mcgurrin@MITRE.ARPA (07/28/87)
For those of you like myself, who have a Hayes modem and Smartcom I software, I spoke to customer service at Hayes the other day, and there is an update to old versions which adds support for XMODEM and PRODOS. It is available for $25 along with your original master disk, but you must get an authorization number from them first. They can be contacted at 404-441-1617. I was interested since I have just gotten a IIgs and need something with XMODEM to download Binary II files (eventually I'm sure I'll get a 1200 baud modem or maybe 2400 baud). Standard disclaimers apply, I have no connection with Hayes other than being a customer and pass this information along for information purposes.
burton@SILVER.BACS.INDIANA.EDU (Rex_Burton) (07/29/87)
what is this binary II files i keep readin about?
mcgurrin@MITRE.ARPA (07/29/87)
Binary II is a format which someone (I wish I remembered his name off-hand to give credit) developed for handling uploads and downloads of non-ASCII apple files. Various comm. software manufacturers had means for doing this, but they were non-standard. For this reason, software uploaded to BBSs or value added nets like compuserve loaded software in ASCII, and then you downloaded it and Exec'd it to have a working program. Unfortunately, IIgs programs are large, and ASCII versions take up a lot of space. What was needed was a protocol for file transfers that add the necessary file info (type of file and file size), and handled a full 8 bits. Binary II does this, and has been accepted as a standard by major commercial nets. The formats are freely available (and posted here awhile back), and commercial, shareware, and public domain programs are available which will handle Binary II files. The actual transmission uses XMODEM. I hope that this is a reasonably accurate summary of what it is. A much better description by the original author is floating around on various boards, this was all from memory.