SLO BYTES NEWSLETTER - JANUARY, 1987 NEWSLETTER INFORMATION The SLO BYTES Newsletter is a monthly publication of SLO BYTES of the Central Coast of California (San Luis Obispo) an IBM/compatible personal computer user's group. Information found in this Newsletter is derived from magazine articles, manuals, books, other PC user group newsletters, and our own members. The purpose of this publication is to inform our members of meetings, their program content, and other information related to the use of IBM-PC's and compatible computers. Dues to SLO BYTES are $18 per year. As a member you will receive a membership card, an updated membership list, SLO BYTES monthly newsletter, and free use of our Public Domain Library. Contributors are asked to submit articles for the next issue by the 10th of each month either in writing or on disk (ASCII format preferred). Address all correspondence to SLO BYTES PC USER'S GROUP, % Bob Ward, 2100 Andre' Ave., Los Osos, Ca. 93402. Phone 8am-5pm 546-2164, after 5pm - (805)528-0121. Other user's groups have permission to publish any material found in this newsletter. Have a computer related item to sell? Tell the editor and we will put it in our newsletter. For further information call Bob Ward @ (805)528-0121 eves. **************************************************** Meetings are held the 4th Thursday of every month, unless noted otherwise in the newsletter calendar, at 6:15 pm. They are hosted by the Biology Department and located at Cal Poly University, Biology's Science North, Room 307. **************************************************** DI$COUNT$-DI$COUNT$-DI$COUNT$-DI$COUNT$-DI$COUNT$ Discounts usually apply only to regularly priced merchandise. Ask a salesman to make sure. You must present your membership card to receive a discount. Paradise Computers 5% - all computers, peripherals, 441 Marsh St. and software. San Luis Obispo 10% - Ribbons, paper, disks & 544-7127 other expendable items. Star Computers 5% - any software in stock. 655 Morro Bay Blvd. Morro Bay 10% - paper, ribbons, cable & 772-7827 other supplies. Computer Logic 10% - off retail - all computers, 973 Foothill Blvd. software, computer periphe- Store #4 rals and products. Contact San Luis Obispo Bruce, Paul, or Dave for 544-8347 your discount. $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ NEWS FROM OUR LIBRARY #058 PINBALL RALLY - Great pinball games: Pinball Rain, and Twilight Zone. Requires graphics. #169 PC-GRAPH by ButtonWare - use in conjunction with PC-FILE for all your graphing needs. #170 WORDSTAR Aids - several utilities to make WordStar easier to use. #171 Games, graphics, modem utilities, fast formats, and much more. #172 PC-TICKLE by ButtonWare - Appointment calendar, calculator, etc. #173 PC-STYLE by ButtonWare - Helps writing style and composition. A must for newsletter editors! #174 PC-TYPE by ButtonWare - Word processor. Evaluation copy limited to 200 lines Please note: There was a duplication in last month's additions. #169 BASIC Programming Aids was already in our library under disk #156. Also note #058, Expert System's Artificial Intelligence was replaced. This disk is part of another 4 disk program in our library, #'s 107-110, Database of Steel. PC-SIG goofed on this one! Demo's: 1. Andrew Tobias' "Managing Your Money" (update, 3 disks), and 2. Paradox Database interactive demo by ANSA. ++-+++-++-+++-++-+++-++-+++-++-+++-++-+++-++-+++-++- COMINGS & GOINGS Last month we had an exceptional meeting with refreshments, the use of a new computer projector, and a fine presentation by George Campbell. George took us step by step through Microsoft's QuickBASIC Compiler. After showing us how to compile a program he ran several benchmark programs written in BASIC and used by both BYTE and PC Magazine. BYTE uses the Sieve of Erastothenes which ran over ten times faster after being compiled, while PC Magazine takes a different approach by adding 10,000 integers together. This program, when compiled with QuickBASIC, ran 4.5 times faster. The results of both speed test were graphically presented. It's difficult to pick up a computer paper or magazine without seeing reference to PC clones. Next month we are fortunate to have Rick Smith from Star Computers in Morro Bay discuss with us IBM compatible computers. He will demonstrate the Kaypro 10. This computer comes with a 20 megabyte hard disk, dual speed (4.77 & 8 MHz) processor, and the ability to emulate color graphic programs on a monochrome screen (similar to the Everex Edge Graphic card). It also runs CPM software to boot (no pun intended)! Kaypro guarantees their computer will run all IBM business software. If it doesn't you have the option of returning the computer for a refund or Kaypro will do their best to modify the computer so it WILL run the software. Besides this 90 guarantee, the company warrants the computer for one year should you have hardware difficulties. Bring your favorite program and put this machine through its paces. Perhaps Rick can run our benchmark programs so we can compare the increased speed at 8 MHz. ==================================================== BITS 'N BYTES *** Raffle winners at our last meeting were: 1. Howard Amborn (disk holder), 2. Erin Wirtz (1 year membership), 3. Ron Jorgensen (10 disks), and 4. Bill Kearns (disk holder). Thanks to Rosemary Bowker for providing us with the interesting Raffle program. *** Due to a scheduling conflict, meetings will we held in room 307 this quarter. It's just down the hall from our old meeting place. Don't think anyone will get lost. Just follow the noise. *** At the suggestion of some of our members, one of the computers will have our file locator disk installed on drive D: (RAM). Several individuals have requested this as a means of locating specific public domain files that may be mentioned during the course of our meeting. The computer will be posted "D: file locator disk". This computer may also be used for copying disks during the meeting. *** Room 307 also has an adjoining room in which you will find a computer. Short