@database "ar322.guide"
@Node MAIN "Amiga Report Online Magazine #3.22 -- December 18, 1995"
===========================================================================
  December 18, 1995         @{" Turn the Page " link MENU}                Issue No. 3.22 
===========================================================================
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                 "THE Online Source for Amiga Information!"

                      Copyright 1995 FS Publications
                            All Rights Reserved
@endnode
@node MENU "Amiga Report Main Menu"
@toc MAIN

===========================================================================
==                               Main Menu                               ==
===========================================================================

    @{"  Editorial and Opinion   " link OPINION}             @{"    Featured Articles    " link FEATURE}

    @{"         Reviews          " link  REVIEW}             @{"  News & Press Releases  " link NEWS}

    @{"      Aminet Charts       " link     FTP}             @{"       Reader Mail       " link MAIL}

                     ---------------------------------

    @{"    About AMIGA REPORT    " link ABOUT}             @{"    Dealer Directory     " link DEALER}
 Contact Information and Copyrights     Amiga Dealer Addresses and Numbers

    @{"     Where to Get AR      " link WHERE}             @{"     Advertisements      " link COMMERCIAL}
 Mailing List &  Distribution Sites     Online Services, Dealers, Ordering
               ______________________________________________
         //   |                                              |       //
========//====|  Amiga Report International Online Magazine  |======//=====
==   \\//     |  Issue No. 3.22           December 18, 1995  |   \\//    ==
==============|  "THE Online Source for Amiga Information!"  |=============
              |______________________________________________|
@endnode
@node JASON "Editor"
@toc STAFF

===========================================================================
                                  EDITOR
===========================================================================

                               Jason Compton
                               =============
             Internet                                  Address
             --------                                  -------
     jcompton@shell.portal.com                1203 Alexander Ave
     jcompton@xnet.com                        Streamwood, IL 60107-3003
                                              USA

               Fax                                      Phone
               ---                                      -----
           708/741-0689                             708/289-7047

@endnode
@node KATIE "Assistant Editor"
@toc STAFF

===========================================================================
==                           ASSISTANT EDITOR                            ==
===========================================================================

                             Katherine Nelson
                             ================

                                 Internet
                                 --------
                            Kati@cup.portal.com

@endnode
@node ROBERT "Senior Editor"
@toc STAFF

===========================================================================
                               SENIOR EDITOR
===========================================================================

                               Robert Niles
                               ============
            Internet                                   Address
            --------                                   -------
        rniles@Wolfe.NET                           506 W. Orchard
                                                   Selah, WA 98942

            FidoNet                                      Fax
            -------                                      ---
           1:3407/103                                509/697-5064

@endnode
@node WILLIAM "Contributing Editor"
@toc STAFF

===========================================================================
                            CONTRIBUTING EDITOR
===========================================================================

                               William Near
                               ============

                                 Internet
                                 --------
                              wnear@epix.net

@endnode
@node ADDISON "Contributing Editor"
@toc STAFF

===========================================================================
                            CONTRIBUTING EDITOR
===========================================================================

                              Addison Laurent
                              ===============

                                 Internet
                                 --------
                       addison@jobe.shell.portal.com

@endnode
@node EDITORIAL "compt.sys.editor.desk"
@toc OPINION

===========================================================================
    compt.sys.editor.desk                          By: @{" Jason Compton " link JASON}
===========================================================================

I'm not sure I'd want to spend all of my weekends this way, but every now
and then it would really be nice.

WOA Toronto brought thousands of Amiga fans and users together over three
days, in what was a very positively charged atmosphere.  Some veterans of
the '93 show pointed to the considerably more upbeat mood.  In December
'93, Commodore was well on the road to collapse and many were simply hoping
the shoe wouldn't drop.  Now, the dismal times are behind us and the focus
is on creating a better marketplace for the Amiga and Amiga products.

We (Katie and I) apparently brought the bad weather of Chicago with us to
Toronto, ruining everyone's beautiful Thursday with bitter cold and snow
Friday night.  But the show went on anyway.

Here we are, December 1995.  Last year at this time, we'd already missed
several "deadlines" for the Commodore resolution and were shaking our heads
at the "missed Christmas season."  This year, the Christmas season has
Amiga 1200s being sold in quantity throughout Europe, as 4000Ts ship from
SMG to dealers across North America.

A much merrier Christmas, indeed.

Nope, Amiga Technologies won't break any Commodore sales records this year,
excepting the 4000T, a product Commodore never actually sold in appreciable
quantities.

But they have done what many thought was impossible.  They've rescued the
Amiga from Commodore and are taking it to a new processor.

Sure, people will continue to be critical of some of their policies.  But
the opportunity never presented itself for me to shake the CEO of
Commodore's hand.  But I've met Petro.  The look in his eyes told me he
really does care about this Amiga thing that is important enough, for
whatever reason, for all of us to still be here, making a difference,
rather than a rank-and-file member of The Rest Of Computing.  After all, it
had to take considerable courage to leave a job as head of production for a
large PC manufacturer to take on the Amiga gamble, but he did it.

Amiga Tech deserves to be told when they're making mistakes.  But they also
deserve to be encouraged for what goes right, as do the other companies in
the Amiga market who make it the place it is.

For this Christmas season, why not call up your favorite Amiga dealer,
manufacturer, or distributor and thank them for their support?

I'd like to thank all of you thousands upon thousands of readers for yours.
Without your support and interest, there would be no Amiga Report worth
speaking of.  Thanks for letting us make a difference.

Jason

@endnode
@node COMMERCIAL "Commercial Products"
@toc MENU

===========================================================================
                            Commercial Products
===========================================================================

@{"        Editor's Choice        " link EDITORCHOICE}  Jason's picks

@{"   Portal Information Systems  " link PORTAL}  A great place for Amiga users.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    @{"  Opinion  " link OPINION}  @{"  News  " link NEWS}  @{"  Articles  " link FEATURE}  @{"  Reviews  " link REVIEW}  @{"  Charts  " link FTP}

@endnode
@node MAIL "Reader Mail"
@toc MENU

===========================================================================
                               Reader Mail
===========================================================================

From mlanza@southern.co.nz Wed Dec 13 23:45 CST 1995

Since writing the Amiga POP Client "GetMail" and the SMTP Client "PutMail"
I have been swamped with "thank you" EMail messages.  Unfortunately due to
my occupation in the DP field and the pressures of work I have had to drop
my after hours hobby, namely playing with the Amiga.  I simply did not have
enough time to play with two (some times three) different hardware & OS
combinations.  However, I have not as yet sold my Amiga 3000 and I am
getting quite a large number of requests for enhancements, additionally
GetMail often crashes A1200's when exiting.  I have therefore decided to do
some more work on these utilities over the Xmas period (I have to reinstall
the OS, AmiTCP and my Compiler which will impose a slight delay).

I would very much appreciate it if you could communicate a few points to
your readers.

1) I welcome bug reports and enhancement requests for the next three/four
weeks.

1) New releases of PutMail & GetMail will be available in the third week of
January.

Modifications planned are as follows.
- New parameter to include local host name in From: address, Yes/No.
- Optional progress indicator (in a window) for large UUEncoded files.
- Fix the GetMail Exit Crash on A1200's running WB3.
- More robust initial HELO handshake with the host.
- More robust message header processing.
- PutMail to process multiple files (maybe).

Known problems, unsure of details and how to resolve them.
- Can't find the ENV:HostName variable ?  (Not very common)
- Incompatible with Net3 ? (Dunno anything about Net3)

2) GetMail & PutMail are in the public domain.
The full source code can be obtained from;
ftp.netnet.net/pub/aminet/tcp/mail PutMailSRC.lha and GetMailSRC.lha

3) The next release of these programs will be my final release.
(Hopefully other people will support and maintain them though)

Many thanks to all those who sent me EMail thankyou messages.  Many thanks
to Jason and his staff for doing such a great job!

Best Regards to the Amiga Community,
Martin V Lanza,
mlanza@southern.co.nz.

                        --- --- --- --- --- --- ---

From: Ryan Paque <rpaque@acs.stritch.edu>
Date: Mon, 11 Dec 95 13:09:11 -800
To: jcompton@xnet.com

I would just like to thank all the writers of Amiga Report for providing
the Amiga community with a reliable and consistant source of information.

Without you guys, I'd be stuck out in limbo and probably would have ended
up jumping ship.  Being the sysop of the only public Amiga-run BBS left
here in Milwaukee, WI sort of cuts me off from the rest of the world.  I'm
probably one of the few Amiga users in the United States that has "local"
access to an Amiga dealer (Safe Harbor Computers) but so far, Amiga Report
is the only place that I have heard anything about the Power Amiga systems
(well, here and the AT home page, but that's besides the point...).

I truly hope that Amiga Tech.  can bring the Amiga back to some power
again.  I don't have delusions of masses of humanity throwing off the
shackles of Microsoft and converting to Amiga, but I think that it
definately deserves much more position in the market than it currently has.
Hopefully the base configurations for the Power machines will be comparable
to what the PC world has to offer.

I'm sure this would never happen, but I think the best ploy AT could come
up with to sell the machines would be to somehow include a fast harware IBM
emulater and a fast hardware Macintosh emulator and then write some code
into the OS so that you can run anything you stick in the drive without
even knowing what it is (besides maybe a telltale light on the menu bar or
something similar).

Fantasy, I know...  But isn't that what makes most Amiga users unique?  Not
to slight anybody else in computer world, but it takes a certain mindset to
go out and buy a computer that isn't among those pushed on you from every
direction.

Despite what everyone keeps telling me, the only thing that I use these
IBMs and Macs at school for (besides my classwork) is NetScape.  The Amiga
needs something like this all nice and bundled in one package.  Hunting
around for 500 billion seperate programs and then trying to get them to
talk to each other is not only time consuming, but also nerve wracking. 
(Hint Hint, Amiga Tech).

Well, this was a bit longer than I originally intended, but its not often
that I get to communicate with Amiga users who actually know something,
besides the few regulars on FidoNet.  Lately all I've been doing is arguing
with some rich guy about why I don't need to change the BBS from an Amiga
to an IBM...  If it dies, I'll obviously have to, but until then, my trusty
A500 and the BBS' A2000 will have the place of honor.

Keep up the good work guys!
@endnode
@node OPINION1 "The Amiga in Luxembourg"
@toc OPINION

===========================================================================
                          The Amiga in Luxembourg
                 (alternative title: Am I the only fool?)
  Christian Kemp                                           ckemp@innet.lu
===========================================================================

Please excuse my bad English, but it's the fourth language I (have to)
learn.

So the Amiga is on sale again.  This is, of course, very nice for Germany
and other big countries.  But small countries are, just like in the bad old
Commodore times, ignored.  Okay, I admit that the weekly Amiga sales in
Germany are higher than yearly sales in a small country, IF Amigas were
sold there.

Yes, you understood the above correctly, at the time of writing this text
there is NO Amiga dealer in Luxembourg.  The nearest store is over 200
kilometres away!  There is absolutely no support for the Amiga, anytime I
mention that I'm (still) using an Amiga I get reactions like "oh yeah, that
game computer" or simply puzzlement, because they can't imagine that
someone here is still using an Amiga.

The domination of the clones is nearly perfect, but I think that the Amiga
wouldn't sell that bad here either.  A lot of people are still using a 286
or 386 and they are thinking of buying a new computer.  This would be *the*
chance for Amiga Technologies to make the Amiga more well-known (and
respected) again by selling a medium-range Amiga with built-in Internet
access and some good advertising, stating that the Amiga is far easier to
use and much better for the Internet...  However advertising is, as it
seems, completely out of question.

If Amiga Technologies don't want to invest money in small countries, the
least they could do would be to give the remaining Amiga users here in
Luxembourg, or other small countries, the chance to have their favorite
computer repaired by qualified technicians and they could give them the
possibility to order from a local shop, or through a local telephone number
a new model or product information.

Do not hesitate to contact me at the E-Mail address mentioned above if you
have more questions or if you are from Luxembourg.
@endnode
@node NEWS1 "Aminet Set 2"
@toc NEWS

TITLE

Aminet Set 2 - The complete Aminet since Set 1 on four new CDs

AUTHOR

Urban D. Mueller  (umueller@wuarchive.wustl.edu)

CONTENTS

Aminet Set 2 contains close to 4 gigabytes (when uncompressed) of
freely distributable Amiga software on 4 newly mastered CDs. There
are more than 12.000 archives from the following categories:

3000 Mods      (directly playable)
2000 Demos     (directly startable)
2000 Images    (directly viewable)
 800 Documents (directly readable)
 500 Games     (directly startable)
1000 Communications programs
2000 Utilities and applications
     ...and more.

Aminet Set 2 contains all the Aminet data found on Aminet CD 5 to 8 plus
750M of software that was on none of these.  280M of the software are newer
than Aminet 8 and 200M of electronic books were included.  Only 150M were
already found on Aminet Set 1.

USER INTERFACE

As an alternative to the well known Amigaguide based user interface you can
now use the directory utility 'Filer' which comes in a registered version
on the CD.

As usual, an index of all 4 CDs is found on each of the CDs, and a fast
facility to search all readmes on all disks exists.

A registered version of DeliTracker is used to play the modules.

PRICES

The CD can be ordered from the following addresses: (credit cards OK)

Germany: Stefan Ossowski          (English spoken)
         Tel:   +49-201-788778
         Fax:   +49-201-798447
         Email: stefano@tchest.e.eunet.de

         Price: DM 59

USA:     Fred Fish
         Tel:   +1-602-491-0442
         Email: orders@amigalib.com

         Price: $39.95

Prices exclude shipping.  A complete index of Set 2 can be found in the
file docs/lists/Aminet-Set-2.lha on any Aminet site.

Aminet Set 1 (the complete Aminet as of Jan 95 on 4 CDs) is still available
and forms, together with Set 2, a complete snapshot of Aminet.
@endnode
@node NEWS2 "RevUp v1.3"
@toc NEWS

TITLE

RevUp

VERSION

1.3 (17.11.95)

PROXITY SOFTWORKS

Proxity Engineering and Technical Support

Usenet:  pets@amiuni.tynet.sub.org
Fidonet: 2:246/1416.0 (pets)

AUTHOR

Boris Folgmann

Address:  Friedrichstrasse 7
          71546 Aspach
          Germany

Usenet:   <boris@prox.tynet.sub.org>
Internet: <prx@studbox.uni-stuttgart.de>
WWW:      <http://www.informatik.uni-stuttgart.de/
          fachschaft/adressen/bsfolgma.html>
Fidonet:  2:246/1416.41 (Boris)
IRC:      PRX

PGP Fingerprint: 82 84 70 38 26 5E 50 5A
                 9C DB CA CA 62 0A 31 52 

Phone:   ++49-(0)7191-23439
Fax:     ++49-(0)7191-2604

DESCRIPTION

RevUp manages version strings following the Amiga standard for including in
own programs, e.g.  '$VER: YourTool 2.4 (11.9.95)'.

It's a must for every serious C, Oberon or Assembler programmer, so have a
look at it!  Your makefiles together with RevUp will do all the work for
you.

RevUp <version> <projectname> {<dependency>} [REV <revision>]
      [BETA] [C] [ASM] [OBERON] [LOG] [EXTRA] [ENVVAR] [TINY]

Required:
 VERSION     : Version number.
 PROJECTNAME : Basename to use for all RevUp files.
 DEPENDENCIES: Files which dates are checked.

Optional:
 REV   : Explicit revision number.
 BETA  : Generate beta information.
 C     : Generate C headerfile (default).
 ASM   : Generate Assembly includefile.
 OBERON: Generate Oberon definition module.
 LOG   : Interactively add history info to logfile.
 EXTRA : Generate extra information.
 ENVVAR: Set envvar for archive naming.
 TINY  : Don't print credits.

EXAMPLE

> RevUp 1 SuperTool EXTRA

generates SuperTool_rev.h:

/* C headerfile generated by RevUp 1.3 */

#define VERSION     1
#define REVISION    1
#define DATE        "12.7.95"
#define VERS        "SuperTool 1.1"
#define VSTRING     "SuperTool 1.1 (12.7.95)\\r\\n"
#define VERSTAG     "\\0$VER: SuperTool 1.1 (12.7.95)"
#define TIME        "14:57:51"
#define PRGNAME     "SuperTool"
#define BASENAME    "SUPERTOOL"
#define VSTR        "SuperTool 1.1 (12.7.95)"
#define USER        "boris"
#define HOST        "prox"

User and Host are imported from environment variables.

FEATURES

o RevUp generates and maintains include and header files with
  revision information.

o Basically RevUp is similar to the developer tool BumpRev, but
  it offers a lot of additional features.

o ANSI-C, Oberon and Assembly language supported.

o Multiple dependency files.

o Beta count management for beta versions included.

o Interactive logfile generation.

SPECIAL REQUIREMENTS

Kickstart 2.04
Workbench 2.0

Workbench 2.1 for localized DOS error messages.

AVAILABILITY

<ftp://ftp.uni-paderborn.de/pub/aminet/dev/misc/RevUp13.lha>

PRICE

Free

DISTRIBUTABILITY

Freeware (C) 1994-1995 by Proxity Softworks
@endnode
@node FEATURE7 "BLAZEMONGER Port"
@toc FEATURE

FOR IMMODERATE RELEASE

                ESCOM AND BLAZEMONGER INCORPORATED
                   TO PORT FAMED COMPUTER GAME
                       TO POWERPC PLATFORM

                       MUI 3.1-Based Port
                      Shocks Computer World

Chickenmilk, WI -- December 1, 1995 -- BLAZEMONGER INCORPORATED, creator of
the ultra-violent BLAZEMONGER (TM) series of games, announced today that
the next version will run on the Power Amiga, Escom's upcoming
PowerPC-based computer.  "Yes, we're aware that the computer doesn't exist
yet," said Bobby Blazebleeder, First Programmer and Death Lord of
BLAZEMONGER INC.  "That's never stopped us before.  We'll be finished in
about three hours.  Then it will be Amiga Technologies' job to catch up."

The updated program, "BLAZEMONGER 961" (subtitled "Return of the
Skin-Peeling Kitchen Utensils of Fate") will feature the company's
trademarked cataract-inducing graphics, eardrum-piercing sound, and the
latest new development, "ScentSurround." Loosely based on the
similarly-named movie theater gimmick from the 1970's ("Sensurround" would
shake movie viewers' chairs at appropriate moments), the "ScentSurround"
system connects a thin tube from the Amiga's external floppy port to the
user's nose and mouth.  At crucial points in the game, top-secret chemicals
are sprayed into the user's nasal passages.  "You should see what people do
when they inhale dragon pheremones," said Blazebleeder.  "No, on second
thought, you shouldn't."

Even stranger is BLAZEMONGER INCORPORATED's announcement that the next
version of BLAZEMONGER will be based on MUI 3.1.  "I can't believe it,"
said a stunned Harv Laser, Emperor-For-Life of the Amiga Zone on Portal.
"Who...  who would have suspected that BLAZEMONGER's ultimate programmers
needed a GUI builder to help them code?  Sigh.  I have lost all my faith in
life and will probably sell my body to Atari for spare parts."

Jim Drew of Utilities Unlimited was quick to confirm that BLAZEMONGER would
definitely run under the "Q" operating system as well.  (Rumor has it that
"Q" is based, at least in part, on disassembled BLAZEMONGER code.)

Other industry pundits take a harsher view.  "I predicted over twelve
billion years ago that this would happen," chortled Mork Bannett,
editor-in-chief of "The Rag-On-Commodore Rag." "Blazemonger is a big phony.
I don't even think it exists, and here is proof." Unfortunately, our
interview was cut short by the timely arrival of the BLAZEMONGER "Customer
Service" department.

But it appears that BLAZEMONGER INCORPORATED may have the last
thousand-decibel laugh after all.  "Those WIMPFACE industry 'pundits' are
scared of their own 3-D shadows," said Blazebleeder.  "'MUI' is really the
code name for our own, homebrew user-interface builder, MUTILATION USER
INTERFACE.  It is far more powerful and MUCH more violent than the 'other'
MUI, MagicUserInterface by Stefan Stuntz.  You want configurability? 
MUTILATION USER INTERFACE lets you configure not only the appearance, size,
and location of every monster in BLAZEMONGER, but also the speed, memory
size, and number of processors in your computer!  Just set the tooltype
'PROCESSORS=64000' and you basically have a Connection Machine
supercomputer for under a thousand dollars."

Escom is reportedly "pleased" about its new association with BLAZEMONGER
INCORPORATED.  "They're pretty clever d00dz," said Dr.  Peter Kittel,
Vice-President of Small, Furry Mammals at Amiga Technologies.  "Their
developers located a serious bug that we'd missed in our beta version of
AmigaDOS 4.0.  Rather than fix it, though, they actually rewrote the REST
of the operating system to turn the bug into a feature!  That takes GUTS,
not to mention serious mental derangement."

Watch for "BLAZEMONGER 961" coming soon to a dealer near you!

                                                        Dan

 //////////////////////////////////////\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\
| Dan Barrett -- Computer Science Dept, University of MA, Amherst, MA 01003 |
| http://www.cs.umass.edu/~barrett/public.html   --    barrett@cs.umass.edu |
 \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////////////////////////////////////
---
Copyright 1995 by Daniel J. Barrett.  All rights reserved.
This article may be freely distributed as long as it is distributed in its
entirety.  It may not be included in any publication without the written
permission of the author.  So nyaaah.
@endnode
@node NEWS4 "Datastore 2.0"
@toc NEWS

DIGITA AND SOFT-LOGIK ANNOUNCE DATASTORE 2.0

(St.  Louis) Soft-Logik Publishing is pleased to announce the North
American release of Digita Datastore 2.0.  This is a feature update to
Datastore 1.1 and will be available in December.

Datastore is a personal non-relational database manager.  It comes with
EasyStart Templates(tm) to get users started quickly, and also has
extensive online help.  Datastore features mail-merge with Wordworth, forms
with text and graphics, sophisticated queries and a Navigator with
VCR-style controls.

The new features in 2.0 are: Non-editable list view (allowing a screen full
of records to be viewed) with disjointed selection of records; Manual
selective queries with Hide Current Record, Switch Hidden Records, and Show
All Records menu commands; Modeless Find requester; Print on-screen
records; Print Setup requester; Improved speed; Wordworth label templates
and instructions for easy mail merging with Wordworth.

Datastore 2.0 is available as a disk upgrade for $25 directly from
Soft-Logik.  The suggested retail price is $140.  Owners of other
Soft-Logik programs may order it directly from Soft-Logik for $75.  Owners
of Softwood's Final Data may order it directly from Soft-Logik for only
$65.

Soft-Logik Publishing today released Datastore 1.1.  This maintenance
update to Datastore 1.0 includes minor bug fixes.  It is intended for those
customers who choose not to upgrade to Datastore 2.0.  An online patch from
the 1.0 North American version to the 1.1 North American version will be
available soon.  Updates via disk are also available on request for a
nominal disk charge of $10.

Datastore 1.0 was awarded 88%% by Amiga Format and 91%% by Amiga Shopper.

Digita International is the leading publisher of Amiga productivity
software in Europe and Soft-Logik Publishing is the leading publisher of
Amiga productivity software in North America.  Soft-Logik sells and
supports Digita's Wordworth, Datastore and Organizer in the United States
and Canada, while Digita International(R) sells them in other countries.
@endnode
@node NEWS5 "Olaf Barthel Hired By Amiga Technologies"
@toc NEWS

From: c621412@gold.missouri.edu (Russ 'Argel' LeBar)
Subject: Olaf Barthel hired by AT!!
Date: 4 Dec 1995 04:53:26 GMT

[Originally posted to comp.sys.amiga.misc, one of Term's betatesters
explains some of the details of Olaf Barthel's employment by Amiga
Technologies. -Jason]

Olaf Barthel was hired as some type of programming consultant to AT about
2-3 weeks ago to, I believe, work on the new AmigaOS.  I knew about this,
but really didn't know if he wanted it public knowledge, but, well, he said
that he not only didn't care if al of you found out about it, but that
since AT isn't collecting opinions, he just might...  Now, don't go
flooding his mailbox (especially not with "use MUI" stuff).

To anyone who's worried because 'term' is a huge monster, Olaf Barthel has
learned A LOT from making term - he won't make the same mistake twice. 
(Think of it this way - he's gotten most of the mistakes out of the way
already :-)

In my opinion, this is a very good thing - I *know* Olaf knows the OS
inside/out and he listens to ideas.  A very good combination for what will
hopefully be a very bright future for the amiga.

Olaf, if you're reading this, good luck, and remember, you asked for it!
;-)

                        --- --- --- --- --- --- ---

From: "Olaf Barthel" <olsen@sourcery.han.de>
Date: Sun, 10 Dec 95 12:43:51 +0100

[After the announcement of his hiring, Olaf Barthel publicly cleared up the
details of his employment with Amiga Technologies. -Jason]

Thank you for the many friendly comments following Russell's announcement.
I do not want to burst a bubble, regarding my position please do not expect
too much too soon.  I am an `external' programmer with a consulting
contract.  In this context `external' means that I am not based in
Bensheim, home of Amiga Technologies GmbH.  Specifically, a few development
projects were handed over to me and other programmers (yes, I am not
alone), but these did not yet cover designing a new operating system, let
alone applying changes or fixing bugs.  Mark the "not yet" well, please.
Since I do my work at home I do not have as much insight into the
development at Bensheim and thus am not as well- informed as I would want
to be.  All this boils down to that I am not in a decision-making position
(some apparently were lead to be believe that I now occupy Dr.  Peter
Kittel's position ;) nor doing operating system development at the moment.

As for the AmigOS project, I used to sign up with it as a design
coordinator.  Due to my own fault, I lost this position due to lack of
presence.  I regret that I could not devote the time to it that would have
been appropriate.  As far as I can tell, there exists no connection between
the project and the AT department responsible for R&D.

Russell mentioned that I would be collecting bug reports and enhancement
requests for the operating system and Workbench contents.  Amiga
Technologies is not yet doing this via electronic mail, but services to
take care of this are bound to be established as soon as the new Amiga
Developer Support Program is in operation.  Until then, I offer to collect
your suggestions and bug reports via electronic mail on my private home
site.  This will be tough, as I am receiving mail and news via modem,
sourcery is not directly hooked up to the Internet, so please be as brief
as possible.

Please send your enhancement requests and bug reports regarding the Amiga
operating system releases v2.04 through v3.1 to the following address:

      bugs@sourcery.han.de

Please be as brief as possible, sourcery is a private site which is not
directly connected to the Internet.  The information collected will be
handed over to the R&D department at Amiga Technologies GmbH.  In the near
future, this service will be replaced by a similar service offered by Amiga
Technologies GmbH, please monitor comp.sys.amiga.announce to know about it.

When you send your requests and reports, please use the tool "Report" to
generate report forms.  You can find this tool on Aminet under
"util/misc/Report.lha" or in the 3.1 Native Developer Kit on the
"3.1_SWToolkit" disk.

Oh dear, I hope I am not going to regret this.

--
Home: Olaf Barthel, Brabeckstrasse 35, D-30559 Hannover
 Net: olsen@sourcery.han.de
@endnode
@node NEWS6 "Nova Design Launches WWW Site"
@toc NEWS

Nova Design, Inc. Launches World Wide Web Site 

For Immediate Release 
Friday, December 08, 1995 

Contact: Bob Fisher
         Nova Design, Inc.
         804-282-5868

Richmond, VA - December, 95.  Nova Design, Inc.  has now increased their
presence on the Internet dramatically with the opening of their World Wide
Web site to the public.  This exciting new web site gives users, and future
users, of Nova Design's products a totally new and interactive access for
product information, press releases, and product support.

In keeping with Nova Design's position as a cutting-edge graphics software
company, the web page features a state-of-the-art graphical interface,
while retaining full access capabilities for those limited to text based
interfaces.  The site is compatible with Netscape(tm), yet retains
backwards compatibility to Mosaic(tm)-style browsers.

Information currently available online includes all of Nova Design's recent
press releases, complete product information, ImageFX(tm) generated
graphics demonstrating many astounding special effects, information and
tips on using ImageFX, interactive areas for the press and end users to
post questions and comments, as well as links to Amiga web sites and other
web sites throughout the world.

To reach and enjoy the web page site, use the following URL (Universal
Resource Locator):

http://www.portal.com/~kermit 

If you have additional questions or information, you may use the email
links on the Web site to reach Nova Design, or you may contact us at our
real-world address shown below.

Nova Design, Inc., 1910 Byrd Avenue, Suite 214, Richmond, VA 23230.   For
customer support or information call (804) 282-6528, or fax us at; (804)
282-3768.

ImageFX, PaintFX, AutoFX, CineMorph and Cinematte are trademarks of Nova
Design, Inc.  All other trademarks are held by their respective owners. 
@endnode
@node NEWS7 "Personal Paint 6.4"
@toc NEWS

PRESS RELEASE

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE    December 8, 1995

PRESS CONTACT: Ellen Kazmaier

tel: 314-256-9595; fax: 314-256-9595

SOFT-LOGIK ANNOUNCES PERSONAL PAINT FOR NORTH AMERICA

(St.  Louis) Soft-Logik Publishing is pleased to announce the North
American release of Personal Paint 6.4.  This is the first Soft-Logik
release of Personal Paint.

Personal Paint 6.4 is an easy-to-use paint program that comes with stunning
effects and animation capabilities.  It has the paint features Amiga users
have come to expect including line, ellipse, rectangle, polygon, freehand,
Bezier curve, fill and spray tools.  Personal Paint also features multiple
clipboards, multiple undo and redo, built-in virtual memory, gradient
fills, and alpha channel.  It has special effects including emboss, water
colors, and stereograms.  In contrast to competing programs, Personal Paint
supports AmigaOS datatypes, JPEG, PCX, PNG and other image formats.

Its animation features include a storyboard, frame timing, multiple
palettes, and animbrushes.  Personal Paint supports Anim5 (Deluxe Paint),
Anim7 (Adorage) and Anim8 formats.  It requires at least 1MB of memory and
AmigaOS 1.3 or later, but does not require a hard drive.  All screen modes
are supported, and it can quickly convert 24 bit, HAM and HAM8 to 256
colors for easy editing.  It is compatible with many graphic cards,
including EGS, Picasso, Piccolo, Retina and Rainbow.

Personal Paint was developed by Cloanto of Italy, and is now published
worldwide by Digita International.  As with other Digita products,
Soft-Logik is distributing Personal Paint 6.4 in North America.  The
suggested retail price is $140.  Owners of other Soft-Logik programs may
order it directly from Soft-Logik for $75.

Personal Paint 6.1 was awarded 88%% by Amiga Format and 87%% by Amiga
Shopper.

