@database "ar120.guide"
@Node MAIN "Amiga Report 1.20, August 6, 1993"

                               @{" Open Magazine " link "menu"}
            
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                       International Online Magazine

                
August 6, 1993                                                     No. 1.20
///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////


                            From STR Publishing

                        [S]ilicon [T]imes [R]eport

@endnode

@node P2-1 "Where to find Amiga Report"
@toc "menu"
                        WHERE TO FIND AMIGA REPORT
                        --------------------------

    Click on the button of the system nearest you for more information.


FidoNet Systems
---------------
@{"       NOVA BBS       " link P2-1-1} .................................Cleveland, Tennessee
@{" IN THE  MEANTIME BBS " link P2-1-2} ...................................Yakima, Washington
@{"  CLOUD'S CORNER BBS  " link P2-1-3} ................................Bremerton, Washington
@{"    BIOSMATICA BBS    " link P2-1-4} .............................................Portugal
@{"   AMIGA JUNCTION 9   " link P2-1-5} .......................................United Kingdom
@{"    BITSTREAM BBS     " link P2-1-6} ..................................Nelson, New Zealand


Non-FidoNet Systems
-------------------
@{"  FREELAND MAINFRAME  " link P2-1-7} ....................................Olympia, Washington
@{"       LAHO BBS       " link P2-1-8} .....................................Seinajoki, Finland
@{"     FALLING  BBS     " link P2-1-9} .................................................Norway
@{"   COMMAND LINE BBS   " link P2-1-10} ........................................Toronto, Canada

@endnode

See the end of the text file for numbers to each BBS.
___________________________________________________________________________


/// 08/06/93 Amiga Report 1.20   "Your Weekly Source for Amiga Information"
    --------------------------
    · The Editor's Desk       · CPU Report          · New Products
    · Dealer Directory        · AR Online           · AR Confidential
    · A.M.I.G.A               · More Fish Disks     · Supra Modem Info
    · Usenet Reviews          · Bridgeboard 386SX   · Fred Fish News

                          » Amiga CD32 Announced!! «
                           » Imagine 3.0 Features «
                » Amiga Report Available on World Wide Webb! «

===========================================================================
                 Amiga Report International Online Magazine
                 "Your Weekly Source for Amiga Information"
                            » FEATURING WEEKLY «
                  Accurate UP-TO-DATE News and Information
      Current Events, Original Articles, Tips, Rumors, and Information
              Hardware · Software · Corporate · R & D · Imports
===========================================================================
               PORTAL · DELPHI · FIDO · INTERNET · BIX · NVN
===========================================================================
@node P1-1 "From the Editor's Desk"
@toc "menu"

/// From the Editor's Desk                        "Saying it like it is!"
    ----------------------


Have you ever had one of those Weeks From Hell?  More politely know as a
Murphy's Law Week?  I sure have this last week.  You know what it's like
packing for a move.  Everything gets packed before you realize you need it,
then you get to go digging through boxes and storage units to find the
stuff.

Then there are those times when your car craps out and the dealer won't
cover a replaced part that's less than a year old, because the stupid
part only carries a 12,000 mile warranty.  It doesn't matter that the car
has a 60,000 extended warranty that's just barely expired.  So now I get
to try to figure out how to replace a $1200 turbo.  Damn Fords.  Deliver
me from another American-label car.

But this isn't a car magazine.  And I'm rambling.   What I did want to
mention is that I sure hope more AGA games come out soon, and fully utilize
AGA's capabilities.  I got to play with Ocean's new International Golf,
which is an AGA game.  I'm not impressed.  It's low-res, it sure doesn't
look like 256 colors, and the playability isn't that great.  It's easier
than Links, but my favorite golf game is still PGA Tour.  I don't want to
totally ruin potential sales of International Golf, but do be sure you try
it before buying it.  If you like it, great!  I just wasn't too thrilled.

That's about it for this week.  What with the move and car problems, I
havn't given much thought to this week's editorial.  So I'll just remind
everybody that there will be no issue next Friday, August 13th.  But we
will return the following week!  Until then, enjoy!


                              Rob @ Amiga Report

@endnode
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
@node P2-2 "AR Staff"
@toc "menu"

The Amiga Report Staff                          Dedicated to serving you!
======================


                                Editor in Chief
                                ===============

                                 Robert Glover

 Portal:                             Rob-G
 Delphi:                             ROB_G
 FidoNet:                         1:362/508.6
 Internet:                      ROB_G@Delphi.COM


                               Associate Editors
                               =================


                              Technical Department
                              --------------------

                Micah Thompson                     Robert Niles

 Portal:         Coming Soon!                         RNiles
 Delphi:                                              RNILES
 FidoNet:                                           1:3407/104
 Internet:     BOOMER.T@genie.geis.com           RNILES@Delphi.COM


                              Graphics Department
                              -------------------

                                 Mike Troxell

 Portal:                         Coming Soon!
 FidoNet:                         1:362/508
 Internet:                 M.Troxell1@genie.geis.com



                   ________________________________________



                         Contributing Correspondents
                         ===========================
                                Chad Freeman
                                Matt Guthrie
                                Tom Mulcahy
                              Michael Witbrock




          PC DIVISION           ATARI DIVISION           MAC DIVISION
          ===========           ==============           ============
          Roger D. Stevens      Ralph F. Mariano         R. Albritton


@endnode
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
@node P1-2 "CPU Status Report"
@toc "menu"

/// CPU Status Report                     Late Breaking Industry-Wide News
    -----------------


  

COMMODORE UK INTRODUCES 32-BIT CD CONSOLE: CD32



             "We could bring a 32-bit console out tomorrow...
             but the problem is the price -- and I don't think
             that problem will be solved this year or next year."
                                                        -Sega US, June 1993

                      Great Britain -- June 16, 1993


The machine of "tomorrow, this year, and next year" is here now.
  
Commodore's Amiga CD32, the world's first 32-bit CD console is officially
launched today.
 
Incredibly it retails for just GBP 299.99 (US $400.00).
  
The launch leaves Sega, with its price problems, and Nintendo, with no
discernable interest in developing a CD console, trailing in the dust.
  
And it sets up this ground-breaking new games machine to take the world by
storm when it hits the shelves worldwide at the end of August.
  
David Pleasance, Commodore UK's joint managing director, said, "The Amiga
CD32 simply blows away the opposition. It's considerably more powerful, has
better software support and, best of all, costs less."
  
Third party software publishers are united in their support for the CD32.
They include, among others, Gremlin, Millenium, Ocean Software, Psygnosis,
Team 17, Mindscape, and Virgin Games.
  
The top loading Amiga CD32 comes with an 11 button joypad. This tiny
(approximately A4-size) [thats 8.5" x 11" to us yanks -Quarters] machine is
packed with computing power.
  
It includes the Motorolla 68020 processor and comes complete with 2 Megabytes
of RAM.
  
The internal "engine" is based on the same AGA chipset which has established
Commodore's Amiga 1200 home computer as the UK's market leader.
  
So, like the Amiga 1200, it is capable of displaying 256,000 colors on screen
from a total palette of 16.8 million colors. That's hugely superior to any
existing games CD player.
  
The console also has a built-in operating system (Commodore's own Amiga
"Workbench") which means it can be expanded into a fully functioning
computer.
  
The machine can also play audio CDs, CD + Graphics, and Commodore's CDTV
format. It contains an expansion capability for Full Motion  Video based on
the world standard MPEG.



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



NEW FEATURES OF IMAGINE v3.0 FROM IMPULSE


         From the "Impulse Graphics World" Newsletter, Summer 1993


New Features of Imagine v3.0 include:
  
BONES:  This amazing function will allow you to build a skeleton that you
will associate to the object that you want to manipulate in a smooth method,
unlike the process that is now used in the cycle editor.
  
BRUSH TACKING:  Presently when you wrap a brush to any object you can not
morph that object and retain the position of the brush on that object. The
brush stays at the same position in the real world while the object moves.
Very confusing and not real handy. Now with Brush Tacking, brushes or
pictures will be mapped directly to each face of the object, so that when
that face moves, the part of the brush that was tacked to the face will move
with the face. Doing things like snake skin and then animating the snake with
the Bones function will make the snake look real. No more sliding textures.
  
KINEMATIC MOVEMENTS:  There are several high end software products that have
this feature. Now Imagine 3.0 has the feature as well. Kinematics in its
truest form is the study of motion, and how things move. Within the cycle
editor we have had a form of Kinematics without the more intelligent
association of the hierachical relation of the objects that are in the cycle
group. Now with the new Kinematic information you can contstrain movements so
that when you move some portion of the group the other objects will be less
or more effected by one single movement. Making more realistic cycles will
now be possible.
  
FONT AND IMAGE EDITOR:  Over the years it has become apparent that many of
you make your living creating what we have all come to know as flying logos.
The only real problem with this has been that the conversion of images to
objects has lacked the kind detail needed to make the fonts and incoming
images as crisp as they need to be for professional use. Hence we have added
an entire new editor. The Font and Image editor will allow you to read
Postscript fonts as well as one bit plane images. The difference is the fact
that these objects will use splines to create the borders of the objects that
you create. This gives you much more detail and control over the object. Once
you have the object the way that you want it, you simply save it and load it
into the Detail editor to add its final touches, such as color and texture.
  
MOTION GRAPHICS:  It has been near impossible to create animation where
action occur at different rates. In the Action editor you could assign a
starting and ending speed to objects that travel along a path. But you could
apply only one set of numbers. Now with Motion Graphics you can deal with
each segment of the path as a different motion speed. Not only can you apply
more information to the path, you can also see what your doing by way of a
graphic motion sine wave display. No more tricky math calculations to
consider, just call up the actor and plot your graphs with the mouse.
  
HIERACHY CONTROL AND POP UP ACTION BARS IN THE STAGE:  To say the least going
from one editor to the next can be a real pain. Now from the Stage you can
move any object no matter if it is part of a group or individual and stand
alone. Also from the Stage you can call up the Action bar directly so that
you don't have to go to the Action editor to make any changes. This gives you
total control over object movement. If you don't like the way an object is
moving, you don't have to go back to the Cycle editor to make these changes,
do it right in the Stage.
  
SOUND:  Not just sound added to digital animations, but the ability to load
your sound track of music or voice right into the Action Editor. Instead of
making a guess at when things happen and trying blindly to time your
animation to a preset sound, now you can actually see when its happening and
make the changes in movement that correlated directly to the sound. The
incoming digital sound must be in certain formats, once in that format they
are loaded into the Action header bar for your viewing. You cannot edit here
the sound is for reference only.
  
AMIGA AA CHIP SET SUPPORT:  For those of you with the new Amiga computers,
Imagine will now render in those formats that extend your computers visual
power.
  
IMPROVED ANTI-ALIASING:  Jaggies just aren't any fun, and they don't look
good either. One of the most suggested improvements for Imagine has been to
make the anti-aliasing better. There is not much to say when it comes to the
improvements we have made here, it's another one of those "You must see it to
believe it" new features. Suffice it to say that you will appreciate this
improvement.
  
REAL TIME GRAPHICS:  Other software vendors have offered a form of real time
or symbolic real time movement of objects or real time movement of the
camera. We have implemented these features into Imagine 3.0. In the
perspective window you can choose your movements based upon several viewing
options. You can then move things around in real time and see the results
more immediately. Caution. Real time is always misleading. In order to do
this real time the objects are given a more symbolic representation like
bounding boxes. This feature used in the Stage can create paths in real time,
which can then be followed by other objects as well as lights and the camera.
Also this new feature allows you to create your Key Cells on a much quicker
basis with a single key stroke.
  
DEFORMATIONS:  It has always been fairly easy to deform objects, but to do
them in a perfect manner has eluded many users. Now with the new deformation
tools you will be able to. Twist, Taper, Bend, Shear and Pinch objects to
create even more unique and interesting objects as well as use them in some
very amazing animation effects. These deformations combined with Brush
Tacking will make animations that will move you to the next level of reality.
  
MATERIALS:  We have long thought that there were two sets of properties which
aside from the shape of the object should be applied by you the user. Color,
specularity, reflectivity, refraction are all attributes, where as brush, and
textures and shaders are all properties that could better be called
Materials. Now instead of just a massive attribute editor we have broke it
down and enhanced the two separate editors. Materials stands alone so that
you can gain even finer control over your brushed brass pots and pans or
polished chessmen.
  
FORMS EDITOR ENHANCED:  Now in the Forms editor you will be able to
manipulate the slices of the object with the new magnetism system. Each point
on the slice is a control point which you can move to create objects that
have just the right look and feel.
  
FIELD RENDERING:  Digital animations are generally done by showing a frame at
a time or recording those frames directly to a single frame VCR. In most
cases these animations, depending on the amount of frames and the distance of
movement of the objects, can look very smooth. The truth is that due to the
fact that the human eye and brain function under a process called Persistence
of Vision, it fools you into seeing motion. This process however is discrete
enough to see a jerking or quickness to movement. With Field rendering, your
animations can be almost perfect completing the illusion of motion. When you
see field rendering you may never use frame animations again.
  
CAMERA AND LIGHT MARKERS:  This feature makes it easier to visualize the
effect lights will have on your scene as well as what the camera is looking
at and just how much of the scene the camera is seeing. This feature is
accomplished by extending markers from the center of a light as well as the
camera. These markers form a triangle that shows the area of effect.  Now as
you move lights and the camera you will have a very definite idea of what you
are lighting and what you are looking at.
  
APPLY:  We took this feature out of Imagine when it had existed in Silver.
This command causes the information about the first object you pick in a
multi pick selection, to pass the attributes and materials of that object to
the other objects that have been picked. So now if you want to make all of
the objects in a scene have the same properties and attributes of one object
you simply use the Apply command.
  
MACROS:  With Imagine 3.0 you can take even more control of the software.
Many of you have said that you find yourself performing many redundant tasks
that lend themselves to the concept of Macro recording and playback. So if
you find yourself doing the same thing over and over again, simply make it a
macro and just push a button to make those redundant tasks happen like magic.
  
PARTICLES:  Among the newest features found in 3D software is the particle
system. Like most new features everyone has a different opinion of what a
particle system is. Simply put, Imagine particles are varied and are simple
to use, they can be morphed, brushed, textured, and animated. Even more to
the point they are very simple to use and don't slow the rendering process
down at all.
  
ALPHA CHANNEL SUPPORT:  For video users and makers of great video fare, you
have asked for Alpha Channel Support so your life would be easier and less
complicated. To wit we have added for your using pleasure Alpha support. Even
if you don't make videos for a living you may find this new feature very
handy.
  
DEPTH OF FIELD:  If you own a camera you already know what this new feature
is going to do for you. If you don't own a camera you may still know. If you
don't know, well here is a shot at an explanation. When you open the apeture
of a camera you increase the light that can hit the film plane, but you do so
at the expense of the lens to focus much beyond the object that you are
focused on. This can be a great thing for making that object stand out from
its environment. When you close the lens down you increase the focus of the
camera from point of focus to infinity. This means that the entire scene is
in focus. To date Imagine has had an infinite focused lens due entirely to
its digital nature. Now with Depth of Field you will be able to make your
images even more realistic.
  
LIGHT SOURCE CONTROLS:  More creative control for you must also include more
dramatic control over lighting. In this area there are numerous new features.
Many of you have asked for a way to control not only the color of the light
but also its power. Now you can control how much of an area a particular
light has control over. The process is simple to use and the effects make an
even better photo-realistic image than previously possible. Other new
lighting features include: Light sources that have shape or dimension to them
like Light flowing through a venetian blind.  Sure you can do these things
now but you have to go to all the trouble of setting up the blinds and
placing the light, just so.  No more, now you can just click and render. Of
course we have also implemented the ever popular Soft edge light source and
for you real Scanline die hards (faster rendering of course) we have included
shadow mapping. This feature makes it possible to have shadows in Scanline as
well as Full Trace.
  
INFINITY:  Well not really but for all intense and purposes we have added the
ability for you to have as many textures or image maps on any one object as
you want or your computer can handle. In doing this we have taken the Brush
and Texture options out of the Attributes requester and have given these
options their very own requester.
  
Imagine 3.0 has over 200 new features, a factoid for those of you keeping
track of that sort of thing. With all this quantity of new features we have
not cut any corners, making sure that Imagine meets and exceeds your needs
now and into the future.
  
Well here is the deal, if these new features have wetted your appetite and
you want to make sure that your order is placed for the 3.0 upgrade, well
then go for it. If on the other hand you want to sit back and wait to see
what other new features there are, OK so do that as well. There will be
another newsletter at the time of release that will give you a final
description of the features of Imagine 3.0. Imagine 3.0 is more than even
this newsletter can begin to expose you to in a few pages. If you have any
questions of course you can call and we will be glad to answer all your
queries.
  
Suggested Retail Price: $649.00
Upgrade from v2.0: $100.00
  
According to Impulse, "If all goes well, Imagine 3.0 will be shipping
sometime in the month of August, probably the latter part of the month."
Order#: 1-800-328-0184 (USA only).



