[HEA] _____________________ ___ _ |___ ______________| | | | | | | _ | | | | | || | | | | | | || | | | | | | || | | | ____ _ _ _ _ ______ | | | || | | | / __ \ | | / \_/ \ | ___ \ | | | || |__ ____ | | / / \ | | /\ /\ \ | | \ \ | | | || _ \ | _ \ | | \ \__/ | | | |_|| | | |__/ / | | | || | | || |_|| | | \___/|_| |_| |_| | ____/ |_| | || | | || |__ | |____________________ | | _ |__||_| |_|\____/ |________________________| | | |_| | | Lighting Your Apple II Path On Delphi | | |_| >>> WELCOME TO THE LAMP! <<< ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SIZZLING SHAREWARE: FontPimp 1.0 AND THE BEST OF THE A2 AND A2PRO MESSAGE BOARDS "Teaching the Apple II user how to fish since 1998" :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: The Lamp! An Onipa'a Software Production Vol. 2, No. 2 :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: Publisher & Editor.......................Ryan M. Suenaga, M.S.W., L.S.W. Internet Email....................................thelamp@sheppyware.net :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: TABLE OF CONTENTS ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ February 15, 1999 OPENING PITCH State Of The II, 1999 ------------------------------------------ [OPN] A FUNNY THING HAPPENED [FOR] The Heat Is On ------------------------------------------------- [HET] Miscellanea [MSC] Rumor Mill ----------------------------------------------------- [RMR] Public Postings [PUB] Best Of The Best ----------------------------------------------- [BOB] A2Pro_DUCTIVITY Checking out A2PRO on Delphi ----------------------------------- [A2P] SIZZLING SHAREWARE FontPimp 1.0 --------------------------------------------------- [SIZ] EXTRA INNINGS About The Lamp! ------------------------------------------------ [INN] [*] [*] [*] READING THE LAMP! The index system used by The Lamp! is designed to make """"""""""""""""" your reading easier. To use this system, load this issue into any word processor or text editor. In the index you will find something like: EXTRA INNINGS About The Lamp! ------------------------------------------------ [INN] To read this article, simply use your search or find command to locate [INN]. There is a similar tag at the end of each article: [EOA]. :: DISCUSSED ON DELPHI :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: : : : We just act as mentors toward each other until : : there's just one person standing. : : : :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: D_CUFF ::::::::: [EOA] [OPN]------------------------------ OPENING PITCH | ----------------------------------- From The Editor """"""""""""""" by Ryan M. Suenaga, B.A., M.S.W., L.S.W. [thelamp@sheppyware.net] STATE OF THE II, 1999 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Last month I declared that it was time for the Apple II Community to seize the day like we did in the late 1970's, my point being that _GSoft BASIC_ gave us the tool we needed to do just that. This month, it's still time to seize the day--this time by voting with our wallets for the continued development of Apple II products. It's now been 22 years since the Apple II was first sprung on an unexpecting world--a virtual generation of computer users has been raised on this most humble of platforms. At every turn, you'll still find those who use the II (or used the II) in every aspect of life. Today, the teenagers of yesteryear who hacked 8-bits in the Monitor of the Apple //e are system administrators at Internet Service Providers, and authors of Apple II software from the early 1980's are putting out packages for the Macintosh or Windows. Those of us with an Apple II in our past find that the skills we learned back then have translated well in the information age of today. The future of the Apple II is now assured, thanks to the work of F.E. Systems. _Bernie ][ The Rescue_ and _Sweet 16_ will run on the two major hardware platforms available today, with abilities mostly equal to (and speed far in excess of) even the most hot rodded Apple IIgs around. So do we honor the Apple IIs of our past and ensure the Apple IIs of our future--but what of the present? We stand at a crossroads with the Apple II--again. 1998 could have been the year of the Apple II comeback--and in fact, we had enough new and exciting software (at least for the Apple IIgs) to make it so. But it wasn't. Almost a year ago in this publication, I wrote these words: "The hard questions beg to be asked: if 2,000 Apple IIgs users on the 'Net can download the most highly anticipated game in recent memory, why don't we have more subscribers to _Shareware Solutions II_ or _Juiced.GS_? Why is _The Apple Blossom_ ending its run? Why are our shareware authors struggling to justify another Apple II project? Sadly, while the Apple II appears alive on the 'Net, its vital signs elsewhere appear weak. "Still, two thousand downloads is an exciting number, and hopefully those two thousand files translate into two thousand excited Apple II users who will keep the faith well into the next century and do what they need to do to keep Apple II support alive. "In the meantime, I'll continue to check for vital signs from time to time, and keep an eye out for other signs of Apple II Life on the 'Net." Those other signs of Apple II life stayed weak. Since the time I wrote those words, we've had a large influx of new and exciting products (introductions were centered largely around KansasFest)--from freeware and shareware to commercial software to reclassifications of classic favorites. Yet almost a year later, the Apple II marketplace continues to struggle. Those Apple II developers and publishers who continue to produce software and hardware do so mostly as a labor of love, but without enough financial support to keep them in business, how long will that last? Will we learn from the lessons that the last year has taught us? There's still time to seize the day. Make 1999 the year that 1998 could have been--the year of the Apple II comeback. [*] [*] [*] Guess I'll Pack My Bags And Run Away Department: Kevin Noonan, aka GSWOMBAT@delphi.com produced a fabulous little printed newsletter called _Apple II Update_, based in Australia. I was lucky enough to get a