Digita International is the leading publisher of Amiga productivity
software in Europe and Soft-Logik Publishing is the leading publisher of
Amiga productivity software in North America.  Soft-Logik Soft-Logik is
also the worldwide publisher of PageStream and TypeSmith, and sells and
supports Digita(R) International's Wordworth, Datastore, Personal Paint and
Organizer in the United States and Canada.
@endnode
@node NEWS8 "Sysmon v0.12b"
@toc NEWS

TITLE

Sysmon V0.12 public beta release.

AUTHOR

Etienne Vogt (Etienne.Vogt@obspm.fr)

DESCRIPTION

Sysmon is a system monitoring package based on a shared library and Shell
based support commands.  Main features are :

- Precise CPU usage timing for all tasks with very low overhead.
- System message logging daemon like UNIX syslogd
  (useful for debugging).
- Safe System shutdown script (useful for BBS's and networked
  machines).

SPECIAL REQUIREMENTS

AmigaOS 2.04 or higher (V37).
Hard disk and Fast RAM recommended.

AVAILABILITY

On any aminet site. It was uploaded to :
ftp://ftp.cnam.fr/pub/aminet/util/moni/Sysmon012c.lha (73181)

PRICE

Free.

DISTRIBUTABILITY

Freeware (C) Copyright 1995 by Etienne Vogt.
The sysmon.library can be used freely by freeware software, requires a free
registration to me for shareware software and a written license agreement
from me for commercial software.

OTHER

This is a public BETA release, so I would like people to report any
crashes/gurus/incompatibilities or other unexpected behaviour back to me.
This is particularly intended at owners of 68060 based Amigas as I had no
opportunity to test it under such a configuration.
@endnode
@node NEWS9 "AmigaBase v2.2"
@toc NEWS

TITLE

AmigaBase V2.2

VERSION

2.2, update to Version 2.1

AUTHOR

Steffen Gutmann
Wiesentalstr. 30
73312 Geislingen/Eybach
GERMANY

Fax:   +49/7331/69142
Email: gutmann@informatik.uni-ulm.de

DESCRIPTION

AmigaBase is a powerful programmable database with its own graphical user
interface.

AmigaBase is not a relational database with SQL interface or something like
this.  Nevertheless, or just because, AmigaBase is ideal for managing music
cassettes, videos, addresses, etc.  Complex applications like a finance
manager with automatic printing of transfer forms and writing client
accounts is no problem for AmigaBase, too.

AmigaBase knows of the following data types: BOOLEAN (boolean values),
CHOICE (one item out of many items), INTEGER (integer values), REAL
(floating point values), STRING (any text), DATE (date values), TIME (time
values), and MEMO (unlimited multi line text).

For more information see the ReadMe file in the archive.

NEW FEATURES V2.1 - V2.2

o  New program types: PostOpenProject and PreQuitProject.
o  New functions for programming.
o  New menu item to print a listing of all records and variables.
o  New ARexx functions.
o  New escape code: "\e".
o  Small improvement for opening requesters.
o  Small improvement when using the external editor for programming.
o  Small improvement when searching for data.
o  Changed menu item "Paste buffer".
o  Support of the Spanish and Dutch language.
o  Several bug fixes.

SPECIAL REQUIREMENYS

1 MByte RAM, more recommended. 

AVAILABILITY

AmigaBase V2.2 can be found on any aminet site, e.g.
ftp://ftp.uni-kl.de/pub/aminet/biz/dbase/AmigaBase22.lha (472997)

PRICE

DM 70,-- (US $50) 

DISTRIBUTABILITY

AmigaBase is shareware, (c) Steffen Gutmann 1989 - 1995.
@endnode
@node NEWS10 "Executive v1.30"
@toc NEWS

TITLE

Executive

VERSION

1.30

AUTHOR

Petri Nordlund (petrin@megabaud.fi)
(http://www.megabaud.fi/~petrin)

DESCRIPTION

Executive is a UNIX-like task scheduler for Amiga.  It also has plenty of
other features previously available only in larger operating systems.

Executive improves the responsiveness of your Amiga.  No longer running a
CPU intensive program causes the whole machine to slow down.  You can start
many CPU intensive programs and the machine still feels as fast as before.

Executive also includes many useful client programs which let you control
tasks and monitor what's going on in your system.

The core of Executive is a scheduler that recalculates task priorities
based on system load average and task's recent CPU usage.  The scheduler
will give high priority to interactive tasks and low priority to CPU
intensive tasks.

Executive is similar to Job Manager or Spy System, but it has more features
than these two together, for example:

- highly accurate (1/1000 seconds) CPU usage timing
- 6 different scheduling algorithms
- load averages
- process identifiers
- process group identifiers
- accounting
- focus - task with active window gets more CPU time
- support for MultiUser

Executive consists of a server and clients.  The server is run in the
background and it takes care of scheduling, CPU usage calculations and many
other things.  The client programs are:

  Acct            Accounting daemon
  ALoad           Display load average or CPU usage
  ALoad3D         Display load averages in 3D
  Commander       General task manager
  Ctp             Extended ChangeTaskPri
  Kill            Extended Break
  Lastcomm        List last commands executed
  Meter           Display system information
  Nice            Run programs with lower scheduling priority
  Ps              Process status displayer
  Pstree          Display child-parent relationships
  Renice          Renice a task
  Sa              Display accounting statistics
  Stat            Display some misc. information
  Timer           Time CLI and Workbench programs
  Top             Display information about top CPU tasks
  Uptime          Display system uptime and load averages

Executive doesn't use any illegal programming, it is fully compatible with
all Amiga computers running AmigaDos release 2.04 or newer.

Executive has been carefully designed to work with all kinds of
configurations and care has been taken not to break any programming rules.

It's not possible to give a full description of all Executive features
here, so try it out.  You don't want to use your Amiga without it.

Executive is the highest rated item of shareware CU Amiga magazine has ever
awarded at 98%.

NEW FEATURES

- Preliminary MUI V3 support

- A couple of very important bug fixes

- The Meter-client can now draw graphs

- Many other improvements and bugfixes.

SPECIAL REQUIREMENTS

AmigaDos 2.04 or newer is required to run Executive.

AVAILABILITY

Any Aminet site, for example:

ftp://ftp.luth.se/pub/aminet/util/misc/Executive.lha

Executive has a WWW-page which has links to several Aminet sites and also
some nice screenshots.  The page URL is:

http://www.megabaud.fi/~petrin/Executive.html

PRICE

The freely redistributable version doesn't lack any crucial features so it
can be used without registering.  Registered users get process accounting,
ALoad3D and Meter clients and 5 additional scheduling algorithms.
Registration fee is $15 and it's also accepted in various other currencies
(10 GBP, 20 DEM, 70 FIM, ...).

DISTRIBUTABILITY

Copyright © 1995 Petri Nordlund, freely redistributable.
@endnode
@node NEWS11 "Ensemble Verbes v1.5"
@toc NEWS

TITLE

Ensemble Verbes

VERSION

Version 1.5 (14/11/95)

AUTHOR

Peter E. Janes

E-mail:
   peter_janes@cableshare.ccmail.compuserve.com

Regular mail:
   6868 Egremont Road
   R. R. #8
   Watford, Ontario, Canada
   N0M 2S0

DESCRIPTION

Ensemble Verbes is a program to help students practise and master French
verbs in the most common tenses of the language.  It is designed to support
classroom work, not to replace it.

The shareware version contains only -er verbs and present, subjunctive past
and present participle.  The registered version of Ensemble Verbes
features:

* Over 75 verbs, including -er, -ir, -re, reflexive and irregular
  conjugations
* Seven tenses: present, compound past, imperfect, future,
  conditional, subjunctive present and present participle
* Full online, context-sensitive help via AmigaGuide tm
* Close adherence to Amiga User Interface Style Guide
* Sound support
* Support for international keyboards
* Locale support (English, French, Italian, Norwegian and Spanish
  catalogs included)

Registered users can also obtain The French Student's Dictionary & Guide,
Second Edition, a 158-page book featuring:

* French/English and English/French sections
* Most commonly used vocabulary, in context
* Many easy-to-understand examples to help in selection of
  vocabulary
* Many idiomatic expressions
* Regular and irregular verb charts
* Reference grammar guide
* Over 5700 entries

NEW FEATURES

This is an update to Ensemble Verbes 1.4.  It contains a new Italian
catalog and fixes a bug that caused Enforcer hits when Prop3D is installed.

SPECIAL REQUIREMENTS

Any Amiga running AmigaOS 2.04 or above.  AmigaGuide/MultiView and
Installer are recommended.

AVAILABILITY

All files can be found on any Aminet site.

The unregistered version of Ensemble Verbes may be found at:
  ftp://ftp.wustl.edu/pub/aminet/misc/edu/Verbes.lha (70594 bytes)

Patch files for registered versions may be found at:
  ftp://ftp.wustl.edu/pub/aminet/misc/edu/VerbesRegPch15.lha (44418 bytes)
  ftp://ftp.wustl.edu/pub/aminet/misc/edu/VerbesRegPch14.lha (45813 bytes)
  ftp://ftp.wustl.edu/pub/aminet/misc/edu/VerbesRegPch13.lha (77599 bytes)
  ftp://ftp.wustl.edu/pub/aminet/misc/edu/VerbesRegPch12.lha (21241 bytes)
NOTE: Each file is relative to the previous version.  For example,
      to upgrade Verbes 1.3 to Verbes 1.5 you will need both
      VerbesRegPch14.lha and VerbesRegPch15.lha.

PRICE

Ensemble Verbes:                            CAN $25.00
The French Student's Dictionary & Guide:    CAN $10.00
Ensemble Verbes *and* The French Student's
   Dictionary & Guide:                      CAN $30.00

Add CAN $3.00 for shipping inside North America; outside North America, add
CAN $8.00.

User groups should contact the author for a group registration fee.

DISTRIBUTABILITY

Shareware.  The unregistered version of Ensemble Verbes may be included in
the CD-ROM or floppy collections compiled by Fred Fish and the Aminet
moderators; all others should contact Peter Janes before including the
program.  Both registered and unregistered versions are Copyright (C) 1995
by Peter E.  Janes.

Peter_Janes@cableshare.ccmail.compuserve.com | "And so, here we are, victims of
  Network Administrator, Cableshare Inc. //  |  Mathematics." --Londo Mollari
    ex-Certified Amiga Developer       \X/   | *** SUPPORT CANADIAN MUSIC ***
@endnode
@node NEWS12 "Digita Press Releases"
@toc NEWS

WORDWORTH 5

To be released in January 1996

New features from Wordworth 3.1 include:
 - Footnotes
 - Drag-and-drop Style-sheets
 - ARexx support
 - 24-bit graphics support
 - Automatic bullet points
 - Automatic hanging indents
 - System clipboard support
 - Background printing
 - Font Effects (Stretch, Variable oblique, Drop Caps, etc.)
 - Improved Tables
 - Increased speed
 - Macros
 - Wizards


ORGANISER 2

Available now

New features from version 1.1 include:

 - Linkable items
 - Scrollable Diary page
 - Auto Capitalisation of Postcodes
 - More General Settings
 - Speed improvements
 - Better implemented Diary Themes
 - Navigation buttons for Supplements


DATASTORE 2

Available now

New features from version 1.1 include:

 - Spreadsheet style List View
 - Ability to hide records to create a subset of records, and switch
   between the two sets
 - Queries are now performed on the current subset rather than the whole
   database
 - You can now print individual records graphically
 - The Find requester is modeless
 - Increased speed
 - Print requesters have Setup buttons to display Workbench Printer and
   PrinterGfx preference requesters on Datastore screen
 - Datastore screen is now Public, and supports opening Datastore on other
   Public screens


MONEY MATTERS 4

Available now

New features from version 3.05 include:

 - Completely new interface, same as other Digita products
 - On-line Amigaguide help system
 - Insurance inventory
 - Loan calculator
 - Currency Calculator
 - Amiga clipboard support
 - Digisense (completes dates for you, etc.)


Digita International are now also distributing Personal Paint 6.4 in the
U.K.  and the English version of TurboCalc 3.5 worldwide.

For more information on any of these products, or to order any of them, you
contact our Sales department using one of the following methods:

E-MAIL: sales@digita.demon.co.uk
TEL:    (England) 01 395 270 273
FAX:    (England) 01 395 268 893
WRITE:
    Digita International Ltd.
    Black Horse House
    Exmouth
    EX8 1JL
    ENGLAND

@endnode
@node NEWS13 "Quarterback v6.1"
@toc NEWS

TITLE

Quarterback

VERSION

6.1

PUBLISHER

Quasar Distribution
P.O. Box 188
Southland
Victoria      3192
Australia
Phone +61 3 9583 8806
Fax   +61 3 9585 1074
BBS   +61 3 9584 8590

DESCRIPTION

Quarterback 6.1
Advanced Backup and Archiving Program for the Amiga

While hard drives represent some of the highest technology that exists in
the computer industry, all hard drives will eventually fail.  It is not a
matter of if, but simply a question of when.  If you've invested hours
creating pictures, manuscripts, 3-D ray-traces, or spreadsheets, then you
need some way to protect your investment.  Quarterback gives you that
protection by safeguarding your work against any possible loss.

Features:
· Backup to or restore from floppy disks, high density floppies, hard 
  disks, hard disk partitions, AmigaDOS files, removable media, tape 
  drives, and any AmigaDOS compatible devices.
· Support for special features of newer, more advanced tape drives.  
  There is support for hardware-based compression, fast tape advance, and 
  quick erase features.
· Support for multiple tapes per backup session.  This means that you can 
  back up the entire contents of very large hard disks onto several 
  smaller-sized tapes.
· Automatically formats floppies as it writes.
· Complete or Selective backups and restores.  A powerful Tag Filter 
  allows you to include or exclude files by name (with wild cards), date,
  or archive bit.
· Full macro and ARexx support, allowing you total control over the 
  Quarterback program.
· Optional password protection and encryption, to give you the best in 
  security.
· Fast compression during backups.  In many cases, Quarterback can 
  compress the data as fast as it can be written to your floppy drive.
· Innovative "Interrogator" retrieves device information from SCSI devices.
· Save to a file or print catalogs or session logs.
· Can verify data as it is written.
· Automatically detects and warns about bad media during backup and
  restore.
· Writes file catalog to both first and last disks for extra data
  protection.
· Supports unlimited file lengths, any number of subdirectories, and any 
  number of files per subdirectory.
· Supports both hard and soft links.
· Includes Schedule Pro - a program which allows you to set up Quarterback
  for unattended backup sessions!  Not only can you use Schedule Pro to 
  set up Quarterback to automatically back up your hard disk at any time, 
  or on any schedule, but you can use it to automatically start any 
  program or ARexx script at a particular time 	or on a particular 
  schedule.  You can even use it to automatically dsiplay reminders when
  you need them.

AVAILABILITY

Quarterback is available now in English versions.

DISTRIBUTORS

Australia & New Zealand (and anywhere else not listed)

Quasar Distribution
P.O. Box 188
Southland
Victoria  3192
Australia
Phone +61 3 9583 8806
Fax   +61 3 9585 1074
BBS   +61 3 9584 8590

U.S.A. & Canada

Wonder Computers Inc.
1301 Richmond Road
Ottawa, Ontario
Canada  K2B 7Y4

Phone +1 613 596 2542
Fax   +1 613 596 9349

U.K.

Gordon Harwood Computers
New Street, Alfreton	
Derbyshire
England  DE55 7BP

Phone  +44 1773 836781
Fax    +44 1773 831040

Germany

Casablanca Multimedia
Wielmelhauser Straße 247a
44799 Bochum 1
Germany
Phone +49 (0)234 7 20 35
Fax   +49 (0)234 7 20 60

France

France-Festival-Distribution
3 Rue Anatole France
FR 13220 Chateauneuf-Les-Martigues
France
Fax +33 42-76-18-70

Belgium

FC Systems
Bruul 82
2800 Mechelen
Belgium
Phone +32 (0)15 21.78.67
Fax   +32 (0)15 21.76.55

All distribution enquiries should be directed to Quasar Distribution.

SPECIAL REQUIREMENTS

An Amiga computer with KS 1.2 or greater and 512 K of RAM or greater
Some functions are only available under KS2.x or KS3.x.

PRICE

Please contact your local distributor for pricing and availability.
@endnode
@node NEWS14 "Quarterback Tools Deluxe v2.0.2"
@toc NEWS

TITLE

Quarterback Tools Deluxe

VERSION

2.0.2

PUBLISHER

Quasar Distribution
P.O. Box 188
Southland
Victoria      3192
Australia
Phone +61 3 9583 8806
Fax   +61 3 9585 1074
BBS   +61 3 9584 8590

DESCRIPTION

Quarterback Tools Deluxe
Advanced Disk Recovery and File Management Tools for the Amiga

Quarterback Tools Deluxe is a complete package of disk and file management
tools that can help you recover from disk problems, speed up your disk
access, and manage your files and disks better.

Quarterback Tools Deluxe consists of the following programs:
·Quarterback Tools
- A program to help you find and correct disks errors, recover files that
  have been accidentally deleted, and optimize your disk acess.  In
  addition, for advanced users, Quarterback Tools includes a disk editor,
  which lets you directly examine and modify the information contained on
  your disks.  Quarterback Tools also includes a macro capability, a
  complete ARexx port for advanced users, and is completely customizable to
  your way of working.

·Replicator
- A program to quickly and easily duplicate a large number of floppy disks.
  You can duplicate to multiple floppy drives at the same time, and even
  save an entire disk image as a file on your hard disk to use later.

·Locator
- A program that helps you quickly locate files on your disks.  You simply
  provide any part of a file name, and Locator will search the entire disk
  (or just a sub-drawer of the disk) and find all files that match that
  name.  For each file found, Locator can tell you the location of the
  file, information about the file, and show you a portion of the file's
  contents.

·Encryptor
- A program to encrypt and decrypt files.  You can use this program to keep
  others from seeing the contents of your files; only those people who have
  the file's password will be able to decrypt and use the file.

·File Eraser
- A program that irretrievably erases a file's contents, and then deletes
  the file.  File Eraser includes an option to erase a file using the US
  Department of Defense approved method for permanently erasing files.  You
  can use this program to permanently remove sensitive information from
  your disk; no file recovery program, not even Quarterback Tools, will be
  able to recover the file's contents.

·Disk Eraser
- A program that irretrievably erases either the unused portions of a disk,
  or the entire disk itself.  Like File Eraser, Disk Eraser includes an
  option to erase a file using the US Department of Defense approved method
  for permanently erasing files.  You can use this program to permanently
  erase files which you have already deleted, or to permanently erase all
  files from a disk.

·Keystroke Finder
- A program that shows you the appropriate keystroke combination to type
  any character on your Amiga.  For example, Keystroke Finder can show you
  how to type accented characters like è and â, and special characters like
  ®.  Keystroke Finder works with any keyboard and any "keymap" setting.

·System Mover
- A program that simplifies moving system files - such as fonts, printer
  drivers, and system libraries - from one disk to another.

·Brain Cloud
- A program that renders a floppy disk temporarily unusable by the system,
  without affecting any of the disks contents.  A disk that has a "brain
  cloud" cannot even be formatted by the Amiga!

AVAILABILITY

Quarterback Tools Deluxe is available now in English versions.

DISTRIBUTORS

Australia & New Zealand (and anywhere else not listed)

Quasar Distribution
P.O. Box 188
Southland
Victoria  3192
Australia
Phone +61 (0)3 9583 8806
Fax   +61 (0)3 9585 1074
BBS   +61 (0)3 9584 8590

U.S.A. & Canada

Wonder Computers Inc.
1301 Richmond Road
Ottawa, Ontario
Canada  K2B 7Y4

Phone +1 613 596 2542
Fax   +1 613 596 9349

U.K.

Gordon Harwood Computers
New Street, Alfreton	
Derbyshire
England  DE55 7BP

Phone  +44 1773 836781
Fax    +44 1773 831040

Germany

Casablanca Multimedia
Wielmelhauser Straße 247a
44799 Bochum 1
Germany
Phone +49 (0)234 7 20 35
Fax   +49 (0)234 7 20 60

France

France-Festival-Distribution
3 Rue Anatole France
FR 13220 Chateauneuf-Les-Martigues
France
Fax +33 42-76-18-70

Belgium

FC Systems
Bruul 82
2800 Mechelen
Belgium
Phone +32 (0)15 21.78.67
Fax   +32 (0)15 21.76.55

All distribution enquiries should be directed to Quasar Distribution.

SPECIAL REQUIREMENTS

An Amiga computer with KS 1.2 or greater and 512 K of RAM or greater
Some functions are only available under KS2.x or KS3.x.

PRICE

Please contact your local distributor for pricing and availability.
@endnode
@node NEWS15 "Digital Universe Patches"
@toc NEWS

The patches for V1.02 of "The Digital Universe" are now available.  The
executable patches implement the following changes:

Changes since version 1.01:
===========================
New features
------------
- Now, numerical reports can be output to the screen as well as
  the printer, or saved to disk.
- A few useful keyboard shortcuts dealing with time were added:
  'a' - toggles to automatic time advancement
  'm' - toggles to manual time advancement
  't' - sets "The Digital Universe" to use the current time
- 10 more user-settable fields of view were added, bringing the total
  to 20.  The first ten are used by pressing a number key (above
  the 'querty' keyboard.  The last ten are used by holding down the
  SHIFT key while doing so.  Since the preferences file format had to
  change as a result of this modification, you'll have to re-initialize
  the file when running "The Digital Universe" for the first time
  after upgrading.  Type "DigitalUniverse init" at a shell prompt
  to do this.
- The string gadget in "Find Star", "Find Galaxy", and "Search
  Hypertext" is automatically activated when their respective windows
  are opened.

Bug fixes
---------
- MUI 2.3 and 3.1 have problems in dealing with >V34 amigaguide.library
  (it can only deal with a single amigaguide file, and "The Digital
  Universe" requires 9 separate flies.  To get around this problem,
  "The Digital Universe" pre-loads V34 amigaguide.library, regardless
  of the version of amigaguide.library normally used on your system.  This
  works fine, but has one small problem - V34 amigaguide.library
  was never meant to deal with screens having more than 32 colors, and
  caused the system to crash if a hypertext window was brought up on
  such a screen.  The interim solution is to restrict screen depths to
  32 colors, and this modification was made to V1.02.  Of course, when
  a future version of MUI and amigaguide.library >V34 are happy with one
  another, we'll be removing the temporary restriction.
- If you'd accidentally deleted your Mode_Names icon from your WBStartup
  drawer, your Amiga would not know the names for different screen modes.
  "The Digital Universe" previously never anticipated this scenario, and
  crashed if it couldn't find any valid screen mode names.  V1.02 has
  fixed this problem, providing the system with a <Default mode> screen
  even if there is not a valid name for it.  This stops the program from
  crashing, but of course the best solution is to restore the Mode_Names
  icon from your original Workbench disks.
- Western Australia Daylight Time and Western Australia Standard Time
  offsets were wrong.  They've been fixed from their previous values of
  +8 and +7 respectively to the correct values of +9 and +8.
- Animations generated on overscanned screens with WB3.1 would sometimes
  be corrupted.  We believe we've found and fixed the problem (special
  thanks to Chris Gray for his incredible patience in helping us track
  it down).

Of course, if you purchased V1.00 of our package, you will have to upgrade
to V1.01 before applying the patches for V1.02.

Updates to the hypertext are also available.  The following changes have
been made:

- Product information sheet added to the online help, to provide users with
  a quick reference of the software's features
- Help for the FOVs was expanded to describe the 20 fields instead of just
  the original 10.
- Help for "View Report" option of report generator was added
- HST observations of the Eagle Nebula have been added
- description of planetary discoveries around 51 Pegasi added
- possible third companion to Sirius (Sirius C) mentioned
- Updated information from HST observations about planetary disk around
  Beta Pictoris added.
- Info about asteroid 4 Vesta from HST added
- a few bad links in Apollo 11 were repaired
- expansion on the description of the black hole discovery in NGC 4261
  added.
- Galileo spacecraft mission description expanded to include recent
  successes during its December 7th closest approach and probe entry.  Of
  course, this item will likely be updated further when we start to get
  probe data back from the spacecraft.

As well, three new pictures for the encyclopedia have been made available.
Two of them are updates - images for Beta Pictoris and M16 (The Eagle
Nebula).  The third (of 4 Vesta) is a new image.

The most straightforward way to obtain the patches is to connect to our Web
site with the URL

http://www.syz.com/support

But since some users have been having difficulty obtaining binary files
with their Web browsers, we are temporarily making the updates available
via FTP.  We are *not* really set up to deal with FTP properly, so we ask
that you excuse the mess you'll see if you need to get the files this way.
First of all, our Internet provider's welcome message will appear instead
of our own - don't let that throw you!  :-) In addition, you'll see all of
our HTML files (for the Web service) mixed in with everything else.  Just
ignore all of that and go straight for the support/patches directory to get
the files you need.  The site to connect to is ftp.syz.com.

Of course, it's quite helpful to read the Web documentation concerning the
files first so that you know which ones you require.

There's a lot of downloading and patching for everyone to do to bring their
version up to date.  We hope that these changes fix some of the problems
observed in the past, and add a few small features that you'll find useful.
If you have any problems with V1.02 of the software, please let us know. 
If all appears to be going well, in a few days we'll release a new demo
version of the package to Aminet, and start shipping V1.02 with new orders.

Thanks again for your continued support of "The Digital Universe!".

--
Syzygy Research & Technology Ltd.      | Creators of "The Digital Universe"
Box 75, Legal, AB, T0G 1L0, CANADA     |         for Amiga computers
WWW: http://www.syz.com                |
email: sales@syz.com, support@syz.com  | 113 deg 35' 28" W, 53 deg 56' 50" N
@endnode
@node NEWS16 "OTM Release Schedule"
@toc NEWS

LOOKOUT FOR A STUNNING RANGE OF NEW SOFTWARE FROM ...

OTM

Big News : The signing of Intersect Developments new shooter ATROPHY!  :))

--------------------------------
Release Schedule till March '96.
--------------------------------

December '95
------------

PowerBase v3.5  Amiga       19.95       5th Dec     OTM in-house

    Friendly, powerful flat-file database system

FSP             PC          34.95       15th Dec    Craig Smith
    Football application for following leagues or individual teams

February '96
------------

Piranha         PC          29.95       -           D-Designs
    Frenetic 360' shoot'em up with attitude, 3 players, league and
    deathmatch games

WatchTower      Amiga AGA   29.95       -           CyberArts Ltd.
    Addictive Top down view 'Commando' style arcade war-game

Atrophy         Amiga AGA   29.95       -           Intersect Development
    Hi-res overscan 256 colour shoot'em up!

March '96
---------

Account Master  PC-Win'95   49.95       -
    Friendly full-blown accounts package for Windows'95 - set to rival
    Quickbooks

XP8             Amiga AGA   29.95       -           Weathermine Software
    Vertically scrolling shoot'em up with some unique multiplayer features

Starfighter     Amiga AGA   29.95       -           Fabio Bizzetti
    Epic, 5 disk 3D space shoot'em up with stunningly detailed texture
    mapping and realtime rendering

OTM
Publications & Promotions Ltd 
1st Floor
11 Aldergate
Tamworth
Staffordshire
B79 7DL
UK
Telephone: +44 (0)1827 - 312 302
Facsimile: +44 (0)1827 - 67010
EMail:  OTM@OTMltd.demon.co.uk
@endnode
@node NEWS17 "OTM Press Release"
@toc NEWS

OTM Press Release

2 December, 1995

--------------------
MONTHLY PRESS REPORT
--------------------

Lots of exciting new developments this month including the signing of a
number of top new titles and their respective development teams... 
CyberArts Ltd., Weathermine and D-Designs.  February will see the release
of two incredibly exciting new games, for the Amiga a top down view
'Commando' style arcade war game as previewed in Amiga Format (issue
79)....  WatchTower and for the PC on CD-ROM a frenetic 360 shoot'em up ...
Piranha.

Both titles are being developed by top Finnish teams, CyberArts and
D-Designs respectively and are set to thrill and excite games players
everywhere.  There are a number of seriously dangerous coding teams in
Finland at the moment, whether its the cold, the snow, the long dark
evenings, or something in the water we don't know, but one things for sure
, they will continue to thrill and excite games players everywhere with
their skills.  We are extremely pleased to have established strong links
with them and are looking forward as the publisher of these titles to
releasing them on an unsuspecting world!

We have a long line up of top quality Amiga titles in development, our
support for the Amiga is assured and stronger than ever.  We now have a
wide range of Amiga and PC titles, and are looking forward to also
publishing and developing for other platforms, hopefully in '96, such as
the Playstation and 3DO.

We've moved!  Part of our operation has now moved to new offices in order
to accommodate further expansion, so please take note of our new address.

Screenshots, work in progress reports, playable demos, full product info...
on all other titles will be released v.shortly.

Forthcoming Titles include:

WatchTower, XP8, Starfighter, Virtual Rally, Banzai Frog, QP Tennis

----------
WATCHTOWER
----------

developed by top Finnish Development team CyberArts Ltd.

comes...

W A T C H T O W E R

A top down 'Commando' style arcade war-game

+Simultaneous two player mode
+Seven military weapons to pick up
+Three different terrain types: desert, jungle and city
+Six long and challenging missions
+Adjustable skill level
+Massively armed enemy vehicles and aircraft
+Intelligent kill or be killed enemies
+Vicious end of level guardians
+Hard disk installable

Formats:  A1200/A4000, CD32
RRP:  29.95
Release Date: 	February '96

Screenshots available


-------------
P I R A N H A
-------------
A seriously vicious 360 shoot'em with attitude!

- 1-3 Players simultaneously
- 2-3 Players deathmatch mode
- 2-3 Players league mode
- 10-20 Backgrounds
- 100-200 Levels
- Lots of animated enemies + asteroids + more...
- Lots of CD quality music and sound effects
- 10+ channels of music and 6+ channels of sound effects
- Lots of different bonus stages and hidden levels
- Equipment screen (for buying new weapons etc)
- Lots of different weapons + other equipments
- Stunning visual effects
- 256 color graphics
- Intelligent enemies
- 60fps screen update, 30fps on slow machines ( <486 VLB)
- Supports every major soundcard available
- Tons of playability
- Zillions of exciting atmosphere
- 8 weeks of hard work .. So far
- 100% Protected Mode 32-Bit Code and Music system


FORMATS : PC CDROM
        - recommended (486/66 VLB) , 4MB memory
RRP : 29.95
RELEASE DATE : February '96

Screenshots & demo available

----------------------------------------------------------------------
OTM
11 Aldergate, Tamworth, Staffordshire, B79 7DL, UK
Tel. 01827 312 302  Fax. 01827 670 10   Email.  OTM@OTMltd.demon.co.uk
@endnode
@node NEWS18 "A.N.G.L.E."
@toc NEWS

From: werther@karunko.nervous.com (Werther Pirani)

INTRODUCING A.N.G.L.E. (Amiga Net Games for Light Entertainment)

A.N.G.L.E.  is a brand new, non-profit team comprised by a bunch of Amiga
devotees that don't expect to make money out of this venture.

