farren@gethen.UUCP (Michael J. Farren) (02/02/88)
Please note carefully: THIS IS NOT AN ANTI-MAC FLAME!
We wonder about the reasons software and hardware prices are high? In
an article from comp.sys.mac, rock@sun.UUCP writes about MacWorld Expo:
-The attendants were dressed up like space folk from the TV series "V".
-There was a videotaped 9 minute tour by Leonard Nimoy
-a slick young card shark right out of "Guys and Dolls".
-a guy and gal doing a song and dance take-off of "Entertainment Tonight"
-they gave out top hats
-holding drawings for lobster dinner for two, Federal Expressed in from
Legal Seafood of Boston.
-a drawing for a LazerJet printer
-a drawing from Apple.
-a laser light show on the ceiling.
Somehow, I think a little less expensive glitz might help a bit...
--
Michael J. Farren | "INVESTIGATE your point of view, don't just
{ucbvax, uunet, hoptoad}! | dogmatize it! Reflect on it and re-evaluate
unisoft!gethen!farren | it. You may want to change your mind someday."
gethen!farren@lll-winken.llnl.gov ----- Tom Reingold, from alt.flame chuq@plaid.Sun.COM (Chuq Von Rospach) (02/04/88)
>We wonder about the reasons software and hardware prices are high? In >an article from comp.sys.mac, rock@sun.UUCP writes about MacWorld Expo: >-The attendants were dressed up like space folk from the TV series "V". >-There was a videotaped 9 minute tour by Leonard Nimoy >-a slick young card shark right out of "Guys and Dolls". >-a guy and gal doing a song and dance take-off of "Entertainment Tonight" >-they gave out top hats >-holding drawings for lobster dinner for two, Federal Expressed in from > Legal Seafood of Boston. >-a drawing for a LazerJet printer >-a drawing from Apple. >-a laser light show on the ceiling. >Somehow, I think a little less expensive glitz might help a bit... Mike, you've never been to either NCC, Comdex, or the ABA Convention, have you? This stuff is low key compared to most conferences. chuq Chuq Von Rospach chuq@sun.COM Delphi: CHUQ What do you mean 'You don't really want to hurt her?' I'm a Super-Villain! That's my Schtick!
mike@ames.arpa (Mike Smithwick) (02/06/88)
["I have a dog. I named him 'Stay'. It was a lotta fun training him: Here Stay! Here Stay!"] In article <646@gethen.UUCP> farren@gethen.UUCP (Michael J. Farren) writes: >Please note carefully: THIS IS NOT AN ANTI-MAC FLAME! > >We wonder about the reasons software and hardware prices are high? In >an article from comp.sys.mac, rock@sun.UUCP writes about MacWorld Expo: > >-The attendants were dressed up like space folk from the TV series "V". >-There was a videotaped 9 minute tour by Leonard Nimoy >-a slick young card shark right out of "Guys and Dolls". >-a guy and gal doing a song and dance take-off of "Entertainment Tonight" >-a laser light show on the ceiling. > >Somehow, I think a little less expensive glitz might help a bit... > >-- >Michael J. Farren During the MakWorld Expo I saw a rather amusing news story on KRON. They were talking about using computers for music, and covered a large MacBash which had groups, and glitz coming out of the serial-wazoo. The purpose? To introduce a new >>> Wiz-Bang-Change-The-Furture-As-We-Know-It-Electronic- Miricle <<<: A MIDI interface!! Gee, I wonder what they'd do if they introduce Automatic-Tint-Contol. -- *** mike (Mr. Bug) smithwick *** "the only thing wrong with reality, it that it takes too much time" [discalimer : nope, I don't work for NASA, I take full blame for my ideas]
rob@uokmax.UUCP (Robert K. Shull) (02/09/88)
In article <4464@ames.arpa> mike@ames.arc.nasa.gov.UUCP (Mike Smithwick) writes: >In article <646@gethen.UUCP> farren@gethen.UUCP (Michael J. Farren) writes: >>Please note carefully: THIS IS NOT AN ANTI-MAC FLAME! >>We wonder about the reasons software and hardware prices are high? In >>an article from comp.sys.mac, rock@sun.UUCP writes about MacWorld Expo: >>...lots of examples from the MacWorld Expo... >>Somehow, I think a little less expensive glitz might help a bit... >>Michael J. Farren >During the MakWorld Expo I saw a rather amusing news story on KRON. They >were talking about using computers for music, and covered a large MacBash >which had groups, and glitz coming out of the serial-wazoo. The purpose? >To introduce a new >>> Wiz-Bang-Change-The-Furture-As-We-Know-It-Electronic- >Miricle <<<: A MIDI interface!! > *** mike (Mr. Bug) smithwick *** I wonder what the people that have been using MIDI on the Mac for years thought about this great new invention. Seriously, have you noticed that most companies promote their new products like they were the greatest/most important/most revolutionary invention in the past two centuries? Doesn't matter whether it's a new piece of computer equipment or a new variety of hand soap, there's still plenty of hype. The computer business is about the same as all the rest, no worse, no better. The only difference I can see between the Mac world and the rest of the computer business is a smaller percentage of blue suits. By the way, I agree completely with the comment about increased costs. It's one of the major reasons why MS-DOS clone makers can make their equipment so cheaply, while major companies spend a fortune trying to compete with each other's advertising. Robert -- Robert K. Shull University of Oklahoma, Engineering Computer Network ihnp4!occrsh!uokmax!rob CIS 73765,1254 Delphi RKSHULL Opinions contained herein in no way reflect those of the University of Oklahoma.