few issues and was thoroughly entertained by it. Sadly, the January 1999 issue was the last. Although it was little-known outside of Australia, it will definitely be missed. Thanks, Kevin. For everything. [*] [*] [*] This Just In Department: Per Devin Reade, Head Geek and Tool Push, the long-awaited GNO 2.0.6 has just been released! Head over to http://www.gno.org/~gno to take a look. We'll try to have some GNO coverage next month. [*] [*] [*] Blatant Plugs 'R Us Department: Time for your monthly dose of KansasFest information. For the most fun you won't sleep through, follow the Yellow Brick Road to KansasFest 1999, being held from July 21-25 on the campus of Avila College in Kansas City, Missouri. Registration information is coming soon, and you can get the news hot off the press at the KFest Home Page (http://www.kfest.org). It's time. Take the present of the Apple II in your hands. And I'll see you in a month. Ryan thelamp@sheppyware.net ASCII ART BEGINS _________ _ _ _ |__ __| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |___ ____ | | _____ __ ___ _ _ _____ | | | | | ___ \ / __ \ | | /____ \ | v v | | v ___ \ | | | | | | | | | /__\ \ | | ____| | | /\ /\ | | / \ \ | | | | | | | | | _____| | | / ___ | | || || | | | | | |_| | | | | | | | |_____ | |____ | |__| | | || || | | \___/ / _ |_| |_| |_| \______| |______| \____^_| |_||_||_| | |\____/ |_| | | | | |_| ASCII ART ENDS [EOA] [OPN]------------------------------ A FUNNY THING HAPPENED. . . . | ----------------------------------- Checking out A2 on Delphi """"""""""""""""""""""""" by Ryan M. Suenaga, B.A., M.S.W., L.S.W. [thelamp@sheppyware.net] * The Heat Is On * Miscellanea * Rumor Mill * Public Postings * Best Of The Best THE HEAT IS ON """""""""""""" [*] General Chatter ....... Apple Manuals Online? [*] Entertainment Software ....... SMB and SSII? [*] Telecommunications ....... Using Delphi As An ISP [*] General Chatter ....... Fine Tuning Harmonie MISCELLANEA """"""""""" ZIP ACCELERATOR UTILITIES MAKE IT INTO A2 Good news! I found out today """"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""" that we =do= have permission to upload the Zip accelerator utilities disk to our Database. To make life easier on everyone, I'm going to apply Greg Templeman's freely available patches to the Zip CDev and CDA (which are buggy in their original form) and upload the files as a disk archive. This is necessary because the installer program requires a specific disk name, which can only be preserved by archiving the entire disk. Look for it in a few days. - Tony Ward, A2 Database Manager (TONYW1, 19754, GO COM A2) NOW THAT I CAN TELNET, WHERE DO I GO? You could try: """"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""" lost-gonzo.com This is a BBS that you can telnet to and one of the "doors" on the BBS will connect you to a IIgs running Apple II BBS software. You need to sign up for an account but it only took a day for me to get mine. Heck, the sysop even called me (long distance I might add) when he saw me having problems logging on one night. Mind you, the problem wasn't with his BBS but was due to me beta testing Marinetti. :-) Jeff Blakeney - Dean of the Apple II University in A2Pro ** HyperCard IIgs Course now in session! ** (JBLAKENEY, 19009, GO COM A2) BERNIE BONES UP AGAIN We're not fixing this bug in Bernie. It's already """"""""""""""""""""" fixed. :) There will be a maintenance release (aka MS service pack :) this evening or tomorrow latest that will address the SpeedNanny bug as well as the earlier completed but unreleased Marinetti fix. If you are subscribed to the Bernie news mailing (a very low traffic mailing list), you will learn about the maintenance release as soon as it's out. (http://www.magnet.ch/emutech/Bernie/List) Woof, henrik (GUDATH, 19884, GO COM A2) MUSCLING UP WITH MARINETTI Well, this might not help much but it never """""""""""""""""""""""""" hurts to try. Have you set the serial port speed in Marinetti to 57600 bps? This might be a little fast even for your accelerated IIgs so dropping to a slower speed like 38400 or even 19200 bps might help and make sure that your modem is set to not connect at a speed faster than the serial port speed. I don't think the serial port speed is really the problem but your mentioning that your modem uses a Rockwell chipset might mean your modem is an RPI modem. This type of modem expects the computer to handle data compression and, more importantly, error correction. If modems have difficulty talking to each other they try to do error correction to make sure the data gets through. If your modem is an RPI one, then your modem, connected to your IIgs, is incapable of doing the error correction and you will most definitely get line noise and such when running at higher speeds. Now, I'm sure others will come along and mention that Marinetti does error correction by virtue of the fact that TCP/IP is an error correcting transfer protocol. However, if Marinetti or the machine it is connected to keep getting errors, they have to request that the data get resent and the errors can occur in this data again and so on. The faster your modem is set to go, the more errors you will usually run into and the more time that will be wasted by Marinetti requesting packets be resent as well as resending packets. This could end up causing your Domain Name Server and connection requests to "time out". This would also explain why it works some times and doesn't others because the telephone line conditions can be better some times than others which would mean less errors some times than others. I hope this helps. Otherwise, I just spent a lot of time typing for nothing. :-) Jeff Blakeney - Dean of the Apple II University in A2Pro ** HyperCard IIgs Course now in session! ** (JBLAKENEY, 19994, GO COM A2) THIS MONTH'S BLATANT HARDWARE PLUG FWIW, Paul Lawson recently offered a """""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""" few 1/3 height IBM SCSI drives (model DSAS-3720) for sale at an excellent price. I ordered a couple and have been fooling with them for about three days now. These are very very very nice drives particularly for the price, speedy and spacious with built in active termination (if you want it). Specs on the drives are available at: http://www.storage.ibm.com/techsup/hddtech/dsas/dsasjum.htm Although you can probably figure everything out using Lynx or SIS, a graphical browser would be best to see the accompanying diagrams. To make a long story short, the question was posed to me: "Do these drives work with an Apple II?" With the standard qualifications, the answer is yes. What qualifications am I talking about? 