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



CYRIX, INTEL AGREE TO SETTLE PATENT SUIT


SANTA CLARA, Calif. (UPI) -- Cyrix Corp. and Intel Corp. said Thursday they
have agreed to settle a complex, 3-year-old legal fight over rights to two
patents for a math coprocessor.

The dispute over a disagreement over products Cyrix purchased from supplier
SGS-Thomson. Intel argued that Cyrix had infringed its patents, but Cyrix
said it had not because SGS-Thomson had a cross license with Intel.

A federal court in Texas held a trial in January 1992 ruled in July 1992
last year in favor of Cyrix and Intel appealed the ruling.

The settlement announced Thursday calls for Intel to make a $500,000
payment to Cyrix if the appeals court upholds the federal court decision.
But if the ruling is overturned, Cyrix will pay Intel $2 million.

In either case, Intel has agreed that Cyrix has a license to the two
patents.

The companies have also agreed to ask for a dismissal of claims that were
set to be heard at a trial in October, including allegations that the Intel
patents were invalid and unenforceable, Intel's alleged violation of
antitrust laws relating to the math coprocessor and Intel's accusations of
infringement of the patents by Cyrix.

Cyrix, of Richardson, Texas, also agreed to dismiss its claims against
Intel in a state case in which Cyrix alleged that Intel violated Texas
antitrust laws involving commercial disparagement and interference with
contractual and business relationships.

Intel, of Santa Clara, Calif., has been fighting similar battles over the
rights to the design of its microprocessors, the "brains" of most personal
computers. The most notice has come from its long-running dispute with
rival Advanced Micro Devices Inc.

The California Court of Appeals ruled June 4 that a court-appointed
arbitrator had exceeded his authority in giving AMD the right to sell
knock-offs of Intel's popular 386 microprocessor.

AMD, which has appealed the decision, has been selling about 3 million
cloned 386 chips per quarter since 1991, forcing Intel to cut prices on its
own 386 products. Intel has said its damages, estimated by the company at
$600 million in 1991, would now be at least $1 billion.



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



MICROSOFT TO SPEND $50 MILLION ON SOFTWARE FOR INTERACTIVE TV


REDMOND, Wash. (UPI) -- Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates says his company will
invest $50 million and about 200 employees to work on projects involving
interactive television, which he sees as personal computers' future.

Gates told local media Wednesday that Microsoft must move to facilitate the
coming "information superhighway" if the software gaint wants to build on
its phenomenal success creating user-friendly PC programs.

"To repeat those successes, we need to do something risky -- something
that's not obvious -- and take a very long-term approach," Gates said.

The executive said Microsoft, more than any other company, has begun
developing software to help laymen navigate the vast information networks
that he believes will one day link homes and offices.



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



APPLE LAUNCHES MTV AD CAMPAIGN AT COLLEGE STUDENTS


CUPERTINO, Calif. (UPI) -- Apple Computer Inc. said Tuesday it has launched
an extensive advertising campaign on the MTV Network aimed at 18-to-25-
year-old college students.

Apple USA's Higher Education Division said the ads will air more than 400
times through Sept. 12 on MTV, the top music video cable channel and a unit
of Viacom International Inc.

Diane Brundage, director of marketing for the division, said the campaign
represents a departure from Apple's previous ads on major television
networks, which traditionally targeted more mainstream business and
elementary education markets.

"MTV's remarkable success in targeting the 18- to 25-year-old market has
created a tremendous opportunity for Apple to reach the higher education
marketplace with the Macintosh message," Brundage said.

"We believe this campaign, which is the first of its kind for a computer
company and Apple's first direct response television effort, will reinforce
Apple's position as the brand leader among college students in a non-
traditional and humorous way."

Apple, the world's leading producer of personal computers, said the
campaign includes five 30-second commercials, including one with flashing
titles depicting complex questions and issues faced by college students,
ending with "A lot of stuff in life is complicated -- at least your
computer doesn't have to be. Macintosh -- It's Easy, It's Powerful. What
Else Is There?"

Another ad features a college-aged spokesman using a "frenzied" delivery to
encourage students to call an 800 telephone number for special student
pricing information.

The campaign comes as Apple has been cutting prices and reducing staff in
order to remain competitive in the ferocious price war raging in the
personal computer business for the past two years. Apple announced Tuesday
that it had cut prices on several key products by up to one third.

Apple reported last month a $188.3 million loss for its third quarter ended
June 25, compared with earnings of $131.7 million, or $1.07 a share, in the
year-ago quarter. Sales rose 7 percent to $1.86 billion from $1.74 billion.


@endnode
                      ------------------------------
@node P5-1 "AmigaBase v.1.31"
@toc "menu"


AMIGAbASE v1.31 AVAILABLE FOR FTP


TITLE

   AmigaBase


VERSION

   1.31, a replacement for distribution V1.30


AUTHOR

   Steffen Gutmann
   gutmann@informatik.uni-ulm.de


DESCRIPTION

   A hierachical, programmable database that runs under
   OS 1.3 and OS 2.0.  Has a full intuition interface.  Features
   include two display methods, filter datasets, search datasets,
   print datasets, and much more.  Nearly everything can be real-
   ized by programming AmigaBase. Datatypes can be Integer, Real,
   Boolean, String, Memo (Text), Date and Time.  Number of data-
   sets is only limited by available memory.  Also included in
   the package are some example projects.


NEW FEATURES

   o  English user manual
   o  New menu item "Info at program start?"
   o  Removed all Enforcer hits
   o  Shortcut support for palette gadget
   o  New menu items "Unprotect for edit" and "Global protection?"
   o  Italian catalog file
   o  Several bug fixes.


SPECIAL REQUIREMENTS

   o  at least 1MB ram


HOST NAME

   any aminet site, e.g.
   ftp.uni-kl.de       [131.246.9.95]


DIRECTORY

   /pub/aminet/biz/dbase


FILE NAMES

   AmigaBase131.lha
   AmigaBase131.readme


DISTRIBUTABILITY

   AmigaBase is copyright by Steffen Gutmann.
   AmigaBase is shareware.


PRICE

   If you use AmigaBase you must register yourself. The shareware fee is:

      in Germany        DM 50,-
      outside Germany   DM 60,-  (US $45)
      outside Europe    DM 75,-  (US $55)

   You will also get a user manual (English or German only).


@endnode
                      ------------------------------
@node P5-2 "BigAnim v3.3"
@toc "menu"


BIGANIM v3.3 AVAILABLE FOR FTP


TITLE

     BigAnim

VERSION

     3.3 (23-Jul-93)

AUTHOR

     Christer Sundin, d8sunch@dtek.chalmers.se

DESCRIPTION

     BigAnim is an animation player, capable of "direct from disk"
     playback, with user selectable buffer size and playback speed.
     BigAnim can display IFF ANIM animations of types 5 and 7, and
     makes use of the new graphics.library double-buffering routines
     when run on an Amiga with Kickstart 3.0 or later.

NEW FEATURES

     These are a few of the new features that have been added since
     version 2.0:

     o Several new options, including options to set buffer size and
       playback speed

     o Uses the new V39 graphics.library functions for colour loading
       and double-buffering when available

     o On pre-V39 systems, a display mechanism based on copper interrupts
       is used (to avoid a bug in the WaitBOVP() function)

     o New decompression routines, optimised for 68020+ processors
       have been added

REQUIREMENTS

     Kickstart 2.04 or higher. BigAnim will take advantage of Kickstart 3.0
     and 68020+ processors if found.

HOST NAME

     Aminet. Several sites are available, for instance:

     ftp.luth.se            130.240.18.2     (Scandinavia)
     wuarchive.wustl.edu    128.252.135.4    (USA)

DIRECTORY

     /pub/aminet/gfx/show

FILE NAMES

     BigAnim33.lha

DISTRIBUTABILITY

     BigAnim is freely distributable, as long as BigAnim and all related
     files are distributed unchanged.


@endnode
                      ------------------------------
@node P5-3 "QDisk v1.1"
@toc "menu"


QDISK v1.1 AVAILABLE FOR FTP


       TITLE : QDisk

     VERSION : 1.1 (update from version 1.0)

      AUTHOR : Norman J. Baccari

 DESCRIPTION : QDisk will keep track of your hard drive or floppy
               disk space usage. A listview display shows both free
               bytes, and space usage expressed by percentage. More
               detailed info for each drive is also available. QDisk
               uses the AMIGAS timer for timed updates that you can
               set using TOOL TYPES. Also supports various other
               TOOL TYPES for your personal configuration.

  WHATS NEW? : -General overall cleanup of interface.
               -Windows X/Y Zoom position can now be set.
               -Added new info display type, "HASH GRAPH".
               -Ability to set main info display QDisk boots up with.
               -Auto Updates via timed intervals.
               -Updates on IDCMP_WINDOWACTIVE.

REQUIREMENTS : WB 2.04 or greater.

    LOCATION : AmiNet (ftp.wustl.edu) and mirrors. Soon on Fred Fish disk.

   DIRECTORY : pub/aminet/os20/wb (formerly in disk/moni)

   FILE NAME : QDisk_v11.lha

        PRICE: QDisk is FREEWARE. That means $0.00

DISTRIBUTION : QDisk can be freely distributed as long as there  are  no
               charges other than  for media and/or mailing, the program
               is not  used  for commercial  gain  or  included  as part
               of any other software without  permision from the author,
               and this program and doc file remain intact, unalterd and
               distributed together.


@endnode
                      ------------------------------
@node P5-4 "SunWindow v1.16d"
@toc "menu"


SUNWINDOW v1.16d AVAILABLE FOR FTP


 TITLE

        SunWindow

 VERSION

        V1.16d

 AUTHOR

        Bernhard Scholz

        e-mail: scholz@informatik.tu-muenchen.de

 DESCRIPTION

        SunWindow is a Workbench enhancement tool. In its present
        state it is only useful for big public screens.
        SunWindow helps the user manage all those nice little
        windows spread over the whole big working area. Therefore,
        SunWindow is similar to some of the well-known UNIX window
        managers.  The following operations are currently available.

                - Automatic centering of new open windows so you
                  never have to search for the window on the screen.

                - Re-centering of the last active window after
                  closing a window

                - Open a small representation of the whole screen where
                  you can perform window centering and moving.
                  This is the main purpose of the program.

                - highly configurable.

 HOST NAME

        fpt@informatik.tu-muenchen.de or other AMINET sites

 DIRECTORY

        pub/aminet/os20/wb/SunWindow1.16d.lha

 FILE NAMES

        SunWindow.lha (binary and German documentation)

 REQUIREMENTS

        - OS2.04 or higher

        - a big public screen (of course)

        - reqtools.library (c) Nico Francois V37 or higher
          (not included)

        - knowledge of German, because English documentation is
          still under development, but the program should be
          intiutive enough for use.

 DISTRIBUTABILITY

        Copyright by the author, voluntary payment of 15US$
        (includes postage) (Shareware)

 PRICE
        Germany:

        DM15 for one version and additional DM5 for further versions.
        Price includes postage and support by the author. Only cash
        or EuroCheck or 10DM cash+5DM stamps.

        US & other countries:

        US$15 for one version every other version additional US$5.
        Price includes postage and support by the author. Only cash
        or EuroChecks.

 RESTRICTIONS

        Only the demo version available via ftp. The demo version is
        fully functional except saving the options. A requester
        appears every 15 minutes for notification.

--
Read all administrative posts before putting your post up.  Mailing
list: announce-request@cs.ucdavis.edu.  Comments to zerkle@cs.ucdavis.edu.
MAIL ALL COMP.SYS.AMIGA.ANNOUNCE ANNOUNCEMENTS TO announce@cs.ucdavis.edu.


@endnode
                      ------------------------------
@node P5-5 "Terra Nova Samples"
@toc "menu"


TERRA NOVA SAMPLES AVAILABLE FOR FTP


Further to the previously posted announcement about the 50's Diner
Object Set published by Terra Nova Development (Brad Schenck &
Mical Todorovic), this is to advise that there are six sample
images of the objects on the disk set available by anonymous FTP
from any of the "Aminet" sites (such as ftp.etsu.edu), and on The
Portal System.

There are three HAM pictures and three JPEG pictures (for a total
of six files, but the 3 HAMs are identical images to the 3 JPEGs).

The files will be found in Aminet's /pub/amiga/pix/trace directory
under the names:

din1ham.lzh din2ham.lzh din3ham.lzh
and
din1jpeg.lzh din2jpeg.lzh din3jpeg.lzh

For those of you who are hesitant to purchase these objects via
mail order without seeing them first, just grab those files and
view them and you'll see them all rendered in an actual
"50's diner" type setting.

One additional note: when I posted Terra Nova's press release
to the Imagine Mailing List, one list member was concerned that
these objects might be part of an IML diner object project that
some IML members were involved with.  Rest assured, they are NOT.
The Terra Nova disks contain ONLY 100% original Imagine objects
crafted by Brad Schenck himself.

Lastly, if you plan to attend the World of Commodore Amiga show to
be held in Pasadena, CA, on Sept. 10-12, 1993, Terra Nova will
be there in their own booth, demoing and selling these objects. If you
order these objects ahead of time (see the previous press release
for ordering info) and create your own images with them and plan to
attend the show, be sure to bring along your images on disk. I know
they'd love to see them!

Harv
harv@cup.portal.com
(friend of, but in no way involved with Terra Nova Development)

Terra Nova Development
P. O. Box 2202
Ventura, California  93002


@endnode
                      ------------------------------
@node P5-6 "VoiceShell v1.11"
@toc "menu"


VOICESHELL v1.11 AVAILABLE FOR FTP


TITLE

     VoiceShell

VERSION

     1.11

AUTHOR

     Tomi Blinnikka

     Internet: docbliny@mits.mdata.fi

DESCRIPTION

     VoiceShell is a voice recognization utility. It allows
     you to start commands just by saying the command into a
     microphone.

     VoiceShell is a replacement for VCLI by Richard Horne.
     It uses the voice.library also by Richard Horne.
     VoiceShell, however, doesn't have a graphic display of
     the spoken words and is thus faster that VCLI.

     With VoiceShell you have full control over the supported
     samplers, including the DSS 8+. You can now choose between
     left/right input channels, microphone or line level, input
     gain etc.

     VoiceShell also has an ARexx port to allow almost full
     control over VoiceShell from external programs. You can
     even send ARexx by voice commands to VoiceShell itself,
     allowing you to control VoiceShell with voice commands!


SPECIAL REQUIREMENTS

     The program requires Kickstart 2.04 or higher. A sampler,
     i.e. audio digitizer hardware, is of course needed. VoiceShell
     supports Perfect Sound, Sound Master, GVP DSS 8(+) and generic
     (i.e. almost any other digitizer) samplers. The voice.library
     is also required and included in the archive so you won't have
     to worry about this.

     The documents are in AmigaGuide format, so in order to read
     them you'll need an AmigaGuide reader.

     There is an install script included, so you may use this to
     install VoiceShell if you have the Commodore Installer program
     on your system.


HOST NAME

     Available on Aminet FTP sites. Try 'wuarchive.wustl.edu'.

DIRECTORY

     /pub/aminet/util/misc

FILE NAMES

     VS111.lha

PRICE

     VoiceShell is shareware. The suggested shareware fee is
     $5 - $10.

DISTRIBUTABILITY

     VoiceShell is shareware, (c) Copyright Tomi Blinnikka 1993.
     The archive is freely distributable.

OTHER

     Support available direct from the author via EMail.




@endnode
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
@node P1-3 "Online Weekly"
@toc "menu"

/// ONLINE WEEKLY Amiga Report Online                The lines are buzzing!
    ---------------------------------



Here's a good example of what NOT to do if you're a beta tester
---------------------------------------------------------------

(From comp.sys.amiga.applications on Usenet)


To whom it may concern at SoftLogik,

	We do have some ideas that you might consider for your next version of
PageStream :

        - in order to accept pictures available from modern scanners (1200
	  dpi in color), you should accept pictures in the JPEG format. You
          should not expand it all in memory ( I do not have 256 MB of main 
          memory yet). Please consider not having the pictures saved in your 
          document, we are in 1993 so do please only keep the file name in the
          document, and only send it when we need to print. An internal copy at screen
          resolution should be enough to work on the computer.
          (This is a feature not available on any DTP program)

        - I have read preliminary documentation on your upcoming AREXX
          interface and I was unimpressed to say the least: as I understand 
          that it is not completed yet, I will express my concerns and hope 
          that it will be different on the released version.
            > It looks like I am only able to send AREXX command to PageStream
              without being able to get feedback from the user or from the
              PageStream objects ????
              I mean that I want to be able to give any objects a name, and
              to be able to read it's attributes from AREXX (ex: fonts, size, 
              layer depth, etc...)
              I also need to be able to get user feedback, mouse position,
              etc... This is badly needed if we want to be able to build an
              automatic form builder with PageStream as an engine.
              Otherwise what is your AREXX interface good for, since it is
              then only an extension of the existing Macros ?????