rock%warp@Sun.COM (Bill Petro - Program Management Office) (02/11/89)
San Francisco MacWorld Expo 1989
review and commentary by Bill Petro
CONTENTS:
What's Hot:
Star Trek Heizer Software
Hyper Hype Mathematica
SuperCard Virtual
the Manhole WingZ
Culture 1.0 Mac on your wrist
Apple Announcements:
Mac SE/30
A/UX 1.1
X.11
Product Reviews:
VideoWorks INITPicker
SuperPaint Acta Advantage
Studio/8 Nisus
Magneto-optical Disks Vantage
ALSoft DAtabase
MasterJuggler MacMoney
MultiDisk Authorware
Redux PerfectWORD
Each year the MacWorld Expo gets bigger and better, but mostly bigger.
A couple of years ago you could know who all the third party peripheral
makers where as there were only a handful of hard disk and monitor
vendors. All that has changed. There was little vestige of the
"users" Expo for "the computer for the rest of us". This market has
matured, or at least grown up. The show was more pitched at the
"business" person. This year there were about 500 booths for the
60,000 visitors in two locations in San Francisco. I spent two days
visiting just the exhibits and picked up quite literally over 10 pounds
of literature. The bigger displays were in Moscone Center, the area
where exhibitors who have appeared numerous times in the past get first
shot. The more times you've been to the show, the closer you get to
the center of the room. The rest were in Brooks Hall. Last year, for
example, Interleaf had a large and impressive booth in Moscone Center.
This year they had a small and sparsely attended booth in Brooks Hall,
suggesting that their premier publishing product is beyond the needs
and budget of most users.
WHAT'S HOT
------ ---
Star Trek
The Qume display had a number of the stars from Star Trek. While WingZ
had Leonard Nimoy on video tape, Qume had the crew of the Starship
Enterprise in person. Commanders Checkov (Walter Koenig) and Uhura
(Nichelle Nichols) were on hand from the original show on Friday, while
Saturday and Sunday saw Counselor Troy (Marina Sirtis) and Ensign
Crusher (Wil Wheaton). They were signing autographs on photocopies
made on the Qume printer. I asked the Qume representatives how they
were able to get the stars. I was told, "Money". Qume's CrystalPrint
Publisher is PostScript compatible.
Hyper Hype
Last year has seen a lot of HyperCard hype, this year saw some
reality. One of the most exciting products related to the show was
from Silicon Beach Software, the company that has brought us such
premier entertainment software, and the exciting Digital Darkroom.
SuperCard
Silicon Beach Software produced one of the first "second generation"
paint/draw programs, SuperPaint. It has only recently been equalled or
exceeded by products like Canvas 2.0, Adobe Illustrator, or Aldus
Freehand. With this product, as well as their upgrade of SuperPaint to
version 2.0. (see Product Reviews, below), Silicon Beach Software does
it again with a "second generation" HyperCard clone. But it is more
than just a clone, it is in many ways a superset of HyperCard.
SuperCard allows you to import your existing HyperCard stacks and its
scripting language, SuperTalk can interpret any HyperTalk script,
except of course those that do things like query what version of
HyperCard is running. Unlike HyperCard, SuperCard has resizable
windows - up to 34 feet by 34 feet. Now all you need is a monitor that
large. Additionally, multiple stacks can be open at the same time.
The user can create custom menus that have command keys. Different
font styles and sizes can be mixed in the same field.
This year, animation is the hot item and SuperCard provides this in a
limited way through the scripting language. Color support, something
not yet available in HyperCard, is available now in SuperCard. There
is a subset of SuperPaint included as the superior paint/draw graphics
package. This includes AutoTrace for object manipulation. With
SuperCard, "anything can be a button", linking the object to a script
command. On-line help for the scripting language is provided.
Most exciting of all though, is that SuperCard can create custom,
standalone applications, that require no license fee. Indeed, these
standalone applications do not require the original SuperCard to run!
This involves adding about 225K to the application as overhead.
