info-mac@uw-beaver (08/16/85)
From: Moderator John Mark Agosta <INFO-MAC-REQUEST@SUMEX-AIM.arpa>
INFO-MAC Digest Thursday, 15 Aug 1985 Volume 3 : Issue 32
Today's Topics:
Switcher 4.3
FontDisplay 1.0
New Key Caps accessory
FreeTerm: a terminal emulator with MacBinary
Core Wars
HyperDrive and OverVUE 2.0
MACBOOSTER CACHE MEMORY; HARD DISK CAUTION FOR CACHE USERS
Disk Cache, RamDisk, Minifinder, Switcher
Macintosh Revealed
MacDraw Kudos
MacDraw to IMpress conversion program
MacTerminal and AppleLine Question
Versaterm problem
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Date: Mon, 12 Aug 85 11:00:19 pdt
From: barry@playfair (Barrett P. Eynon)
Subject: Switcher 4.3
Here is Switcher version 4.3, the "release" version, from Compuserve.
[Archived in [SUMEX]<INFO-MAC>UTILITY-SWITCHER-43.HQX. -RMA]
------------------------------
Date: 6 Aug 85 06:59:30 EDT
From: Jeffrey Shulman <SHULMAN@RUTGERS.ARPA>
Subject: FontDisplay 1.0
Below is a PackIt file containing FontDisplay and its documentation.
FontDisplay is a program that displays and prints fonts.
Jeff
uucp: ...{harvard, seismo, ut-sally, sri-iu, ihnp4!packard}!topaz!shulman
arpa: SHULMAN@RUTGERS
[This has already been posted to Usenet - Jeff]
[This file is archived in [SUMEX]<INFO-MAC>UTILITY-FONTDISPLAY.HQX. --RMA]
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 13 Aug 85 16:49 MST
From: Platt@HIS-PHOENIX-MULTICS.ARPA
From: <@CISL-SERVICE-MULTICS.ARPA:Dave-Platt@LADC>
Subject: New Key Caps accessory
This posting contains a new, "bug free" version of the improved Key Caps desk
accessory; it lets you display characters in a font other than the standard
one, via a menu. This version is in the new font/DA-mover format, and seems to
install and work properly with no special waving of dead chickens or other
ritual objects or tools. It runs fine on a 512k Mac under the Finder; I
haven't tested it to see which applications it is/isn't compatible with. I
found this one on a Mac bulletin board (either Firesign Theatre or Mass. Mac &
Electric; I don't remember which).
Dave Platt
ARPA: Dave-Platt%LADC@CISL-SERVICE-MULTICS.ARPA
[This file is archived as [SUMEX]<INFO-MAC>DA-KEYCAPS.HQX. -RMA]
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 13 Aug 85 17:00 MST
From: Platt@HIS-PHOENIX-MULTICS.ARPA
Subject: FreeTerm: a terminal emulator with MacBinary
This file contains the FreeTerm terminal emulator. It's a simple utility (dumb
CRT, no VT-100 or other cursor positioning). It understands XMODEM (checksum,
not the newer CRC version as best as I can tell), and also knows the MacBinary
protocol. For those who haven't run into it yet: MacBinary is a variant of
XMODEM that permits Macs to send applications & documents across an 8-bit link
complete with their file types & icons. MacBinary has a major advantage over
the "transfer to Mac" feature in MacTerminal 1.0: it's entirely encapsulated
within an otherwise-standard XMODEM stream, and thus you can use MacBinary to
send files to & from systems that speak only vanilla XMODEM (you don't need
doctored-up versions of MacGet and MacPut). MacBinary storage is becoming
extremely common on Mac-oriented electronic bulletin board systems.
This file is being sent as a .HQX'ed version of a PackIt document. You'll need
both BINHEX 4.0 and PackIt to decipher it. Once you've run PackIt, you'll have
both the FreeTerm 1.7 application and a MacWrite 4.5 file of documentation.
I found this version of FreeTerm on the Computer Languages bulletin board
system.
Dave Platt
ARPA: Dave-Platt%LADC@CISL-SERVICE-MULTICS.ARPA
[Archived as [SUMEX]<INFO-MAC>UTILITY-FREETERM.HQX. -RMA]
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 12 Aug 85 11:07:58 pdt
From: barry@playfair (Barrett P. Eynon)
Subject: Core Wars
Here is an implementation of A.K. Dewdney's Core Wars program, as described in
his Scientific American articles, with some documentation and sample fighters.
