SLO BYTES NEWSLETTER JULY, 1989 What's New Our early meeting started at 1:30 with George Campbell demonstrating one of our new Shareware programs: COPY2. If you have ever tried to fit a large number of files from a hard disk subdirectory onto several floppies you will remember all the empty space at the end of each floppy disk or the frustration of matching the size of file to the capacity of the floppy disk. COPY2 does it all for you. It reads the subdirectory, then with some smooth calculations, copies files, not necessarily in the order they appear in the directory, to a series of floppy disks, filling each as it goes before asking for the next. The remainder of the early meeting consisted of fielding questions about DOS and other computer questions. After a short break, French Morgan demonstrated PrintRite. Here's the ultimate spooler that buffers print to file, disk or the printer. It pops up in the middle of any other program and reports all printer activity. This is a great program if you have two printers and two different printer ports. A simple keystroke and you can switch between five different printer ports. Much easier than using a mechanical switch box. PrintRite by Rite Software retails for $99.95. Included with their literature is a discount coupon for user group members saving you $25.00. I will have these at the meeting. Also look for the PrintRite demo disk in the library. Mark your calendars for next month. It should be interesting, entertaining and educational. The early meeting will start with George demonstrating two new devices he received for review. Both from Covox, Inc., one is called the "The Incredible Speech Thing", the other "Voice Master Key". The Incredible Speech Thing is just that. It is incredible. It consists of an external speaker, an amplifier and cable hooking in-line to your parallel port, and software. What does it do? It talks of course! It will read any ASCII file either from the screen or a file and through the speaker comes a very understandable synthesized voice pronouncing the words as "it" reads them. Actually it isn't an "it" at all. You can choose either a female or male voice. It comes with both. I was a bit skeptical before I heard this thing read, but even the pronunciation of proper nouns is very good. The Speech Thing talks as well as my 3 year old daughter.... very understandable. An excellent addendum for individuals with sight problems. During the second half of the early show George will demonstrate the Voice Master Key. This comes with a head set, similar to those worn by an air traffic controller or telephone operator, a cable, a board for the computer and software. This device "learns" your voice, creates macros and automatically runs your computer according to your voice command. To my amazement all George had to do was say, "PROCOMM" and the computer automatically loaded Procomm and ran the program. Next he said, "DIRECTORY" and it automatically listed the directory. Very interesting indeed. I asked him to teach it, "FORMAT C:", but that abruptly ended my personal demonstration. For our main meeting, Bryan Johanson, area manager for WordPerfect will return to SLO BYTES and demonstrate WordPerfect 5.0 and WordPerfect Library. Bryan was our guest speaker a few years back with an earlier version of WordPerfect. You won't want to miss this one I guarantee you. WordPerfect will dance before your eyes. What's In a Name? By Dan Hanson, PC Chronicles, Greater Cleveland PCUG, December 1988 Reprinted from MBUG-PC Newsletter, Monterey Bay PCUG, March 1989 Did you ever stop to and think about the variety of names that software companies use for their products? Lotus is not hard to figure out. They expanded the visible calculator (Visicalc) into a (1) spreadsheet which could serve as a (2) database and do (3) graphics. They claimed it was as easy to use as, well, you know what. Rumor has it that the name 456 was registered by a company in the hope of selling the rights to Lotus when the product was upgraded. Unfortunately for that company, they did not register the name Version 2.01. Being bilingual, Phillipe Kahn was able to come up with the next best thing in Quattro. After awhile Lotus got a little fancy. Would you rather spend all day with your hard-hat on struggling with Framework or take in a Symphony or relax with a little Jazz? Some packages are very pretentious. This may have started back in the CP/M days. A product came out that was not just another word processor but a Wordstar! Look, up in the sky. It's a bird, it's a plane, it's Supercalc. Even the whole subject of Expert Systems seems to be showing off. Perhaps the most ostentatious claim is the current best-seller, WordPerfect. Not WordPrettyGood but WordPerfect. I always thought that Mormons were more humble than that. You'd never see a ClevelandState Graphics package but Harvard Graphics is a best seller. Why should you be content to just do a