Our focus is more on providing games for an area that has not been explored
very well on the Amiga and our intention is to provide the first few
efforts as a "gift" to game players.

A.N.G.L.E.'s MAIN GOAL

Produce multi-player games to be played over the Internet rather than
across a serial link.  To proceed at a reasonable pace, we need more
programmers, gfx artists, muscians and designers -- any takers?

A.N.G.L.E.'s RELATED GOALS

Help other individuals and teams writing their own TCP/IP based software,
whether games or "serious" applications.

Help end-users struggling with AmiTCP/IP, SLIP/CSLIP/PPP and the likes to
get on-line *properly* with the minimum of fuss.

A.N.G.L.E.'s WEB SITE

Detailed info, including a little questionnaire to help us shaping up our
first game, are available at:

http://www.iper.net/angle

...and before you ask, it's actually "iper", not "hyper"! :)

A.N.G.L.E.'s EMAIL CONTACT

Plain e-mail works as well:

ANGLE-admin@karunko.nervous.com

Thank you for your time and patience!

Sincerely,

Werther 'Mircko' Pirani
-- 
e-mail:          werther@karunko.nervous.com

A.N.G.L.E.       Amiga Net Games for Light Entertainment
                 http://www.iper.net/angle
@endnode
@node NEWS19 "Amiga Atlanta Invitation"
@toc NEWS

Amiga Atlanta, Inc.  cordially invites computer enthusiasts to the Amiga
Atlanta 10th Anniversary Celebration Banquet, Saturday, January 20, 1996 at
7 p.m.  at the Terrace Garden Inn, 3405 Lenox Rd.(across from the Lenox
Square Mall) in Atlanta, GA.  This is not only the 10th anniversary of one
of America's oldest Amiga user groups, it is also the 10th anniversary of
the Amiga platform.  It is anticipated that Amiga users, developers and
retailers from all over the United States - and possibly abroad - will be
in attendance.  Amiga legends such as Dave Haynie, Fred Fish, R.J.  Mical
and Jason Compton are expected to attend.  A representative from The
Governor's office will be on hand to issue a special proclamation.  And,
the new owners of the Amiga platform, Amiga Technologies - all the way from
Germany - are expected to give the keynote address.

This is an event that should be of interest to any computer enthusiast -
regardless of their platform of choice.  Why?  Because it brings more
competition to the computer marketplace and thus lower prices.

There is more to do on Saturday, January 20,1996 in Atlanta than go to a
history-making banquet, however.  Many of those coming to Atlanta for the
banquet should also take the Grey Line Bus Tour of Olympic Venues.  Yes,
see all the Olympic venues and see where Olympic history will be made
before the crowds come to town.

Space is limited.  Banquet reservations are just $28/person.  So, make your
banquet reservations now.  Local reservations can be made by calling Lamar
Morgan at (404)365-0670.  For those traveling to Atlanta from within the
United States and in need of flight and hotel reservations as well as
banquet reservations, call Bear Stearns Travel at 1-800-915-2327 and ask
for Cindy Benson.  For those traveling to Atlanta from overseas for the
banquet, call Bear Stearns Travel collect at 1-816-880-3108 and ask for
Cindy Benson.

For more specific information regarding the banquet, check out the AAi Home
Page: http://www.mindspring.com/~amigaatl; or, send email to:
lamar@mindspring.com

Believe me, this is one banquet computer enthusiasts should not miss.

Lamar Morgan
President
Amiga Atlanta, Inc.
@endnode
@node NEWS20 "Digital Universe Mailing List"
@toc NEWS

Digital Universe Mailing List

Hi there everyone.  This is a message to the Digital Universe mailing list.
For those newcomers to the list, welcome!  The purpose of the list is to
provide registered users of the software with information relating to "The
Digital Universe".  When you bought our product, customer support didn't
stop there.  We're hoping to be able to demonstrate to other software
companies what customer support should be like!

If we received your email address with your order, you were automatically
added to our mail list.  Traffic is expected to be generally quite low, but
if you would like to be removed, just send email to support@syz.com and let
us know.

Anyway, on to the news:

1.  THIS MAILING LIST
We've received a number of messages from people wanting to know the details
of how to send messages to this mailing list.  Unfortunately, our Internet
service provider is not yet set up to provide "public access" messaging -
which means that you can't send messages to a central site to have them
immediately broadcast amongst all members of the list.  But if you have
anything you would like to tell or ask your fellow "Digital Universe"
ousers, just send the message on to us at support@syz.com, instructing us
to post it to the list.  Within a day or two, we should be able to get your
message out.

2.  OUR WEB PAGE
Our Web page has undergone fairly significant changes in the last few
weeks.  If you haven't been there for awhile, we have a section devoted to
new discoveries relating to astronomy.  You'll be able to access
information there much faster than waiting for it to make its way into
patches to the hypertext (since we wait for a significant number of changes
to the hypertext before releasing a new version...  otherwise we'd be
swamped in an endless sea of versions)..

We're quite excited about another new addition.  The Internet puts a wealth
of astronomical information at your fingertips - if you only know where to
look.  Many people are interested in obtaining images of astronomical
objects, but have no idea where they might find them.  We're currently in
the process of putting together a huge database of URLs to astronomy images
around the net.  This index is searchable - which means you can ask it to
find something like "NGC 3214", or "Saturn" and it will return links to all
the pictures that it knows about.  Compiling this database will take a long
time (and we don't plan on ever really being done :-), but in the meantime
we're off to a good start with about 15000 images indexed so far.  Much of
this is due to our linking directly with the Digitized Sky Survey Web
pages...  giving you direct access to images of all NGC and IC objects.

We still have a long way to go, and plan on announcing the service publicly
to various astronomy newsgroups when we have it set up a bit better.  In
the meantime, feel free to test the service, and send us any comments that
you might have on it.  Links to additional URLs not yet indexed (believe
me, there are LOTS of those :-) are also greatly appreciated.  We hope to
make the service the definitive guide to finding astronomical images on the
Web.

You can reach it via links on our home page http://www.syz.com/ or directly
with the URL http://www.syz.com/images/

Just a word of warning - some of the images, though freely accessible on
the Web, may be copywritten by various individuals or organizations.  Just
because we at Syzygy provide links to these images does not mean that
you've bought the rights to these images when you bought our product.  We
don't own the copyright on these images any more than you do - so be sure
to check with the original sources if you want to use them in any
publications.

One last thing to check out - Galileo will be reaching Jupiter in just 4
days - December 7th!  Until its encounter, we feature images on our home
page obtained directly from JPL that show the current position and
orientation of the spacecraft.  At the moment, they're updated daily..
.but on arrival day, they'll be updated every 5 minutes.  It's interesting
to connect to the pages periodically to see how fast that Galileo is
approaching its target.

Obviously, when Galileo arrives and the probe data finally relayed back to
Earth, we'll have to do a lot of hypertext editing ..  :-)

3.  DIGITAL UNIVERSE V1.02
Two releases of Digital Universe are currently out - the initial V1.00 and
V1.01.  (you can get patches on our Web site to upgrade V1.00 to V1.01 if
you don't already own the latest version).  We've been working on V1.02 for
quite some time, adding a few more minor features and eliminating a few
more bugs (persistent little things :-) We just have one or two things left
to straighten out and we'll be able to release V1.02, along with the
patches.

But we're after your advice before going ahead with one of our patches.  It
only affects users using Workbench 3.0 or greater (or anyone capable of
opening a screen of more than 32 colors), so WB 2.0 owners can feel free to
skip this section.  As for the rest of you, bear with us a bit on a
technical discussion.

As you're probably quite well aware, "The Digital Universe" has an awful
lot of hypertext.  As such, it's split up into 9 files.  Unfortunately, MUI
has a bug when dealing with more than one hypertext file when using a
version of amigaguide.library > 34....  it can really only deal properly
with a single file.

Luckily, amigaguide.library V34 (the WB 2.0 version) and MUI get along just
fine.  So "The Digital Universe" pre-loads its own copy of V34
amigaguide.library, irregardless of the version you normally use on your
system.  That way, MUI is forced to using V34 and the hypertext normally
works okay.

However, there is one potential problem that got past us in bug testing. 
If you're using a screen with more than 32 colors and open up an amigaguide
window (either through pressing HELP, getting More Info on an object, etc.)
amigaguide.library will cause your computer to promptly crash.  This
appears to be due to the fact that V34 amigaguide.library assumes that you
can't have more than 32 colors on a screen at once....  reasonable, since
with WB2.0, for which it was written, you couldn't.

"The Digital Universe" only uses 16 colors on a screen at a time, so we
were tempted to restrict the depth of a screen to 4 (16 colors).  But some
users have wanted to modify the "showpic" script to use their own IFF ILBM
viewer to display images directly on the DU screen.  For this, they would
appreciate more colors so that the pictures turn out alright.

But since all the pictures (except a few HAM images here and there) are 16
colors anyway, restricting the user to a 32 color palette might serve the
bill perfectly...  and luckily amigaguide.library seems happy with 32
colors.

We're after your input on this decision, if it affects you.  Do you think
that restricting the palette to 32 colors would be reasonable?  (for that
matter, does amigaguide.library V34 crash for anyone using a 32 color
screen?  Most of our testing was done on a 16 color screen...) If not, do
you have any alternate suggestions?

We were hoping that the problem would have been fixed with the recent
release of MUI 3.1...  but unfortunately it doesn't appear to have been. 
When we can safely use versions of amigaguide.library greater than 34,
we'll remove the pre-loaded library and any screen depth restrictions that
we might impose at this time.

Comments are more than welcome.

4.  SOFTWARE PIRACY
We've learned that at least one individual has managed to circumvent our
copy protection (the user's registered name encoded into a keyfile), and
has started to circulate pirated copies of "The Digital Universe".  We
realize that cracking our protection scheme is not a very difficult thing
to do, and it was never intended to deter dedicated software pirates.  But
the reason that we're bring this up is to ask you to protect your
investment.  If you learn of anyone spreading illegal versions of "The
Digital Universe", please either try to discourage them from doing so, or
notify us.  Obviously, the best support for the software will come from a
company which has been financially compensated for all of the versions in
use.

And that's about it for this message.  I hope your local weather's been
good for observations lately - we've been getting nothing but snow for the
past several weeks...  :-)

Dan Charrois

--
Syzygy Research & Technology Ltd.      | Creators of "The Digital Universe"
Box 75, Legal, AB, T0G 1L0, CANADA     |         for Amiga computers
WWW: http://www.syz.com                |
email: sales@syz.com, support@syz.com  | 113 deg 35' 28" W, 53 deg 56' 50" N
@endnode
@node NEWS21 "Excelsior! Purchased by AmiCom!"
@toc NEWS

Excelsior!  Professional BBS has been Purchased by AmiCom!  (Amiga
Communications!)

So, who is AmiCom!  ?  AmiCom is a team of dedicated Excelsior!  Sysops who
wanted to do everything in their power to keep Excelsior!  BBS alive and
competitive with this ever changing BBS world.

AmiCom!  has put together a Team of Support and Registration sites all
around the world to make it easier for Sysops to get assistance.  This
support effort is also backed by Excelsior's own support network.  (E!Net)
With this network, and the enthusiastic support members, This will prove to
be the Best support that Excelsior!  BBS has ever seen.  And possibly any
other BBS package for the Amiga as well.  (IMHO)

Excelsior! 2.0 will be sold in 2 packages.

Excelsior! (Full package)
         - Excelsior registered TrapDoor.
         - Excelsior registered QSilver / Mercury

Excelsior lite!  (WITHOUT TrapDoor, QSilver / Mercury).

This allows those who already own a Frontdoor mailer (TrapDoor, GMS,
Etc...) to purchase Excelsior!  at a lower rate than those who need the
mailer package.

The QSilver / Mercury that is included with E!, are Excelsior!  Specific
versions of their Multi-BBS counterparts.  These versions are faster, and
with the Co-ordinated efforts between AmiCom!  and Bitplane enterprises,
will have more flexibility.

Other things for the Future of Excelsior...  Well, We're open for
suggestions.  Currently, We've been taking Excelsior!  and making it
Modular by converting many of the internal functions and putting them into
"External" libraries.

We feel this will have several benefits.

  = Smaller Executables.  (Of course)  ;)
  = Greater speed.
  = Less memory usage.
  = Third party utilities would have easier access to functions.
  = Easier Updates.  (Just release the new Libraries.)

Some new additions to Excelsior! include:

  - Sysop definable menus using GUI Menu editor.
  - Sysop definable HOTKEYS.   ;)
  - Screen Definable.
  - RIP-II support.

The Excelsior!  project is turning out to be a Bigger project than ANYONE
out there may have thought.  But we are working hard to make it what
everyone expects.  And possibly throw in a Few surprises as well...  :)

I think everyone will be VERY happy with it when it's released.

For more information, Please send E-Mail to one of the Below listed
AmiCom!/Excelsior!  Development Sites:

The Hidden Pyramid:     1-315-433-5398
             Sysop:     Jay Britton
           Fidonet:     1:260/346
             E!Net:     312:1200/0
          Internet:     jbritton@dreamscape.com

   The Factory BBS:     1-918-687-1750
             Sysop:     Larry Bowers
           Fidonet:     1:3813/308  1:3813/318
             E!Net:     312:4100/0
          Internet:     amicom@galstar.com

   Total MeltDown!:     1-309-862-0857
             Sysop:     Jeff Fink
           Fidonet:     1:232/316  1:232/315
             E!Net:     312:2000/0

For Voice support,  Call:  1-918-682-4897

AmiCom Postal address:     AmiCom!
                           P.O. Box 2785
                           Muskogee, OK. 74401
@endnode
@node NEWS22 "Upcoming C-16/+4 Emulator"
@toc NEWS

A short list of features for an upcoming Commodore 16/+4 emulator...

Name:           A4  (great eh? :-) )
Prozessor:      needs 68020 (sorry for A500/600/2000 users)
OS-version:     2.0 or later
Features:
  * emulates the Commodore C-16/Plus4 OS (Basic 3.5 + Ass. monitor)
  * allows data storage in Amiga directories (LOAD and SAVE)
    (a floppy-drive emulation)
  * real Floppy (C=1541) access (par.  port) is worked on, but is
    still very buggy
  * 32K of memory are availible ( 64K is worked on)
  * V1.0 written in C
  * current V2.0 written in assembler
  * runs on a Workbench window or on its own customscreen
  * VIC emulation is very raw (but uses the build in charater set
    which can be customised.  Only standart colors are supported now.

The first public release will be V 0.1!
The 64 KB version allready works  :-)

==========-"-==========
    Thomas Koenig
<tomking@koenig.VOL.at>
==========-_-==========
@endnode
@node NEWS23 "ftp.amigalib.com goes Aminet!"
@toc NEWS

Fred Fish's Amiga Library Services has generously turned ftp.amigalib.com
into a full Aminet mirror for anonymous FTP.  This brings the total of full
North American mirrors back to 3, replacing ftp.cdrom.com which terminated
Aminet support in the summer.

@endnode

@node NEWS24 "PowerManager 2.0 Contest"
@toc NEWS

POWERMANAGER SCREEN SAVER DESIGN CONTEST

WCi Lazarus Engineering Division is pleased to announce its first
PowerManager screen saver contest.


WHAT IS POWERMANAGER

During the Calgary AmiJam Amiga show in July 1995, Lazarus Engineering
revealed a special edition of it's PowerManger software complete with a
flaming AmiJam logo screen saver.  The software never went into full
production and is a rare commodity currently owned by only a few select
people.  The PowerManager software contains the following:

* A DPMS monitor controlling module.  DPMS stands for Display Power
Management System and is a standard defined by the EPA (Environmental
Protection Agency) in the U.S.  DPMS allows a computer to control the
amount of power a monitor is using through video signals.  Most monitors
displaying the "Energy Star" logo have DPMS ability (there are over 500
models currently available with this ability)

* A screen saver controlling module.  Included with PowerManger in Calgary
were five screen savers and their source code.  Two of them displayed a
logo and then burst it into flame, one was a multi-coloured star field
(with accurate star colors), something called curvo which has to be seen,
and a simple black-screen module for shutting down older monitors which
looked for this before they would go into power- saving mode.

* A disk cacheing module.  Lazarus Engineering purchased the cacheing
engine found in Steve Tibbett's CacheX software, enhanced it to work with
all amiga disk devices including removable media like CD-ROM drives, iomega
ZIP drives, floppies, etc., added support for multiple devices, and a stats
window that lets you know how useful it's been.

* A hard drive power management module.  During a period of inactivity you
can let PowerManager spin down your hard drive(s).  The internal IDE hard
drive controllers found in A4000s, A1200s, and A600s are supported as well
as any SCSI HD controller which supports the SCSI spin-down command (most
new controllers do).


CONTEST DETAILS

Lazarus Engineering is looking for interesting, entertaining, and
functional screen saver modules for it's upcoming (Q1 1996) release of
PowerManager 2.0.  A total of 30 entries will be chosen and included
(without source).  Entries will be judged on the following criteria:

- Compatibility (systems and display adapters)
- Originality
- Entertainment value (coolness factor)

The following rules apply to entries received:

- Code must be original and free from any copyrights
- Source code must be provided with entry
- Code must conform to the spec outlined at the bottom of this doc.
- Employees of WCi and it's divisions (Wonder Computers,  WCi Distribution,
  Lazarus Engineering, Information Technology) are not eligible


PRIZES

Top 30 Entries
--------------

Every blanker selected for inclusion in PowerManager will receive an Amiga
Technologies "Back for the Future" black polo shirt as well as a copy of
PowerManager 2.0.

Top 10 Entries
--------------

The top 10 entries will receive a Wizard 560 dpi 3-button mouse (your
choice of beige or black), as well as the AT polo shirt and PowerManager
2.0.

Winning Entry
-------------

The single winning entry will receive either a Cybervision 64 2Meg graphics
card by Phase-5 or a Picasso II 2Meg graphics card from Village Tronic
(your choice), as well as a 16-bit Toccata sound card from MacroSystems.  A
Wizard 560 dpi 3-button mouse, an AT polo shirt, and a copy of PowerManager
2.0 are also included in this package.

Only modules selected for inclusion with PowerManager become the property
of WCi and Lazarus Engineering.  Entries must be uuencoded files containing
executable and source sent to:

lazarus@wonder.ca

This address can also be used for general inquiries.  Sample blanker code
is available on the ftp site:

ftp.wonder.ca
/pub/powermanger/devkit.lha

The text of which is also included below.



=============================================================================

PowerManager Compliant Screen Savers
------------------------------------

The control system for a screen blanker is fairly simple.  PowerManager
will send one of four signals to the blanker process.  The signals tell the
screen blanker to quit, start blanking, stop blanking, or show it's
interface for preferences.  Since only four operations are needed the DOS
signals CTRL-C, CTRL-D, CTRL-E, and CTRL-F are used.  The means you don't
need to allocate any signals, and the programs can be tested as standalone
programs from a CLI window, pressing CTRL-keys to switch from mode to mode.

Upon startup, PowerManager will need to know if the blanker module was able
to launch and initialize correctly.  This is done by sending a message to
the public PowerManagerBlank port.  The message should have the node name
field pointing to the task base of your blanker.  If you must quit at some
time, sending a message with a name of null will inform the PowerManager
that this blanker process has exited.  You do not need a reply port.  The
mn_length field should contain the correct size of the message and
PowerManager will free the RAM for the message once it is received.  This
of course means you cannot place the message as a structure inside your
code, as freeing that will cause problems when you try to quit the blanker.


Quick Overview of steps required:
---------------------------------

- Initialize everything you need

- Find Port "PowerManagerBlank"

- Send a message to the port with mn_Length set up, and ln_Name is your
  task base. (FindTask(NULL))

- Wait for four DOS signals plus any internal signals you need
  On CTRL-C, QUIT
  On CTRL-D, Start Blanking
  On CTRL-E, Stop Blanking
  On CTRL-F, Set preferences

- On exit, Send a message to the PowerManagerBlank port with ln_Name as
  null.


How to get in touch with us:
----------------------------

If you have any questions about writing a blanker for PowerManager or the
supplied examples, please contact:

davide@wonder.ca

@endnode
@node NEWS25 "DesignWorks 2.0"
@toc NEWS

DESIGNWORKS 2.0
   
(North Hollywood, CA - Video Toaster User Expo '95) WCi Lazarus Engineering
Division announces the immediate availability of DesignWorks 2.0 for the
Amiga.  DesignWorks 2.0 is an updated and re-engineered version of the
DesignWorks structured drawing software formerly developed and sold by New
Horizons.

DesignWorks 2.0 features such improvements as a new user interface, updated
operating system and graphics support, DR2D and EPS exporting, improved
ARexx macros, multiple and selective undo and redo levels, extensive bitmap
import support, improved drawing speed and accuracy, enhanced object
manipulation, freehand object rotation, and improved document
magnification.

The product's design philosophy according to Steve Cockwell, the Lazarus
Engineering Division Head, is "providing superior products through proper
engineering and design." As a result, DesignWorks 2.0 combines ease of use
with features found in more expensive drawing packages.  DesignWorks gives
both professional and home users what they need to produce quality
drawings.

The minimum system requirements for DesignWorks 2.0 is an A500 or better,
running Workbench 2.0 or higher, and at least 1MB of RAM.  A hard drive is
recommended, but not required.

MSRP for DesignWorks 2.0 is $119.99 U.S./$149.99 Canadian.  Dealers may
sell for less.  For more information, please contact WCi Distribution, at
613-226-0000, or by EMail at distrib@wonder.ca

Upgrades are available for $99.95 Canadian from any previous DW version.
The front cover of your DW manual must accompany your order.  Contact
613-226-0000 or sales@wonder.ca for more information.
@endnode

@node FEATURE6 "1995 World of Amiga, Toronto, Canada"
@toc FEATURE

===========================================================================
                   1995 World of Amiga, Toronto, Canada
                            By: @{" Jason Compton " link JASON}
===========================================================================

Calgary's AmiJAM broke the North American Amiga show ice and showed that an
Amiga show could be well organized.  Montreal's Amiga Convention showed
that you really could bring a decent amount of exhibitors out for the
machine.  WOA Toronto showed that you could do both.

The bitter cold of the WOA weekend still drew thousands to the Toronto
International Centre for the first show to call itself World of Amiga in
two years.  (WOA New York '94 was cancelled shortly before Commodore bit
the dust.) Organized by Wonder Computers, Inc., launched by a speech from
Petro Tyschtschenko, chief of Amiga Technologies, and spanning three days,
the show brought together an impressive mix of retailers, developers, and
presenters.

The Show
--------

No, really.  I was impressed.  @{"Katie" link KATIE} and I arrived in Toronto late Friday
night, after the show had closed, so we missed Petro's speech.  Hopefully,
we'll get a transcript soon but I'm told it was very similar to the Cologne
speech we published in AR 3.20.  But when I walked into the show on
Saturday morning, I had to smile.  Nothing but Amiga set up in three aisles
across a very long show floor, significantly larger than Calgary and
Montreal.  It was Wonder's party, so to speak, and as such they took a
prime positition in the middle of the room for a large retail display,
capstoned by what I called the "Pyramid 'o Softwood", with Final Writer,
Data, and Calc stacked high off the table.  (They were selling the three as
a bundle, something Softwood needs to look into doing.)  Even though the
retail areas were pretty much always busy (the little A600 that tracked the
sales got a good workout), they were hardly the only attraction.  I have to
apologize in advance--I didn't even get a chance to visit every booth,
something I can only look at as a good thing, since I was there for two
entire days.  I also don't have a full list of exhibitors here, but hope to
obtain one soon.

That said...what was new at the show?  Well, the A4000T and A1200s drew a
good deal of attention at the far end, middle aisle, of the show floor.
SMG and Amiga Technologies were set up here (until Petro's departure midway
through Saturday).  The 4000Ts were shown off both in action and with the
case off, and it's clear that Amiga Tech hasn't changed the board screens
at all, since the memorable "Haynie Kludge" jumper is still labeled.  The
machine case was rather uninspiring, visibly a stock PC part (given the
Turbo button which disables the 4000T's internal speaker) but it was still
nice to see.  The machine in operation was marked up with some sort of
black substance.  Oops.  The A1200s spent most of their time sitting there
and playing Pinball Mania or running Wordworth, both pack-in items.

Rick Stine of SMG was the big man on the scene, and did not seem to enjoy
himself excessively--apparently, one too many people gave him a hard time
over the 880k floppy issue and the price.  He told me that both he and
Amiga Tech did a lot of work to try to get floppies built, but the only
offers they were made called for more floppies than they were willing to
buy, and even that wasn't a definite.  My major issue with the 880k floppy
is that it makes the Amiga useless in a disk-sharing environment, since it
can't read any Mac floppies and can only read 720k DOS floppies, a format
in which virtually no new PC software is delivered.  The 4000Ts were using
old Commodore-badged keyboards, but Stine told me the shipping 4000Ts had
their own, new keyboards.  This remains to be seen.

SMG's not the kind of company to discuss future speculation.  So the issues
open to discussion were simply the shipping of units and filling of orders,
something they feel they're doing quite well at right now.

On a side note, SMG's corporate information made it quite clear that they
are not a company that will live or die by the Amiga.  While both their old
corporate profile and newer color information sheet speak proudly of the
work they did, providing all of North America's service for Commodore,
they're a multi-service corporation and most of what they do is NOT product
distribution.

PreSpect Technics had much the same display they did at AC '95, showcasing
their MultiFace IV serial/parallel card and Oktagon SCSI controller.  One
of these days, we'll get a MultiFace for review...

National Amiga sat right next to PreSpect.  The small Amiga mail-order
business, which does 90% of its business over the 'net, did so well at the
show that Greg Scott, the president and owner, bought the first round of
drinks after the show Saturday night.

AmiTrix, manufacturers of the SCSI-TV and A570-TV products as well as North
American distributors for the Amiga Link SANA-II floppy port networking
system, had their wares on display.  Amiga Link now ships with IAM's Envoy
2.0.

Speaking of IAM, Dale Larson won an AT&T contest and is vacationing in
Australia as we speak.  In his place, he sent Hal Greenlee, formerly with
NASA, and Steve [something I can't remember] to represent the company.  I
didn't have a chance to discuss sales with them, but they had the entire
IAM line on display, including so many Deathbed Vigil tapes that they
actually ran out of cases and had the tapes shrinkwrapped individually.
One of the highlights of Sunday afternoon was Hal Greenlee walking
pensively through the show crowds with a makeshift placard taped to his
shirt.

Bruce Smith, Amiga book publisher, was at the JCV booth showing off his
recent titles.  We should be receiving the newest 3 for review in AR
shortly.  My attempt to get him to do a book on the World League (In
addition to Amiga books, Smith also publishes seasonal sports books) didn't
meet with much success, however.

Legendary Design Technologies (and Distribution, and Entertainment) were
on hand with their Link-It! product, designed for high-speed parallel port
networking between the PC and Amiga.  They also were blowing out old
Psygnosis games (and I missed Walker!) and showing off a new game from
their Entertainment division.  Upcoming products promised in their flyer
include dataTAX 95, which on CD-ROM will include all US and Canadian tax
forms, a new MOD CD which promises over 4,000 unique tunes, and a PC serial
mouse-to-Amiga serial port adapter kit.

CineReal Pro-Video Productions was on hand displaying the Broadcaster Elite
non-linear editing system.  I was unable to stay for the entire
demonstration, but what I saw was impressive enough that I will pursue
having a review done for AR, despite all being shown on a very very small
monitor.  The system is PAL/NTSC compatible, so could very well give V-Lab
Motion a run for its money (and be a viable product in markets where the
Flyer is not.)

Speaking of V-Lab Motion, NoahJi's had the Draco on display.  The real
thing, running on an 060 in its full glory.  Two words: Nice machine.
Extremely quick and responsive, and with an impressive suite of Amiga
software included.  The system is of course all designed around the
Macrosystem V-Lab Motion non-linear editor, which is currently a Zorro II
card but will be available as a "Draco Direct" 32-bit version capable of
really high throughput levels.  The machine ships in a tower case (much
more attractive than the 4000T's), with Zorro II and Draco Direct custom
slots and a number of drive bays.  Eric Kloor and Rick Sulpizio had a very
impressive demo area set up with a camera and monitors, and were joined by
Amiga Report's video columnist and NoahJi's East Coast Sales Manager and
Creative Director Bohus Blahut, who dresses nicer than they do, on
Saturday.

Phantom Development sat near to NoahJi's, showing off their ClassAct BOOPSI
toolkit, largely through showing off Amiga Report Tech Journal editor Osma
Ahvenlampi's new Amiga mail reader, Voodoo.  They also had Digital Quill,
the new text editor, for sale in a complete package (At AC '95 they were
selling disks with vouchers for manuals, awaiting their completion.)  

Right next door was the WCi (Wonder) Distribution table, showing the
product line available to dealers through the WCi net.

SoftLogik, the publishers of the popular PageStream DTP package as well as
Digita's North American distributors, were on hand with PageStream
3.0something and a very large monitor.  They also had gobs of Digita
newsletters and press releases for the taking.  Nice people, too bad
they're going to be selling the package for the Mac and PC now.

Village Tronic was on hand, showing off their aging but still popular
Picasso II video card and promoting their entire line of products,
including AmiTCP, now published through them.  Hubert Neumeier spoke with
me about the upcoming Picasso IV, a card that promises high performance for
the Amiga.  He also seemed concerned when I informed him AR had a tough
time contacting VT's North American distributors for information, so I
expect we'll be able to bring news and reviews of VT products much more
quickly in the future.

If there was one product (aside from the 4000T and Draco) that people
walked away from WOA Toronto, shaking their heads and saying "God, I wish I
could afford that, it's so neat!", it was the MicroScribe.  Put simply, the
Microscribe is a very slick looking piece of metal swing arm that digitizes
3D objects.  Using Lightwave for the Amiga or PC, you touch the pen end to
vertex points of a grid you draw on your object, and the VertiSketch
software and Lightwave translate these points into an object.  VERY clever
and seemingly very easy to use, but it doesn't come cheap.  The product was
demoed both on an Amiga and on a PC laptop system.

Lazarus Engineering, Wonder's R&D arm, was showing off Designworks 2.0, the
revamped New Horizons structured drawing program, and the KB-10, a PC-AT
keyboard adapter for Amiga 2000/3000/4000/CD32 (the latter two require a $5
adapter to change the 6 pin port on the machine to a 5 pin).  I was
promised that a new 64-bit graphics card would be started after the show
and completed by Thursday, but apparently they were just kidding.