I asked the representative from Silicon Beach Software what their
relationship was with Apple, as they are creating what could be
considered a competing, and to some, a superior product. I was told
that Apple is very supportive of their efforts, indeed, Apple Products
President Jean-Louis Gassee was quoted by MacWEEK as saying that
SuperCard has a "high drool factor". I further asked the
representative how they will assure that they are not going a direction
different from Apple, and might be caught by surprise when the next
version of HyperCard comes out. He told me that a HyperCard Language
Committee has been formed to discuss any changes or improvements that
Apple intends to include in future versions of HyperCard. The future
of a color HyperCard remains to be seen. SuperCard is expected to ship
in the second quarter of 1989 at a price of $199. It will need at
least 2 megabytes (MB) to run.
the Manhole
One of the hot new games this year is "the Manhole", developed by Rand
and Robyn Miller of Cyan, and distributed by Activision. This is a
collection of 5 HyperCard stacks, with more than 600 cards. It is a
fascinating adventure game with animation and digitized sounds. This
is a wonderful implementation of HyperCard with a trip down a manhole
or up a beanstalk or through a fire hydrant. You'll encounter a White
Rabbit, a dragon, a talking walrus, a sunken ship, a boat ride with an
elephant, the lamp post of "The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe", and
many more. This requires a hard disk as the stacks take up almost 4 MB
of disk space on 5 floppies. It is also available on CD. The game is
dedicated "to Kinslee and Kerryn ...the two prettiest little girls".
I picked it up for my pretty little girl and she loves it.
Culture 1.0
There have been a number of public domain history or time-line stacks
out, but Culture 1.0 is the sharpest commercial HyperCard application I
have seen. The implementation is clean and professional looking. The
historical content was written by Walter Reinhold, a Presbyterian music
minister and teacher at NYU. He has written 59 historical essays on
famous people, places and events of Western civilization. Most of the
detail goes from the 5th and 6th centuries up to the 20th. A 20th
century update is being worked on.
There are supplemental links to Biblical and Greco-Roman history. An
ingenious sub-period cultural grid avoids the static time-line method of
examining history. There are links to history, literature, art, music,
religion/philosophy, and miscellaneous - displayed by country.
While the content cannot be altered - Reinhold said "I won't let you
destroy my work!" - there is a Reader's Notes feature that allow the
user to add up to 30,000 characters of text in a pop-up field. This
would be an excellent way to jot down notes and add supplemental
information. There is also a Cultural almanac of events in history for
each day of the year, kind of a "history of the holidays".
The makeup of his essays shows that the author's expertise is mostly
along the province of the artistic and musical. For example, an essay
on Mozart will show his contemporaries, and will even give you an
example of a digitized musical selection.
This 6 floppy, 4 MB package includes over 200 graphic images, 75
signature melodies of famous composers, and 30 general introductory
essays. It is priced at $175.
Heizer Software
CompileIt! from Heizer Software is intended to turn HyperCard's
HyperTalk scripts into external commands (XCMDs) for faster execution.
Because HyperTalk is an interpreted language, it is not as fast as
compiled modules. CompileIt! would make these interpreted scripts into
compiled modules. Silicon Beach Software is also looking at this
program for their SuperTalk.
Mathematica
Symbolic algebra programs can help automate mathematics by manipulating
formulas directly, performing integration, differentiation, power
series expansion, equation-solving, and so forth; such programs can
also use arrays and compute numerically to arbitrary precision.
Mathematica is a system which Stephen Wolfram created to do numerical
computations and symbolic or algebraic calculations, as well as 2-D and
3-D graphics and animation. Mathematica's principle designer said, "We
built Mathematica to make all kinds of mathematics as easy as
calculators made arithmetic."
But the real excitement in the Mathematica booth was actually the NeXT
computer that they had running the program. This was my first view of
the machine "in the flesh" as it were. I was not the only one eyeing
the black cube. There was quite a crowd there in a very small corner
booth to see the machine go through its paces. It was quite alluring.
Virtual
Connectix Corp. announced a $695 package called Virtual that will be of
interest to those affected by the current DRAM shortage. This virtual
memory solution for the Mac II includes both a software INIT and a
Motorola 68851 paged memory-management unit (PMMU) that gives users 8 MB
of virtual memory. By translating RAM addresses into hard disk
addresses, the operating system can use the disk as "swapped" memory.
The software only version will be available for $295 to those who
already have a PMMU or a 68030. Now Mac users are looking for cheap
PMMU's rather than DRAM. An upgrade to 8 MB DRAM would otherwise cost
$8,000. At the keynote speech, Jean-Louis Gassee said, "Apple will
have virtual memory in 1989." While this is exciting for the
Macintosh, virtual memory has been available on other UNIX(R)
workstations for years.
