than
willing to send anyone a demo disk
for $5.00 which will come right off
the price. And whoever buys the
demo will get the program first. Or,
if they would rather not buy the
demo but would like to see what
we are talking about, they can go
to Federated or any other Atari
outlet and take a look at the
cookbook. And they will be getting
a fine program for their money
anyway—the only home catering
program on the market and the first
external program from the desktop.
in the future do you see yourself
doing the sorts of things that are
being done with GEOS (coming out
with other GOE-compatibie pro¬
grams)?
What we have done differently than
them is that we decided we were
going to publish the desktop and
the developers’ kit at the same
time, or one shortly after the other.
We are not holdingonto our tech¬
nology. We are sharing it with other
developers. We are in it to make
money, let’s not kid ourselves. Of
course, we can not supply the
world with free software, but if our
desktop is any good, they will buy
it; if it is not, then they will not buy
it. We have mastered the thing to
the point where nothing could con¬
ceivably be wrong with it that can
not be fixed. Try the resizer. Have
you noticed that dashes will go to
cups? Tablespoons will go to
quarts. Have you noticed that the
dry ingredients are limited to cups
only? You don’t have a gallon of
salt to deal with. 999 servings and
you get an awful lot of cups. That’s
true in the editor for your own
recipes as well. We are not just
changing the numbers. We are
going from teaspoons to table¬
spoons to cups to quarts to gallons
with our own algorithm. You can
put the price of the recipe at the
bottom, and that will go up and
down as well. If you have a recipe
for steak that on average costs you
$3.00 to prepare, and you love it,
and someone calls you to cook the
steaks for twenty, and yours is for
two, you can find out how much all
twenty need to kick in for this little
party. You can also put our wines
on the wine guide, and price those
out too. That way you can get a
good idea what you little night out
will cost you.
June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 35
ATARI ST/MEGA
CN REVIEW
KEEP THE GOOD STUFF COMING
NeoDesk, Tempos and other goodies
by J. Andrzej Wrotniak
Not so long ago some soft¬
ware companies on the Atari ST
market were spending lots of
money for advertising products
which did not work, and enthu¬
siastic reviewers were raving about
great programs which were some¬
times performing as advertised,
usually crashing not more often
than once an hour.
Some publishers, however, are
switching to the unorthodox way of
making money: by devoting more
attention to writing (or distributing)
good programs. Hard to believe,
but this may even become a trend.
A complete reversal of sound
business practices? What is going
on here?
Here are some remarks on the
programs which recently attracted
my attention and which, I think,
deserve attention in the ST field.
NeoDesk:
A Clean, Mean (But Not Lean)
Desktop Machine
After having heard a lot of
gossip about this supposedly great
program, I decided to see it with
my own astigmatic eyes. One
phone call and four days later it
arrived in a plain brown wrapper,
raising my secretary’s eyebrows.
NeoDesk is written by Mr. Dan
Wilga (have you seen his Public
Domain MemFi/e/ sector editor?),
and Mr. Wilga seems to take pride
in his work. Here he is again,
saying “Look, guys, here is how
things should be done”, and put¬
ting his programming skills where
his mouth is.
In brief, Neodesk'x s an alterna¬
tive desktop for the ST. When you
run it, the regular desktop with
familiar windows and icons dis¬
appears, being replaced by—yes,
you’re right— almost familiar win¬
dows and icons, behaving as you
would expect. You can run other
programs from it, do operations on
files, format disks, display files—
-yes, this is a desktop.
No big deal? Wait. There are
dozens of features in NeoDesk,
which you will soon start to
appreciate and enjoy, wondering
how could Atari have left them out,
and how could you live without
them.
Almost all menu entries have
keyboard alternatives. File icons
are always rearranged to fit the
window width. Disks can be for¬
matted in various standards. File
copying leaves the time stamp
unchanged, and file operations
can be aborted at any point. The
file template at the top of a win¬
dow can be modified so that only
files matching it will be displayed.
Selecting any group of files will
display their total size. The list
goes on and on, and I will skip
over some more advanced—and
less frequently used—points.
My favorite feature is the pos¬
sibility of dragging programfiles
from their windows to the desktop.
When the window is then closed,
the program still remains acces¬
sible for execution, as long as the
the floppy disk—if it is a floppy
disk—is not removed from the
drive.
Hard disk users will love this
option, as the desktop configu¬
ration can be saved to disk, so that
these selected files will be avail¬
able upon bootup. Have I men¬
tioned that NeoDesk can be auto-
executed (STARTGEM, a public
domain program, is included) when
you boot you machine? You may
have all the most frequently used
programs on the desktop at the
same time, without opening, clos¬
ing and resizing windows. Some
people may want to buy NeoDesk
just for this single feature.
If you do not like NeoDesks
built-in icons (or the desktop pat¬
tern), a custom editor is enclosed-
-suit yourself. Designing your own
icons can be more fun than some
of the games I’ve seen.
The program seems to work
without glitches. Mr. Wilga adheres
to the old-fashioned (and, of
course, economically unjustified)
principle of debugging a program
before selling it. Some people
NeoDesk File View Options 18:18:22
Page 36
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
ATARI ST/MEGA
CN REVIEW
never will learn from the industry
leaders.
Yes, I would like to see some
minor changes to the program. I
am missing the “Show As Text”
display mode, the real “Sort By
Type” option (in addition to the
modified one) and the possibility of
declaring executables by any
extensions I choose. All these fea¬
tures are available in the standard
GEM desktop (the last one by
modification of the DESKTOP.INF
file), and not much space was
gained by leaving them out.
Also, file copying on a one-
drive configuration is not really im¬
proved, still requiring zillions of
disk swaps the same way as the
standard DRI desktop does.
The main disadvantage of
NeoDesk\s its size: almost 150k of
your precious memory. For the
520ST owners this is a major limi¬
tation, which may make a dif¬
ference between a very useful uti¬
lity and just a nice conversation
item to impress your friends (one
of my friends, a Macintosh owner
is still there with his jaw hanging
down). The same is true when you
work on a 1040 with a half-mega-
byte RAM disk. However, you may
always exit NeoDesk \o the regular
desktop, reclaiming all this
memory, if you need to. One may
also hope that future versions of
NeoDesk may be trimmed down
by 30-40k, which may be a signifi¬
cant difference.
On the other hand, those of us
who use 1040’s or Mega ST’s, will
never regret $30 spent for the
NeoDesk, and for the hard disk
owners it is a must.
If the Atari Corporation wanted
to improve the ST user interface
significantly without spending too
much money, they should just buy
the rights to NeoDesk (possibly
ordering some modifications), burn
it into ROMs and install it into
every machine sold. But they seem
to be too busy building prototypes
ofnew computers, incompatible
with the ST line (of course: who
cares about my software invest¬
ment?), to be available some year
in the next century.
Desktop Publisher
From GST/Timeworks
I am not going to write a
review of this product. The Pub¬
lisher deserves an in-depth
review, which I do not feel quali¬
fied to write; on the other hand,
the new look of Current Notes is a
proof that the program works.
Every serious ST user I know
already bought a copy before any
advertising appeared in the press.
The power of the grapevine.
Without any previous
experience in desktop publishing,
in less than an hour after opening
the package i was able to format
some old text files into columns
and boxes, mix various fonts,
paste, crop and resize Degas pic¬
tures, and do other things pre¬
viously out of my reach. Does the
program need more recommen¬
dation?
Being generally a very good
and solid product, the Publisher
has some flaws. Three points of
criticism come into mind:
Design. The feature I miss
most is the possibility of exporting
a text unit (“story”) back into a
text file. In some situations (after
modifying the text from within the
Pub/ishei) it can be very desirable.
Implementation. The pro¬
gram sometimes crashes (I sus¬
pect the text editing at the redu¬
ced-size viewing modes, try to
avoid doing it). Resizing of the
pixel-mapped images sometimes
works in an unpredictable fashion
(no lasting damage here, though).
Documentation. The manual
is suitable for a very inexperienced
user, but it makes a much better
impression before you read it than
after. Basically, it contains almost
nothing not included into the on¬
screen help. Not a single word is
uttered on how you install your
own fonts, what are the principles
used by the program for font
choice and substitution, etc. With
experimentation and patience
many of these questions can be
answered, but not all. I would
gladly pay $20 extra for a detailed
technical manual.
In spite of the above, the pro¬
gram is gooooood. This may be
one of the hottest sellers of 1988.
Available for $80-$100 (discoun¬
ted) it is a bargain, too. Go to your
dealer and do not come back
without it.
Fontz!
The Publisher’s Companion
This program was reviewed in
depth by Milt Creighton in the May
issue of the Current Notes. Once
again: everybody knew about
Fontz! without any advertising
iW» File Edit Options Page Style Text Sraphics Help
j e 1: ‘ <
B:\SfiMPLE-I.DTPTi
. : • • ss
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Times_24
Swiss.
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Swiss
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Times 12 T^pWT Swiss 12
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HEADLINE
SUBHEAD
Camdot 36
Camdot 29 i
Catttdut 18
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June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 37
ATARI ST/MEGA
before the program was ever
available.
I found it very handy in clean¬
ing up, modifying and adapting a
new set of fonts for the Publisher,
and the accompanying manual
answered many questions I was
always afraid to ask. The program
is nicely designed and clean; I
have yet to discover any problems
(other than crashing at the attempt
to read an illegal file). The docu¬
mentation is brief, complete and
useful.
One may predict, that a
majority of Publisher users will end
up buying Fontz! as well; selling for
less than $30 it is a very good buy.
If the author, Mike Fulton, decides
to write a font librarian, I am
already looking forward to it.
GEMFED
A Public Domain Alternative
If you cannot afford to buy
Fontz! or do not plan to do much
font-related work, you may want to
try GEMFED.
This program by Brad Christie
has been around for a while. It
allows you to access, modify or
design GDOS fonts. No, it will not
translate fonts from other stan¬
dards (as the Macintosh ones), but
otherwise it will perform most
things Fontz! does.
Early versions had some bugs,
but the recent one (I have 1.11)
seems to be clean: I’ve used it
quite a lot with no problems.
Tempus
Fast and Neat Text Editor
Finally, I would like to call your
attention to one program I really
like a lot and use all the time. This
is Tempus ; an ASCII file editor
written by M.Schuelein for the
German CCD (of the Persona/
Pascal fame), and distributed in
the USA by Eidersoft.
An ASCII editor? No fonts, no
styles, no pictures, no columns?
Come on, we are talking word
processing and desktop publish¬
ing, and here comes a product that
just can be used for creating plain
ASCII files? Is this enough of a
reason to make all this noise?
Yes! For many of us (mostly
programmers, but not only) a text
editor is the program with which
we spend more time each day
than with anything else, and Tem¬
pus can save you a lot of incon¬
venience and irritation.
First, it has a plethora of func¬
tions. Four text windows, half¬
height text mode, powerful block,
search and replace functions,
everything you would expect from
a powerful text editor, and more.
Some of the functions you may
seldom use (e.g. printer translation
files, redefinable function keys,
cross-reference listing), but never
do they obstruct or interfere with
the basic operation. And, of
course, everything is accessible-
from the keyboard (in addition to
the menu bar).
...Tempus is lightning fast.
I have never seen any¬
thing even come close, on
a micro or a mainframe....
Second, all of it is imple¬
mented in an extremely con¬
venient and elegant way. Looks
very clean, behaves like an angel,
and in a year or so of using it I
have never, ever crashed.
Third, it is lightning fast. I have
never seen anything even coming
close, on a micro or a mainframe.
You would not believe this screen
redrawing speed is possible, blitter
or not. The search and replace
functions are also faster than in
any other ST program. Just in¬
credible.
Fourth, it is addictive. Once
you switch to it, using anything
else is a pain. Give it a try and
there is no way back (although it is
not cheap at discounted prices
around $30-$40).
There is nothing to criticize in
the implementation of this pro¬
gram; in the design area few im¬
CN REVIEW
provements may come to mind.
The feature I am miss most is the
possibility of redefining the key
bindings for the editor functions,
but this is a complaint I have about
every editor or word processor on
the ST.
In the meantime...
While others are coming up
with new hardware or software,
Apple is running around and suing
everybody in sight for the “Macin¬
tosh look and feel” in their pro¬
grams (the said “look and feel” did
not even originate in their pro¬
ducts, as Xerox was first here).
There are two ways of staying
ahead of competition on the mar¬
ket. One is to develop better pro¬
ducts, and the other is to disturb
others trying to develop better
products.
What Apple does is just pathe¬
tic. The next thing they may want
to do is to claim rights to the
rectangular shape of the computer
screen. The outcome of this legal
squirmish may influence very sig¬
nificantly the next few years on the
microcomputer field, and we may
be also affected by it.
Distributors of the
products mentioned:
NeoDesk. Gribnif Software,
P.O.Box 350, Hadley, MA 01035.
Desktop Publisher. Timeworks,
Inc., 444 Lake Cook Rd., Deer¬
field, IL 60015, (312)948-9202.
Fontz! Neocept, 908 Camino
Dos Rios, Thousand Oaks, CA
91630, (805)498-3840.
GEMFED: available on GEnie,
CompuServe, many bulletin boards
and on the CN Public Domain Disk
No.127.
Tempus: Eidersoft USA Inc.,
P.O.Box 288, Burgettstown, PA
15021.
Page 38
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
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rn \£C COMPl! LDW BASIC COMPILER
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BASIC REV. 1.1
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AND EASIER.
LDW BASIC is a powerful, integrated programming tool
that lets you edit, compile, and execute your BASIC pro¬
grams without exiting to the desktop. It also creates a
program file which can be executed directly from the desktop.
You will never have to load the BASIC language interpreter
or run-time module to execute your program.
LDW BASIC Rev. 2.0 is very easy to use, yet it’s more
powerful than any other development system for the Atari
ST. It supports a fill set of high level GEM access statements
and functions which let you:
H Create and use your own windows, menus, dialog
boxes, buttons, edit fields and check boxes.
■ Use desk accessories while running your BASIC
program.
■ Design your own mouse pointer shapes and icons.
■ Trap GEM events.
You get all this and much more. No more PEEKs/POKEs
to access GEM. Among the supported statements are:
ACTIVEW, ALERT, ASK FILE, ASK MOUSE, BOX,
BUTTON, DIALOG, DRAW ICON, EDIT FIELD,
EVENT, INFOW, MENU, MOUSE, ON DIALOG, ON
MENU, ON MOUSE, REDRAW, TITLEW, WINDOW and
about 40 more new statements.
LDW BASIC Rev. 2.0 is a stand-alone development tool,
but it can also compile any program written using the old
ST BASIC interpreter or the new ST BASIC interpreter. It
is also functionally compatible with BASICs for the
Macintosh.
For more information or to obtain a listing of benchmarks contact
Logical Design Works, Inc., (408) 435-1445
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Compare the following benchmarks and see why LDW BASIC
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780 Montague Expwy., Suite 403
San Jose, California 95131 U.S.A.
ATARI ST/MEGA
CN REVIEW
AWARD MAKER PLUS
For Awards With A DIY Twist
Review by Bi/iMoes
We all know how important it is
to show a little appreciation to
those around us. Everyone likes a
little recognition. Maybe a smile
will do. Or perhaps we say a word
or two. And when we need some¬
thing more tangible, something
that will last longer than a
moment’s memory, ST users have
no shortage of possibilities.
Award Maker P/us, a recent
release from Baudville, has awards
and certificates for many occa¬
sions. Nothing surprising there,
right? And, yes, we’ve already
seen another product, Certificate
Maker (CN Sept. 1987), do the
same thing. But wait: Award Maker
goes another step. And it’s a step
that should appeal to do-it-your¬
self fans everywhere.
In addition to the software’s 10
built-in award borders, you can
design you own. And if you’re not
really excited with any of the
illustrations on the standard awards
and certificates, you can, again,
create your own. This program,
then, offers the potential for an
infinite assortment of borders and
graphics for your awards.
Options. Putting an award
together is simple. You’ll choose:
award style (286 available,
although many are merely slight
variations); title font (4); title text;
name/text font (4); name; text;
signature; date; border style (10
plus your own); and border color,
for those with a color printer.
Of the 286 award styles, four
generic awards allow you to import
your own pictures. These picture
files must be Degas format, but
can be any resolution (low,
medium, or high). A name list can
be used for multiple awards. Dri¬
vers are supplied for many dot¬
matrix printers and the adventur¬
ous may even alter a driver. The
program runs on either a color
or monochrome monitor.
After you’ve typed your text
and finished with all selections,
you’re ready to print the award. If
you want to see what it all looks
like first, preview it. One view will
show the full award at a smaller
view. Click on the GEM window’s
full-box and you’ll be able to see
a magnified image. This full¬
screen window is especially useful
when you’re using your own bor¬
ders or graphics and you want to
make sure it all looks right.
Borders and Graphics.
Creating a border, especially the
first one, is not easy and the
documentation’s explanation is
both wrong and very insufficient. A
border uses a 60 X 120 pixel
section. (I successfully used a 60
X 121 area. A Baudville spokes¬
man said that a slight variation
may be necessary due to the way
Degas Elite is used to pick up the
image.) The border section you
draw will be the top left corner and
a straight section. The lower half
of your drawing will be the straight
I File
Nane List
Printer
section to be repeated along the
sides. The top left corner will be
turned to fit the other corners.
Borders must be created with
Degas E/ite, medium or high reso¬
lution, and saved in *.ICN block
format.
I spent several hours putting
my first border together and it took
a lot of tedious pixel-by-pixel
work and much switching from
Degas to Award Maker and back. It
seems best to make your first
border a simple two-line frame.
Once that simple border is correct,
you’ll find more complicated bor¬
ders to be easier in design.
It’s very important to carefully
count pixels as you put your
design together. A mistake in
counting by just one pixel means
your border may not match up as it
goes around the award. Degas
Elite’s magnification mode is very
useful in this process. It’s some¬
what demanding, but designing
your own borders does work and it
offers some exciting possibilities in
Menu Screen from Award Maker
Page 40
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
ATARI ST/MEGA
CN REVIEW
creating awards. It’s too bad
Baudville didn’t include a template
screen and some suggestions for
creating borders. Border design, a
bit of a challenge, will probably
only be used by a few brave, and
persistent, souls.
Including your own graphics,
however, is simplicity itself. Just
click on “Import Picture” and then
the file name. Any non-com-
pressed Degas format file can be
used. Award Maker will then con¬
vert the image to high resolution.
You may need to adjust colors first
as dark backgrounds can obscure
the graphics. Be sure to preview
your award in magnified mode
before you make any final judg¬
ments.
Documentation. The ST-
specific eight-page brochure gets
you through the options. A
separate 32-page booklet shows
the various font, border, and award
styles available. The award styles
include those for academic, fam¬
ily, sports, humorous, and general
topics.
Negatives. Documentation
claims the two-disk package sup¬
ports two drives. Not so. You’ll
need to pull program disk “A” and
insert library disk “B” in your boot
drive. A second drive can be used,
however, for your own data disks.
Also, unfortunately, you cannot
preview your award until you’ve
gone through all the options,
although this does give the pro¬
gram a speed its competition
lacks. Award Maker doesn’t offer
much in the way of canned humor
and the software is copy-protec¬
ted.
Comparison and Summary.
The ST now has two major players
in this specialized market, both
easily used. The first, Certificate
Maker, includes many humorous
awards and has a supplemental
disk available to increase the certi¬
ficate topics. This is one for those
who want a good collection ready
to go.
Award Maker P/us ($39.95)
offers a reasonably complete cer¬
tificate collection. Especially note¬
worthy are the exciting and crea¬
tive opportunities for personalized
borders and illustrations. Once you
get through the initial detail work in
setting up that first border and
think about the possibilities with
your own art, clip art, or digitized
pictures in those borders and cer¬
tificate illustrations, you’ll begin to
appreciate the capabilities of this
one. Award Maker, a program that
deserves the Plus.
[Baudvi/ie, 5380 52nd Street SB
Grand Rapids, Mi 49508 (616)
698-0888.J
Desktop Ability Plus More!
From Within Application Programs
Replaces Standard Item Selector Found
In Most Programs
Perform These Functions From Within
An Application Program
WANTED: Application & Design Software
would like to publish or enhance to publish your
Assembly Language ST program or utility. Send
us a letter and describe your program and in¬
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1 Set Drive Path
1 Format a Disk
1 Create a Folder
1 Print a Disk Directory
1 Info About Disk or Folder
1 Delete Files or Folder
• Wildcard File Delete
> Rename Files or Folder
1 Wildcard Extension Rename
1 Move a Folder or File
• Wildcard File Move
’ Copy a Folder or File
1 Wildcard File Copy
1 Lock & Unlock Files
• Wildcard Lock & Unlock
Universal™ Item Selector
Application & Design Software
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Visa or Mastercard Orders:
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June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 41
ATARI ST/MEGA
CN REVIEW
The Telecom Dream:
The Nite Lite Multiline BBS Running on one ST
Review by Ed Seward
For several years quite a few
members of the Atari community
have been asking for a multiline
BBS capable of running on an ST.
In March, NOVATARI purchased
the Nite Lite Multiline BBS which
provided the required interface and
software. This was followed on
April 17th with the combining of
the ARMUDIC BBS and WAACE ST
BBS under the ARMUDIC name.
Thus, instead of running two
separate BBS’ (one for 8-bit Atari
owners and another for ST owners)
with one phone line each, we now
have one BBS with four phone
lines running on one ST system.
(The interface we are using will
allow up to seven lines.)
Nite Lite BBS software
The Nite Lite Multiline BBS
software comes on two single¬
sided disks with two manuals. One
disk contains the executable files
and the other the Personal Pascal
source code to the programs. The
smaller manual covers the inter¬
face commands that are available
and the bigger manual explains the
setting up of the BBS and the
many commands that are avail¬
able. (One of these days I’ll have
to read the smaller manual.)
With most BBSs one gets a
generic set of menus. No menus,
however, come with the Nite Lite
software. The flexibilty of the pro¬
gram, of course, allows the opera¬
tor to build his own menus, but a
few sample sets of menus would
help certainly help people who
have never run a BBS before. I’ve
set up BBSs using FoReM, BBS
Express ST and Nite Lite. It takes
longer to set up a Nite Lite BBS
but that is due entirely to the
greater freedom given the sysop.