Oregon Research was proudly displaying Cinema 4D, the new low-cost
rendering package for the Amiga.  They also had a number of HiSoft imported
products on display, as well as their own Termite and On the Ball standbys.
Bob Luneski and I discussed Cinema 4D (which is apparently doing very well
considering its recent introduction to non-German markets) and the Atari ST
market, which they still do quite well in.  

Retailer Zipperware, from Seattle, was on hand to sell product, with an
interesting free gift to customers--a random PC CD-ROM (very popular were
Windows 95 demos and CompuServe samplers) with a universal "No" stamp (the
circle and a line through it, you know what I mean) and a badge on the back
saying "Merry Christmas from Zipperware."  Some came with paper clip hooks,
allowing them to be used as ornaments.

Veteran hardware developers DKB were there, with their entire product line
on display, including the new WildFire 2000/060 card, WildFire SCSI
hardcard, and Link UP serial/parallel card.  Good news for A3000
owners--the demand for a WildFire 3000 has convinced Dean Brown to go ahead
with the design, meaning that the WildFire 060 will be available in the
fullness of time to 2/3/4000 owners.  We will, of course, endeavor to bring
you reviews...

A bit of a surprise was the new educational title for the CD32 entitled
Robokeet, an introductory spelling program with an arcade sequence
interspersed between the learning sections.  Very clever, even if the
arcade sequence was not up to Team17 standards--that wasn't the point.

Wonder's IT division had a booth set up demonstrating various Amiga
Internet tools and applications on a really huge monitor.  I didn't hang
out here much except when I was frantically downloading Emplant software
before my talk.

The Toronto Pet User Group was promoting themselves and the various
Commodore computers they support, including the C= 65 they had in their
booth.

The Amiga Based User Group and Valleysoft were both there--I distinctly
remember their presence, but I didn't get a chance to speak with either of
them.

I suppose I should feel guilty for not talking with the Newtek folks.  But
their major display seemed to be a few video monitors showing a looping
demo tape of Lightwave's real-world accomplishments and capabilities, with
lots of Babylon 5 clips.

In the far corner of the show floor sat a local TV production class.  They
put together a film of highlights from the Friday show in time for
Saturday evening's official wine and cheese, which all of the show VIPs and
exhibitors were invited to.  But many of the teenage students spent their
time at another booth...

...one of the most successful, from my perspective, booths at the show.
That was the clickBOOM booth, displaying Capital Punishment, a new
beat-em-up game almost ready for publication.  The head of the clickBOOM
team, Alexander Petrovic, was set up with three demo A1200s, running a beta
of the game that, even though only one warrior was implemented, was drawing
the attention of a number of attendees, including the aforementioned
students.  More importantly, it caught Mr. Tyschtschenko's eye, and he
spent a half hour meeting with Alex.

Quite simply, I don't think anybody was really expecting to see new games
at a North American show, even one of a WOA scope.  And even though they
saw more than one (remember, Legendary had their own work-in-development),
they weren't expecting to see one with some serious promotional material
behind it.  Large, full-color posters with a professionally-designed logo
adorned the walls of their booth, and the sounds of combat drew people in.
Capital Punishment is a very smooth and engrossing game in the Mortal
Kombat genre.  Unfortunately, we haven't been able to run the demo on
anything but a stock A1200...hopefully this will change before release.
clickBOOM is actively seeking publishers and apparently received at least
two offers at the show alone, but is still considering its options.

But the booth that, despite selling only one product (and a demo unit at
that), was in my opinion the most gripping of the show was the Phase5
booth.  In a sense, it shouldn't have been all that impressive.  Only the
company's general manager, Wolf Dietrich, staffed the booth full-time
(although Wade Evans, Manager of MIS for Wonder, helped out).  There was
nothing for sale, and he even forgot his demo A1200 card.  But he had THE
BOARD, a prototype PowerUP 604 card, in a glass case, a shelf above
Phase5's other offerings.  People also got a lot of enjoyment playing
with the CyberStorm 060 and CyberVision 64 cards on display, but the real
talk of the town was the PowerUP card, and it was rare that Wolf had less
than 3 or 4 people at a time clamoring for his attention.  But he handled
it all very well, encouraging people to take their product brochures and
PowerUP information booklet and to send in the coupon for information.
The CyberStorm Mark II, 060 for the 4000 and 3000, is promised soon, as is
an upgrade path to PowerPC for those people who have bought CyberStorms
after September 1995.

I had a chance to speak with Dietrich about his company's concept for
"Zorro IV", which would represent a high-power bus system for the Amiga but
allowing for the use of industry standard PCI parts.

This entire PowerPC movement has re-captured the imagination and dreams of
a number of embittered Amiga users.  If you're one that is still
embittered, I think a number of your doubts would have been alleviated
after a look at the PowerUP card.  Mine were.

Seminars
--------

The seminars at the show seemed to be very successful.  My emulation talk,
as usual, was fraught with technical difficulties.  It took the combined
effort of Wade Evans and Bishop Wong ("The Self-Proclaimed Healthiest Amiga
Technician Alive") from Wonder 45 minutes to get the A4000 up and running
Emplant Mac in 15khz NTSC for the projector screen, and that was 30 minutes
into my talk.  But I was somehow able to entertain a sitting-room-only
crowd without a screen for 20 minutes, giving them a rundown on emulators
of the past and present.

I unfortunately didn't get in to see any others, but the talks seemed to
draw enough to fill the room they were in (40-50 seats) without taking too
many people off of the show floor, something that detracted from sales at
AmiJAM, where two talks ran at once, which is great for the attendees but
bad for exhibitors.

People
------

Where to start?  Amiga celebs, bigwigs, and long-time users were all
on hand.

I was able to meet with Petro...for about 30 seconds.  He had been hounded
the entire time he was there by countless people hoping for an audience, so
I barely had time to shake his hand, give him my card, and thank him for
his work for the Amiga before he had to leave for the airport.  Hopefully
we'll have more time to talk at the Amiga Atlanta banquet on January 20th,
which he and Gilles Bourdin will be attending, in addition to Dave Haynie
and Wonder Computers, and hopefully other sponsors.

Eric Schwartz was there as well, modeling what should be the next Big Thing
for Amiga users who want to show their allegiance.  A self-designed T-shirt
featuring a maniacally grinning Amiga 4000 and monitor peering from atop a
hill, with the very catchy--and accurate--motto, "Amiga:  We're Back, And
We're Pissed."

Amiga Convention '95 organizers Frederik Tessier and Yannick Koehler made
the trek from Quebec to check out the show.

Katie and I had a great talk with Steve [some other last name I've
forgotten] who was there reporting for the Lightwave mailing list.  For
some reason, I can't remember the last name of any of the Steves I met at
the show, and for that I'm truly sorry.  But Steve pointed out that even
though other computer systems work for video production, the Amiga is the
one that is the most flexible for the budding video producer, allowing a
system to be built $1000 or $2000 at a time, rather than an outlay of
$10,000 at once just to have a usable machine.

Doug Cotton, editor of Commodore World, was the only print magazine editor
at the show.  Creative Micro Designs had considered setting up a booth but
the plans never materialized.  Still, Doug flew out to see the sights and
have a Guiness or two.  He was accompanied on Saturday by Jim Butterfield,
but I didn't get a chance to meet him.  CMD's plans to start an Amiga
magazine haven't gone beyond the idea stage, unfortunately.  Hopefully, the
presence at the show will give him enough material to push the idea a bit
more to the CMD purseholders.

Giorgio Gomelsky and Livingston Hinckley of the AMUSE NY user group came
out for the show.  Giorgio is the AMUSE TV producer, and Livingston is the
president of the group.  They conducted interviews and generally tried to
cover as much of the show as possible, including being involved in some
behind-the-scenes meetings with Wonder after the show.

Those Side Notes...
-------------------

Without Dave Haynie or Dale Larson on hand to cause trouble, the
after-hours scenes were a bit tamer than other trips this year.  But...

Karaoke in Toronto?  Forget it.  All we could find was a Japanese
restaurant in a hotel, where all of the karaoke we saw in there was sung
and subtitled in Japanese.

Katie and I couldn't escape the Amiga people.  On Monday, we went to the
Toronto Science Center and ran into AmiTrix.  We found a number of Amigas
driving the displays, including the "Land Like a Cat" display.  I won our
mini-contest, landing with a force only 1.7 times my weight.  Not quite as
rewarding as beating Dave Haynie at Galaga, but...

At each Amiga show this year, one person has enjoyed a Guiness or two while
another said it was a repulsive substance.  I finally decided to find out
for myself.  It's actually pretty good, as beer goes.

Wolf Dietrich of Phase5 has a voice very reminiscent of Arnold
Schwarzenegger's.  He's also got a similar build.

What Came From All This?
------------------------

As Sunday wound down, I didn't see any unhappy faces.  In fact, the mood
of both the participants and exhibitors was upbeat, even if everyone was
dead tired by 6 pm Sunday.  I don't have exact attendance figures, but the
day-to-day estimates put it somewhere around 3,000.  Saturday was by far
the busiest day, and it did my heart good to realize that I just couldn't
tell what was going on in the booth 15 feet away, because too many people
were in the way.  I don't have each exhibitors sales figures, of course,
but a happy face is a face that's made a profit.

I have to admit that I had my doubts coming into the show if it would
really draw a significant amount of people--AmiJAM and AC '95 combined
brought in around 1,000.  But Toronto in December was a prospect enticing
enough to pull out thousands of Amiga fans to the show to see what was
happening.  Walking away from the show, it has to be said that the mood is
positive.

The show floor had old faces with the strength and courage to support the
Amiga market: DKB and Newtek spring to mind.  New industry leaders such as
Phase5 stunned the floor.  New Amiga strongholds like Zipperware and
Legendary kept the spirit up.  In the face of it all, new Amiga machines
were on the SMG tables.  A company that was a lone dealership in Ottawa a
few short years ago pulled it all together.

WOA Vancouver, June '96, and WOA Toronto, December '96, are already in
planning by Wonder's IT division.  I hope AMUC in Calgary and the Montreal
AC '95 convention organizers take this to heart and go forward with their
own shows next year.  I hope the Gateway St. Louis organizers are inspired.
This show was a real milestone for the Amiga in North America, and
globally.

Already, I've received a request from a general-interest computer magazine
for a reprint of this article--and I'm not done with it yet!  Let the
momentum grow.
@endnode
@node FEATURE1 "1995 World of Amiga"
@toc FEATURE

===========================================================================
                            1995 World Of Amiga
                          By: C.  Edward Stewart
===========================================================================

Patience is a virtue, they say; Amigans must be truly virtuous.  After what
can only be described as a farcical bankruptcy procedure, the Amiga was
left adrift, holed below the waterline by those that were supposed to be
sailing her.  We watched, aghast, as the fair-weather-Amigans jumped ship
in droves, quoting Gatesian drivel all the way.

Now, over a year later, we stand once again on the deck of the best boat in
the computer fleet.  Amiga Technologies has run the flag back up the
flagpole and set sail into the future (or back for the future!).

First, the drawbacks

The show was held in one of the smaller rooms of the International Centre.
While that wasn't a major drawback, it was a noticeable difference from
previous shows.

There were a lot more `look what we can do' booths than in previous years.
I always like to see new technology, but it bugs me when the people showing
it neglect to bring any for sale!

A lot of the display machines were either not working or were running demos
that remained stuck at the final credits screen for far too long.

The show certainly gave a good indication of what is coming in the future,
but was a bit shaky in the here and now.

Who was there

I won't pretend to remember everything that went on, but here's some of the
notable companies and exhibits.

TPUG (Toronto Pet User's Group), still showing the C64 (though it was in a
very minor position - finally), had a fair-sized booth and some Amiga stuff
for sale.

ABUG (Amiga Based User Group) also had a booth, though they were a bit less
flashy than the TPUG.  Also, ABUG had a huge pile of games, peripherals,
computers and other Amiga paraphernalia for sale.  Most of it was used, but
all in good shape.

Valley Soft had flyers with price listings for a bunch of Amiga games and
some hardware.

Newtek's Video Toaster and all the related hardware was there, of course. 
The best news?  This year, it wasn't just a `toaster show' like the last
WOC was.  As usual, Newtek's flyers were slick and their presentation made
me glad I had an Amiga.

Legendary Entertainment was there with their Psygnosis game blowout.  Not a
lot of titles, but at $2 per game, there were a lot of people walking out
with stacks of Psygnosis boxes.

PageStream was shown there, PageStream 3, that is.  Their big boast was
cross platform compatibility.

Right near the door was the MicroScribe 3D device.  It looked like a robot
arm and it was used to digitize real world objects into the computer.  It
was quite a neat toy, but way out of my price range.  If you are a toaster
nut, you might want to check this one out.

DKB was at the show, still supporting the Amiga.  They had displays of
their line of products and some very slick information packages.

Wonder Computers, the show sponsors, had the biggest booth, right in your
face as you walked in.  Unfortunately, the dearth of new hard/software
extended to them as well.  There was a lot of hype, but no new stuff!

AMIGA Technologies GmbH had what could have been a very impressive booth. 
It was open and they had both 1200's and 4000T's there, as well as the new
M1438S monitor (PAL version).  The problem was, there were no staff there
to talk to.  I wandered around, looking at the innards of the 4000T and
fiddling with the 1200, but no one seemed interested in telling me about
them.  The spec sheets are quite impressive, though I think that, if they
are going to put one out, they should get someone to proofread it.

There were other booths there but I was not impressed.  I liked the corner
where a TV place had set up a number of Amigas for people to play with,
running digitizers, trackers and such like.

All things considered, it was a good show.  The overall impression I got
was one of hope for the future.  If AmigaTech gets the North American
advertising going, they may be able to put the Amiga on top of the heap. 
If they follow the example set by Commodore, the Amiga will remain a
computer that gets `Amiga?  What's that?' from everyone you tell about it.

That about wraps up my coverage of the World Of Amiga show in Toronto in
1995.  Now I can hardly wait for the one in 1996!

You can reach me at:
  CyberSpace BBS
  (519)579-0072 28.8
  (519)579-0173 14.4
  Online Games
  AMOS Support
  Free FAX service
  Users validated within 24 hours
@endnode
@node FEATURE2 "1993 World of Commodore"
@toc FEATURE

===========================================================================
                          1993 World of Commodore
  Greg Scott                                     gscott@gold.interlog.com
===========================================================================

[Greg and I thought it would be interesting to get some historical
perception on this year's WOA Toronto, compared to the last one Commodore
put on in 1993. -Jason]

Here's a review I did of the last WORLD OF COMMODORE in Toronto 1993.

I was working for a dealer in my city (London) called MusicMart at the 
time and I did the review for our local user group. I was walking around 
with the new (at the time) Sharp ViewCAM's (the ones with the 4" LCD 
screen colour screen as your viewfinder) and everyone though it was neat.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

I hit the World Of Commodore Amiga show on the last day (the Sunday) armed
with my Sharp ViewCAM VL-E40 (on sale for $1779 at MusicMart!) and came up
with some pseudo interviews with the demonstrators there.  Here is my
transcript:

The almighty British Magazine Distributors were there showing off all their
latest imports.  One side of their display was games, and they other side
was productivity.  Many new and interesting titles are coming this way for
AGA Amigas and look very promising in game play.  I interviewed a
representative from the UK division of MindScape and asked him how things
are looking in the gamers market.  Read this at the end.  Oh yes, Mortal
Monday shall arrive soon on the Amiga platform. 

Brilliance, A-Max 4, Vidi Digitzers and a few other things were highlighted
on the productivity side.  I did not spend much time there as it was kind
of busy, and I wanted to hit some of the more interesting people.  (besides
I was negotiating getting an Alien Breed II poster)

The colour output I saw coming off the new Fargo Primera Colour Printer
looked almost as good as the girls showing it off.  It uses a wax-thermal
transfer to make up colour on the page, AND it's upgradable to a
dye-sublimation process that uses clay-impregnated paper to give an even
better output.  It only does 203 dots per inch, but the pictures I saw
looked like photographs.  Cost per copy is about $0.45 for wax and $2.79
for dye-sublimation.  They were unable to comment on what this would
translate into Canadian funds, but the printer itself would sell for about
$1500 with the dye-sublimation kit.  Quite a bargain for the colour
quality.  Another nice feature is the fact that it comes with drivers for
the Amiga.  It got the cover of January's issue of Amazing Computing. 

Lotsa people from London there.

I talked to this weeks editor of Amiga World, Tim Walsh, and first thing I
asked was why the change to the terrible binding.  He faintly replied with
"Not my department".  A nicer and more helpful lady, Lisa Jaillet, who does
Desktop Video World explained that since Amiga World dipped down to under
85 pages during the summer, that they had to go with the different binding.
Well, I reminded her that this was no longer summer and she just smiled and
asked to play with the camera.  After about a 5 minute sales pitch on the
camera I also told Lisa about the British invasion of Amiga magazines.
Surprisingly she knew nothing about them.  I explained the possibility of
bad reviews whether or not they advertised in the magazine, and got another
smile and received a large shopping bag with 2 complentary issues of Amiga
World and the current Desktop Video World.  Tim was still sitting there,
patentiently reading a magazine and waiting for the show to end. 

I saw Emplant.  That was about it.  I wanted to talk to Jim Drew and see if
he's the same sort of asshole he is on the nets, but he was too busy
entertaining people with System 7.  I did look for the chick that
accompanies the ads, she was no where to be found.  Oh well. 

Next door to Emplant was a dealer selling CD32...  $485 show price.  Wow. 
Expect it to be regularly sold for just over $500. 

The Video Toaster 4000 was shown off at a big booth with lots of room for
an audience.  It was demonstrated by some frenchies with a Jean Cretien
accent.  Kinda funny to listen to.  There were some great scenes from
upcoming Babylon 5 and SeaQuest DSV shows. 

ASIMWare Innovations was showing off both AsimVTR and ASIM-CDFS.  AsimVTR
was playing back an animation with scenes from a movie.  DCTV was used to
give a nice colour output along with a fast Maxtor hard-drive and a 4000
and 4091 SCSI-II interface.  No other hardware was used to play back the 50
frames per second animation.  Very impressive to watch.  Paul Reeves the
programmer says it will do 30 frames per second on an unaccelerated Amiga
2000.  And ASIM-CDFS is a CD-ROM filing system for your Amiga and CD-ROM
drive.  It's needed to properly read CD-ROM discs on your Amiga.  It also
comes with an audio CD playing program and if your drive is capable, a
PhotoCD decoder. 

Know where the name ASIM came from?  Took a bit to get it out of him, but
Paul is a student at McMaster University in Hamilton.  ASIM is the last
name of his favourite professor. 

Touring around Commodore's booth I saw many A1200's, some 4000's, some
3000's, even a CDTV.  Most prevelant was a Video Toaster editing suite.  I
even saw some Commodore employees! 

CD32 was everywhere.  It was playing games, playing audio CD's, and playing
movies.  Yes, movies.  Movies are now coming on regular 5 inch CD discs. 
They are MPEG compressed on the disc and played back through a compatable
Full Motion Video player.  CD32 just happens to be one of these with the
FMV option.  There is great potential for this as all the game playing kids
can also watch movies.  It's also on CD, so it'll last longer, be cheaper
to produce, randomly accessable, and you will not have to rewind it when
you return it to the rental store.  It was playing Star Trek 9 (?) The
Undiscovered Country, and it looked incredible.  There were a few pixelized
chunks here and there, but only if you looked hard. 

When I was looking at CD32 I talked with Carolyn Scheppner, Technical
Director for Amiga Technical Support.  I asked her odd questions such as
'Just how big is the West Chester building, and is it really big enough to
drive your car around in the halls ?' and 'What kind of guy really is Dave
Haynie?' and finally, 'How do you say Lew's last name?' I got in reply,
'Yes it's very large down there.', 'Oh he's a fun guy.' and 'Eggebrecht' (a
lot of help in print eh?)

A small compact unit with a reset button, a headphone jack, and two
indicator lights on the front.  The controller has a four position
directional pad, 4 individual fire buttons and a play button for CD's. 

Soft Logik Publishing was there with PageStream 3.0.  95% of Soft Logic is
Amiga.  NO PC products have been annouced, planned or even thought of by
them.  Good to hear that.  They are a 13 person company based in St.
Louis.  Nice people there and very informative.  I even got their marketing
director on tape with her tounge sticking out at me.  Oh, the other 5% of
their product line?  The Atari version of PageStream, they are supporting
it, but not developing for it anymore...  so sell your ST now! 

Warm and Fuzzy Logic was showing off their one and only product. 
LightRAVE.  It allows you to use LightWAVE 3d without a Video Toaster.
They say theyhave heard nothing from Newtek.  Oh yes, they have 4 other
products in development, should be interesting to see.  The name of the
company was developed from a deep involved thought process to come up with
something that people would not forget, and no they were not drunk.  Warm
and Fuzzy Logic is a small 4 manned (no womened) company with 600 square
feet of office space in an office building in Richmond Vigina.  Very nice
(and tolerating) guys and I am eager to see what they come out with next. 
Oh yes, the 'hardware module' of LightRAVE is made from silicon and not
cast iron as he tried to have me believe. 

Amazing Computing were great to talk to.  The Editor, Don Hicks, helped me
joke along about their competitor Amiga World and how many editors they
have had in the last year.  He told me how they are going to put the Guide
To The Amiga on a CD32 disc with demos of software.  They would be great
for dealers to get ahold of.  This way they could have the computer search
through the database for products for customers and in some cases load up
demos of that software.  Excellent idea and I know I will be one of the
first to purchase it.  Oh, and he loved my ViewCAM. 

Legendary Software, based right up here in Brantford have taken over
DataTAX.  DataTAX was the only income tax return software for Canada.  The
author unfortunately dropped the product last year and left Canadian Amiga
owners hgh and dry without any computerized income tax software.  Legendary
is redeveloping the product and also allowing previous owners to upgrade at
the regular cost.  In addition Legendary has other products, Address-It and
Invoice-It.  Two programs that can help automate your home office. 
Address-It is a more comercialized (and more reliable) version of
Addresser.  It allows you to export your databse to Invoice-It which is an
on-the-fly invoicing program that will allow you to keep track of any
incoming cash and accounts.  No it does not handle stock, but they are
working on Account-It which is a complete accounting package for the Amiga.
And lastly, Link-It, based on ParNET will allow you to connect an Amiga and
an IBM-PC and share files quickly and easily between the two machines.  It
will even convert picture and sound files into a compatable format for the
destination machine. 

TPUG was there.  With 64's.  Oh ah.  Hot damn.  Sell your Amiga's quick!
Degrade!

Amiga On-Line Reference Manual is a complete AmigaGuide document with offer
600 pages of catagorized text.  It covers, most major Amiga programs,
references on all Amiga models, some A-Rexx, a list of people who use the
Amiga, and other helpful hints and tips on your machine.  Also in the works
is a Video Toaster On-Line referenc manual. 

Axiom Software was showing off Anim Workshop and Wavelink.  Anim Workshop
is a program that allows you to edit and combine animations in ANIM5
through 8 format.  It also interfaces with Art Department or ImageF/X. 
Wavelink is a version of ParNET that allows you to network two Toaster
machines together and use them both to render the same scene.  It comes
with a 10 foot ParNET cable and software to get you up and going. 

Tammy W.  Gray, a former Newtek girl (she can be seen in the later DigiView
ads and on the back of the original toaster box, as well as many of the
original Video Toaster demonstrations and trade shows) now works for Axiom
software as of last May.  She quit Newtek saying they are now too big, too
pig headed, and were not paying enough.  This just confirms the earlier
information I had about disgruntled Newtek employees.  I did get her on
camera a little, but she shyed away because she was wearing a retainer.  
She did grab the camera and point it at me though...  Good-bye Amber, hello
Tammy. 

I ran out of battery power and had to resort to plugging into the game
display at BMD for my last interview.  I talked with Mark, a representative
from MindScape in the United Kingdom. 

Mark told me about the new titles that are coming out for the Amiga and
highlighted Captive II: Liberation all along the way.  He mentioned how it
was 2 years in development and how the CD32 version has 640 megabytes
packed on to a disc.  There are 8 cities all with different people, and
over 4000 missions.  Biggest game I have heard of yet. 

They are re-releasing some titles, such as Chaos Engine with better
graphics and sound for AGA and CD32 machines. 

MindScape goes by reviews.  If one of their products do not receive a good
review, they do the best they can to make it up in the next game.  This is
good, it shows MindScape listens to their users and tries to provide an
excellent product. 

I was also told about the gaming platform statistics in the UK. 
Approximate figures include 20-25% for the Amiga, 25% for Sega Genesis,
16-18% for Nintendo, 8% for IBM-PC and 2-3% for the Sega CD.  Seems the
Amiga has Sega to compete with over there.  Mark also mentioned how cruddy
the Sega-CD system is and favours the Nintendo equivalent. 

Right now MindScape develops for Amiga, Amiga AGA, CD32, IBM-PC,
IBM-PC-CDROM.  They are considering 3D0 and CD-I.  CD-I has been looked at
heavily but may be ruled out due to high development costs.  MindScape
perfers Amiga platforms because it is easy to develop for.  Just buy a
machine and away you go. 

Piracy is aparently policed quite well over there.  Mark has found that it
is more widely known about in the UK than it is in North America.  Now
software publishers are looking towards CD-ROM format.  It's cheaper to
produce, and incredibly hard to copy.  If it is copied, you would have to
have either enough hard-drive space to store it, or a CD-ROM mastering
system.  Both fashions requiring a lot of money. 

That's all the battery power I had in the camera.  If you want to see the
tape, it should be at the December meeting for people to view.  I took a
rather off-key approach to the people at the boothes.  Most of them plan on
attending the New York show, and well, so do I.  I hate the city, but it'd
be nice to see Tammy again..  ;)
@endnode
@node FEATURE3 "Interview with Pieter van Lieven"
@toc FEATURE

===========================================================================
      Interview With Pieter van Leuven, Author of the Vic-20 Emulator
  George Lui                     GEORGE-MW_LUI@HP-Singapore-om1.om.hp.com
===========================================================================

[George Lui is a big fan of the Vic 20 emulator for the Amiga.  He decided
to interview the author via e-mail.  Here's what he got. -Jason]

> 1)      Did you have a VIC 20 and why ?

Yes, I still have it.  This was the first computer that I owned (and used).
I was interrested in computers and I had the choise between buying a ZX-80
or a vic-20.

> 2)      What did you do with it ?

Write very simple programs on it.  I learned programming in machine
language on it.  And ofcourse playing games on it.

> 3)      What led to the creation of your VIC 20 emulator ?

I wanted to do something with my amiga.  So making an emulator was a nice
project.  I choose the VIC-20 because that was the computer I owned for I
bought an Amiga.  I knew allmost all the details of the VIC's hardware.

> 4)      How long did it take ?

1/2 Year (with a lof help from friends)

> 5)      What programs/hardware did you use ?

DevPac asembler and debugger, SAS C-compiler, an Amiga 2000 and a terminal
to display debugging information.

> 6)      What were the difficult parts in writing it ?

The 6502 emulator.  When VIC program didn't worked it is often a wrong
implemented 6502 instruction.  To find out whihc instruction causes the
problems can take some time.  Especialy when the faults are not in the
emulator but in the vic-program.  I was looking for a fault for months and
the problem was that I initiated all the addresses with the value 0.  In
the real vic it has random values.  Cosmic Cruncher forgot to initialise on
variable.  When it was not equal to zero the program worked (most of the
time on a real vic).  On the emulator it was always going wrong.

> 7)      Did the graphics and sound emulation proved to be trickey ? 

It's implemented trickey.  But is was very easy to findout how it worked. 

> 8)      What are the main steps in writing an emulator ?

Find out a smart way how to emulate the hardware.  The processor is not
that difficult. 

> 9)      Do you think that BASIC should be popular again ?

Nope, there are much better languages.  I prefere C because it's gives you
the possibility do some dirty programing.  But one of the better program
languages is modula or other kind of languages that looks like modula.

> 10)     Did you have fun writing it ? 

Yes, it kept me from the street :-)

> 11)     Are there any plans for a future update on the emulator ? 

When I buy a new kind of computer.

> 12)     Will you port the program to other platform ? 

See above question. (Probably on a PPC-platform)

> 13)     80's micro emulation seems to be popular these days. Why do you think 
>         that this is so ?

Just sentiment.  A lot of people started with computers from the 80's.  Now
you need a lot of computer power for programs but some of the old games
where more enjoyable then the games from now.

> 14)     What are your thoughts on the present state of the Amiga ?

Not that many improvements the last years, but still a lot better then the
PC's.

> 15)     What do you think of Amiga Technology ?

I hope they can continue the Amiga-line with a lot of new
hardware/software. 

> 16)     What do you think of 'The Amiga Report' ?

Sorry, I don't know 'The Amiga Report'

> 17)     What do you think of Jason Compton ? 

Who??

[Oh well. -Jason]

> 18)     What would be your dream Amiga machine ?

A multi processor system with a flexable Operating System.  And ofcourse
nice graphics and sounds for games.

Regards,
   Pieter
@endnode
@node FEATURE4 "IPISA '95 Show Report"
@toc FEATURE

===========================================================================
                           IPISA '95 Show Report
  Manuel Lemos                                               etmall@ua.pt
===========================================================================

WHAT?

IPISA is an annual meeting of Amiga developers.  In Italian, IPISA means
'Incontro dei Programmatori Italiani per lo Sviluppo su Amiga.' In English,
this means exactly, meeting of Italian programmers for development under
the Amiga.

WHERE?

IPISA 95 took place in Milan that is a large city the north of Italy with
around 5 million inhabitants.

WHEN?

This year, IPISA took the morning and the afternoon of Saturday, 18 of
November.

WHO?

A group of Italian enthusiasts of Amiga programming organised IPISA.  Many
of them are students at Milan's university.  They worked hard on their free
time for many months before the meeting day to organise this event.

Almost 400 Amiga developers and enthusiasts attended the meeting this year.
Some of them bothered to travel during all night from the south of Italy,
just to arrive in time to the meeting day morning.

Italian developers held most of the talks and presentations, but the main
guest star was definitely Dr.  Peter Kittel.  Dr.  Peter Kittel came from
Germany to bring several good news to all the amigans.

Angela Schmidt came also from Germany to talk about the story and the
latest release of Meeting Pearls, and Haage and Partner came to talk about
Storm C/C++ development environment.

Oh, and I (Manuel Lemos) came from Portugal to talk about Objection that is
a portable Object Oriented programming support system.

HOW?

As a non-Italian speaker, everybody kindly treated me as a guest.  I
arrived in the morning of the day before the meeting day.  Many thanks to
Fabrizio and his mother (I hope I have spelt the name right) that bothered
to pick me up at the Milan-Linate airport.

