home *** CD-ROM | disk | FTP | other *** search
Text File | 1993-08-24 | 28.9 KB | 588 lines | [TEXT/ttxt] |
- TidBITS#190/23-Aug-93
- =====================
-
- This week we bring you a thoughtful article about copy-protected
- MIDI software, an overview of the new Centris 660 AV and Quadra
- 840 AV, some humorous notes for people who do telephone
- technical support, and we continue our multi-part Newton series
- with a look inside the MessagePad.
-
- This issue of TidBITS sponsored in part by:
- * APS Technologies -- 800/443-4199 -- 71520.72@compuserve.com
- Makers of hard drives, tape drives, memory, and accessories.
- For APS price lists, email: aps-prices@tidbits.com
-
- Copyright 1990-1993 Adam & Tonya Engst. Details at end of issue.
- Automated info: <info@tidbits.com>. Comments: <ace@tidbits.com>
- ---------------------------------------------------------------
-
- Topics:
- MailBITS/23-Aug-93
- Copy Protection in the MIDI Market
- Two New Macs - A Quick Trip Around the AV Room
- Your Customer Could be a Space Alien
- Under the MessagePad's Hood
- Reviews/23-Aug-93
-
- [Archived as /info-mac/per/tb/tidbits-190.etx; 30K]
-
-
- MailBITS/23-Aug-93
- ------------------
- **AudioVision monitor connections** -- In response to last week's
- discussion about connecting a Quadra 840AV to the AudioVision
- monitor, we learned that Apple has no plans to modify the 840AV's
- (or the Centris 660AV's) motherboard to add a different port for
- connecting to the AudioVision monitor. No matter what kind of Mac
- you have, you need to make sure to purchase an adapter along with
- the AudioVision monitor. Apple corrected its price list (as of
- 16-Aug-93) to avoid future customer confusions.
-
-
- Your Customer Could be a Space Alien
- ------------------------------------
- by Tonya Engst, TidBITS editor
-
- This article, a deliberate takeoff of urban legend article, "Your
- Co-worker Could be a Space Alien," goes out with a grin to people
- who do telephone technical support.
-
- Many callers are actually space aliens who sound human, but you
- can expose these visitors by looking for certain tip-offs, say
- experts.
-
-
- Odd or mismatched software and hardware.
- Aliens might run "MacWriter on their Apple Microsoft," or use
- "PerfectWord on a Claris 610."
-
- Strange or unusual software habits.
- An alien might not understand the hierarchical filing system, so
- she might put all her files and applications in the same folder.
- Aliens can also exhibit paranoia, so an alien may worry that if he
- throws out one document, all other documents will disappear.
- Perhaps this occurs in different solar systems.
-
- Bizarre sense of humor.
- Aliens often exhibit inappropriate senses of humor. For instance,
- an alien may burst out laughing in the middle of a serious
- discussion about the difference between clicking and dragging.
-
- Puts you on hold frequently.
- Aliens have trouble with human language and often must put you on
- hold to consult references in order to figure out what you are
- saying.
-
- Keeps a written or recorded diary.
- Aliens worry that they won't retain every subtlety of the
- conversation and feel more comfortable recording it.
-
- Misuses everyday items.
- Aliens have trouble with human-based objects, so an alien would be
- more likely to use a mouse upside down. Aliens having Pivot
- monitors are constantly pivoting them. Scientists speculate that
- they are trying to align their monitors with a distant magnetic
- wave system, but tests have been inconclusive.
-
- Constant questions about customs.
- Aliens want to know why thing happen as they do, so they may
- interrupt every suggestion you make to ask why or to suggest
- another way of doing it. Don't be put off by this behavior, aliens
- can't help it.
-
- Secretive about personal life-style and home.
- Aliens don't like to give anything away for fear of blowing their
- cover. If a caller has a great deal of difficulty telling you,
- say, the names of the fields used in a print merge, and then
- finally tells you the information is classified, you are probably
- assisting a space alien. Another tip-off is aliens that cannot
- reveal the names of their hard drives.
-
- Frequently talks to himself.
- The alien may be rehearsing or practicing what he will say next.
-
- Displays a change of mood when near certain high-tech hardware.
- An alien may become nervous or hyperventilate when near computer
- hardware. Aliens also become unobservant and have trouble reading
- labels. If a customer cannot identify the name of the computer,
- and the name is affixed to the front of the computer, you may have
- a space alien on your hands.