tutoring and /or show and tell sessions will have priority over copying disks one this computer. *** Results of election of officers. President: Byron Smith (they liked his smile). First Vice President: George Campbell (they liked his presentation). Second Vice President: Dick Trueman (they like his unique utilities... where does he find all these things?). Secretary: Bob Ward (no one else is crazy enough to volunteer for this job!). Treasurer: Ray Miklas (his name is already on the checks). There you have it folks.... the gang leaders. $$$ Just a reminder for many of you. Check your mailing label. If it says JAN 86, we will be happy to relieve you of $18.00. We are still saving for some type of projection device so we won't have to depend on Poly's AV department. *** In the last newsletter Bob Ward mentioned several of his favorite RAM resident public domain programs. They may not work unless loaded into RAM in a certain sequence. A disk with the programs and a batch file indicating the correct sequence will be available at the next meeting. ==================================================== Reprinted from Harvest, November, 1986 Northern Illinois Computer Society DELETING MULTIPLE FILES By Andy Schwartz (from April '86 Saint Louis User's Group for the IBM PC newsletter) If there is a computing corollary to Parkinson's Law, it must be "The Number of Files Expands to Fill the Space Available." I used to think that 10 megs would be sufficient -- now I've upgraded to a 30 meg hard disk, but it won't be too long until I've filled that up, if I'm not careful. The ERASE command is a wonderful remedy for this problem. Individual files may be erased, or you may use the "wild card" characters ? and * to erase multiple files simultaneously, if there are some common elements to the names. For example: ERASE FILE*.DOC erases all files with the first four characters of the file name equal to "FILE" and the extension equal to "DOC". ERASE works fine if the multiple files have some common elements to their names or extensions, but what happens if you want to erase multiple files where there are not common portions of the names? You must issue the ERASE command multiple times, once for each file you want to erase. To get around this problem, and to make it easier to erase several files with one command, I created the following batch file, which I have called DELETE.BAT. ECHO OFF :LOOP IF .%1 == . GOTO ALLDONE IF EXIST %1 GOTO OKFILE ECHO The file %1 does not exist. GOTO GOON :OKFILE ERASE %1 ECHO File %1 is erased. :GOON SHIFT GOTO LOOP :ALLDONE The execution line for using this batch file might be the following: DELETE cat.doc cat.wks bird.lst horse.dbf Notice that multiple files are listed as arguments on the executions line, with spaces as delimiters. CONT. Each file name is initially loaded into a batch file parameter of %1,%2,etc. If the file with the name in %1 exists, it is erased as indicated by the message "File XXX is erased". If it does not exist, the message "File XXX does not exist" appears. The SHIFT command is then used to move the contents of %2 into %1, %3 into %2, and so on. Then when the loop is empty, the batch file branches to ALLDONE. This batch file will not only help you manage your disk space, but also provides an example of the use of the SHIFT command in batch processing. Of course, I am taking up more disk space by having the DELETE.BAT file there; I guess I shouldn't wonder why my disk is getting full. ==================================================== CALENDAR January 22nd Rick Smith - Demonstrate the Kaypro computer. February 26th French Morgan - Demonstrate the AST IBM compatible computer. Demonst- rate all capabilities of the Kodak DATASHOW computer projection screen. March 26th Bob Ward - Critique and demonstrate LeMenu - a hard disk management and menu program. Due to classroom scheduling conflicts, the January, February, and March meetings will be held in Science North, room 307. ==================================================== WORDSTAR version 4.0 by French Morgan For those of you who are Wordstar die-hards, Micro Pro is about to release the long awaited upgrade of Wordstar V. 3.31. The PC/MS DOS version of Wordstar arrived in 1981 as a converted program from the old (and still hanging in there) CP/M OPERATING SYSTEM. Since April 1983 and version 3.31, Micro Pro has not upgraded its product, but did try to replace it with a similar word processor call Wordstar 2000. This proved to be a very unpopular program which caused Wordstar to drop from #1 in popularity to almost out-of-sight. Since Wordstar was so widely used, many software companies (2 are Borland International and Ashton-Tate) emulated many of the old Wordstar commands; Sidekick's Notepad and the dBASE editor are 2 examples. The new release of Wordstar version 4.0 is expected the middle of January, 1987. Micro Pro will be sending out upgrade notices to all registered owners. Newcomers will have to wait a while longer to purchase a copy. Upgrade cost will be $89 plus shipping. The suggested retail price is $495, but look for mail order prices to be much less. Wordstar version 4.0 will have a new look to it, but still retain the old commands. Approximately 125 new commands and command sets have been added. If you have used Word Perfect then you may get an idea of what Wordstar version 4.0 will be like ... finally! An expanded list of additions and/or changes can be found in the January 6, 1987 issue of PC WEEK. Micro Pro did not initiate the new product/upgrade. A company in Pleasant Hill, California had been working on a new product called New Word. Micro Pro bought the product, added a few 'tricks' and ta-dah- h-h-h ... version 4.0. We will evaluate the upgrade and have a demonstration in the near future. ==================================================== NEW MEMBERS Welcome to the following new members. May all your problems be bits and not megabytes. Arthur Kennedy 772-7412 Peggy Rodriguez 541-2255 Fred Steele 489-8983 ====================================================