1 will just mention some of the
features of the Nite Lite BBS pro¬
gram. It would literally take a book
to cover 88 commands available to
the sysop to control various
aspects of the BBS. Note that
these commands do not include
the built-in commands such as
those used in the chat, file and
message areas. The sysop has
TOTAL control over the menu
structure of the BBS. Of course,
the sysop will have to write his
own help files for his BBS since
the help file contents will be
determined by how the sysop sets
up the BBS.
An example of the flexibility of
Nite Lite is the handling of the
various file and message areas
that can be made accessible. For
ARMUDIC, 1 have the message
bases divided into three areas.
The main Message Menu has
three message bases with com¬
mands to call up the menu for the
8-bit specific message bases and
ST specific messages. The main
File Menu has the upload com¬
mands, the commands to access
the 8-bit file areas as well as the
ST file areas. 1 could just as easily
have had an 8-bit only menu un¬
der which the 8-bit file and mes¬
sage areas would be accessed
and a similar set up for the ST
users. 1 could also have had in¬
dividual menus for accessing just
related file and message areas,
say the Magic SAC message base
and file area on one menu, an
Adventurers message base and
file area on another menu, etc. In
fact, you could use all these
options on one BBS although that
would make it a little messy for the
caller.
There is a chat room for all the
callers to get together. You can
also link several Nite Lite BBS’ for
a ‘Linked Chat Room’ where
everybody on each linked BBS
can chat with everybody else.
There are 36 access levels allowed
with each level being shown a
different main menu. 1 use this
capability to provide the club pre¬
sidents with their own private
message base which is accessed
from the main menu that they see.
The Weak Points
There are a few areas of this
package that could use a little
work. First, there is the part of the
manual dealing with the initial
setup of the BBS. 1 found a couple
points relating to initializing the
message area open to interpre¬
tation.
Second, all message bases are
kept in the same batch of files.
Under this arrangement, a few very
active message bases can cause
messages in the slower areas to
scroll off. 1 have not had a problem
with this yet, but 1 feel uncomfor¬
table with it.
Finally, there is the file area.
The only transfer protocol suppor¬
ted is straight xmodem with
checksum. The other areas of the
BBS have quite a few commands
to allow a tremendous amount of
flexibility and the file area is on the
bare bones side right now.
The Callers’ Response
Joe Waters suggested includ¬
ing some of the users’ remarks.
Rather than just summarizing some
of the responses, 1 have provided a
sampling of the logoff remarks left
on the BBS during our first month
of operation. There were only a
few negative remarks but I’ve in¬
cluded most of them here for the
sake of a balanced review.
® Trevor Williams, 11:24:55 pm
Apr. 21, 1988: Ed, 1 know that
this has been said, and that you
probably can’t do anything
about it. But it would be very
nice if the system could tell
users if there are any messages
in a particular base or not. At
least it lets you hit return to see
the new messages. Also, in the
file section, is there a way to
see just the new files.
® Steve Steinberg, 01:07:20 am
Apr. 22, 1988: Would like to
know why this board is in ASCII
if its an Atari board?
® Scott Robinson, 01:18:14 pm
Apr. 22, 1988: Very nice, and
fast!
IS Tim Bladen, 03:52:06 pm Apr.
22, 1988: 1 think this is an
Page 42
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
CN REVIEW ATARI ST/MEGA
improvement over WAACE
[FoReM ST], A lot of nice
features chat mode, all atari
users together again, and faster
response plus multiline.
TS Ken Jacobs, 02:39:08 pm Apr.
25, 1988: Definitely will take
getting used to. Structure is
quite different than FOREM.
Also getting a lot more line
noise than 1 used to.
2? Herb Goertzel, 08:06:24 pm
Apr. 27, 1988: 1 can’t say that
I’m particularly fond of this BBS
software. Is there any way to
just list the files that are new
instead of having to peruse the
entire list and is there any way
to have the file descriptions
available as well as the file
names?
SAlexander Giannini, 04:59:49
pm May 3, 1988: 1 really like the
feel of the BBS.
® Alexander Vachon, 12:30:03
am May 6, 1988: 1 like this board
better & better.
S Brian Merrell, 08:23:46 am
May 9, 1988: 1 liked your other
BBS system (FoReM ST) better.
Sysop’s Response
Paul Swanson (Nite Lite Sys¬
tems) has been very helpful in
answering my questions and still
working to improve this great
package. He has made several
sets of command interpreter files
avaiable to registered sysops—
the best example being an inter¬
active multiplayer game. 1 feel that
the Nite Lite multiline BBS soft¬
ware is a great package and
recommend it (with the required
interface of course) without hesi¬
tation.
Hardware Required
The hardware 1 mentioned
above very briefly is being made
and sold by Nite Lite Systems
also. There are two types of inter¬
faces available at this time—the
SPP408 allows for up to three
phone lines and the SP808 allows
up to seven. One of these inter¬
faces is required in order to have
the multiline capability. The 65C02
CPU and 8K ram buffer are the big
reason the BBS is so fast because
the ST doesn’t have to do all the
work.
[Nite Lite Systems, PO Box R,
Billerica, MA 01821. Nite Lite Multi-
line BBS software, $100. SP408
Programmable interface, $199.
SP808 Programmable interface,
$349.J
ARMUDIC & WAACE
ST BBS’
Just a quick note for those that
may not have heard about the new
phone numbers for the ARMUDIC
BBS (formerly the two BBS’ men¬
tioned above). The new number is
573-9207 (still area code 703 for
those outside the metro dialing
area).
The X pAivsioN Box
Utilises both floppy and hard drives
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SPECIALIZED SUBSYSTEMS
ALL prices subject to change without notice
_
June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 43
ATARI ST/MEGA
CN REVIEW
WordUp
The First Second-Generation Word Processor for the ST
Re vie w by Mi/t Creighton
Many of us expected this word
processor years ago. What makes
it different? It simply does some¬
thing no other word processor can
do on Atari ST machines at pre¬
sent: WordUp provides multiple
on-screen fonts in varying point
sizes (each with a variety of type-
styles) and, in addition, permits the
integration of text and graphics in
a single document. True, Microsoft
Write provides multiple fonts but
has no graphic integration capabi¬
lity and while 1ST Word Pius allows
one to insert graphics, it has no
multiple font capability. The closest
you can come to WordUp from
Neocept are desktop publishing
programs such as Publishing Part¬
ner or Publisher and both of them
lack true text editing capabilities.
WordUp fills a unique market
niche, but just how well does it
accomplish its objectives?
The program comes on three
disks: a program disk and two
system disks. The program disk
contains most of the WordUp-
specific files while the system
disks invoke GDOS. One of the
system disks is for those of us
wallowing in the misery of owning
only a single-sided drive(s) while
the other is for the fat cats with a
double-sided drive(s). There is
also an “assign.sys” file provided
for those with hard disks. The
primary difference between the
disks is that the double-sided ver¬
sion contains extended character
sets.
Setting up the program is no
more difficult than setting up most
other GDOS-based programs.
Those of you who have done it
before should have no problem,
and those of you who have not
should be able to get through it
without too much difficulty as long
as you use one of the pre-set
versions provided on the disk. Just
follow the installation instructions
carefully.
I might add at this point that
this program was designed to
work with Fontzi, the font-conver¬
ter also from Neocept. Fontzi per¬
mits you to convert Macintosh,
Amiga, and even Degas fonts to
GEM for use with WordUp in
nearly any point size you want.
The ads are somewhat misleading,
however—especially the part
about not having any problems! If
you dare to climb down into the
pit with the dreaded G DOS-
monster, you had better be a
seasoned warrior. Neophytes to
the computer-world would be
well-advised not to tamper with
their fonts or their assign.sys files
until they have earned their spurs.
Now that I have identified all
the jazzy features and posted the
appropriate warning notices, it is
time to confront the program itself.
Just how well does WordUp do
what it is advertised to do? The
answer is that WordUp has both
good and bad points: I found the
design concepts to be superior
while the implementation fell
below expectations.
For example, the cursor
movement features are surperb.
One can move word-by-word,
move to the beginning or end of a
line, move to the top or bottom of
a screen, or go to a specific page.
Placement of the cursor with the
mouse is the best I’ve seen out¬
side of Microsoft Write. Unfor¬
tunately, the screen update speed
is slow and the scrolling is clumsy.
Most of these particular problems
are not the fault of Neocept but
come about because the screen
has to be handled as a user-
defined graphics image. It is still
irritating, however, to watch help¬
lessly while the backspace key
eats half the sentence I so care¬
fully crafted. Also, the slider bar
operates fitfully unless you have
turned on the option to have it
behave properly, in which case the
whole program moves at the
speed of molasses.
I found that a number of my
desk accessories interfered with
WordUp, causing the program to
crash. In addition, if I got too far
ahead of the type-ahead buffer
with scrolling and cursor move-
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Page 44
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
CN REVIEW ATARI ST/MEGA
merit commands, WordUp would sometimes crash.
Later versions will undoubtedly correct this. In fact,
there is already a new version out that corrects one
bug which did not permit using more than one
graphic image per page. As an aside, Neocept has an
interesting technical support policy. You get 60 days
of free support over the telephone (a non toll-free
telephone number is given in the manual) after which
you have to pay a fee of $25 to get another year of
support. Neocept will, however, answer written
requests for help from registered owners without
requiring a fee. It’s not a bad arrangement.
WordUp uses paragraph markers to separate
paragraphs and a separate carrage return to separate
individual lines of text (in an address, for example).
Since you can set the amount of white space
between paragraphs and the line spacing can be set
separately, you have to make sure you use the
correct command. Non-printing markers are placed
on the screen where these commands are used. The
resulting flexibility has all sorts of ramifications.
WordUp has left justify, full justify, and center
commands but no flush right command. The block
commands are slow but complete. The formatting for
justification and margins is the best I’ve seen on any
word processor to date. The drop-down menus all
have keyboard equivalents. It does have a rudimen¬
tary on-line help feature, but no spelling checker or
thesaurus.
WordUp has basic, but functional, mail merge
features. Its search capabilities are very powerful. Its
footnoting is manual rather than automatic (no
renumbering). It has a macro feature that employs a
glossary technique, similar to Microsoft Write, (power¬
ful but not my favorite). WordUp makes use of master
pages for headers, footers, and page numbers—a
very nice feature with lots of flexibility. It does not,
however, give the program a true double-column
capability as the manual claims. You can import and
export ASCII files and the file menu has some unusual
commands to permit formatting of a disk or checking
disk space. Another nice feature.
As advertised, you can import DEGAS high-
resolution, Neochrome, or GEM Image files into
WordUp, insert them in the middle of you text, and
then watch the text flow around the image. There are
some limitations, however. Since WordUp was written
to emphasize its text handling features, placing the
image is not as easy as in a desktop publishing
program. It is possible to crop the image and scale it,
but the “move” command was removed some time
before release through it is still referred to in the
manual. The “read.me” file on the disk says that it
was found that using the block commands was easier
than using the "move” command and the command
was removed to eliminate redundancy. I suspect the
truth of the matter may be that the “move” command
did not work properly because I cannot imagine how
it could have been more clumsy than using the block
commands. I also found that the graphics are touchy
and can cause WordUp to crash. In addition, on one
occasion, resizing of the image caused a number of
characters from the international character set to be
sprinkled throughout my text. That is definitely not
one of my favorite features.
The Bottom Line: Is WordUp worth its $80 price
tag? Overall, I would have to say that it is, in spite of
its lack of a spelling checker or a thesaurus. It isn’t as
powerful as WordPerfect or WordWriter ST, but it will
do things they won’t. It doesn’t appear to be as
bug-free as Microsoft Write, but it has additional
capabilities and isn’t nearly as expensive (and you do
get an FX-80 GDOS driver). It doesn’t have the page
layout capability of Publisher, but it has substantially
better text-editing features. As I said earlier, it fills a
niche. It is the first of the second-generation word
processors to come and, like all new advances, it
broadens the horizon by redefining what we will
come to expect in the future.
"I used to feel like
a dummy. But
with The Atari ST
Book, / can do all
sorts of nifty
things, like embed
printer codes in
text, or use a word
processor to alter
BEFORE my desktopjnf file." AFTER
In the past, many of the ST's features and capabilities
hadn't been adequately explained in language that the
average user could understand. But now The Atari SZ
Book o f Tips . lMtrij£ti2ni, Secrets and Hints for the
520., IQ4Q and Me_g a £Ts provides step-by-step
instructions that help both beginning and experienced
users get the most out of their STs. And no
knowledge of programming is required!
Covers Item Selector and desktop tricks, printers,
modems, Control Panel palette settings, RAM disks,
files, AUTO folders, copying, desk accessories, cold
& warm boots, installing applications, free software,
word processors, chess, and a list of over 30
magazines (Worldwide) with ST coverage. 159 pages
The Atari ST Book, by
Ralph C. Turner. $16.95 in check
or money order from a U.S. bank.
(Includes shipping and handling to North
America. Europe add $4.00 for air mail.)
Index Legalis Publishing Co., P.O.
Box 1822-9, Fairfield, IA 52556.
© Copyright 1988 by Ralph C. Turner
June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 45
ATARI ST/MEGA
CN REVIEW
CYBER CONTROL
The CAD-3D Motion Control Language
Review by Bi//Moes
Soon after the ST, two names
joined: CAD-3D ... Tom Hudson. The
first excited. The second guaranteed
quality.
Later, a major update/revision,
Cyber Studio (CN Sept. 1987), was
released which included the capabi¬
lity of creating sophisticated anima¬
tions with CAD-3D 2.0 and editing
those animations with a new
language, Cybermate. And then
Cyber Paint (CN Ap. 1988) threw
open the box, allowing the fireworks
from various animation forms in a
single film. Today, with the additional
support disks available, ST users
have a powerful combination of gra¬
phics and animation not available
anywhere else.
Yet with Cyber Studio it’s still a
tedious task to actually create much
in the way of an animation. Creating
an animation can easily take hours.
Hours of carefully moving or turning
an object and then saving the
screen. And then moving or turning
an object and then .... Frame by
frame by frame by .... ‘Tis a problem.
Cyber Controi is the solution.
Written by Tom Hudson, it not only
can be used to tackle the tedious,
but can be used to create anima¬
tions not at all possible otherwise. If
you’re seriously interested in deve¬
loping animations with the Cyber
Studio package, take a look at this
one.
Cyber Controi which installs as
a desk accessory, is used as a
BASIC-like programming language.
Its programming commands include
the familiar: FOR/NEXT, IF/THEN,
GOTO, GOSUB/RETURN. When it’s
clicked on, you’ll have a clear text
window over nearly all of the screen
and you’ll enter the language com¬
mands to develop the program.
There are no line numbers; you’ll use
labels for program segments. Cyber
Control includes specific reserved
commands for: movement of the
cameras (16 commands); object
manipulation (33); lighting (4); spline
and hierarchy (8); animation record¬
ing (7); and miscellaneous (15). In¬
cluding the additional programming
commands, more than 100 com¬
mands are available.
As you write the program, using
up to 128 variables, you’re telling
CAD--3D exactly what you want
done for each frame. After you’ve
written the program creating your
CAD-3D animation and SAVEd it,
click on RUN, located on the upper
Cyber Control bar. The syntax
of your file will be checked; the
check will stop at a mistake. When
the syntax is correct, the program
will run and the animation will be
created.
It is not possible for Cyber Con¬
trol’s syntax check to point out
errors you might make within an
animation, such as moving objects
outside the CAD-3D universe. If an
error shows up during the run, the
program will stop and you’ll be
dumped back on Cyber Control’s
editing screen. One of the 45 pos¬
sible error messages will be dis¬
played and the cursor will mark the
offending line.
As a programming language,
Cyber Control has very good flexi¬
bility. Much that is possible in CAD-
30, such as loading templates for
spin or extrude, a partial spin, object
movement, scaling or rotation,
creating primitives, light manipula¬
tion, (the list goes on) will all be
possible from Cyber Control.
But these possibilities from
CAD-3D we already know. What
about the unknown? Step into
Cyber Control.
Cyber Control offers additional
animation commands to help you
develop sophisticated shows. Some
of these are easily understood. Oth¬
ers are not.
Spline. A spline is a smooth
curve defined by naming points
along that curve. There are three
types of splines possible: linear
(straight point to point), B-spline (a
gentle curve in the space between
the named points), and S-spline (an
exaggerated curve to go through the
points). After the splines have been
defined, they can be used to move
objects, cameras, or lights during
your animations.
Cameras. Three cameras are
available. One is the normal CAD-
30 camera, fixed in space. The
second camera can be placed any¬
where in the CAD-3D universe (x, y,
and z axes) and then pointed any¬
where else. You can also name the
camera #2 bank angle. The third
camera is similar to camera #2 and
can be placed anywhere in the
universe. It differs from camera #2 in
that, in addition to placing the
camera anywhere, you specify the
camera’s heading, pitch, and bank
angles. Camera #3 could, therefore,
be used to simulate aircraft flight.
This third camera also allows you to
set the focus, or how far objects
appear from the screen when you’re
using stereo separation. If you’re not
creating stereo views, the focus
adjustment will have no effect.
Hierarchial Tree. Take a look
at your hand. Flex the fingers. Move
your wrist. Notice how they’re all tied
together by joints? (Sounds like a
3rd grade science class.) Anyway.
With a hierarchical tree you can
create animated objects that seem
to be hinged together, such as a
flexing hand or a walking body.
Creating a hierarchical tree is an
involved process. The steps include:
(a.) naming the objects you want
shown; (b.) limiting the movement
so that objects don’t bend the wrong
way (optional); (c.) putting the parts
together by telling how they relate to
each other; (d.) stating the order of
rotation (optional); (e.) positioning
the joints to be changed or moved;
and (f.) moving the objects. Yes, it’s
just as complicated as it sounds.
Page 46
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
CN REVIEW ATARI ST/MEGA
Vertices and Faces. CAD-3D
shapes are all made of triangular
faces. This feature can be used to
good advantage if you’re interested
in creating objects on a detailed
basis. After you’ve determined what
your object should look like, you’ll
give each vertex a number and list
the coordinates in the CAD-3D
universe. Then, each face is defined
by listing the vertices it uses, noting
whether the face’s edge line is to be
shown, and stating the face’s color
as taken from the CAD-3D color
palette. It’s quite possible, using
these tools, to create some very
unusual objects. It requires typing
many numbers, but it’s really not a
very difficult process.
Stand Alone. Most will use
Cyber Control within CAD-
30. However, it’s also pos¬
sible to use it by itself, out¬
side of CAD-3D. With the
varied and flexible language
commands, you can load a
Degas or Neo background
and then bring in additional
image/cel shapes (Degas
Elite’s Block format) to be
moved over the back¬
ground. As with normal
CAD-3D animations, these
cel animations can be
recorded. This feature
doesn’t rival full-fledged
animation programs, but it’s easily
done. The backgrounds and cel im¬
ages also can be used in standard
CAD-3D animations.
Editing. Cyber Controls text
manipulation capabilities seem suffi¬
cient for a modest editor in a pro¬
gramming language. You can do the
usual load/save or merge. There’s a
search for strings, not case sensitive.
Keys move you to the start/end of a
line and up or down a page. You can
mark text blocks to cut and paste.
Text files can be printed. Lines can
have up to 75 characters.
Documentation. The 176
pages, which fit into your binder
from Cyber Studio, explain the soft¬
ware quite well. Well-illustrated
tutorials and demos guide you
through the program’s capabilities
and the reference section explains
the commands available. An appen¬
dix by Hudson offers additional
ideas and takes a stab at explaining
hierarchical object trees. Another
appendix by Darrel Anderson offers
tips on advanced object creation.
Both Hudson and Anderson in¬
clude Cyber Control files you can
use to create objects. Because the
language allows INPUT statements,
these object-creation files give you
the chance to see how the pros
develop programs and to then use
their programs to create objects of
your own. Hudson offers a file to
create CAD-3D objects based on
math functions and one to make coil
springs. Anderson includes a file to
create spline models and another
one to extrude objects that follow
the curved path of a spline.
Other Notes. It should be
obvious by now that Cyber Control
is for the hard-core CAD-3D ani¬
mators. If you’re not sure about it all,
you may want to take a look at an
early, and very limited, version
released in the public domain (CN
ST Library disk 152). The PD version
may offer a hint, but the real power
of Cyber Control is understood only
after use.
And again, let it be clear: this is
a programming language. If you’ve
done any work with BASIC, you’ll
recognize many familiar commands.
Even programmers of other
languages will be somewhat com¬
fortable. Non-programmers, though,
may have a tougher time. The
documentation is not a program¬
ming primer.
Parts of Cyber Control axe rela¬
tively easy to understand and use.
For example, using it as a stand¬
alone cel animator is straight-for¬
ward. And the development and ani¬
mation of standard CAD-3D objects
is not difficult. Cyber Control defini¬
tely relieves the tedium of long hours
spent watching final versions of Su¬
perview line on endlessly.
Using splines, though, may be a
bit of a challenge for some. And
manipulating the hierarchical object
tree is best left to the forest rangers.
It’s very easy to make changes
in the Cyber Control file. The wire¬
frame mode, quickly drawn, is useful
in previewing your animations. Then,
after all is set, you can change from
wireframe to solid mode, add the
Record commands, and record your
animation.
Although not absolutely necess¬
ary, you’ll find it extremely
helpful to have version 2.02
of CAD-3D. This later ver¬
sion allows you to use all of
the Cyber Control com¬
mands and permits up to 80
objects in CAD-3D memory.
If you purchase Cyber Con¬
trol, you can send in the
warranty card with the ori¬
ginal CAD-3D 2.0 disk and
get the CAD-3D 2.02
upgrade free. Otherwise, it’s
$5.00. An updated version
of the animation editing
language, Cybermate,
requires $5.00. Cyber Control, not
copy protected, will work with one
SS drive, although two drives are
highly recommended.