-
- Experts point out that a caller would have to display most if not
- all of these traits before you can positively identify her as an
- alien.
-
-
- Copy Protection in the MIDI Market
- ----------------------------------
- by Nick Rothwell -- cassiel@cassiel.demon.co.uk
-
- For the majority of Macintosh users, those without copy-protected
- software, this article will be a minor curiosity. Lucky you. For
- those left, you will want to read this to save yourself the hours
- of aggravation that I went through installing The Latest Upgrade.
- Specifically, we're dealing with professional music software.
-
- Music software (specifically, MIDI sequencers, patch editors and
- librarians) has been copy-protected basically forever. I bought a
- copy of Mark of the Unicorn's (MOTU) Performer in 1988, and it
- came on a copy-proof floppy disk which had to be "keyed" into the
- Mac for the program to run. The program won't run without a key
- disk, and the key disks carry formatting errors to circumvent
- duplication. If the key floppy gets damaged for any reason, you're
- lost, regardless of the number of dollars per second being burnt
- in a production studio, or the size of an audience. If you live in
- the U.S. you stand a chance of getting a replacement, but if you
- live outside the U.S. the support is probably such that a change
- of career is a better idea.
-
- A couple of years later a new scheme came along, and was adopted
- both by MOTU and by Opcode who by this time had a pro-level
- sequencing package of their own. There were still key disks, but
- there was also a procedure for installing on a hard disk. An
- "install count" on the key floppy would decrement in exchange for
- a copy of the application on the hard disk. At this time, another
- mechanism would kick in to avoid duplication of the hard disk copy.
- The application's location on the disk would be stored in a secret
- format in hidden key files also on the disk, preventing making a
- useful copy of the application from the hard disk since the copy
- wouldn't have the keying information.
-
- The advantage now is that you don't have to mess around with
- floppies. But the disadvantages to legitimate users are
- significant. Disks cannot be optimised without destroying the
- install key. And of course, backups are useless; damage the disk
- for any reason, and you lose the key forever. If you get an update
- of the program, you have to go through a deinstall/reinstall
- procedure. You rely on the scheme working properly, and it doesn't
- always. A legally installed copy will, every now and then, declare
- itself illegal and refuse to run.
-
- But at least it stops piracy and keeps the software companies in
- business, right? Wrong. Leaving aside the arguments about whether
- illegal copying of software eats into sales or not, you can
- circumvent these protection schemes. These methods are not
- trivial, but are reasonably well known. So all the schemes do is
- inconvenience legitimate users.
-
- Anyway, a lot of music software seems to use the same scheme. Or,
- I should say, "used." There is now A New Scheme, featured in
- Performer 4.2, the latest version of Opcode Galaxy, and on its way
- in Vision and MAX. It works as follows: instead of installing a
- copy of an application with a specific key, you attach a key to a
- hard disk. The application can be moved around (or upgraded, an
- important benefit) without wrecking the key. That's the Major Pro.
- Major Con: the protection key is buried deep within the disk. I
- suspect a pointer within the boot blocks, but that's only a guess.
- The installation process is now one of authorising a disk, rather
- than installing an application.
-
- The more complicated the scheme, the more that can go wrong. The
- more complex the scheme, the more it has to assume about the
- target configuration, and the less likely the assumption is to be
- correct. The Performer installation blew up several times over a
- period of several hours. I partition my disks with Silverlining,
- and yet the installation instructions and scripts assume a single-
- partition disk. Installation has to be to the boot "disk" - so I
- had to resize partitions to make space. The instructions stated
- that any copies of the application on the disk would run. Wrong:
- the application is keyed from its own partition. Not a serious
- drawback, but the wording of the instructions shows this
- eventuality hadn't been considered, which is worrying. So, I had
- to move the authorisation tag from one partition to another, which
- failed several times, due to a bug in the copy protection
- machinery which causes it to not always recognize a legal key.
-
- Hopefully your experiences with these schemes won't be as
- problematic as mine. But if they are, the above notes may be
- useful.