WingZ
Just as last year, one of the most popular exhibits was put on by
Informix. There was a videotaped 9 minute tour by Leonard Nimoy in a
black turtle-neck sweater and a stoic visage. Who better to present
computer software than Mr. Spock of Star Trek? The product, which was
running on a color Macintosh II, is a super-spreadsheet program. It
has a number of things, however, that go beyond a spreadsheet. It
allows for text and graphics inside the spreadsheet, showing
possibilities in the desktop presentation market. There is a limited
text editor supporting fonts, and linked 3-D (color) graphics. If you
change a figure in a cell, the linked graphic will change as well. It
is supposed to be 60% faster than Excel (which is twice what they
claimed last year) and can support a truly enormous amount of data.
The spreadsheet can hold more than a billion cells in a 32,768 by
32,768 matrix employing what is called "sparse matrix memory
management" which allocates memory for only cells that contain data.
The program boasts not just macros you'd expect in Excel, but an actual
programming language to build powerful applications. This language,
HyperScript, supports custom menus, font control, graphics rotation,
limited animation, etc. There are on-screen buttons, scrollers, and
help.
The video presentation has not needed to be updated from last year, as
the program has not shipped. It is clearly superior to the first
generation spreadsheets. But now, Ashton-Tate's FullImpact product has
been released as a second generation entry, and has received good
reviews.
On the downside, WingZ is seriously competing with last year's
FullWrite as the holder of the title "hottest vaporware" program. It
was expected last year that WingZ would beta in March and be released
in May. This has had some effect on the company itself, whose delays
in completion of this program have seen a recent 15% reduction in staff
at Informix. The company has determined to ship it by the end of the
quarter.
Mac on your wrist
The WristMac from Ex Machina was one of the more interesting high tech
toys featured at the show. For $225 ($295 for the Executive
water-resistant version) you get a Seiko RC-4500 watch and a port to
connect the watch to the serial port of the Mac. You can download 80
screen pages to the watch in 30 seconds. A page is 2 lines of 12
alpha-numeric characters along with a third line of 4 numerals. It
comes with a HyperCard stack to enter your schedule and data into for
download to the watch. Data can also be imported from 4th Dimension,
Focal Point, City-to-City, Business Class, etc. The watch sports
daily, weekly, and one time alarms. An optional bi-directional cable
is available to upload data back to the Mac. This last feature is a
great boon for people who don't know how to use paper and pencil.
APPLE ANNOUNCEMENTS
----- -------------
Much has been said elsewhere in the way of the recent announcements
from Apple. I will limit my comments to the implications of just
three of them.
Mac SE/30
Apple has called this the "Year of the CPU" and at the show announced
the Mac SE/30. Apple's new 68030-based Macintosh SE line doesn't
support either existing Mac SE or Mac II (or IIx) expansion cards. In
order to speed I/O processing, the new Macs use a 110-pin bus
architecture to be named the 030 Direct Connection. The 030 Direct
Connection avoids the bus arbitration required by the Mac II Nubus
architecture. The result is improved I/O performance (at the sacrifice
of potential parallel coprocessing). What this means though, is that
there are now three different busses among the Mac SE and Mac II
families. The new hardware also requires a new "Product Support
Release" of the operating system, System 6.0.3.
According to Apple's press release, "Several well-known hardware
developers have already endorsed the 030 Direct Slot and are
introducing products at MacWorld. These cards expand Macintosh SE/30
customers' options in networking and communications, allow the addition
of external color and gray-scale monitors, and let users work with
digital signal processing (DSP) based sound. These companies include:
Avatar Corporation, Creative Solutions, Digital Communications
Associates, DigiDesign Inc., Dove Computer Corporation, Epic
Technology, Kinetics, MacPEAK Systems, Micron Technology, and SuperMac
Technology."
What is interesting about this product is that it fills a large gap in
Apple's product line. It was perceived that the Mac SE was much closer
to the Mac Plus than the Mac II. In many ways, the SE/30 meets and
exceeds the capabilities of the Mac II and even the IIx with its 68030
processor. This is of greatest interest to those who do not need the
6-slot expandability afforded by the Mac II, and still want the small
footprint. The option of adding a large color monitor would in this
case be an ideal choice.
Although the SE/30 is four times the speed of the current SE, some
users are waiting for the rumored 3-slot 68030 Macintosh II, allegedly
called the IIcx, that is set to appear in March at the Hanover Faire in
West Germany. This would be positioned between the SE/30 and the Mac
IIx. What this means to the future of the 68020 Mac II is anybody's
guess.
A/UX 1.1
While A/UX is a full implementation of AT&T's UNIX(R) System V, Release
2, Version 2 with the expected BSD 4.3 extensions, it is "only" UNIX.
