[comp.sys.amiga] Request for info on good Texas dealers.

hugh@kink.UUCP (Hugh D. Gamble @ Phaedra V's Amiga 2500) (11/15/89)

My sister and brother in law are in the market for a computer.
They used to have a Mac, but are considering getting an Amiga
this time.

The main use will be for writing research papers in chemistry
and math, and doing calculations.  Both of them are educated
professionals, but not especially knowledgeable about computers.

They are at Texas A&M University in College Station.  I would
appreciate the names & addresses of any good Amiga dealers in
the area, where they might go to get a demonstration of the
Amiga and advice about specific h/w s/w combinations.  A demo
of "Shadow of the Beast" on an A500 isn't going to interest them
much, someone who could show off a wp, spreadsheet, etc. on an
A2000, or A2500 would be good.

Email me any pertinent info, and one more, "serious use" Amiga
could well be the result.  Thanks.

P.S.  I don't need any suggestions as to what they should buy,
I can consult on that pretty well.  I don't have any first hand
experience with dealers in the area though, and as non-techies
they aren't about to buy something they can't get local support
for.
 

--
# Hugh D. Gamble (416) 267-6159  No Disclaimers.
# hugh@kink.UUCP 
# looking for a woman who can sit in a mini-skirt and talk philosophy,
# executing both with confidence and style. 

cmcmanis%pepper@Sun.COM (Chuck McManis) (11/18/89)

In article <27175.AA27175@kink> (Hugh D. Gamble) writes:
>The main use will be for writing research papers in chemistry
>and math, and doing calculations.  Both of them are educated
>professionals, but not especially knowledgeable about computers.

If you set them down in front of a system with 3MB and a decent 
HardDrive, then bring up the AmigaTeX previewer and then run TxEd
or something like it that has REXX capability, then start TeX.
Now in the TxED startup file have a line that says :
MACRO 't' TeXMe
And in the REXX: directory you put a file named TeXMe.txed, which
contains :

'SA' 'RAM:Texbuffer.tex' ; Save As RAM:Texbuffer.tex
ADDRESS 'AmigaTeX'
'TeXify' 'RAM:Texbuffer.tex'
END

Now in the TxED window enter something like 
$\sum{x - 1}\over{x^2}
\end
and type ^T (Control-T)..... Something *wonderful* will happen.
TxEd will run the Rexx macro, which will tell TxED to save it's
buffer into a file Texbuffer.tex on the ram disk and it will tell
TeX to actually format it, and then when TeX is done, the previewer
will pop to the front and show you what it looks like, which will
be a heck of a nice equation that *no other* wordprocessor in the
world seems to be able to do in a WYSIWYG or non-WYSIWYG fashion.

Click the front to back gadget of the previewer to throw it back behind
the Workbench screen and then keep editing. Want to see what it looks
like ? Hit ^T, if you put a macro on ^P to run dvips you can actually
have one to preview, and then when your happy hit ^P and it will come
out on your DeskJet Plus (or whatever you use) looking really, really,
nice. 

It was this kind of thing that turned a bunch of scientists at SLAC into
total Amiga fans. 

What you will need :
	3MB system (you can run with 1MB but to run everything at once you
		   (should get 3MB
	HardDisk   (40MB is fine, 80MB if their wild and crazy)
	QuarterDeck (To do backups)
	Rexx	   ( To glue the editor and TeX together)
	AmigaTeX + (To do the magic)
	HP Driver  (Or a printer driver for what ever your output device)
	WShell     (Because it makes even more whizzy things possible)
	Editor	   (TxED, CedPro, a modified uEMACS, UEdit, basically anything
		   with a REXX port should work.)


--Chuck McManis
uucp: {anywhere}!sun!cmcmanis   BIX: cmcmanis  ARPAnet: cmcmanis@Eng.Sun.COM
These opinions are my own and no one elses, but you knew that didn't you.
"If it didn't have bones in it, it wouldn't be crunchy now would it?!"