-
- Floppy-based copy protection stinks, yes? Magical hard disk
- installation schemes stink too, yes? So why not use a hardware
- dongle instead? This is the course taken by Steinberg for their
- Cubase sequencing software. It uses an ADB dongle. And it works
- well... except on PowerBooks, where sleep mode causes the dongle
- to malfunction. Of course, we all know that copy protection
- schemes serve no purpose except to inconvenience legitimate users,
- and the pressures of the music business (studio recording and live
- work) make this more significant than in some other fields. So, is
- there any chance of such schemes being dropped? The only
- indication I have is from Mark of the Unicorn, and I quote, "not a
- chance." Let me leave you with an excerpt from Apple's document
- "Antipiracy Technologies," on the subject of key floppies and hard
- disk installation schemes:
-
- "Since this kind of copy protection depends on specific
- characteristics of the hardware, the copy protection may
- occasionally malfunction, thus preventing your customer from
- legally using the program he or she bought. Also, you have no way
- of knowing whether the floppy-disk copy protection that you use
- will work with future hardware from Apple and other companies.
-
- "Technical reasons aside, floppy-disk copy protection is bad
- because it breaks the most important law governing antipiracy
- technologies: Thou Shalt Not Annoy the Legitimate User. Limited-
- use installer programs and key disks are inconvenient to use, and
- they often cause legitimate users problems. When this copy
- protection malfunctions, you suddenly have a very unhappy
- customer, one who sees copy protection as a useless encumbrance
- that doesn't deter the software pirate but that penalizes the
- legitimate user for being honest."
-
- [If you have comments about this article, please hold off on them
- for now. Copy protection usually beats up a storm of debate, but
- Adam's book is keeping us busy and we just don't have time to read
- your thoughts this week. Thanks for understanding. :-) -Tonya]
-
-
- Two New Macs - A Quick Trip Around the AV Room
- ----------------------------------------------
- by Tonya Engst, TidBITS Editor
-
- Apple's newest Macintoshes are fast machines with new video and
- sound capabilities. To review, the new Centris 660AV, formerly
- known as the Cyclone, uses a Centris 610 case; likewise, the new
- Quadra 840, once known as the Tempest, lives in a Quadra 800 case.
- As usual, Apple's naming scheme comes from marketing folks who
- think it's funny that people try to memorize this stuff
- (especially considering that the latest rumors have Apple ditching
- the Centris name entirely and calling all of the old Centris
- machines Quadras). At least AV seems to stand for audio-visual.
- Introductions aside, what's the deal with these Macs and should
- you buy one?
-
- If you don't care about audio-visual applications, you might buy
- an AV Mac for the 68040 chip, faster NuBus 90 architecture, and
- SCSI DMA (Direct Memory Access). If you care about sound, video,
- or telephony, then the AV Macs may be the place to be, since they
- sport a DSP chip (similar to the one used in the now-obsolete NeXT
- machines) to keep these capabilities humming along. A few of
- quirks worth noting: AV Macs don't support A/UX, they only support
- 32-bit addressing, and the serial port has an extra pin. Although
- the port works with the usual 8-pin cables, the new ninth pin
- carries power to a pod (more on pods below), and lets you turn on
- your Mac by calling it on the phone.
-
-
- In the Macintosh AV room
- If it all works as described, you can use the new DAV (Digital
- Audio Visual) port to bring in video from VCRs and video cameras.
- You can play the video on the screen in the provided Video Monitor
- program, convert it to a QuickTime movie, convert video frames to
- PICT images, play around in the included VideoFusion Fusion
- Recorder, and output video to VCR tape or an attached TV screen.
-
- The DSP chip works with Apple's new and still-unfolding GeoPort
- architecture to provide the capabilities of a modem, fax board,
- speakerphone, answering machine, or even an Ethernet- or ISDN-
- based videophone. The videophone gives 15 frames per second in a
- small window, so we're not talking about putting someone onscreen
- as in Star Trek. Each AV machine comes with an adapter box, known
- as a pod, that attaches the Mac to the phone system. This is so
- Apple can make different pods for phone systems in different
- countries, not to mention ISDN and digital PBX, which should all
- be available sooner or later.
-
- The AV Macs also include PlainTalk - formerly know by the code
- name Casper - software that works with the DSP chip to turn speech
- into computer commands and text into speech, of sorts. I've heard
- a PlainTalk version of a paragraph from TidBITS, and although it
- sounded like a computer, I understood every word. Evidently, there
- are a few different voices to pick from. Currently the speech-
- recognition works for adult, English-speaking, North American
- voices, but more options should come soon.
-
- The AVs come wired so you can speak to them, as in, "Computer,
- Control Panel. Computer, Memory." You can create complex voice
- macros using QuicKeys or AppleScript (a special version of
- QuicKeys ships with the computer). To help the Mac pay attention
- to you, you preface every command with a keyword (like Computer in
- the example above) and the AVs come with a special microphone.