I have packed the files together with PACKIT and converted them with BINHEX 4.0
for uploading here. Reverse the process after downloading and moving the HQX
file to an empty disk, as the files take up about 90K unpacked.
[This has been archived as [SUMEX]<INFO-MAC>DEMO-COREWARS.HQX. -RMA]
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 9 Aug 85 14:08:39 edt
From: roy leban <@UMich:roy@lenat>
Subject: HyperDrive and OverVUE 2.0
I recently got OverVUE 2.0, which, incidentally, is a very nice program. With
the new version, you can install the program on a hard disk. The installation
procedure (which is the same for floppies and hard disks) involves copying the
files (in a certain order), running the original, exiting and then loading the
new copy (which is then validated).
What I'd like to know is what are they doing to my hard disk?
Here's my guess: There is this file "more.over" which starts out as being
several K long. After validation, it has it's size set to 0 and the file
"OverVUE" has it's modification set to now. My guess is that the file's
contents are still in-use, but are no longer pointed to by the directory entry,
and that OverVUE has some resource which has been modified to contain the
location on disk where the stuff is. The problem with this theory is that such
a scheme would allow the disk to be copied with a simple sector copy, which I
do not believe to be the case (am I wrong?)
The reason I'm particularly curious is that I have lost my Startup volume twice
after running OverVUE. Other than this, I have never had any reliability
problems with the HyperDrive. Does anyone have any better ideas as to what's
going on and possible reasons as to why I've lost the Startup drawer?
(Incidentally, avoidance procedure is to reboot after exiting OverVUE).
Thanks,
Roy Leban roy%farg@umich[.csnet] Roy_Leban@Umich-MTS[.ARPA]
------------------------------
From: John Clark <clark@rand-unix.ARPA>
Date: 14 Aug 85 12:22:10 PDT (Wed)
Subject: MACBOOSTER CACHE MEMORY; HARD DISK CAUTION FOR CACHE USERS
Lately I have grown quite attached to a product called MacBooster (published by
Mainstay)--a write-thru disk cache. In general, it works well both with
floppies and with my Tecmar hard disk. Speedup is dramatic, especially for
disk-intensive applications. It works with most copy-protected stuff, it
recognizes contiguous memory beyond 512K, and the price is reasonable ($50
list). If your Mac is >= Fat, forget about ramdisks...caches are the way to
go. (TurboCharger, by Nevins Microsystems, $90(?), is another commercially
available cache; I have heard that it is unable to recognize hard disks,
though.)
Speaking of hard disks... MacBooster DOES recognize them (Tecmar, at least).
However, since I began using MacBooster with the Tecmar, I have had several
mysterious hard disk "crashes" in which various volumes got trashed
sufficiently to require reinitialization.
If my understanding of what's happening is correct, this obnoxious behavior can
be expected with other hard disks and cache products, as well. Fortunately,
there may be a work-around... The problem is best illustrated with an example.
The following is specific to Tecmar and MacBooster; there may be differences
for other hard disk/cache combinations.
Suppose you mount, using the Volume Manager, a volume ("Vol A"), which gets
designated as Drive 4. You run MacBooster and create, say, a 320K cache. You
do some stuff with Vol A, e.g., delete some files, add some files, &c.
Whenever the volume directory changes, it is updated on the Tecmar from the
current directory in the cache. You're done with Vol A, so you run the Volume
Manager, unmount Vol A--which frees Drive 4, and mount another volume ("Vol B")
--which now inherits the designation, Drive 4. (Apparently, this unmount/mount
business goes on at a low level, "behind the back" of MacBooster, whereas
MacBooster works at the File Manager level.) You quit the Volume Manager;
MacBooster detects an inconsistency between its directory and that of the newly
mounted volume, and thus writes its version of the directory (Vol A) to Drive
4. Zap! You've just corrupted the directory of newly mounted Vol B. With no
file tags on the hard disk, you might as well forget about reconstructing the
directory. Depending on the damage, the behavior that ensues upon exit from
the Volume Manager can be quite weird; the Finder may or may not be able to put
up the icon for the volume. If you're lucky, you may be able to make a copy of
some files whose directory entries weren't overwritten.
How to beat this? Use the Volume Manager only to MOUNT volumes, not to unmount
them. Unmount volumes from the desk top by dragging them to the trash can
(Finder 4.1). Apparently, the cache "knows" about volumes unmounted in this
fashion, whereas it is oblivious to what the Volume Manager unmounts. I can't
guarantee that this will always work, but I have no contrary evidence so
far....