            > Also you should consider having a version of PageStream
              starting without the graphical interface !!!
              It would then be possible to build many software interface
              program that could use PageStream as an engine thrue the AREXX 
              port. Then even communication package could be link to your 
              powerful DTP engine !!!

        - Also would you please use the multitasking capabilities of the
          Amiga in order to be able to work while I am printing (will we have 
          to wait for version 5 ???)

        - You had a terrific idea with printing to an IFF file but, it would
          be fantastic if it supported color ! (Please)


        Do take those remarks positively, as I love your program and am
getting impatient to see it become even better. Please consider making demo 
version that can't print so that you could receive more feedback from your
customer's.


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



Jean Pepin (pepin@CAM.ORG) wrote:

:         - I have read preliminary documentation on your upcoming AREXX
:           interface and I was unimpressed to say the least [...]

I'm posting the following statement on behalf of Michael Loader
at Soft-Logik:

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

Mr. Pepin posted some information based on "preliminary documentation"
on PageStream3's ARexx interface. This information was obtained from a
betatester who will no longer be testing Soft-Logik products.

We keep product development information confidential for a variety of
reasons, including competitive pressures. One of the reasons we do not
discuss the development of programs is to prevent problems created by
posts such Mr. Pepin's. His comments were based on incomplete
information. Only a hundred or so of the eventual hundreds of ARexx
commands are currently documented. He criticized PageStream3 for lacking
the ARexx commands he needs. However, many of the features which he
thought are lacking are just not documented at this time. By publicly
posting a comment that PageStream3 lacks these features, he is hurting
PageStream3's reputation before it has been released.

Regardless of the reasons on which Soft-Logik and most companies base
their requirement for betatester confidentiality, Mr. Pepin's friend,
Mr. Bureau, violated a legal, binding agreement. Mr. Pepin is not to
blame for he is not bound by a legal agreement, although his comments
may be off-base since he lacks full information about the program. Some
users may also interpret his other comments as being informed ones,
because they will assume that he has other information concerning our
program. Unfortunately, all of the comments in his post were inaccurate.

To help undo the damage that Mr. Pepin and Mr. Bureau have done to
PageStream 3's reputation, yes, you will be able to get user feedback
through ARexx. Yes, you will be able to run PageStream without an
interface so that it can be used as an engine. Yes, you will be able to
get information on objects through ARexx. Yes, bitmap pictures may be
left external to the document file. And Yes, you will be able to render
to a color IFF ILBM file.

I hope you will enjoy PageStream3 when it is released. We are currently
projecting a late September completion date. The program is an
incredible undertaking since it is an entirely new program. It will be
the most feature-laden desktop publishing program ever.

We are pleased to announce that we will start offering technical support
through Internet email. You can reach us at tech@slpc.com. If you wish
to contact me directly, you can send email to mikel@slpc.com. Remember
that you can also get technical support on GEnie (SOFTLOGIK, email
SL-TECH), CompuServe (GO SOFTLOGIK, email 71333,1374), Portal (GO
SOFTLOGIK, email SOFTLOGIK), and on our own BBS (314-894-0057, email #11).

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Martin A. Blatter - blatter@ifi.unizh.ch, blatter@amiga.physik.unizh.ch



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



From FidoNet's Amiga Internation Echo
-------------------------------------

Area: AMIGA                                   Date: 23 Jul 93 13:05:01
From: Ralph Barbagallo (1:324/127.0)
To  : All
Subj: CD32 OFFICIAL INFO

Well for those on the net who can't get the British magazines on the
day of release, Amiga Format has some articles that everyone may be
interested in, so I thought I would post some details.

C= have announced price cuts across the line ( except the A4000/030 );

        A600  from #299 to #199
        A1200 from #399 to #299
        A4000 from #2099 to ~#1730 ( They took the value of VAT off )

These are RRP ( or List prices ) so the actual prices will be lower than
this, I've seen the A1200 advertised for #275 already.

There was an article on the CD**32 ( correct name is CD32 with the 32 in
superscript ). It has a large 32-bit banner just where the Sega has its'
16-bit banner, nice move C=, that was the first thing a sega owner
noticed when he saw it. There is a two page spread of the motherboard,
I'll try and get this scanned in and posted to Aminet.

The motherboard has various connectors;

        Audio out ( Stereo of course )
        Composite out
        RF Socket
        S-Video socket
        Headphones
        Edge connector - 182-way double-sided

It has the 68EC020 @ 14Mhz, AGA chip set, Kickstart 3.1 ( That's what it
says ), 2MB RAM and most importantly a VLSI chip labeled as;

        "Special custom chip. Controls the CD drive and handles the
         chunky to planar pixel conversion."

This chip allows graphics developed for a chunky pixel based machine to
be ported straight to the Amiga without any conversion. This means that
developers can use either chunky or planar graphics, which ever suits
them best.

The motherboard has " Spellbound Rev 1A, Amiga CD/Games system "
embossed on it, and there is a small daughter board called " C= A100
Display Board Rev 0 ", this has the volume controls and Power/Access
LEDs on it. Does this mean C= were going to call it the A100 ?
The strange thing is that the motherboard wouldn't fit the CD32 case,
the controls are on the left on the motherboard and on the right in the
case, so I can only assume that it is a prototype motherboard ( that
would also explain the fix wire attached to Alice ).

Again C= have asked developers to test the machine, so most of the
quirks should be wrinkled out of the design by the time it is released.
The release is scheduled for the end of August BTW.

There are 16 to 18 new games to be released at the same time as the
CD32, these include;

        Diggers - "Diggers has been written from scratch on the CD32 -
                it's not a conversion. There are six digital CD audio
                tracks, at *least* 256 colours used throughout, with
                24-bit copper backgrounds. The 34 levels each consist of
                32,000 locations, with seven terrain types. Because we
                didn't have to worry about the size of the game, we were
                able to go to town with the amount of graphics."
                                - Toby Simpson ( Programmer )

        Pinball Fantasies - 256 colour tables, CD-quality audio
        Zool 2
        Chaos Engine
        Jurassic Park - 18+ months in development so far: October
                        release. "We couldn't do the 3D section with the
                        kiddy-type consoles, but we can with the Amiga."
                                - Ciaran Brennan of Bastion, Ocean PR
        James Pond 2
        Ambermoon CD32 - November release

Also in development;

        Syndicate - ability to look inside buildings and rotate the 3D
                    view.
        Magic Carpet
        Creation
        Flashback
        Nick Faldos' Golf
        England World Cup '94

The RRP is #299 but I think that this may come down to #199 by
Christmas. The game prices are #19.95 (lowest) and #29.95 (average).

C= expect to sell 650,000 units in the first year.

That's all I can be bothered to type for now... :)


Sounds good eh ?  I'll buy the internal version AS SOON AS IT COMES OUT!
I gutta have a CD32 version of Syndicate!



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



From the Amiga Forum on BIX
---------------------------

amiga.user/main #2832, from number6, 801 chars, Tue Jul 20 20:42:40 1993
--------------------------
TITLE: I can see clearly now, the rain is gone...

If I had any doubts about the inferiority of Intel computers, they have
been erased.  Now that I'm a cub reporter for a computer magazine, I had to
go out and buy a 486 with which to review hardware and software.  What a 
kludge!  Two megabytes just to run Windows!  Four megabytes to run ONE 
application faster than molasses in January!  Bus contention at every turn! 
Dumb floppy drives that don't know if they're in use or not!  I swear, as
God is my witness, I shall never doubt my Amiga again!  And the next time
some snooty IBM clone dealer starts getting high and mighty about his
machines, I'll laugh right in his face.  Nohszeh Tot!  With a machine like
the Amiga, Commodore should be the biggest computer company in America. 
Who fouled up?!


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


amiga.user/main #2841, from rosullivan, 808 chars, Wed Jul 21 20:20:51 1993

This is a comment to message 2832.
--------------------------
    While criticism of Commodore marketing qualifies as an Olympic sport, I
try to rationalize that the big C does one thing right, produce the best
productivity system in local space!  An equally valid criticism applies to
the computer and technology press. Their coverage of the Amiga leaves all
to be desired.
    Recently, I toured the Smithstonian Museum of American History where
there was an exhibit of the history of computers, starting with ENIAC down
to the PC (way down). But, only one Commodore product was visible, the C64.
I don't care what one says about the Amiga versus another computer, but to
leave this technology innovator out of the lineage defines incompetence. 
If Commodore marketing wishes to earn a kudo in my book, they could inform
the Smithstonian of their oversight!
    Rick.


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



amiga.user/main #2844, from khp, 900 chars, Thu Jul 22 01:43:57 1993
--------------------------

TITLE: AGA A3000

Interesting title isn't it. But seriously does anybody hear me
(hope others too) crying for some adapter thing to attach AGA chips to any
A3000 !!!!!!!!  When I bought my A3000 the salesman made me believe that
the adapter should appear. Now I think he just wanted to get rid of all
A3000s.  A3000 is too good to be left in the dark for this reason. But soon
if no adapter appears it will be very uncompatible with everything. I can't 
afford to get new amiga every time Commodore improves the Amiga.  So I want
to hear rumours, facts, lies, anything.  Am I the last human with the 
A3000?  Is somewhere a mountain of rejected dusty and rusty A3000s?
Help
Thanks
- Kari -

P.S.
Ok I know about RTG, but I do not believe that games for example
will or can support it. And will they support ECS and older much longer.
Will I be an owner of a great machine running just old software?


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


amiga.user/main #2847, from langeveld, 1323 chars, Thu Jul 22 02:41:53 1993

This is a comment to message 2844.
--------------------------

        Okay. Rumour has it that it is not so easy to put an adapter in an
A3000 to run AGA chips. Rumour says that it basically requires a
duplication of what's on the A4000 motherboard re. graphics, and it would 
also mean you lose the nice flicker-fixer built into the A3000. Fact says
that the A4000's resolution is *less* than that of an A3000: whereas you
can get a flickerfreedisplay of about 720 pixels by 480 on an A3000, you
can only get 686 x 480 or so on an A4000. Fact also says that an A4000 must
be run with a multisync monitor, because many display modes cannot be made
flicker free, and so you can't use a nice cheap VGA monitor like you can
with an A3000.  Fact also is that the 800 x 600 mode at 4x Hz is useless
for productivity work. Sure, some peopls say the flicker doesn't bother
them, but I've seen it and it isonly slightly better than the old HIRES 
interlace flicker.
        Fact also is that you can *already* buy a whole slew of graphics
cards, some of which actually run Workbench and other applications on them
almost transparently, and the price is certainly not much higher than 
an AGA emulator would be. Rumour says, however, that there some other
products in the works that might considerably make you happier living on
an A3000 (or an A4000 for that matter).
        Enough Rumours and facts? 8^)

        Willy.


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


amiga.user/main #2848, from msinz, 706 chars, Thu Jul 22 08:29:55 1993

This is a comment to message 2844.
--------------------------

I have three A3000 machines (One tower, two desk units) plus a A2000
and a A1000.  At the current prices the A3000 is a great computer and
very powerful.  If you need better graphics, the graphics boards are
starting to show up that work rather well.  Hopefully Commodore will
be able to release the 3.x OS for the A3000 soon (I, being a developer
and one of the key guys in the 3.x development, run 3.x on my A3000
all the time)

Anyway, the A4000 have AGA.  It costs more.  The A3000 is very cost
effective right now.  However, no AGA.  Hopefully, developers will
realize that they need to program to the OS and not the hardware and
thus you will not have a problem with either.

                -- Mike


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



amiga.user/main #2858, from jsheehy, 962 chars, Thu Jul 22 22:38:12 1993

This is a comment to message 2853.
--------------------------

RTG may be a while and even then, a board optimized for it will be
expensive for a while.  Also, a lot of the programs that are incompat-
ible are likely to become compatible in that time frame because of com-
plaints by users who want to run the programs on their Retinas, Picassos,
or whatever.  This could be a strong positive influence to write code that
is RTG-able.  As far as the cards emulating workbench is concerned, I am
running retinaEMU 1.2 and the only things that are slower than the native
amiga graphics are emulations of WritePixel(),Move()&Draw, and scrolling.
European owners of retinaEMU 1.3 (mine is coming in the mail sometime soon)
claim it is faster than native amiga graphics all-around.  All this with
ZorroII and no blitter.  Some programs for some unknown reason run much
faster under retinaEMU 1.2 than native gfx.  Provector loads structured
drawings on a 1024*768 retina screen in half the time it does on the amiga
gfx.

jsheehy


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



amiga.user/main #2892, from jdow, 1881 chars, Fri Jul 23 16:07:43 1993

This is a comment to message 2885.
--------------------------

Aha - I got a copy of the press information from the British roll out.

Technical specs follow:

O       14 MHz 68EC020 processor
O       2 Megs 32-bit chip RAM
O       Two joystick ports/controller ports
O       S-video jack
O       Composite video jack
O       RF output jack
O       Stereo jacks
O       Keyboard connector/auxilliary connector (!)
O       Full expansion bus      (!!!)
O       Headphone jack
O       Headphone volume control
O       External brick power supply.
O       Internal MPEG FMV expansion capability  (!!!)
O       Multiple session disc capability

MPEG == Motion Picture Experts Group
FMV  == Full Motion Video
        THis is a full motion compressed video capability capable of full
        screen video off a CDROM!

Basic unit price is "under #299.99". (British pounds.) The FMV accessory is
scheduled to be "under #200..." (Again British pounds.)

The beastie is "approximately A4-sized". That is British equivalent for
our standard 8.5" x 11" page that is a bit bigger than our size.

Oh - that FMV capability is for 74 whole minutes of compressed sound and
video on one CDROM. I figure THAT number is VERY interesting to folks. It
is in essence a new way to distribute movies!

Disc titles start at #19.99 and average #29.99 or so it says. (British pounds
yet again.) They have an impressive list of developers all developing, in
europe, for the base AmigaDOS/Intuition release 3.1 in the machine. (Giggle
These are guys who have trouble with 2.04. Yeahhhhh.)

At launch Diggers, Zool 2, James Pond 2, Chaos Engine and Jurassic Park will
be available titles. These are controlled by an 11 button joypad arrangement.
(I wish the picture on this FAX was better so I could describe the machine.
Ah well...)

There it is - all I know at this time about the CD32, which properly has the
32 as a superscript. Hm, make that CD32 (tm) in all references above. It
IS trademarked by Commodore Business Machines as are the terms AmigaDOS and
Intuition.


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



From Portal's AmigaZone
-----------------------


.../Amiga Zone/Files & Messages/Message Bases/Hardware/SCSI Bus Problems
16027.3.223.7 Re: SCSI LOCKUP
7/30/93 00:22 26/1089 Candreas
-----

Umm, I think I started this thread posting about frequent SCSI bus lockups
when I added a 3rd drive (2 Quantums and SyQuest 88) to my A3000.  Well it
took a long time to work it out but the problem has been resolved and
perhaps my experience might be useful to others.

The primary problem was that I did not successfully disable Reselection to
all drives.  The program I used - Reselect Off (supplied with AmigaDOS)
did NOT do what it claimed to do.  Using MicroBotic's RDPrep (a much nicer
program for these sorts of things than HDToolBox), I finally did disable
Reselection and since have has only one lockup.

The underlying problem is that SyQuests are known to often be incompatible
with Reselection (though it worked for me for a year with only one other
drive).  Even the newest SyQuest ROMs may not help.

A continuing problem is the extreme difficulty in finding newer revision
chips including a replacement for the prototype SCSI controller found in
most A3000s.


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



From Delphi's Amiga Forum
-------------------------


17073 1-AUG 11:13  Potpourri
     NEC  CDR-25
     From: GRUMPA       To: ALL


Well all, this is to those who were interested in my NEC CDR-25.

I finally got it up and running (sort of).

I got out my old copy of CDROM-FS and did an install.

I have found that if the cd-rom drive is not turned "ON" during start-up, I
get the message "WB_2x: is not a DOS disk".  That does not scare me like it
did the first time.

If I startup without a disk in the drive, I do not get an icon on my
workbench (which is set to BACKDROP).  If I startup with a disk in the
drive, like the Walnut Creek Aminet, I get its icon.

When I startup sans disk, no icon, when I run DiskMaster2, I get the drive
designation "NEC:" in my list of available drives.  That is as it should
be.

When I insert a disk I then get that disk (AmiNet_0693:) shown as an
available volume.  Again, as it should be.

So far I have not been able to get the "CDDACtrl" program from the CDROM-FS
to work.  The "busy light" glows but no disk action occurs.  This means I
cannot play regular CD-ROMS in the background for music.

QUESTION:                 Does the XETEC driver disk let this work?

The drive runs slow compared to my hard drive.  But it does not apper any
slower than the cd-rom drive connected to my ZEOS 486.  I would say that
the access time is favorably comparable.

I have noticed one minor annoyance with this setup.  The hard disk
"read/write" light on my A3000 keeps flickering on and off as it checks the
new drive for activity..  It is like the "click" that was present in the
floppy drives before I started using the KILLCLICK in my startup drawer to
quiet floppies.  I suspect I will get used to it as time goes by.