The Macintosh "added value" that one would expect of a "Macintosh" UNIX
has not been evident for the most part. Until now, only a limited
amount of the Macintosh toolbox was available from A/UX, and printing
was not easy. A/UX 1.1 now does support a lot more of the Mac toolbox
than 1.0, including color and printing. It does not support 100% of the
toolbox: in particular, low level, hardware specific code like the
SCSI Manager, the Time Manager, and the Serial driver are not
supported.
A/UX 1.1 will run on the SE/30, provided you have 4 megabytes of memory
and the disk space. Apple did not announce this compatibility because
one of the announced features of A/UX 1.1 was printing over LocalTalk,
and this feature doesn't work on the SE/30 since no intelligent
LocalTalk cards are available. When such a card becomes available from
a third party, A/UX may need an update to support it.
A/UX is a response by Apple to requirements by government, university,
and technical customers. UNIX is the operating system Apple needs to
really make the Macintosh a workstation. Microsoft has committed that
their products will run under both MacOS and A/UX. The released
version of WingZ is intended to as well.
X.11
Release 1.1 of A/UX, now also provides the industry standard X Window
System as an add-on product and is compliant with the IEEE POSIX Draft
12 Standard and the Federal Information Processing Standard No. 151
(FIPS). This allows programs written for the X Window System Version
11, Release 3 to run on A/UX or use A/UX as a display workstation.
Also available with the X Window System, according to Apple, is the
ability to develop distributed applications that separate the execution
and display of applications among computers from Apple and other X
Window System vendors. This should be available in March.
PRODUCT REVIEWS
------- -------
With about 500 booths, it was hard to see it all, let alone comment on
it all. Here are some of the more interesting ones that caught my
eye.
VideoWorks
If last year was the "Year of HyperCard" , this year is the "Year of
MultiMedia". SuperCard addresses this "market", as does WingZ and,
most zealously, VideoWorks. In three years, MacroMind has produced
three generations of leading edge software. Three years ago, one of
the first programs I bought for the Mac was VideoWorks. I had asked
one of the developers and now president of MacroMind, Marc Canter, how
he came to develop the program interface that looked like a music
score. He said that his great love is music, and that he had always
been a Disney kid. This application allows a person to animate like a
pro. Last year saw the release of VideoWorks II, a more powerful
upgrade to the original. At the show this year, VideoWorks Director
allows you to do even more. It has been used in Hollywood to do some
impressive animation - in a relatively short amount of time.
SuperPaint
Silicon Beach's popular SuperPaint has been upgraded to version 2.0
(actually 2.01, but who's counting?). This program eliminates the need
for programs like MacPaint and MacDraw, and in my opinion, even
FullPaint. With it comes a number of new features and welcome additions
to the old program. There are free rotating text objects so the user
can rotate a text box, and then return to edit the text. SuperPaint
1.0 has a unique reduced view, allowing you to see both views
simultaneously. This has been enhanced with an active area outline.
There is now in Version 2.0 greater control of user preferences.
The interesting additions include AutoTrace, which allows the user to
convert a bit-mapped raster image (MacPaint) into an object outline
(MacDraw) for bezier manipulation and higher printer output resolution.
The bezier tool even allows you the option of adding new handles to the
object. A bezier reshaping tool is also included.
Customized arrows and dashed lines are available. The airbrush can now
be adjusted to control flow, area, and dot size. Even the palettes can
be repositioned. The new version allows plug-in paint tool modules.
Paralleling HyperCard XCMDs, these can be done by outside developers or
be found in the public domain. A developer's toolkit is available to
produce things like wet brushes, balloons, quill, tornado dithering,
and a toothpaste tool. Although this is not intended as a color
program, it does have a color preview feature.
Studio/8
This impressive package from Electronic Arts is a high-end color
program. It requires an 8-bit color card for 256 colors or gray scale
work. It has a tool palette that contains a number of powerful tools,
from 8 adjustable airbrushes to rotatable arcs, ellipses, and bezier
curves. But the real power is in the nine Tool Modifiers which alter
the way in which each of the tools works. They give you control over
shape filling, bordering, or transparency. The 256 color palette can
be controlled by definable gradients. It can create effects like
blend, watercolor, neon, smear, smooth, shade, tint, and darken. It is
most impressive in its ability to create color effects like butterfly
wings and the folds of a curtain with powerful mask and dithering
control.
Magneto-optical Disks
The show this year saw the first introduction of magneto-optical disks,
popularized by the NeXT machine. Price ranges from the $3,000 to the
high $5,000 arena, with the Sony drive at the high end. Capacity of
these disks is 650 MB.