In regard to other hard disks and caches, this problem might be expected if the
hard disk "volume manager" works at a lower level than the cache works.
Has anyone else had problems like this? Perhaps someone else can provide a
better explanation of what's happening. I'd be interested in hearing of other
bizarre experiences with caches.
--John Clark
clark@rand-unix
------------------------------
Date: Sat, 10 Aug 85 14:51:30 edt
From: Velu Sinha <velu@maryland>
Subject: Disk Cache, RamDisk, Minifinder, Switcher
This is sort of a follow on to zim@mitre's question about how to most
effectively use RamDisk & Switcher together.
All four of these utilities are very useful, and speed up the performance of
the Mac immensly. However, it would be very nice if these could be used all at
once. Of course, on a FatMac, this is not so doable; however, on MegaMac's, it
would be quite useful.
Does anyone have any experience in using these utilities together?
In specific, could someone tell me how I can use Minifinder as THE finder from
RamDisk? It would be very nice if I could have system, minifinder, and an
application on the ram disk; and a disk cache to buffer read/writes [physical
disk] to data files on the physical disk.
Thanks.
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 9 Aug 85 23:54:46 EDT
From: winkler@harvard.ARPA (Dan Winkler)
Subject: Macintosh Revealed
First a note about the price of Macintosh revealed -- You can actually get it
for less than the cover price of $24.95. I got my copy of Volume 1 for $19.96
(plus $1.00) tax at the New England Mobile Book Fair.
I like it very much and I think it's well worth the price. It's very
elementary in places, but that can certainly be refreshing compared to Inside
Macintosh. It promises its second volume will be more advanced and will allow
you to send in for a disk containing the source of their main example program,
a mini editor.
The author is Stephen Chernicoff, whose name you may recognize from certain
sections of IM.
You may be amused by a few of the chapter titles:
Chapter 3 "Thanks for the Memory"
Chapter 4 "Any Port in a Storm"
Chapter 5 "Quick on the Draw"
Chapter 6 "Summoning Your Resources"
Chapter 7 "Getting Loaded"
Chapter 8 "Upstanding Characters"
Dan.
------------------------------
Date: Sun, 11 Aug 85 22:47:42 EDT
From: Joel Malman <malman@BBNJ.ARPA>
Subject: MacDraw Kudos
Well if no one else is going to say it:
I think we should send our kudos to Mark Cutter (at Apple Computer) for a job
well done on MacDraw (Version 1.7). While there are still some bugs (i.e. draw
a box, and try to print it in draft mode), he took a program that crashed more
often than I care to recall, fixed most of the bugs, and made it into a product
Apple Computer can be proud of. Mark, my hat is off to you.
joel
(The above is my own opinion and is in no way the opinion or policy, either
expressed or implied by BBN Labs., Inc.)
------------------------------
Subject: MacDraw to IMpress conversion program
From: dick@su-isl.ARPA
Date: 12 Aug 85 08:59:46 PDT (Mon)
Sender: dick@su-isl.ARPA
Does anyone in MacLand know of the availability of a program similar to
paintimp for converting MacDraw files to IMpress (Canon laser printer) format.
The paintimp program converts MacPaint files to IMpress format.
Thanx - R.Roy
------------------------------
Date: 14 Aug 85 10:40 EST
From: CML5A9%IRISHMVS.BITNET@WISCVM.ARPA
Subject: MacTerminal and AppleLine Question
We have access to a Mac hooked up to a VM system via AppleLine and MacTerminal.
I was wondering if anyone knew how to generate a New Line keystroke. The
user's manual seems to suggest that new line is generated by Return and the
Enter key is used as Enter. However, it seems as if both keys are acting as
Enter Keys. Anyone have any suggestions? This is esp a pain in XEDIT as the
Enter key causes a jump to the current command line.
- Tom Dowdy
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 14 Aug 85 15:50:09 pdt
From: mcguire@nprdc.arpa (Stve McGuire)
Subject: Versaterm problem
Running VersaTerm I am having problems with the PRINT GRAPHICS screen dump.
Printing seems to be fine until the last few lines which come out as complete
garbage. Has anyone encountered the same problem and how, if at all, was it
corrected? Any help would be greatly appreciated.
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End of INFO-MAC Digest
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