Summary. Cyber Control
($59.95) greatly eases the task of
recording CAD-3D animations. In
addition to the standard CAD-3D
object creation and manipulation
steps, it introduces several new and
exciting possibilities for your anima¬
tions: three cameras to dynamically
spy on the scene, spline paths for
cameras, lights, and objects to fol¬
low during a film, and the hierarchi¬
cal connection for object sets. It’s
not all easy, but it’s all possible with
this sophisticated and flexible soft¬
ware.
rThe Catalog, Antic Publishing, 644
Second St., San Francisco, CA
94107(415)957-0886]
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June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 47
ATARI ST/MEGA CN REVIEW
IMPOSSIBLE MISSION II
Evil Elvin Strikes Back
By Dan Greenb/att
Good morning, Field Agent
Bravo 29. Your mission, should you
choose to accept it, is to neutralize
Professor Elvin Atombender .
again. This time he has construc¬
ted a computer that will break the
launch codes to our nuclear mis¬
siles in eight hours. You must
break into his West L.A. tower
complex and destroy the com¬
puter.
Sounds easy, right? 1 mean,
this is the 25th century, and you’re
only a veteran of Operation Cobra
Blue, created just in case Atom-
bender did this sort of thing again.
Well, obviously it isn’t easy, as this
is called Impossible Mission II. (The
first Impossible Mission was never
made for either Atari line.) Why so
impossible? Because good old
psychotic Elvin has eight towers
surrounding the one with the
code-cracking computer, all of
which are fraught with danger.
Danger, in this case, means a
collection of robots guarding every
room and its contents with a pas¬
sion. There are electrified sentry
robots that are equipped with
lasers that will turn the unsuspect¬
ing agent into grilled cheese.
Bashbots will push intruders off
ledges into space or crush them
against walls. Suicidebots do the
same thing, only they will die with
the intruder as it pushes him over
the ledge. And Minebots leave
deadly mines that explode when a
human steps on them.
The layout of each room is
simple. Besides robots, each room
contains ledges, elevators, floors
that can shift from one side to the
other, computer terminals, and
various objects. In order to pro¬
gress from one tower to another,
the objects must be searched for a
portion of a three-digit passcode
that will open the security doors to
the adjacent towers. Objects can
also yield security commands,
extra time, or nothing at all.
Objects can only be searched
once, and many passcodes you
find will not work, as there are
some 9-20 of them scattered
throughout each tower. In addi¬
tion, each number can only go in
one place in the code, as indica¬
ted by its color. Colors are not
interchangeable. (For example, if
the code is green 6, red 8, blue 4,
and you have green 4, red 6, blue
8, then your computer will not
register success.)
computer. This may seem to be
easy to avoid. Believe me, it isn’t.
Every time you are zapped or
crushed or otherwise killed, five
minutes is deducted from your 8
hours. This may not appear to be
much, but if you die six times
trying to negotiate one room, that’s
a half-hour down the tubes!
Your clock is constantly run¬
ning, too, so time can become a
real problem in the later stages of
the game. On top of ail that, you
only get 30 minutes of real-time in
each tower, so you can’t wait
around and play cautiously for too
long.
In any case, passcodes are not
the only thing you need to defeat
Elvin in under eight hours. You
also need music. In each tower,
one room contains a safe. This
safe has a musical sequence in it.
To open the same, the time bomb
security command must be used,
the bomb must be dropped, and
the agent must be away from the
explosion that results. The safe
must still be searched for the
music. There are six musical
sequences in all, along with two
duplicates. To enter the central
tower, all six musical sequences
must be played off your tape
recorder. This device is built into
your pocket computer, which also
helps you assemble the passcodes
connecting the towers. Once the
six pieces are played, you can
enter the express elevator to the
central tower.
This is the final phase. In this
ordinary-looking penthouse room,
there are three terminals side by
side in the center. Access the right
one, the codes are disarmed and
the world is saved. Access the
wrong one, and you feel the awe¬
some power of a 2200 volt electric
shock.
Simple, right? That’s why they
call it impossible. And believe me,
...Any arcade master will
love this game, as the
action is almost always
intense. It is also quite
intensely difficult...
The best way to defeat the
robots’ purpose is to dodge or
jump over them. However, other
ways exist. Elvin built a security
system into his towers, and this
can be used against him. This is
where the security commands
come in. There are six commands.
The lift-reset command will set the
lift-platforms in the room at their
original positions as defined when
you walked in. The platform com¬
mand moves adjustable floor seg¬
ments across the room, making
some objects more accessible
and dumping robots all over the
place. The unplugged robot sym¬
bol disables every robot in the
room for a period of time. The
mine symbol arms a player’s mine
that will explode when any robot
(or the agent) steps on it. And the
light symbol turns on the lights in
any dark rooms in the tower.
There is only one way to
lose—if the 8 hours runs out
before you deactivate the central
Page 48
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
ATARI ST/MEGA
CN REVIEW
PRESCHOOL KIDPROGS
Entertainment For The Young ST User
Review by Roger Abram
A feeling of impending doom
always comes over me when buy¬
ing software for my kids. Let’s face
it, the likes and dislikes of children
are not only unpredictable, but
change on a daily basis. Spending
$20 to $40 on a program for them
is like begging for trouble.
Take my four year old, for
example. For weeks on end all she
has wanted for lunch was a grilled
cheese sandwich. Then last week
she came to the conclusion she
hated them. Now she’s on a
cheese hot dog kick. Who knows
how long that will last?
I do, however, have temporary
judgement lapses and try my best
to select a program that will either
entertain my kids or teach them
something. Whatever I decide to
purchase, it has to be priced at a
level that won’t send shockwaves
through the Abram household
should it either bomb out or not
have staying power.
Preschool KidProgs, by Mich-
Tron, comes close to meeting my
requirements. It’s main drawback is
its price—it lists for $39.95.
Programmed in GFA Basic by
D.A. Brumleve, Preschool KidProgs
is actually a collection of three
bright and colorful programs
designed to stimulate the deve¬
lopment of young children. The
programs are completely mouse
based and after some initial gui¬
dance, I did find that my four and
six year olds could be pretty much
left alone with the game.
Of the three modules, Kidkeys
is their favorite. The main screen
for this program has a keyboard
on it which you can select to be
either a piano or organ. You can
then click on the keys and make
your own music or you can pick a
tune to play from the program’s
library. In all, there are twenty
familiar tunes that my kids love to
sing along with. There are such
notables as “I’m A Little Tea Pot,”
“Mary Had A Little Lamb,” “Three
Blind Mice,” and “The Itsy-Bitsy
Spider.” For moms and dads who
may have forgotten a word or two,
at least one verse of each song is
printed in the manual.
The second module, Kid-
blocks, is an onscreen, multi¬
sided block puzzle featuring six
different pictures. Initially, the
blocks are all scrambled and the
child has to click on each block
until the desired side is displayed.
When a picture is successfully
arranged, music sometimes plays
or the picture becomes animated.
The last module, Kidgrid+, is a
limited drawing program consisting
of 192 triangles which can be filled
with color to create your own
pictures and designs. The twelve
different colors appear in rectan¬
gles on the left side of the screen
and the youngster only has to click
on the appropriate box to select
the color. The mouse is then
moved to a triangle and clicked
again. The triangle changes to the
new color.
My children thoroughly enjoy
Preschool KidProgs and I would
recommend it to all young kids and
their parents, if not for its price. A
better buy would be Current Notes
disk #211 which contains pro¬
grams for youngsters, including my
four year old’s current favorite —
KidPotato, also programmed by
D.A. Brumleve.
[MichTron, 576 South Te/egraph
Pontiac, Michigan, 48053 (313)
334-5700. Co/or monitor on/y.J
Im possible Mis s ion II
you will probably flounder for at
least a week before figuring out all
the little details of the game, and
how to access everything. Average
playing time is about 45 minutes.
There is, fortunately, a save game
feature allowing the player to quit
and come back later after his/her
nerves are reassembled. This
game is very addictive.
One complaint I had was the
documentation, or lack thereof.
More specifically, the docs are
very vague in places. For example,
I first thought after reading, “Tie
together the musical sequences
into a full melody,” that I should
go back and shift the music
around until I created a song. So I
went back to the safe where I
thought was the beginning of the
song, and found I could not
search again. I realized then that
all I needed was the six pieces, in
any order. I died trying to get out,
and after escaping from the room I
had only three seconds to reach
the express elevator. Naturally, I
didn’t make it.
Another gripe I had was an
odd quirk in the sound. On my
520, it was fine. But when I
hooked up my 1040, it acquired a
whine and was muted drastically.
But perhaps this is just my com¬
puter.
And perhaps I also took the
instructions too literally. Oh well.
This game is too good to pass up.
Any arcade master will love this
game, as the action is almost
always intense. It is also quite
intensely difficult, and mastering it
can be seen as a challenge. Buy
Impossible Mission II and relish it.
Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a
world to save.
[Epyx, P.O. Box8020, 600 Galves¬
ton Drive, Redwood City, CA
94063. Joystick and color monitor
required.)
June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 49
ATARI ST/MEGA
CN REVIEW
PH ANTASIE III
You Can Nick A Disc, But You Can’t Nikademus
Reviewed by Robert Mil/ard
The current Dungeonmaster craze has cast other
recent fantasy releases in a wan light. FTL’s compel¬
ling offering may prove to be “the” ST game, period,
if a success formula of reputation times sales is
applied. So Phantasie His promise of a do-or-die
confrontation with the nefarious Nikademus might not
elicit a battle roar from Atari gamers. Besides,
although the original’s ST conversion was the first
CRPG to exploit sixteen-bit graphics potential, Phan¬
tasie //seemed no more than a new plot in the same
game system. But Phantasie ill - The Wrath of
Nikademus is so graphically superior to its lineage,
and makes such intelligent use of the ST machine,
that dungeonmaster notwithstanding, it deserves
attention.
The title screen boots up, accompanied by the
usual forgettable music (thankfully confined to the
opening sequence), and credits designer Doug Wood
as well as Westwood, the company handling the ST
conversion. Westwood also handled Roadwar 2000
and its busy, blurry graphics of North America. But
they have obviously learned a lot about art on the ST
since then. These graphics have a luster, depth, and
clarity that trumps LDW’s efforts on the previous
Phantasies. (This writer’s review of Phantasie i can be
found in the May 1987 issue of Current Notes. Most of
the game system descriptions therein apply to the
latest release as well.) The major criticism of fantasy
games these days is an overemphasis on graphics,
but if The Bard’s Tale’s myriad monster pictures made
that game a hit, Phantasie i/i’s arsenal of artfully-
rendered adversaries should earn it a fair share of
sales.
Phantasie Hi’s game interface has been improved
as well. Dialog boxes and statistical screens offer a
more fluid maintenance of party members when in
towns. Items can now be traded between characters
without a complete party disbursement, though the
system still has some flaws. The surface world map of
Scandor, viewed through a smallish window, scrolls
with no disk access. (Waiting for a new map screen to
load in the previous Phantasies induced Sierra deja vu
in some gamers.) Best of all, each dungeon can be
saved separately. Previously, only one save was
possible, so each dungeon had to be completely
accomplished before proceeding to the next one.
Disk access on the whole has been minimized,
reflecting the same ease of play Westwood achieved
with the RoadwarQ&mes.
Doug Wood’s rather rigid game design seems to
discourage radical changes, but the few new features
are good ones. Each time a character advances a
level, it can train in three of nine possible areas that
include four thieving skills, three fighting skills,
listening for monsters, and swimming. If a character
can attack but not parry, or disarm a trap but not pick
a lock, it was the gamer’s choice that made it so.
Injuries are more complex, too. The right half of the
game screen shows each party member’s name,
magic points, hit points, and a human form with
outstretched appendages that graphs each charac¬
ter’s injuries. A range of colors on each body part
indicate the degree of injury. Reality factors determine
options. Serious injury or loss of a right arm will
prevent spell-casting or weapon-wielding. Leg in¬
juries will render a character down on the ground. In
turn, the party members have a new combat option,
aiming a blow at a critical body part, much like a
hunter in The Bard’s Ta/e. And it can be accomplished
with a long overdue addition to the game’s weaponry:
the bow.
For those unfamiliar with the game, Phantasie
involves fighting many different monsters, mostly in
dungeons that are simple overhead mazes. A battle
switches to full screen, black background, with
excellent party and monster pictures, limited anima¬
tion, and no tactical movement. (The new feature of
party rank movement is largely abstract and not a
major factor.) Towns are single screen and serve
primarily for statistical maintenance. The surface
world offers little exploration and discovery. The
game’s important events occur in the dungeons.
Though dungeon graphics are only simple lines and
dots, the layout is usually clever, and the little puzzles
and plot incidents therein are the game’s main appeal
beyond combat and character development.
Lately, discussion of CRPG plots is a can of
wyrms that, in this review, will be opened for only a
brief instant. A concensus of opinion on GENIE
indicates that Phantasie /// is briefer and perhaps
easier than the first two installments. There are still
scrolls to find, special items to use, abstract charac¬
ters like Filmon and Lord Wood, netherworlds and
planes, and puzzles. But the dungeon designs seem
Page 50
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
ATARI ST/MEGA
CN REVIEW
less inspired; some are quite small and can be fully
explored in a few minutes. If some fantasy games
feel like War and Peace, Phantasie /// seems
somewhat of a fast read.
Yes, Phantasie /// is like / and // and so many
other CRPG efforts: hack and slash, thrust and
parry, and then some. And then some more. But it
is the kind of polished, classy effort that Atari
owners have historically accorded recognition. And
it is the final chapter of the struggle against
Nikademus. Yet, an incidental effect of the
Dungeonmaster’s omniscient spell may cast the
game into a sopor. Indeed, it may become a
sleeper.
Misty Writings —In my review of U/tima /<< I
failed to mention an important feature that was
added to the ST version: dungeon saves are
possible! This is especially helpful in the abyss,
and just before entering the codex. Evidently, few
gamers are aware of the small text adventure in
Roadwar 2000. If you defeat an invader death
squad in tactical combat near Miami, there is a
random (50 or 100 to one) chance of getting a
plane, which will fly you to Nassau. That’s where
the text adventure is ... If anybody needs help with
any of the CRPGs I’ve reviewed in the past year,
they can reach me on GENIE.
For the Atari ST and IBM Compatibles
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Atari ST Software
Jinxter.$ 27
Carrier Command.$ 33
Universal Military Simulator..$ 33
Block Buster.$ 27
Harrier Combat Mission.$ 33
Death Sword.$ 15
Impossible Mission 2.$ 27
Lords of Conquest.$ 15
Rockford.$ 21
Stellar Crusade.$ 36
Gold of the Realm.$ 28
Hunt for Red October.$ 33
Alternate Reality ’City’.$ 27
Alien Fires.$ 27
Gunship.$ 33
Mavis Beacon Type Tutor.$ 30
Police Quest...$ 33
Atari ST Software
Desktop Publisher ST.$ 81
Word Writer ST.$ 51
NeoDesk..$ 20
Turbo ST.$ 35
Omni-Res. $ 25
GFA Basic or Compiler.$ 39
Cyber Studio.$ 67
Cyber Paint...$ 53
Spectrum 512.$ 53
Quantum Paintbox.$ 31
Drafix 1...$120
Analyze.$ 24
Word-Up.$ 51
Fontz.$ 25
Teachers Pet.$ 33
PC-Ditto........$ 65
VIP Professional Lite.$ 50
Hours: 10 AM- 10 PM (EST) Mon-Fri
Terms: MC/VISA or COD (no surcharges)
cash or certified check
Shipping: Software!Accessories , add $2.50
FREE on orders over $75
COD orders add $2.50
Returns: Defective products replaced with
same item.
Prices and product subject to change w/o notice.
European ST Titles
Arcade Force 4.$ 42
Arkanoid.$ 25
Akari Warriors.$ 30
Captain Blood.$ 36
Leatherneck.$ 30
Master of the Universe.$ 30
Preditor.$ 30
Out Run...... $ 30
Rampage.$ 30
Many others arriving daily call....
June Specials
DungeonMaster.$ 24
Dark Castle.$ 24
Slaygon. $ 24
Print Master Plus.$ 24
Shanghai.$ 15
Paintworks.$ 15
June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 51
ATARI ST/MEGA
CN REVIEW
JUGGLER and JUGGLER II
The Con Artist
By Donald C. Lyles
A review of Jugg/er and Jug¬
gler// is actually a review of three
different programs. The first is the
original version of Jugg/er, the
second, a review of Jugg/er //, and
the third, a look at the revised
version of Jugg/er. Last month,
encouraged by my editor, I took on
the assignment of trying to master
Jugg/er (version 1.0). Fine, no
problem. I could certainly juggle
my schedule to write the review.
But then minor difficulties arose.
Jugg/er did not really "juggle”
the way it was supposed to. As a
matter of fact, in more than one
way it bungled. Michtron had a
good idea for a program: a utility
to allow two or more applications
to remain resident in ram concur¬
rently while the user switches back
and forth between them. While not
a true multi-tasking environment,
given the basic premise and
assuming it would work as advert¬
ised, it could have, should have,
satisfied those of us looking for
multi-tasking on the ST.
Being an astute (and informed)
software user, I turned to the
instruction manual first. It seemed
fairly straightforward, directing me
to run the program by clicking on
the file “juggler.app”.
First problem. There was no file
called “juggler.app”. Dutifully, I
made note of the disparity and
clicked on “juggler.prg” instead.
True to the instructions, a dialogue
box appeared asking which pro¬
grams I wanted to load. Now,
according to Michtron, Jugg/er
runs GEM-based programs.
Among those purported to work
are Thunder, DB Master One, First
Word and Michtron BBS 2.0.
Being a trusting soul, I tried load¬
ing DB Master One and First Word.
The results were not good. First
Word worked only if it was loaded
first. DB Master One did not work
at all with First Word loaded. The
two programs simply would not
juggle back and forth.
After a couple of phone calls
to Michtron and the promise of a
revision being mailed to me as
soon as possible, I tried again.
This time I loaded First Word and
Thunder two programs which
would be nice to be able to
access concurrently. Low and
behold, success! But this distur¬
bed me. Why was this combina¬
tion successful, while others also
touted as “compatible” were any¬
thing but?
After the arrival of Jugg/er and
Jugg/er//, the revision, it was back
to the keyboard for testing. Jug¬
gler //, which is referred to in the
manual as a “quick starting” pro¬
gram, resembles K-Switch. Jug¬
gler H allows you to divide your ST
memory into eight partitions (of
course, the more memory the
better). Each partition acts like its
own individual computer, com¬
pletely independent of the others.
You switch back and forth bet¬
ween the partitions by either using
a desk accessory function and
clicking on the partition you wish
to activate or by “stepping”
through each of the partitions in
rank order by depressing the shift
and alternate keys simultaneously.
Michtron says they created
Jugg/er H for programs that do not
follow the protocol set up by Atari
as well as for programs that are
not GEM-based. The result? It
works! As a matter of fact, as I
write this article, I am using four
partitions on my (1 Mb) 520ST.
The program does allow for
switching between GEM and non-
GEM based programs. It is effec¬
tive and appears to be safe (at
least I have not run into any
problems yet.)
The revised version of Jugg/er
does not appear to hold any new
surprises. As a matter of fact, it
has the same number of bytes in
the program and still carries the
version number 1.0. It still works
with some GEM-based programs
and lets you switch from active to
background programs using the
mouse (essentially, what you are
doing is moving from screen to
screen). The only difference bet¬
ween the revised Jugg/er and Jug¬
gler // appears to be that Jugg/er
is strictly for use on GEM-based
programs.
You can not switch programs
while your computer is doing any
active I/O work, such as reading or
writing to the disk or printing. Other
than that restriction, I have
encountered no problems using
Jugg/er. Note that you are pro¬
vided an option of saving the
programs you want available as
switchable applications. When you
run Jugg/er the selected applica¬
tions are all loaded automatically.
Jugg/er and Jugg/er II can be
used concurrently. For example,
divide your computer into two par¬
titions using Jugg/er //. Have the
first partition operate a non-GEM-
based game and then step (using
the Shift and Alternate keys) to the
second partition. Use Jugg/er in
the second partition to juggle two
GEM-based programs.
Using Jugg/er can be a little
cumbersome at times. Jugg/er and
Jugg/er // will not work with a ram
disk, Publishing Partner nor with
any type of cache program or
Deskcart. I recommend that once
you find those programs that you
would like to be able to switch
among, be sure to save them
using the SAVE option in Jugg/er.
It’s not multi-tasking, but it is an
alternative that, one way or the
other, will work.
[Jugg/er / <5 // by Michtron, 576 S.
Telegraph, Pontiac, Michigan,
48053(313) 334-5700. $39.95.]
Page 52
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
ATARI’S SMALL MIRACLES by Joe Russek
FLAG
This one is a bit longer than usual, but after
viewing those red and white stripes, followed by the
blue rectangle covered with stars, you will appreciate
the extra effort you made.
10 REM Draw the United States Hag
20 REM High Resolution 4-Color Graphics,
25 REM No Text Window
30 GRAPHICS 7+16
40 REM Setcolor 0 Corresponds To Color 1
50 SETCOLOR 0,4,4:RED=1
60 REM Setcolor 1 Corresponds To Color 2
70 SETCOLOR 1,0,14:WHITE=2
80 REM Setcolor 2 Corresponds To Color 3
90 BLUE=3:REM Defaults to Blue
100 REM Draw 13 Red & White Stripes
110 C=RED
120 FOR 1=0 TO 12
130 COLOR C
140 REM Each Stripe has 6 Horizontal Lines
150 FOR J=0 TO 6
160 PLOT 0,I*7+J
170 DRAWTO 159,I*7+J
180 NEXT J
200 C=C+1:IF C>WHITE THEN C=RED
210 NEXT I
300 REM Draw Blue Rectangle
310 COLOR BLUE
320 FOR 1=0 TO 48
330 PLOT 0,1
340 DRAWTO 79,1
350 NEXT I
360 REM Draw 9 Rows of White Stars
370 COLOR WHITE
380 K=0:REM Start with row of 6 stars
390 FOR 1=0 TO 8
395 Y=4+I*5
400 FOR J=0 TO 4:REM 5 STARS IN A ROW
410 X=K+5+J*14:COSUB 1000
420 NEXT J
430 IF KoO THEN K=0:GOTO 470
440 REM Add 6th Star Every Other Line
450 X=5+5*14:GOSUB 1000
460 K=7
470 NEXT I
500 REM If Key Hit, then STOP
510 IF PEEK(764)=255 THEN 510
515 REM Open text window w/o clearing screen
520 GRAPHICS 7+32
525 REM Change colors back
530 SETCOLOR 0,4,4:SETCOLOR 1,0,14
1000 REM Draw 1 Star Centered at X,Y
1010 PLOT X-l,Y:DRAWTO X+1,Y
1020 PLOT X,Y-l:PLOT X,Y+1
1030 RETURN
GTIA TEST
Running counterclockwise, a peach, pink, blue
oval gradually is formed until it becomes a solid. Later
little, black lines one-by-one disappear.