I stayed all the afternoon at the home of Paolo Silvera where I meet the
well-known Amiga E language Dutch developer Wouter van Oortmerssen.  It was
with a great pleasure that I got the news that such a qualified software
engineer as Wouter will most likely to join the Amiga Technologies
engineering team.

Depending on Wouter, the incoming version of AmigaDOS will feature a
co-operative system of protected memory and the executable binary files
stored in portable CPU independent format like for instance under TAOS.

By night I met with everybody of the IPISA organisation for dinner.  The
dinner took at an internationally award winning 'pizzeria.' There, I could
confirm that what I heard about Italy being the worst place on earth to eat
pizza could only be a joke.  The pizza's that I tried were very tasty.
They are thin but so large that you can make a whole meal just with one
pizza.  Anyway, I think I would get sick very quickly if keep eating pizza
every day just as I ate in all the three days that I stayed in Milan.
Well, let's just get back to IPISA.

The meeting day was very long for everybody that participated.  Although
the meeting started at 10 in the morning many people, mostly of
organisation, arrived much sooner to make sure that everything will start
on schedule.

The conference hall was quite large and seemed to be almost full by the
time the conference started.  Sergio Ruocco welcomed everybody present.  A
short but smooth ray-traced IPISA logo animation was projected on a large
screen of maybe around 4x3 meters.

An Amiga 4000 connected to a professional video system that fed the images
to a large RGB projector.  The persons that had anything to show to support
their presentations used this A4000.

Like most of the persons that were going to present their work, I had to
arrive sooner to install the stuff I brought to the show.  Unfortunately I
had been very busy in the weeks before the conference day and I was not
able to prepare a better presentation as I wished.

I had to carry my hard-disk to the conference and plug it in another Amiga
4000 supplied by the organisation to install some stuff that remained to
the last hour.  This took me quite some time to work out and so I was not
able to pay proper attention to all the morning presentations.

I am not going to describe in detail all the talks because they were too
many and I was not able to pay proper attention to everyone.  This is
mostly because I do not understand enough Italian worthy to mention,
although my mother language (Portuguese) is quite similar to Italian.

Here follows a summary of the talks by order of appearance.  I hope I have
not forgotten any of the presentations.

o Angela Schmidt talked about the story and the latest release of Meeting
  Pearls.

o Michele Battilana presented a talk with reflections about the future.  He
  made allusions to other systems and trends that he believes Amiga should
  follow.  Many thanks for the beta version of Cloanto's personal suite
  that he gave away in a CD to every IPISA participant.

o Paolo Canali presented a PCI 2.0 solution for the current Amiga
  architecture.

o Maurizio Ciccione presented the current developments of is Audio Lab 16
  version 2 program.  This program is still under development but it looked
  very impressive.  It seems to a complete solution for professional audio
  engineers.  A version will available later in Aminet.

o Gabriele Falconi and Stefano Guarnieri presented a visual environment to
  simulate neural networks.  The theme is very interesting but it is not
  very well known for the generality of the programmers.  The program
  looked simple but very effective.  Future developments may turn the
  application into a very useful tool for programmers that want to use the
  fuzzy logic technology in their applications.

o Vicenzo Gervasi presented an integrated environment to support Object
  Oriented Programming under the language E.  The seemed to be a very good
  looking and complete system.  It features visual support for class
  browsing, automatic tool building and revision control.

o Giuseppe Ghibo presented a library to support recursive paths for TeX.
  He also described a complete TeX installation that he worked out for the
  IPISA CD.

o Giuseppe Ligorio presented an improved compression scheme for sound and
  image IFF files based on variant of Huffman algorithms.  Too bad he had
  not much time to do more than introducing the theme due to time
  restrictions.

o Alberto Longo presented a complete analysis on the viability of writing
  smooth texture mapping games under Amiga.  He demoed Breathless, which is
  a doom-like game, to show how fluid this kind of games can turn out using
  his technology.  In a few words: it looked impressive!

o Michele Puccini presented a library to manage high speed animation.
  Unfortunately, I was to busy by the time of this presentation and I was
  not able to pay proper attention.

o Alessandro Tasora made one of the most spectacular presentations.  He
  presented several modules for Real 3D that support particle based 3D
  animations.  He had some wire frame based animations ready to show.  The
  animations looked very impressive and Alessandro was very applauded.

o Federico Zuccollo presented a BOOPSI class based solution for improving
  the AMIGA file system access.  This was a very technical and detailed
  presentation.

o Manuel Lemos (myself) presented an Object Oriented Programming support
  system to develop portable applications named Objection.  Unfortunately,
  I was not able to talk much about my system due to time restrictions.  My
  system consists of a library that implements OOP support in very similar
  way to BOOPSI but in truly a portable fashion.

Objection was completely developed in ANSI C.  About 80% of all the code
that was developed for all the classes and the system kernel is system
independent.  This means only about 20% of the code need to be rewritten to
port the Objection to another environment.  The system currently supports
Amiga under Intuition and POSIX (UNIX) compliant platforms under X-Windows.

Many base classes needed to write applications were already developed.
Some application specific classes are under active development, like for
instance a PostScript export class and RTF (Rich Text Format) export and
import classes.

I demoed an application that was my graduation project.  It is a visual
editor to design Finite State Machines.  This is a high level tool to model
for instance microchip hardware.  Both AMIGA - Intuition and POSIX -
X-Windows where shown running at the same time on the AMIGA.  The X-Windows
version was running under DaggeX X-Windows server.  I was not able to put a
version running under AmiWin X-Windows server on time for IPISA.

Objection will be freely available to non-commercial AMIGA software
developers.  Commercial software developers will have to pay licence.

o Haage and Partner presented the new C/C++ development environment.  It
  looked great but it felt as it needs to mature a lot to support Amiga
  specific programming up to the level of SAS C.  despite this, it features
  visual automatic tool building support.  This is an important feature
  that lacks on SAS C.

The C++ compiler was claimed to be a fast although the generated code was
not as good as it could be due to the lack of a global optimiser.  They are
considering making the compiler full ANSI C++ 3.0 compliant.

The debugger seemed visually good looking but nothing was said about its
abilities to debug multi-thread or shared library based applications as SAS
CPR is able.

AMIGA TECHNOLOGY SPEAKS

Dr.  Peter Kittel was the most wanted speaker in the afternoon.  He divided
his talk in three parts: what AT has done so far, what they are doing now
and they plan for the future of the Amiga.

The reintroduction of the Amiga in the market was what he talked about
concerning what AT has done so far.  So, this is not worthy to mention it
again.

Now, AT is working on the restart of ADSP planned for 1 of December (a bit
late now).  Commercial developers will pay more (300 USD) than
non-commercial developers (100 USD) as usual.  Commercial developers will
get phone support.  I wonder what does this means exactly because any
serious developer uses Internet to communicate.

From now on, the access to the developer program will be restricted to real
AMIGA developers.  Non-commercial developers have to show at least one
public domain program for the Amiga and commercial developers have to show
at least one commercial application.

AT plans small enhancements and bug fixes to the Amiga OS and the current
Amiga models in early 96.  There will be no more beta versions of the
operating system circulating around like in the past.  It is to be hoped
that this will prevent the OS being pirated in the BBSes.  Dr.  Kittel
mentioned Windows 95 beta versions as a joke.

AT is going to introduce a PCMCIA based Quad speed CD-ROM drive named
Q-Drive some time very soon.  They are also going to release an Internet
surfer package for the Amiga.  No mention on the WWW browser that will be
supplied.

AT is talking to several companies to discuss strategic alliances and to
bring back new and old AMIGA developers to support the AMIGA with their
products.  Motorola was mentioned regarding the future Power PC based
Amiga.

In a more distant future, AT will be working on hardware independent
version of the AmigaDOS.  Low end and high end Power PC based Amigas will
be the first to run the new version of AmigaDOS.  High end Power AMIGAs
will be most likely CHRP compliant.

Power AMIGAs will feature a proprietary chip set.  It will not be AAA, but
will be something that will have many of its features.  This chip set will
feature 24 bit video and 16 bit audio.  Power AMIGAs will be definitely PCI
based.

Dr.  Kittel then tried to answer almost every question that was posed by
the audience.  He apologised for the things that he could not talk about. 
Most of the questions are related with topics described above.

Dr.  Kittel was not able to answer a particular question that claimed my
attention.  It was about the differences of prices of the AMIGA computers
in each country.  He said that AMIGAs are sold to every distributor at the
same price.

The answer is simple and it scares me that AT either ignores or pretends to
ignore the real reason for this.  The reason is that in many countries
there is only one company that buys all the Amigas that arrive to that
country.  That company resells the AMIGA to any other local distributor but
with their own 'tax' added to the original local distributor price.  This
is what it seems to be why the AMIGA was so overpriced in many countries.

It's a shame if AT will continue to close their eyes to this situation
because this seriously hurts the AMIGA chances of being more popular in the
future.

In the end Dr.  Kittel encouraged developers to write only OS legal
software.  He also encouraged every AMIGA user to advocate for the AMIGA
spreading the good news about the AMIGA that is back for the future.

Dr.  Kittel was very applauded before and after a question and answer
period.  Almost everybody stood up to applaud him.

LIKES

In a few words, IPISA was impressively very well organised.

The number of attendants was very high (almost 400).

DISLIKES

The arrival of some late hour guests, like for instance Dr.  Peter Kittel,
forced the organisation to rearrange the time and the duration of all the
other presentations.  This was a bit frustrating for many of the speakers
like myself as we were not able to talk about many aspects of our work in
such shortened periods of time as we wished.

In compensation Dr.  Kittel's talk was in my opinion the most interesting
for everybody.  Anyway, I understood that the organisation will probably
split next year IPISA meeting in more days if the number of speakers keeps
increasing like for this year's meeting.

Milan's weather by mid-November is already too cold.  Probably it would be
a good idea to reschedule IPISA for some time earlier in the year when the
weather is warmer.  Maybe a month earlier would be warmer enough to
encourage more non-Italian's developers to attend to IPISA and take the
chance to visit the beautiful historical side of Milan.

Almost all the conferences were in Italian.  Fair enough because before
everything this is an Italian developer meeting held in Italy.  It would be
great if English versions of the papers related with the talks could be
made available to the Amiga community through the IPISA WWW pages.  I am
sure this would encourage many more non-Italian developers to attend IPISA
in the future.

CONCLUSIONS

IPISA is yet another proof that AMIGA is back for the future.  If there is
an international meeting that AMIGA developer should not miss, IPISA is the
one.  Even Dr.  Kittel admitted that in Germany there no developers meeting
of this quality.  Do not miss IPISA 96 if you are a serious AMIGA
developer.  Congratulations to the whole staff of the IPISA organisation.

Copyright Manuel Lemos 1995
Internet : UpperDesign@zeus.ci.ua.pt
FidoNet  : 2:361/9.1
BIX      : mlemos (@bix.com)
@endnode
@node FEATURE5 "WOA '95 Show"
@toc FEATURE

===========================================================================
                              WOA Show Review
  Jason Eyre                                   eyrej@limestone.kosone.com
===========================================================================

To date I have attended 4 WOA shows over the past 5 years and have enjoyed
them all for the most part.  My friends and I piled into a mini-van in
Kingston Ontario and struck out for Toronto.  We decided it would be best
to go up on the second day of the show, more time to see everything.

After braving the harsh weather during our trip we finally arrived at the
convention centre.  To my surprise the parking lot was practically empty! 
Which in the past was quite full and usually with people directing traffic.
Well I thought to myself that it was still quite early, around 11:30 or so,
and figured more would come later in the day.

I was looking forward to seeing the displays and finding all the good
bargains.  Well we bought our $8 dollar tickets, filled in the ballots to
possibly win the Amiga 1200 system and went in.  Thats when my excitment
for this show was knocked down a peg or two..  The convention room was
smaller and not nearly as nice as the one where the show had been held in
the past.

<gripe mode on>

I pulled out my list of goodies that I wanted to purchase and started on my
marry way hunting for them.  First on my list was AmiTCP 4.0 I've been
wanting to purchase it for awhile and thought that I would wait for the WOA
show to do it since they would probably have some special show price..
WRONG!  I found it at a couple of boothes and the price tag on them read
$149!  I couldn't believe what my eyes were seeing.  The least they could
have done was offer a special show price!  Well I quickly scratched that
off my list of things I wanted to buy and went looking for a new mouse.  I
found what I was looking for at the Wonder Computers table which took up
most of the floor space in the centre of the room.  There was alot of
hussle bussle around Wonder's table and rightly so--they had quite alot of
software and hardware for sale.

I bought my new mouse (EK1000 Eklipse $22.98) which made me feel better
knowing that I was able to find one at a fairly decent price.  I spotted
the Amiga Technologies booth and headed right over to have a look at the
new 4000T.  It was a modest booth with some nice colour brochures of the
Amiga 1200 and the 4000T.

I went right up to the 4000T to have a look at the future of Amiga only to
be shocked at what I saw.  The machine was filthy!  There was dirt and
grime on the interior front panel and not just a little bit.  I couldn't
believe no one had taken the extra 5 minutes and wipe the machine down with
a damp cloth.

The 4000T has an impressive looking case and is quite large, maybe a bit
smaller than the 3000T.  When I saw the 4000T it wasn't running anything
impressive that I could remember.  None of the machines seemed to have been
configured for display.  The 1200 (Dirty aswell) had a plain out of the box
workbench displayed and only had the stock 2 megs of chip ram.  If I was
somone interested in buying an Amiga these machines definatly weren't going
to help to sell me one.  The old labels on the 1200 had been pried off and
replaced with paper labels.  <sigh> After being totally disappointed with
what I saw at the AT booth I went roaming around checking out the other
displays.  NewTek had some nice televisions on display playing fighter
scenes.  In shows past they have had alot of floor space to put on a good
demonstration.  But this year they were relegated to a small area which
made it hard for people to see the demos playing and listen to the guy
talking about the capabilities of the machine and software.

Phase 5 was there showing off its accelarators and had a nice glass display
with the new PowerPC accelarator with the 604 CPU.  Their brochure says
they plan on selling them in mid 1996 in a price range of $700-$1500
depending on what configuration of board you get and for which machine. 
I'll definatly be sending away for more info about the Phase 5 boards. 
These boards in my opinion are going to help breathe new life into our
beloved machines by bringing new software developers to the platform and
possibly taking the Amiga into new areas not previously ventured into.

I spent maybe 3 hours wandering around.  The company that had bought
Psygnosis inventory was selling off the old companies software by the
truckload at $2 a game and giving a free game with every purchase.  I saw
many people walking away with arm loads of games.  They made for excellent
Christmas gifts at that price!

One of my friends was interviewed for a cable show down in the US that is
dedicated to the Amiga, his name is Stev Cole if you happen to catch the
show.

In hind sight the show was a sucess.  Many people are still dedicated to
the Amiga and companies are still willing to support the machine if there
is money to be made and judging from this show there is.  Hopfully the
things I have mentioned in this small "review" will be noticed by the
people responsible for setting up the show and will take note for the
future.
@endnode
@node REVIEW1 "ZIP Review Clarification"
@toc REVIEW

===========================================================================
                         ZIP Review Clarification
  Wolfram Gottfried                                gottfrie@acca.nmsu.edu
===========================================================================
 
I received a letter from Rask Lambertsen about a potential error in my
ZIP drive submission that was published in AR321.  Since you received a
copy too, I am sending you a copy of the response I sent back.
 
I was the one who wrote the article in AR321 about the ZIP drive and the
Amiga.  I didn't take into account the LOCK command in Amiga OS because
it's not the same kind of write protect.  The LOCK command write protects a
device, not a disk.  The Mac and IBM ZIP tools software provides for a
write protect of the disk itself, something written to the disk that acts
like the write protect tab on a floppy drive.  If you LOCK the ZIP: drive
with the Amiga OS and then change disks, it still won't let you write to
the drive, even though there is another disk in the drive.  What I meant in
the AR article is that there is no way to write protect an individual disk,
either with a physical sensor trigger (IE write protect slide on a floppy)
or via software (Mac/IBM software write protect).  Sorry for the
confusion...I didn't realize people woudl get confused over that.
@endnode
@node REVIEW2 "Review: Maple V Release 3"
@toc REVIEW

===========================================================================
                 Review: Maple V Release 3 for the Amiga.
  Stephen Judd                                              sjudd@nwu.edu
===========================================================================

Chances are good that you have heard of Maple, and wondered about it a
little.  It doesn't change colors in Autumn.  And although I haven't tried
it, I don't think it tastes very good on pancakes.  What Maple is and what
it is useful for is something that will hopefully be addressed in the text
which follows.

This review is going to be at a semi-highbrow level.  It seems to me that
if you think an eigenvalue is some kind of German bargain price, that a
phase portrait is used for identification purposes on Star Trek, or maybe
think that the only people interested in natural logs would be Greenpeace,
then this software will probably not be very eigenvaluable to you.  (On the
other hand, if you spend a lot of time doing problem solving in science and
mathematics, you will probably find this to be one of the more powerful
tools in your arsenal.)

Accordingly, I am not going to spend time explaining mathematics; I assume
that you either understand or at least can appreciate my examples.

This review will be in three parts.  First is a brief introduction to and
overview of Maple and symbolic mathematics in general.  The next part will
be some more detailed examples of using Maple to analyze and solve
problems.  The final part will deal with the Amiga-specific aspects of the
implementation.

I should also point out that I am an Applied Mathematician, and that the
examples I give reflect the kinds of things I personally use Maple for;
other disciplines may find Maple useful for other things, and this review
will barely scratch the surface of Maple's capabilities (the
quick-reference guide is over 500 pages long).  There are a number of books
available on Maple which will of course give much more detail about its
various capabilities.

Finally, since Applied Mathematicians are universally recognized as being
the most handsome, witty, brilliant, literate, and downright humble
examples of God's grandeur, I, well...  I forget what else I was going to
say.

So without further ado about nothing:

What in the world _is_ Maple?
-----------------------------

Although Maple is capable of a wide variety of numeric computations, the
real power of Maple is it's ability to deal with things symbolically.
Simply put, it can do calculations in the abstract, much as you or I can.

For example, how would you factor x^2 - 4?  Even a juror knows that it
factors into (x-2)*(x+2).  Let's see what Maple has to say about it:

    > factor(x^2-4);

            (x-2)(x+2)

What is the derivative of sin(x)?

    > diff(sin(x),x);

            cos(x)

How about the integral of cos(x), from some number a to pi/2?

    > int(cos(x), x=a..Pi/2);

            1 - sin(a)

Neat, huh?  Maple is of course useful for things besides doing Calculus
homework:

    > readlib(fourier);
    > fourier(t/(1+t^2), t, w);

        I Pi (e^w Heaviside(-w) - e^(-w) Heaviside(w))

Maple knows about many special functions:

    > assume(n>0);
    > int(exp(-t) * t^n, t=0..infinity);

        GAMMA(n~) n~

i.e.  n*gamma(n).  Maple knows plenty about most of the common special
functions (Bessel, Gamma, Dirac Delta, etc.), and knows quite a few others
besides!  Maple can solve large sets of equations, algebraic as well as
differential.  Maple also has powerful routines for generating plots in 2D
and 3D, even animations.  Maple has a programming language associated with
it, so you can write large programs to perform more complicated
calculations with Maple (e.g.  write a program to perform a Center Manifold
reduction); in fact, many such programs are included with Maple.  Maple
knows sequences and series (asymptotic series, power series, etc.), number
theory, graph theory, statistics...  and on, and on, and on.

Finally, Maple can save output in many ways.  It can save it to a file.
Maple can save it in LaTeX form (the double quote " is shorthand for the
previous expression, e.g.  GAMMA(n) n).:

    > latex(");

        \Gamma (\mbox {{\tt `n`}})\mbox {{\tt `n`}}

You can even save stuff as FORTRAN or C code:

    > f:= sin(x^2 + y^2):
    > g:= cos(x^3 + y^3):
    > J:= jacobian([f,g],[x,y]):
    > fortran(J, optimized);

        t1 = x**2
        t2 = y**2
        t4 = cos(t1+t2)
        t10 = sin(t1*x + t2*y)
        J(1,1) = 2*t4*x
        J(1,2) = 2*t4*y
        J(2,1) = -3*t10*t1
        J(2,2) = -3*t10*t2

Very cool.  Maple is the cutting edge of symbolic mathematical programs.

Yeah, okay, fine; what is it Good For?
--------------------------------------

Maple, like computers in general, will not solve your problems for you.
Maple is a very powerful tool when you already know what you are doing,
e.g.  what kind of answer to expect, etc.  I use it in two ways: first, as
a program for doing massive amounts of grunt work, and second, as a tool
for analyzing various aspects of a problem.  That is, it may not solve my
problem, but I can use it to look at various specific parts of the problem,
to gain further insight into the problem.  Maple can tell you what happens,
but not why it happens.

The best way to demonstrate this is to work through some problems where I
have personally found Maple helpful.  Consider the following differential
equation:

    du/dt = f(u,v)
    dv/dt = g(u,v) 

Now let's say we can Taylor-expand f and g about the origin, to cubic
order:

    f(u,v) = au + bv + cu^2 + duv + ev^2 + ju^3 + ku^2v + luv^2 + mv^3
    g(u,v) = pu + qv + ...

Now let's expand u and v as a Fourier sine and cosine series.

    u = a_0 + a_1 cos(t) + b_1 sin(t) + a_2 cos(2t) + ...
    v = c_0 + c_1 cos(t) + d_1 sin(t) + ...

Now we need to substitute these expressions into the Taylor expanded f(u,v)
and g(u,v), and simplify all of the trigonometric expressions, e.g.  cos^2
(t) = (1 + cos(2t))/2.  Now, I am certainly capable of doing this, but it
is quite a tedious process, and doing it doesn't give me any great insight
into the problem.  Maple on the other hand is more than happy to chug
through something like this.  Maple is also happy to solve the sets of
algebraic equations which will result.

I am currently solving a problem similar to this one, but my equations
involve various x-derivatives as well, so my expansions are Fourier
expansions in space with time-dependent amplitudes.  Interestingly, by
writing a large Maple code to solve some things for me, I realized that I
could calculate things by hand, very simply.  So my big Maple code is now
just a check of my hand calculations.  But it does have an important moral:
using Maple helped me to gain some insight into solving the problem as a
whole.

There is another important moral: Maple will solve things as it sees fit. 
In the example of my program, when I first saved my results to a file, the
resulting file was some 6000 lines long!  So I had to reorganize the code
to make Maple calculate things in a different order, so that I could
interperet the resulting expressions.  In the process I realized that I
could write them in a fairly compact way.  Unfortunately there was no way
for me to trick Maple into writing them in that particular way!  So, as
always, a brain and a pencil still play the most important role.

To stress the point, I once wrote a program to perform a center manifold
reduction in Maple.  At one point I ended up with a rather large matrix,
which I needed to calculate the eigenvalues of.  Maple got a little
confused trying to calculate these symbolically; it just so happened that
the matrix had a lot of structure, though, so by breaking the problem into
smaller parts -- finding the eigenvalues of some small block-matrices -- I
could make Maple happy once again.

    How about another example:

        d^2x/dt^2 + w^2*x + b*x^2 + c*x^3 = 0

where w,b,c > 0, i.e.  a nonlinear pendulum with no damping.  A regular
pendulum has nice closed orbits -- it just oscillates back and forth about
the origin, and trajectories in phase space are circles.  What effect do
the nonlinear terms have on these trajectores?

This equation is pretty easy to analyze, since we can use a simple energy
argument.  Multiply the equation by dx/dt and integrate to get,

    (dx/dt)^2 + w^2*x^2 + 2/3 b*x^3 + 1/2 c x^4 = E

Constant values of E represent trajectories.  There is a quartic potential,
so I know the trajectories are closed.  Here is where Maple comes in handy:
what do the trajectories look like in phase space (that is, a plot not of x
versus time but of dx/dt versus x)?  I know they are roughly circular.  I
also know that a new pair of fixed points appear when b^2/4 = c*w^2, so I
should look at it in the two different cases:

    > with(plots):
    > Energy:= y^2 + x^4 + 2*x^3 + w^2*x^2;
    > e1:= subs(w=2, Energy);
    > e2:= subs(w=0.5, Energy);
    > contourplot(e1, x=-2..2, y=-4..4);
    > contourplot(e2, x=-2..2, y=-4..4);

This will plot level curves of Energy, which represent solutions to the
equation.  Contourplot is actually a three-dimensional plot, so with a
simple click and drag of the mouse I can look at it from a different
perspective -- instead of a bunch of circles it now looks like a bowl, so
you can really see the energy well.  Now I'll stick some sort of axis on
the graph.  All that remains is to print it out or save it to a postscript
file, publish a paper, become famous, and retire to an idyllic life of
writing entertaining Commodore 64 programs.

Incidentally, if you want to see Maple choke, try to look at the closed
orbits of e2 near the origin.  The plot routine does some pretty funky
disco if, say, x=-0.001..0.001 y=-0.00001..0.00001.

I could have used Maple in a few other ways as well for this problem.
After all, we very often can't use an energy argument.  First I write the
system as a two-dimensional coupled system:

        dx/dt = y
        dy/dt = -c*x^3 - b*x^2 - w^2*x

Now I can do a couple of things with these.  An easy thing to do would be
to plot the vector field (e.g.  the tangent lines to solution curves in
phase space):

    > u:= -2*x^3 - 3*x^2 - x;
    > fieldplot([y,u], x=-2..2, y=-4..4);

I could just generate a (numerically generated) phase portrait directly by
using the command phaseportrait(), and I really could just use the command
odeplot() to calculate the solution x(t) numerically.

Just for fun, let's try to get Maple to solve the equation analytically,
with initial conditions x(0)=1 and dx/dt(0)=0: (the fake TeX output is by
me, not Maple)

    > deqn:= diff(x(t), t$2) + w^2*x(t) + b*x(t)^2 + c*x(t)^3 = 0;
    > initcons:= x(0)=1, D(x)(0)=0;
    > dsolve(deqn, x(t));

        t = +/- \int_0^x(t) 6 \over sqrt(-36 w^2 y^2 - 24 b y^3 - 
            18 c y^4 + 72 C1) dy - C2

    > dsolve({deqn, initcons}, x(t), series);

        x(t)= 1 + (-1/2 b - 1/2 w^2 - 1/2 c) t^2 + 
              (5/24 c b + 1/6 c w^2 + 1/8 c^2 + 1/12 b^2 +
               1/8 b w^2 + 1/24 w^4) t^4 + O(t^6)

    > dsolve({deqn, initcons}, x(t), laplace);
    >

In the last example, Maple does not even return an error message!  It is
supposed to generate a solution by using Laplace transforms, but doesn't
like something about this equation.

Finally, to generate a particular solution curve:

    > d1:= subs(c=2, b=3, w=2, deqn):
    > dsolve({deqn, initcons}, x(t), type=numeric):
    > odeplot(p, [t,x(t)], -4..4);

From the earlier analysis I know that there will be very different looking
solution curves based on how large w is, and also depending on what initial
condition I choose, e.g.

    > d2:= subs(c=2, b=3, w=0.5, deqn):
    > ic:= x(0)=-1, D(x)(0)=0:

Plots of d2 will differ greatly depending on which initial condition is
used!  There are now three fixed points, one of which is unstable, and the
two initial conditions start near different fixed points.

So, once again, Maple can say what happens, but not why it happens.

In summary, I find Maple to be a very useful tool for analyzing problems
which involve tedious if not downright formidable calculations, such as
huge algebraic manipulations.  The ability to generate various types of
graphs such as vector fields is also helpful.  The ability to output in
LaTeX and also to write code to evaulate complicated mathematical
expressions is a very powerful and useful feature as well.  Finally, I find
it very handy to have for checking calculations of my own, both algebraic
and numerical (for instance, it provides an easy way to check if that FFT
code you just wrote works like you think it does).

Now, I don't even want to get started about the state of education in
America, but I will once again suggest that tools like Maple are of
tremendous value once you know what you are doing.  The downside to tools
of this sort is that there is a certain temptation to become dependent on
it for many trivial calculations!  Overall, though, it is a tool well worth
a place in any researcher's toolbox.

Hey, What Happened To The "Amiga" Part?
---------------------------------------

The Amiga version of Maple comes on nine disks, and the full installation
takes up around 25 Megabytes of disk space.  The main Maple package
consists of the disks, two hardcover Springer-Verlag books entitled "First
Leaves: A Tutorial Introduction" and "Maple V Language Reference Manual", a
small softcover set of Release 3 notes (about sixty pages long), a
double-wire-ring bound quick reference guide (about 500 pages), a list of
Maple related books, and a sheet of paper for the Amiga describing
installation instructions, online documentation, getting help, etc.

The rest of the Amiga-specific documentation is contained in two Amigaguide
files.  While some of you might have some apprehensions about this, you
shouldn't.  It was some time before I even got around to looking at them. 
Most of what you are doing is related to Maple, not the Amiga, and most of
the Amiga-specific features are very natural.

That said, the Amiga version has lots of really neat features.  The Amiga
version of Maple Vr3 was written by Willy Langeveld out at the Stanford
Linear Accelerator and Tomas Rokicki of Radical Eye software.  Both of
these names should be familiar to any Amiga user; they have both been
active in the Amiga community for many years.  Willy, whose background is
in particle physics, is probably best known in the Amiga community for
programs such as VLT and the XPK standard, and was instrumental in getting
ARexx included with the Amiga operating system.  Tomas is the author of
programs such as AmigaTex, dvips, and blitter Life, but is probably BEST
known for his BADGE killer demo "RadBoogie", with the mysterious quote "Or
I Won't Get Dressed...", which after some six years now I hope will finally
be explained to me ;).

What this means is that Amiga Maple was written by people who understand
both the needs of the scientist and the needs of the Amiga user -- a rare
treat in the Amiga world!  It means that you get a 'real' Amiga program --
one which is memory and CPU efficient, OS friendly, contains Amigaish
features, an ARexx port, etc.  -- which is also a tremendously powerful
tool for scientific research.
    
I should probably mention my setup.  I am running Maple on an Amiga 1200
with a DKB Mongoose 50MHz 030/882, 4+2M RAM, a 3.5" Maxtor IDE drive in an
external (Dataflyer) housing, PanaSync C1391 monitor, and other irrelevant
stuff (Supra 28.8, lame Chinon CD-ROM attached to SCSI option on the DKB
board, etc.).  The machine is running OS 3.0 (KS 39.106, WB39.29).

Hmmmmm, where to begin?  Maple can open on the workbench or on a custom
(public) screen.  I personally have it open up on a custom screen, Super72
interlaced.  This gives me a nice large worksheet area, and keeps the
workbench uncluttered.  Since the screen is public, I jump my editor (ame)
to that screen, so that I can work on my programs on the same screen (in
case this is not clear, I edit a large file containing my Maple code, and
then read the file into Maple's worksheet).  Maple has a problem with
stealing pens from the workbench and not giving them back, but a simple
patch is available.