1) The drive does -not- supply terminator power, so you must have some other SCSI device supply it. If you have a RamFAST, set the jumper on the Rev. D card or the DIP switch on the Rev. B/C cards to supply power; if you have an Apple High Speed or Rev. C SCSI card, do the term power modification; or use a drive on the chain that does supply terminator power. 2) If you use this drive with a RamFAST, you are limited to 12 partitions on the drive. As you can see, that's at most 11 ProDOS partitions, with about 350 megs or so left over which can be made a single HFS partition if you'd like. Aside from that, this drive is a great deal for Apple II users, as well as for users of other platforms who can use a relatively small boot drive or a drive to master CDROMs with. I think Paul will be getting more soon although maybe not at quite a good a price as last time. Rest assured that even at double, maybe even triple the price of his previous offer, these are a total steal. (Unsolicited Blatant Plug, copyright 1999). - Ryan -- rsuenaga@apple2.org -- http://lamp.sheppyware.net Posted by ProTERM Mac and PTMM v2.5 - The integrated information solution (RSUENAGA, 18910, GO COM A2) ASCENDING ACCENTIT This is a Temporary Initialization File that always """""""""""""""""" checks the GS keyboard translation preference to make sure it is set to "Standard" at boot time and when changing applications. This has been a valuable system extension for me, because Spectrum does adjust keyboard translation when online, and under certain rare circumstances (like a system hang or crash) might leave your translation preferences changed, thereby forcing you to manually go into the General Control Panel and change it back from "None" to "Standard." Max Jones, Juiced.GS http://www.wbwip.com/juiced.gs Delivered by Spectrum 2.2 and Crock O' Gold 3.0b5 beta (JUICEDGS, 18984, GO COM A2) IRONTOOTH'S SPEAKERPHONE SCRIPT Well, I was going to post this to the """"""""""""""""""""""""""""""" database, but if you would like to try it, and let me know if you have any problems... The following is an ANSITerm script for Rockwell-based modems with speakerphone capability (look for a microphone and speaker jack on the modem). I have to adjust the settings a bit to reduce feedback on my system using the microphone that came with my Phoebe V1456VQE modem (from JAMECO) and its internal speaker. If you copy this script, make sure that labels (e.g. #intro) that are alone in a line don't have any spaces preceding them. ************************** *| SPEAKERPHONE |* *| |* *| By Don V. Zahniser |* ************************** * * ANSITerm script for controlling a Rockwell-chipset modem with * speakerphone capabilities * * - Adjust defaults for your modem/microphone performance * * Mute Parameter * (0 = Microphone off, 1 = Microphone on, 2 = Room monitor) as n0 1 * * Speaker Attenuation * (0 to 15 in 2dB steps - 0 to 30dB attenuation, 16 is Speaker Mute) as n1 5 * * Microphone Gain * (0 to 3 - 0, 6dB, 9.5 dB, 12dB gain) as n2 1 #intro if off #intro2 no "Can't use the phone while online!" go #exit #intro2 fo wh ba bl de me "^L" re "at#cls=8^M" wa "OK" #menu de me "^L" ba db wi 10 7 60 12 lo 12 8 me "1 - Dial" lo 12 9 me "2 - Pick up/Answer" lo 12 11 me "0 - Exit" key n0 str s0 n0 up s0 if s0 == "1" #dial if s0 == "2" #answer if s0 == "0" #exit #dial de me "^L" re "at#vrn=0^M" wa "OK" re "at#vls=6^M" wa "OK" ge "Phone number to dial:" s9 re "atdt" s9 "^M" wa "VCON" go #menu2 #answer de me "^L" re "at#cls=8^M" wa "OK" re "at#vls=6^M" wa "OK" re "ATA^M" wa "VCON" go #menu2 #menu2 re "at#spk=" n0 "," n1 "," n2 "^M" wa "OK" de me "^L" ba db wi 10 7 60 12 lo 12 8 me "Change Speaker Level (+/-)" lo 12 9 me "Change Microphone Gain ( )" lo 12 10 me "Microphone Mute Toggle (M)" lo 12 11 me "0 - Hang up & Exit" key n9 str s0 n9 up s0 if s0 == "+" #volup if s0 == "-" #voldn if n9 == 11 #micup if n9 == 10 #micdn if s0 == "M" #micmute if s0 == "0" #exit #volup if n1 == 0 #fullvol sub n1 1 go #menu2 #voldn if n1 == 16 #voloff add n1 1 go #menu2 #fullvol no "Speaker at maximum Volume" go #menu2 #voloff no "Speaker is muted" go #menu2 #micmute if n0 == 0 #micon as n0 0 no "Microphone Muted..." go #menu2 #micon as n0 1 go #menu2 #micup if n2 == 0 #gainup add n2 1 go #menu2 #micdn if n2 == 3 #gaindn sub n2 1 go #menu2 #gainup no "Microphone at full gain..." go #menu2 #gaindn no "Microphone at lowest gain..." go #menu2 #exit de me "^L" re "ath^M" wa "OK" re "atz^M" wa "OK" exit * ch at+"/olright" - Don (IronTooth) Delivered by my ANSITerm off-line reader scripts... They're OLRight! (DZAHNISER, 18932, GO COM A2) OLRIGHT! 4.0 ODDS AND ENDS I don't think I mentioned that OLRight! v4.0 """""""""""""""""""""""""" directly supports most of ANSITerm's Command-keys, so can be used as a default script for start-up of ANSITerm for general use. As an example, the ANSITerm dial menu is now accessible from OLRight!'s menus and by using Command-D. I just added preferences for _not_ archiving mail online each time and for _not_ checking for Delphi Binary Mail each time. Saves a few seconds on each online session... - Don (IronTooth) Delivered by my ANSITerm off-line reader scripts... They're OLRight! (DZAHNISER, 18933, GO COM A2) DOES BABELFISH NEED SFUTILITY? It was indeed written to be used with """""""""""""""""""""""""""""" Babelfish, but it is not necessary for the current version. It is reported by some people to cause problems, but others see none. We have never been able to track down why it should on some machines but not on others. It is safe to remove it. Ewen Wannop - Speccie - Mon 4 Jan 1999 - 198 days till KFest '99 Delivered without using a IIgs by Spectrum 2.2 & Crock O' Gold 2.6 Bernie ][ the Rescue 2.0 woofing on a PowerMac 8200/120 