100 REM GTIA TEST
110 DIM C(22,2)
115 GRAPHICS 10:FOR Z=704 TO 712:READ R:POKE
Z,R:NEXT Z
116 DATA 0,26,42,58,74,90,106,122,138,154
118 LIM=22:T2=3.14159*2/LIM
120 GOSUB 2500:FOR V=1 TO LIM:T=T+T2:GOSUB
2500:NEXT V
200 GOTO 1000
400 FOR X=1 TO 8:Z=PEEK(704+X):Z=Z+16:IF Z>255 THEN
Z=26
420 POKE 704+X,Z:NEXT X:POKE 77,0:GOTO 400
1000 REM
1010 FOR R=1 TO 8:T6=R
1020 GOSUB 1520:NEXT R
1110 FOR R=9 TO 15:T6=16-R
1120 GOSUB 1520:NEXT R
1210 FOR R=16 TO 23:T6=R-15
1220 GOSUB 1520:NEXT R
1310 FOR R=24 TO 30:T6=31-R
1320 GOSUB 1520:NEXT R
1400 IF T3=l THEN GOTO 400
1410 T3=l:GOTO 1010
1520 COLOR T6:V=0:GOSUB 2000:PLOT X,Y:
FOR V=1 TO LIM:T=T+T2:GOSUB 2000:GOSUB
3000:DRAWTO X,Y:NEXT V:RETURN
2000 X=(30-R)*C(V,1)+40:Y=(60-R)*C(V,2
)+80:RETURN
2500 C(V, l)=SIN(T):C(V,2)=COS(T):RETURN
3000 IF T3=l THEN IF (R=l AND V>11) OR
R>1 THEN POSITION X,Y:POKE 765,T6:XIO 18,#6,0,0,”S:”
3010 RETURN
GTIA DEM 2
At first squares are formed from the outside to the
inside of the screen. Later squares become rectan¬
gles, going from vertical to horizontal shapes. The
entire process continues ad infinitum.
1 REM GTIADEM2
10 GRAPHICS 11
20 FOR X=0 TO 78
30 C=C+l:COLOR C:IF C=127 THEN C=0
40 PLOT X,Y:DRAWTO 78-X,Y:DRAWTO 78-X.191-
Y:DRAWTO X,191-Y:DRAWTO X,Y
50 Y=Y+2:IF Y>191 THEN Y=0
60 NEXT X:GQTO 20
June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 53
TIPS’N’TRAPS
by Jim Stevenson Jr.
Welcome Back. I almost missed an issue from lack of messages, but I managed to get some unanswered
questions together from previous issues. And, good news! A new board just went up called the Crusader’s
Castle, which will become a new source for Tips ‘N’ Traps. The new number is (703)360-1984, so give it a
call for those of you with modems, along with Merlin’s Litterbox at (703)250-7303. If you want to ask me
something personally, call me (voice only) at (703)378-3540. See you next month.
DUNGEON MASTER
Q. I must have got on the bandwagon late, but I’m still
on level 4 of DM. I think I have been everywhere, but
the steps leading down to level 5 are blocked by an
iron gate that seems immune to anything I can do.
Any help would be appreciated. I do have the maps,
so I think I have been everywhere. Thanks.
--Jeff Johnson
A. Still in the realm of the purple worms, eh? Well, this
is what you gotta do (though you probably won’t like
it):
• Go back to the zombie suspended over the pit
(next to the message THIS IS MY PRISONER. LET
HIM SUFFER).
• Kill the zombie (with a throwing star, preferably,
but a fireball spell will do the trick, too ... you just
want to save your mana for what comes next).
• Be prepared to fight your way through about
another half-dozen pairs of worms ... they’re
released when you kill the zombie.
—’’Reforger"
Q. Once you have merged the Firestaff and Power
Gem how do you kill Chaos? I have tried fluxcaging
him but he just teleports out. Is there any key for the
IR door?
—"Raven”
A. You have to surround him with cages and/or walls.
—"Refotger"
Q. I had him surrounded with fluxcages but they just
wore off after a while. Do I have to do something else
to him once I have him surrounded?
--’’Raven”
A. You need to use the ‘FUSE’ power of the FireStaff
on him once he is trapped by your fluxcage.
—Chris Leonhard
Q. When is a rock not a rock? When it isn’t a stone, or
floor, or wall, or anything for that matter.
—"Jack Flack”
A. Believe it or not, the answer to that is “when it is
nothing”. Makes sense right? Makes too much sense,
actually.
Q. How do you get past the “test your strength” Blue
Mist on level 6?
—"Raven"
Q. After you have the third Ra key, is it necessary to
keep going or can you just turn around and go back
up to level 7? I tried to keep going, but ran into two
knights that I can’t kill. Does anyone know an easy
way to kill them?
—"Raven"
TRINITIJ
Q. I’m stuck way at the beginning. I have the paper
bird that tells me to be at Long Water at 4:00, but I
can’t get there because of the “Do Not Walk On
Grass” notice. The comic book that comes with the
game shows me symbols that match those on the
Sundial. What do I do before I get nuked at precisely
4:00 pm?
--Derrick Williams
A. Anyway, back to Trinity. I got pretty far in it since
last I played (to the Kitchen or thereabouts) so I’ll
lend you a stick out of the quicksand. Examine
everything. Look at everything that is mentioned in
the text. Talk to people. While not useful point-wise,
you’ll get some valuable insight to the game and
what’s going on. Especially the woman who’s feeding
the birds. Try the format “ASK WOMAN ABOUT xxx”.
Ask her about everything. For fun, try TRINITY.
Imagine yourself actually there. If you’re stuck, do
something else and go back to it. A few hours away
from the game or a good night’s sleep will bring fresh
insight later on. Of course, those are the rules as with
any Infocom game or, for that matter, any adventure
game.
Okay, a couple of keywords/phrases for you to think
about: The sign says: “do not WALK on the grass,
tree, soccer, perambulator.” Oh, and don’t forget to
not leave empty-handed where the sundial is. Once
you’re passed this section of the game you can’t go
back. I had to restart the entire game.
—Sam Wright
SPLICE QUEST
Q. How do you get past the door in front of that little
volcano, and next to the pit with the green tentacles?
Page 54
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
Also, where do you get the “fizzy” stuff to kill
Orat?
--Jim Stevenson
BEyOND ZORJC
Q. How do I get the alligator’s jewel through?
—"Shaman"
Q. (1) How do you get out of the cellar in the
pub? I got everything in it, but I can’t get out. (2)
How do you cross the bridge, or does the
umbrella serve a purpose when it’s broken? (3)
Does anyone know the answer to the riddle on
the cliff (My tines be long, etc.)
—“Max Quordlepleen"
POLICE QUEST
Q. How do you get the girl out of the hotel so you
can play poker? Also, do you need the radio? And
if so, how do I get it?
-’’Raven”
LURKING HORROR
Q. What do you do with the brass hyrax? Do you
put it on the hand?
—’’Shaman”
Q. I found the tomb in the sub-basement of the
Aero Building and opened the lock. Now, those
stupid rats are in the tunnel. How do I get past
them, or survive them?
—”Zor Prime”
Q. How do I enlarge the crack in the wall? What
am 1 looking for in the cinder block tunnel, and
how do I frighten the Urchin?
—Steve Steinberg
THE PtAWN
Q. Can anyone “shed some light” on how (and
where) to find what the Guru wants??
—Dave Lee
SPJICE QUEST 11
Q. What do I do after I have gotten to Vohaul’s
asteroid? I have explored it fully, and am at an
impasse.
-Anonymous
| ST DISK- A- MONTH"™*!
DID YOU KNOW THAT:
THERE ARE 14 MONTHS IN EACH
YEAR??
YOU CAN GET ALL THE NEW AND
BEST OF PUBLIC DOMAIN/SHAREWARE
EACH MONTH AUTOMATICALLY??
THAT YOU WON'T GO BROKE
"KEEPING UP"??
Well, the last two Items above are
absolutely true; the first of course Is not,
but It might as well be, since with the
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P.S. CN READERS - "THANKS".
June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 55
ATARI XE/XL
CN REVIEW |
THE GAME CART
by Len Poggiali
BUG HUNT and BARNYARD PLASTER
Two Games for Atari’s Light Gun
To date, Atari has released two
cartridge titles employing its XE
Game System light gun. Bug Hunt,
a relatively straightforward shoot¬
ing contest, was packaged with the
game system; Barnyard Blaster,
which is a good deal more sophis¬
ticated, sells separately ($29.95
list). Both may be played either by
one or two players.
A certain amount of fear (bor¬
dering on paranoia) of small crea¬
tures is evidenced in the storylines
of both games. In Bug Hunt the
human player is supposed to be a
computer operator whose mother¬
board is attacked by flies, roaches,
termites, ants, and spiders. To
keep them from driving you (the
player) crazy, you must shoot them
with your light gun. Barnyard Blas¬
ter's you and your grandpa try¬
ing to save your farm from an
infestation of vermin. Unfor¬
tunately, most of these so-called
“vermin” are rabbits, ducks, chick¬
ens, birds, and owls, a definite
indication that gramps and his off¬
spring are not playing with any¬
thing remotely resembling a full
deck.
Scoring in Bug Hunt is based
on how difficult (because of size
and/or movement) each insect is
to hit. How many bonus points a
players receives and whether he
advances to the next wave is
determined by the percentage of
bugs hit per total shots fired.
Because of this, it is not a good
idea to fire wildly in the hope of
eventually hitting your target. It
also doesn’t make sense to fire at
those more-difficult-to-hit
objects, such as moving caterpil¬
lars or tiny bugs, unless you are in
one of the early waves where
accuracy doesn’t count for as
much. In later rounds you should
focus on the larger creatures—the
frogs, butterflies, and a demon-like
creature who materializes from a
small, gem-like bug. As you im¬
prove, of course, you should begin
to take on the more challenging
objects, as they bring with them a
good deal more points than do
their larger, slower brethren.
At the end of each wave, a
status screen appears showing the
wave number, the numbers of
shots and hits, the accuracy per¬
centage and bonus (if any), and
the wave and total scores. When
the game ends a final status
screen appears and displays the
player’s score and gives one of
eleven final ratings (e.g.,
“Hacker”) based on the points
earned.
Rank in Barnyard Blaster is
determined by the number of
screens completed. For example,
for finishing from 33 to 36 screens,
one earns the title of “Blaster”,
while the poor soul who finishes
none is labelled a “Total Dud”. To
advance from one screen to the
next, you must use the 40 bullets
you are given wisely, achieving at
least the minimal level of accuracy
designated for each round. The
quicker you shoot a moving target,
the morepoints you gain for a hit.
Each time you complete a screen,
your screen score, bullet bonus
(based on how many bullets are
left), and total score are displayed.
Unlike the one-screen playing
field of Bug Hunt, Barnyard Blaster
provides its shooters with four
colorful, nicely drawn playing
areas. In the Barnyard Screen,
bottles and cans balanced on a
fence provide suitable, static tar¬
gets for the novice. Each may be
hit directly, in which case they
smash or are partly blown away, or
they may be shot away intact if the
player hits them from below. In the
latter case the ping-like sound
effect when the bullet makes con¬
tact is particularly effective.
The Cornfield Screen contains
both static (melons and pumpkins)
and moving (crows and rabbits)
targets. The former must be shot
before the animals may be dispat¬
ched. In the Barn Screen, however,
there are only moving objects
(birds, owls, mice, etc.). Naturally
that makes this screen more diffi¬
cult than the earlier two.
Whenever the player com¬
pletes one of these three screens,
Gramp’s Bonus Screen appears.
Gramps will throw ten bottles into
the air, one at a time, and the
player should shoot as many as
possible for bonus points. Shoot¬
ing Gramps (as much as he may
deserve it) ends the bonus round
immediately.
My children and I enjoyed
playing both games, although we
all felt that Barnyard Blaster was
superior for a number of reasons.
Although Bug Hunts motherboard
and insect targets were drawn
sharply and realistically, and ani¬
mation was lively, the absence of
additional, unique screens was a
drawback. Barnyard Blasters
quartet of cartoon-like playing
fields, on the other hand, were
appropriately cute, providing just
enough variety to keep this game
interesting long after Bug Hunt
ceased to be a novelty.
By using only shades of
metallic green and white in Bug
Hunt, authors Rob Zdybel and
Adam Murphy create an eye-
Page 56
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
ATARI XE/XL
CN REVIEW
catching visual effect; however,
after awhile, this too becomes tire¬
some, and one longs for the
strong, varied hues found on
James V. Zalewski’s Barnyard
Blaster.
Finally, there is much more
variety to be found in Barnyard
Blaster, not only in the number of
screens but also in the types of
targets.
Where Bug Hunt bested Barn¬
yard Blaster were in its score-
keeping system, by the types of
creatures being shot at, and by the
presence of the demon-like crea¬
ture. While it is made clear in the
former game what accuracy per¬
centage is needed in order for the
player to advance to the next
wave, there is no mention of this in
the latter contest. Secondly, while I
take no issue with blasting insects
(except for the butterflies), killing
ducks, chickens, and bluebirds is
not my notion of sport or self-
defense. Finally, the presence of
the “demon” in Bug Hunt adds an
element of danger to the proceed¬
ings. In all other cases in both
games, what we are shooting are
defenseless creatures. Only with
the “demon” is there any sense of
threat to the player.
The light gun does not work
perfectly in either game. I found
that lining up both sights with the
target was time-consuming and
quite often no more effective than
just shooting from the hip. In fact,
once I got the feel of the weapon,
shooting Dirty Harry-style gave me
a good deal more accuracy. A
quirk specific to Barnyard Blasters
that it is often easier to hit smaller,
more point-valuable targets than
those larger, less valuable ones.
This is particularly true in the Barn
Screen where I rarely missed the
tiny mice but wasted shot after
shot trying to hit ducks, chickens,
and the owl.
Although I enjoyed playing
both games, and would recom¬
mend that XE Game System
owners purchase Barnyard Blaster
(and that 8-bit computer owners
buy a gun I Bug Hunt package as
well as Barnyard B/astef), I would
like to see future titles provide
more excitement by having targets
not be defenseless, harmless ani¬
mals. Perhaps with its soon-to-
be-released Chicago gangster
cartridge (tentatively entitled The
Unp/ugab/ed) Atari will succeed in
creating a more challenging, excit¬
ing game than either Bug Hunt or
Barnyard Blaster. Until then these
two will do quite nicely.
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June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 57
ATARI XE/XL
CN REVIEW
US DOUBLER and RAMBO XL
Two Good Investments for the 8-bit Owner
Review by Ai Wiliams
US DOUBLER
The US Doubler (the “US”
stands for Ultra Speed) consists of
two plug-in modules that, when
installed in a 1050 disk drive,
convert the 1050 into a true dou¬
ble-density, single-sided drive.
In most cases, installation
consists of opening up the case of
the disk drive, installing the ICs,
and closing it up again. Since Atari
has made two different types of
1050 drives, however, things could
become a bit more complicated.
The ICs given with the installation
kit are of the type that is most
commonly found, but if your 1050
takes the other type of 1C, then
you have four options.
First, you can send the 1C back
to ICD, and they’ll replace it with
the correct plug-in unit. Secondly,
you can move two jumpers to
make your 1050 drive conform to
the 1C that comes with the kit. Your
third option would be to send the
1050 back to ICD along with $15,
and they’ll convert it for you. The
easiest and quickest way, howe¬
ver, is to have your dealer convert
your drive for you. The cost is
usually rather nominal.
For some reason, when Atari
designed the 1050 drive, they used
a drive mechanism that was cap¬
able of writing double-density, but
the electronics that they used
could only support an enhanced
density mode. That is why a rather
simple modification of the elec¬
tronics is able to give you double¬
density.
The US Doubler will give you
180 kilobytes on each side of a
disk, and with the use of Sparta-
DOS, a high speed transfer of data
to and from the drive. Even with¬
out SpartaDOS, you’ll get an eight
per cent increase in transfer
speed, and additionally, the new
electronics will position the read/
write head more accurately.
For the modest price of the
doubler, and the small amount of
time and effort that it takes to
install, the US Doubler is a worth¬
while investment.
[/CD, /nc., 1220 Rock Street,
Rockford, //. 61101, (815) 968-
2229. List price is $69.95 with
SpartaDOS, or $39.95 without
SpartaDOS.]
RAMBO XL
While this is a review of the
RAMBO XL modification for the
Atari 800XL and the Atari 1200XL
computers, you will generally need
SpartaDOS for full support of the
modification. TheSpartaDOS Con¬
struction Set retails for $39.95, and
SpartaDOS X, which is a cartridge
version of SpartaDOS retails for
$79.95, and is also made by
ICD.,Inc.
RAMBO XL converts your Atari
800XL or 1200XL into a 256K
computer that, when used with
SpartaDOS, supports a 192K
RAMdisk and is completely com¬
patible with 130XE programs and
with Basic XE in the extended
mode. It will also support Atari
DOS 2.5 and its 64K RAMdisk.
The kit comes with a RAMBO
XL piggyback board, a piece of
fine hook-up wire, a piece of heat
shrink tubing, and most impor¬
tantly of all, the instruction manual.
You supply the eight 256K
DRAMS.
The manual gives you simple,
step-by-step directions for
accessing the main circuit board of
your computer. This should be
done as soon as you get the kit
since you should find out one
important item. Does your com¬
puter have sockets, or are the IC’s
soldered directly to the board? If
you have your chips soldered in,
then ICD recommends that you
send your computer to them to
have them modify it for you. The
charge for this will be $30.00,
which includes return shipment.
Since you will have to unsolder
nine, 16-pin chips, add a board,
and bend up five pins on a 40-pin
chip, unless you are a really skilled
technician, it is recommended that
you avail yourself of this option if
your chips are soldered in. If you
are not sure of doing the modifica¬
tion yourself, then you might con¬
sider letting ICD do it for you
anyway.
Naturally, when I opened the
case of my 800XL, I discovered
that all of the chips that I would
have to access were soldered to
the main board. While I may not be
too bright, I’m not exactly crazy
either, so I sent the computer, the
RAMBO XL board, and the DRAM
chips to ICD to have them install it.
I received the modified 800XL
within a week - ICD works fast!
The first thing that I tried was
AtariWriter+; the program thought
that I was using the 130XE. As a
matter of fact, I’m using the 800XL,
now complete with bank switching,
the same as if I were working with
the 130XE. Every program that I’ve
tried so far thinks that the 800XL is
a 130XE—complete compatibility!
As nice as it is to be able to
use 130XE programs, the really
Page 58
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
ATARI XE/XL
CN REVIEW
nice part of the modification is the
large RAMdisk available to the
user. I’ve been learning to use
Kyan Pascal, and since it is a
compiled language, it is disk inten¬
sive. As a result, I am always
loading files to and from my com¬
puter. The sheer speed of the
RAMdisk really shines here.
For example, using Atari DOS
2.5 to load the public domain
game Space Lords took me about
one minute. With SpartaDOS, it
took 14seconds. Using the RAM¬
disk, the loading time was under
two seconds.
Another good use for the
RAMdisk lies in the field of tele¬
computing. Having the RAMBO XL
is just like having a double-density
disk drive inside your machine,
only better! The RAMBO XL sup¬
ports a 192K RAMdisk, while a
single-sided double-density disk
is 180K. The disk drive is a
mechanical device which suffers
wear-and-tear, and which takes
time to physically operate. The
RAMdisk operates at machine
speeds, and makes hard disk
drives appear slow. It is totally
solid state in nature, and so suf¬
fers no wear-and-tear.
If you do any tele-computing,
then perhaps the RAMBO XL
might be for you. ICD has a BBS
which is up 24 hours every day at
(815) 968-2229 and which sup¬
ports 300/1200/2400 with XMO¬
DEM downloading. You’ll be able
to find RAMBO XL support files
there.
As good as the RAMdisk is,
however, there is more. Advanced
programmers can bank switch the
RAMBO XL, dividing the 256K of
memory into 16 banks of 16K
each. The RAMBO XL manual
gives information on bank switch¬
ing.
If you have an 800XL, and
would like to upgrade your
machine not only to be compatible
with the 130XE, but also to be a
super version of the 130XE, then
the RAMBO XL is certainly worth
looking into.
[/CD, Inc., 1220 Rock Street,
Rockford, //. 61101, (815) 968-
2229. List price is $39.95; buyer
must supply eight256K DRAMS for
this project.]
A & M Enterprises
P.O. Box 5552 Plymouth, Ml 48170
Call Toll Free 1-800-342-4514
Information: (313) 981-4830
&
Atari ST,
Atari 8-Bit,
Amiga,
Commodore,
IBM Compatible
Modem Specials
Avatex 1200HC $94.95
Avatex 2400 $179.99
Atari SX212 $84.95
I.B. Drive
5.25" DS/DD DISK DRIVE
Only $219
PC-Ditto $61.95
Future Systems
3.5" DS/DD 84 Track
Disk Drive
L.E.D. Track Indicator
Only $199
Bulk Disks
3.5” DS/DD 1.19ea
5.25" DS/DD ,29ea
Hardware
Atari ST Hardware
Call
Atari 130XE
149.95
Atari XF551 Drive
179.95
Atari 80 Column Card
69.95
Supra 20 Meg Hard Drive
569.95
Panasonic 1080i Printer
179.95
Panasonic 1091 i Printer
219.95
Star NX-1000
176.95
Cables
ST/IBM 6' Printer
6.95
ST/IBM 10' Printer
9.95
RS-232 M-F6'
7.95
ST Drive Cable
16.95
Atari I/O Cable
8.95
Accessories
Atari ST Cover
7.95
Atari ST Drive Cover
6.95
Atari 130XE Cover
6.95
Monitor Master
53.95
Mouse Mat
6.95
Disk File 40-3.5 M
6.95
Disk File 50 - 5.25"
6.95
PR Connection
74.95
ICD Printer Connection
49.95
Joysticks
Epyx 500XJ
14.95
Atari Brand
6.95
Wico Bat Handle
18.95
Suncom Slik Stick
6.95
The Terminator
15.95
Supplies
Disk Drive Cleaner
4.95
lOpk Maxell 3.5" SS/DD
13.95
lOpk Maxell 3.5" DS/DD
18.95
lOpk Sony 3.5" SS/DD
13.95
lOpk Sony 3.5" DS/DD
17.95
Mailing Labels
4.95
Ribbons
Call
Software
GFA Basic
37.95
GFA Basic Compiler .