You have a fair amount of control over things like fonts -- what kind of
font to use for equations, for text entry, etc.  This was very useful
indeed to me, because the default font for text entry is a CG font -- too
bad I don't have any CompuGraphic fonts!  (I think Commodore ran out of
money and deleted them from the OS distribution).  I changed the font to
Ruby, and everything was fine.

You can customize things in other ways, but I'm that type of user that
usually doesn't bother with something if I don't have to :).  For instance,
there is a tool bar at the top of the worksheet which you can customize,
etc.

Plots are pretty neat.  There are lots of dither and coloring options.
Plots can be saved as IFF files (in addition to PostScript etc.). 
Furthermore, plots can be clipped into the system clipboard, and hence
pasted into other programs easily.  I tried generating some 3D animations,
and they ran very smoothly.

Willy Langeveld et.al.  went to extraordinary lengths to make the program
memory and processor efficient.  It won't run on a 1M 1.3 Amiga 500, but
Willy tells me it will run on a 2000 with a few megs of RAM on it (and,
presumably, OS2.1 or so).  I was worried that with a mere six megabytes
about all I could do was integrate e^x dx, but so far I have been able to
do just about everything I have set out to do.  Sometimes I feel the memory
crunch, but I have zero complaints here: I am more surprised at how much I
can do with 6M.

Maple dynamically allocates memory as it needs it, but one downer is that
it doesn't give it back when it doesn't need it any more.  This is endemic
to the Maple core program, and is not fixable at the Amiga program level. 
One fix is to just quit Maple and start it again.  Another fix is to buy
more memory.  Still another is to use a program like VMM.  I have not tried
this, but it is supposed to work with Maple.  (One place this has bitten me
is in a loop, where I accidentally ended the loop with a ";" instead of a
":", which had the result of printing out each loop variable, etc.  This
then filled up the worksheet, which starts chomping up memory pretty
quick.)

The main Maple library is some 10 megabytes large; Amiga Maple searches
through the library to find what it needs, so you don't want to store that
library on a fragmented disk!  (In fact, it is recommended that you place
the library on its own partition).  On the plus side, functions and such
only need to be loaded once.

The rather extensive interactive help facility is all done in AmigaGuide
format.  You can also access help from the worksheet in the usual way, i.e.
>?int.  Revision 3 has the nice feature that you can access just the
examples, or just the calling format, etc., instead of the entire help
file.

Amiga Maple has an ARexx port with about 70 commands.

Support is excellent: you can't beat talking to the programmer!  I know
they've released at least one patch to fix the WB pen allocation problem,
and they are looking at the CG font issue.  Willy answered all of my
questions quickly, no matter how strange they were, and was quite enjoyable
to talk to.  Note that I am referring to Amiga specific issues here; for
Maple issues Waterloo is also very accessible.

So, how does this compare to similar products?  There is nothing similar to
it on the Amiga.  Software-wise, the closest thing to Maple is Mathematica.
I used Mathematica for several years before using Maple, and I greatly
prefer Maple.  Last time I checked, the ubiquitous, all-knowing "they"
seemed to feel that the Maple algorithms were more robust, but I really
have nothing to support such a claim.  Universities often support one
program or the other; here at Northwestern we are a "Maple School".  If you
are lucky and your school has a site license, you can get Maple at a very
substantial discount.  (It is also worth noting that programs like Matlab
are now using part of the Maple kernal).

Platform-wise, I use Maple on Suns and HPs (and Amigas :).  I think the
interactive help is better on those machines, but overall I like the Amiga
version better!  Manipulating plots is a snap.  Speed is very comfortable
(I haven't tried to do any comparisons with massive CPU- intensive
calcuations though).  I like having it on a separate screen.  Maybe I just
like having menus work in the Amiga way.  Suffice to say that I find it to
be entirely comparable to Maple on other platforms, to have a very
comfortable feeling about it, and an excellent example of properly written
Amiga software.

There is, I think, a certain stigma attached to the Amiga, that in terms of
serious scientific research it is not "professional".  May I suggest that
this is, in the words of a television censor, Bullstuff.  With Maple,
AmigaTeX, a good 2D plotting program like xmgr or gnuplot, and a decent
X-server, the Amiga literally becomes a mini workstation.  Granted, it
would be nice to have things like Matlab and IDL for the Amiga, but the
tools I mention above are just about "it" when it comes to tools in use
around the department here at Northwestern.

In short, then, with the addition of Maple to my software library, I now
have a mini-workstation which runs AmigaDOS.  Think about that: a
workstation with screens and ARexx and MODs and ArmyMiner and all the other
great things that are Amiga.  The only things I really need a true
workstation for are CPU-intensive tasks (and, truth be told, X-intensive
tasks).

While Maple is clearly not for everyone, it is a very valuable tool for any
serious researcher in the sciences.  It is my feeling that the mere
presence of Maple for the Amiga makes the machine a very credible platform
for performing scientific research, not to mention a very viable machine
for the 'education' market.  There isn't much scientific software for the
Amiga, but the few programs that do exist are excellent.  Thus I highly
recommend Maple Vr3 for the Amiga.  Maple is an outstanding piece of
software, and the Amiga version is excellent.  I exhort you to go forth and
purchase, and when the price sends you into shock, remember that you are
not just investing in your research, you are investing in the future of the
Amiga.
@endnode
@node REVIEW3 "Review: Colonization"
@toc REVIEW

===========================================================================
                           Review: Colonization
                          By: @{" Katherine Nelson " link KATIE}
===========================================================================

Colonization (Microprose) is a game brought to us from the makers of
Civilization, as long-awaited sequel.  There was some question as to
whether it would be released on the Amiga, but fortunately, Microprose came
through for us.  Only an ECS version is available, but it could almost pass
for AGA because the graphics are very well done (similar in quality to
Settlers, another ECS game).

Another mark in the positive column for Colonization is the fact that it
runs straight from my hard drive on my 4000/040.  I was never able to get
Civilization to run without using its boot disk, and I tried everything.
So the less hassle for me to play this game translates to a happier
reviewer.

Basically, Coloniztion is a game of (surprise) colonization and revolution.
You are the leader of the colonial presence of one of four European powers,
the English, French, German, or the Dutch.  Your goal is to create colonies
that prosper, and evenutally, to declare independence from your parent
nation, and survive (and win) the onslaught that ensues.

Three different world options appear after the playing language is
selected.  These are:  Start a Game in NEW WORLD, Start a Game in AMERICA,
and CUSTOMIZE New World.  Any of these are good for play, but I prefer not
to choose America, simply because in order to trade more efficiently,
colonies need to have access to the ocean.  There is a lot of coastline in
the America version, but that is the only surface available for all four
European powers.  Many medium-size islands seems to work better.

After selecting where you want to play, a difficulty requester appears.  I
am not a master strategen, so I chose the easiest: Discoverer.  I'm sure
some of you out there could cope with the fifth level, Viceroy, but I think
this review would never have been completed if I had tried it.  There is a
@{" cheat " link CHEAT}, however, to make it easier.

The greatest challenge of the game is to balance your manpower between
food-related work, defense, and the cash crops that help put money in the
coffer.  Beyond that, you have to deal with the colonies and colonists of
the other three nations, and you have to deal with the Indians (Native
Americans) through friendship and appeasement or through force.  All in
all, a lot of things to manage.

I have found that it is a good idea to have at least one solider or dragoon
(mounted solider) in each colony.  Unlike Civilization, these military
units are formed from existing people, plus they do not consume any
resources.

In reference to goods that can be traded with the Indians or brought back
to Europe, it seems best to process all raw goods except Ore.  Ore is worth
more money unprocessed than converted to tools or muskets.  It is a good
idea to stockpile the tools and muskets anyway, though, because they are
needed for creating roads/plowing fields, and for fighting in the war,
respectively.  But with respect to cotton, furs, sugar, and tobacco, you
may as well create cloth, coats, rum, and cigars.

Trading with the natives can be useful, because the crown does not charge a
tax on those trades.  Also, sometimes a real good deal will crop up.
However, sometimes the natives do not offer good prices, and refusing them
can increase tension.  Trading in Europe is more consistent, but prices
fall if you glut the market.

In Civilization, the emphasis was on creating shields to build things,
including Wonders; wheat to feed the people; coins for purchases; and light
bulbs for discoveries.

In Colonization, in order to build things, you have to have someone working
as a carpenter and possibly a blacksmith.  You need trees for the carpenter
and ore for the blacksmith.  They create hammers and tools, which are used
to create the building or item.

To get food you need a farmer and/or a fisherman.  The farmer will grow
corn, and the fisherman (after you build Docks), will catch fish to feed
the people.  New colonists are available in the colony when the food
reaches 200 or on the European docks when enough crosses (symbolizing
religious freedom, go figure...) are generated.  Crosses are generated in
the Church (which you have to build), and increased by assigning someone as
a priest in it. 

Money can only be obtained through trade, or conquest of other colonies or
native settlements.

Combining the ideas of Discoveries and Wonders, in Colonization you put
people in the town hall to increase the generation of liberty bells.  When
enough have been created, you choose a new member of the Continental
Congress.  Each possible member has different advantages, with pluses under
one of several subjects: Trade, Military, Political, Religious, or
Exploration.  You get extra points when you retire for each member of the
Continental Congress, but it is not necessary to have all of them.

Generating the liberty bells is also extremely important during the War of
Independence because they keep people in the Sons of Liberty, which gives
production and defense bonuses.  Also, another European power will
volunteer to aid you if you can create enough liberty bells, and these
added forces can make a great deal of difference.

On the subject of the war... You cannot declare war until there is at least
50% rebel sentiment (created by the liberty bells) in your collective
colonies.  You may still have individual colonies that support the crown
when you declare, but this makes the war more difficult.  Immediately upon
declaring war, your enraged European monarch lands the troops near your
colonies.  This is pretty fast moving, considering they take no travel time
between Europe and the New World.  You always spend a few turns sailing
between, but it seems that either their ships are faster, or they knew the
kind of rebel scum you were, and were prepared.

The british forces have many attack bonuses.  They are better trained, but
you have an advantage when both of you are in open terrain.  These bonuses
are still not stellar.  The best idea is to have a large number of troops,
and hope for power in numbers.  Having some artillery helps a great deal,
as long as it is in a colony, and not out in the open.

The War can last a great deal of time, and you will need money to support
it.  This can be obtained either through trade with the natives (which is
one reason not to wipe them out, if you don't go with the moral one), or
build a Customs House, which lets you trade with the other European powers
without sailing all the way out there.  There are a lot of fees on this
type of trade, though.

At any rate, if you win the war (by fending off a great deal of troops or
re-capturing all of your colonies), you see your number of points, look at
some pretty screens, and then the game suddenly quits.  I would prefer that
it went back to the opening screen so you could play again, but I'm just
lazy.

Another strange "feature" of the game is that while you are at war with the
crown, you can still buy ships from them.  I don't know if they just
assumed there would be some sympathizers in the Mother/Father country, or
if they just didn't think that the Crown would mind selling weapons to the
enemy.

Finally, I'll end on some good points.  The sound is excellent.  You can
turn it off, too.  This is good, because although there are several good
songs you can choose to play, if you're playing for hours and hours like
you need to, it gets repetitive anyway... Maybe they need a sing-along
version to keep my attention longer, I don't know.  But it is really good
for as long as you can listen.  Also, a good change from Civilization, the
saved games are not in the main directory.  They are buried within the game
directory, and that keeps them out of the way.  Did I mention it ran
straight from my hard drive? :)

Colonization is a great game for Civilization lovers.  It has a great deal
of strategy involved, though, so probably is not for the light of heart
unless you cheat (See the button above).  It looks and sounds impressive,
and is one of the better games I've seen for the Amiga.
@endnode
@node CHEAT "Colonization Cheat"
@toc REVIEW3

To get 50,000 extra gold and reveal the entire map, name one of your cities
"Charlotte".  (Without the quotes, of course.)
@endnode
@node REVIEW4 "Review: The Global Amiga Experience CD"
@toc REVIEW

===========================================================================
                  Review: The Global Amiga Experience CD
                            By: @{" Jason Compton " link JASON}
===========================================================================

I had to laugh recently.  I was flipping through a 2-year old Amiga
magazine, roughly when the CD32 was released, and reading an article about
CD-ROMs.  It essentially said that there wasn't a very good market for
CD-ROMs on the Amiga, except for what looked like a lucrative CD32 game
market.

Oh, how the times have changed.

CD32 games trickle out, due to artificially low sales of the machine (since
Commodore couldn't afford to build them).  At the same time, the
general-purpose CD-ROM market has been gaining momentum, thanks to a great
deal of available material and low production costs.

The Global Amiga Experience does something that's actually a really good
idea.  It compiles over 200 demo versions of Amiga software along with 8
full commercial titles (aging versions, but hey, free is free.)  The likes
of Imagine 2.0, Scala 1.13, Vista Pro 1.0, Distant Suns 4.0, Clarissa 1.1,
and Edge 1.721 are nothing to sniff at, and upgrade offers are included for
all six.  (We use Edge 1.721 for Amiga Report, in fact.) X-Copy and
Steuerfuchs '93 are included as well, the latter being some sort of German
tax program. 

The demo versions are by and large of commercial software packages, most of
which are still readily available.  This is an excellent thing for the
market and something that lends itself very well to a pack-in with CD-ROM
drives from dealers and Amiga + CD-ROM bundles.  Oh, you mean we don't have
official CD-ROM packages from Amiga Technologies?  It's time to start.

The CD doesn't have what I'd call a pretty layout--there isn't enough
indexing, and an AmigaGuide interface to the CD would have been
appreciated.  As it is, you get a whole mess of assigns that should make
anything runnable from CD-ROM, if you so choose.

The only real problem with this CD is that you're not informed ahead of
time that a great deal of the content will be in German only (including,
very unfortunately, the Edge text editor you're getting the full version
of), and others will be PAL-only (such as Imagine 2.0).  This may not be
the compiler's FAULT, but I do think it would have been nice to let
everyone know.

The CD is pretty recent, only released a few months ago.  There have been
some changes and updates to versions in that time, of course, and the
rather important fact that VRLI has dropped Distant Suns and sold it to
Chaocity, and the fact that Imagine 3.0 is about to become a CU Amiga
coverdisk are pretty important to potential upgraders of their commercial
versions.

The bottom line?  DM39, or US$29.  True, you could get the vast majority of
these demos from Aminet, but unless you already have Aminet Sets 1 and 2,
it'll take you quite some time.  You also won't snag 8 free commercial
software packages.  If you're shopping for Amiga software but don't know
what you like, this CD will be a great tool.

Logic Creations
Rankic & Schneider GbR
Prof. - Druck - Str. 38
72666 Neckartailfingen
Phone: ++49 7127 22608
Fax:   ++49 7127 3760
@endnode
@node REVIEW5 "Review: The AGA Experience CD-ROM"
@toc REVIEW

===========================================================================
                     Review: The AGA Experience CD-ROM
                            By: @{" Jason Compton " link JASON}
===========================================================================

No, there isn't a conspiracy to use the word "Experience" for CD-ROMs, it
just worked out that way.

Sadeness PD and NFA created The AGA Experience as both a tool to show off
the capabilities of AGA Amigas, and a way to compile lots of PD disks into
one small package.  The fare is varied, running from AGA eye-candy demos to
commercial software demos to rendered animations and slideshows (some of
adult nature), and finishing off with a strong dose of Amiga online
magazines, including a licensed compilation of Amiga Report.  Not bad, eh?

The collection, as the name implies, is targeted at AGA users, although the
minimum requirements for some software (some application software such as
emulators and picture files) is less, and of course you don't need a
4000/040 to read AR.  A comprehensive AmigaGuide index and contents file is
included, although you have to use other methods to actually access the
software--generally, the icons are configured to either run or decompress
the item you choose.

The CD also sports a small collection of original software not for
redistribution, consisting of slideshows, Klondike card sets, and NFA's Out
of Space disk magazines.

Complaints are few...I guess my only real complaint as far as the CD's
content goes is that there are far too many versions of the NFA and
Sadeness logos on the CD, to the point of being ridiculous.  But they're
more or less all in the same place so it's not an annoyance, just odd.

The CD does what it says, and creates an "AGA Experience".  I suppose if
you're looking for a way to justify the purchase of that new A1200 or 4000T
and CD-ROM drive, popping in this CD and playing a round of Pulp Fiction
Klondike might make you feel better...

Some PD disk collections have come in clumsier form, others in prettier
(the Assassins CD comes to mind.)  The AGA Experience is not quite what I'd
call an attractively laid out CD, but the directory trees are reasonable
and logical, and the necessary assigns are made for you with a click of an
icon.

The price is UKP 20, or roughly US$30.  More than an Aminet CD, but you're
paying for a planned compilation of showoff software as opposed to a
collection of the newest software.  I do think the Aminet AmigaGuide
interface should become a standard for CD-ROMs on the Amiga, but that's not
anything I expect to see soon.

I never quite thought I'd see a licensed Amiga Report collection on the
same CD with a "Big Girls" slideshow, but that's just me...

Sadeness PD/NFA
13 Russell Terrace
Mundesley
Norfolk
NR11 8LJ
Phone: ++44 1263 722169
@endnode
@node REVIEW6 "Review: Aminet 8 CD-ROM"
@toc REVIEW

===========================================================================
                          Review: Aminet 8 CD-ROM
                            By: @{" Jason Compton " link JASON}
===========================================================================

The Aminet series.  You know it, if you've ever used one you probably
haven't been disappointed, and it's a lot faster to use than even a 28.8k
modem.  Aminet has long been the leader in new, freely redistributable
Amiga software and the Aminet CD series, by going quarterly and then
bimonthly, has lead the way for CD-ROM shoppers looking for the newest
software.  Those with net access don't always want to run up their phone
bills or hog connect time with FTPs to the Aminet network, and those
without FTP access can get the latest several hundred megs of Amiga
software on CD-ROM for a pretty low price.

No major surprises appear in this edition, although a registered version of
the very flexible mod player DeliTracker has been licensed for inclusion
with the CD.  Being a long standing fan of Bryan Ford's Multiplayer,
Delitracker caught me off guard and is considerably more complex, with some
options and features which are not completely intuitive...so you'll want to
read the docs.

The familiar AmigaGuide interface is back.  (I think I keep saying that
every time I review an Aminet CD.)  So are the prefs and search tools,
including one feature I've never quite taken note of before: the ability to
search ALL of the CDs (in other words, the entire Aminet) for the string
you're interested in, which generates an index-style report with a column
telling you which CD to check.  Nice.

The Aminet 8 theme is mods, with some 2,000 or so on the CD.  The index
allows you to access them either by name or by category with the "shuffle"
option (which is handy if you're lazy or bored.)  One drawback is that if
the mod is actually an .lha'ed pack of mods, it will only play the first
mod of the pack.  Perhaps in the future, this will be corrected...

Aminet continues to deliver prompt access to the latest in Amiga software,
and the CDs are coming out so fast that Aminet 8 (October 95) is already
old news, Aminet 9 has been released.  The CDs run roughly US$20 but are
often discounted on one-year subscriptions.

Aside from being an Aminet mirror yourself or having an extremely fast link
with Aminet mounted as a device on a 24 hour basis, there isn't a more
effective or convenient way of bringing the collected fruits of the Amiga
share/freeware community to your home than with these CDs.  One of these
days there may be one that's a waste, but that hasn't happened yet.

Stefan Ossowski's Schatztruhe
Gesellschaft fur Software mbH
Veronikastr. 33
D-45131 Essen
Germany
@endnode
@node REVIEW7 "Review: Super Skidmarks"
@toc REVIEW

===========================================================================
                          Review: Super Skidmarks
                            By: @{" Jason Compton " link JASON}
===========================================================================

The premise of Skidmarks and its successor is simple enough.  It almost
seems as though the developers, Acid Software, brainstormed and came up
with "Hey, what about a racing game where you leave marks on the track?"

Thus was a legend born.  Super Skidmarks is the sequel to the game that
dared ask that question.  It sports AGA and ECS compatibility (which
dictates the prettiness of the game: AGA players can race up to 8 cars
while ECS users are limited to 4.  (Cut those in half if you want to haul
trailers on the cars you race, which is neat but somewhat silly.)

The race takes place on a large, multi-screen track, although link options
and AGA's ability to display a high-res screen cuts down on the amount of
scrolling necessary.  With link options and split screening, you can get a
considerable number of friends in the game.

Lots of cars and lots of tracks are the order--two disks of cars (and you
can roll your own with Imagine) and 4 disks of tracks.  Unfortunately, you
can't install the game to HD, as Acid claims it would encourage piracy.
There was supposed to be a special installer coming, but it hasn't surfaced
yet.  Dual floppies are nice, but not necessary, to playing the game.

The racing feels fast and smooth in Tournament mode (where you have a
limited number of "replays", which you lose if you fail to finish first in
a race), but is sluggish in the regular race mode, presumably as a training
level for the tournaments.  Having this more flexible would have been
appreciated, however.  One complaint is that the Skidmarks racing model
prevents you from going outside of the boundaries of the track, whether or
not you're in the air.  This makes for some irritating "bounces" off of the
track, making for a ridiculous concept when you fly through the air and
your forward motion stops dead.  It's all part of the game, but not a very
"friendly" part.

The computer players provide a challenge at first but after a few hours of
racing should no longer be a serious enough threat to totally knock you out
of competitions.  Super Skidmarks has flexible serial link options (no TCP
networking, though) so playing with friends is encouraged on several
levels.

Complaints?  Well, the wheels on the cars don't turn.  Detail counts for a
lot, and Super Skidmarks does a good job of keeping it up graphically, but
the static car images are a minus.  Actually, the whole "disregard for
physics" is a bit of a problem (sideswipe collisions actually increase the
speed of both cars, which most physics students would have a problem with),
but it IS a game, after all.  I also found the game somewhat unstable on an
A3000, with crashes during disk loading.  This didn't show up on an A4000,
however.

Super Skidmarks is an extremely playable game for an individual, but is
better suited to a party or friends environment.  It's not realistic, but
it's a lot of fun.
@endnode
@node REVIEW8 "Review: Roadkill"
@toc REVIEW

===========================================================================
                             Review: Roadkill
                            By: @{" Jason Compton " link JASON}
===========================================================================

Roadkill comes from Acid Software, the same developer/publisher team that
put together Super Skidmarks.  Instead of racing for the pure love of the
sport (and the thrill of marking up the track), you race to earn money and
blow up other drivers, in a futuristic (and top-down) environment.

Strictly one player and strictly AGA, Roadkill is pretty and smooth (and
works well on an 040, no mean feat for many games).  You get a choice of 6
(remarkably similar save for color) cars to inflict Roadkill with, and can
arm yourself mid-race with rocket and missile powerups, because after all,
what's a game these days without powerups?  Money is also there to be
collected.

Your car has only a certain amount of protection from the 8 or so computer
drivers out there to race against you.  They tend to be less aggressive
than you, however, so you can take advantage of their passivity in the
various "kill zones" (areas with mean metal spikes on the walls of the
track) or sneak up behind them with a rocket (keyboard controlled unless
you're playing the CD32 version, eek!)  This makes Roadkill a bit lopsided,
since you feel like you're playing with different rules than everyone else.

While it's fun to blow up other cars (not to mention profitable, you get
cash for each car destroyed, including Jackpots and Super Jackpots), the
real goal is to place (1, 2, or 3) in the race.  Fail that, and you lose a
"replay", or life.  The same applies if you beat your car to hell and don't
make a pit stop in time to avoid your explosion.  After the race, you're
told how much money you've earned, and shown the next race, including the
option to do a single lap, with no danger from other cars or mines or
lasers--a preview.  This is actually pretty nice, but never seems to help
quite enough as the pressure of the real race, and the increased speed,
will make you forget the preview lap.  Luckily, onscreen "Radar" of a sort
shows you the general layout of the track.

No, it's not a bad game.  In fact, it's very pretty to look at and the
control system is reasonable enough, except for those keyboard-fired
missiles.  But why, oh why, can't you actually spend the money between
races?  It would make it seem like a much less hollow pursuit, but as it is
it merely acts as a "score" in case you're competing for points with a
friend.

Roadkill has a great game engine, but is too limited to be a game to play
again and again.  The violence aspect of the game, which the box pays a lot
of attention to, is largely overrated--cars blow up but it's certainly
nothing repulsive.  Those looking for blood and gore should pick up Screech
on Aminet...now that's disturbing.  Roadkill has good racing, but the
implementation just isn't there.
@endnode
@node REVIEW9 "Review: Alien Breed 3D"
@toc REVIEW

===========================================================================
                          Review: Alien Breed 3D
                            By: @{" Jason Compton " link JASON}
===========================================================================

HOW long were we waiting for this game?  It seems like forever ago that the
demos came out, with what looked like the most complex Doomish game engine
for the Amiga, if not the one with the biggest screensize.

Now the real game is out.  Yet another installment in the overworked Alien
Breed franchise, AB3D retains the rather small viewing window of the demos
but does indeed sport a gaming engine in some ways more advanced than the
standard benchmark, Doom for the PC.  The reflective/refractive/noise
dampening water is the best example.  On the other hand, AB3D has less
weapon choices, no automatic mapping (the lack of which has been defended
by author Andy Clitheroe as unrealistic--Would you map if you were running
around shooting aliens?), and saving can only be done between levels, with
a password.

No, it's not perfect.  But it is pretty fun to play, and has been designed
for playable speed on low-end AGA Amigas, which results in lightning
quickness on an 040/25 or so.  The aliens are actually pretty disgusting
and scary and sound like it, both when shooting at you and when dying.  The
game's sound effects and scarcity of resources (it's not difficult at all
to run out of ammo completely) create a very claustrophobic atmosphere,
which is diminished somewhat by the static border that surrounds the
viewing window, which shows you which of the 4 colored keys per level
you've collected.  There is a human heart in the center, which presumably
is supposed to do something, but doesn't.  It has the look and feel of an
unimplemented idea...

Speaking of unimplemented ideas, Clitheroe is working on what is
tentatively being called Alien Breed 3D Special Edition, a new game engine
which will allow for more resolution flexibility (as it is now, you are
stuck with what you are given, period), more engine features and shading
advancements (right now your big choice is to decide how much texture the
floor has), and new levels.  Initially, there was to be a free patch for
certain new features for existing owners but Team17 was encouraged enough
by the brisk AB3D sales to decide to market a new product, which will
include a level editor.  (The original AB3D levels will apparently not be
included but will be playable in the new engine provided you own AB3D.)

I found AB3D quite playable with a joystick, which is in a sense a bad
thing because you'll still be relying on the keyboard for such things as
strafing, ducking, and looking behind you (an excellent and obvious, yet
unusual, feature.)  Developers really need to start supporting the
CD32-style gamepads for non-CD32 machines, they're quite flexible and
useful.  Some might even like them to go a step further and support
PC-style analog joysticks, many of which support more buttons and switches
than seems reasonable.

The issue and idea of future releases is all well and good (previously,
AB3D was to be Team17's last Amiga release), but that's not important to
the question of whether or not AB3D is fun to play.  Yes.  Is it
frustrating to play?  Well, the interesting thing is that the more machine
speed you have, the more playable the game will be, yet the more you'll
want to have more screen resolution and a larger viewing area.  The game is
good enough to stand on its own, although the engine is not quite perfect,
as white pixels are noticable where some wall seams aren't rendered
properly.  But the satisfaction of blowing away the three red crawly things
around the corner soon makes you forget about that.

If there's one reason not to buy AB3D, it's the damned copy protection.
Look, I don't mind document protection.  But I find glossy black ink on
shiny black paper to be absolutely intolerable.  I'd sooner they ask me to
TRANSLATE the word on Page 23 of the manual from German to English.
Luckily, the game is HD installable with a minimum of fuss, but that
doesn't excuse the black-on-black.