good job on your spreadsheet when you could Excel? Would you rather do Windows or polish a Gem? Compare those gaudy names with the more unassuming VolksWriter (beep beep). Multimate sounds friendly. Imagine yourself in an Australian bar saying "I'll have another Multi, mate." HAL sounds like he's one of the boys and though Seemore might be kind of nerdy he's okay with me. I've never met Genifer but I'll bet she's broken some hearts. (No, I have not been Fontasizing about her?) Peachtree sounds tasty but I have to entrust my business to a fruit tree. (Sorry, John Sculley). Then there are the macho products. Who would want to go three rounds with something called Powerbase or Clout? Why just buy a programming language when you can have TURBO Pascal or TURBO C or TURBO Basic or TURBO.... Don't you feel a little unpatriotic in not buying @Liberty? Are we supposed to salute when Norton Commander marches by? I'm really leery about buying the Brooklyn Bridge. How about the mystical products like Revelation or Oracle? Sounds kind of like high-speed Ouija boards. Paradox might appeal to the schizophrenic market and Q&A to all the closet philosophers out there. Solomon sure sounds wise to me. I'm so afraid to buy Knowledgeman. I heard what happened to Adam and Eve. I like some of the plain descriptive names the best. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out what you do with Pagemaker or PC-Write. I hope Microsoft didn't pay too much to the genius who came up with Word. Even Apple users could figure out what to do with PC-Talk. What could be better than APL which cleverly stands for A Programming Language? I Always worry when a product claims to be easy. These are often the most difficult products to master. Is AutoCad really automatic? Will DacEasy let me scrap the accountant? If I hit my knee with a hammer will I master Reflex? Will a floppy disk really induce me into screaming Eureka? I like Sidekick. I can almost hear Tonto call me Kimosabe everytime I hit Control-Alt. Hi Ho Silverado! I wonder who's faster, Clipper or Sprint. Personally I'd bet on Lightning. The winner takes the Relay Gold. Some names are completely abstract to me. Once I threw my copy of Javelin across the room in frustration but it did not stick in the ground. Nor did my Condor sprout wings and fly. Tech support was not very helpful with this problem either. I am definitely not going out of my way to do anything with MUMPS. Yes, there is a virtual Tornado of different types of software names. Just AskSam if you don't believe me. Time to Manage My Money so I'd better Gofer now. NEW MEMBERS Welcome to the following individuals who joined SLO BYTES during the month of July. Doug DePue John Lawkies Gigi Sawyer Frank Stoiber And congratulations to Gigi Sawyer who won a copy of PrintRite at the last meeting. What a way to start out as a new member! EXPIRED Hey there, for get something? We need your dues if you wish to remain on the SLO Bytes membership roll. Allan McKibben Mel Sage Richard Shaffer Treasurer's Report Here's an accounting of the "bucks in the bank" by treasurer, Teri Sorgatz: Beginning Balance $ 821.73 Deposit $392.00 Dividend $ 16.20 Expenses $200.55 Balance $1029.38 Reference File By George Campbell SLO BYTES PCUG Some of you may remember a meeting a couple of months ago when we saw a demonstration of Right Writer III. Mentioned at the end of that demo was another program from Reference Software. Reference File was it's name and handling your data was its game. We didn't get much of a look at the program, so I thought I'd provide a brief review. Unlike most database programs, Reference File is memory-resident and sits in your PC's memory (using 140K!) until you want to get at your databases. You can also run the program by itself if you need all of your computer's memory, but that defeats the program's purpose. You can access as many different sets of data as you want, just by pressing Alt-F. Naturally, you can remove the program from memory any time you need the RAM for other programs. There's a full set of on-line help screens to make learning the program a snap, so you won't need to spend hours reading the manual before you get started. The manual is very good, though, and a quick read-through will insure that you don't miss out on any of its features. The program uses drop- down menus for all its functions, letting you forget all the commands and still have full access to the program. Once you pop it up on the screen, you can do almost anything with your data. You can create or alter your databases, add new ones, paste data into your applications automatically, search for any records that you need, and drop back into your application without so much as a by-your-leave. The program includes several sample databases, like a name and address file, a Rolodex-like address book, a bibliography database, Dos help, and others. These can be used as-is or changed to suit your