- Note that the microphone and PlainTalk ship with Macs sold in the
- U.S. and Canada, but everyone else has to buy them separately. I
- wonder if this will change when PlainTalk can recognize more voice
- types.
-
- Sound Manager 3.0 comes as part of the System Enabler, so you can
- play with sounds, distorting or enhancing them, and you don't have
- to buy any third-party software to at least have some basic fun.
-
-
- Conclusions
- The AV Macs seem like a grand experiment. What features will prove
- popular? Which ones will be ignored? At this time, it's unclear if
- developers will write software and continue to write and support
- software that takes advantage of these Macs, or if developers will
- focus on the larger PowerPC market.
-
- These Macs could be sensational fun. Not that the capabilities
- can't be created on other Macs with the right hardware and
- software, but that Apple has put a lot of possibilities together
- in one package, so you get a blazingly fast Mac along with
- software to play with. Not only can you create and view movies,
- but you talk and listen to the Mac. I wouldn't buy a Video Spigot
- board and all the trappings, because I don't know enough about
- video to justify the purchase, but if I had an AV Mac, I'd explore
- all of its capabilities. Whether the new abilities are up to
- reliable business uses, intelligent educational applications, or
- great works of art remains to be seen, but if they don't measure
- up, Apple is bound to improve them next time around.
-
-
- Under the MessagePad's Hood
- ---------------------------
- by Tom Thompson, BYTE Senior Tech Editor -- tomt@bytepb.byte.com
-
- The MessagePad, Apple's new Personal Digital Assistant, is a type
- of Newton. So, you may ask, what exactly is a Newton? Newton
- represents an architecture that combines hardware, software, and
- application technologies. The Newton architecture doesn't try to
- create a miniature computer. Instead, by discarding bulky desktop
- computer trappings like keyboards and hard drives, the
- architecture provides mobile yet powerful systems that have rich
- communications functions. Importantly, Newton is not proprietary.
- Apple intends to license it, and has already done so to Sharp,
- Siemens, Motorola, Cirrus Logic, and Matsushita.
-
-
- An Outside Glance
- The MessagePad typifies the design goals of the Newton
- architecture. The system is diminutive enough to carry around like
- a paperback book. It weighs just under one pound, measures .75
- inches thick, and has a 7.25 by 4.5 inch face. A low-power,
- reflective, LCD, 336- by 240-pixel, black-and-white screen
- displays information. The MessagePad has no keyboard; the primary
- input device is a passive plastic stylus. A resistive film over
- the screen senses and tracks the stylus motions. The MessagePad
- comes with an RS-422 serial port and a low-power, half-duplex,
- infrared transceiver built in. The serial port uses a Mac mini
- DIN-8 connector, and like the Mac, this port doubles as a modem
- port and LocalTalk network connection. The infrared transceiver
- uses Sharp's infrared communications protocols to "beam" data at
- rates of up to 19,200 bps (typically 9,600 bps) to another Newton
- at distances up to three feet. For communications, there's a
- seven-ounce fax modem that runs off the MessagePad's power charger
- or two AA alkaline batteries.
-
-
- Pad Power
- Stand-alone power comes from four AAA alkaline cells or a
- rechargeable nickel-cadmium battery pack. Apple estimates battery
- life at two weeks for alkaline cells, and one week for the battery
- pack. A small lithium cell preserves memory while the batteries
- are changed, and an ingenious interlock mechanism prevents you
- from removing the battery pack and the lithium cell at the same
- time. You plug into the wall using a universal power adapter (100V
- - 240V, 50 - 80 Hz), which also recharges the battery pack.
- Different power adapters are available for the U.S., Japan,
- Australia, and Europe.