It's not Doom.  I'm not sure it's really captured the excitement Doom
created when it was released.  But it is a very playable and quite polished
texture-mapped Doom-genre game with excusable flaws, a popular topic, and
with promised enhancements to come...
@endnode
@node CHARTS1 "Aminet Charts: 3-Dec-95"
@toc FTP

| The most downloaded files from Aminet during the week until 3-Dec-95
| Updated weekly. Most popular file on top.
|
|File              Dir        Size Age Description
|----------------- ---        ---- --- -----------
ar321.lha          docs/mags   89K   0+Amiga Report 3.21, November 30, 1995
png_dt.lha         util/dtype  79K   0+PNG DataType (68000/020) v. 43.2 + d
html30gu.lha       docs/hyper  99K   0+Complete HTML 3.0 reference in Amiga
mn_ansitest.lha    comm/mebbs   3K  23+ANSI Test Door for MEBBSNet
pip_v22.lha        util/misc   35K   0+View any screen in a window on anoth
Reboot_1.2.lha     util/misc   15K   0+Reboot utility. V1.2
DiskMonTools34.lha disk/moni  102K   0+V 3.4 of THE moni/optim/salv/cdrom t
mNews0_1.lha       comm/news   29K   0+MUI news group reader for AmiTCP. V0
InstallerGuide.lha docs/hyper  32K   0+Installer doc in AmigaGuide format.
WWWCache.lha       comm/net    12K   0+V1.8 of Arexx script for caching ima
Stat36_1.lha       util/sys    10K   0+An extension of C:Status.
IPDialv19.lha      comm/tcp    93K   0+SLIP dialer; stdin/out terminal prog
VInfo36_2.lha      util/sys    10K   0+An alternative to C:Info
AW95BP_as.lha      pix/icon    91K   0+Another Win95 Boot Pic. (AmigaStart)
BangerMenu123.lha  util/boot   28K   0+Startmenu activate by CAPS-Lock
ReqTools23Usr.lha  util/libs  156K   0+ReqTools 2.3 - the requester toolkit
CGraphX214u.lha    gfx/board  477K   0+CGraphX gfx extension update 2.14
Bioday.lha         util/misc   28K   0+Biorythms with many comments & GUI V
IBrGrab.lha        pix/illu   472K   0+Screen Grabs of IBrowse WWW Amiga Br
Aminet-CD-9.lha    docs/lists  79K   0+Aminet CD 9 index and description

| The highest rated programs during the week until 4-Dec-95
| Updated weekly. Best program on top. Please rate all the programs you
| download. To do so, send to aminet-server@wuarchive.wustl.edu :
| RATE <path> <num>
| where <path> is the file you want to judge and <num> is a mark from 0..10
| with 10 being the best. You can rate several programs in one mail, but
| don't rate your own programs. Example: RATE dev/gui/mui23usr.lha 8
|
|File              Dir        Size Age Description
|----------------- ---        ---- --- -----------
SmartWB.lha        util/wb      4K   5+Boosts up Workbench's windows refres
IPDialv19.lha      comm/tcp    93K   0+SLIP dialer; stdin/out terminal prog
mui31usr.lha       dev/gui    771K   1+MagicUserInterface V3.1, user files
hdsleep.lha        disk/misc   11K   6+Turns your hard drives motor off. v1
Knights242.lha     game/2play 223K  56+Two-player violent dungeon bashing
Knockout.lha       game/2play 190K  12+Two *very* addictive multiplayer gam
Team17_Demos.dms   game/demo  680K  37+Demos of Alien Breed 3D and King Pin
MouseBounce.lha    game/gag     5K 344+Screen hack that is also a game.
scrotax2.lha       game/shoot 347K  11+Scrotax Version 2.01 - BUGFIXED & UP
3D_Pro.lha         gfx/3d     211K   3+The easy-to-use 3D stereogram/SIRD g
RomIcons9.lha      pix/icon   336K  26+New MagicWB2.0 Icons/ImageDrawers/..
DamageWolf3D_2.lha gfx/misc   292K   4+A ROTT (PC game) walkaround demo; 3D
NetMail-13.lha     comm/mail  130K   6+E-mail program with GUI, groups, fil
Online1.4.lha      comm/misc   89K  24+Ultimate Phone Call Coster/Logger OS
Interplay40b.lha   disk/cdrom  53K   4+CDPlayer (Archos/CD32/PowerCD/SCSI/+
ReOrg3_1.lha       disk/optim 326K 117+Disk optimizer with DC-FFS support
DiskSalv11_32.lha  disk/salv  118K  21+Dave Haynie's DiskSalv version 11.32
ViperAGA12.lha     game/2play 390K  57+Updated AGA Snake game with 6 player
MagiC64N.lha       misc/emu   250K   5+C64 Emulator V1.01 (A1200 Bug fixed)
ShapeShift3_2a.lha misc/emu   240K  10+Macintosh II emulator, V3.2a
gfft-1.12.lha      misc/sci   296K  64+FFT spectrum analysis of sample file
MagicMenu_1.29.lha util/cdity 106K 105+PopUp menus for OS 2.x and newer
Executive.lha      util/misc  527K   1+UNIX-like task scheduler (V1.30)
snoopdos30.lha     util/moni  128K  63+System monitor, many new features ad
NewMultiView09.lha util/sys     8K   7+A frontend for MultiView
VChk803.lha        util/virus 199K   2+Version 8.03 of Virus_Checker. Amiga
AB3Dicon.lha       pix/icon     2K   4+Icon for Alien Breed 3D - MWB Style.
DosMan121.lha      util/wb    145K  27+Complete GUI Dos Manual
@endnode
@node CHARTS2 "Aminet Charts: 11-Dec-95"
@toc FTP

| The most downloaded files from Aminet during the week until 11-Dec-95
| Updated weekly. Most popular file on top.
|
|File              Dir        Size Age Description
|----------------- ---        ---- --- -----------
mn_ansitest.lha    comm/mebbs   3K  24+ANSI Test Door for MEBBSNet
ar321.lha          docs/mags   89K   1+Amiga Report 3.21, November 30, 1995
png_dt.lha         util/dtype  79K   1+PNG DataType (68000/020) v. 43.2 + d
html30gu.lha       docs/hyper  99K   1+Complete HTML 3.0 reference in Amiga
E-MailMosaic.lha   comm/tcp    23K   0+To get & put E-Mail with Mosaic
AESicons6.lha      pix/icon    91K   0+80 NewIcons: AB3D,IBrowse,ZIPDrive,m
pip_v22.lha        util/misc   35K   1+View any screen in a window on anoth
Knack108a.lha      util/arc    66K   1+GUI for PGP, DMS, LHA, LZX, ZIP, ZOO
mNews0_1.lha       comm/news   29K   1+MUI news group reader for AmiTCP. V0
mcx228.lha         util/cdity  51K   0+Multi Function Commodity
InstallerGuide.lha docs/hyper  32K   1+Installer doc in AmigaGuide format. 
DiskMonTools34.lha disk/moni  102K   1+V 3.4 of THE moni/optim/salv/cdrom t
AW95BP_as.lha      pix/icon    91K   1+Another Win95 Boot Pic. (AmigaStart)
xpkILZR.lha        util/pack   24K   0+Fast (Un)Packing - Low Mem Requireme
PowerUp_MPC604.lzh pix/illu   380K   0+Photo of MPC604 PowerUp board of Pha
Stat36_1.lha       util/sys    10K   1+An extension of C:Status.
SSpeed12.lha       util/moni  358K   1+SysSpeed V 1.2 added Graphical Displ
speakt.lha         util/misc   67K   1+A text speaking program
VInfo36_2.lha      util/sys    10K   1+An alternative to C:Info
berzbench11.lha    pix/icon   195K   1+V1.1 Probably the best patterns for

| The highest rated programs during the week until 11-Dec-95
| Updated weekly. Best program on top. Please rate all the programs you
| download. To do so, send to aminet-server@wuarchive.wustl.edu :
| RATE <path> <num>
| where <path> is the file you want to judge and <num> is a mark from 0..10
| with 10 being the best. You can rate several programs in one mail, but
| don't rate your own programs. Example: RATE dev/gui/mui23usr.lha 8
|
|File              Dir        Size Age Description
|----------------- ---        ---- --- -----------
SmartWB.lha        util/wb      4K   6+Boosts up Workbench's windows refres
IPDialv19.lha      comm/tcp    93K   1+SLIP dialer; stdin/out terminal prog
Knights242.lha     game/2play 223K  57+Two-player violent dungeon bashing
Knockout.lha       game/2play 190K  13+Two *very* addictive multiplayer gam
MouseBounce.lha    game/gag     5K 345+Screen hack that is also a game.
scrotax2.lha       game/shoot 347K  12+Scrotax Version 2.01 - BUGFIXED & UP
3D_Pro.lha         gfx/3d     211K   4+The easy-to-use 3D stereogram/SIRD g
bs131.lha          util/boot   49K   2+Try it now! No BootScreens, but sele
mui31usr.lha       dev/gui    771K   2+MagicUserInterface V3.1, user files
Online1.4.lha      comm/misc   89K  25+Ultimate Phone Call Coster/Logger OS
ViperAGA12.lha     game/2play 390K  58+Updated AGA Snake game with 6 player
DamageWolf3D_2.lha gfx/misc   292K   5+A ROTT (PC game) walkaround demo; 3D
mcx228.lha         util/cdity  51K   0+Multi Function Commodity
snoopdos30.lha     util/moni  128K  64+System monitor, many new features ad
tin130gamma.lha    comm/news  182K  18+TIN 1.3 PL0 Beta 950726. UUCP/NNTP N
fruitkitchen.lha   demo/aga   566K  16+A new demo of the asm95 in helsinki
VK_DEMO.lha        game/demo  765K   5+Virtual Karting playable demo
Bloodfest1.lha     game/role  515K   5+Captive & HiredGuns style 3d adventu
Bloodfest2.lha     game/role  598K   5+Captive & HiredGuns style 3d adventu
AmigaAGA-EVD12.lha misc/emu     8K   2+15bit & faster 4/8bit driver for Sha
AlgoMusic1_4.lha   mus/misc   103K   6+Creates and plays great algorithmic
AB3Dicon.lha       pix/icon     2K   5+Icon for Alien Breed 3D - MWB Style.
Executive.lha      util/misc  527K   2+UNIX-like task scheduler (V1.30)
control1.dms       demo/aga   817K  13+Control (Winning Demo From GASP `95)
control2.dms       demo/aga   552K  13+Control (Winning Demo From GASP `95)
fear.lha           demo/aga   1.4M  11+Fear 1/1 *AGA*
@endnode


@node MAILLIST "Amiga Report Mailing List"
@toc WHERE

===========================================================================
                        Amiga Report Mailing List
===========================================================================

If you have an internet mailing address, you can receive Amiga Report in
@{"UUENCODED" link UUENCODE} form each week as soon as the issue is released.  To be put on
the list, send Email to listserv@itesmvf1.rzs.itesm.mx.

Your subject header will be ignored.  In the body of the message, enter

subscribe areport <your real name>

ie: 

subscribe areport A. R. Reader

The system will automatically pull your e-mail address from the message
header.

Your account must be able to handle mail of any size to ensure an intact
copy.  For example, many systems have a 100K limit on incoming messages.


** IMPORTANT NOTICE:  PLEASE be certain your host can accept mail over   **
** 100K!  We have had a lot of bouncebacks recently from systems with a  **
** 100K size limit for incoming mail.  If we get a bounceback with your  **
** address in it, it will be removed from the list.  Thanks!             **

          *** The following is only for Australian readers!  ***

To circumvent the new pay-per-megabyte system for Australian Internet
communication, Paul Reece has been kind enough to set up an AUSTRALIAN-ONLY
mailing list, to save his fellow countrymen some money.

You can join the list by sending mail to:   majordomo@info.tas.gov.au

with the single line (in body of message):

subscribe ar

Amiga Report will then be bounced to you.
@endnode
@node UUENCODE
@toc MAILLIST

===========================================================================
                          UUDecoding Amiga Report
===========================================================================

If you receive Amiga Report from the direct mailing list, it will arrive in
UUEncoded format.  This format allows programs and archive files to be sent
through mail by converting the binary into combinations of ASCII
characters.  In the message, it will basically look like a lot of trash
surrounded by begin <filename> and end, followed by the size of the file.


To UUDecode Amiga Report, you first need to get a UUDecoding program, such
as UUxT by Asher Feldman.  This program is available on Aminet in

     pub/aminet/arc/

Then you must download the message that it is contained in.  Don't worry
about message headers, the UUDecoding program will ignore them.

There is a GUI interface for UUxT, which should be explained in the docs.
However, the quickest method for UUDecoding the magazine is to type

     uuxt x ar.uu

at the command prompt.  You will then have to decompress the archive with
lha, and you will then have Amiga Report in all of its AmigaGuide glory.

If you have any questions, you can write to @{"Jason Compton" link JASON}

@endnode
@node AMINET "Aminet"
@toc WHERE

                                  Aminet
                                  ======

To get Amiga Report from Aminet, simply FTP to any Aminet site, CD to
docs/mags.  All the back issues are located there as well.

Sites: ftp.netnet.net, ftp.wustl.edu, ftp.tas.gov.au, ftp.doc.ic.ac.uk

@endnode
@node WWW "World Wide Web"
@toc WHERE

                              World Wide Web
                              ==============

AR can also be read with Mosaic (in either AmigaGuide or html form). 
Reading AmigaReport with Mosaic removes the necessity to download it.  It
can also be read using programs found in UNIX sites such as LYNX.

Simply tell Mosaic to open one of the following URLs:

     http://www.omnipresence.com/Amiga/News/AR/
     http://www.pwr.wroc.pl/AMIGA/AR/
     http://mm.iit.uni-miskolc.hu/Data/AR
     http://www.fhi-berlin.mpg.de/amiga/ar/
     http://ramiga.cts.com/~AR
     http://www.sci.muni.cz/ar/
     http://metro.turnpike.net/P/panther/main.html
     http://www.lysator.liu.se/amiga/ar/
     http://ArtWorks.apana.org.au/AmigaReport.html

The following AR sites also have a mailto form, allowing you to mail to
Amiga Report from the web site.  <Make sure your reader has forms
capability).

     http://www.pwr.wroc.pl/AMIGA/AR/
     http://www.sussex.ac.uk/Users/kcci1

Amiga information can also be accessed at this URL:
http://www.cucug.org/amiga.html

Mosaic for the Amiga can be found on Aminet in directory comm/net, or
(using anonymous ftp) on max.physics.sunysb.edu

Mosaic for X, Macintosh(tm) and Microsoft Windows(tm) can be found on
ftp.ncsa.uiuc.edu
@endnode
@node COPYRIGHT "Copyright Information"
@toc ABOUT

===========================================================================
==                       _    _       __  ___    _                       ==
==                      /\\  |\\   /| || //  \  /\\                      ==
==                     /  \\ | \\ /|| ||(< __  /  \\                     ==
==                    /--- \\|  \/ || || \\_||/--- \\                    ==
==                   /______________________________\\                   ==
==                  /                                \\                  ==
==              Amiga Report International Online Magazine               ==
==                December 18, 1995       Issue No. 3.22                 ==
==                     Copyright 1995 FS Publications                    ==
==                           All Rights Reserved                         ==
===========================================================================

Views, Opinions and Articles presented herein are not necessarily those of
the editors and staff of Amiga Report International Online Magazine or of
FS Publications.  Permission to reprint articles is hereby denied, unless
otherwise noted.  All reprint requests should be directed to the editor. 
Amiga Report and/or portions therein may not be edited in any way without
prior written permission.  However, translation into a language other than
English is acceptible, provided the editor is notified beforehand and the
original meaning is not altered.  Amiga Report may be distributed on
privately owned not-for-profit bulletin board systems (fees to cover cost
of operation are acceptable), and major online services such as (but not
limited to) Delphi and Portal.  Distribution on public domain disks is
acceptable provided proceeds are only to cover the cost of the disk (e.g. 
no more than $5 US).  CD-ROM compilers should contact the editor. 
Distribution on for-profit magazine cover disks requires written permission
from the editor.  Amiga Report is a not-for-profit publication.  Amiga
Report, at the time of publication, is believed reasonably accurate.  Amiga
Report, its staff and contributors are not and cannot be held responsible
for the use or misuse of information contained herein or the results
obtained there from.  Amiga Report is not affiliated with Escom AG.  All
items quoted in whole or in part are done so under the Fair Use Provision
of the Copyright Laws of the United States Penal Code.  Any Electronic Mail
sent to the editors may be reprinted, in whole or in part, without any
previous permission of the author, unless said electronic mail is
specifically requested not to be reprinted.

===========================================================================

@endnode
@node GUIDELINE "Amiga Report Writing Guidelines"
@toc ABOUT

===========================================================================
                      Amiga Report Writing Guidelines
===========================================================================

The three most important requirements for submissions to Amiga Report are:

     1.  Please use English.

     2.  Please use paragraphs.  It's hard on the eyes to have solid
     screens of text.  If you don't know where to make a paragraph break,
     guess.

     3.  Please put a blank line in between paragraphs.  It makes
     formatting the magazine much much easier.

     4.  Please send us your article in ASCII format.

Note:  If you want to check ahead of time to make sure we'll print your
article, please write to the @{"Editor" link JASON}.

Please stipulate as well if you wish to retain copyright or hand it over to
the editor.
@endnode
@node EDITORCHOICE "Editor's Choice"
@toc COMMERCIAL

===========================================================================
                              Editor's Choice
===========================================================================

These are selected products, reviewed by myself, that I've liked.  So, I've
landed them and decided to sell them.

All prices are in $US.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

Chris Hames' PC-Task 3.1 IBM emulator is available for the rather low price
of US$110.

PC-T 3.1 offers 286-level compatibility, video displays up to SVGA with
support for many popular graphic card systems including CyberGraphics, and
a built-in BIOS.

Orders will be drop-shipped from Wonder Computers, North American
representatives for Quasar Distribution products.

Credit card or money order/postal cheque accepted to
@{" Jason Compton " link JASON}.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

John McDonough's The Music Maker, a Contemporary New Age CD composed on the
Amiga, is available through Amiga Report.

The crisp, clean sounds and calm melodies present a welcome alternative to
many pounding alternatives.

Available for US$12.00 plus $3 shipping in the US.  Non-US orders, please
contact before ordering.  Check or money order accepted addressed to
@{" Jason Compton " link JASON}, shipments made by the artist.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

|                                | Issue    | Approximate  | Amiga Report |
|           Product              | Reviewed | Retail Price | Reader Price |
---------------------------------|----------|--------------|--------------|
|                                |          |              |              |
|GPFax Amiga Fax Software        |   2.30   |   $100.00    |    $60.00    |
|    (Class 1 and 2)             |          |              |              |
|                                |          |              |              |
|Micro R+D CD-ROM Volume 1       |   2.25   |    $69.00    |    $30.00    |
|    (Includes early Transition  |          |              |              |
|    graphics converter and loads|          |              |              |
|    of artwork)                 |          |              |              |
|                                |          |              |              |
|Micro R+D CD-ROM Volume 2       |   2.26   |    $99.95    |    $46.75    |
|    (Includes entire Nature's   |          |              |              |
|    Backdrop series)            |          |              |              |
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

Orders may be placed via check, money order, or postal cheque, made out to
Jason Compton.  Visa/Mastercard accepted via post or E-Mail.  No CODs.

Mail all orders to @{" Jason Compton " link JASON}.  Orders will be processed by
Amiga Report and drop-shipped from Micro R+D.

In the US, add $5/$10/$20 for UPS shipping, ground/blue/red label,
respectively.  Overseas: It is recommended that you consider $20 to be the
minimum cost for shipping.  If you plan to order more than one item, E-mail
for shipping cost.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sidewinder's Future Shock II CD is now available through Amiga Report.
Featuring 15 Amiga-generated tunes totalling 71 minutes, Eric Gieseke's
work is captured on an Amiga-independent media.

Available for US$12.00.  Please add $5 for shipping.

Make check or money order payable to @{" Jason Compton " link JASON}.  Orders will be
drop-shipped from Sidewinder Productions.

For overseas orders, please contact through E-Mail before ordering.
@endnode
@node PORTAL "Portal"
@toc ONLINE

===========================================================================
                  Portal:  A Great Place For Amiga Users
===========================================================================

                The Portal Information Network's Amiga Zone

          The AFFORDABLE alternative for online Amiga information
          -------------------------------------------------------

Portal is the home of acclaimed Amiga Zone, a full-service online SIG
(Special Interest Group) for Amiga owners and users. We promise, and
WE DELIVER ongoing & aggressive Amiga support!

You can dial into Portal to access the Amiga Zone in many ways: direct
dial to our San Jose, CA high-speed modems (you pay for the phone call
if it's not local), or though any SprintNet or Compu$erve indial anywhere
(with a small hourly fee) or via the World-wide Internet "telnet"
program to portal.com (no hourly fee).

Even Delphi and BIX users can Telnet into Portal for a flat $19.95 a month,
with *unlimited* use.

Portal is NOT just another shell service!  Its Online system is fully
menu-driven with on-screen commands and help, and you can easily customize
it for your favorite terminal program and screen size.

Some of Portal/Amiga Zone's amazing features include:

 * 2.5 GIGabytes of Amiga-specific file space - we have so much Amiga Stuff
      online, we've lost count!
 * The *entire* Fred Fish collection of freely distributable software,
       online.  ALL 1000 disks!
 * Fast, Batch Zmodem file transfer protocol. Download up to 100 files at
      once, of any size, with one command.
 * Amiga vendor areas with participants like AmigaWorld, Elastic
      Reality (ASDG), Soft-Logik, Apex Publishing, and others.
 * 40 "regular" Amiga libraries with over 10,000 files.  Hot new stuff
       arrives daily.
 * No upload/download "ratios" EVER. Download as much as you want, as
      often as you want, and never feel pressured doing it.
 * Live, interactive nightly chats with Amiga folks whose names you will
      recognize.  Special conferences.  Random chance prize contests.  We
      have given away thousands of bucks worth of Amiga prizes - more than
      any other online service.
 * Message bases where you can ask questions about *anything* Amiga
      related and get quick replies from the experts.
 * Amiga Internet mailing lists for Imagine, AMosaic, LightWave, EGS,
      OpalVision & others feed right into the Zone message bases.  Read
      months worth of postings.  No need to clutter your mailbox with them.
 * FREE unlimited Internet Email with 5 meg of free storage.
 * A FREE UNIX Shell account with another 5 meg of free storage.
      You can run Amiga Mosaic through your shell and explore the
      vast World Wide Web!
 * Portal has the Usenet.  Thousands of "newsgroups" in which you can read
      and post articles about virtually any subject you can possibly
      imagine.
 * Other Portal SIGs (Special Interest Groups) online for Mac, IBM, Sun,
      UNIX, Science Fiction, Disney, and dozens more.  ALL Portal SIGs are
      accessible to ALL Portal customers with NO surcharges ever. You
      never worry "Ooops... Am I paying for this area?" again!
 * Portal was THE FIRST online service to offer a full package of Internet
      features: IRC, FTP, TELNET, MUDS, LIBS.  And you get FREE unlimited
      usage of all of them.
 * Our exclusive PortalX by Steve Tibbett, the graphical "front end" for
      Portal which will let you automatically click'n'download your waiting
      email, messages, Usenet groups and binary files!  Reply to mail and
      messages offline using your favorite editor and your replies are sent
      automatically the next time you log into Portal.  (PortalX requires
      Workbench 2.04 or higher)
 * Portal does NOT stick it to high speed modem users. Whether you log in
      at 1200 or 2400 or 9600 or 14.4K you pay the same low price.

To join Portal or for more information call:

   1-800-433-6444 (voice) 9a.m.-5p.m. Mon-Fri, Pacific Time
   1-408-973-9111 (voice) 9a.m.-5p.m. Mon-Fri, Pacific Time

   1-408-725-0561 (modem 3/12/2400) 24 hours every day
   1-408-725-0560 (modem 96/14400) 24 hours every day

   or enter "C PORTAL" from any Sprintnet dial-in, or "portal" at any
   CI$ network dialin, or telnet to "portal.com" from anywhere,
   and then enter "online" and then "info"

Call and join today.  Tell the friendly Portal Customer Service
representative, "The Amiga Zone and Amiga Report sent me!"

[Editor's Note: Be sure to tell them that you are an Amiga user, so they
can notify the AmigaZone sysops to send their Welcome Letter and other
information!]

The Portal Information Network accepts MasterCard, Visa, or you can pre-pay
any amount by personal check or money order.  The Portal Online System is a
trademark of The Portal Information Network.  SLIP, UUCP and custom domain
accounts are also available.
@endnode
@node BBS_AUSTRALIA "Distribution BBSes - Australia"
@toc BBS

===========================================================================
                      Distribution BBSes - Australia
===========================================================================

                              -=NEW ZEALAND=-

                             * BITSTREAM BBS *
               FidoNET 3:771/850.0   AmigaNET 41:644/850.0
             +64-(0)3-548-5321, SupraFaxModem 28k8 VFast Class


                               -=VICTORIA=-

                         * NORTH WEST AMIGA BBS *
          EMail: mozza@nwamiga.apana.org.au     Fido: 3:633/265.0
         BBS Phone/Fax: +61 3 9331 2831   USR Courier V.Everything


@endnode
@node BBS_EUROPE "Distribution BBSes - Europe"
@toc BBS

===========================================================================
                        Distribution BBSes - Europe
===========================================================================

                                -=FINLAND=-

                               * LAHO BBS *
       +358-64-414 1516, V.32bis/HST   +358-64-414 0400, V.32bis/HST
          +358-64-414 6800, V.32/HST   +358-64-423 1300, V.32bis

                             * KINDERGARTEN *
                      Email: matthias.bartosik@hut.fi
                        +358-0-881 32 36, v.34/HST


                                -=FRANCE=-

                              * DYNAMIX BBS *
                        Email: erlsoft@mcom.mcom.fr
        +33.1.48.89.96.66 Minitel (vv23) to Modem (v32bis/Videotex)

                        * RAMSES THE AMIGA FLYING *
     Internet: user.name@ramses.fdn.org     Fidonet: 2/320/104-105-106
              +33-1-45845623 V.34     +33-1-53791200 V.32bis


                                -=GERMANY=-

                           * DOOM OF DARKNESS *
                      Email: marc_doerre@doom.ping.de
                    +49 (0)4223 8355 19200 V.42bis/Zyx
           AR-Infoservice, contact Kai Szymanski kai@doom.gun.de

                              * IMAGINE BBS *
                    Email: Sysop@imagine.commo.mcnet.de
                B+49-69-4304948 Yoriko 28.8ET V.Fast Class
              Login: GAST (Download from area "Amiga-Report")

                         * LEGUANS BYTE CHANNEL *
                    Usenet: andreas@lbcmbx.in-berlin.de
                49-30-8110060   49-30-8122442   USR DS 16.8
                 Login as User: "amiga", Passwd: "report"

                              * REDEYE BBS *
                       Internet: sysop@redeye.muc.de
               +49-89-5460535 (V.32b, Zyxel EG + / USR V.34)

                          * STINGRAY  DATABASE *
                 EMail: sysop@sting-db.zer.sub.org.dbp.de
                          +49 208 496807 HST-Dual

                            * VISION THING BBS *
             Infect East German HQ, Keks ASCII Design World HQ
                          ++49(0)345 663914 19200
                          System Password: Amiga


                                -=GREECE=-

                            * HELLAS ON LINE *
          EMail: cocos@prometheus.hol.gr    Telnet: hellas.hol.gr
       82 Hunter Lines (28.8KB): ++301/ 620-6001, 620-6604, 620-9500

                              * ODYSSEY BBS *
            email: konem@prometheus.hol.gr   39:250/1@Amiganet
                ++ 301 412-3502 (ZyXEL 16.8K)   22.00-10.00


                                -=IRELAND=-

                               * CUGI BBS *
                            Fidonet: 2:263/155
                          +353 1 837 0204 V32bis

                               * FWIBBLE! *
               Fidonet: 2:263/900.0   E-Mail: 9517693@ul.ie
              Phone: +353-902-36124    Midnight to 8am (GMT)
                       Freq "Readme.txt" for details


                                 -=ITALY=-

                        * AMIGA PROFESSIONAL BBS *
                 Amy Professional Club, Italian Amos Club
                              +(39)-49-604488

                               * FRANZ BBS *
                          EMsil: mc3510@mclink.it
                            +39/6/6627667 24hrs

                             * SPEED OF LIFE *
                  FidoNet 2:335/533   AmigaNet 39:102/12
                The AMIGA Alchemists' BBS   +39-931-833773


                              -=NETHERLANDS=-D

                       * AMIGA ONLINE BS HEEMSTEDE *
   Fidonet: 2:280/464.0, 2:280/412.0   Internet: michiel@aobh.xs4all.nl
                +31-23-282002   +31-23-470739   14400 Supra

                             * THE HELL BBS *
           Fido-Net : 2:281/418.0   e-mail : root@hell.xs4all.nl
                     +31-(0)70-3468783 (v32bis Supra)

                          * TRACE BBS GRONINGEN *
            FidoNET 2:282/529.0   Internet Martin@trace.idn.nl
               +31-(0)-50-410143 (14k4 Buad (28k8 V.34 soon)

                              * X-TREME BBS *
                      Internet: u055231@vm.uci.kun.nl
                            +31-167064414 (24h)


                                -=NORWAY=-

                              * FALLING BBS *
                       EMail:  christon@powertech.no
                            +47 69 256117 28.8k


                                -=POLAND=-

                          * SILVER DREAM!'S BBS *
                            SysOp: Silver Dream
                            +48 91 540431 (24h)


                               -=PORTUGAL=-

                               * CIUA BBS *
                FidoNet 2:361/9   Internet: denise.ci.ua.pt
                  +351-34-382080/382081 (V32bis soon V34)


                                -=RUSSIA=-

                          * NEW ORDER BBS *
 E-Mail: norder@norder.spb.su  FidoNet: 2:5030/221.0  AmigaNet: 39:240/1.0
            +7-812-2909561 (24 hours) USR 21k6 Dual Standart


                                 -=SPAIN=-

                            * GURU MEDITATION *
                           Running Remote Access
                          +34-1-383-1317 V.32bis

                            * LA MITAD OSCURA *
  E-Mail: jovergon@offcampus.es  Fido: 2:341/35.19  Amiganet: 39:192/1.19
                               +34-1-3524613

                        * MAZAGON - BBS - SYSTEMS *
       E-mail: jgomez@maze.mazanet.es   FTP: ftp-mail@ftp.mazanet.es
                        +34 59 536267 - Supra 28.8
                              Login: a-report


                                -=SWEDEN=-

                                * CICERON *
                        E-mail: peman@solace.mh.se
                               +46 612 22011


                              -=SWITZERLAND=-

                          * LINKSYSTEM LINK-CH1 *
                   contact: rleemann@link-ch1.aworld.de
      +41 61 3215643 V32bis/Zyx16800     +41 61 3832007 ISDN X75/V110
                 Local newsgroup link-ch1.ml.amiga-report


                            -=UNITED KINGDOM=-

                           * AMIGA JUNCTION 9 *
        Internet: sysadmin@junct9.demon.co.uk     FidoNet: 2:440/20
                    +44 (0)372 271000 14400 V.32bis/HST

                             * CREATIONS BBS *
 E-Mail: mat@darkside.demon.co.uk   2:254/524@Fidonet   39:139/5@Amiganet
              +44-0181-665-9887 Hayes Optima 288 2400 - V.FC

                              * METNET CCS *
     Email: metnet@demon.co.uk    FidoNet: 2:2502/129.0  2:2502/130.0
           10 Lines: +44-1482-442251   14k4 +44-1482-444910 16k8

                           * OCTAMED USER BBS *
  EMail: rbfsoft@cix.compulink.co.uk     Support board for OctaMED Users
                            +44 (01703) 703446

                              * SCRATCH BBS *
      EMail: kcci1@solx1.susx.ac.uk     Official Super Skidmarks site
                      +44-1273-389267  24 hrs  14.4k
@endnode
@node BBS_NAMERICA "Distribution BBSes - North America"
@toc BBS

===========================================================================
                    Distribution BBSes - North America
===========================================================================

                                -=ARIZONA=-

                       * MESSENGER OF THE GODS BBS *
                           mercury@primenet.com
                               602-326-1095


                           -=BRITISH COLUMBIA=-

                             * COMM-LINK BBS *
               InterNet: steve_hooper@comm.tfbbs.wimsey.com
  Fido: 1:153/210.0    AmigaNet 40:800/9100.0    604-945-6192 USR DS 16.8

                              -=CALIFORNIA=-

                            * TIERRA-MIGA BBS *
  FidoNet: 1:202/638.0   AmigaNet: 40:406/3.0   Internet: torment.cts.com
                           619.292.0754 V32.bis

                          * VIRTUAL PALACE BBS *
                   Sysop Email: tibor@ecst.csuchico.edu
                                916-343-7420

                        * AMIGA AND IBM ONLY BBS *
                               (619)428-4887
                           vonmolk@crash.cts.com
                       AmigaNET address: 40:406/7.0


                                -=FLORIDA=-

                            * LAST! AMIGA BBS *
                              (305) 456-0126
                             USR 21600 HST D/S


                               -=ILLINOIS=-

                           * EMERALD KEEP BBS *
                 FidoNet: 1:2250/2     AmigaNet: 40:206/1
                      618-394-0065 USR 16.8k DS