http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/ewannop/ (EWANNOP, 19030, GO COM A2) A POTPOURRI OF TELECOMM THOUGHTS II Not Disturb will help if you are """""""""""""""""""""""""""""""" launching ProTerm after starting GS/OS, but to get the optimum speed out of ProTerm, with the minimum dropped characters, you should not be launching it from GS/OS in the first place. All P8 telecomm programs will run screamingly fast if you boot directly into P8 then run the application. There will be no interrupts generated that might interfere with the data, and even a stock unaccelerated IIgs should connect cleanly at 57600 baud. Under GS/OS there can be a whole chain of things in the interrupt loop that either grab system time, or just take too long to execute. It is for these reasons that desktop telecoms programs like Spectrum, need as clean an environment as possible to get high baud rates with no dropped characters. The faster your IIgs is, the less this is will be a problem. So an accelerator helps things enormously. Running Spectrum under Bernie ][ the Rescue on a G3 PowerMac, emulating a 40Mhz IIgs, means you can have whatever extras you like on the system, and can even forget II Not Disturb, and still get 57600 baud cleanly! Ewen Wannop - Speccie - Sat 9 Jan 1999 - 193 days till KFest '99 Delivered without using a IIgs by Spectrum 2.2 & Crock O' Gold 2.6 Bernie ][ the Rescue 2.0 woofing on a PowerMac 8200/120 http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/ewannop/ (EWANNOP, 19198, GO COM A2) TEXT VERSUS WEB ON DELPHI A2--BUILDING BRIDGES For those of us who do """""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""" (most of) our access via the web-side, ASCII art tends to end up as a compressed, unreadable jumble because the nicely formatted monospace text displays in a proportional font. So I really have no idea what you posted! I'm not sure if it works when posting from the telnet side, but I've had some success when I need to retain the format of a posting, by enclosing part (or was it "all") of the text in
...(which is HTML for PREformatted data). This tends to work pretty well, since most browsers display this in a monospace font. I'd love to be able to get the joke! While I'm up on my soapbox... As other web-side users may have noticed, if you "Preview" your post before posting, what little formatting you get by default (for example, paragraphs usually stay as separate paragraphs) goes completely out the window! If you must preview the post, go back to the standard "Compose" screen and post from there directly. -- Peter Watson -- Write to MSDOS disks on the Apple IIgs? -- Impossible! ;-) (PETERWATSON, 19048, GO COM A2) >>>>> From the text side (dial-up or telnet), you can do the same thing """"" with dot-commands (a period preceding the command alone on the line). The command for
is '.pre' and the command foris '.end pre' I use these for the Topic/Subject lists (Yes, I know one is overdue...). The preceding paragraph was formatted using these commands. - Don (IronTooth) Delivered by my ANSITerm off-line reader scripts... They're OLRight! (DZAHNISER, 19049, GO COM A2) WHAT'S UP WITH PRODOS 8 Y2K COMPLIANCE ON THE IIGS? This is what I """"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""" believe to be the case, although I haven't yet fully checked it out: The officially supported ProDOS clock, and we're talking ProDOS, pre-ProDOS 8, pre-ProDOS 16, pre-GS/OS is the Thunderclock, which does not support years. In order to figure out years, ProDOS uses the date and day of week along with an internal year table, so every seven years it needs to be patched and updated. The IIgs clock -does- support years, and the only person to report the 1993 issue is a //e user, so I do not believe it's needed for IIgs users at this point. - Ryan M. Suenaga, M.S.W., L.S.W. -- rsuenaga@apple2.org Editor and Publisher, _The Lamp!_, published monthly on Delphi Posted by PTMM v2.5 - The integrated information solution (RSUENAGA, 19162, GO COM A2) DESKJET AND IIGS COMPATIBILITY UPDATE I have good DeskJet news and I have """"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""" bad DeskJet news. First, the good news. HP has recently released the DeskJet 420, a IIGS compatible color capable ink jet printer which costs $119 Retail. Now, for the bad news... The following DeskJet 700 series are not compatible with the IIGS: 710, 712, 720 or 722. During the past few years, HP has offered several models of DeskJet that could not be used with the IIGS. Those printers (such as the short-lived DJ 820CSe) had a silkscreen designation on the front of them that said: "For Windows." The 700 series of IIGS incompatible printers no longer have the silkscreen "For Windows" designation. And, to make things even more confusing, the 722c comes in two different boxes; the older box clearly states that the printer is for use with Windows only, but the newer box doesn't. There _is_ information listed on the side of the boxes and in HP's literature which indicates which DeskJets will work on the IIGS, but only if you know exactly what you are looking for. ALL DeskJet printers which work on the IIGS have two things in common: they support HP's PCL Level 3 printer language, and they are compatible with MS-DOS. Since PCL is backwards compatible, PCL Level 4 and 5 printers can also be used on a IIGS. It appears as if all other current models of DeskJet (aside from the 710, 712, 720, 722) do support PCL3 and are MS-DOS compatible, and so they are IIGS compatible. So, if you are looking for a new DeskJet, you are going to have to look at the box and/or at HP's literature. If the box says MS-DOS (or DOS 3.3 and later) and PCL, then it'll work on the IIGS, with Harmonie. If it says only Windows, Windows 95, Windows 98 or Windows NT, it will not work with a IIGS. Joe Kohn Publisher of Harmonie (The GS/OS printer drivers which work with HP printers.) http://www.crl.com/~joko (JOE_KOHN, 19149, GO COM A2) <<<<< Considering that the vast majority of DeskJets work great on the """"" IIGS, it would be much more efficient to simply list the models that do not work, as I already did with the 710, 712, 720 and 722. IOW, every DeskJet currently sold