-
-
- Inside the MessagePad
- The heart of the MessagePad is a general-purpose 20 MHz ARM610
- RISC microprocessor made by Advanced RISC Machines. The ARM610
- combines on a single chip an ARM6 RISC CPU, a 4K cache, a write
- buffer, and an MMU (memory management unit) designed to Apple's
- specifications. The write buffer enhances performance by storing
- up to eight 32-bit data values and writing them to main memory
- independently of the CPU. The MMU implements a two-level page-
- table structure and certain extensions that make it suitable for
- object-oriented systems. A read-lock-write operation performs
- indivisible memory updates, which are essential for testing and
- setting semaphores or handling shared memory in a multitasking
- operating system. The ARM610 can handle Big-Endian (Motorola) and
- Little-Endian (Intel) addressing modes, and has fast interrupt
- response features that make it ideal for real-time processing. It
- also consumes little power (less than .5 watts), and is fully
- static (when the processor's clock stops, its internal state is
- preserved and it consumes little power). The small ARM instruction
- set (it has only ten basic instruction types) provides high-level
- language support, yet is straightforward enough to allow assembly
- language programming. Last but not least, the ARM610's
- manufacturing costs less than $25 in quantities of 100,000.
-
- A custom Apple ASIC (Application Specific Integrated Circuit)
- controls the MessagePad's power and the various memory and I/O
- subsystems, including the serial port, the infrared transceiver,
- and the LCD screen. It handles sound generation, DMA (Direct
- Memory Access) for sound and serial data, the PCMCIA card
- interface, timing signals, and calendar functions. By the way, if
- you wondered, PCMCIA stands for Personal Computer Memory Card
- International Association.
-
- The MessagePad uses 4 MB of ROM to store its operating system and
- several built-in applications. Included here is the handwriting
- recognition engine written by Paragraph International, a U.S.-
- Russian joint venture in Sunnyvale, California and Moscow.
-
- The MessagePad has 640K of SRAM (Static RAM) for working memory
- and data storage, of which approximately 200K is free for user
- data. There's no hard drive to save data, so users will probably
- want a flash memory card for backups. I had a chance to try the 2
- MB PCMCIA RAM card from Epson. I inserted it into the card slot,
- and switched the MessagePad on. Although this card was originally
- designed for PC notebooks, the MessagePad recognized it, and asked
- to erase it. After several seconds, I had an additional 2 MB of
- memory to work with - a good show for Apple PIE, Epson, and
- hardware standards. The Newton Intelligence allows you to file
- individual schedules and notes to the card, or make a backup of
- all data.
-
- Other cards let you add functionality to the MessagePad. Lots of
- cards should be coming from various vendors, and one of the main
- cards to look forward to using is the PCMCIA Messaging Card, which
- consists of a one-way wireless pager that can receive text
- messages.
-
-
- The Newton Operating System
- The MessagePad uses the Newton OS, or Newton Intelligence, in
- Apple parlance. The Newton Intelligence (NI) is an object-
- oriented, multitasking OS from the ground up. However, it borrows
- a number of useful components from the Macintosh. Portions of
- QuickDraw - the Mac imaging engine - handle the display. The NI
- uses the AppleTalk protocol stack to support name look-up, zones,
- data streams, and printing. There's currently no support for
- AppleTalk Remote Access. However, the NI is designed to be
- extensible, and Apple plans to distribute software updates and
- extensions via online services. Apple built the NI on several
- software components: the Recognition Architecture, the
- Communications Architecture, the Information Architecture, and the
- Intelligent Assistance.
-
-
- The Recognition Architecture
- The Recognition Architecture deals with stylus input, and a text
- recognition engine - or recognizer - handles printed text, cursive
- text, or a mix of the two. The recognizer is trainable, and adapts
- to your handwriting over time (about 150 words, if you use the
- built-in training program). You can also specify the type of text
- you write and the character shapes in the Preferences section to
- short-circuit the training process. The recognizer uses a 10,000-
- word dictionary to assist in word recognition. This makes for fast
- word identification, but it also means that the results of a
- misinterpreted word, or for a word missing from the dictionary,
- can be wide off the mark. The user interface allows new words to
- be added to the dictionary. The overall design makes the
- MessagePad easy to adapt to overseas markets. By changing
- dictionaries, you can make the Newton Recognition Architecture
- handle new languages.
-
- A graphics recognizer detects specific objects and stroke
- symmetries as you sketch. A round scribble becomes a circle; four
- perpendicular lines become a rectangle. These recognizers detect
- several predefined gestures to edit or erase text. Both the text
- and graphics recognizers can be switched off so that the
- MessagePad only records digital ink. However, it's better to have
- the recognizers in action, because text and object-based graphics
- require less storage. Also text can be searched for, or used by
- other applications. Due to storage constraints and usability
- problems, the MessagePad doesn't support deferred recognition -
- the ability to store screens of ink and then extract text and
- graphics later. However, nothing in the Architecture precludes
- this feature from being added in the future.