needs. Naturally, you can create your own too. Unlike most databases, Reference File doesn't limit you to specific field lengths in a database. You can add text to any field to your heart's content, making it as long as you like. This has some distinct advantages over PC-FILE or dBase, since you often don't know just how long your data fields need to be. Reference File offers all the standard database tools, like sorting, fast conditional searches, printing reports, and importing and exporting data from other databases. Reports are easy to set up, and printing can use the facilities of most common printers to produce customized lists or even to print mailing labels from your data. Why look at Reference File? First, it's convenient. Having your data available at the touch of a fingertip is amazingly useful. Being able to insert an address into a letter you're writing, without exiting your word processor, can save time. Second, it's flexible. Since it's a text-based system, you can type as much information as you want into a database. The program's no substitute for a full-scale database like PC-FILE or dBase, though. If you're a business user with thousands of records, you probably can't handle them efficiently with Refrence File. For most of us, however, this program could just be the answer to a dream. You can contact Reference Software at 330 Townsend Street, Suite 131, San Francisco, CA, 94107. Reference File sells for about $100 and requires a PC with at least 512K of memory. It can run with any monitor. A hard disk is a must for this program. Question & Answers By Daniel M. Vance The Journal newsletter of the Tucson Computer Society, October 1987 Reprinted from INDY PC News, January 1988 Q. When I try to format more than one 2.0Mb diskette on my IBM PS/2 model 50, I get the error message: "Track 0 error: Invalid media." What am I doing wrong? Do I have a bad 3.5 inch diskette drive? A. No, you do not have a bad diskette drive. You simply have an undocumented feature (a bug) in the DOS 3.3 FORMAT.COM program. IBM is aware of the problem and is working to correct it. IBM suggests that when this error occurs, do a DIR of drive A, then format another diskette. Q. We leave our IBM AT running around the clock to allow other offices to call in by modem to update our inventory database. We notice on weekends when no one accesses the computer that the date on the unit does not advance properly. Is our AT CMOS battery going bad? A. Your battery is not failing you. If there is no activity on the system for 24 hours, with the time passing 2400 hours, the DOS DATE will advance the system date properly. However, if inactivity of the system continues for another 24 hours, the time passing 2400 hours, the DOS DATE will not advance the date to the next day. IBM is aware of the problem; their suggestion to correct the situation is to press at least one key for every 24 hour period or reset the date on the system when you return to work on Monday. Q. What is the difference between parallel and serial? Are serial printers better than parallel printers? A. The terms parallel and serial are communication terms to describe methods of data transfer between computers and other equipment. Parallel communication transfers eight bits of information at a time, each on a different wire, while serial will transfer the same data one bit at a time on the same wire. Serial cables are common since they use 7/8th's fewer wires than parallel cables. That can save a lot of money when working with large computer systems which may have miles of cabling running between buildings and cities. Parallel communications can run faster than serial. However, parallel cable is normally less than 50 feet long because data can be lost when eight bits are being transferred at once. At one time, you would rarely find a parallel cable over six feet long. Now with stronger signals from computers and better insulated cables, 15 foot cables are standard stock items in many computer stores. Serial cables can go for much greater distances before they need amplifiers or special shielding. An advantage in the "IBM world" is that most printers can use a "standard" IBM parallel cable. However, very few serial printers use the same serial cable, and there is no such thing as a standard IBM serial cable. The most common serial cable I see is the HP LaserJet cable which will also work on some of the HP plotters. The external Hayes modem cable will work several modems, but I have seen two different wiring configurations for it. The only standard with serial cables is that they use standard DB-25 connectors on both ends. IBM started to use standard DB-9 connectors on one end, now they have switched back to DB-25 connectors on both ends. Well, so much for setting a standard and maintaining it. Q. Why should I backup my data from my hard disk and floppy diskettes? A. You should always have a second copy of your important data and installed