37.95
GFA Basic Book
24.95
GFA Companion
31.95
Laser C
144.95
Flash
19.95
Z-Time STFM
49.95
Software
Word Writer ST
49.95
Data Manager ST
49.95
Publishing Partner
56.95
Microsoft Write
74.95
Battlezone
19.95
Star Trek
24.95
Dungeon Master
24.95
Impossible Mission II
24.95
Gunship
31.95
Call for our
Current Listing
of more than
500 Titles of ST
and XL/XE Software
Ordering Information:
Mastercard and Visa accepted. No surcharge for credit cards. Personal checks, please allow 4 weeks for clearence. C.O.D.'s accepted add $3 C.O.D. charge. Ml
residents add 4% sales tax. Shipping: Continental U.S. add 3% minimum $3 HI, AK, Canada add 5% minimum $5. All other areas add 15% minimum $10. All
shipping in excess of above will be added. Please allow 2-3 weeks for delivery. All defective items must have a return authorization number or they will be
refused at your expense. Please call (313) 981-4830 for RA#. Prices and availability subject to change without notice. Hours: 9-5 est Not responsible for
typographical errors.
June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 59
AT ARI ST/MEGA __ CN REVIEW
SUPERBASE PERSONAL
Relational Database Management for Tyros
Review by John Barnes
A “user-friendly” relational
database for the Atari ST is as
elusive as the Holy Grail. This
review examines Superbase Per¬
sonalis the latest candidate in this
field. In addition to the “intuitive”
GEM interface there are glitzy fea¬
tures such as the ability to store
pictures and documents in your
database.
Will those in the Atari ST world
who distain programming finally be
able to organize their lists nicely? A
Current Notes author, who is
engaged in reconstructing the his¬
tory of his World War II fighter
squadron, recently raved about
SuperBase Persona/ as the tool
that let him get some real work out
of his Atari ST. If a product can
generate this much enthusiasm in
a database beginner, it must be a
product wothy of some conside¬
ration.
It turns out that my colleague
just likes the way the program lets
him print out up to four mailing
labels across without having to
write a program. His struggle with
this task in dBMAN had proved
unrewarding. He also missed the
“point and click” simplicity of
other GEM programs when it
came time to update the records
in his lists.
Features
SuperBase Persona/ (SB) is
easy to install and use. There is no
protection. The GEM interface
makes it easy to define the struc¬
ture of the database. SB provides
the user with complete flexibility in
specifying field lengths and in
modifying the form of records.
Best of all, SB does not lose the
trailing part of a field when you
shrink its length.
You can have pictures or text
documents as entries in your
database. This opens up a great
many possibilities. “Input Filters”
make it easy to build in limited
integrity checks on input data.
The vital “Import” and
Desk
Project
Record Process Set
1-
Systen
11:33
Suoerbases ARTIC2
indexed on Filenane
Filenane
Abstract
Written Publishe
Pages Title
■ 1
1ATABASE DATABASE.ABS 11-13-8? 1-0-1
9ATATRV DATATRV.TXT 11-10-87 12-1-87
1BMAN DfiMAN.TXT 10-1-87 11-1-87
1ATATRV DATATRV.TXT 11-10-87 12-1-87
DATABASE DATABASE.ABS 11-13-87 1-0-1
0.00 Hoh to Avoid Bad Database Ha
4.50 Datatrieve - an ST File Mana
O.0O dBMAN - Industrial Strength
4.50 Datatrieve - an ST File Mana
0.00 Hoh to Avoid Bad Database Ma
m
DATABASE.ABS
Koh to Avoid Bad Database Managers
Sets forth criteria for evaluating database nanagenent softnare. "File
lanagers" and relational products are considered. The article lists 3
criteria for evaluating database nanagenent products.
tziixiijiioDmczitziGoctacom
o
“Export” functions allow you to
bring in lists from outside your
database system and to output
them so you can use them with
other software (a spreadsheet or
graphing program, for example).
The “Query” feature in SB is
able to link several files together.
There is a built-in report generator
that embodies a couple of nice
functions for structuring reports.
SuperBase Persona/ claims that it
is “relational” in nature. More on
that later.
SB provides pretty good con¬
trol over your display with table,
record, and form viewing capabili¬
ties. The adjustable windows and
columns along with the change¬
able field order make it possible to
view tables quite conveniently.
Record filters provide a convenient
way to focus on a subset of the
data.
Making a List
The only way to measure the
agony of working with a database
is to build one of your own. I tried
a couple of different things. The
one that looked best was a list of
my Current Notes articles wherein
the external file field contains an
abstract for the article. This func¬
tion is worth pursuing because it is
not easy to do in dBMAN.
The basic process of defining
the files and fields for this data¬
base proceeded smoothly enough,
although I discovered that it is
difficult to modify a field name. I
built two files, the first was a list of
disk files containing the text of the
articles, the second contained the
titles, a pointer to the abstract,
submission dates, publication
Page 60
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
ATARI ST/MEGA
CN REVIEW
dates, and other related informa¬
tion. The file name (without the
extension) serves as a link bet¬
ween these two lists. The figure
below shows the basic record
viewing screen for the titles list in
this application.
Once I had defined the struc¬
ture of my database I had to get
some data into it. I used DOJT! to
make an ASCII file containing the
names of the files in the Current
Notes folder on my disk drive. After
editing the file into a suitable form,
I used the Import function in SB to
get this data into its database file. I
then used SB’s record operations
to get rid of a few file names that
did not belong in the list.
Once I had a printed version of
this list in hand, I went back to
WordPerfect to look up the titles
and to make abstracts for the
articles. I entered the information
into the titles file by hand using
SB’s record functions. I then
played with various ways of filter¬
ing, querying, and sorting the files
to make various ordered lists.
These functions were
accessed in a reasonably natural
way from GEM buttons and drop
down menus, avoiding the some¬
time tortuous syntactic require¬
ments of dBMAN’s command line
statements.
With a little more persistence, I
was able to use the "Query" func¬
tions to make new database files
by performing the equivalent of the
“Project”, “Join”, and “Intersect”
functions of the relational algebra.
This capability sets Superbase
Persona! apart from database
managers of the “file manager” ilk.
The ability to do this without a
programming language should
prove attractive to those who do
not want to tackle dBMAN.
After some more browsing
around I felt reasonably comfor¬
table with what was going on.
Flies in the Ointment
Once I understood what SB
did, I could evaluate how well it
does it. The criticisms that follow
are partly matters of taste. None of
them are fatal, but remedying
them would result in a product that
would get an A rather than a
gentleman’s C.
The operator interface leaves
a lot to be desired. The drop down
menus use obscure names and
are quite jumbled. There should be
a “Files” menu and “Select direc¬
tory” should be on it, rather than
in the “System” menu. I can
discern no good reason for failing
to use the standard ST file selector
dialogs. The program needs an
escape mechanism to abort pro¬
cessing that might have gone
astray. There is also a need for a
simple button to clear the screen,
which can get quite cluttered
when moving back and forth in
table view mode. This product
needs to provide some online
help.
Boom Box Buttons
SB uses a “boom box” meta¬
phor for controlling the record
pointer. The row of little buttons
along the bottom of the illustration
control record selection in the
same manner as the buttons on a
tape recorder: rewind, fast for¬
ward, stop, etc. I hate it. These
functions should be placed on the
“F” keys. Grabbing the mouse and
clicking firmly on one of the boom
box buttons is simply too slow.
Some, but not all, of the other
drop-down menu functions are on
Alt keys. "Remove Record" is a
function that ought to be on a key
somewhere (perhaps Ctrl-Del?).
An “Undelete" function might also
be handy.
The horizontal slider is good
for looking at wide tables. Why
can’t we have a vertical slider bar
for moving forward and backward
through our tables?
The mouse pointer should be
more functional in the table view¬
ing mode. You should be able to
point to a record and bring it up for
editing, removal, or duplication.
There is also too much point¬
ing and clicking in the structure
definition dialogue. It is silly to use
the mouse to run a counter up or
down when a couple of key
strokes would do nicely. Keyboard
alternatives to the button selec¬
tions (a la WordPerfect) would be
nice here. Also, some of the but¬
tons are kind of dinky, requiring
extra care in mouse positioning.
Certain dialog boxes should use a
default selection (one you can
select by hitting RETURN).
The documentation, while it is
far better than some, could use
clearer writing and better organi¬
zation. Clear, concise explanations
are lacking and the order is jum¬
bled. At least there is an index, but
it could use a few more entries
(“recalculation”, for example). The
examples are too boring to be
instructive. The overall feel can
best be described as “tacky”,
although it is functional.
SB's claim to a “relational”
character comes into play only in
the query process, when fields
from different files can be linked
together in the query output. I will
accept this use of the term “rela¬
tional”, although I prefer to reserve
it for those database systems that
can maintain a continuous linkage
between multiple open files.
While SB lets you (and in
some cases requires you to) have
multiple open files, flipping back
and forth between them is awk¬
ward because there is only a single
window for record viewing and the
record pointers are not relationally
linked.
The program could do a better
job on calculated fields. These
June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 61
ATARI
CN REVIEW
should be updated whenever a
component of the calculation is
changed. The user should not
have to click on the field or save
the record to force recalculation. If
manual recalculation is desirable
to enhance speed, this should be
a settable option.
At the present time SB does
not have command language sup¬
port. Superbase Professional,
which features a BASIC-like
language, is supposedly in the
works, but I have only heard of an
Amiga version. Users whose appli¬
cations require a language-driven
database manager will have to be
content with dBMAN for a while
longer. If you really want pictures
and external text files as part of
your database, try Superbase.
SB provides for Password
protection, but I think this is silly
on the ST, because there is no
privileged user mode for altering
or recovering passwords. God
help you if you forget the pass¬
word.
Conclusion
This Holy Grail is a bit tarn¬
ished. It is suitable for dining off
of, but not for worshipping. As I
mentioned above, I would give the
product a “C” for a final grade.
Most Atari ST users can main¬
tain a simple database file. If this is
all you need, you might try a less
expensive product, like File Mana¬
ger ST or Datatrieve. On the other
hand, designing a database for an
application that requires multiple
files with links between them is
much more of a challenge. Howe¬
ver, relational database technology
is an active field because the
results justify the effort.
I can visualize a structure of a
WWII pilot’s database in which the
names of the pilots are linked to
pictures of the aircraft they flew, to
the names of their planes, to the
missions they performed, to the
places they endured, and to the
losses they suffered. Maps, pho¬
tographs, and memoirs would be
tied together in a way that would
bring the jungles of New Guinea to
life on the screen. Some day ....
Toad Computer Services , Q r :k ' Ef fZT" ffZ P ,
P.0. Box 1315, Sevema Park, MD 21146 A Service. We Really Do Care
Atari ST (
PC Ditto 3.0.$74.95
Magic Sac Plus.$109.00
Spectrum 512.$49.95
IMG Scanner.$75.00
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Pub. Partner Prof.$139.95
VIP Prof. GSM.$169.95
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Midimaze.$27.00
Marble Madndss.$26.00
Deskcart. $74.95
Personal Pascal.$52.00
Cyber Studio.$65.00
Cyber Control.».$45.00
Cyber Paint.$49.00
Gun ship ST.$37.00
Lattice C.$104.00
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Interlink ST.$31.95
Gauntlet.$37.50
Pluto*.$24.00
Barbarian.$28.00
Terrorpods.$28.00
TDI Moduli 2.$59.95
GFA Basic 2 0.$59.95
VT-100 Cartridge..$26.95
Surreal Time Clock (520).$39.00
Surreal Clock (520£m/l040).$49.00
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Indus GTS-100ST.$209.00
Crystal Castles.$26.00
Color Computer eyes.$184.00
Build Your Own Hard Disk
Interfaces
ICD ST Host Adapter - $115.00
ICD 256K MIO Board - $169.00
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XE MIO Adapter $19.95
Pick One Of Each
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Printers
2400 Modems
1200 Modems
Panasonic 1080i
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Anchor 2400
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GVC2400
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$89.00
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Atari XE
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Printshop.
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Indus GT.
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Flight Simulator II.
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All Scenery Disks.
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Basic XE.
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Call For Prices on Our Full Line of
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Supplies
Epyx 50QXJ Joystick.$14.95
Almost All Cables.$12.00
Maxell/Verbatim 3.5" SS/DB...H3.00
Maxell 3.5" DS/DD.$19.95
Bulk 3.5“ SS/DD Disks.$11.00
Bulk 3.5“ DS/DD Disks.12.00
3.5" Disk Box (40).$8.75
Maxell 5.25" SS/DD Disks.$8.00
Bonus SS/DD 5.25 1 ' Disks.$6.50
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A or mmipv erdw Maryland rajridtntK add sales tax. All Pnces and DclicitS subject to change without notice. NO CC
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$3.00 for shipping or call fox exact shipping price. Ah sales are final. Defective merchandise replaced with same merchandise. No refunds after sale is complete. Ah returns must be authorised by
telephone before shipment. Returns without authorization will be returned at our discretion. Returned shipments subject to restocking fee. Items shipped via UPS. Maryland area pickups available.
We carry a complete Hnc erf hardware and software. Call for more great prices) We attend most Atarifest* and other shows - See you there! We can provide technical assistance as well.
Page 62
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
ATARI XE/XL
CN REVIEW
PIRATES OF THE BARB ARY COAST
The Right Mix of Action, Strategy, and Planning
By Lincoln Hal/en
Pirates of the Barbary Coast has an interesting
mix of strategy and action I like to see in any game.
The game is set during the times when pirates ruled
along the Barbary coast off North Africa. Players trade
goods in various ports to survive and to make enough
money to pay a ransom to Bloodthroat the Pirate who
has kidnapped your daughter.
Going from port to port is, of course, dangerous
since there are other pirates out to sink you. You
defend yourself by loading and firing your cannon. If
you inflict enough damage, you can board the pirate
ship and read the ship’s log for clues or seize its
booty.
I found the mix of action, strategy, and planning
the most interesting feature of this single person
game. You have to remember to keep your crew fed,
to keep notes on which ports give the best deals, and
to keep track of clues and riddles. In addition you
must also become efficient in loading your cannon.
This requires that you practice loading your cannon
just as sailors had to long ago (put in the powder,
tamp it down, put in the ball, and brush out the
barrel). Finally, you are ready to fire the cannon which
also takes practice since you must judge the correct
elevation before firing. You are also able to look for
buried treasure and may have to fight Bloodthroat if
you meet him while going around the islands.
The clues and trading features change each time
you play, but after a few times you can figure the
game out, and the challenge is not as formidable.
Pirates performed very well although I did run into
a few problems. I got stuck a few times when learning
the game and had to reboot and start over. The cover
of the box showed a number of interesting graphics
but the graphics must have been for an ST or Mac
because the 130XE I used displayed mediocre
pictures of only about six scenes. In addition, the
developers advertised “animated graphics” but the
only animation I saw was a picture of a pirate ship
moving across the horizon like a homemade arcade
game. Although sound is used, its use is so minimal
that it has little impact on the performance of the
game.
The traders, on the other hand, are very clever,
always looking for the highest demand on the various
items they trade in. Such demands can change
frequently, and once the word gets out that certain
items are bringing high prices at certain ports, many
people try trading them there causing the prices to
fall. However, if you try to cheat or lower the price too
much, you arelocked out from doing any trading! A
good player will take notes to figure out the best
places for trading and to keep track of the other
clues. The software simulation from this standpoint is
quite good.
Documentation is of average quality. Certain key
facts were not given which made learning to play a bit
frustrating. For example, the instructions do not tell
you that, when loading your cannon, you can load
several cannons at the same time. It was nearly
impossible to keep up by trying to load a single
cannon each time to take a shot at the pirate’s ship.
I think the game is easy to use. By following the
instructions and skillfully moving around the joystick,
you can attain the skills necessary to play the game.
Pirates of the Barbary Coast by StarSoft Develop¬
ment Laboratories should complement anyone’s soft¬
ware library.
fTDC Distributors inc., 3331 Bart/ett Boulevard,
Or/ando, FL 32811.J
D & P Computer Supply
■■■■■f ■■■
;.X>X , X , X , X , X , X , X'X , X , X , X , X , X , X , X , X , X , X , ;*lw;'#.jr\*\«:*r+y , X , JWv)'.;M X./av.v.'Xv.vI'/TvX'X'X'X
Hard Drives
Atari 20meg - $589.95
Supra 20meg- $569.95
Supra 30meg- $749.95
Supra 45meg- $879.95
Supra 60meg- $1,299.00
SUPRA mega hard drives (internal)
20maa $520 30meo $650
Modems
Avatex 1200 -$109.95
Avatex 1200hc -$129.95
Avatex 2400 - $239.95
Supra 2400 - $149,95
Practical 2400sa- $199.95
(all modems are external)
RS232 cable- $14,99
Nothing fancy generic hard drive
Economical drive using standard SCSI interface,
2Dm egs- #499.99
Star Printers
NX-10 120cps Draft / 30NLQ Epson FX-80/ibm $173.95
NX-15 120cps Draft/30NLQ Epson FX-185/lbm 15" carridge $324.95
NB24-10 216cps Draft / 72cps LQ / 24pin head Ibm/Epson $514.95
NB24-15 216cps Draft/72cps NLQ/24 pin head/lbm/Epson 15" $ 699.99
Computer paper
Memorex 201b- IVORY COLOR- lOOsheets per package $4.50 PER PACK
STANDARD 91/2’" - 201b mico-perf 2700 sheets per carton $22.00 per case
STANDARD 14 7/8“ - 20 lb regular edge 2700 sheets per case $33.00 per case
3 1/2" Disks (box of io’s)
SONY SS- $12.99 D3-$16.99
FUJI SS-$12.99 DS-$17.49
* SPECIAL *
Supra 2400 + RS232 cable lor $159.95
And free shipping on tnis order
Mail payments to: D&P Computer 1
P.O.Box 811 or CALL
^residents add 5.5% sales tax) Elyria, Ohio 44036 (2161-926-3842 9am-6prn ^
June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 63
PUBLIC DOMAIN GEMS
FOR THE ATARI XE/XL
Daisy-Dot
I downloaded Daisy-Dot (D-
D) (Novatari Utility Disk, #10)
almost two years ago. I was just
about to send away for an $80
upgrade chip for my RX-80 so I
could get NLQ printouts. I’m glad I
kept my money because I was
really impressed with D-D! Roy
Goldman had created a printing
utility that produced a quality of
print unavailable in any of the
printer drivers for 8 bit word pro¬
cessors.
D-D’s features include a
choice of five fonts, four graphic
densities, proportional fonts, flex¬
ible character spacing, a font edi¬
tor, 91 ASCII characters and 14
commands. D-D comes with a
complete documentation file that
takes you through the steps
necessary to print out a file.
In short, you take your Atari-
writer+, Paperclip , Textpro ,
SpeedScript or Letter Perfect file
and print them to disk. Then you
load D-D and select your font, file
to print, density and spacing
options and you are ready to print.
D-D does a good job on text files,
although two-column output is not
supported.
This brings us the the best
part. Somebody called The Wizard
has taken Roy Goldman’s D-D and
added more features while making
it much easier to use—enter Dot-
Magic (DMG)—the Daisy-Dot II
program you may have read about
in computer publications. DMG
uses D-D fonts and comes with
nine fonts, prints double width,
underlines, supports Prowriter as
well as Epson, allows picture files
in two sizes to be added to text
and retains all the other features in
D-D. DMG also has a correctable
typewriter mode and a custom
address label maker with up to 99
copies. The documentation file is
a treat to print out and read. It
demonstrates all the features of
the program.
Both programs are included on
their respective sides of the disk.
DMG offers even more utilties and
further documentation if you write
to the author at the address inclu¬
ded on the disk docs. A contribu¬
tion is requested and I feel it is
justified by the sharing of such a
full-featured program. It may take
a while to get the feel of the way
you use DMG's options, but, if you
want near letter quality output, it is
worth it!
—Roy Brooks
Space Lords
Okay, I give in. I have tried to
play Space Lords (Novatari Game
Disk #16) for several months, but
just could not get into the game. I
could not believe that everyone I
knew that was into games was
really enjoying Space Lords. And
then I finally did what I usually
advise everyone to do—I looked
on the disk to see if there were
any text or doc files. Lo and
behold, there were three of them.
There was a lot more to the game
than I had imagined. After setting
the system up and playing just a
couple of games, I was actually
enjoying it.
Space Lords is a very good
strategy game with adequate gra¬
phics and a reasonable enough
amount of real time play that
keeps your hand on the joystick
during battles to effect a retreat or
to activate shields against missiles
launched from command satel¬
lites. Since this game can take
hours, and even days, to play,
most players will find the SAVE
game feature particularly useful.
Just follow the instructions
and try playing against the com¬
puter while it controls two or three
other Space Lords. Of course,
these other Space Lords could be
other players. Attack as many
planets as possible in the begin¬
ning since this will be when they
are at their weakest, especially if
you have selected the option that
allows neutral planets to build
additional missiles.
—Alan Friedman
Print Shop Icons
Utility Disks #15, #17, and
#30 are chock full of print shop
icons, hundreds and hundreds of
icons. If you are into Print Shop,
then these disks are for you. There
are Atari icons, Boy Scout icons,
cartoon icons, and more. For
anyone not familiar with Print
Shop, it is a commercial software
program for making signs, ban¬
ners, cards and letterheads with
your printer. You select the picture
(icon) you want to work with from
your icon disk. The more icons you
have, the more variety you can
have in your creations. With these
disks and the ones that come with
Print Shop, you should have avail¬
able any icon you need.