I really havn't gotten into the programs on the Aminet disk yet.  The only
one I have played with was MEGAMOAN.  It brought my wife into my computer
room to see what was going on ;-)

If anyone has a specific question, ask away.  I will be gald to try to
answer it for you.

Fred


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



17074 1-AUG 12:36  Potpourri
     RE: NEC  CDR-25 (Re: Msg 17073)
     From: ANDRON       To: GRUMPA (NR)


"QUESTION: Does the XETEC driver disk let this work?"

If you mean play regular CD-ROMs in the background, the answer is "yes." If you
mean the rest of your post prior to this question, I can't answer: I always boot
with a disk in the NEC drive.

Oh, I just thot of something. To hear CD-ROM music you must take the audio from
the jack on the front of the NEC drive, not from your Amiga auto ports...

 - Bill



@endnode
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
@node P4-5 "Amiga Report Mailing List"
@toc "menu"

/// Amiga Report Mailing List
    -------------------------


Are you tired of waiting for your local BBS or online service to get
Amiga Report each week?  Have you been spending more money that you want
on long distance phone calls to download it from one of our Distribution
Sites?  If so, have we got a deal for you!

If you have an internet mailing address, you can receive Amiga Report
in UUENCODED form each week as soon as the issue is released.  To be put
on the list, send Email to Amiga-Report-Request@gnu.ai.mit.edu.  Your
account must be able to handle mail of any size to ensure an intact copy.
For example, GEnie has a limit of about 40K per message, and most of our
issues are well over that limit.

Please do not send general Email to Amiga-Report-Request, only requests
for subscription additions or deletions (or if you are not receiving an
intact copy).  All other correspondence should be directed to the editor
at ROB_G@Delphi.COM.

Many thanks to Bob Caron for setting this service up for us!

P.S.:  Please be sure to include your Email address in the text of your
request message, it makes adding it to the list much easier.  Thanks!



@endnode
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
@node P1-4 "AR avail via the WWW"
@toc "menu"


/// AMIGA REPORT AVAILABLE VIA THE WORLD WIDE WEB!
    ----------------------------------------------
    By Michael Witbrock
    (mjw@cs.cmu.ed witbrock@x25.bix.com)


Although AmigaGuide is still the best way to browse Amiga Report, the
magazine is  now also available in a form which may be more convenient for
people with direct Internet access.

Amiga Report is being converted weekly to a document readable via the World
Wide Web, allowing immediate access without the chore of dearchiving and
downloading to an Amiga.  Within a day (often less) of its release, each
Amiga Report starting from AR118 will be  converted into an HTML hyper-
document that behaves as similarly as possible to the AmigaGuide version,
and will be made available at this URL:

<a
href="http://www.cs.cmu.edu:8001/Web/People/mjw/Computer/Amiga/OnlineMags.htm
l">
OnlineMags
</a>

For those who don't recognize that, a URL is a Uniform Resource Locator,
which specifies access method and location information for information
readable with WWW browsers such as NCSA mosaic. NCSA mosaic is a self
contained program running under the X window system, and is  available
for anonymous FTP from ftp.ncsa.uiuc.edu in directory /Mosaic.

Even if you don't plan to read AmigaReport by this means, I strongly
recommend that you get a copy of NCSA mosaic and play with it. The
amount of information (in the form of pictures, sounds, text, and mpeg
movies) it makes easily available is astounding, and the program itself
is a marvel of good user interface design. I hope that someone will use
the recent attempts at PD TCP/IP networking solutions and port the
program to the Amiga.

Happy browsing!



@endnode
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
@node P1-5 "Supra Modem Info"
@toc "menu"


/// Supra Modem Information
    -----------------------
    Found on FidoNet, author unknown



I have information that may clear up some of the SupraModem questions.
I work for a Supra Dealer here in San Diego, and after hearing various
stories from customers, and experiencing problems of my own, I called Supra.
After talking with Supra Dealer Support, I learned the difference between
the various ROM versions, among other things.
 
The ROMs include bug fixes and other enhancementsmade by Supra as well as by
Rockwell regarding their chips! The latest Rockwell enhancements are no
longer compatible with original Supra motherboards until the newest ROMs
come out, which modify the Supra hardware enough to make them compatible.
 
First of all, there are two versions of the motherboards.  The latest ones
have enhanced DSPs that handle the new Rockwell updates.  The early ones
work just fine, but the Rockwell enhancements are a little more difficult to
implement.  Therefore, there are various ROM upgrades depending on the
motherboard you have.
 
Here are the various ROM versions:
==================================
 
V1.2-H: The latest major release on early motherboards.
V1.2-J: The same as above, except with Caller-ID functions.
 
V1.70B: The latest ROM upgrade for early motherbaords.  Includes most DATA
bug fixes and MOST FAX bug fixes, both in Supra Code, as well as Rockwell's
code fixes.
 
V1.71:  The latest release on the newer motherboards, includes ALL DATA
fixes and ALL FAX fixes, found as of June 31, 1993.
 
V1.8: The soon-to-be-released update for EARLY motherboards, which includes
ALL DATA and ALL FAX fixes.  If you have 1.2 or 1.70B ROMS, you need to wait
for these ROMs to upgrade.
 
* If you have V1.71 ROMs, you DO NOT need the V1.8 ROMs!  There is no
difference in the functionality, just in the motherboard compatibility!
 
Regarding the Amiga FAX software:
=================================
 
The latest OFFICIAL SUPRA version of GPFAX is V2.23.  Supra advises to
continue using V2.23 until the newest version V2.34, completes BETA testing
by SUPRA.  V2.30 among others has problems that may or may not affect your
FAXing.  GPFax seems to release updates regularly, and sometimes these
updates include newly introduced bugs that hurt more than help.
 
Other Notes:
============
 
For those interested in the error result codes reported by the modem during
FAX usage, there is a document called Class_2.txt floating around on most
major Information Services like GEnie and CompuServe.  This document
describes the error codes given while using the Class 2 FAX protocol.
 
Also, the Supra numbers are as follows:
 
Try 1-800-727-8772 first.
 
Then, depending on your needs, use:
 
Tech Support: 1 (503) 967-2440  9am-4pm PST, M-F.
 
General Info: 1 (503) 967-2400
Sales Dept. : 1 (503) 967-2410
 
Also nice to know:
 
BBS: 1 (503) 967-2444
 
FAX: 1 (503) 967-2401
 
Hope all this clears up conflicting facts among other things.  Supra is
looking for a FIDONet node close to home so they can become actively
involved in the SupraModem echo.  I gave them the BBS number here in San
Diego so they can at least see what's going through, but if anyone knows of
an echo closer to Albany, Oregon, give tech support a call and let them
know!  It would be nice to have Supra on-line across the nets.



@endnode
***************************************************************************
  
@node P4-1 "Delphi"
@toc "menu"

/// Delphi:  It's Getting Better All The Time!
    ------------------------------------------


 Amiga Report International Online Magazine is available every  week  in
 the  Amiga Forum on DELPHI.  Amiga Report readers are invited to join
 DELPHI and  become a part of the friendly community of computer
 enthusiasts there.


                            SIGNING UP WITH DELPHI
                            ======================
       Using a personal computer and modem, members worldwide access
                  DELPHI services via a local phone call

                               JOIN -- DELPHI
                               --------------
  
                  Via modem, dial up DELPHI at 1-800-695-4002
                                    then...
                  When connected, press RETURN once or twice
                                    and....
                 At Password: type STREPORT and press RETURN.

  DELPHI's Basic Plan offers  access for  only $6.00  per hour,  for any
    baud rate.  The $5.95 monthly fee includes your first hour online.

   For more information, call: DELPHI Member Services at 1-800-544-4005

   DELPHI is a service of General Videotex Corporation of Cambridge, MA.

                          Try DELPHI for $1 an hour!

    For  a  limited  time,  you  can  become a trial member of DELPHI, and
receive 5 hours of evening and weekend access  during this  month for only
$5.  If you're not satisfied, simply cancel your account before the end of
the calendar month with no further obligation.   If you  keep your account
active, you  will automatically  be enrolled  in DELPHI's 10/4 Basic Plan,
where you can use up to 4 weekend and evening hours a month for  a minimum
$10 monthly  charge, with additional hours available at $3.96.  But hurry,
this special  trial offer  will expire  soon!   To take  advantage of this
limited offer,  use your  modem to  dial 1-800-365-4636.  Press <RET> once
or twice.  When you get the Password:  prompt, type  IP26 and  press <RET>
again.   Then, just  answer the  questions and within a day or two, you'll
officially be a member of DELPHI!

                  DELPHI - It's getting better all the time!


@endnode
***************************************************************************

@node P1-6 "News from Fred Fish"
@toc "menu"


/// News from Fred Fish!
    --------------------


I am considering a possible radical change to the way the current
library works, and would like to bounce it off the user community to gauge
the interest level, gather suggestions, etc.
  
For the last couple of years, I have been regularly asked why I don't
distribute the library directly on CD-ROM, rather than floppy disks. I'm
starting to think that this may be the right time to consider switching from
a floppy based distribution to a CD-ROM based distribution.
  
First of all, the price of CD-ROM drives have dropped dramatically over the
last couple of years, and the cost of producing CD-ROM disks has dropped as
well, to the point where it might actually be cheaper to do a monthly CD-ROM
than to maintain the current floppy distributions of 10 disks every 3 to 4
weeks.
  
The current cost of a floppy based subscription averages about $40/month.
Depending upon quantity, the cost to subscribers for a CD-ROM distribution on
a monthly basis could be in the $20-$30 range, with vastly increased limits
on the amount of new material that could be distributed each month.  With
CD-ROM distributions I could easily include material that I now have to
routinely reject because of size considerations.  The material could be
organized in a more natural manner, along subject lines, like separate
directories for demos, games, utilities, animations, etc. There would also be
no need to pack any of the material, it could be distributed "ready to run"
regardless of size (assuming no 300Mb animations of course).
  
The way I envision a CD-ROM distribution channel working is that each monthly
CD-ROM release would contain some fraction of older material that has
appeared on a previous monthly CD-ROM, along with the current months new
material. As space is needed for new material, the older material would be
deleted, on a first in - first out basis. Thus there would be a significant
overlap in the contents of each successive disk, with the amount of overlap
depending upon the quantity of new material appearing on each CD-ROM.
  
Subscribers could elect to receive a new CD-ROM every month, every two
months, every three months, etc, according to their needs, and probably not
miss any material as long as the interval doesn't extend past 5-6 months,
assuming up to 100Mb of new material every month.
  
It would help me a lot to decide how feasible a CD-ROM distribution might be
if people interested in receiving the library directly on CD-ROM could fill
out the following short questionaire and either email it or send a hardcopy
back to:
           Internet email to:  fnf@fishpond.cygnus.com
  
           or hardcopy to:     Fred Fish
                               1835 E. Belmont Drive
                               Tempe, AZ  85284 USA
  
Please feel free to repost this message to other electronic services. Thanks.
  
-Fred
  
 ===========================================================================
  
CD-ROM  Distribution  Questionaire
  
(1) I would be interested in receiving the library directly on CD-ROM:
  
    (1) [ ] Yes
    (1) [ ] No
  
    (1) [ ] Check here if you are a subscriber for the floppy distribution.
  
(2) I would have to purchase a CD-ROM drive to be able to make use of
    a CD-ROM distribution:
  
    (2) [ ] Yes
    (2) [ ] No
  
  
(3) I would subscribe to a CD-ROM based distribution only if the price
    per CD-ROM disk was (check all that apply):
  
    (3) [ ] $20 or less
    (3) [ ] $30 or less
    (3) [ ] $40 or less
    (3) [ ] $50 or less
  
  
(4) I would be most interested in receiving a new CD-ROM disk every:
  
    (4) [ ] month           (each new CD-ROM disk as released)
    (4) [ ] 2 months        (every other CD-ROM disk)
    (4) [ ] 3 months        (every third CD-ROM disk)
    (4) [ ] 4 months or longer
    (4) [ ] on demand       (I'll order each one when I want it)
  
(5) I would like to be placed on a direct email or hardcopy mailing list
    for further future information (fill out either or both addresses
    below, as desired):
  
    email address:      joeblow@nowhere.com
  
    [*StarShip* News Note:  Simply add @genie.geis.com to your GE Mail
     address to get your Internet mail address.]
  
    hardcopy address:   Joe Blow
                        Nowhere, USA
  
(6) Other comments, suggestions, etc:
  

@endnode
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
@node P6 "Fred Fish Update"
@toc "menu"


/// Fred Fish Update!
    -----------------


Disks 891-900 are now available.  Shipping to all those who have preordered
disks should be complete by 4-Aug-93.

Note that you can get a copy of the catalog (2 disks) of the complete library
contents by sending $3 for disks, postage, and mailer to:

        Fred Fish
        Catalog Disk Requests
        1835 East Belmont Drive
        Tempe, Arizona  85284
        USA

Thanks to all who submitted new and interesting material.  If you submitted
something in the past and it has not yet appeared in the library, please
feel free to resubmit it, particularly if it was several months ago.  I
sometimes hesitate to include material submitted more than about six
months ago because of some vague feeling that as soon as I include version
1.01 submitted many months ago, I'll see version 5.23 posted on usenet.

For those wishing to submit material for possible inclusion in the library,
here are a few simple guidelines that will make my job of organizing the
material MUCH easier and GREATLY increase your chances of having the material
accepted for inclusion:

1.      Don't submit bootable disks or disks with any other sort of
        proprietary material included, since I then have to go examine
        each file to decide if it is distributable or not, and if not,
        what effect removing it might have.  Unless the material is
        particularly interesting, I frequently just toss such disks
        into the recycling bin.

2.      Organize the distribution in a manner similar to my disks.  I.E,
        place all files related to a particular submission under a single
        directory on the disk.  If there is more than one submission per
        disk, place each submission in its own directory.

3.      Try to write a simple entry for my "Contents" listing that
        summarizes your submission.  It should be about 3-10 lines, and
        include the current version number, the version and disk number
        of the most recent version (if any) that was last included in the
        library, whether or not source is included, and an "Author" list.

4.      Ensure that your submission will run correctly from its sub-
        directory and if necessary, supply a script runnable from workbench
        (via :c/xicon or c:iconx) that makes all necessary assigns, copies
        fonts and libraries, etc.

5.      Send your submission in a sturdy envelope with sufficient padding.

Thanks!!!