programs because stored data can be destroyed in many ways. Spilled drinks (hot coffee) can ruin a diskette and damage hardware in a flash. Sharp fingernails can do physical damage. Static electricity can alter data. Smoke particles can deposit on diskettes and leak through the small filters found on some hard disk drives. Operators too quick on the keyboard can erase the wrong disk or directory or even re-format the hard disk with older versions of DOS. A hard disk can crash, damaging data beyond recovery. The mechanics of maintaining the read/write head of a hard disk a few thousands of an inch above a disk spinning at over 3000 rpm have been likened to a transcontinental jet plane flying at an altitude of 100 feet. A particle of dust or smoke, a power surge or outage or a strong knock can force the read/write head into the surface of the disk, destroying everything in its path. Reports of office thefts show that personal computers are the number one item taken. Vandalism and fires do occur. Insurance can replace your equipment in a short time, but loss of data can halt a business operation. A good backup of all your programs and data can help soften this kind of damage and allow you to have your computer system running shortly after delivery of new equipment. Q. What is the difference between justification and proportional spacing? A. Justification is the printing of text with even left and right hand margins. The letters in the test will be spaced out to provide these straight margins. Proportional spacing is the adjustment of the spaces and letters to make text more readable. Larger characters will take more space than smaller ones. A good example is the letter "w", which takes more space than an "i". A new term to microcomputer word processing is kerning. Kerning is the technique of arranging two adjacent characters so that a portion of one overhangs into the space of the other character. Example: the letter "a" fits partially under the "W" like in the word "Wall". Q. I am using WordPerfect on a two-floppy-drive IBM XT. When I try to save to drive B, my data disk, I get the error message "File creation error". I have 50Kb of available space on my floppy disk, more than enough for my 20Kb file. I am using filenames which have no special characters. How can I avoid this error message? A. The error message you see is not generated by WordPerfect but by IBM DOS when you try to put too many files on your floppy disk. This error has nothing to do with available disk space, but the maximum number of filenames DOS allows on the root directory of a particular type of diskette or hard drive. On double-sided diskettes the limit is 112; on hard disk drives the maximum number of files on the root directory is 512. To avoid this problem, make one or more sub-directories from your root directory. DOS treats each sub-directory name as a filename. In theory you could have 512 sub-directories on a hard disk, directly off the root. News From Our Library The following disks have been added to our library for the month of July, 1989: #174 Two business application programs. CHURCHCF will keep records and run the financial end of Church business. BILL is a billing program. (what else!) #339 GRAPHICS FILES: ARTMART2 - a series of .PCC clip art. Cooking theme. 1STPUB1 - a series of .ART file for use with 1ST Publisher. They can be converted through 1ST Publisher to .MAC files for use in other programs. CARSIGN - You've see the yellow car signs in the back windows (grandmother in the trunk, etc.). Now you can make your own. No grandmothers allowed in the trunk though. PICEM19B - view paint files (.PCX) on any graphics monitor thru VGA. VUGIF180 - View those .GIF files in EGA or VGA. #340 UTILITIES: ASSIGN40 - Assign up to 100 function key combinations. CUDM22 - Colorado Utilities; diskette manager and cataloger. EMTMS210 - Format Master ver 2.18. Formats all kinds of disks. FFF103 - searches hard disk for file of your choice. HIDEIT - hide and unhide subdirectories. PDEL33 - Patiquin's sophisticated file deletion program. SPLIT48 - will split large files to fit on floppy disks. VAMPIRE - copy BIOS instructions to file. VLIM - created expanded memory from extended memory (requires 70K base memory). #341 UTILITIES: IAU19 - adjust your hard disk interleave factor. LISTFRAG - list fragmented files on hard disk. LKMUP251 - Lock 'm Up - password your computer. SST - seek stopper. Removes fragmented files. ZIPKIT41 - .ZIP accessory utilities. UPDATES: #252,253, & 254 - PC-CALC+ Buttonware spreadsheet #336,337, & 338 - PC-Type II Buttonware editor with spelling checker. This program was on disk #174. #325 Updated to Checkup ver 3.6 & FluShot+ ver 1.6. FIND1701 - virus checker added to this disk. DEMO'S: #122 LOAN PLUS - Advanced Performance Inc. #123 ESTIMATE - Construction cost estimates Disks #174, #339, #340 & #341 may be purchased for $.90 each or copied from the library in Fisher 