—Alan Friedman
Print Shop Utilities
You may be wondering what
you can do with Print Shop icons if
you don’t own Print Shop. Well,
Utility Disk #34, can be used to
make labels that utilize these icons
or to convert the Print Shop icons
to Atari DOS format and then
create labels that not only use
these icons but print the text in any
Atari font including some unique
fonts on this disk. Another utility
lets you make a directory of the
icons on a disk (very helpful when
you are looking for a particular
font.)
This is a double-sided disk.
The front side of the disk consists
of machine language programs
and special fonts. The reverse side
contains additional programs and
all the documentation files.
—Alan Friedman
Adventurer’s Companion
I don’t have the patience or
time to figure out long, involved
text and adventure games. If you
are like me and have several text
adventure games lying around that
you never solved, then Novatari
Demo Disk #10 may be the grea-
Page 64
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
test disk in the Novatari PD library. This disk contains
the solutions to 11 different games—not clues to
help you along, but the actual solutions. With this disk
you can solve Dark Crystals, Hitchhiker’s Guide,
Cutthroat, Ghosttown, Infidel, Mask of the Sun,
Mission Asteroid, Pyramid of Doom, Pirate Adventure,
Witness and Deadline. This, of course, takes the
challenge out of these games, but after months-
-maybe years—of frustration, you may enjoy the
FINAL SOLUTION.
—Alan Friedman
General Ledger & Smartsheet
From our friends in Australia comes disk #37: The
General Ledger and Smartsheet. General Ledger s a
full double-entry bookkeeping system that can
handle up to 99 accounts and 1000 transactions. The
documentation is exceptional and there are example
files on the disk. Smartsheet is a spreadsheet that is
capable of doing financial forecasting, budgeting and
can be used as a general spreadsheet. It is in the
Visicalc/Speedcalc format and also comes with good
documentation.
—Alan Friedman
* mmPUTER 5 UCCE 55 !!* mnOUriEES:
1-MONITOR BOX
FOR THE ATARI ST COMPUTER!
color and mono on 1 monitor!!!
IH THE PROPER REs'o'lUTi'qHM >ioT A SIMULATidH. SirHEnSSTTfllRT™
Finally, just 1 monitor for the ST can produce color and monochrome
in their proper resolutions with our 1-MONITOR BOX! This is
not a simulation or approximation, but the true real colors
your Atari is capable of and excellent monochrome graphics!! This
monitor with our monitor box can do Atari ST Color and Mono, Atari 8
bit, IBM CGA,EGA, and even VGA graphics! Finally one monitor for ail
your computers! Even Mac will work! Unclutter vour desk. The
combination of our monitor box and monitor will replace your ST
mono and color monitors & your switch box. If you have an Atari 8
bit you no longer need that monitor as our monitor has composite
input. You can even run your VCR thru it or watch TV with a iper
on this monitor! If you have an IBM PC or compatible, this monitor will
produce CGA, EGA, and VGA graphics! This is a midtiscan monitor
capable of 8QQ x 56Q resolution! !! Note on all systems, audio must
be output thru seperately, because muitiscan monitors do not have
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stereo or portable radio. Imagine how good Music Studio will sound
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picture in all resolutions, call us now!
ST Monitor box-$199
Muitiscan Monitor $899.99
BOTH ABOVE $999.99
JThis Month 7 !" SPECIAL
:-$199,99 ~{.Monitor Box-$139
Monitor -$569
Both-$669
to ORDER:sehd check or mohey order mComputerSuccsss
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** Computer S access U*
PC-on the ST
RUN SOFTWARE MEANT FOR
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ON VOUR ST i!
PC DITTO $63.95
Microsoft Word PC-$199
MS Dos 3.2/GW Bas-$73
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CAU. FOR SYSTEM BEST FOR YOU I
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MEMORY UPGnAOES AVAILABLE!
PRINTERS:
STAR NX1Q00 5178
STAR G15 5289
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PAHASOHIC 10801 5169
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Compatible. Free online
time, speaker, volume,
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1200 baud $83.99
MODEM CABLE 59.99
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Hard Drive Kits:
all you need to build your
own and save aiot of $$.
Includes adapter,drive,
controller, software, &
mounting kit. You supply
case/power suDpiy (or
we will for addltionaD.
30 Meg-$595
40 Meg-$675
60 Meg-$399
now includes free case &
power supply nm»»nnnuHnta
Mac on the ST
Magic Sac plus-$108
Translator 1- $249
Professional- $379
Mac Microsoft Word $179
Discovery Cart. $189
CONVERSION TO MAGIC SAC
FORMAT AVAILABLE FOR
ANY MAC SOFTWARE-CALL
FOR RATES AND FOR ANY
MAC SOFTWARE YOU NEED!!
UPGRADES
upgrade your Atari 20
meg hard d rive to :
40 meg-$375°9
60 meg-$S5CL00
PRICE INCLUDES TRAOE-iH
XEP 80 $by
ST Ccnputereyes $299 $149
Xetec 8bit interface $29
5T ST Disk Drive $^[$149
ST to PC Drive Cable J39 $18
SF 314 drive(ST) ,$299 $189
Software Closeouts
Mac Microsoft Word ViT-V
B Graph(8 bit) $ST $29
PrirrtShop-Gr III $5* $19
Silent Service yti ,$18
Harrier Strike $40 $18
Thunder $17
Skyfox yfi $]0
Spectrum 512 $39
Cyberpaint $39
CAD 3D2.0 ^T$49
Flash
Juggler michtm$23
8*
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[To ORDER:seho check or money order ^Computer Success, PO Box 3031, Wayland Squar e, Providence, Rl,
02906. PHONE 401-751-0038.master and visa accepted-but add sx for bank fee. add for shipping.- modems, oisk drives, printers 57,
SOFTWARE 54 FOR TO 4 TITLES. 56 FOR OVER 5 TITLES, SYSTEMS 518. LASER-528, CANADA-56 ADDITIONAL. AP0-54 AD0ITI0HAL. ALL SEHT INSURtALL
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June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 65
ATARI XE/XL CN REVIEW
DROPZONE
Going Defender One Better
Review by Joe Pietrafesa
Attention ail Defender fanatics!
Remember when you played Atari
Defender in the arcade, on your
Atari 2600, and even on your Atari
8—bit? Well, put those memories
aside because the Defender of the
future has come on to the scene
for your Atari 8-bit computer.
The game, written and created
by Archer Maclean for the Micro-
daft company, is called Dropzone.
Maclean has come up with the
idea of an old favorite and added a
brand new twist to the game.
When the program is being
loaded, you must hold down the
Option key. The initial screen pro¬
duces an image of the Microdaft
logo in shiny, metallic letters. After
a few seconds the game will begin
to load for game play. Within a
minute, maybe more, the game will
be loaded. Brilliant colors engulf
the upper portion of the screen as
you see the heading “ Dropzond ’
being printed along the top.
Underneath the heading is the
creator’s name along with the date
the game was copyrighted.
Beneath the heading you
begin to see just what this game is
all about. Soon, by merely touch¬
ing the Start button, you will come
face to face with your enemies,
nine in all, waiting to defeat you.
You see them in rows of three’s.
All are deadly, but some not as
deadly as others. The point score
for each nemisis is listed next to it.
A SPORE, for example, is worth
the most (750) while an undeter¬
mined amount is given for killing
an ANDROID. By pressing the Start
key or the fire button on your
joystick, you begin your utterly
impossible mission.
When you begin play, you will
swear you have seen this place
before. Can it be just like Defen¬
ded. In the lower portion of the
screen is a map of the entire
surface of the planet. This allows
you to see where every alien is
hiding. In the lower left corner are
the number of troops you have left
to defeat your foes. In the right
hand corner you have bombs,
which, when used, are devastating
to each and every XENO that is on
the screen at the time you blast.
It is Defender, right? Not
exactly, but here’s the twist. In¬
stead of one spaceship fighting
against mutants, you are one
lonely human, carrying an anti¬
gravity, jet-propelled backpack
and a heavy duty laser, your only
...you are one lonely
human, carrying an
antigravity, jet-
propelled backpack and
a heavy duty laser....
weapons with which to destroy the
menacing aliens. Another dif¬
ference is your ability to gain a
force field. By pressing any key on
the keyboard of your computer,
you will be able to activate your
cloak. The cloak is a type of force
field that will protect you from the
fire of your enemies. The cloak
only lasts a short amount of time
so be careful to use it wisely, but
it is a great defense for stopping
the aliens.
The object of your mission is
very simple: try to save all of your
men from the aliens and wipe the
aliens out at the same time. Sound
easy? Well, watch out! Like
Defender, the aliens try to catch
your men on the surface and bring
them up to the top. Be careful,
because once your men are tou¬
ched by an alien they become
androids, and if you try to help
them, they will only kill you. So
you must destroy them before they
destroy your other men or even
you!
Simulated game play as seen
by Joe Pietrafesa:
My human appears in the mid¬
dle of the screen, right above the
home base, his laser on and ready
to go.
I can see my men along the
surface. They are waiting to be
saved. As I look on the screen and
at the map, I can see swarms of
angry aliens just waiting for battle.
I move down to pick up a man,
and I am attacked by three PLAN¬
TERS! I manage to destroy all of
those enemies and bring my man
to safety (one of the seven to be
rescued). I see five more PLAN¬
TERS on the horizon. I decide
there are too many to handle for
one person. I make sure all of
them are on the big screen; then I
press the space bar. BOOM! Every
single one is destroyed by the
bomb I just dropped.
I see three more men. I can
only get one at a time, so I pick up
the farthest one away. There is
only one more enemy so I pursue
him, knowing I have the advan¬
tage. I am getting closer.
Now I see he has one of my
men. Oh no! I desperately try to
shoot, but the PLANTER gets to
the top of the screen. He now
turns into a NEMESITE, which is
crazier than a PLANTER. He is
quick, and he catches me. A col¬
orful explosion appears as my hero
desintegrates into tiny particles.
Only two more troops left, but
no more aliens either. I pick up the
rest of the men and clear the
board. I receive a 700-point bonus
for saving seven men. (100 x 7).
Now comes the second board
which is more challenging than the
first. Right away I use a bomb
because the enemy are just
Page 66
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
CN REVIEW
ATARI XE/XL
swarming. Next I use my cloak.
This gives me just enough time to
destroy some SPORES and one
BLUNDER STORM. The cloak
wears off, and I am doomed.
Immediately I am shot and blown
up.
This is my last chance to save
the world. I end up saving four
more men. I see more PLANTERS,
three left to be exact. I decide to
use my last bomb. Wait ... Wait...
Now! I drop the bomb. I only got
two of the enemy. One is left. My
score is 9900. The PLANTER
chases me. I try to outrun and
outgun him, but to no avail. He
catches me, and once again, I am
destroyed. But that pushes me
over the 10,000-point mark, and I
am able to put my name in the
Dropzone Hall of Fame.
Overall, I thought this was an
excellent game because I used to
love Defender. The graphics are
excellent, and the colors and
sound are superior to normal
games played on the 8-bit. My
only problems with this game were
that at first it was hard to control
my hero with the joystick. I found it
difficult to manuever and shoot at
the same time, but, with a little
practice, I was able to get the
hang of it. Also, I found it
extremely difficult to handle the
joystick and to press the Space
Bar in order to activate the bomb
and even the cloak. At times I
found myself having to stop to
look at the keyboard to try to find
the Space Bar; while I was looking,
my man would be destroyed.
If you can live with these
flaws, then the challenge awaits
you. Can you save the planet from
evil and deadly aliens? If you think
you can, then what are you waiting
for? By now you should find your¬
self being transferred into the
Dropzond.
[Microdaft, 19 Harbor Drive, Lake
Hopatcong, NJ 07849, (201) 663-
0202. List price is $24.95.]
Is your 5,25" ST compatible drive
making a monkey out of you?
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Atari ST only lets you have access to
your first two drives? Then you need our
THIRD DRIVE CABLE - $31.95
NO more unplugging necessary.
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old cable did.
a Just plug it in and go.
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To order contact your nearest dealer or:
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GET THE FULL USE MO PLEASURE OF SUCH I OESRTW. THIS PRAGRM
USES SLIBIM NEHUS AM ICtHS TO 10 FROM OK JM Tl TK NEXT, ITS !
WOE HITH TIE USER IN KIM. THERE IS HIT MOTHER FROIRAH LIRE
THIS FOR TK ST. MM TflU CAN CREITE THINGS VON ONLY WISHED KFORE
K MVE SOLI SI HMV IT THESE PRIORAHS IN EUR WE IN TK LAST I
MONTHS, THAT HE CREATED A SAMPLE PRMRIH THAT HILL ALLflM VOI TO
TEST THE EASE OP TK PROGRW. ALTER PICTURES, HOST THEH.SJMM
EXPAND IKK,SLOW THEM UP,ROTATE THEM. TKSE ARE JUST A FEW THUMB
m CAN M. THERE ARE SO NAKV OPTIONS Tl THIS PROGRAM ITS NEST Tl
TRY TK SAMPLE OR IUV THE ORIGHAL. ^
THE SPSI MS*...8681,,®® SSKPU! Iffifflffi) ...888.M
gras son nueBfsn........ s^.ibi
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0 LRBEL PROP.. THIS PRO SUB HAS MADE FM OTHER PRMR AKERS'
TBS PROGRAM ALUMS SUCH FREEDOM IN DESIGNING YOU OHH LABELS, ANY
SHAPE OR SIZE. THIS PRMRM HAS ALMOST TK SAME ICONS AND SLIDING
KNUS AS THE SPAT KSKTOP ABOVE. IT IS HSER FRIENDLY. ANCE YN I
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COLO. 80909 719-596-0135
June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 67
CUIOBIENT NOTES ST ILIIIBICaVIBT
JUNE, 1988
#250: CLIP ART NO. 11: Food
2. 22 more screens of clip art of
food-related pictures. Converted
from Macintosh pics. Tinyview.
296K.
#249: CLIP ART NO. 10: Food
1. 27 screens of clip art of food-
related pictures. Converted from
Macintosh pics. Tinyview. 333K.
#248: CLIP ART NO. 9: Whim-
sey. 21 screens of whimsical clip
art converted from Macintosh pics.
Picswitch07, tinyview. 297K
#247: CLIP ART NO. 8: Sports.
24 screens of clip art for sporting
events converted from Macintosh.
Picswitch07. Tinyview. 282K
#246: CLIP ART NO. 7: Mac Art
2. Mac Art Library (28-51). 24
screens of Macintosh clip art. 325K.
Picswitch07, Tinyview.
#245: CLIP ART NO. 6: Mac Art
1. Mac Art Library (1-27). Conver¬
sion of 27 screens of Macintosh
clip art. 322K.
#244: MIDIPLAY DEMO. Demo
of MIDIPLAY, Version 4.25 by Elec¬
tronic Music Publishing House. In¬
cludes two songs: Mozart Gavotte
and Bach G Minuet 2. Demo will
play without a MIDI instrument, but
to make full use of demo, a MIDI
instrument is required.
#243: BOWLMAN, Version 1.22.
A shareware program by George
Terpening, Bowling Manager. This
will help you keep track of bowling
statistics for yourself, your team,
and your league (up to 6 teams—a
more complete version is available
if you register). Single-sided disk,
files ARC’d.
#242: UTILITY NO. 24 ARC
SHELL II version 1.91 with disk and
folder commands from within the
shell. Desk Manager version 2.1
allows greater control on system
bootup. Ledbetter Utilities
(L UTILS) is a collection of four
very useful utilities from the person
that wrote the Express series of
term and BBS programs. M2GRV2
is another manager program for
those that use the Tempus editor
with the TDI Modula-2 package
rather than the editor that is inclu¬
ded in that package. VT PRO is a
powerful! editor of VT52 graphics.
DEGASAVE (from the ARC
DEGASNAP) is the program that
redirects the Alt-Help key com¬
bination so that the screen is saved
in DEGAS format instead of being
sent to the printer.
#241: VDOS (Virtual Disk
Operating System) A shareware
graphic interface from Marathon
Press that allows easier access to
your frequently used programs.
This interface includes many com¬
mand options frequently contained
within command line interfaces
(CLI’s) but is much easier to use.
This disk is a must if you have a
hard disk and frequently use a
variety of programs in one session.
#240: Game Disk No. 14 BOG
vl .2 (Boggle clone with dictionary)
a word-finding game; Core Wars
(based on Scientific American arti¬
cles, a knowledge of assembly
language programming is recom¬
mended); Escape (a pretty good
adventure-type maze). All three
games run in either medium or
high resolution.
MAY, 1988
#239: CLIP ART NO. 5: Holidays
and Headers. 28 screens full of
excellent clip art. Disk includes
PICSW7 and DSLIDE. For color or
monochrome.
#238: PUBLISHING PARTNER
UTILITY NO. 2. New PP fonts
(CYRILLIC, HELVETIC, HUDSON,
and SATURN). Printer Drivers
(HPD, HPF, LQ1000F, NECP7D,
NECP7F, and PS_PLUS). Font
Editor (w/docs) for creating your
own PP fonts.
#237: MUSIC STUDIO SONGS
NO. 7. 35 more Music Studio
songs. Disk includes 2 PD song
players and a program to convert
the 8-bit Advanced Music System
(AMS) songs to Music Studio for¬
mats.
#236: PLAYIT DEMO NO. 2.
More digitized sounds for your ST:
ADAM12, DRAGNET, MRED,
SUBETHER, and SYNCLOCK.
#235: CYBER DEMO DISK.
(Four animations: CAMFILM,
PSLOGO, RAISINS, and SAUCERB,
with ANIMATE3.PRG)
#234: UTILITY DISK NO. 23.
DSKSCAN1—ST Floppy Disk
Manager VI .0/2.0, by Todd Burkey.
DSL1DE2—Deluxe Slideshow V2.0,
shows all popular ST picture file
formats. HDOPTIMZ—Atari ST File
System Checker and Repairer, VI.1
and File System Compacter, by
Barry Locklear. MEMFILE—Mem-
File VI .3, a desk ACC to view and
edit any portion of ST’s memory, a
file on any disk drive, or the
individual sectors of any drive.
PENICILN - virus killer program.
SDDFR12—Super Directory Data
File Reader.
#233: SHEET. This is a shareware
spreadsheet program by Mr. Chor-
ming Lung. Complete docs inclu¬
ded on disk.
#232: MODULA-2 SOURCE
DISK NO.4. GEMMODUL—a very
useful and large assortment of
modules that ease the use of GEM
functions. MATHTRAP—a collec¬
tion of modules for adding more
math functions. THEACC—an ACC
that gives 2 formatting formats,
numerous copying options and disk
DOS type commands ail in one
ACC.
#231: C SOURCE DISK No. 8.
Another collection of C source
code. HACKSORC—source to the
game HACK. PENICILN—contains
the source code to an ACC to help
protect against computer virus’ as
well as the ACC itself.
#230: MONO GAME DISK NO.
5. CRIBBAGE—play the computer
in a game of Cribbage; DRAW-
POKR—A very well-done game of
draw poker. Also runs in color.
MEGAMA11—Mega Maze 1.1
requires a joystick and is an adven¬
ture maze of sorts. Also runs in
color.
APRIL, 1988
#229 - EASY DRAW UTILITY
DISK. Fonts: (Chicago
7,10,14,18,28,36; Courier
7,10,14,18,28,36; and Calig
(7,10,14,18,28,36); Easy Draw Art
(18 GEM Pics: addressbk, alphabet,
assetpl, asset-p2, assissi,
box brd, callig, clip-tmp, dailycal,
disk_lbl2, hitech, linebrd,
pd_art_1, pd art_2, rocky, scrolbrd,
swiss, vhsjbl)
#228 - SUPERCHARGED EASY
DRAW SLIDE DEMO (mono¬
chrome). A self-running demo of
the capabilities provided by
Migraph’s new Super Charged Easy
Draw.
#227 - CASTING D’ENTERPR-
ISES by Propulse. An impressive
demo of the animation and gra¬
phics capabilities of the ST. This
French “film” runs for about 7 1/2
minutes.
#226 - FRACTAL ZOOM VER¬
SION 6.A. This unique program
lets you create a variety of fractals
both at full screen resolution as well
as in a smaller “preview” box.
Page 68
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
Animation options lets you turn
your fractals into a zooming movie,
(color)
#225 - BREACH & EMPIRE- 14
additional scenarios for use with
BREACH. A collection of maps for
EMPIRE players as well as the
fixsave.prg which allows owners of
older versions of EMPIRE to use
the play-by-mail option.
#224 - TOY PROLOG. This
language operates exactly like the
system described in Programming
in Prolog by Clockrin & Mellish.
(Note complete docs, but they are
in GERMAN!).
#223 - C SOURCE DISK NO. 7.
C source programs for ARC.TTP, a
C compiler, formatting disks at 11
sectors/track, disk formatting pro¬
gram, code for accessing TNY file
formats, and a cross assembler to
6809 CPU-based systems.
#222 - DESK PAK PLUS
(Shareware) 10 desk accessories in
a single file: clock, calendar, phone
book, calculator, appuointments,
free ram, note pad, copy file, delete
file, desktop.
#221 - UTILITY DISK NO. 22:
ARCSHELL Version 1.8; ARC
Accessory; DCFORMAT acc.; DIS-
KFREE (speeds up - 10 fold -
GEMDOS diskfree() function);
FOLDRXXX (takes care of 40 folder
limit in TOS); FSELV55 (replace¬
ment for GEM file selector box);
SUPER BOOT 3.2 (all-in-one type
boot program).
#220 - UTILITY DISK NO. 21:
YOUR 1ST UTILITY DISK. Micro-
Time Alarm Clock, ST Ramdisk and
Printer Buffer, Clock/Calendar,
ASCII Printout, DeARChiver, Disk
Manager, Disk Directory Listing
Program, and Accessory Selector
and Resolution Setter.
MARCH, 1988
#219: DBMAN DEMO DISK.