ALSoft
The company known for its leading disk defragmenter DiskExpress,
ALSoft, has recently released two new products- MasterJuggler and
MultiDisk. All too often, when speaking with the "techs" that
represent various companies at the Expo, it does not take too many
questions to exhaust their knowledge of their products or, for that
matter, computers. That was not the case with ALSoft. The "techs"
there were the actual developers of the products, and they were very
knowledgeable and informative. They could explain why they made design
decisions, and were quite savvy about their competition. At shows like
this, I like to ask various competitors about their products and how
they compare. ALSoft came through with flying colors.
MasterJuggler
MasterJuggler is an enhancement to many of the features in the earlier
Font/DA Juggler Plus. It combines some of the abilities of other
products all rolled into one. It can put more fonts, DAs and sounds
under the Apple menu (than the Apple limit of 15 DAs for example) -
like Suitcase II. It can generate pull-down or pop-up menus of
applications and documents - like On Cue. It handles some chained
applications - like Tempo II, though not with the sophisticated
branching logic. It does have hot key equivalents to all its pop-ups -
like QuicKeys, but without QuicKeys' breadth of flexibility. Its
closest rival is Suitcase II, a popular product, and the one to market
first.
I find MasterJuggler superior in almost all areas, with only a few
exceptions. One of the things I like most about it is that it can be
configured so that when switching applications under MultiFinder, the
other applications are hidden, without having to close the windows. It
has much greater control of sounds, even more than the shareware
program SoundMaster. Not only does it allow you to associate sounds to
system functions like disk insert or eject, startup, restart, and
shutdown - but it also allows you to let each application have its own
alert sound. Now you can have HyperCard alerts sound like the Star
Trek transporter!
MasterJuggler allows you to compress your sounds and fonts to conserve
disk space. It is a little more sensitive than Suitcase II is about
modifying files that it has open. Suitcase II will let you do it but
warns you. MasterJuggler requires that you close the file first. Like
QuicKeys, this quickly can become an indispensable tool. Although it
is more powerful than Suitcase II or On Cue, it is not quite as easy to
use. On Cue has icons to the left of the application name in the
pop-up menu, making it faster to use, and permits access to the DA
Handler layer, which MasterJuggler only does through the Apple menu.
Suitcase II displays the fonts in the font menus inside the
applications. ALSoft explains that the reason this was left out was
because this feature slows down the application. And they do permit
this viewing through the Font List pop-up menu. But one cannot leave
that menu up while selecting the application font menu. I understand
their design decision but miss the functionality that Suitcase II
affords. ALSoft should add this as a configurable feature.
MultiDisk
One of the things that can slow down a hard disk is the number of
entries in the directory file. The fewer entries there are, the faster
the disk can read through the directory. If you have fewer files on
more partitions, theoretically, your performance will be faster. There
are a number of disk partitioning programs on the market. MultiDisk
has some differences. It allows you to create a partition of a given
size and designate the size that you might want to later resize it to.
This is to initialize the size of the directory file. You can later
resize the partition up to that size without recreating it. You can
also shrink the size of the partition. MultiDisk allows you to encrypt
a partition, password it, and make it open automatically. An added
feature is the ability to lock it. This will protect the applications
in this partition from viruses. On a network one user could protect
his data from other users. One added value of a multi-partitioned disk
is that one partition is not be affected by directory damage to another
partition.
Redux
One of the first powerful backup programs for the Macintosh was HFS Backup.
Now, the same developer, Dave Winzler has written Redux, distributed by
Microseeds Publishing, Inc. It will be most closely compared to the
current leading backup program, DiskFit. I have been using DiskFit for
over 2 years now, and have found that it is, to overuse a phrase, "user
friendly". DiskFit allows you to use the same set of floppies during
incremental backups so that old files are deleted, and in this way,
your backup set does not grow larger. Redux does all this and more.
A user can get incredibly fast backups using Redux to make non-Finder
compatible backups. These can then be restored only by using Redux, so
the user must be sure not to have the only copy of the program on the
hard disk. Redux fixes some of the glaring problems of its
predecessor, HFS Backup, which only created non-Finder compatible
backups. Redux can also do a complete hard disk to hard disk
duplication in Finder compatible format.
There is a very helpful backup strategy tutorial in the back of the
well written manual which is useful to both the novice and the "power
user" alike, along with an explanation about the powerful scripting
features. With these scripts for example, a user could backup only
documents (no applications) of type "ABCD" whose names begin with "R"
or end in "X" or contain "edu" and were modified after a certain date
and are in folder "Junk". Redux will tell you in advance how many
floppies you will need. Files can also be manually checked or
unchecked on a very clear hierarchical display of the disk files. A
filter control is available as well to select or exclude certain kinds
of files.
The program will run under MultiFinder, and will even shrink to a small
window while in the background. It could benefit from the addition of
on-line help, as is available with DiskFit. Redux is bundled on
Jasmine hard disks.