-
-
- The Communications Architecture
- The Communications Architecture supports a variety of I/O devices.
- With a serial cable, the MessagePad prints to Apple serial
- printers. An optional cable, available in the Print Pack, stores
- printer drivers and allows the MessagePad to print to a wide
- variety of parallel printers. The same serial port allows you to
- print to PostScript printers through a LocalTalk connection. The
- infrared transceiver lets you exchange data with another
- MessagePad or a Sharp Wizard 9600. This architecture is
- extensible, so new devices can join the repertoire.
-
-
- The Information Architecture
- The Information Architecture levers off the NI's object-oriented
- design. As data enters the MessagePad, the Information
- Architecture tags (or names) it and compresses it as required.
- Data is saved in an object called a frame, a structure composed of
- data stored in tagged locations called slots. Slots can contain
- data values, code, and even other frames. Frames use a unified
- data model which eliminates data translation overhead and the
- redundant copies such translations often make. This common data
- format also promotes data sharing among Newton applications. As
- objects, high-level meanings can be attached to frames: address,
- for instance, can represent "One Phoenix Mill Lane."
-
- A collection of related data frames is known as a soup, and soups
- reside in physical locations called stores. A soup of contact
- names might exist on a store that's located on a RAM card. Soups
- maintain indexes to the frames within them. What this means is
- that all information entered into the MessagePad automatically
- becomes part of an object database that can be searched, modified,
- and displayed in different forms by various applications. All
- information is processed as Unicode, which means the MessagePad
- can readily handle foreign languages.
-
-
- The Intelligent Assistance
- The Intelligent Assistance uses the soup of data objects to make
- plausible connections between information and your actions. For
- instance, to see the Intelligent Assistance in action, draw a
- sketch in the NotePad and ask the MessagePad to "fax to Lisa." The
- Intelligent Assistance will assume you want to send the sketch.
- Next, it will locate everyone named Lisa in the object database.
- If there's more than one, the MessagePad prompts you to make a
- choice. The Assistance then retrieves the fax number associated
- with the desired Lisa and generates a fax image. If a fax modem is
- connected to the MessagePad, the Assistance transmits the fax.
- Like the rest of the NI, the Intelligent Assistance rules can be
- extended to handle new applications or devices.
-
- The synergy of the Intelligent Assistance with the object database
- makes the MessagePad a winner. The ability to locate information
- within the system and act on it in rational ways is a major
- improvement. Once a contact and her relevant information is
- captured in a MessagePad loaded with communications options, you
- can easily call her, fax her, schedule appointments with her, or
- send her email. The Newton OS eliminates the many redundant
- operations (launching an application, locating a file, opening the
- file, and searching for data in the file) that you do on a desktop
- computer to accomplish the same thing, and it's a model desktop
- computers should adopt. The Newton implementation is by no means
- perfect, but it's a huge step in the right direction.
-
-
- Reviews/23-Aug-93
- -----------------
-
- * MacWEEK -- 16-Aug-93, Vol. 7, #33
- QuarkXPress 3.2 -- pg. 34
- Pioneer DRM-604X -- pg. 34
- Digital Palette C150005 -- pg. 38
- Infini-D 2.5 -- pg. 39
-
- * BYTE -- Sep-93
- Newton Expert Pad -- pg. 22
- Centris 660AV, Quadra 840AV, SGI Indy -- pg. 81
- FirstClass BBS -- pg. 149
-
-
- $$
-
- Non-profit, non-commercial publications may reprint articles if
- full credit is given. Others please contact us. We don't guarantee
- accuracy of articles. Caveat lector. Publication, product, and
- company names may be registered trademarks of their companies.
-
- This text is wrapped as a setext. For more information send email
- with the single word "setext" (no quotes) in the Subject: line to
- <fileserver@tidbits.com>. A file will be returned shortly.
-
- For an APS price list, send email to: <aps-prices@tidbits.com>
-
- For information on TidBITS: how to subscribe to our mailing list,
- where to find back issues, how to search issues on the Internet's
- WAIS, and other useful stuff, send email to: <info@tidbits.com>
- Otherwise, contact us at: ace@tidbits.com * CIS: 72511,306
- AppleLink & BIX: TidBITS * AOL: Adam Engst * Delphi: Adam_Engst
- TidBITS * 1106 North 31st Street * Renton, WA 98056 USA
- ----------------------------------------------------------------
-
-
-
-