Demo version of the latest release
(Ver 4.0) of dBMAN. Databases
limited to a maximum of 20
records.
#218D: PLAY IT. (DS) Programs
to input a sound file from ST Replay
and output a file that can be played
with either of the two player pro¬
grams provided. Disk includes a
collection of ready to play SND
files. Here your ST Talk!
#217: MUSIC STUDIO NO. 6.
Another 70+ songs for use with
Music Studio. Includes PD player to
create your own music albums.
Works MIDI (C)
#216: MUSIC STUDIO NO. 5.
Over 70 new songs for use with
Music Studio. PD player to create
your own music albums. MIDI (C).
#215D: A.I.M., Ver 2.3 (DS).
Atari Image Management System
(color or mono). Sophisticated
image manipulation program from
Germany that lets you perform
math on images (can read in NEO
and DEGAS pics).
#214: SPECTRUM 512 MOVIE
ANIMATION. Imitation of Amiga
demo that shows 4 monitor
screens at the same time each with
a different animated display.
#213: MONO GAME DISK NO.
5. Adventure writing system;
Daleks - graphic strategy game;
Krabat2 - play chess against the
computer; Stocks and Bonds; Eli¬
minator - interesting variation of
card game; breakout.acc and
reversi.acc.
#212: MONO GAME DISK NO.
4. Spacewar - battle Klingon crui¬
ser; Megaroids - Asteroids clone,
Runner (great arcade game!),
Squixx (like QIX).
#211: GAME DISK NO. 13 For
Younger Kids: 2 music prgs (Kid-
music and Kidpiano); Make your
own Mr. Potatoe Head with KidPo-
tato; and KidMixup - display pics
that tell a story.
#210: GAME DISK NO. 12 2
vers of Pacman; create jigsaw
puzzles from DEGAS pics; drive
race car around track; drive car to
top of hill in widow maker, make
yourself invincible in Time Bandit.
#209: GAME DISK NO. 11 . Try
your hand at Las Vegas: Poker,
Black Jack, Roulette, and Slots.
(C).
FEBRUARY, 1988
#208: GAME DISK NO. 10. Mil-
borne; G-Ranger; NIM; Trucker;
and Darts (C).
#207: STATISTICALLY
ACCURATE BASEBALL. Share¬
ware baseball strategy game (no
graphics) includes data for four
teams: ‘62 Giants, ‘70 Reds, ‘84
Cubs, and ‘86 Mets (C)
#206: UTILITY DISK #20. Ver
2.05 of BOOTUP (set screen and
text colors on bootup; Epson font
editor; calculator and limited
screen plotter; fast disk copier;
convert IFF picture files to Spec¬
trum format; show Spectrum,Degas
and NEO pics from one slide
program; convert AIM files to
DEGAS.
#205: SPECTRUM SPACE PIC¬
TURES NO. 2. Apollo9,10; Astrol;
Earth1,2; Earthris; Lem.
spslide8.prg.
#204: SPECTRUM SPACE PIC¬
TURES NO. 1. Crab, Earth, Moon-
flag, Orion, Nasa_p01,2,3, patchl,
spslide8.prg.(C)
#203: SPECTRUM ANIMATED
BALLS DEMO. 5 metal balls,
hanging from rack, with first and
last alternately swinging out and in.
(C).
#202D: CYBER DEMOS AND
UTILITIES. 4 animations: Chasers,
Elmsk31c, scout, and texture, con¬
tains routines to create shadows
and splines within CAD-3D.V2.0 (C)
DSDD &1MB.
#201: FLASH & INTERLINK
UPDATES. All the files on this disk
require either Flash 1.51 or Interlink.
Prgs to create Flash DO files, to
auto download and auto logon, to
update Flash 1.51 to ver 1.52.
Interlink files for ANSI emulation
VI. 12, and TXF transfer protocols
including multixy which allows file
transfers in the background.
#200. TELECOM DEMO DISK. 3
ARC’d working demos of new ter¬
minal programs: VTX< KIS and ST
Talk Professional.
#199: MUSIC CONSTRUCTION
SET SONGS. 32 songs w/
player. (C/M)
#198: MUSIC STUDIO SONG
DISK 4. 75 songs w/player. (C)
#197. MUSIC STUDIO SONG
DISK 3. 65 Songs w/player (C).
#194: VANTERM Version 2.3.
New release (3/24) of this super
terminal emulation package.
#176: ST WRITER ELITE, Ver.
2.52. Latest version (3/20). Sup¬
ports multiple printers. English,
German, and Spanish. Complete
documentation. _
All CURRENT NOTES Disks are
$4.00 each. Add $1/(6 disks) for
postage and handling. Order disks
from CN LIBRARY, 122 N. Johnson
Road, Sterling, VA 22170.
Discounts are available for
larger orders. 10 or more disks
($3.80 each); 20 or more ($3.60
each); 30 or more ($3.40 each); 40
or more ($3.20 each). 50 or more
($3.00 each). Maximum charge of
$6 for postage and handling.
Pinfeed disk labels for 3.5" disks
are available for $4/100.
June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 69
CURRENT NOTES MACIIC LIBRARY
These disks contain Mac programs in “Magic”
format for use with the MAGIC SAC Macintosh
emulator. Disks are $4.00 each. Order from CN
Library, 122 N. Johnson Rd, Sterling, VA 22170.
Add $1/6 disks for S&H.
MO: MAGIC SAC. Version 4.52, (or the most
recent ver) of MAGIC program.
M2: TELECOM DISK No.1. BinHex 5 0, Free
Term 1.8, FreeTerm.Doc, Kermit, Packlt III
(VI .3), Stufflt 1.0, TermWorks 1.3.
M3: UTILITY DISK No.1. DES, Font Doubler,
MacDump, Mini Finder, Packlt III (VI.3), Reverse
Screen l.Obl, RMover, Scan, Set File. SLICER.
Version Reader 1.1, Write Stream.
M4: GAME DISK No.1. Backgammon, Bash
Big Blue, Curves, MacLuff, MacYahtezee, Maze
3D, Meltdown, Missile Command, Munch, Pep-
siCas,Smile, Snow, Solitaire, Space Bubbles,
Vax Runner II.
M5: DISK LIBRARIAN. Disk Librarian V1.82A.
Disk Librarian Doc, Short Doc. Contains listing
Of CN MAGIC LIBRARY.
M6: GAME DISK No.20. Ashes, Black Box,
Destroyer, HexPuzzle, Killer Kalah, MacPoly
Demo, Office Attack, Point Symmetry Demo,
Snake, Solitaire, Trophy List, Wall Game,
Wheel.
M7: GAME DISK No.3. Ashes, Break the
Bricks, Deep Ennui, Go, Mac Gunner, MacBugs,
MacCommand, MacYahtzee, Wiz Fire 1.1
M8: DESK ACCESSORIES No.1. 3DTTT
Game, Art Thief, Ascii, Bagels Game, Big Ben,
Calculator, CopyFile, DA Tester 1.5, Delete File,
Desk Acc. Tester, DeskZap 1.2, Eject&Reset,
Extras, File Hacker DA, File Tools, Font Grap-
per+, Font GrapperS, Hex Calculator, HP 12c,
MemScan, MemWindow, MerriMac Blackjack,
miniWriter, MockTerminal, MockWrite, Moire,
MW Count, Other 3.0, Puzzle, Reader, Rubik’s
Cube, Sampler, Scrapbook, Scientific Calcula¬
tor, SetFile 3.3, SkipFinder, TheBox, Tiler 1.5,
Trails, Transfer, TrapList, Utils, Word Count,
Zoom Idle.
M9: UTILITY DISK No.2. Bind Icons, Change
Appl. Font, Convert Desk Acc., Desk Accessory
Mover, File Hacker, FontDoubler, Index, Make-
Screen, MicroFinder, Purgelcons, RamAStart
1.3, REdit, ResEd, SelectPaint, Show Version,
User Interface Demo.
M10: GRAPHICS DISK No.1 Amy, ArtistO,
ball demo, Big Ben, Brooke, Bugs, Curves,
Display Message, Dragon, Fighting 51, Fourth
Dimension, GARF, HotSex!, Liar’s Club, Living
Art, Max Headroom, Moire 3.0, Nightmare,
Optical Illusion, Paint Grabber, Painter’s Helper
#1, Pattern*, Pisces, Rotations, Saddle, The
Fourth Docs, ViewPaint 1.5.
Mil: PRINT UTILITIES. Coventry-12, Disk
Labeler, Fast Eddie, Font Mover, Ink, MacWrite
4.5 to Text, miniWriter, MockWrite, Pica-10,
ReadMacWrite, Walla Walla-9.
M12: MACBILLBOARD. Chipmunks, Donald
& daisy, Goofy At Bat, Announcement, Babe
Ruth, Carrotprint, Classic illusions, Escher,
Escher Hands, MacBILLBOARD (MacPaint
clone), Max, Mickey and Minney, mm, Quick
Tour, T-Shirt.
M13: FONT DISK No.1. Akashi, AlgBlurb,
Algebra, Athens, Boxie, Dover, Geneva, Hood
River, ImageWriter, LED, London, Los Angeles,
Luxor, Mars, Monaco, Park Ave, Pica, Ravenna,
Rome, Runes, San Francisco, Seattle, Steel
Brush, Ultra Bodoni.
M14: FONT DISK No.2. Bookman, Courier,
Coventry, Dali, Genevaa, Hebrew, Manteco,
Shadow Box, Sri Lanka, Times, Walla Walla, and
font display 4.6 w/docs.
M15: GAME DISK No.4. Alice, Amps
3.0(B2), Bricks, Canfield 2.0,lago, Lets Get
Tanked!, MacHeads, Nim, Space Attack, Third
Dimension.
Ml6: FONT DISK No.3. About Lachine,
Alice, Avante Garde, Berkeley, Broadway,
Camelot, Cartoon, Centura, Chancery, Eon,
Exeter, Fallingwater, Fantaste Key, Fantaste!,
Future, Ham, Helvitica, Hollywood, Lachine,
Lineal, Madrid, Pittsubrg, San Quentin, Silicon
Valley, Stencil, Unicoi plus DAFont2.da and
SysFonts.da.
Ml7: DUNGEONS OF DOOM 4.0 Graphic
adventure game.
M18: DESK ACCESSORIES No.2. About
Popup.txt, Alarm clock, Art Grapper+, Calcula¬
tor, Choose Scrapbook*, DA File, DA Tester
1.5, Disk Labeler, Disklnfo 1.45 + SICNs,
Explorer, Gone Fishin’, Hex Calc, Label Maker,
MemWindow, MiniWRITER 1.34, Multi-Scrap-
book, MW 4.5 Counter.DA, Popup 1.0, Pro-
Count, ReadiPrinter, Ruler, SFstartup 1.0,
Skipfinder 6.1, Sleep, Stars 1.6, Stars II, Sys-
fonts, TeaTime, Timer.
Ml9: PINBALL CONSTRUCTION SET
GAMES. Pinball Construction Set Player plus
12 Games: Apple, Black Hole, Face, KalinBall,
Madonna, Minute-Mag, Patchwork Mess,
Phantom, Pure-Gemme, Samurai, The Royal
Pain, Wizards Lair.
M20: GAME DISK No.5 Chase Em, Crystal
Raider, Daleks, Golf MacWay, Kill File, Kill,
King, King.MacWrite, On-The-Contrary,
StuntCopterl .2.
M21: GAME DISK No.6. Guess, Hacker’s
Contest, Hot Air Balloon, Match, Ramml.0,
Third Dimension, Trick-Track, Utaan Attack,
Zero Gravity.
M22: GRAPHICS DISK No.2 BlowUp 3 0,
Blowup Notes, CalendarMaker 2.2.1, Dynamo,
Graphic, MadMenus, Math21, Rays, Simutree,
Spiro, Tree, Vanlandingham.
M23: VAMPIRE CASTLE. Graphic adven¬
ture game.
M24: DEEP ANGST. Graphic adventure
game. 1 Mb ST only.
M25: GAME DISK No.7. Billiards, Cross
Master Demo, Flash Cards, Hangman-9.0,
MacLuff, Master Guess, Safari 1.0, Venn.
M26: GRAPHICS DISK No.3 3D Sketch,
AniRama, Bin/Graphics, Brownian Motion,
Control, Fractal Contours, Fractals, Icon Col¬
lector, Julia, MakePaint, Melting Clock, Small
View, ShapeArt, StarFlight, Window Demo.
M27: UTILITY DISK No.3 Browse/Shazam!,
Clocks: analog & digital, Edit, FEdit 3.0, launch,
lazymenu, Magic Beep 1.0, Menu Editor,
microFinder, Quick Dir, Quick Print, Ram-
Start2.0+, Road Atlas, ShrinkToFit, SicnEdit,
SortMenu, SortMenu Code, SuperFinder4.0,
TabsOut, Unpit, WayStation.
M28: RED RYDER 7.0. Red Ryder 7.0, Red’s
7.0 stuff, RR7.0 Macros, RR Docs.
M29: PCS PLAYER No.2. Pinball Construc¬
tion Set Player plus Games: Circus Circus, D
&D , Diadora, Max, Merlin, Modern Mistress,
Queston, The Royal Pain, Twilight Zone,
Whazit.
M30: GAME DISK No.8. Bowl-A-Rama,
MacTrek 1.1, Mystery Box 1.0, Shots, Star Trek
Trivia Quiz, Window Blaster 1.0.
M31: BLACK WIZARD. Graphic adventure
game by Richard Loggins.
M32: FONT DISK No.4. Canberra, Chicago,
Humanistic, Music, New Dali, Palencia Appli¬
cation, Palo Alto, Pioneer Shadow plus F/DA
sorter and Font Tester.
M33: CLIP ART No.1. Aircraft, Business, Car
Logos, Cars & Trucks, Clip Art Demo, Disney,
Eyeballs, Flowers, Misc, Seasons Jreesl,
Trees2, ViewPaint 1.5.
M34: GAME DISK No.9. 1000 Miles,
Asteroids, Cairo ShootOut!, Donkey Doo, Duck
Hunt, Pentel.0.
M35: FONT DISK No.5. Beehive, Beverly
Hills, Boise, Chicago, Courier, DeStijl, Ham,
Happy Canyon, Helvitica, Mod. Chicago, Old
English, Square Serrif, Sri Lanka, Worksheet.
M36: CASTLE OF ERT. Shareware graphic
adventure game.
M37: MAC-A-MUG PRO DEMO. Version
1.0, Create your own mug shots by combining a
variety of different facial features.
M38: VIDEO WORKS PLAYER #1. PD
player for Video works animated screens. In¬
cludes 11 movies.
M39: DEMO DISK #2. Demos of Anatomiser
(learn human anatomy), DeskPaint (desk acc
MacPaint clone), and SuperPaint (graphic pro¬
gram with both MacPaint and MacDraw fea¬
tures).
M40: HACK, Version 1.03. Game is similar to
Rogue, includes manual with full docs.
M41: RADICAL CASTLE. Graphic/text
adventure game.
M42: FONT DISK No.6. 15 new fonts: Berlin,
Boston II, Courier, Dorza, Highwood, MicroBos-
ton, MiniBoston, New York, Palo Alto, Sparta,
Stiletto, Symbol, Tatooine, Venice, Wartburg.
M43: UTILITIES No.4. DiskDup*, MacSnoop
1.03, RamDisk* 1.4, ResTools 2.01, Oasis 2.01
(HFS), Font Librarian (HFS), Switch.
M44: FONT DISK No.7. 18 new fonts: 42nd
Street, Aldous, Art Deco, Ascii, Blockbuster,
Border, Clairvaux with docs, Coptic, Deep Box,
Ivy League, Klingon, Las Vagas, Little Box,
Madrid, Memphis, Minneapolis, Rivendell,
Spokane.
M45: GAME DISK No. 10 Blackjack 4 0,
Gunshy 1.0, Humpback, New Social Climber,
Panic, Puzzle 1.0, Star Trek Trivia Quiz, Video
Poker.
M46: DA DISK No. 2. 35 DAs: 3D Tic-
Tac-Toe, A-Bus ID Poker, Abacus, Calendar,
CheapPaint, Collapse, ConCode, Crabs2,
DAFile, DAFont, Disp.Msg, Double Apple, Exe¬
cutive Decision, FatMouse, FixPic2.0, Flow, Fun
House, Func Keys, Font, Idle, KeyMouse,
KnockOut, Multi-Scrap, MW to Text, New
MiniDos, Orig Clock, PaintDA, Poker, ProCount,
Ruler, Titerl.5, Time!ogger2.11, Utilities, Wrap,
WXModem, Sample It.
M47: GRAPHICS No.4. Cursor Designer,
Earthplot3.0, Graphics2.0, Mondrianl.0,
MotionMaker2.0, Moving Finger, Wallpaper,
Zoomation.
M48D: HYPERSTACKS No.1 Address,
Databook, Fractal, Funy Day, Home Desk,
HyperNews 1.2, HyperZoetropes, MacGallery,
MacVermont #2, Notebook, Periodic Table, and
ResEditIPS. (Double-Sided)
M49D: HYPERSTAKCS No.2 Ear, Illusions,
Passing Notes, Shipstack, Silly, and US States
V2. (Double-Sided) NOTE M48 and M49 require
HyperDA and some form of DA tester (Sample
It! on M46 or DA Tester 1.5 on M8 or M18).
M50: FONTS #8. Alderney 9-48; Cairo 18;
Cyrillic 12; Greek 10,20; Paint 18; Playbill
12,18,24; Rehovot 10,12,20,24; Runes 12,24;
Washington 12; Zodiac 18.
M51: GAME DISK NO. 11. Bouncing Balls,
Fire Zone, Mac Word Hunt 2.0, Out Flank, Risk
and Word Search.
Page 70
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
NOV ATARI XL/XE PUBLIC DOMAIN LIBRARY
The price for mail orders is $3 per
disk plus $1 for postage and
handling for every 3 disks. Send
checks, payable to NOV ATARI, to
Alan Friedman, 5951 Heritage
Square Drive, Burke, VA 22015.
Any user group librarians who are
willing to trade library disks write
or call Roy Brooks, 4020 Travis
Parkway, Annadale, VA. 22003,
phone 703 750 0146. We trade
with groups all over the world.
Demos
1: Miscellaneous
2: Movie Maker Clips
3: Heavy Metal Art
4: Miscellaneous
5: Desktop DOS + Demos
6: VizPics
7: Mandelbrot factal graphics
8: Hitchhiker’s Guide to Galaxy
9: WIZARD ofOZ
10: Adventurers Companion
Education
1: Mathematics
2: Primary Language
3: Teachers’ Toolbox
4: Word Builder 1.0
5: Animated stories
6: Geography
7: Bio+Chem with touch typing
8: Basic Math
9: Higher Math and Language
10: The Cell
11: Spelling Bee
12: Math Game
13: Word Games
Games
1: Text Adventures I
2: Gambling
3: Simulations
4: Mazes
5: Parlour Games
6: Graphics
7: Action! Games
8: Arcade Look-A-Likes
9: Text Adventures II
10: Text Adventures III
11: Surf’s Up
12: Ski King
13:20 BASIC Games
14: Super Quiz A & B
15: Two Graphic Adventure Games
16: Space Lords
17: Pinball Games
18: Machine Language Games
19: Dandy Dungeon
Language
1: Fig-FORTH
2: ACTION! source codes
(cf. GAMES 7)
3: ACTION! Graphic Demos
4: ACTION! Utility Programs
5: ACTION! Modules #1
6: ACTION! Modules #2
7: BASIC XL-REF Base
8: ACTION! Modules #3
9: KERMIT telecom
10: TURBO BASIC
11: Pascal Sampler
12: Searcher XL Turbo
13: Turbo Basic for 400/800
14: C Language
Music
1: TV/MOVIE Themes
2: ROCK
3: JAZZ
4: BASIC with animation
5: Arns Player: 12 Rock Songs
6: Ams Player: 14 Movie/Video
Themes
7: Ams Player: 16 Oldies
8: Ams Player: 18 Classics
9: Ram130 AMS Beetles’ Songs
10: MUSIC COMPOSER Songs
11 Pokey Player
12: M usic Major
Utiiiity
1: MISCELLANEOUS introduction
2: Printers
3: DOS 2.5
4: Directory & Label Printer
5: Graphics Trilogy
6: Copymate XE
7: SCOPY sector copier
8: Translator Disk
9:256K Upgrade
10: Daisy-Dot NLQ
11: Dos 2.6
12: MACHDOS2.1
13: Print Shop Editor
14: Easy Find
15: Print Shop Icons
16: TEXTPRO 1.1
17: Print Shop Icons
18: Touch Edit
19: DOS 4.0
20: Graphics
21:130XE upgrades + Utilities
22: HI-RES130 (graphics)
23: Rainbow DOS
24: Font Master
25:3-D CAD
26: Adelaide Symbolic Disassem¬
bler
27: DB’s & Spreadsheet
28: Graphic Utilities & Pics
29: String Magic
30: Print Shop Icons
31: Hacker’s Toolkit
32: Weekly Scheduler
33: Textpro 2.5r (telecom)
34: Print Shop Utility
35: Monitor/Debugger
36: Diet & Nutrition
37: General Ledger
38: Super Copiers
39: Atari Writer Drivers
Telecommunications
1:850 Interface
2:835/1030 Modem
3: MPP Modem
4A: AMODEM 7.2
5A&B Chameleon Terminal Emu¬
lator
6:1030&850 Express (3.0 & 2.1)
7: Data Comm
8: AMIS XM10 BBS program
9: AMODEM 7.4 + Rverter
10: Forem XE
June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 71
NOVATARI
Northern VA Atari Users’ Group
President.G.Weatherhead.703-938-4829
VP-ST.. Ian Charters. 703-845-7578
VP-8BIT.Alan Friedman.703-425-0575
Treasurer.Curt Sandler.703-734-9533
Secretary.Edmund Bedsworth .703-536-5958
Membership. Earl Lilley.703-281-9017
Prg. Chr. XL/XE . Randy Ingalsbe.703-644-0159
.NinaKraucunas.703-250-3572
Prg. Chr. ST.Jim Stevenson
.Duane Shie.703-430-9693
Telecom SIG.Ed Seward.703-573-3044
MS-DOS SIG... Mike Gibbons.703-440-0379
KID SIG.Ted Rabenko.703-437-5221
Sysop-Armudic Ted Bell.703-455-5312
Sysop-WAACE Ed Seward.703-573-3044
LIBRARY-8-BIT Roy Brooks.703-750-0146
MAIL.Al Friedman.703-425-0575
LIBRARY-ST.... Bob Bell.301-593-0889
.Glen Bernstein.703-455-6053
HOTLINE.Andrea Bonham. 703-534-3503
Atarifest ’88.Gary Purinton.703-476-8391
ARMUDIC.