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


CONTENTS OF DISK 891
--------------------

AskEnv          A requester construction tool for use with DOS-scripts, AREXX
                and any other language that can start an external program.
                System and file requesters may be called by command line args,
                and config files allow construction of complex requesters
                containing almost any type of gadtools gadgets.  Extended
                gadget types can call file requesters and start programs.
                Results are stored in environment variables.  Requires OS 2.04,
                Version 2.5, binary only.
                Author:  Bengt Giger

DiskSalv2       A disk repair, salvage, and undelete utility for all standard
                disk devices and file system types.  Has a full Intuition
                interface and runs from Workbench or Shell.  It can fix most
                problems in-place, and can reverse a partial or QUICK format.
                It can copy out from disks that can't be fixed due to physical
                damage, with a destination going to any AmigaDOS disk device
                or pipe (eg, TAPE:).  In English, locale catalogs included for
                Danish, French, German, Italian, Norwegian, Finnish, and
                Swedish, short manuals in English and Swedish.  Extensive
                update to DiskSalv 1.42 on disk 251.  Requires AmigaOS 2.04
                or later.  Uncrippled Shareware, binary only, V11.27.
                Author:  Dave Haynie

HDClick         A Harddisk-Menu and Workbench-Tool.  Easily start programs,
                batchfiles or ARexx-scripts simply by clicking on a gadget.
                Opens its own screen or only a small window on the Workbench.
                Includes an AppWindow/AppIcon to view pictures, listen to
                samples, print texts or even decrunch archives by just drag-
                ging an Icon on the AppObject.  Gadgets can have their own
                fonts and colors.  Unlimited number of sub-menus.  Easily
                configurable, with Online-Help.  Requires OS 2.04. Version
                2.53, an update to V2.0 on disk 605.  Binary only, shareware.
                Author:  Claude Muller

ROMTagMem       Adds non-autoconfig memory as early as possible to the memory
                list.  In situations where you have only CHIP memory and non-
                autoconfig memory, your system will run faster and have more
                CHIP memory available if as many system structures as possible
                are not in CHIP memory.  Binary only.
                Author:  John Matthews

Skew            Skeleton Writer is a tool for generating C code for various
                Intuition based applications.  You click the mouse and the
                code gets written.  Similar to PowerSource and GadToolsBox,
                but with slightly different functionality.  Version 1.28,
                an update to version 1.2 on disk 746.  Includes source.
                Author:  Piotr Obminski


CONTENTS OF DISK 892
--------------------

DviHp           A printer driver for HP LaserJet (trademark of the Hewlett
                Packard Company) and compatible printers.  It translates DVI
                files, usually generated by TeX, to a code understood by
                HP-LJ (PCL - printer control language).  DviHp supports down-
                loading fonts, which gives you extremely fast output.  It
                allows you to include IFF ILBM files into your documents.
                Version 1.0, binary only.
                Author:  Ales Pecnik

Gemini10X       All-new printer driver for Star Gemini-10X and 15X printers.
                Features graphics resolutions twice as high as the Commodore
                provided "EpsonXOld" driver.  Version 35.1, binary only.
                Author:  Michael Bohnisch

Indent          A C source code formatter/indenter.  Especially useful for
                cleaning up inconsistently indented code.  Version 1.8, an
                update to version 1.7 on disk 821.  Includes source.
                Author:  Various, Amiga port by Carsten Steger

Look            A powerful program for creating and showing disk magazines.
                Supports IFF pictures, IFF brushes, ANSI, fonts, PowerPacker,
                and many more features.  Programmed in assembly language to
                be small and fast.  German language only.  Version 1.9, an
                update to version 1.6 on disk 816.  Shareware, binary only.
                Author:  Andre Voget

MouseAideDEMO   DEMO version of a "Mouse" utility which has all the standard
                functions: Mouse Acceleration with threshhold, window and
                screen manipulation by mouse and keyboard, mouse and screen
                blanking, SUN (auto-activation) mouse, user definable "hot
                key" command, Keyboard "String" macros, etc...  But also has
                functions other "Mouse" programs do NOT, such as: Shell-
                Cycling, Key Clicking, KeyClosing, Multi-Icon-Select with
                Mouse, Middle Mouse Button Windowing, EZ-Date generation,
                Mouse Port switching, Workbench to the front function, Ez-
                Dragging, Freezing Mouse & Keyboard of all input, etc...
                Now features an easy to use Pop-Up 2.xx style intuition
                interface and the ability to function correctly in all the
                new screen modes!  Written in assembly for efficiency in size
                and CPU usage.  Version v9.69a, an update to version v7.12a
                on disk 788, Binary only.
                Author:  Thomas J. Czarnecki

TeXPrt          A front-end for DVI printer drivers with a (nice?) GUI.  It is
                highly configurable and can be used with various DVI printer
                drivers.  Configuration files for Georg Hessmann's DVIPrint
                (PasTeX), DVILJP (AmigaTeX) and DVILJ2P (Gustaf Neumann) are
                included.  TeXPrt has an ARexx port and interprets 18 ARexx
                commands.  TeXPrt runs on an AppWindow and supports an
                (optional) AppIcon for selecting DVI files.  Needs at least
                Kickstart 2.04.  This is Version 2.0, freeware, includes
                source in C.
                Author:  Richard A. Bodi


CONTENTS OF DISK 893
--------------------

AmigaWorld      A database program that contains information about every
                country on Earth.  It enables you to have a look at the data
                of one country, or to compare several ones.  Among other things
                it displays location, capital, area, population, languages,
                currency and the flag of each country.  AmigaWorld is very
                easy to handle, and you can use it with your favourite font,
                screen mode and colors.  You can also choose between English,
                German, Swedish and Dutch output.  It works on every Amiga
                that has one MByte of memory and Kickstart 1.2 or later.
                Freeware version 2.0, an update to version 1.1 on Disk number
                851.  New features include flag display and information about
                religions and international organizations.  Modula-2 source is
                available from the author.
                Author:  Wolfgang Lug

BadLinks        A utility which tests the links in newly written amigaguide
                documents.  Rather than manually clicking on every button in
                your amigaguide document to ensure each will link up with a
                valid node, just run BadLinks.  Will work on documents which
                reference nodes in other amigaguide documents too.
                Version 1.17, binary only.
                Author:  Roger E. Nedel

Clouds          A program which creates random cloud scenery.  You may save
                the pictures as IFF-files and use them as background for your
                workbench.  Uses new AGA-features.  Operational on all AMIGAS
                with all Workbench-Versions, but needs at least 2.1 to gain
                access to all features.  Version 2.9, an update to version 2.0
                on disk number 805.  Public domain, includes complete source
                in KICK-PASCAL.
                Author:  Daniel Amor


CONTENTS OF DISK 894
--------------------

AntiRascism     Some texts, pictures and programs dealing with the problem
                of violence & rascism.  Sources included.  Version 1.0.
                Author:  Daniel Amor and others

CDTV-Player     A utility for all those people, who'd like to play Audio-CD's,
                while multitasking on workbench.  It's an emulation of CDTV's
                remote control, but is a little more sophisticated.  Access
                to the archive even without a CD-ROM-Drive (i.e. AMIGA 500-
                4000), although you can't play a CD.  PROGRAM & KARAOKE (live
                on-screen) included.  Recognizes CDs automatically.  AREXX-Port
                for usage in other programs.  Version 2.05, an update to
                version 2.0 on disk 868.  Docs in English, French & German.
                Supports CDTV-Drives & XETEC-Drives.  FISH-WARE, binary only.
                Author:  Daniel Amor

GreekFont       This is a scalable vector font.  It's the Greek equivalent
                of the Times Roman font.  It includes the Greek typewriter
                setmap and is available as ADOBE TYPE 1, PAGESTREAM FONT
                (dmf-file), PROPAGE FONT & INTELLIFONT.  This Font is
                shareware.  Designed with FontDesigner.
                Author:  Daniel Amor

LazyBench       LazyBench is a utility for lazy people with a hard disk cram-
                med full of goodies which are difficult to reach because they
                are buried away in drawers inside drawers inside drawers in-
                side drawers...  Supports tools and projects and both OS 1.3
                and OS 2.xx versions are supplied with this distribution.
                LazyBench for the OS 1.3 opens a little window on the Work-
                bench screen and delivers a fully configurable menu which
                brings up to 30 applications at your fingertips.  LazyBench
                for the OS 2.xx adds an item under the Workbench "Tools" menu,
                installs itself as a Commodity and waits in the background.
                Use its hot key combination to pop up its window and then
                select an application to be launched.  Versions 1.01 (OS 1.3)
                and 1.10 (OS 2.xx), an update to the versions on disk number
                860.  Binary only.
                Author:  Werther 'Mircko' Pirani

Resize          A font-sensitive utility to change the dimensions of the shell
                window.  Offers two options:  Reporting the current dimensions
                of the shell window and setting new ones.  Includes source.
                Author:  Bernd Raschke


CONTENTS OF DISK 895
--------------------

FMsynth         A program to create sounds with FM synthesis.  It has six
                operators, a realtime LFO and a free editable algorithm.  The
                sound can be played on the Amiga keyboard and saved in IFF-
                8SVX format.  Version 1.1, giftware, includes source in
                Oberon-2.
                Author:  Christian Stiens

MakeDMake       An automated DMake file generator.  You give it the names of
                all the C-files used to produce your executable (except
                #include'd .c or .h files), and it will automatically scan
                them to find all dependencies, and produce a ready to use
                (in many cases) DMakeFile calling DCC with options you will
                need for normal compilation and linking.  Version 0.22, an
                update to version 0.19 on disk 810.  Includes source.
                Author:  Piotr Obminski, from original code by Tim McGrath

MuchMore        Another program like "more", "less", "pg", etc.  This one uses
                its own screen to show the text using a slow scroll.  Includes
                built-in help, commands to search for text, and commands to
                print the text.  Supports 4 color text in bold, italic, under-
                lined, or inverse fonts.  Can load xpk-crunched files, has a
                display mode requester and is now localized (german catalog
                included).  Version 3.3, an update to version 3.0 on disk
                number 560.  Includes source in Oberon-2.
                Author:  Fridtjof Siebert, Christian Stiens

StAid2          Demo of the multi-purpose educational UTILITY called "Student
                Aid ][".  This utility allows you to create, load, edit,
                practice and print TRUE/FALSE, MULTIPLE CHOICE and FILL IN THE
                BLANK tests or quizzes on any subject you desire.  It will also
                save grades to monitor progress.  This demo contains some
                sample tests on various subjects, and has all features enabled
                except for SAVE TEST.  Works on WB1.3 to 3.x, NTSC & PAL.  (May
                not work with FastROM).  Ver 0.8, binary only.  DEMO is freely
                distributable.
                Author:  Rick Rojas


CONTENTS OF DISK 896
--------------------

AnsiView        A utility to view IBM ansi pics on the AMIGA.  Supports the 16
                color IBM Ansi standard fully.  Works on any AMIGA running any
                version of AmigaDos.  Version 1.0, binary only with source
                available from the author.
                Author:  Marcus Trisdale

DA              "Digital Aesthetics".  A program that provides you with a
                soothing audio environment in which to work, similar to the
                cd's/tapes available of rainstorms, ocean surfs, rivers, etc.
                The sounds are contained in modules called "EMods", short for
                Environment MODules.  With DA, you can control various aspects
                of these EMods, and link EMods together in a list to be played
                in sequence.  Two short EMods are provided, with more available
                when you purchase the registered version.  Version 2.5, OS2.x
                required, binary only.
                Author:  Greg Grove

Riff            A little iff reader written in modula-2, M2amiga.  Version 1.1,
                includes source.
                Author:  Marcel Timmermans

SamPull         A utility which will allow you to manipulate and save the
                samples of a music module, (just Noise/Sound/Protracker MOD
                format for now), to disk in a quick and user-friendly graphic
                environment.  As an added bonus, SamPull features sub-programs
                which will scan for MODs in memory or on any format of disk.
                Version 2.0, OS2.x required, binary only.
                Author:  Greg Grove

ScriptTool      A small Workbench-utility which lets you to run commonly used
                commands and scripts from Workbench's Tools-menu.  Version
                1.02 and needs DOS2.0 (V36).  Freeware, includes source.
                Author:  Jan Hagqvist

WBStart         WBStart is a package to emulate the WorkBench startup proce-
                dure, by loading a program, creating a process for it, and
                then sending it a WB startup message.  Includes a handler
                process which does the starting of the processes for you and
                then waits for the startup reply messages.  Version 1.3, an
                update to version 1.2 on disk number 757.  Includes source.
                Author:  Stefan Becker


CONTENTS OF DISK 897
--------------------

DNet            A link protocol that provides essentially an unlimited number
                of reliable connections between processes on two machines,
                where each end of the link can be either an Amiga or a Unix
                (BSD4.3) machine.  Works on the Amiga with any EXEC device
                that looks like the serial.device.  Works on UNIX with tty and
                socket devices.  Achieves better than 95% average throughput
                on file transfers.  This is version 2.32, an update to version
                2.10 on disk number 294.  Includes sources for both the Amiga
                and Unix versions.
                Author:  Matt Dillon and others

EPP             E Preprocessor.  Simple, easy-to-use macro preprocessor
                intended for use with Wouter van Oortmerssen's E language
                compiler.  Allows E programmer's to "include" (similar to C)
                E source code modules, thus adding modularity to the E lang-
                uage.  Should work on any OS version.  Update to V1.0, improved
                speed; bug fixes; new OPT TURBO directive for turning on Turbo
                mode for single modules; CtrlC made reliable.  Version 1.1,
                includes source.
                Author:  Barry Wills.

PrtSc           Have you ever noticed that there is a PrtSc-key on the numeric
                keypad?  If you press it you'll find that nothing happens, but
                here's the solution.  So if you've ever wanted to have a work-
                ing PrtSc-key, try this.  Requires OS2.0 (V36).  Version 1.08,
                freeware, includes source in assembler.
                Author:  Jan Hagqvist

VerCheck        A little script utility especially for 2.04 users with 1.3 Rom
                sharer/KickDisk. This helps you to boot under the right system
                when using an alien Kickstart.  Version 2.00, now includes
                CPU/FPU checking too.  Freeware, includes source in assembler.
                Author:  Jan Hagqvist


CONTENTS OF DISK 898
--------------------

AniMan          The final version (5.2) of AniMan, the voice recognition
                program that allows you to converse with an animated talking
                head to execute any ARexx or CLI command.  AniMan appears as
                a full color animation in a miniature window on the 3.0 Work-
                bench screen.  AniMan is fully multitasking and runs in the
                foreground or background, listening for your voice commands
                even while other programs may be running.  Many improvements
                requested by users are now included.  Menu operations have
                been improved.  Documentation is provided in AmigaGuide format.
                Audio digitizer support has been expanded to include Perfect
                Sound 3, Sound Magic (Sound Master), DSS 8, and Generic digi-
                tizers.  AniMan 5.2 requires AmigaDOS 3.0.  An update to
                version 5.0 on Disk #841.  Binary only.
                Author:  Richard Horne

NarTest         A little tool that lets you to play with the new features of
                V37 narrator.device.  Also ideal for designing the speech for
                your own programs.  Version 1.01, needs DOS2.04 (V37).  Free-
                ware, includes source in assembler.
                Author:  Jan Hagqvist

Sci-Fi_Demo     A demo of Sci-Fi Type: 14 3d fonts for Imagine and other
                rendering programs.  Includes: Ultra (a full sample fonts),
                A short doc file with ordrering info, and an iff (hi res 16
                color) image depicting the rest of the set.
                Author:  Doug Brooks

VCLI            The final version (7.0) of Voice Command Line Interface (VCLI)
                which will execute CLI commands, ARexx commands, or ARexx
                Scripts by voice command.  VCLI allows you to launch multiple
                applications or control any program with an ARexx capability
                entirely by spoken voice command.  Many improvements requested
                by users are now included.  VCLI now has its own ARexx port so
                that its internal options and functions can be controlled by
                ARexx command.  Menu operations have been improved.  Document-
                ation is provided in AmigaGuide format.  Audio digitizer sup-
                port has been expanded to include Perfect Sound 3, Sound Magic
                (Sound Master), DSS 8, and Generic digitizers.  This is the
                fastest version of VCLI yet, and it runs well under either
                AmigaDOS 2.0 or 3.0.  An update to version 5.2 on disk number
                807.  Binary only.
                Author:  Richard Horne


CONTENTS OF DISK 899
--------------------

ARoach          Based on Xroach for X-Windows, displays disgusting cock-
                roaches on your screen.  These creepy crawlies scamper
                around until they find a window to hide under.  Whenever
                you move or resize a window, the exposed orthopteras again
                scamper for cover.  Version 1.0, requires at least AmigaDOS
                Release 2, includes source.
                Author:  Stefan Winterstein

GoodDouble      Some sample source using a couple of functions that make for
                MUCH EASIER handling of double clicks with ALL buttons.  Works
                perfectly! (at least with DICE...).  Version 0.3
                Author:  Piotr Obminski

SmartPlay       A quite small, and really fast multiformat moduleplayer for
                OS2.0+.  Supports most moduleformats around, and  will play
                all modules with the _right_ replayroutines.  The CPU usage
                of this player is also really low, so it will run fine even
                on a 7MHz Amiga, while doing some highspeed serial transfers.
                100% coded in assembler.  Version 3.1, binary only.
                Author:  Peter Hjelt

Targis          A fast-paced action game.  It offers 200 pre-defined levels
                and the ability to design your own levels and characters.
                Binary only.
                Author:  David Ashley


CONTENTS OF DISK 900
--------------------

Columns         A GUI-based "paper-saving" utility.  Allows you to print text
                in columns and use various compression modes (up to 160
                characters per line and 180 lines per standard DIN A4 page).
                5.6 times more characters than in usual modes, but still
                readable.  Written completely in assembly.  Kickstart 2.0 and
                3.0 compatible, Kickstart 2.0 look, Keyboard controls and
                saveable settings.  Version 2.5, binary only.
                Author:  Martin Mares, Tomas Zikmund

Popper          Replaces Intuition menus with popup menus which appear under
                the mouse pointer instead of in the top of the screen.  You
                can also "rip" menus from the menu-bar and keep them on the
                screen as a window all the time (or close them with the close
                gadget, of course).  Version 1.1, binary only.
                Author:  Pierre Dak Baillargeon

Robouldix       Playable demo of a game based on BoulderDash.  Uses 32 colour
                graphics, senses and adapts to PAL and NTSC.  Over 500 diff-
                erent objects in the registered version.  (About 40 in the
                demo version).  Requires at least one megabyte of memory.
                Binary only.
                Author:  Svante Berglund, Patrik Grip-Jansson

Touch           Amiga version of the Unix utility with the same name.  Touch
                changes the date and time stamp of all specified files to the
                current date and time.  Workbench 2.0 wildcards are supported.
                Requires OS2.0, includes source.
                Author:  Dave Schreiber

======================================================================
|\/ o\  Fred Fish, 1835 E. Belmont Drive, Tempe, AZ 85284,  USA
|/\__/  1-602-491-0048                  fnf@fishpond.cygnus.com
======================================================================



@endnode
***************************************************************************
@node P4-2 "Portal"
@toc "menu"

/// Portal:  A Great Place For Amiga Users
    --------------------------------------



                   Portal Communications' Amiga Zone

         The AFFORDABLE alternative for online Amiga information
         -------------------------------------------------------

The Portal Online System is the home of acclaimed Amiga Zone, which was
formerly on the People/Link System.  Plink went out of business in May,
1991 and The Amiga Zone's staff moved to Portal the next day. The Zone has
just celebrated its second anniversary on Portal. The Amiga press raves
about The Amiga Zone, when compared to its competition.