INITPicker
Also from Microseeds Publishing comes a program to control those files
that you can never have too many of, INIT files. INIT files are small
startup documents or programs for the Macintosh. Like the similar INIT
manager Aask.INIT from CE software (available in the MockPackage),
INITPicker does more than Aask. You might ask, "What's INIT for me?"
Not only does INITPicker allow you to select which INITs you want at
startup time, but it allows you to do it later from the Control Panel.
But more than that, it allows you to change the order in which they are
run, and not just the default alphabetical. This would allow you to
rearrange INITs that conflict with each other. And, because some
viruses create their own INIT files, INITPicker protects against these
by allowing you to not run new INITs until instructed to.
Acta Advantage
The Acta desk accessory is a wonderful tool for organizing ideas,
outlining a talk or larger paper, or just getting your thoughts
together. Acta Advantage, from Symmetry extends its power as a
full-blown application. It is clear that they are making a pitch
toward the Desktop Presentation market. Centering, header and footer,
and a rounded page border are now available in the page setup.
You can automatically open a document at startup. There are a number
of format drivers for importing or exporting of files. The current
export drivers are WriteNow, Microsoft Works, MORE, ThinkTank, and
MailMerge. The import drivers include text, Scrapbook, ThinkTank, and
MORE.
There is greater control of topics. You can now mix different fonts
and styles on the same line, which you could not do with the original
DA version. A nice preview feature in the Print command shows you
on-screen what the final printout will look like, with a magnifying
glass and a grabber hand to move the magnified view around. On-screen
and printout label options allow the outline to have Roman, Scientific,
or Bullet labels. The previous Search only feature in the DA version
has been upgraded to include Search and Replace.
There are a few nits to pick with the program though. It does support
the cursor keys, but there is no word or sentence selection from the
keyboard, so that a person has to reach for the mouse to correct the
previously mistyped word. It would be nice to have greater control of
the level of expansion or collapse with a single command. An example
would be to expand the outline to only two levels deep, or to collapse
all headline to a single line, without having to option-click each
one. These would be particularly advantageous on the small 9 inch
Macintosh screen.
The ease-of-use would benefit from keyboard control of outline
expansion and collapsing. The program will output to MacWrite, where
the indentation controls maintain the distinctive outline indentation.
However, when saving a file as text, it will lose this indentation,
each topic turned into a long line only prepended by various levels of
tabs. Because Acta uses word wrap rather than hard carriage returns,
an output format driver for saving to text files with the requisite
leading tabs and hard carriage returns would be quite welcome.
Beyond all this though, I have found it to be the easiest-to-use
outline processor that I have tried. (I used it to produce this
review.) It is more intuitive and less modal than MORE. Plus, there
is lots of bang for the buck. It is not exactly in the same league as
MORE II (although there was a time when the Acta DA was bundled with
MORE 1.1), but for the money it is worth it. MORE II retails at $395,
more than three times the price of Acta Advantage.
Nisus
QUED/M from Paragon Concepts is regarded as one of the most highly
acclaimed power text editors, ideal for programmers and people who
don't need the features associated with traditional word processors:
mixed fonts, multiple columns, graphics inclusion, etc. Instead,
QUED/M can open a number of files and search through closed files for
"regular expressions". It has text markers, text hiding, ten numbered
clipboards, auto line-numbering, window splitting, and, most
importantly - macros. It will record your keystrokes while you type
them and save them to a named macro. I find it very reminiscent of the
power of the emacs editor.
Now from Paragon comes the word processing answer, Nisus. It expands
upon QUED/M's power by adding a GREP feature for searching, similar to
the "grep" feature in UNIX. You can search not only for words and
phrases, but also patterns of characters, wildcard modifiers, and even
font and style characters. A spelling checker and thesaurus has been
added. In addition to the power of QUED/M come the other things you
would expect of a medium to high-end word processor. It supports
multiple columns, headers and footers, auto repagination, some graphics
tools, limited page layout facilities, and support of color graphics
insertion into the text. It has admirable word wrap around objects.
Nisus is frequently overlooked in comparisons to FullWrite or Microsoft
Word. While perhaps not in the same league as some of the high-end
word/document processors, it reveals a very strong text editing
heritage and is worthy of note.
Vantage
Preferred Publishers, a relatively new company, has come out of the
starting gate with two very useful and productive programs, Vantage and
DAtabase. If these two flagship products are any indication of things
to come from Preferred, there will be a lot to look forward to.
If QUED/M is like emacs, Vantage is like the vi editor. Vantage is the
commercial successor to the McSink text editing desk accessory. McSink
had everything but the kitchen sink, and like Red Ryder, the popular
telecommunication program, it has gone commercial. Dave McWherter, of
Signature Software, who developed McSink, has turned his previous
shareware product into a real winner. He has added a spell checker,
color support, and macros among other things. (The shareware McSink
6.4 is now available on most public networks and BBS's.)