.2400B.
. 703-573-9219
BBS.
.2400B.
. 703-573-9216
.300/1200B.
. 703-573-9208
.300/1200B.
. 703-573-9207
New Members: Dues are $20/year/family which
includes a subscription to CURRENT NOTES and
access to more activities. Join at the main meeting or at
a chapter meeting or by sending $20, payable to
NOVATARI, to Earl Lilley, 821 Ninovan Rd.SE, Vienna,
VA22180.
Novatari Main meeting meets the second
Sunday of the month at the Washington Gas Light
Building, 6801 Industrial RD, Springfield, VA. Take 495
to east on Braddock Rd. (620) to south on Backlick
Rd.(617). Left on Industrial Rd. Washington GasLight is
the second building on the right. 5:30 Telecom SIG;
6:15 announcements, open forum, door prizes; 6:45
VAST and 8BIT SIG meetings. M.Vernon/Hybla
Valley, 1st Thursday, 7:30 Contact Ron Peters at
780-0963. Sterling, Sterling Library, 7:30-9:30, 1st
Wed. Contact Milo Flagel at 471-5273.
BBS: Access to the BBS’ requires a fee in addition
to the dues. This fee is $5/year for NOVATARI members
and $7.50 for members of other WAACE clubs, $10 for
other nonWAACE users. BBS access fees are to be
made payable to “NOVATARI” and sent to: Ed Seward,
PO Box 541, Vienna, VA 22180.
President’s Report
ARMUDIC contest winner will be announced at
June 12th meeting. 2400 baud modem will be
awarded.
New names have been added to the "Hot List"
since it was published in the April issue. Ken says he
has had calls from as far away as Texas and California
from the April listing. When California Atarians call east
coast instead of Atari west coast UGs, we wonder.
Congratulations to the new Atari Computer Divi¬
sion’s newsletter Atari User Group News. It will come
monthly to the representative of each User Group to
help us keep abreast of the UG news, new develop¬
ments, and technical information. (Look for my
condensations on ARMUDIC.) From reading the first
issue by editor Elizabeth Shook it is not clear whether
8-bit is to be included in the Atari Computer division or
whether it has been downgraded to the Atari Games
Division. Let it be known that NOVATARI’s 8-bitters are
serious computer users, and should be included. I
spoke to Elizabeth and she is investigating.
A.U.R.A.
Atari Users Regional Association
President.
.. Steven Rudolph.
301-464-0835
8-bit VP.
.. BobLangsdale.
301-390-6554
16-bit VP.
... James Bonbright.Jr..
301-933-4891
Treasurer.
.. Bob Brock.
301-268-2554
Membership...
.. Dave van Allen.
301-593-4654
8-bit Libr.
...Wayne Heiden.
301-330-0130
16-bit Libr.
.. Herb Lane.
202-332-3618
Equipment.
.. Jesse Ayer.
.301-345-1592
Facilities.
.. Richard Stoll.
301-946-8435
Used Equip....
.. Lincoln Hallen.
.301-460-5060
* AURA Has New Meeting Place *
Meetings - Beginning June 16th, we will be
meeting in the Multipurpose room at the GRACE
EPISCOPAL SCHOOL in Kensington Maryland. Grace
Episcopal School is located on Connecticut Avenue,
1/4 mile north of the Connecticut Avenue (North) exit,
on the east side of the street. We will continue to meet
on the third Thursday of the month. Library sales begin
at 7:00, the meeting begins at 7:30. We will continue
having separate XL and ST demonstrations. DOOR!!!!
Correspondence. All correspondence, including
membership renewals, changes of address, etc.
should be sent to: AURA, P. O. Box 7761, Silver Spring,
MD 20910. AURA cannot guarantee CURRENTNOTES
subscription fulfillment unless the member provides
written confirmation of address changes, renewals, etc.
to the address given above.
New Members. Dues are $20/year and include
subscription to CURRENT NOTES. Send name,
address, phone number, and check to above address.
April Meeting. The meeting theme was graphics
output. Bob Brock and Line Hallen demonstrated
some of the XLent line of software products producing
enhanced text and pictures. Steve Rudolph demon¬
strated a color inkjet printer with DEGAS and Maps &
Legends showing that hi-rez, vibrant color, the major
feature of the ST, is useful for more than games. Both
demonstrations were wellattended and ran over the
Page 72
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
scheduled time.
All attendees were given questionnaires to com¬
plete. These forms will give the officers the information
on the members equipment, uses and interests;
valuable information to be used for planning future
meetings. We will have copies at the next couple of
meetings for those who missed the April meeting.
Herb Lane (16-bit Librarian) has made good
progress in developing a database for our PD library.
This will make it much easier to close in on those disks
that contain the desired files.
Door prizes were given and again were well-
received. This month we gave out a videotape, joystick
adapters, and diskettes. Do to popular demand, we’ll
continue door prizes for awhile.
N.C.A.U.G.
National Capital Atari Users’ Group
President.Peter Kilcullen.202-296-5700
Vice President.. Mike Poliak.703-768-7669
Treasurer.Allen H. Lerman.301-460-0289
XL/XE Librarian Mike Poliak. 703-768-7669
ST Librarian.Enrique Seale.202-295-0112
Meetings: 3rd Tuesday, 5:30 - 8:30 pm, room
543, National Science Foundation offices, 1800 G St.,
NW, Washington, DC. Closest subway stop is Farragut
West on the Blue and Orange lines. Building is
identified by sign for Madison National Bank on the
corner. Front entrance is on west side of 18th between
F and G.
New Members: Membership dues are $20 and
include a subscription to CURRENT NOTES. Join at the
meeting or send check, payable to NCAUG, to Allen
Lerman, 14905 Waterway Dr, Rockville, MD 20853.
W.A.C.U.G.
Woodbridge Atari Computer Users’ Group
President. LouPraino.703-221-8193
First VP.ArnieTurk.703-670-2547
16Bit VP. Darrell Stiles.703-494-9819
8-Bit Board Rep Stan Rupert. 703-670-3338
ST VP. Bill Parker..703-680-3941
ST Board Rep... Bill Brooks.703-895-5404
Treasurer.Chris Moore.703-670-5143
Secretary.Frank Bassett. 703-670-8780
Librarian.Mike Stringer.703-791-3331
Past President.. Jack Holtzhauer.703-670-6475
Meetings: 7-10PM, Community Room, Potomac
Branch, Prince William County Library, Opitz Blvd.,
Woodbridge, VA. Entering Woodbridge from either
North or South on Route 1, proceed to the intersection
of Route 1 and Opitz Blvd. (opposite Woodbridge
Lincoln-Mercury). Turn West on Opitz and take first left
turn into the library’s parking lot. The Community Room
is located to your left immediately upon entering the
main building. Meeting Dates: Feb. 9, Mar. 8, Apr. 19,
May 10, June 13.
New Members: Initial membership fee is $10/yr
plus $1 monthly dues. Membership includes a sub¬
scription to CURRENTNOTES. Join at meeting or send
check, payable to WACUG, to Frank W. Bassett, 15313
Blacksmith Terr, Woodbridge, VA 22191.
S.M.A.U.G.
So. Maryland Atari Users’ Group
President.Terry Daniels.301-292-7594
Secretary. Fred Brown.301-645-4009
Treasurer.Samuel Schrinar.301-843-7916
Newsletter Ed ... Leroy Olson.301-743-2200
Librarian.Sherwood Conner.... 301-292-5752
Meetings: 2nd Thursday, 7:30 pm, John Hanson
Middle School in Waldorf, MD. Traveling thru Waldorf
either east or west on Rt 5, exit on Vivian Adams
located 200 ft west of Waldorf Carpets & Draperies and
directly across from the Village Square sign.
New Members: Membership dues are $20 and
include a subscription to CURRENT NOTES. Join at the
meeting or send check, payable to SMAUG, to Sam
Schrinar, 2032 Alehouse Court, Waldorf, MD 20601.
F.A.C.E.
Frederick Atari Comp Enthusiasts
President.Chris Rietman.301-663-0325
Vice President.. Mike Kerwin.301 -845-4477
Treasurer. Buddy Smallwood.... 717-485-4714
Librarian.Jason Harmon.301 -663-1176
Secretary.Wilson Small.301-845-2370
Bulletin Board.301-865-5569
Meetings: 4th Tuesday, 7 - 9:30 pm, Walkersville
High School, MD Route 194, one mile north of MD
Route 26 (Liberty Road).
New Members: Dues are $25/year/family and
include a subscription to CURRENT NOTES. Join at
meeting or send check, payable to FACE, to Buddy
Smallwood, PO Box 2026, Frederick, MD 21701.
M.A.C.C.
Maryland Atari Computer Club
President.Jim Hill.301-461-7556
Vice-President DanHonick.301-356-6453
Treasurer.John Cromwell.301-356-6453
Secretary.Bob Brent.301 -254-3896
8-bit Librarian.. Cam Whetstone.301 -486-2609
ST Librarian.CVharles Smeton.(none)
Newsletter EditorTim Caldwell.301-687-1413
Meetings are held on the last Tuesday of every
month at 6:30 pm at the Pikesville Library located 1 mile
east on Reisterstown Rd, Exit 20 off the Baltimore
beltway. Turn left into parking lot atthe fifth traffic light.
New Members. Club dues are $22 per year, and
include a subscription to Current Notes. Join at the
meeting or mail check, payable to M.A.C.C., to James
Hill, 8591 Wheatfield Way, Ellicott City, MD 21043.
June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 73
Time to RENEW???
If your label shows 8806, this June
issue is your last. Renew Now!!!
CLASSIFIED ADS
Classified ads are free to subscribers
of CURRENT NOTES ($0.10/wordfor
others). Send your ad to CN CLAS-
S/F/ED, 122 N Johnson Rd., Sterl¬
ing, VA22170.
FOR SALE: GFA BASIC (Interpre¬
ter) for the ST; Swiftcalc (Timeworks)
for the ST; Tandy CM5 Color Monitor
(TTL RGB). Best offer for each or all
three. Call Robert Vider at 301-
464-2778 (evenings and weekends)
or 202-371-1211 (work-days).
ATARI 520ST for sale, with color
monitor, 1 disk drive, Star SG-10
printer and a lot of software, includ¬
ing Publishing Partner, Thunder, and
more, $700. Also, an Amdek Color 1
composite monitor, best reasonable
offer. Call 301-949-7356.
CURRENT NOTES REGISTERED CLUBS
LIST OF ADVERTISERS
Classified Ads.. 74
A&D Software 503/476-0071.... 41
A&M Entrpr 800/342-4514. 59
AccuSoft. 25
ACA 301/948-0256. 7
Avant-Garde 904/221 -2904. 2
Cal Com Inc. 301/933-3074. 19
Comp Success 401/751-0038.. 67
Current Notes ST Library. 68
D&P 216/926-3842 . 63
Diskcovery 703/536-5040 . 3
Electronic Clinic 301/656-7983 14
The Faster Disk. 44
Hi-Tech Advisers.813/294-1885 51
Index Legalis Publishing. 45
Irata Verlag 303/596-0135 . 67
Joppa 301/679-5517 . 51
L&Y 703/643-1729. 75
Mars 312/530-0988. 67
Migraph 800/223-3729 . 57
Novatari XL/XE Library. 71
One Stop 217/337-7867 . 43
Patnor 915/598-1048 . 55
Proco Products 401/568-8459. 27
Sideline 800/888/9273. 23
Solar Powered 602/899-6992... 11
ST Informer. 15
Toad 301/544-6943. 62
WordPerfect 801/225-5000. 76
Members of registered clubs can
subscribe to CN at the discount rate
($17/year). To add your club to the
list, send in an initial subscription list
of 10% of the membership or 6
members whichever is less. For
more info, contact Joe Waters, 122
N. Johnson Rd., Sterling, VA 22170.
Note: ACE=Atari Computer Enthu¬
siasts and AUG=Atari User Group.
ALABAMA: Huntsville AUG, 3911 W.
Crestview, Huntsville 35816 205-534-1815.
ARKANSAS: Little Rock Atari Addicts, 28
John Hancock Cir, Jacksonville 72076 501-
985-2131.
CALIFORNIA: Atari Bay Area Computer
Users Society, PO Box 22212, San Fran¬
cisco 94122 415-753-8483. Long Beach
ACE, 1667 E. Plymouth St, Long Beach 90805
213-423-2758. San Diego ACE, PO Box
203076, San Diego 92120 619-224-8975.
Santa Maria/Lompac ACE, 608 N. Pierce,
Santa Maria 93454 805-925-9390.
CONNECTICUT: AUG of Greater Hart¬
ford, 503-B East Center St, Manchester
06040.
FLORIDA: Atari Boosters League East,
P.O. Box 1172, Winter Park 32790.
ILLINOIS: Central Illinois Atari Users
Group, 1920 East Croxton Ave, Bloomington
61701-5702 309-828-4661. Lake County
ACE, PO Box 8788, Waukegan 60079 312-
623-9567.
INDIANA: Atari Lovers of Uliana Equaled
by None, PO Box 2953, Gary 46403 219-
663-5117. LCC/ST, Karl Werner, Eli Lilly Corp
Cntr, Indianapolis 46285 317-276-3020.
IOWA: Midwest Atari Group-lowa
Chapter, PO Box 1982, Ames IA 50010
515-232-1252.
KANSAS: Ft. Leavenworth Atari Group,
PO Box 3233, Ft Leavenworth 66027 913-
651-5631. Wichita ACE, 1722 N. Murray,
Wichita 67212316-722-1078.
KENTUCKY: Atari Exchange of Louis¬
ville, PO BOX 34183, Louisville 40232.
MARYLAND: Nameless AUG, 3475
Manassas Ct, Davidsonville 21035 301-798-
0566.
MASSACHUSETTS: Acton-Boxborough
Atari Computer Users Society, PO Box
1523, Westford 01886 617-937-8046.
MICHIGAN: Michigan Atari General In¬
formation Conference, 28111 Imperial Dr,
BOX M, Warren 48093-4281 313-978-8432.
MISSOURI: ACE St Louis, PO Box 6783, St.
Louis, MO 63144. Warrensburg/Whiteman
Atari Computer Owners, PO Box 199,
Warrensburg 64093 816-747-2543.
NEW YORK: Atari Computer Owners of
Rochester NY, PO Box 23676, Rochester
14692 716-334-5820. Rockland Atari Com¬
puter Users Group, 29 Riverglen Dr., Thiells,
NY 10984 914-429-5283.
N. CAROLINA: Charlotte AUG, PO Box
240313, Charlotte 28224 704-366-4320. Peid-
mont Triad AUG, Rt. 9, Box 2740, Reidsville
27320. Triangle Computer Club, Rt. 3, Box
760, Hillsborough 27278 919-942-2764.
OHIO: Cleveland ACE, 5482 Beacon Hill Ct,
Seven Hills 44131 216-749-4853.
PENNSYLVANIA: Allentown Bethlehem
Easton’s ACE, PO Box 2830, Lehigh Valley
18001 BBS 215-759-2683. Spectrum Atari
Group of Erie, PO Box 10562, Erie 16514
814-833-4073. Southcentral PA ACE, PO
Box 11446, Harrisburg 17108-1446 717-761-
3755.
TENNESSEE: Knoxville AUG, 953
Roderick Rd, Knoxville 37923 615-693-4542.
TEXAS: DACE, Rachel Duke, 5902 Preston
oaks Rd, #1005, Dallas 75240 214-3656-4320.
Dallas ACE, 5902 Preston Oaks Rd, #1005,
Dallas 75240 214-404-8569. ST Atari
League of San Antonio, 3203 Coral Grove
Dr, San Antonio 78247 512-496-5635.
VIRGINIA: Greater Richmond Atari Sup¬
port Program, 1420 Yale Ave, Richmond
23224 804-233-6155. Southside Tidewater
Atari Tech Users Society, 5245 Shenstone
Circle, VA Beach 23455 804-464-2100.
WASHINGTON: Seattle Puget Sound
ACE, PO Box 110576, Tacoma 98411-0576.
WISCONSIN: Packerland Atari Com¬
puter Users Society, 339 S. Maple St,
Kimberly 54136 414-788-1058.
DeskJet Pages in this issue: 8,9,10,28,30
Current Notes Subscription Rates
Current Notes annual subscription rate is $20 ($36 for 2
years). Foreign subscriptions are $35/year for SURFACE mail.
AIR MAIL rates: Canada/Mexico, $37; Cent. America, Carib¬
bean, $47; S. America, Europe, N. Africa, $57; Middle East,
Africa, Asia, Australia, $67. All foreign subscriptions are
payable in US dollars drawn on a US bank.
Send check, payable to Current Notes, to CN Subscriptions,
122 N. Johnson Rd., Sterling, VA 22170.
Page 74
CURRENT NOTES
June 1988
ATARI 8-BIT
HARDWARE
130XE. CALL
65XE. CALL
XF551. CALL
XM301 MODEM. 49.99
U.S. DOUBLER. 29.99
HAPPY DRIVE FOR 1050. 129.99
NEWELL 256K UPGRADE. 94.99
INSTALLED. 115.99
RAMBO XL 256K UPGRADE. 39.99
P.R. CONNECTION. 59.99
PRINTER OR MODEM CABLE. 12.99
XETEC PRINTER INTERFACE. 39.99
XEP 80 80COLUMN FOR800X& 130XE.. 72.99
ATARI STANDARD JOYSTICKS. 7.99
LANGUAGES
LIGHT SPEED C
NEW & EXCITING. 34.99
OSS ACTION. 49.99
OSS BASIC XL. 49.99
OSS BASIC XE. 49.99
OSS MAC 65. 49.99
WORDPROCESSORS
XLENT’S HOT PRODUCT
FIRST WORDPROCESSOR. 24.99
ATARIWRITER(CART). 29.99
ATARIWRITER PLUS. 39.99
PAPERCLIP. 39.99
BUSINESS APPLICATION
SYNCALC. 32.99
SYNFILE. 32.99
B-GRAPH. 29.99
SILENT BUTLER. 19.99
LONG AWAITED NEWS ROOM. 39.99
TEACHER’S GRADEBOOK. 34.99
GAMES
GAUNTLET. 27.99
GAUNTLET DEEPR DUNGEON. 19.99
ONE-ON-ONE(CART). 19.99
ATARI ST
HARDWARE
520 ST WITH MONOCHROME
WIT H COLOR MONITOR CALL
1040 ST WITH MONOCHROME FOR
WITH COLOR MONITOR PRICES
RAM UPGRADE (INSTALLED)
CALL FOR MEMORY SIZE NEEDED
SUPRA harddisk 20 MBYTE.549.99
30 MBYPTE.... CALL
60 MBYTE.CALL
ST CABLE RS232C OR CENTRONIC. each9.99
MAGIC SAC PLUS. 129.99
MAGIC SAC ROMS. 39.99
ATARI SF314 DOUBLE-SIDED. 209.99
FUTURE GTS-100. 219.99
COMPUTER EYES VIDEO DIGITIZER... 169.99
LANGUAGES
GFA BASIC SUPPORTS GEM WELL. 49.99
GFA BASIC COMPILER. 49.99
MEGAMAX C. 159.99
MARK WILLIAMS C. 129.99
AC FORTRAN. 129.99
ASSEM-PRO. 44.99
WORDPROCESSORS
WORD WRITER TIME WORKS. 49.99
WORD PERFECT. 199.99
FIRST WORD PLUS. 89.99
MICROSOFT WRITE. 99.99
PUBLISHING PARTNER. 69.99
PUBLISHING ST. 89.99
DATABASES
DATA MANAGER TIME WORKS. 49.99
SUPER BASE. 89.99
DBMAN 4.0. 189.99
WE FIX ATARI COMPUTERS
SPECIAL OF THE MONTH
ATARI STARTER LAB & LIGHT MODULE FOR $29.99
REGENT WORD II FOR $19.99
L&Y ELECTRONICS INC.
(703) 494-3444 13644C JEFFERSON DAVIS HWY.
METRO 643-1729 WOODBRIDGE, VIRGINIA 22191
PRICES ARE SUBJECT TO CHANGE
IN STOCK ONLY-SALE ENDS JULY 15,1988
ATARI SERVICE
AUTHORIZED SINCE 1982
NO CREDIT CARD SURCHARGE
ACCEPTED MASTER
CHARGE, VISA, CHOICE
June 1988
CURRENT NOTES
Page 75
If you’re looking for software that takes full advantage of your
Atari’s capabilities while providing an extensive range of features,
look no further.
WordPerfect offers the power you need with features like Col¬
umns, Indexing, Merge, Macros, Speller, andThesaurus. You’ll
find them useful for everything from simple memos to complex
reports. All features are easily accessed using the Atari mouse
and pull-down menus, or WordPerfect’s standard keystrokes.
WordPerfect’s GEM-based design taps the Atari’s resources with
ready access to desktop accessories, full color adjustment for
color monitors, a definable mouse pointer and cursor, and the
ability to move and size up to four windows. And WordPerfect
is written in assembly language to take full advantage of the
Atari’s speed.
WordPerfect Corporation offers Atari users the stability of a
proven product, produced by a reliable leader in software man¬
ufacturing. With full documentation, toll-free customer support,
and free software upgrades, your investment will be profitable
for years to come.
Expand your options with WordPerfect - the most powerful word
processor you can buy for the Atari ST. For a demonstration,
contact your local dealer.
WordPerfect
CORPORATION
1555 N. Technology Way • Orem, UT 84057
Tel: (801) 225-5000 • Telex: 820618 • FA£: (801) 227-4288
WordPerfect is a registered trademark of WordPerfect Corporation. All other products and brand
names are registered trademarks or trademarks of their respective companies.