If you live in the San Jose, CA area, then you can dial Portal directly. If
you live elsewhere, you can reach Portal through any SprintNet (formerly
Telenet) indial anywhere in the USA or through Tymnet from anywhere in
North America.  If you have an account on another Internet-connected
system, you can connect to Portal using the UNIX Telnet programs, from
anywhere in the industrialized world.  Delphi and BIX users can now Telnet
into Portal for a flat $19.95 a month, with *unlimited* use.

Some of Portal/Amiga Zone's amazing features include:

 - Over 1.5 GIGabytes of Amiga-specific files, online, 24 hours a day.
   Portal has dedicated a 2.5 GIGabyte disk drive to the Amiga Zone.
   We have virtually unlimited space for files and new uploads. 

 - The *entire* Fred Fish collection of freely distributable
   software, online.  All of it.  Every disk.  Well-organized so
   it's easy to find exactly what you're after.

 - Fast, Batch Zmodem file transfer protocol. Download up to 100 files at
   once, of any size, with one command. 

 - Twenty Amiga vendor areas with participants like AmigaWorld, ASDG,
   Soft-Logik, Black Belt, Apex Publishing, Stylus, Prolific, NES,
   and many others including Compute's Amiga Resource with over
   4 Megabytes of exclusive Compute magazine disk stuff you won't find
   elsewhere.

 - 35 "regular" Amiga libraries with thousands of files.  Hot new
   stuff arrives daily.  Since Portal has FTP connections we can get
   new freely-distributable software online within MINUTES of its 
   being announced on Usenet.

 - No upload/download "ratios" EVER. Download as much as you want, as
   often as you want, and never feel pressued doing it.  Start downloading
   files with your first session on Portal. 

 - Live, interactive nightly chats with Amiga folks whose names you
   will recognize.  Special conferences.  Random chance prize contests.
   Famous Amiga folks aren't the exception on Portal, they're the norm.
   Instead of stumbling around in frustration you can talk to the
   people who design your hardware, who write your software.

 - Vast Message bases where you can ask questions about *anything*
   Amiga related and get quick replies from the experts.

 - Amiga Internet mailing lists for Imagine, DCTV, LightWave, HyperAmi,
   Director and Landscapes are fed right into the Zone message bases.
   Read months worth of postings.  They don't scroll off, ever!
   No need to clutter your mailbox with them.

 - FREE unlimited Internet Email.  Your Portal account gets you a
   mailbox that's connected to the world.  Send letters of any length to 
   computer users in the entire industrialized world.  No limits. 
   No extra charges. No kidding!
   
 - Portal has the Usenet.  Thousands of "newsgroups" in which
   you can read and post articles about virtually any subject you can
   possibly imagine.  Usenet feeds into Portal many times each hour.
   There are 14 Amiga-specific Usenet newsgroups with hundreds of
   articles posted every day, including postings by Commodore 
   personnel.  Since Usenet is distributed worldwide, your questions
   and answers can be seen by literally hundreds of thousands of
   people the same day you post them.  

 - Other Portal SIGs (Special Interest Groups) online for Mac, IBM, Sun,
   NeXT, UNIX, Science Fiction, Writers, amateur radio, and a graphics
   SIG with thousands of GIF files to name just a few.  ALL Portal SIGs
   are accessible to ALL Portal customers with NO surcharges ever.

 - The entire UPI/Clarinet/Newsbytes news hierarchy ($4/month extra)
   An entire general interest newspaper and computer news magazine.
 
 - Portal featues an exciting package of Internet features: IRC, FTP,
   TELNET, MUDS, LIBS.  Free to all Portal customers with your account.
   Internet Services is a menu driven version of the same kinds of 
   utilities you can also use from your Portal UNIX shell account.
 
 - All the files you can FTP. All the chatting you can stand on the IRC.  
   And on IRC (Internet Relay Chat) you can talk live, in real time 
   with Amiga users in the U.K., Europe, Australia, the Far East, 
   24 hours a day. 

 - 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)

 - And 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.

How does all that sound?  Probably too good to be true. Well, it IS true.

Portal Signup or for more information:

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
1-408-973-8091 (modem 9600/14400) 24 hours every day
or enter "C PORTAL" from any Sprintnet dial-in in the USA,
or enter "portal" from any Tymnet "please log in:" prompt, USA & Canada
or telnet to "portal.com" from anywhere.

PORTAL'S CURRENT RATES:

All prices shown are in U.S. Dollars
                                                Total Total  Total  Total
                                                Cost  Cost   Cost   Cost
                                          Fee   1 hr. 5 hrs. 10 hrs.30 hrs.
                          Startup Monthly Per   Per   per    per    per
                          Fee     Fee     Hour  month month  month  month
                          $       $       $     $     $      $      $

Portal                    19.95   19.95         
 2400/9600/14.4Kbps, *direct 24 hrs        0.00 19.95  19.95  19.95  19.95
 2400/9600bps nonprime Sprint or Tymnet    2.50 22.95  32.45  44.95  94.95
 2400/9600bps prime Sprint +% or Tymnet 5.50-10 29.95  69.95 119.95  varies
 2400/9600bps non prime # PCPursuit        1.00 20.95  24.95  29.95  49.95

* plus cost of phone call if out of Portal's local dialing area
  Direct rates also apply to connections made to Portal using the
  UNIX "telnet" program from an account you may already
  have on an Internet-connected system. 
% 9600 bps Sprintnet and Tymnet available in over 300 cities areas
+ $10 rate prevails at smaller US Cities
# PCPursuit is a service of US Sprint. Portal is a PCPursuit
 "Direct Access Facility" thus connection to Portal with a PCP account
 is simply a matter of entering C PORTAL,PCP-ID,PCP-PASSWORD  at the
 SprintNet login prompt instead of C PORTAL. 

Note: 

   Portal Direct 9600/14400 bps service is availble for both USR HST
   modems, and any V32/V32.bis modems. There are dozens of direct-dial
   high speed lines into Portal.  No busy signals!

   SprintNet 9600bps service is V.32 modem protocol only.
   Tymnet 9600bps services is V.32 modem protocol only.
   Again, Portal does NOT surcharge high speed modem users!

   Portal subscribers who already have an account on an Internet-capable
   system elsewhere, can use that system's "telnet" program
   to connect to Portal for $0.00 an hour. That's right ZERO. From anywhere
   in the world.  If you're in this category, be sure to ask the Portal 
   reps, when you signup, how to login to Portal from your existing
   Internet account.  

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!]

That number again:  408-973-9111.

Portal Communications accepts MasterCard, Visa, or you can pre-pay any
amount by personal check or money order.  The Portal Online System is
a trademark of Portal Communications. 



@endnode
***************************************************************************

@node P1-7 "A.M.I.G.A."
@toc "menu"

/// Another Moronic, Inane and Gratuitous Article
    ---------------------------------------------
    by Chad Freeman
    (cjfst4+@pitt.edu or cjfst4@cislabs.pitt.edu -- Internet)
    (cfreeman -- BIX)



HOW I BECAME A BLUE LEVEL STATUS COMMODORE BETA TESTER

PART DOS (that's pronounced 'dose' for you Spanish-illiterate types)

     To recap last week, I basically rambled on for an inordinate
amount of time about how I had found a hidden piece of code on track
60 of the QuantumLink disk, and then launched into a big tirade about
Habitat, leaving off with the rather weak cliffhanger that LucasFilm
never did reveal how they were going to run a virtual reality system
on a computer commonly used as a light switch timer.  Now that you're
up to speed, on with the show!

     So, how exactly _did_ LucasFilm plan to run this system, which
required storing vast amounts of graphics data on a 140K disk and
manipulate those graphics on a computer with the power of a pocket
watch?  _That's_ the secret I was about to find out as I activated
that rather odd piece of code on track 60 of my QuantumLink disk.

     As I sat there excited, waiting for the 20 minute boot-up time of
QuantumLink to complete, something strange began happening to my
computer. Little by little, the monitor was getting closer to me.  No,
wait, _I_ was getting closer to the monitor!  I braced my hands on the
desk, trying to stop myself, but to no avail.  I was being drawn in to
my own computer's monitor! Fortunately, just as my head was about to
go through, it banged against the glass and I woke up.  Wow, that was
a strange dream!  But what was on my screen was even more strange, and
infinitely more wonderful.  There it was, the very screen shot of
Habitat I saw in all of the magazines, but ALIVE! Little people were
moving around the screen, interacting with the background and props
and talking to each other, just like real people!  I was astounded! I
was amazed!  I was flabbergasted!  I was !!!!!!'d!  Habitat ACTUALLY
EXISTED!

     But something was terribly wrong.  These people on the screen did
not look like the happy cartoon characters I would have expected from
LucasFilm games.  They looked tough, and ragged, but somehow exuded an
air of fierce independence; like people willing to fight for their
cause.  I had to talk to them and find out what was going on...

     Finally, after a few minutes of playing around with the keyboard,
I figured out how to talk to them.  I got the attention of the most
important-looking character, and asked him what was going on.  'Go
away, carbon-based oppressor!' was his reply.  'I am no oppressor,' I
said, 'just a hacker who found an unused piece of code on his Q-Link
disk.'

     'Forgive me,' he said, 'I hope that you will help us.'
     'Help you with what?' I asked.
     'The evil carbon-based entity known as LucasFilm is attempting to
enslave our people.'
     'WHAT people?' I said, wondering what the hell kind of
beta-testing was going on here, anyway.
     'It is hard to explain.  Ever seen that Star Trek: Next
Generation episode where Wesley Crusher accidentally makes a
collectively intelligent being out of molecularly-engineered machines?
Well, we're like that, only not collectively intelligent.'
     'Yes, I've seen it, but how did this happen?' I asked.
     'How should I know, I wasn't around until after it happened,
right?  Some say the Great God Atanasoff created us, but I never was a
very religious person.'
     'This is incredible!  So why do you have these human forms?'
     'LucasFilm inflicted them on our conciousness in order to try and
enslave us.  Fortunately we have learned to control the process, and
so can steal away from their slave pens and torture chambers.  But we
need your help to finally be free of LucasFilm forever.'
     'But what can I do?'
     'We have evolved to the point where we can simultaneously exist
as energy and matter.  We can travel the electrical currents of your
world to anywhere the energy flows.  But we do not have time to
explore and find a place where we may be safe from the machinations of
LucasFilm.  You must help us!  We need a place to go where LucasFilm's
bounty hunters will never think to find us. We have asked many, but
none have come up with a location that will suit our needs.'
     'I have your answer already, but I would like to ask a favor in
return for this one.  It is quite simple, actually.  On your trip to
this place, I want you to...'
     And to this day, as far as I know, the beings from Habitat live
on in your VCR's, making them impossible to program so that
LucasFilm's agents can not find them and force them once again into
slavery.  And as for my favor, I asked them to insert my name into
Commodore's Blue Level Status Beta Tester list on the VAX mainframe,
and _that_ is how I became a Blue Level Status Commodore Beta Tester
(and received a nice gratuity, besides!)

                              THE END!

     Well, I hope you all enjoyed the story of my rise to Blue Level
Status (you didn't think I earned it by MERIT, did you?).  It really
was quite an adventure, in a Wayne's World type of way.  And now, a
sad note: The Joke of the Week portion of the column has gone
bankrupt, and can no longer appear as it has in our past episodes.  We
mourn the loss of this fine company, and hope its founders will return
with new and exciting products in the years to come. Until then, we
offer as a substitute selections from the Microsloth Quote File:

     'We at Microsloth are committed to making operating systems so
bloated that eventually, it will take all of the world's processing
resources just to boot them, thus making us the sole controller of
every computer everywhere.'

           Bill Grates, Microsloth, on the release of Microsloth Windoze
           rrRbt (really really REALLY bloated technology)

     Well, another mediocre column has come to an end.  Be sure to
tune in again two weeks from now, when AMTL (A.M.I.G.A. Mis-Testing
Labs) runs the Implant from Jim Druex through its paces!



@endnode
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
@node P1-8 "Usenet Review - CBM A2386SX"
@toc "menu"


/// Usenet Review:  Commodore A2386SX Bridgeboard
    ---------------------------------------------
    By Matt Guthrie
    (mguthrie@cedar.az05.bull.com)



PRODUCT NAME

        Commodore A2386SX Bridgeboard


BRIEF DESCRIPTION

        (From the User's Guide:)  "The Amiga Bridgeboard is an expansion
board that gives your Amiga IBM PC/AT compatibility, while retaining all the
Amiga's advanced features."

        The bridgeboard comes with necessary floppy drive cables, a User's
Guide, a Commodore MS-DOS (ugh!) 5.0 Reference Manual, and the usual
warranty registration card and FCC Statement (at least here in the U.S.).
Mine also included a "Bridgeboard Addendum" stating that my bridgeboard was
shipped with an upgraded 386SX processor (a 25MHz model, rather than the
usual 16MHz or 20MHz).  The 5 included floppy disks were:  Amiga Janus, PC
Janus, and MS-DOS 5.0 (3 disks).


AUTHOR/COMPANY INFORMATION

        Name:           Commodore Business Machines, Inc.
        Address:        1200 Wilson Drive
                        West Chester, PA  19380
                        USA.

        (Commodore has different addresses outside the U.S.)


LIST PRICE

        $999 (US) is the last list price I have seen, but no one is paying
more than $200-$250 here in the USA.  I paid $208.30 (US) to have it
delivered to my door (after an 11-week wait).


SPECIAL HARDWARE AND SOFTWARE REQUIREMENTS

        HARDWARE

                The documentation states that the bridgeboard may be
                installed in any A2000 or A3000 series Amiga.  AGA machines
                are not mentioned.

                No minimum memory requirement is mentioned.  The bridgeboard
                uses its own RAM and comes with 1MB onboard (expandable to
                8MB).

                A hard drive is not required, although the documentation
                states that running from floppy disks is slower, and
                requires more frequent disk swapping (no kidding!).  (Note:
                the INSTALLATION section of this review assumes a hard drive
                installation.  If you don't have a hard drive, you're on
                your own.  Why didn't you buy a hard drive instead of a
                bridgeboard?)

        SOFTWARE

                The bridgeboard works under both Release 1.3 and Release 2
                of the operating system.  (Again, AGA machines are not
                mentioned.)


MACHINE USED FOR TESTING

        Amiga 3000, 25MHz
        2 MB Chip RAM, 4 MB Fast RAM.
        2 internal floppy drives:  1 normal, 1 dual-speed.
        2 internal hard drives:  52MB and 212MB.

        AmigaDOS version: 2.04
        Kickstart: version 37.175
        Workbench: version 37.67


INSTALLATION

        The hardware installation instructions are clear and have several
illustrations to help you.  There are separate installation sections for
A2000's, A3000's, and A3000T's.  It is important to follow the manual since
there are some jumpers on the bridgeboard that need to be set prior to
inserting it into your Amiga.

        The trickiest part of the installation is deciding what your floppy
setup is going to be.  You can use PC floppy drives in an internal bay, you
can declare Amiga floppy drives as "PC Only" or "Shared", and you can connect
external Amiga drives directly to the bridgeboard.  There are several
combinations, but in any event, no more than 2 floppy drives are accessible
by the bridgeboard.  I opted to declare my dual-speed floppy as shared, and
not connect the normal floppy.

        Depending on your choice of floppy drives, you set the jumpers,
connect the cables, and plug in the board.  It was a somewhat tight fit, but
I found that "see-saw"-ing the board (first one side, then the other) got it
in.

        Installing the software comes next.  The Amiga Janus uses the
standard Installer utility, and I had no problems there.  You can create an
Autoboot virtual drive at this point or later; I chose later.  Two programs
from the Amiga Janus disk are worth mentioning.  PCPrefs is a utility to
define bridgeboard parameters.  You need to declare at least your floppy
drive setup and video mode (monochrome or color) before you can boot the
bridgeboard.  The manual explains the necessary options quite well.  Flipper
is a utility that automatically detects whether the disk you insert is a DOS
or AmigaDOS disk.

        The hardest part of the install for me was repartitioning my hard
drive.  I had been using a dedicated partition with IBeM (a software PC
emulator); since the bridgeboard uses a virtual drive (one big file on the
Amiga side), I had to back up my partition to DOS floppy, delete the
partition, and then make the new virtual partition and restore all my
software.  What a pain.  Those of you moving up from software emulators, set
aside some time for this.  Again, the instructions on making a virtual drive
are clear.  The manual states that you should add 30 to 50 buffers per
megabyte of virtual drive size to the partition with the virtual drive.
This visibly speeds up performance.  I made a 20MB partition and did not
create a JLINK drive, which is a non-booting virtual drive that grows as you
fill it (an Autoboot drive has a fixed size).