                            * PHANTOM'S LAIR *
  FidoNet: 1:115/469.0   Phantom Net Coordinator: 11:1115/0.0-11:1115/1.0
                         708-469-9510 708-469-9520

                            * STARSHIP CUCUG *
                       Email: khisel@prairienet.org
                               (217)356-8056

                         * THE STYGIAN ABYSS BBS *
                            FIDONet-1:115/384.0
  312-384-0616 USR Courier HST   312-384-6250 Supra V.32 bis (FREQ line)


                               -=LOUISIANA=-

                             * The Catacomb *
                        E-mail: Geoff148@delphi.com
                       504-882-6576 Supra v.fc 28.8k


                                 -=MAINE=-

                     * THE KOBAYASHI ALTERNATIVE BBS *
          Usenet and FidoNet Echo Areas     FidoNet: 1:326/404.0
                     (207)/784-2130     (207)/946-5665
                   ftp.tka.com for all back issues of AR


                                -=MEXICO=-

                               * AMIGA BBS *
                             FidoNet  4:975/7
                        (5) 887-3080   9600 V32,MNP

                           * AMIGA SERVER BBS *
                         Now with 17 CDs available
                              Number: 5158736

                          * TERCER PLANETA BBS *
                  FX Network 800:525/1, CD-ROM, ANSI/RIP
           [525]-606-2162 24h   2400 - 28.8k V.fast Class / V.34


                              -=MISSISSIPPI=-

                            * THE GATEWAY BBS *
        InterNet: stace@tecnet1.jcte.jcs.mil   FidoNet: 1:3604/60.0
                    601-374-2697 Hayes Optina 28.8 V.FC


                               -=MICHIGAN=-

                            * DC Productions *
                    Email: dcpro!chetw@heifetz.msen.com
                               616-373-0287
                               V.Everything


                                -=NEVADA=-

                              * PUP-TEK BBS *
                       EMail: darkwolf@accessnv.com
                               702-553-2403

                              -=NEW JERSEY=-

                          * T.B.P.  VIDEO SLATE *
              Full Skypix menus + normal and ansi menu sets.
                         201-586-3623 USR 14.4 HST

                           * DLTACOM Amiga BBS *
                              (201) 398-8559
                           Fidonet: 1:2606/216.0
             Internet: dltacom.camphq.fidonet.org (email only)


                               -=NEW YORK=-

                             * THE BELFRY(!) *
                         stiggy@dorsai.dorsai.org
                       718.793.4796     718.793.4905


                                -=ONTARIO=-

                           * COMMAND LINE BBS *
                Canada's Amiga Graphics & Animation Source
                             416-533-8321 V.32

                              * CYBERSPACE *
                       joehick@ophielia.waterloo.net
                     (519) 579-0072     (519) 579-0173


                                -=QUEBEC=-

                              * GfxBase BBS*
       E-mail: ai257@freenet.hsc.colorado.edu     Fidonet: 1:167/192
                             514-769-0565 14.4


                               -=TENNESSEE=-

                            * AMIGA CENTRAL! *
                  Internet mail:  root@amicent.raider.net
                   615-383-9679  1200-14.4Kbps V.32bis

                               * NOVA BBS *
    AmigaNet 40:210/10.0 40:210/1.0 40:210/0.0     FidoNet 1:362/508.0
                         615-472-9748 USR DS 16.8


                               -=VIRGINIA=-

                       * NETWORK XXIII DATA SYSTEM *
                       EMail: gottfrie@acca.nmsu.edu
                           804-266-1763 v.42bis
                     Login: anon     Password: nopass


                              -=WASHINGTON=-

                          * FREELAND MAINFRAME *
                         Internet - freemf.wa.com
                  (360)412-0228 five lines - USR v.32bis
         New users have immediate access to Amiga Report Downloads

                              * PIONEERS BBS *
                            FidoNet: 1:343/54.0
                   206-775-7983 24 hrs.  Supra 28.8k v34
              Login: Long Distance     Password: longdistance
                  Or File Request the MAGIC NAME: AR.lha

@endnode
@node BBS_SAMERICA "Distribution BBSes - South America"
@toc BBS

===========================================================================
                    Distribution BBSes - South America
===========================================================================

                                -=BRAZIL=-

                            * AMIGA DO PC BBS *
          Fidonet: 4:801/44     Internet: fimoraes@dcc.unicamp.br
     Weekdays: 19-07 (-3 GMT)   Weekends: 24 hours     +55-192-33-2260

@endnode
@node DEAL_ASIA "Dealers - Asia"
@toc DEALER

===========================================================================
                              Dealers - Asia
===========================================================================

                                 -=JAPAN=-

                           Grey Matter Ltd.
                         1-22-3,Minami Magome
                      HillTop House 2F suite 201
                          Ota-ku,Tokyo 143
             Tel:+81 (0)3 5709-5549     Fax:+81 (0)3 5709-1907
   BBS: +81 (0)3 5709-1907    Email: nighty@gmatter.japan-online.or.jp

@endnode
@node DEAL_AUSTRALIA "Dealers - Australia"
@toc DEALER

===========================================================================
                            Dealers - Australia
===========================================================================

                              -=QUEENSLAND=-

                               Image Domain
                               92 Bridge St
                        Fortitude Valley, Brisbane
                     E-mail: s322698@student.uq.edu.au
                 Voice: 617-3216-1240   Fax: 617-3852-2720


                             -= NEW ZEALAND =-

                                CompKarori
                         LG/F Karori Shopping Mall
                            Karori, Wellington
                          Tel/Fax: +64 4 476-0212
                       Email: sales@compkarori.co.nz

@endnode
@node DEAL_EUROPE "Dealers - Europe"
@toc DEALER

===========================================================================
                             Dealers - Europe
===========================================================================

                                -=AUSTRIA=-

                   A.R.T.  Computeranimation Ges.m.b.H.
                              Feldstrasse 13
                              3300 Amstetten
                Tel: +43 7472/63566-0 Fax: +43 7472/63566-6

                                -=BELGIUM=-

                               CLICK!  N.V.
                            Boomsesteenweg 468
                        B-2610 Wilrijk - Antwerpen
           VOICE: +32 (0)3 828.18.15     FAX: +32 (0)3 828.67.36
           INTERNET: vanhoutv@nbre.nfe.be      FIDO: 2:292/603.9


                               -=BULGARIA=-

                           KlubVerband ITA Gmbh
                                1309 Sofia
                          P.F.13, KukushStr.  1-2
                  Tel: +359-2-221471   Fax: +359-2-230062
          Email: KVITA@VIRBUS.BG     Contact: Dr.  ING B.  Pavlov

                                -=DENMARK=-

                              Fribert Consult
                       C. T. Barfoeds Vej 2, 3.  tv
                           DK-2000 FRB / Danmark
               Phone: +45 31 87 98 64   Fax: +45 31 98 09 36
             EMail: fribert@datashopper.dk   Fido: 2:235/317.0
                            (mail order only!)


                                -=FINLAND=-

                              DataService Oy
                               P.O.  Box 50
                            Kuurinniityntie 30
                                02771 ESPOO
          Voice: +358 (9) 400 438 301     Fax: +358 (9) 0505 0037

             Lincware Computers Oy / Lincoln Technologies Ltd
                              Lovkullankuja 3
                               10300 KARJAA
            Voice: +358-(9)50-5583720   Fax: +358-(9)11-205415
                      EMail: linctech@freenet.hut.fi


                                -=FRANCE=-

                            Quartz Infomatique
                          2 bis, avenue de Brogny
                              F-74000 ANNECY
                  Tel./Fax (automatique): +33 50.52.83.31
                      E-Mail: Yann-Erick.Proy@Imag.fr


                                -=GERMANY=-

                           AMItech Systems GmbH
                              Ludwigstrasse 4
                             D-95028 Hof/Saale
               VOICE: +49 9281 142812   FAX: +49 9281 142712
                       EMail: bsd@blacky.netz.sub.de

                    dcp, desing+commercial partner GmbH
                               Alfredstr.  1
                              D-22087 Hamburg
                 Tel.: + 49 40 251176 Fax: +49 40 2518567
                 EMail: info@dcp.de WWW: http://www.dcp.de

                          Hartmann & Riedel GdbR
                               Hertzstr.  33
                           D-76287 Rheinstetten
            EMail: rh@fs.schiele-ct.de     Fido: 2:2476/405.12
              Voice: +49 (7242) 2021     Fax: +49 (7242) 5909
     Please call first before visiting us, otherwise we may be closed.

                             Hirsch & Wolf OHG
                              Mittelstra_e 33
                              D-56564 Neuwied
            Voice: +49 (2631) 8399-0   Fax: +49 (2631) 8399-31

                           Pro Video Elektronik
                                Roßmarkt 38
                           D-63739 Aschaffenburg
                 Tel: (49) 6021 15713 Fax: (49) 6021 15713


                                 -=ITALY=-

                              C.A.T.M.U.  snc
                            Casella Postale 63
                             10023 Chieri (TO)
                          Tel/Fax: +39 11 9415237
       EMail: fer@inrete.it (Ferruccio Zamuner)   Fido: 2:334/21.19

                            Cloanto Italia srl
                           Via G.  B.  Bison 24
                                33100 Udine
                 Tel: +39 432 545902   Fax: +39 432 609051
              E-Mail: info@cloanto.it   CompuServe: 100145.15


                                 -=SPAIN=-

                               Amiga Center
                               Argullós, 127
                              08016 Barcelona
                Tel: (93) 276 38 06     Fax: (93) 276 30 80

                           Amiga Center Alicante
                                Segura, 27
                              03004 Alicante
                            Tel: (96) 514 37 34

                        Centro Informático Boadilla
                                Convento, 6
                     28660 Boadilla del Monte (Madrid)
                Tel: (91) 632 27 65     Fax: (91) 632 10 99

                                Centro Mail
                            Tel: (91) 380 28 92

                                  C.R.E.
                             San Francisco, 85
                          48003 Bilbao (Vizcaya)
                Tel: (94) 444 98 84     Fax: (94) 444 98 84

                               Donosti Frame
                           Avda.  de Madrid, 15
                      20011 San Sebastián (Guipuzcoa)
                Tel: (943) 42 07 45     Fax: (943) 42 45 88

                            Eurobit Informatica
                    C/.  Gral.  Garcia de la Herran, 4
                           11100 - San Fernando
                                   Cadiz
                           Tel/Fax: (956) 896375

                                 GaliFrame
                           Galerías Príncipe, 22
                             Vigo (Pontevedra)
                Tel: (986) 22 89 94     Fax: (986) 22 89 94

                                 Invision
                             San Isidro, 12-18
                     28850 Torrejón de Ardoz (Madrid)
              Tel: (91) 676 20 56/59     Fax: (91) 656 10 04

                                 Invision
                               Salamanca, 53
                              46005 Valencia
              Tel: (96) 395 02 43/44     Fax: (96) 395 02 44

                                  Norsoft
                                Bedoya, 4-6
                               32003 Orense
                Tel: (988) 24 90 46     Fax: (988) 23 42 07

                                 PiXeLSOFT
                              Felipe II, 3bis
                              34004 Palencia
                Tel: (979) 71 27 00     Fax: (979) 71 28 28

                                 Tu Amiga
                             Plaza Pedro IV, 3
                       08120 La LLagosta (Barcelona)
                Tel: (93) 560 76 12     Fax: (93) 560 76 12

                                  vb soft
                               Provenza, 436
                              08025 Barcelona
                Tel: (93) 456 15 45     Fax: (93) 456 15 45


                                -=NORWAY=-

                             DataKompaniet ANS
                        Trondheim Innovation Centre
                           Prof.  Brochs gt.  6
                             N-7030 Trondheim
                  Tel: +47 7354 0375   Fax: +47 7394 3861
EMail:datakompaniet@interlink.no  WWW:http://www.interlink.no/datakompaniet


                            -=UNITED KINGDOM=-

                           Almathera Systems Ltd
                Southerton House / Boundary Business Court
                             92-94 Church Road
                         Mitcham, Surrey / CR4 3TD
            VOICE: (UK) 081 687 0040     FAX: (UK) 081 687 0490
 Sales: almathera@cix.compulink.co.uk     Tech: jralph@cix.compulink.co.uk

                        Brian Fowler Computers Ltd
                           90 South Street / Exeter
                              Devon / EX1 1EN
               Voice: (01392) 499 755   Fax: (01392) 493 393
                Internet: brian_fowler@cix.compulink.co.uk

                             Visage Computers
                              27 Watnall Road
                           Hucknall / Nottingham
           Tel: +44 (0)115 9642828   Tel/Fax: +44 (0)115 9642898
                        EMail: visage@innotts.co.uk

@endnode
@node DEAL_NAMERICA "Dealers - North America"
@toc DEALER

===========================================================================
                          Dealers - North America
===========================================================================

                                -=CANADA=-

                          Animax Multimedia, Inc.
                         196 Joseph Zatzman Drive
                          Dartmouth, NS / B3B 1N4
                 Ph: (902)468-AMAX     Fax: (902)468-4341
                       EMail: animax@ra.isisnet.com

                           Atlantis Kobetek Inc.
                           1496 Lower Water St.
                           Halifax, NS / B3J 1R9
               Phone: (902)-422-6556     Fax: (902)-423-9339
                     E-mail: atkobetek@ra.isisnet.com

                Atlas Computers & Consulting - Derek Davlut
                       400 Telstar Avenue Suite 701
                           Sudbury, ON / P3E 5V7
                Phone: (705) 522-1923   Fax: (705) 522-1923
                   EMail: s2200147@nickel.laurentian.ca

                           Computerology Direct
                             Powell River, BC
                                  V8A-4Z3
               Call 24 hrs.  orders/inquiries: 604/483-3679
          Amiga users ask for HEAD SALES REP for quicker response!

                        Comspec Communications Inc
                              74 Wingold Ave
                     Toronto, Ontario, Canada M6B 1P5
 Computer Centre: (416) 785-8348  Sales: (416) 785-3553  Fax: 416-785-3668
      Internet: bryanf@comcorp.comspec.com, bryanf@accesspt.north.net

                             ElectroMike Inc.
                         1375 Boul.  Charest Ouest
                       Quebec, Quebec, Canada G1N2E7
         Tel: (418) 681-4138, (800) 463-1501   Fax: (418) 681-5880

                         GfxBase Electronique, Inc
                              1727 Shevchenko
                             Montreal, Quebec
                  Voice: 514-367-2575   Fax: 514-367-5265
                             BBS: 514-769-0565

                              National Amiga
                             Oakville, Ontario
              Fax: 905-845-3295   EMail: gscott@interlog.com
          WWW: http://www.interlog.com/~gscott/NationalAmiga.html

                        Oby's Amigo Computing Shop
                             765 Barrydowne Rd
                     Sudbury, Ontario, Canada P3A-3TG
                         VOICE/FAX: (705)524-5826
                    All Amiga Computer Store Since 1990

                            Software Supermart
                            11010 - 101 Street
                     Edmonton, Alberta, Canada T5H-2T1
                Voice: (403) 425-0691   Fax: (403) 426-1701
                       EMail: ssmart@planet.eon.net

                         SpectrumTech Electronics
                       412-1205 Fennell Avenue East
                           Hamilton, ON L8T 1T1
                Voice: (905) 388-9575   BBS: (905) 388-2542
           E-Mail: ste@spectrum.gryn.org   Contact: Derek Clarke


                           Wonder Computers Inc.

                        WCi (Corporate)
                        1827 Woodward Dr. Suite 110
                        Ottawa, Ont. CAN K2C 0P9
                        V: (613) 226-0000
                        F: (613) 226-9990

       Calgary Store                      Ottawa Store
       8180 Macleod Trail S. Suite 12     1315 Richmond Rd.
       Calgary, Alb, CAN T2H 2B8          Ottawa, Ont. CAN K2B 8J7
       V: (403) 253-0009                  V: (613) 596-2542
       F: (403) 253-2435                  F: (613) 596-9349

       Toronto Store                      Montreal Store  
       371 Old Kinston Rd.                130 Laurier St. W.
       Scarborough, Ont. CAN M1C 1B7      Montreal, QC. CAN H2T 2N7
       V: (416) 286-0001                  V: (514) 279-0002
       F: (416) 286-0038                  F: (514) 279-6229

       London Store                       Vancouver Store
       395 Wellington R. S.               4040 #3 Rd. Unit 280
       London, Ont. CAN N6C 5Z6           Richmond, B.C. CAN V6X 2C2
       V: (519) 681-0004                  V: (519) 279-4240
       F: (519) 681-7736                  F: (519) 279-4241


                             -=UNITED STATES=-

                               A&D Computer
                               211 South St.
                          Milford, NH 03055-3743
                Voice/Fax: 603-672-4700   BBS: 603-673-2788
                         Internet: amiga@mv.mv.com

                                AmegaByte!
                             5001 Garrett Ave.
                           Beltsville, MD 20705
              VOICE: (800) 834-7153   VOICE: (301) 937-1640
             FAX: (301) 937-1658     INTERNET: amega@globe.net

                           Amigability Computers
                               P.O.  Box 572
                           Plantsville, CT 06479
                            VOICE: 203-276-8175
                         Internet: caldi@pcnet.com

                              Amiga-Crossing
                                PO Box 12A
                        Cumberland Center, ME 04021
        VOICE: (800) 498-3959 (Maine only)   VOICE: (207) 829-3959
              FAX: (207) 829-3522   Internet: amiga-x@tka.com

                           Amiga Video Solutions
                           1568 Randolph Avenue
                            St.  Paul, MN 55105
                 Voice: 612-698-1175     Fax: 612-224-3823
           BBS: 612-698-1918     Net: wohno001@maroon.tc.umn.edu

                          Applied Multimedia Inc.
                              89 Northill St.
                            Stamford, CT 06907
                           VOICE: (203) 348-0108

                            Apogee Technologies
                          1851 University Parkway
                            Sarasota, FL 34243
                            VOICE: 813-355-6121
            Portal: Apogee     Internet: Apogee@cup.portal.com

                            Armadillo Brothers
                            753 East 3300 South
                           Salt Lake City, Utah
          VOICE: 801-484-2791     Internet: B.GRAY@genie.geis.com

                            Computer Advantage
                             7370 Hickman Road
                           Des Moines, IA 50322
                          Voice/Fax: 515-252-6167
                       Internet: Number1@netins.net

                             Computer Concepts
                   18001 Bothell-Everett Hwy, Suite "0"
                             Bothell, WA 98012
                           VOICE: (206) 481-3666

                               Computer Link
                              6573 middlebelt
                           Garden City MI 48135
                 Voice: 313-522-6005     Fax: 313-522-3119
                         clink@m-net.arbornet.org

                       Computers International, Inc.
                             5415 Hixson Pike
                           Chattanooga, TN 37343
                            VOICE: 615-843-0630

                              CyberTech Labs
                               PO Box 56941
                         North Pole, Alaska  99705
 Vox: (907) 451-3285   BBS1 : (907) 488-2547   BBS2 & Fax: (907) 488-2647
            EMail: 71516.600@CompuServe.com   Fido: 1:355/17.0

                              DC Productions
                          218 Stockbridge Avenue
                            Kalamazoo, MI 49001
                       (616)373-1985   (800)9DC-PROD
                    Email: dcpro!chetw@heifetz.msen.com

                               Digital Arts
                            122 West 6th Street
                           Bloomington, IN 47404
                VOICE: (812)330-0124     FAX: (812)330-0126
                                BIX: msears

                              Digital Castle
                       4046 Hubbell Ave.  Suite 155
                         Des Moines, IA 50317-4434
                           Voice: (515) 266-5098
                          EMail: Sheep@netins.net


                              HT Electronics
           E-Mail: HT Electronics@cup.portal.com     BIX: msears

           422 S. Hillview Dr.          211 Lathrop Way, Ste. A.
           Milipitas, CA 95035          Sacramento, CA 95815
           V: (408) 934-7700            V: (916) 925-0900
           F: (408) 934-7717            F: (916) 925-2829


                           Industrial Video, Inc.
                           1601 North Ridge Rd.
                             Lorain, OH  44055
         VOICE: 800-362-6150, 216-233-4000     Contact: John Gray
                  Internet:  af741@cleveland.freenet.edu

                            Kipp Visual Systems
                          360-C Christopher Ave.
                          Gaithersburg Md, 20878
                               301-670-7906
                           kipp@rasputin.umd.edu

                     Tom Lively / The Lively Computer
                             8314 Parkway Dr.
                             La Mesa, CA 91942
                   Voice: 619-589-9455 Fax: 619-589-5230
                        Net: tlively@connectnet.com

                                Magic Page
                            3043 Luther Street
                          Winston-Salem, NC 27127
          Voice/Fax: 910-785-3695   E-mail: Spiff@cup.portal.com
                          Contact: Patrick Smith

                                MicroSearch
                        9000 US 59 South, Suite 330
                              Houston, Texas
                 VOICE: 713-988-2818     FAX: 713-995-4994

                         MicroTech Solutions, Inc.
                         1885 N.  Farnsworth Ave.
                               Suites 6-7-8
                           Aurora, IL 60505-1162
        Voice: 708-851-3033   Fax: 708-851-3825   BBS: 708-851-3929
           Email: info@mt-inc.com   WWW: http://www.mt-inc.com/

                          Mr. Hardware Computers
                      P.O.  Box 148 / 59 Storey Ave.
                          Central Islip, NY 11722
                 VOICE: 516-234-8110     FAX: 516-234-8110
                         A.M.U.G. BBS:  516-234-6046

                         OverByte Industries, Inc.
                       661 Blanding Blvd.  Suite 391
                        Orange Park, FL 32073-5048
            Voice: 904-858-3348   E-mail: overbyte@jax.gttw.com
          URL: http://www.jkcg.com/Webmaster/Overbyte/index.html

                            Paxtron Corporation
                              28 Grove Street
                          Spring Valley, NY 10977
     Voice: 914-576-6522    Orders: 800-815-3241    Fax: 914-624-3239

                              PSI Animations
                         17924 SW Pilkington Road
                          Lake Oswego, OR  97035
                           VOICE:  503-624-8185
                     Internet:  PSIANIM@agora.rain.com

                          Raymond Commodore Amiga
                            898 Raymond Avenue
                         St. Paul, MN   55114-1521
                 VOICE: 612.642.9890     FAX: 612.642.9891

                           Safe Harbor Computers
                          W226 N900 Eastmound Dr
                            Waukesha, WI 53186
                 Orders: 800-544-6599   Fax: 414-548-8130
                       WWW Catalog: www.sharbor.com

                               Slipped Disk
                               31044 John R
                      Madison Heights, Michigan 48071
                           Voice: (810) 546-3475
                  BBS: (810) 399-1292   Fido: 1:120/321.0

                           Software Plus Chicago
                         2945 W Peterson Suite 209
                             Chicago, Illinois
                           VOICE:  312-878-7800

                        System Eyes Computer Store
                          730M Milford Rd Ste 345
                         Merrimack, NH 03054-4642
               Voice: (603) 4244-1188   Fax: (603) 424-3939
                  EMail: j_sauter@systemeye.ultranet.com

                                Zipperware
                             76 South Main St.
                           Seattle, WA  98104
                 VOICE: 206-223-1107     FAX: 206-223-9395
                          E-Mail: jon@nwlink.com

@endnode
@node OPINION "Editorial and Opinion"
@toc MENU

===========================================================================
                           Editorial and Opinion
===========================================================================

@{"   compt.sys.editor.desk   " link EDITORIAL}  Thanks.

@{"  The Amiga in Luxembourg  " link OPINION1}  "Am I the only fool?"

---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    @{"  News  " link NEWS}  @{"  Articles  " link FEATURE}  @{"  Reviews  " link REVIEW}  @{"  Charts  " link FTP}  @{"  Adverts  " link COMMERCIAL}
@endnode
@node NEWS "News & Press Releases"
@toc MENU
===========================================================================
                           News & Press Releases
===========================================================================

@{"   AT Hires Olaf Barthel   " link NEWS5}  The Term developer gets contract work

@{"  Nova Design's WWW Site   " link NEWS6}  ImageFX's home page

@{"   Digita Press Releases   " link NEWS12}  A pack of quickies from Digita

@{"     Quarterback v6.1      " link NEWS13}  Quarterback returns!

@{" Quarterback Tools Deluxe  " link NEWS14}  QBTools returns, too!

@{" Digital Universe Patches  " link NEWS15}  The astronomical package

@{" PowerManager 2.0 Contest  " link NEWS24}  Design screensaver modules for prizes

@{" DesignWorks 2.0 Released  " link NEWS25}  The structured drawing program

@{"     OTM Press Release     " link NEWS17}  OTM signs a new developer

@{"   OTM Release Schedule    " link NEWS16}  Upcoming games from OTM

@{" Amiga Atlanta Invitation  " link NEWS19}  The 10th anniversary banquet

@{"     ftp.amigalib.com      " link NEWS23}  The new Aminet mirror

@{"    Personal Paint 6.4     " link NEWS7}  The paint/effects package

@{"       Aminet Set 2        " link NEWS1}  Everything since Aminet Set 1: 4 CDs

@{"        RevUp v1.3         " link NEWS2}  Make version stringing easier

@{"       Datastore 2.0       " link NEWS4}  Digita's database upgraded

@{"       Sysmon v0.12b       " link NEWS8}  System monitoring utility

@{"      AmigaBase v2.2       " link NEWS9}  Programmable database

@{"     Executive v1.30       " link NEWS10}  The task scheduler

@{"   Ensemble Verbes v1.5    " link NEWS11}  French verb conjugator

@{"        A.N.G.L.E.         " link NEWS18}  An on-line game team forms

@{"   Digital Universe List   " link NEWS20}  Mailing list for Digital Universe users

@{"   Excelsior! Purchased    " link NEWS21}  Many exclamation points to follow...

@{" Upcoming C-16/+4 Emulator " link NEWS22}  The much maligned Commodore classics

---------------------------------------------------------------------------
  @{"  Opinion  " link OPINION}  @{"  Articles  " link FEATURE}  @{"  Reviews  " link REVIEW}  @{"  Charts  " link FTP}  @{"  Adverts  " link COMMERCIAL}
@endnode
@node FEATURE "Featured Articles"
@toc MENU

===========================================================================
                             Featured Articles
===========================================================================

@{"    1995 World of Amiga    " link FEATURE6}  The editor reports.

@{"    1995 World of Amiga    " link FEATURE1}  Another angle...

@{"    1995 World of Amiga    " link FEATURE5}  ...and another.

@{"  1993 World of Commodore  " link FEATURE2}  For historical comparison

@{" Interview with van Leuven " link FEATURE3}  Author of the Vic-20 Emulator

@{"   IPISA '95 Show Report   " link FEATURE4}  Another look at IPISA '95

@{"     BLAZEMONGER Port      " link FEATURE7}  BLAZEMONGER goes PowerPC and MUI

---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    @{"  Opinion  " link OPINION}  @{"  News  " link NEWS}  @{"  Reviews  " link REVIEW}  @{"  Charts  " link FTP}  @{"  Adverts  " link COMMERCIAL}
@endnode
@node REVIEW "Reviews"
@toc MENU

===========================================================================
                                  Reviews
===========================================================================

@{"      Maple V Release 3     " link REVIEW2}  High-power symbolic mathematics

@{"        Colonization        " link REVIEW3}  Microprose's masterpiece...

@{"       Alien Breed 3D       " link REVIEW9}  The Doom-type addition to the line

@{" Global Amiga Experience CD " link REVIEW4}  Demos and free commercial versions

@{"   AGA Experience CD-ROM    " link REVIEW5}  Some showoff material

@{"      Aminet 8 CD-ROM       " link REVIEW6}  The standby

@{"      Super Skidmarks       " link REVIEW7}  Racing with track wear

@{"          Roadkill          " link REVIEW8}  Racing with lots of aggression

@{"  ZIP Review Clarification  " link REVIEW1}  Just a brief note

---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    @{"  Opinion  " link OPINION}  @{"  News  " link NEWS}  @{"  Articles  " link FEATURE}  @{"  Charts  " link FTP}  @{"  Adverts  " link COMMERCIAL}
@endnode
@node FTP "Aminet Charts"
@toc MENU

===========================================================================
                               Aminet Charts
===========================================================================

                            @{"     3-Dec-95    " link CHARTS1}

                            @{"    11-Dec-95    " link CHARTS2}

---------------------------------------------------------------------------
   @{"  Opinion  " link OPINION}  @{"  News  " link NEWS}  @{"  Articles  " link FEATURE}  @{"  Reviews  " link REVIEW}  @{"  Adverts  " link COMMERCIAL}
@endnode
@node ABOUT "About AMIGA REPORT"
@toc MENU

===========================================================================
                            About AMIGA REPORT
===========================================================================

@{"        AR Staff         " link STAFF} The Editors and writers

@{"   Writing Guidelines    " link GUIDELINE} What you need to do to write for us

@{"  Copyright Information  " link COPYRIGHT} The legal stuff
@endnode
@node STAFF "The Staff"
@toc ABOUT

===========================================================================
                                 The Staff
===========================================================================

               Editor:               @{" Jason Compton    " link JASON}

               Assistant Editor:     @{" Katherine Nelson " link KATIE}

               Senior Editor:        @{" Robert Niles     " link ROBERT}

               Contributing Editor:  @{" William Near     " link WILLIAM}

               Contributing Editor:  @{" Addison Laurent  " link ADDISON}
@endnode
@node WHERE "Where to Get AR"
@toc MENU

===========================================================================
                              Where to Get AR
===========================================================================

                         @{"   The AR Mailing List   " link MAILLIST}

                         @{"         Aminet          " link AMINET}

                         @{"     World Wide Web      " link WWW}

                         @{"   Distribution Sites    " link BBS}

                         @{"   Commercial Services   " link PORTAL}
@endnode
@node BBS "Distribution Sites"
@toc WHERE

===========================================================================
                            Distribution BBSes
===========================================================================

                          Arranged by Continent:

                          @{"    Australia    " link BBS_AUSTRALIA}

                          @{"     Europe      " link BBS_EUROPE}

                          @{"  North America  " link BBS_NAMERICA}

                          @{"  South America  " link BBS_SAMERICA}

Sysops: To have your name added, please send @{"Email", link JASON} with the BBS name,
its location (Country, province/state) your name, any internet/fidonet
addresses, and the phone number of your BBS
@endnode
@node DEALER "Dealer Directory"
@toc MENU

===========================================================================
                             Dealer Directory
===========================================================================

                          Arranged by Continent:

                          @{"      Asia       " link DEAL_ASIA}

                          @{"    Australia    " link DEAL_AUSTRALIA}

                          @{"     Europe      " link DEAL_EUROPE}

                          @{"  North America  " link DEAL_NAMERICA}

Dealers: To have your name added, please send @{"Email", link JASON} with the name,
address, phone, and net address (if available) of your establishment.
@endnode