by HP, except for these four models, work great on a IIGS. To save Barry and any one else some time and effort, I already have the answers I was looking for, and have posted the information. And, if all works out, I should soon have a list of ALL DeskJets which are incompatible with the Apple IIGS. There are only a couple, though. And, all the others say on the front of the printer: "For Windows." But, in short, if it's designated as a For-Windows, Windows-Only, or as a WinPrinter, then it's just not going to work on a IIGS. Or a II, II+, IIe, IIc or IIc+. Or, on any of Tony Diaz's prototypes. Joe (JOE_KOHN, 19177, GO COM A2) <<<<< In my quest to get answers, I visited three local stores yesterday """"" that sell HP printers, and fortunately, managed to avoid talking to any salespeople. Since I knew exactly what I was looking for, I looked at all the printers, grabbed all the HP sales brochures I could find, and looked at the actual boxes that the DJs come in. To that end, I can assure everyone that the current DeskJets that work with the IIGS are noted on both the literature and the boxes as being MS-DOS compatible. Or, you could just say the heck with the reading of fine-print, and just buy the DeskJet 420 for $119. When used on a IIGS, even the newest, top of the line DeskJet is only going to operate as a PCL Level 3 printer, which is what the 420 is. Aside from print speed, there is nothing to be gained by buying a more expensive DJ if all you have is a IIGS. Joe (JOE_KOHN, 19179, GO COM A2) <<<<< Two other IIGS incompatible DeskJets are the 820C and 1000C series """"" printers. Neither of these models are currently available; they have both been discontinued. In the case of the DJ 820Cse, I know for a fact that this one has the "For Windows" designation silkscreened on the front. I have not seen the DJ 1000c printer to know whether it carries that silkscreen designation. So to re-cap, the following won't work on the Apple II: DeskJets 710c, 712c, 720c, 722c, 820c and 1000c. There may be just one or two others, but I need to do a little more research before I can say for sure. Joe Kohn (JOE_KOHN, 19180, GO COM A2) THE FUTURE OF THE IIGS ONLINE These days, I generally continue to use """"""""""""""""""""""""""""" ProTerm 3.1 for manual logins, and Spectrum for its script-driven add-ons like SIS and COG. But yesterday, for the first time ever, I actually imagined that at some point in the future, I might be retiring ProTerm. I spent some time yesterday getting Spectrum v2.2 all set up, and finally got around to installing and trying Sheppy's gsAIM (I'm JoeKohn99) and Geoff's ftp-client. And, then it struck me... Unless I make the switch to Spectrum as my exclusive telecomm program, I'm not going to be able to take full advantage of all these really neat Marinetti-aware apps. After all, in order to get gsAIM Instant Messages, you need to be online with GS/OS. I'm typing this message off-line using COG. But, by having flat-rate unlimited access to the net, I could just as easily be typing this message in COG, while still connected to the net with TCP/IP...and be chatting with a gsAIM "Buddy" at the same time! Multi-tasking (of sorts) has arrived, and the full impact of that just didn't hit me until yesterday! Thanks for opening my eyes to that Richard, Sheppy, Geoff and Sir Ewen! ;-) At some point, when we have a full suite of Marinetti-aware apps, I imagine that ProTerm will lose some of its allure for me. Old habits are hard to break, and I do really like ProTerm, but... I'm now 100% convinced: Marinetti and Spectrum are the future of the IIGS online. Then again, bringing it back to the subject of NiftySpell and Spectrum, I'm sure glad that NiftySpell picked up that typo a few paragraphs upstream ;-) Joe (JOE_KOHN, 19430, GO COM A2) NIFTYSPELL TECHNICAL ASSISTANCE One NiftySpell...coming right up. """"""""""""""""""""""""""""""" In a response to my e-mail request, Chris Vavruska says that he'll put together some technical info so that other programmers can call up NiftySpell's spell check functions directly, without having to first open up the NiftySpell NDA. I do not know how long that will take. As it is now, all it takes to spell check an outgoing gsAIM message is to access the NiftySpell NDA and click on the Check Window function. By providing direct support for NiftySpell in gsAIM, you'll save users from having to access the NDA directly. But, aside from "the cool factor" of having a Spell Check button in gsAIM, the two already work together quite well. Speaking of "the cool factor," let me ask a question...does AOL's Instant Messenger have the ability to spell check messages, or is that something only the IIGS can perform? Joe Kohn (JOE_KOHN, 19456, GO COM A2) THE FUTURE OF THE II IS IN EMULATION Speaking as a developer, it is """""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""" important for us to have a level playing field before we start to do any coding. This is one of the reasons why you have seen very little written for the Second Sight display, as it is not stable, and very few are in use. If everyone was using an emulated IIgs under Bernie, then we could indeed improve the resolution or screen size of the IIgs. But then we might as well just write the programs for the Mac, as it already has those attributes without expanding Bernie any further. The level playing field for me is a IIgs, preferably accelerated, with at least 4Mb of Memory, a hard disk drive, and running System 6.0.1. Anything less than that will not necessarily work with any of my software. I think the same will be true of most other developers. I did make the plea some time ago that everybody should have that minimum specification. Certainly it is necessary for most of the new software issued within the last year. Ewen Wannop - Speccie - Tue 12 Jan 1999 - 190 days till KFest '99 Delivered without using a IIgs by Spectrum 2.2 & Crock O' Gold 2.6 Bernie ][ the Rescue 2.0 woofing on a PowerMac 8200/120 http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/ewannop/ (EWANNOP, 19292, GO COM A2) >>>>> Actually, the reason I want to see extra features added to Bernie """"" above a real IIgs is this: I like programming the