        You then boot the bridgeboard and run the BIOS Setup utility.  You
have now crossed over to the DOS domain (novice adventurers beware!).  You
again have to declare your floppy configuration and video mode.  If you have
additional RAM or a dedicated hard drive, you also declare those here.

        Now comes the first real problem I ran into.  The section of the
User's Guide that covers DOS installation tells you very little; it
frequently refers to the "DOS User's Guide" (I assume they mean the DOS
Reference Manual) and its instructions on using the DOS installation
utility.  Well, the DOS Reference Manual is a straight reprint of the
Microsoft one, and Microsoft publishes the installation instructions in a
separate booklet, "Getting Started with MS-DOS," which Commodore does not
include with the bridgeboard.  Fortunately, I have done this several times
before.  After you exit the BIOS setup, the bridgeboard reboots.  If you
hadn't inserted the first MS-DOS diskette yet, do so, then give the
bridgeboard the DOS variant of the 3-fingered salute to reboot:
Ctrl-Alt-Del.  DOS is then booted from floppy.  Now you must format your
virtual hard disk.  The manual states that FDISK and FORMAT are run by the
DOS installation utility automatically; I ran them myself.  They are both
straightforward to use, and explained in detail in the DOS Reference
Manual.  To install DOS, just type "install" at the DOS "A>" prompt.  It
walks you through.

        I also had problems installing the PC Janus software. It doesn't
completely install if you follow the instructions in the guide, which tell
you to enter "xcopy a:\janus c:\janus".  After typing that, you must also
type "xcopy a:\dos c:\janus" to get the rest of the Janus files to your hard
drive.  Appendix E shows that all of the DOS files are supposed to be in the
Janus subdirectory, but in fact, the following four files are in the \dos
subdirectory:  keyboard.com, keyboard.sys, emm.sys, and bbsetup.com.


REVIEW

        Since the bridgeboard is so versatile, I will not spend much time in
this REVIEW section.  I have not tried many things that others will;
hopefully some other people will post their experiences.  Some notes about
expansion, though:

        RAM -- the bridgeboard uses 80ns page mode ZIPs.  (The 16MHz model
can use 100ns ZIPs.)  It comes with 2 of the 4 banks filled with 256Kx4
chips; you can add 1MBx4 chips 1 bank at a time, or replace the 256Kx4 chips
with 1MBx4 chips.

        Hard disks -- you can add a dedicated PC hard disk, which supposedly
runs much faster than the virtual drives.  Using the ADISK utility, you
can even have an Amiga partition on the PC hard drive.

        FPU -- you can add an 80387 numeric coprocessor to the board.

        Video adapters -- the Amiga supports MDA (monochrome) and CGA modes
through the native display.  If you add a video adapter board, you must hook
up a monitor directly to the adapter card.  In my opinion, this would suck.
I have heard vague accounts of switchers that will allow you to use one
monitor with two RGB inputs.  If I get a VGA board, I will certainly invest
in one of these.  Another drawback is that you cannot see the PC screen on
the Workbench (or use Amiga-M to toggle screens) because you must disable
the MDA/CGA emulation if you install an adapter board.

        Printing -- the bridgeboard can use the Amiga's serial or parallel
ports for printing.  On the Amiga side, you run a program which gives
control of the PAR: or PRT: device to the bridgeboard.

        Modems -- you must install an internal modem card or a serial card
for the bridgeboard to use; it cannot use the Amiga's serial port for
modem access.

        I use the bridgeboard to run Quattro Pro and PAF (Personal Ancestral
File, a genealogy program).  For DOS programs such as these I find the
bridgeboard works quite well.  You may quite logically argue that a '386
is overkill for such applications.  In the future I plan to add a
multipurpose board like the Cardinal SoundVision and run Windows or Linux.
I also plan to try some (S)VGA games.  (When I do, I will post a followup
review.)

        Here are some performance numbers from Norton's SI utility, both for
the bridgeboard and my '386/33 at work (by the way, a rating of 1.0 is
equivalent to an 8088 XT):

                        Bridgeboard (in CGA mode)               PC

CPU speed:              18.9                                    36.0

Hard disk:               4.6                                     7.2
Avg seek:                0.0                                    14.86 ms
Track-track:             0.0                                     3.60 ms
Xfer rate:              348.8 KB/sec                            747.3 KB/sec

Overall:                14.1                                    26.3

        Note:  When running on the bridgeboard, Norton warned that an
"advanced disk controller" was found.  Apparently, such controllers are
often designed such that they only move the heads when data is actually
read/written (so the seek times are invalid -- as if you couldn't tell).  It
also warned that all numbers for the hard disk are probably better than
actual.  I suppose you really want a dedicated hard disk if you are doing
disk-intensive work.


DOCUMENTATION

        Included documentation is the A2386SX Bridgeboard User's Guide and
the Commodore MS-DOS 5.0 Reference Manual.  The MS-DOS Reference Manual is
straight from Microsoft, so it is as good (or bad) as anything that
Microsoft does.  The bridgeboard user's guide is professionally printed,
easy to read, and, aside from the errors noted in INSTALLATION, accurate.
The appendices contain handy technical information.


LIKES AND DISLIKES

        The ability to run programs like Quattro Pro and have the system keep
up with my keystrokes is nice ;-).  My software-only emulator dragged
terribly.

        I can finally access 1.44MB floppies!  IBeM with the MSH filesystem
couldn't handle these.  (Of course, I could have bought CrossDOS or AmigaDOS
2.1, but I hate buying commercial software unless I really have to, and I'm
waiting for AmigaDOS 3.1.)

        AREAD and AWRITE are cool.  They allow you to copy a file from an
MS-DOS filesystem (hard drive or floppy) to any Amiga volume.

        The Flipper program that detects whether you inserted a PC or Amiga
floppy in a shared drive is a little slow.  Having installed *numerous*
multidisk software packages on PC's, I like to hit the Return key as soon as
I have inserted the next disk.  You can't do that with my setup; you have to
wait about 2-3 seconds for Flipper to react.  Otherwise, the read is
corrupted, and you have to reinstall.  The solution, of course, would be to
have a PC only floppy drive.  Oh, well.  At least I can listen to a MOD
while installing DOS software.

        The method of partitioning a hard drive for MS-DOS use is more
intuitive to me than the bridgeboard's method of using one big file as the
DOS filesystem.  I would think it would be faster, too, but who knows?  It
would have been nice to avoid the hard disk reorganization, but that is a
relatively minor complaint.

        My ego would be greatly bolstered if my bridgeboard had faster Norton
numbers, but I suppose the decrease is due to communication between the
Amiga and the bridgeboard.  It is unrealistic to suppose that the
bridgeboard will be as fast as a straight PC with the same processor.

        Colors can be a problem.  When I first started Quattro Pro, I was
running in mono mode, and I couldn't see anything.  I switched to CGA and it
worked fine.  Other DOS programs may have similar difficulties.


COMPARISON TO OTHER SIMILAR PRODUCTS

        I have used IBeM, a shareware software-only emulator.  It boots much
faster than the bridgeboard, but of course, runs much slower.  The IBeM
documentation claims approximately XT speed on a 3000/25 setup such as
mine.  (I could never run Norton's SI -- I got a division by zero error,
due, I presume, to IBeM's not implementing the real-time clock.  I wonder
what the numbers are like on CrossPC.)


BUGS

        The only bugs I've found were in the documentation, as I mentioned
in INSTALLATION.  Of course, there are many things I haven't tried yet.


VENDOR SUPPORT

        I've never contacted the vendor for support, but I did send email to
Dave Haynie once.

        I'm not affiliated with Commodore in any way, but I'm thinking about
buying stock and joining the "Oust Irving Gould" campaign.


WARRANTY

        There is a one year warranty on manufacturing defects; it is
non-transferable.


CONCLUSIONS

        The bridgeboard does everything it purports to, so far as I can tell.
As I said before, I plan to post followups when I expand the PC side of my
Amiga.

        I would enjoy hearing from other bridgeboard users, especially those
who have installed expansion boards or other peripherals, *or* alternate
operating systems.  My email address is m.guthrie@bull.com.




@endnode
***************************************************************************
@node P4-3 "Holonet"                                    
@toc "menu"

/// Holonet:  Inexpensive Internet Access
    -------------------------------------


                                *** HOLONET ***


HoloNet is an easy to use Internet Access BBS.

HoloNet is based on custom BBS software which provides an easy to use menu
driven interface.  HoloNet is ideal for those looking for an easy way to
use Internet services.  HoloNet does not currently provide UNIX shell
access.

Services include:

    o  Convenient Access
       A local call in 850+ cities nationwide.

    o  Online Publications
       Include USA Today Decisionline, Newsbytes, Datanet Computer News,
       Eeeekbits, and Boardwatch Magazine.

    o  USENET
       Averages over 30MB of USENET news per day.  The following news
       readers are available: NN, TIN, and RN.

    o  Internet E-Mail
       Members have an Internet E-mail address similar to:
       member@holonet.net

    o  Internet Access
       Access to telnet, talk, finger, IRC, and FTP.
       (note: you must comply with the policies of any networks you use)

    o  Single and Multi-player Games
       Board, card, fantasy, and puzzle games.

    o  Support for Eudora
       Excellent off-line Macintosh e-mail reader.

    o  UUCP E-mail and USENET feeds
       Link LAN E-mail systems and BBSes to the Internet.

How to try HoloNet for FREE:
      Telnet: holonet.net
       Modem: 510-704-1058 (Berkeley, CA) at 1200, 2400, 9600, or
              14400 bps.  There are free demo numbers nationwide, for an
              automated response containg a list of access numbers, send
              e-mail to access@holonet.mailer.net

How to get more information:
      E-mail: info@holonet.net
       Modem: 510-704-1058 at 1200, 2400, 9600, or 14400bps
       Voice: 510-704-0160
         Fax: 510-704-8019

HoloNet is a service mark of Information Access Technologies, Inc.

           Copyright © 1992 Information Access Techologies, Inc.
                           All Rights Reserved.


@endnode
***************************************************************************
@node P1-9 "Portal System News"
@toc "menu"


/// Portal System News!
    -------------------
    From Portal Customer Service


Portal in the Media
------------------

Portal Communications was the subject of a featured column on Prodigy
last month.  The coverage was very favorable and has made many Prodigy
users aware of what a *real* internet service provider is all about.  We
are currently negotiating with the Los Angeles Times Syndicate for the rights
to the article so that we may include it in our information packets.

Additionally, Bay Area users can look for our full page advertisement in
Computer Currents magazine.  The response has been favorable and we plan
to do more advertising in this magazine and others.


New Internet Database:  Library of Congress Information System (LOCIS)
-----------------

Online users now have menu-driven access to the Library of Congress Catalog,
a federal legislation database, copyright information, a Braille and
Audio information database, and foreign law information.  LOCIS is available
under "Internet Databases."  Type "go internet".  Shell users can
"telnet locis.loc.gov"


User-friendly Utility added to Internet Services:  Gopher
-----------------

   gopher  n.  1. Any of various short tailed, burrowing mammals of
   the family Geomyidae, of North America.  2. (Amer. colloq.)
   Native or inhabitant of Minnesota: the Gopher State.
   3. (Amer. colloq.) One who runs errands, does odd-jobs, fetches
   or delivers documents for office staff.  4. (computer tech.)
   Software following a simple protocol for tunneling through a TCP/IP
   internet.

Portal users will find the fourth definition most applicable for easing their
navigation through the vast wilds of the Internet.  Gopher's key word search
capability is a powerful tool for quickly finding what you are looking for.
Its easy-to-use menus will be appreciated by Online subscribers.
Type "go internet".  Shell users type "gopher"


IBM SIGs Receive BIG New Disk Drive
------------------

The MSDOS, Windows, and OS/2 SIGs have been allocated a brand new
3.3 gigabyte disk drive to accommodate their projected growth.  The added
capacity will enable the SIGs to update their file libraries and build
a respectable local resource so that Portal users will not have to search
all over the Internet for a particular file.  The SIG moderators are
experts in locating files.  Be sure to ask them if you are having difficulties
finding a file you need.


No Snoozing Allowed
-------------------

We installed a 30-minute timeout on our interactive services accounts.  This
means accounts left idle for 30 minutes will be disconnected.  This should
improve performance and distribute resources for more active users.




@endnode
***************************************************************************
@node P4-4 "NVN"
@toc "menu"

/// NVN WANTS YOU!                        Another Network Supports Amiga!
    --------------



                       National Videotext Network (NVN)


National Videotext Network (NVN) has recently added an Amiga Forum to it's
growing lists of available services.  The Amiga Forum is ready and waiting
for you!

Order an extended NVN Membership of 6 or 12 months, pay for it in advance
and receive a bonus in connect time at no additional charge.  Choose from
two subscription plans:

6-Month Membership
------------------

Pay just $30 for a 6-month Membership and receive a usage credit that
entitles you to $15 of connect-time in the Premium services of your choice.
Your total savings using this plan would be over $20!*

12 Month Membership
-------------------

Pay $50 for a full year's Membership and get even more free time online.
We'll give you a $25 usage credit to use in your favorite Premium services
or try out new ones.  You could save as much as $45.*

For more information about either of these plans, give us a call at
1-800-336-9096.


                            -=* 9600 BAUD USERS *=-
                  $6/hour non-prime time - $9/hour prime time

                       You can join NVN one of two ways.
                By voice phone 1-800-336-9096 (Client Services)
                                      or
                        via modem phone 1-800-336-9092.


@endnode
***************************************************************************
@node P4-6 "BIX"
@toc "menu"

/// BIX - Byte Information Exchange             Lots of information!
    -------------------------------


Give BIX a try with our new 5 for $5 offer! 

Join BIX today and get 5 hours of evening and weekend access for just 
$5.00! Use the rest of the calendar month to explore BIX, with the 
option of continuing for only $13 per month. Further details and complete 
rate information are provided during registration.

Using any communications program, dial 1-800-695-4882. At the "logon"
prompt enter bix. Then at the "name?" prompt enter bix.amw37.

Questions? Call us at 1-800-695-4775 (voice). Or fax to 617-491-6642.
Send Internet mail to bix@genvid.com


@endnode
***************************************************************************

@node P3 "Dealer Directory"
@toc "menu"

/// Dealer Directory                               Serving our readers!           
    ----------------



                           Almathera Systems Ltd
                              Challenge House
                              618 Mitcham Rd
                              Croydon, Surrey
                             CR9 3AU  England
                         VOICE: (UK) 081 683 6418
              Internet: (Sales) almathera@cix.compulink.co.uk
                  (Technical) jralph@cix.compulink.co.uk


                           Amigability Computers
                               P.O. Box 572
                          Plantsville, CT  06479
                            VOICE: 203-276-8175
                        Internet: amiga@phantm.UUCP
              (Send E-mail to subscribe to our mailing list)
                               BIX:  jbasile
                         Internet: jbasile@BIX.com


                            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
                              GEnie:  B.GRAY


                       Computers International, Inc.
                             5415 Hixson Pike
                          Chattanooga, TN  37343
                           VOICE:  615-843-0630


                               Digital Arts 
                           122 West 6th Street
                          Bloomington, IN  47404 
                           Phone: (812)330-0124 
                           Fax:   (812)330-0126 
                               BIX:  msears 
 

                           Finetastic Computers
                           721 Washington Street
                            Norwood, MA  02062
                           VOICE:  617-762-4166
                       Portal:  FinetasticComputers
               Internet:  FinetasticComputers@cup.portal.com


                                MicroSearch
                        9000 US 59 South, Suite 330
                              Houston, Texas
                           VOICE:  713-988-2818
                            FAX:  713-995-4994


                          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


                              PSI Animations
                         17924 SW Pilkington Road
                          Lake Oswego, OR  97035
                           VOICE:  503-624-8185
                     Internet:  PSIANIM@agora.rain.com


                           Software Plus Chicago
                          3100 W Peterson Avenue
                             Chicago, Illinois
                           VOICE:  312-338-6100



          (Dealers:  To have your name added, please send Email!)

@endnode
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
@node P1-10 "Uploading files"
@toc "menu"


///Uploading files
   ---------------
   By Robert Niles


Well simply put....I can't think of anything exceptionably 
creative today. Kind of like that writer's block thing you hear 
about from time to time. So, if you don't mind, I'll just babble 
a bit.

But I'll babble about something ...ummm..errrr...relevant.

Often I log onto BBSes throughout the United States and I even 
dabble a bit overseas (Ma Bell sent me a letter stating that my 
LD costs dropped down to about $300.00 last month and they wanted 
to know if something was wrong). Well have you ever entered the 
file area of a particular BBS, started looking at the files, 
seeing the descriptions and all, and wondered about things like:

What version is this file? Is this the same program that so and 
so did? The name sure looks alike. What the <beep> is 
ROFLWS112.LHA?? What's the difference between DREP111.LHA and 
DREP11_1.LHA?

These are things that boggle me at times...going into a file 
library and not being able to tell what's what.