External functions can be written in compiled languages that can be
added to the program as well. One such VCMD allows you to catalog a
hard disk and display the results in the file. It does sorting, it can
add prefixes or suffixes, and it does line numbering and columnizing.
It has capitalization control by letter, word, or sentence. It can
open 16 windows simultaneously and save each one to a different file
format. And it is not limited to 32K per document like other mini text
editors.
Vantage will wrap the text to the window or a line length, and install
hard carriage returns. It can also strip line feeds or convert tabs to
spaces. This is ideal for those who want to do text input, and then
upload it to another computer for inclusion into a mail message or a
high-end document processor. For example, I save my files downloaded
from my work computer into Vantage file format for immediate editing
from my telecommunication program.
An added feature over McSink is Vantage's macro facility. It does not
have the power of QUED/M's macros, and it could benefit from some added
logic, but the macro language is pretty simple and straightforward.
The manual is clear, with a good quick reference section. Almost
everything can be done from the keyboard with a command key assigned
for almost every letter of the alphabet and numeral. If I had any
complaints, it would be that some of the less frequently used functions
needlessly have keybindings while the most frequently used functions
are missing key bindings. For the user to fix this, these must be
reassigned with either some menu editor, or the Resource Editor. And
this process is clumsy as ResEdit complains that the menu resources for
Vantage contain more data than is required by the template and the
resource gets truncated to the proper size. One particular frustration
relates to the word selection keybindings. The manual advertises a way
to select a word forward or backward. This feature does not work on the
Macintosh Plus, a machine that represents a large portion of the
installed base.
But what is most amazing about this product is that it is all in a desk
accessory. Admittedly, it is one of the largest DAs I've ever seen,
but it works even on the lowly Macintosh 512E and supports color and
the MultiFinder.
DAtabase
Along with Vantage, DAtabase by Andrew Welch is a very powerful
personal database in a desk accessory. The marketing literature boldly
claims that not only is it, "The ultimate data base desk accessory",
but "The ONLY data base desk accessory". In any event, I know of none
other. It only allows for 2500 records, and is not a relational
database. And it cannot really be compared to the big leaguers like
Omnis or 4th Dimension in terms of power. It is really intended as a
personal database. But, as Guy Kawasaki, president of 4th Dimension's
Acius has said, "4th Dimension's copy protection is its huge manual."
The learning curve on DAtabase is significantly less intimidating.
MacMoney
I have found this product to be the easiest to use and most flexible
personal finance program available. Nice upgrade fixed the annoying
need to double click on an adjacent window to select an item. More
powerful reporting and summary features are also now available.
Authorware
Courseware is of great interest in the marketplace now, particularly in
the educational market. Authorware, Inc. of Minneapolis had some
interesting things to show. Using previously created audiovisuals,
like "Where The Wild Things Are", a beautiful computer generated
animation of the famous children's book, Authorware is able to use it's
iconic scripting language to control the playback unit, in this case a
video disk, to respond to on screen buttons and dialog boxes. The
program can then track and record the progress of the user and offer
help. It is available on the Macintosh, and evaluation is being done
for other platforms.
PerfectWORD
The last word in this review is about The PerfectWORD. It is not a
word processor, it is a processor for the Word. It is the fastest
Bible search and processing program I have seen. It allows rapid word
and phrase search, in English, Greek or Hebrew. It will display the
verse text and word count statistics in English, with the original
Greek or Hebrew in another window. This is not just a simple "grep" of
an ASCII Bible. The text has been compressed and keyed in such a way
that searches are lightning fast. No search takes more than a few
seconds. Searches can allow wild card characters, proximity searches
for words or phrases that occur near each other, but not in the same
verse. These searches can check relationships with AND, OR, and NOT
logic. An example would be "Adam" and "God" within 5 words of each
other. Search ranges can be for the whole Bible, a book of the Bible,
or a range of books. Searches can also be done for all occurrences of
a Greek root for example. One could search for all occurrences that
contain the root of "biblos" (book) using a wildcard. This would show
you "biblos", "biblon", "biblo", or any case ending.
This program is available with add-on modules to the basic program.
The Greek New Testament (USB 3rd Edition -corrected) or the Hebrew
Bible (Biblia Hibraica Stuttgartensia) are $150 and $180 respectively,
above the $225 program module. The various English versions (King
James, New International, and Revised Standard Versions) are available
at $75 each.
This program would be invaluable (though expensive) for the serious
Bible student, pastor, or theologian. It is the ultimate
cross-reference tool, and provides a wonderful means for studying
comparative uses of a word throughout the Bible. A person who passed
by the booth commented, "It's Greek to me", and I don't think he was
quoting from Shakespeare's "Julius Caesar".
{decwrl,hplabs,ucbvax}!sun!warp!rock Bill Petro