292 during the meeting. Keep Your Hard Disk Healthy With Disk Technician Advanced By Bob Ward, SLO BYTES PCUG Several months ago I received a press release along with other literature expounding on the greatness of another "disk doctor".... Disk Technician Advanced from Prime Solutions. One news release detailed how the Air Force had adopted this program to keep their computer hard disks "fine tuned" and free from failure. I tend to believe news releases but was still a bit skeptical considering the release was written on Prime Solutions' stationary. The cover letter included an offer from Steve Luster, Vice President of Marketing, for an evaluation copy of said software. After some hesitation (I really don't have time to evaluate software and also write a newsletter) I called Mr. Luster and received Disk Technician Advanced two days later by UPS. OVERVIEW Disk Technician Advanced comes with a 71 page manual, and one 360 K software disk. Like Spinrite, the disk must first be copied as DTA is computer/hard disk specific. Once the disk is initialized it can not be used on another machine. The first time DTA is run a few simple questions appear on the screen: 1. Do you want to install it on your hard disk or run it from a floppy? 2. Do you want to install SafePark Advanced, the resident head parking program on the hard disk? and 3. Do you want DTA to select the most optimum operating conditions? I chose the fully automated format. After a few preliminary tests including optimizing the hard disk's interleave factor it settles down to do a first "monthly test". This takes just about four hours for a 30 megabyte hard disk on an 8080 machine, depending on the number of defects found and repaired. It is important to have a clock calendar or have the correct system date since DTA depends on this for testing in the future. All TSR and disk cache programs should be removed from memory. The first time through DTA marks all the errors as SOFT 1 errors which are defined as the failure to read/write at least one single bit of information. After marking the whole hard disk, DTA goes back and more thoroughly tests the suspected bad areas marking them as SOFT 1-4, or HARD ERRORS. SOFT 3 and 4 errors and HARD ERRORS are too unreliable for DTA. Any media found in these areas is first copied to another place on the hard disk before being marked unusable. After the hard disk is thoroughly tested a report is prepared which can be directed to either the printer or screen. The report details the number of errors, their type, and how many have been repaired. Daily testing is recommended on subsequent days and only takes one or two minutes to check the hard disk. After 7 days DTA does a weekly test which is more detailed than the daily test but not as rigorous as the monthly test. All the time DTA is watching the SOFT errors from previous testing and checking for new ones. Prime Solutions suggests running this program from a floppy disk. Otherwise, if your hard disk crashes you could loose the history and/or DTA setup. For the more adventuresome, a simple ESC just after the opening menu puts you into manual mode. From here you can override the automatic features choosing a "monthly test" every day if you wish. DOCUMENTATION The documentation appears adequate with several "snap shots" of different display screens followed by a detailed explanation. It includes a 10 Second Instruction manual for those who don't like to read documentation, and a large reference guide for doing nondestructive low-level formats, seek tests and bad track reports. The Error chapter is important for those few occasions where DTA finds a unique situation. I would highly recommend that a user of this program read ALL the documentation before attempting any DTA tests. SUPPORT I called Prime Solutions technical support twice; once to double check my configuration for a special RLL controller card and again for a more detailed answer to their error detection methods. After giving my registration number, I was immediately put in contact with a technician. Both individuals were very courteous and could answer any question put to them about DTA. Their answers were easy to understand even for a novice. THE ACID TEST The first hard disk I tested with DTA was at my place of employment. I sure wasn't going to bomb my hard disk at home if the thing didn't work. I tested a Miniscribe RLL 30 megabyte hard card. Since there was nothing wrong with it to begin with, I didn't think the results really tested the softwares' ability. Then came a Seagate ST238 30 megabyte hard disk that had been on our bulletin board running 24 hours a day for over a year and a half. This disk had been giving "seek errors" for a long period of time. The last time it formatted with Disk Manager the report showed over 600K bad sectors. Now this is a good indication that the patient is infected with a terminal illness! Then one day it just stopped working