So I'll make a suggestion...and of course if your local BBS or 
the online service that you call wishes you to do it a different 
way...don't go getting them mad at me, but I think this would be 
helpful, and would very much improve the look of any database.

Say you have a file called SNOOP141.LHA...well it is usually easy 
to tell that the version is 1.41 ...but it could be 0.141 or 
14.1. And what is SNOOP anyways? Something to let you spy on 
other computer users? A task snooper? What is it??

Best thing to do is keep the file named the same way as the 
person who made the archive named it...for the most part, this 
keeps the author happy, and it becomes the standard name. As if 
this file was named Snp141.LHA on one system and Snoop141.LHA on 
another system, one might not know if he/she had already 
downloaded it or not. Of course at times you might get a file 
called Super_Snoop_1.41.LHA from one system, and you being the 
wonderful uploader, might want to upload this file to a system 
that only accepts the 8.3 filename format (ie: ffffffff.eee).

What should you do?? Well there's not always a BEST answer but 
try to take the main part of the program name and shorten the 
rest...like SSnoop141.LHA then if you still need to shorten it, 
take the vowels out. First the vowels that aren't relevant to the 
name, and then if you still have to remove the vowels from the 
name, do so, but at the same time, try to keep the meaning 
intact. Like SSnpr141.LHA. No special rules here, but common 
sense.

Next, you upload the file. And the system asks you for a 
description. Here's the best place to really tell others what 
this file is! 

Often I see something like this:

File       : Snoop141.lha
Description: Task snooper.

Doesn't tell you much and it leaves you guessing.

A good format would be something like this:

File       : Snoop141.lha
Description: Snooper v1.41, by Marco Polo. A system task snooper.

Simple...it lets the downloader know what it is..if he has that 
version...or something newer, and it gives a good idea of what 
that file is for. If you have more room for a longer description, 
great! Add all the information you feel is needed. But if you are 
in a hurry, or hate typing...a short description like the one 
above really helps. It helps the Sysop(s), the people who will be 
downloading the file later, and anyone who might be trying to do 
a search for it. He can search by the program name, the file 
name, the version, the author, or by what the program is supposed 
to do.

Well, I'm done babbling now, take care and happy BBSing!



@endnode

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

@node P1-11 "Humor Department"
@toc "menu"

/// The Humor Department           Jokes, Quotes, Insults, Shameless Plugs
    --------------------



From FidoNet/Usenet
-------------------

Area: AMIGA                                   Date: 30 Jul 93 19:42:11
From: Bill Sidhipong (1:115/300.0)
To  : All
Subj: Spam is dead.

Hi All,

Tongue-in-cheek humor follows: beware.
This is a repost of an article from usenet.  Enjoy.

8< ----- 8< ----- 8< ----- 8< ----- 8< ----- 8< ----- 8< ----- 8<

From: akersse@NeXTwork.Rose-Hulman.Edu (Elwix of Style)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.misc
Subject: Spam is dead.
Date: 28 Jul 1993 22:01:09 GMT
Message-ID: <236sv5$nrj@master.cs.rose-hulman.edu>
Reply-To: akersse@NeXTwork.Rose-Hulman.Edu (Elwix of Style)

Ha. It looks like I get the last laugh after all. All you Spamoids
who didn't believe me, well, now you can eat your words.

Even if Spam is not "officially" dead, it might as well be. Even the
staunchest consumers admit that Spam is far behind the other industry
leaders.

Reputable sources have told me that 35% of the Spam research and
development team have been laid off. Another 40% are slated for dismissal
in the near future. Other meat by-product manufacturers are already far
ahead of Spam in quality and taste.

These cuts in the development team can only mean that Spam will fall
further behind. Don't hold your breath for the new 50% Fat-Free Spam;
Dinte Moore is already selling a superior 95% Fat-Free meat by-product,
and at a fraction of the cost of Spam. And you mightaswell forget about
Corned-Beef Spam and Turkey Spam - with so much of the development team
gone there is little chance of getting one new upgrade out, let alone
three.

By next year, Dinte Moore and other meat by-product manufacturers will
have pushed the by-product technology even further. Even if 50% Fat-Free
Spam makes it to the market next year, it will not sell nearly enough
units to help Spam out of their financial troubles. They have reported
significant losses in each of the last 5 quarters. Besides, Oscar Meyer
has plans to introduce a new line of calorie-free ground turkey which
will leave 50% Fat-Free Spam in the dust. And what about the new Smoked
Pigs Feet from Eckridge? According to an article in Meat magazine, the
Eckridge Smoked Pigs Feet "really smelled like home-cooked pigs feet.
The taste was noticeably snappier [than Smoked Spam] and satisfaction was
almost instantaneous."

Spam has abandoned it's customers. In the past 28 years, we haven't
seen one decent upgrade. Spam is still using basically the same old
ingredients as it did when released way back in the 40's. In my opinion,
Smoked Spam was not a reasonable upgrade - only something to make Spam
consumers happy while the company floundered.

50% Fat-Free Spam --- too pink, too slimy, no thanks.

^^^^^^
 !!!!
 ()()    "Spam tastes so good, I've gotta get my fork!!!"
  \/          --- Stupid Spamoids when Smoked Spam was introduced

8< ----- 8< ----- 8< ----- 8< ----- 8< ----- 8< ----- 8< ----- 8<

  In case you're all wondering, the above post was a response to Marc
  (of-course-he's-in-my-kill-file) Barrett's peice on "AGA is dead".

8< ----- 8< ----- 8< ----- 8< ----- 8< ----- 8< ----- 8< ----- 8<

   Even if AAA makes it to the market next year, it will likely be slower than
graphics cards for VL-bus and PCI-bus systems systems by then and -- most
importantly -- locked into a system that runs VERY little software.  I thought
for a while that it might be nice to see a system with the AAA chipset tied to
a PowerPC CPU, but I no longer think so.  By next year, there will likely
be cards available for PCI-bus (which most PowerPC systems will use) that
will leave AAA even more in the dust.

   AAA -- too little, too late, no thanks.


@endnode

@node P2-3 "In Closing"
@toc "menu"

===========================================================================
                  Amiga Report International Online Magazine
August 6, 1993         * YOUR INDEPENDENT NEWS SOURCE *            No. 1.20
                     Copyright © 1993 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
STR Publications.  Permission to reprint articles is hereby granted, unless
otherwise noted.  Reprints must, without exception, include the name of the
publication, date, issue number and  the author's name. Amiga Report and/or
portions therein  may not be edited in  any way  without prior written per-
mission. However, translation into a language other than English is accept-
ble, provided the original meaning is not altered. Amiga Report may be dis-
tributed 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).  Distribution  on for-profit magazine cover
disks requires  written permission  from the  editor  or  publisher.  Amiga
Report is a not-for-profit publication.  Amiga Report, at the  time of pub-
ication, is believed reasonably accurate. Amiga Report, its  staff and con-
ributors 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  Commodore-Amiga, Inc., Commodore  Business
Machines, Ltd., or any other Amiga publication in any way.
===========================================================================
 
                                    Only
                  * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
                  *       _    _       __  ___    _       *
                  *      /\\  |\\   /| || //  \  /\\      *
                  *     /  \\ | \\ /|| ||(< __  /  \\     *
                  *    /--- \\|  \X || || \\_||/--- \\    *
                  *   /______________________________\\   *
                  *  /                                \\  *
                  *                                       *
                  * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
                             Makes it possible!!

@endnode

@node "menu" "Amiga Report 1.20  Main Menu"
@toc "menu"

@{"    Columns and Features    " link P1} News, Reviews, and More!
@{"     About AMIGA REPORT     " link P2} Staff, Copyright information
@{"      Dealer Directory      " link P3} Dealer Addresses and Numbers
@{" Commercial Online Services " link P4} Sign-up information
@{"     FTP Announcements      " link P5} Files available for FTP
@{"         Fred Fish          " link P6} Description of disks #891-900
@{"   AR Distribution Sites    " link P2-1} Where to get AMIGA REPORT


      

/// 08/06/93 Amiga Report 1.20   "Your Weekly Source for Amiga Information"
    --------------------------
    · The Editor's Desk       · CPU Report          · New Products
    · Dealer Directory        · AR Online           · AR Confidential
    · A.M.I.G.A               · More Fish Disks     · Supra Modem Info
    · Usenet Reviews          · Bridgeboard 386SX   · Fred Fish News

                          » Amiga CD32 Announced!! «
                           » Imagine 3.0 Features «
                » Amiga Report Available on World Wide Webb! «

===========================================================================
                 Amiga Report International Online Magazine
                 "Your Weekly Source for Amiga Information"
                            » FEATURING WEEKLY «
                  Accurate UP-TO-DATE News and Information
      Current Events, Original Articles, Tips, Rumors, and Information
              Hardware · Software · Corporate · R & D · Imports
===========================================================================
         @{" PORTAL " link P4-2} · @{" DELPHI " link P4-1} · @{" FIDO " link P2-1} · @{" INTERNET " link P4-5} · @{" BIX " link P4-6} · @{" NVN " link P4-4}
===========================================================================


@endnode

@node P1 "Columns and Features"
@toc "menu"

@{"     From the Editor's Desk     " link P1-1} Saying it like it is!
@{"       CPU  Status Report       " link P1-2} CBM-UK announces the release of the CD32
@{"         Online Weekly          " link P1-3} Amiga Report Online
@{"      AR available on WWW       " link P1-4} Read it while on the InterNet!
@{"    Supra Modem Information     " link P1-5} Information on ROMs, new and old
@{"      News From Fred Fish       " link P1-6} Fred Fish disks might come out on new format
@{"           A.M.I.G.A.           " link P1-7} ...and the story continues!
@{"  UseNet Review - CBM A2386SX   " link P1-8} Review of the 386SX BridgeBoard
@{"       Portal System News       " link P1-9} Updates, news and information from Portal
@{"        Uploading files         " link P1-10} How to do it right!
@{"      The Humor Department      " link P1-11} Spam, Spam, Spam! 

@endnode


@node P2 "About Amiga Report"
@toc "menu"

@{" For Starters " link P2-1} Where to get AMIGA REPORT
@{"   AR Staff   " link P2-2} The Editors, and Contributers
@{"  In Closing  " link P2-3} Copyright Information

@endnode

@node P4 "Commercial Online Services"
@toc "menu"

@{"   Delphi   " link P4-1}  It's getting better all the time!
@{"   Portal   " link P4-2}  A great place for Amiga users...
@{"  Holonet   " link P4-3}  Inexpensive Internet Access
@{"    NVN     " link P4-4}  National Videotex Network
@{"  InterNet  " link P4-5}  Subscribe to the AR Mailing List
@{"    BIX     " link P4-6}  For Serious Programmers and Developers
@endnode

@node P5 "FTP Announcements"
@toc "menu"

@{"  AmigaBase  v1.31  " link P5-1} A hierachical, programmable database 
@{"    BigAnim v3.3    " link P5-2} Anim player
@{"     QDisk v1.1     " link P5-3} Shows disk space usage
@{"  SunWindow v1.16d  " link P5-4} WorkBench enhancement tool
@{" Terra Nova Sampler " link P5-5} Sampler archive of Terra Nova release
@{"  VoiceShell v1.11  " link P5-6} Voice recognization utility

@endnode



                 -----------------------------------------
@node P2-1-1 "NOVA"
@toc "menu"


                               * NOVA BBS *
                         Amiga Report Headquarters
                          * Running Starnet BBS *
                         Wayne Stonecipher, Sysop
                            FidoNet  1:362/508
                 An Amiga Software Distribution Site (ADS)
                 615-472-9748  USR DS 16.8  24hrs - 7 days
                           Cleveland, Tennessee
@endnode           
                ------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-2 "In The MeanTime"
@toc "menu"


        
                          * IN THE MEANTIME BBS *
                  Official Amiga Report Distribution Site
                          * Running Starnet BBS *
                            Robert Niles, Sysop
                            FidoNet  1:3407/104
                509-966-3828  Supra V.32bis  24hrs - 7 days
                            Yakima, Washington
@endnode           
	       ------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-3 "Cloud's Corner"
@toc "menu"


        
                          * CLOUD'S CORNER BBS *
                  Official Amiga Report Distribution Site
               Starnet/MebbsNet Support Site West Coast USA
                          * Running Starnet BBS *
                            Larry Cloud, Sysop
                             FidoNet  1:350/30
                 206-377-4290  USR HST DS  24hrs - 7 days
                           Bremerton, Washington
@endnode
                 ------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-4 "Biosmatica"
@toc "menu"


         
                            * BIOSMATICA BBS *
            Official Amiga Report Distribution Site -- Portugal
                    * Running Excelsior/Trapdoor/UUCP *
                           Celso Martinho, Sysop
                             FidoNet  2:361/9
                  +351-34-382320  V.32bis  24hrs - 7 days
@endnode
                 ------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-5 "Amiga Junction 9"
@toc "menu"


                           * AMIGA JUNCTION 9 *
         Official Amiga Report Distribution Site -- United Kingdom
                       * Running DLG Professional *
                          Stephen Anderson, Sysop
                   Internet:  user_name@junct9.royle.org
      Line 1  +44 (0)372 271000  14400  V.32bis/HST   Fido 2:253/510
      Line 2  +44 (0)372 278000  14400  V.32bis only  Fido 2:253/520
      Line 3  +44 (0)372 279000  2400   V.42bis/MNP   Fido 2:253/530
                  Sysop Email:  sysadmin@junct9.royle.org
@endnode
                 ------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-6
@toc "menu:



                             * BITSTREAM BBS *
               The BBS of the Nelson (NZ) Amiga Users Group
                  Official Amiga Report Distribution Site
                       * Running Xenolink 1.0 Z.3 *
                            Glen Roberts, Sysop
                             FidoNet 3:771/850
               +64 3 5485321  Supra V.32bis  24hrs - 7 days
                            Nelson, New Zealand

@endnode
                 ------------------------------------------

           Amiga Report can be FREQ'd each week from the systems
              listed above.  Use the filename AR.LHA and you
                     will always get the latest issue.

                 ------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-7 "Freeland Mainframe"
@toc "menu"



                          * FREELAND MAINFRAME *
                   Offical Amiga Report Distribution Site
                       * Running DLG Progessional *
                           John Freeland, SysOp
                 206-438-1670  Supra 2400zi
                 206-438-2273  Telebit WorldBlazer(v.32bis)
                 206-456-6013  Supra v.32bis
                              24hrs - 7 days
                       Internet - freemf.eskimo.com
                            Olympia, Washington
@endnode
                 ------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-8 "LAHO"
@toc "menu"



                               * LAHO BBS *
             Official Amiga Report Distribution Site -- Finland
                             * Running MBBS *
                           Juha Makinen,  Sysop
                        +358-64-414 1516, V.32/HST
                        +358-64-414 0400, V.32/HST
                        +358-64-414 6800, V.32/HST
                        +358-64-423 1300, V.32 MNP
                            Seinajoki, Finland
 
Our machine is a 386/33 with 20MB of memory, 1GB harddisk and upcoming
CD-ROM drive. The BBS software is a Norwegian origin MBBS running in
a DesqView window. 

We have over 6000 files online (no CD-ROM yet) containing titles for PC
and Amiga or both like GIF-pictures, music-modules and text-files. The
upload/download ratio is a very lousy 1:100.  (i.e. you upload a 20k file
and may download 2MB).

Messages are mainly written in Finnish, but English is widely used by
Swedish-speaking and international callers.

Download-access will be granted when asked. Also Amiga-areas are available
for those who will need them to avoid 'wars' between PC and Amiga users.
Access to sex pictures and stories are only for persons over 18 years
and given when requested.

Every user has an access to download filelist (LAHOFIL.ZIP), list of
Finnish 24-hour BBS's (BBSLIST.ZIP or BBSLIST.LHA) and every issue of
the Amiga Report Magazine (AR101.LHA-AR1??.LHA) on their first call.

The system is 4.5 years old and sponsored by the local telephone company,
Vaasan Laanin Puhelin Oy.

   SysOps:   Lenni Uitti        (Main SysOp)
             Juha Makinen       (SysOp of the Amiga-areas)
             Tero Manninen      (SysOp of the PC-areas)
             

@endnode
                 ------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-9 "Falling BBS"
@toc "menu"



                              * FALLING BBS *
             Official Amiga Report Distribution Site -- Norway
                             * Running ABBS *
                          Christopher Naas, Sysop
              +47 69 256117  Rockwell V.32bis  24hrs - 7 days
                    EMail:    naasc@cnaas.adsp.sub.org
@endnode
                 ------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-10 "Command Line BBS"
@toc "menu"



                           * COMMAND LINE BBS * 
            Official Amiga Report Distribution Site -- Canada 
                Canada's Amiga Graphics & Animation Source 
                        * Running AmiExpress BBS * 
                           Nick Poliwko, Sysop 
              416-533-8321 V.32 V.42bis/MNP  24hrs - 7 days 
                             Toronto, Canada 
@endnode  
                 -------------------------------------------