GS more than anything else. The more power I can get out of GS apps running on Bernie, the less Mac programming I have to do to write the apps I want to write. :) Eric "Sheppy" Shepherd Macintosh & PowerPC Programmers Forum (SHEPPY, 19295, GO COM A2) >>>>> I thought I'd throw in a few cents. """"" It is rather simple to add a few extra features. However, Bernie is an emulator in first place, and it will be measured against a physical Apple IIgs. As long as Bernie is not considered a "stand-alone" platform (the little Bill Gates inside me is already cheering :-), it doesn't make much sense offering software that is limited to Bernie-specific features. (With the notable exception of Woofenstein 3D.) Of course, there will be sporadic lapses on our part, and if a developer depends on non-standard features there's a chance it will be implemented. As long as there are Apple IIgs features missing, such as SmartPort bus support, we better get our job done in that department. - henrik woof woof (GUDATH, 19296, GO COM A2) >>>>> As far as I'm concerned, Bernie is a real IIgs. I do most of my """"" work and testing on Bernie (with the notable exception that I test my 'netti apps on a real GS, because it has a modem and my Mac doesn't). To be honest, I figure that if Bernie adds some special features that I want, I'm likely to stick around as a IIgs programmer longer, because I have new challenges. The real IIgs is too limiting for some of the projects I want to do. Eric "Sheppy" Shepherd Macintosh & PowerPC Programmers Forum (SHEPPY, 19306, GO COM A2) >>>>> I'm pretty much in agreement with this. """"" There are occasional compatibility glitches between Bernie and a IIgs, but consider: as much compatibility as we have with the Apple II series, we don't have perfect backward compatibility. Even the ROM_3 IIgs doesn't perfectly emulate a ROM_01 (or ROM_00 for that matter), an enhanced //e isn't 100% compatible with unenhanced //e's, the ][+ isn't 100% compatible with the original ][, and so on. The difference the other way is larger. Let's do a hypothetical: say Apple released a computer with a G3 processor that looked just like the new PowerMac G3 mini towers, had MacOS 8.5.1, _Bernie_, the IIgs ROM image, and System 6.0.1 bundled and set up, and sold it under the name "Apple IIg3". Would we call this an Apple II? Well, Apple itself would call it a II, and it would run Apple II software under Bernie, as well as Macintosh software. Are there things it's not compatible with on the Apple II side? Sure. 5.25 inch floppies would be the first thing we could point out. But if it's just like the G3 that Apple started selling, it would be missing serial ports and 3.5 inch floppy disks too, among other things. People still call those G3's Macs. I call those G3's Apple II's :) The newest Macs aren't 100% compatible with older Macs, and similarly, the newest Apple IIs aren't going to be 100% compatible with older Apple II's. It's the price to pay of progress. - Ryan M. Suenaga, M.S.W., L.S.W. -- rsuenaga@apple2.org Editor and Publisher, _The Lamp!_, published monthly on Delphi Posted by PTMM v2.5 - The integrated information solution (RSUENAGA, 19310, GO COM A2) >>>>> You know, it's a long time since anyone has been able to make me """"" say (about the Apple II), "Gee, I've never thought of it that way before!". He's right - it *would* be an Apple II! I've always looked at upgrades using a variation of the 80/20 rule (hopefully closer to 95/5!) which says that if I can get all the shiny new features (80% benefit) in exchange for losing some backwards compatibility (20% cost) then the change is worth it. So each time I upgraded, ][+ to //e to IIgs, some of the old software or hardware no longer ran. For that matter, even installing my SuperDrive card cost me the ability to run some software. But it was always worth it, and it was always still an Apple II. As I think Ryan was saying, I believe a G3 based "Apple IIg3" would be as much an Apple II as the original PowerPC were Macs. It was all done with smokescreens and mirrors anyway! All we need now is for someone to put together some stick-on labels, create an appropriate appearance manager "theme" (what is the Mac terminology for this?) and take a "made-over" G3 system to a trade show. I think the reactions (from horror to joy) would be beyond price! B-) -- Peter Watson -- Write to MSDOS disks on the Apple IIgs? -- Impossible! ;-) (PETERWATSON, 19323, GO COM A2) DEALING WITH COLOR GRAPHICS IN GRAPHICWRITER III So, do you have """""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""" something against psychedelic? :-) I don't do much color work in GW III, but I don't believe there is a way to do what you want. Maybe others will know more on this topic. Max (JUICEDGS, 19308, GO COM A2) >>>>> Richard may certainly correct me, but I've tried many things in """"" GWIII with color, and it seems to me that the palette is fixed. There are two things you might want to try. Both involve a lot of work, and I've had marginal success. The first thing is to make a "palette document" in GWIII, using every color on the GWIII palette and print it out, giving you a color reference chart for printing on whatever your printer is. The other (tougher) part, is to copy your objects into Platinum paint, and save it as a paint file. Now you have a "reference document" in Platinum paint... (Gee, it's been a while since I did this, please forgive any lapses I might have) You can use this reference document as a template to create new pictures that should carry their colors over to GWIII. Bring your picture with the custom palette into Platinum Paint. (here's where my memory is real fuzzy) I don't remember if there is a load palette option, or if I went through and wrote down the rgb values for each color in my GWIII palette. Anyway, in your new picture, edit the palette, and change the colors to the values in the reference picture, then remap the picture to the (now-edited) palette. This explanation is most certainly be incomplete, but it might Give you enough to go on and experiment with. __________ | homas (TCOMPTER, 19330, GO COM A2) >>>>> In a word. No. If the colors in the graphic are not a match