altogether. First we tried formatting it with Disk Manager. It said there was something mechanically wrong with it. Then we tried SpinRite just to get the same error message. For all purposes it was dead, dead, dead! Nothing would touch it, or even access the disk drive. It couldn't be reformatted. Our SYSOP was going to make a wall clock out of it just before I rescued it from his handy screwdriver and hammer. I thought, "Now here's the ultimate test for DTA." I booted DTA from my A: drive, put it in automatic mode and watched the screen. There was a lot of "grinding and groaning" and numerous errors flashed before the screen. I figured it would error out with the number of SOFT 1 errors it detected, but on it went for approximately 4 hours. Then DTA went back and retested the SOFT 1 errors. A message appeared on the screen giving me the answer to my original problem. A bad area on the boot sector had been found..... not a good place to have a blemish on ones hard disk folks! DTA worked a little longer and repaired all but 8K on the total hard disk including the bad area on the boot sector. Subsequent testing over the past two weeks shows no additional errors. CONCLUSION Disk Technician Advanced does everything it reports to do. Now I'd like to start collecting junked hard disks to see just how much life DTA could restore to them. Of course DTA can't work miracles. If a servo motor is going out or there is a real mechanical problem, no software in the world can fix it. I wouldn't feel I was giving a fair and accurate evaluation unless I found something that needed improvement. With DTA comes a file called SafePark Advanced. This can be installed onto your hard disk when DTA is initialized to the computer the first time. It's a resident hard disk parking program which does what is says but within very narrow parameters. SafePark parks your hard disk when the computer detects a lack of activity for only 7 seconds. Its limits are 1 to 15 seconds. Please, Prime Solutions, increase the upper limit to at least 3 minutes. It takes me just that long to type the next word. Disk Technician Advanced Prime Solutions 1940 Garnet Avenue San Diego, CA. 92109 (619)274-5000 $189.95 Fall Comdex, 1989 For those of you going to Comdex, here's the most reasonable transportation and accommidations I have found. Drive to Fresno (2.5 hours) and fly round trip via America West Air to Las Vegas for $88. This offer expires sometime in August. From SLO the airfaire is approximately $190. I'll gladly drive to Fresno and back for a $100 savings. Circus Circus still has rooms. One room, 2 people for $42.80 per night. Make reservations soon by calling 1-800-634-3250. If you need a car try Fairway Rent-a-Car. $19.95/day for a small car, $24.95 for mid-size. They are located within walking distance from the airport and open 7 days a week. Call 1-800-634-3476. Bits n' Bytes In all the confusion I forgot to pass out the discount coupons for PrintRite. They will be available at the next meeting. Also there will be a Demo disk of PrintRite for you to copy in the library. Next month look for the difference.... in the newsletter, that is. George is bailing me out while I'm out of town. He will be writing, composing and printing the newsletter in Microsoft Word 5.0. If you're so inclined, take a look at the first couple pages of the August issue of PC World. If you recognize one of the faces inside collect your free diskette jacket at the next meeting. This V.I.P. will be at the meeting and available for autographs. I don't know if he's handing out glossies or if he's just signing the magazine. It is with sorrow that I report the loss of one of our long standing members in SLO BYTES. Jim Hough passed away this month after a long bout with cancer. We'll miss him. We received a large number (50) trial subscription forms to PC Today. I will have these at the meeting. This subscription is free of any charges for a period of one year. Sample magazines will also be available. The BBS has been down for a couple days 7/10-13 due to a combination hard disk problem and/or tape back up problem. The exact cause has not been determined but all is working after a fresh reformat and reinstallation of Wildcat on the board. Our overworked underpaid SYSOP spent 9 hours getting it back on line. A big :} for George! French Morgan's review of PC Tools Delux appeared in the June issue of INDY PC News. Bill Roch's article on DOS HELP! also appeared in the same issue of INDY PC News. SAYTIME, written by our President, George, was chosen as part of June's Disk-of-the-Month for the Space Coast PCUG in Titusville, Florida. Good going guys! 4-SALE IBM PS/2 Model 30 === Hardly Used === dual 3.5" floppies 640K w/ DOS 3.* No hard disk.............................$795 Call Mitchell at 916-544-5919 or 213-455-2473 Calendar August 6th WordPerfect 5.0 to be demonstrated by Bryan Johanson, WP regional manager November 13-17 Comdex, Las Vegas