or """"" close match, GWIII substitutes the closest color which may render undesirable results. The closest color from GWIII's own color palette. I would love to see palette switching in GWIII, but for now I use AppleWorks GS to accomplish graphic imports if I can't get a good match with GraphicWriter III. Barry Delivered with the help of Marinetti v2.0. (BARRY_REES, 19339, GO COM A2) >>>>> Yep, unfortunately the palette is fixed. Also a lot of the internal """"" conversions routines between formats, especially cut/paste system clipboard have reverse mapping palette tables, making it harder to patch. If you have a specific requirement, then perhaps we could look at a possible solution. Regards, Richard (RICHARD_B, 19391, GO COM A2) HARMONIE AND INDEPENDENCE--COMPARING TWO GREAT PACKAGES Harmonie and """"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""" Independence are both simply Printers Drivers. They both work with programs that support the GS/OS Print Manager. Personally, I find that Harmonie yields acceptable results with standard 320 or 640 mode graphics if I use Harmonie's External Rendering option. That said, sometimes it takes a bit of fiddling within a paint program to get the graphic 'just right.' For those who read Shareware Solutions II, the NiftySpell / GShisen graphic that appeared on the back cover of the latest issue took more than 25 attempts before I deemed it "a keeper." Printing 3200 color graphics is, in a sense, a very special case because 3200 color graphics aren't exactly standard. There is a freeware program available, written by my former associate John Wrenholt, that is called Print3200. But, because Print3200 does not work with GS/OS's Print Manager, it only prints to an ImageWriter II. But, surprisingly, it does do a real good job. DreamGraphix does work with the Print Manager, so you can print 3200 color graphics on a DJ if you own that program. But, the results you get will vary, and to be truthful, most of them will not look very good when printed out. OTOH, most 3200 color graphics really only contain 256 distinct colors. So, it's always possible to convert a 3200 mode graphic to 256 colors, and then that can be loaded into a IIGS paint program such as Platinum Paint, and the results will be much more visually pleasing. I should add, in my humble opinion. Since I'm the publisher of Harmonie, I'll answer your questions about pricing and ordering, but because I'm obviously biased, I should perhaps let users of the two sets of Printer Drivers answer your question about which is best or better. Joe Kohn (JOE_KOHN, 19347, GO COM A2) >>>>> Both are acceptable, but Harmonie is superior. If you're going to """"" have just one, Harmonie is definitely the way to go. That said, I use Independence when I need real nice detail on a black and white graphic. I find it easier to get what I need without a lot of fiddling around. Still, if I had to choose, Harmonie would win out without question. Max Jones http://www.wbwip.com/juiced.gs Delivered by Spectrum 2.2 and Crock O' Gold 3.0b7 From a Virtual GS running Bernie ][ the Rescue 2.0 -- Woof Woof (JUICEDGS, 19356, GO COM A2) >>>>> I'm not sure I could say one is "better". I own both. Harmonie """"" does color, and supports more printers. Independence hasn't been updated as recently. Both are from quality publishers. I'd get both. Actually, I did that already :) - Ryan M. Suenaga, M.S.W., L.S.W. -- rsuenaga@apple2.org Editor and Publisher, _The Lamp!_, published monthly on Delphi Posted by PTMM v2.5 - The integrated information solution (RSUENAGA, 19361, GO COM A2) >>>>> I have both Harmonie and Independence, which I use with a DeskJet """"" 500. I would deal with the issue of which is 'better' this way: Advantage: Harmony o External rendering - Gives you the ability to print text-based files using the fonts that are built into the printer - MUCH faster than any printing that Independence can do. You can also use software print buffers (several are available) to dump the external rendered text to a print buffer of up to 64K through the GS Serial Port. o Speed - No matter which way you print, Harmonie is faster. o Color - If you have a color printer o Flexibility - Lots of settings and controls to get printing to come out exactly the way you like. Advantage: Independence o Accuracy - Working with the Page Layout module of AWGS or with GWIII, the objects and margins are printed with Independence exactly where the software indicates. On my system, Harmonie offsets the printing by almost 1/8" along the long axis of the paper from where indicated. This is not really that noticeable in portrait layout, but I do a lot of 2-column 'booklet' landscape printing for a church bulletin, and it is _really_ noticeable then. Also, with _some_ print sizes and aspect ratio selections, Harmonie can't seem to calculate the character/line widths correctly. Margins and justified text can be far from where indicated in the software that I am printing from. This does not happen with Independence. o Simplicity - Fewer controls and easier to use, (but see flexibility, above) I use Harmonie as my general-purpose printer driver, and Independence for the really critical work. If I _had_ to do without one, it would be a difficult choice. - Don (IronTooth) Delivered by my ANSITerm off-line reader scripts... They're OLRight! (DZAHNISER, 19403, GO COM A2) SWEET-16 BEOS INTEL RELEASED As the marketing schmuck I'm only interested """""""""""""""""""""""""""" in shareware fees, potential Y2K law suits, Ryan's commission, the cost of my internet connection and taking Sheppy's RC5 crack team to place 1 for some extra PR. It is true that Sweet-16/BeoS/Intel ("BetelBernie") has been released. I must pass full credit to Andre who has done it completely on his own. Granted, I bet he warezed a few things from Bernie :), but Sweet-16 is Andre's work and not mine, and maybe this 50% manpower also explains why Bernie is somewhat ahead. Due to my pitiful arsenal of Macs I couldn't even help him with testing. I'm still glad you like it and hope you'll spend a great time with it! If you would like to e-mail comments on Sweet16, I'm sure Andre would appreciate a copy. You can contact both of us by using the woof@kagi.com address. - henrik (GUDATH, 19227, GO COM A2) >>>>> After a few days of playing with the Be/Intel version of Sweet 16 """"" on my (shudder) Cyrix 233, I can say that while it has a ways to go, it's very impressive and most promising. The BeOS, otoh, is extremely impressive. Aside from various versions of UNIX, I've never seen an OS for the consumer that is so network-ready and Internet-ready from the get-go, and the GUI is definitely something that any Mac or Apple IIgs fan can get accustomed to quickly. Yes, I did buy the BeOS primarily to test _Be_rnie, but it does shine in its own right. Anyone who has the equipment to try it out ought to (and while Be has a somewhat small list of compatible systems on its web page, if it works with this incredibly generic clone I built with cost as the primary object, it ought to work with most anything, graphic cards notwithstanding :) - Ryan M. Suenaga, M.S.W., L.S.W. -- rsuenaga@apple2.org Editor and Publisher, _The Lamp!_, published monthly on Delphi Posted by PTMM v2.5 - The integrated information solution (RSUENAGA, 19957, GO COM A2) >>>>> Sweet16 should improve greatly over the coming months. As soon as """"" gsAIM 1.0 is out the door, my attention will focus fully on Sweet16. Eric "Sheppy" Shepherd Macintosh & PowerPC Programmers Forum (SHEPPY, 19998, GO COM A2) CDRW ON AN APPLE IIGS? I have a Yamaha CDRW drive here, but I've never """""""""""""""""""""" attached it to a IIgs. Even if I did, at most it would only work as a read-only drive. CDR and CDRW drives don't function (from a user's point of view) like hard drives. You need to prep a hard drive or removable drive cartridge with the data you want and then use specialized software (such as Toast) to burn the CDR or CDRW. The IIgs does not have this type of software. - Ryan M. Suenaga, M.S.W., L.S.W. -- rsuenaga@apple2.org Editor and Publisher, _The Lamp!_, published monthly on Delphi Posted by PTMM v2.5 - The integrated information solution (RSUENAGA, 19512, GO COM A2) PATCHING PRODOS 8 FOR Y2K. . . MINUS ONE A post on comp.sys.apple2 """""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""" reminded me that the year look-up table in ProDOS 8 expires periodically. Specifically, the look-up table in version 2.0.3 (the last version released by Apple) was only good through 1998. 1999 is here, of course...I don't know if this subject has been brought up on Delphi, but if you're using a clock card in a IIe, your computer now thinks it's 1993 again! Here's some of the text from a message I posted to comp.sys.apple2 on this subject: ProDOS will need to be updated once every five or six years. Apple released a version of ProDOS specifically to deal with this problem happening once before, in 1992. I found a directory on my hard drive that I'd forgotten about; it had a version "1.9A" of ProDOS that I had hacked on New Year's '92 to get the clock to work right again (I was running a BBS on my IIe at the time, so having the right date was important). ProDOS 8 v2.0.1, which fixed the problem, was released on 4 Mar 92 (I don't recall if there was a v2.0 that was released earlier). Since ProDOS was designed with the Thunderclock (a clock card that didn't keep track of the year at all) in mind, it used a look-up table to determine the year. I haven't looked at the actual code, but I imagine it uses the current Julian date mod 7 and the day of the week to index into the table. I found the table in the then-current version of ProDOS and changed it to cover a different range of years. Here's something I came up with on my own to figure the current year from the current month, date, and day of the week. First, convert the month and date to a single number. Add the date to the appropriate number from this table: Jan=0 Jul=181 Feb=31 Aug=212 Mar=59 Sep=243 Apr=90 Oct=273 May=120 Nov=304 Jun=151 Dec=334 Divide this number by 7. Subtract from the remainder the day-of-week number; the day-of-week number is a simple progression where Sunday is 0, Monday is 1, and so on up to 6 for Saturday. If the difference is positive, it's your offset into the look-up table. If it's negative, add 7 and use that as your offset into the look-up table. I'm guessing that the Thunderclock driver inside ProDOS does something similar; I crunched the numbers, and they agree with the tables I've found in different ProDOS versions. I diff'd my "v1.9A" and the actual v1.9, which I had backed up on floppy. The year table was at offset 0x3276-0x327C in both files. v1.9 had a table to cover 1986 to 1991 (the decimal value of the last two digits of a year is in each byte...the sequence from v1.8 is 0x5A (90), 0x59 (89), 0x58 (88), 0x58 (88), 0x57 (87), 0x56 (86), 0x5B (91). The revised table I put together covered 1992 to 1996: 0x60 0x5F 0x5E 0x5D 0x5C 0x5C 0x60. In v2.0.3 (the last version of ProDOS 8), the table lives at offset 0xF76-0xF7C and covers 1993 to 1998. Leap years appear twice in each table, which is why they're only good for five or six years each instead of seven. From this information, you can figure up revised tables for any range of five or six years. For instance, here's a sequence that ought to be good until 28 Feb 2004 (from 29 Feb 2004 to the end of that year, the year would mistakenly be reported as 1999): 0x01 0x00 0x00 0x63 0x04 0x03 0x02. In case someone hasn't already done this, here are some "cookbook" instructions to patch ProDOS 8 v2.0.3 for years beginning with 1999. Go to a BASIC.SYSTEM prompt and enter the following commands one at a time (snip this out and put it in a script to EXEC if you want): BLOAD PRODOS,TSYS,A$2000 POKE 12150,1 POKE 12151,0 POKE 12152,0 POKE 12153,99 POKE 12154,4 POKE 12155,3 POKE 12156,2 BSAVE PRODOS,TSYS,A$2000 You might want to make a backup copy of your ProDOS file before you do this, of course. When 2004 rolls around, you'll want to make up a new table from the "formula" given earlier in this message; I'll leave that table as an exercise for the reader. :-) I figured someone might find this useful...wish I'd kept the patch program I whipped up in '92 to fix v1.9 as it would've taken less time to figure it out this time around. :-) -=IIGS=- Scott Alfter ( {