Newsbytes - Internationa…ews 1983 May to 1994 June/Newsbytes - International Computing Industry News 1994 Edition - May 1983 - June 1994 - Wayzata Technologies (5045) (1994).iso/pc/text/mac_text/1988/nb880823.270

Text File | 1991-08-18 | 88.0 KB | 1,915 lines

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[***][8/23/88][***]
LOOK AND FEEL TRIAL DELAYED A YEAR -- APPLE WANTS NEW JUDGE
CUPERTINO, Ca. (NB) -- US District Judge Robert Aguilar has announced
that the first phase -- the licensing agreement dispute -- of the
trial of Apple Computer vs. Microsoft and Hewlett Packard over
visual copyright will not begin until August 14, 1989.  Aguilar
gave no explanation for the lengthy delay, prompting Microsoft
to immediately ask for one.  It's generally acknowledged that
the longer the dispute goes on, the more it will hurt Microsoft
and Hewlett Packard, whose Windows 2.03 and NewWave operating
environment are being challenged.  If the licensing dispute just
starts in a year, then the copyright dispute could stretch out
to years later.

Meanwhile, Apple is asking for Judge Aguilar to remove himself
from the case, citing conflict of interest because Aguilar's
son works at Hewlett Packard.  Aguilar has already declined
to step down from another suit for the same reason, but must
consider it again.  The hearing on this matter is slated for
September 9.

[***][8/23/88][***]
75% OF COMPUTERS FLUNK FCC EMISSION TESTS
SAN FRANCISCO (NB) -- The Federal Communication Commission
has told The SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE that 75% of the PCs it's
recently tested failed radio interference standards.  The report
says clones from Asia are the most flagrant violators.

The FCC officials quoted say companies are submitting "laboratory
queens" or prototype machines to the FCC for approval, then
failing to manufacture the systems that have passed emission
standards.  One testing house says some 150 off-the-shelf computers
were recently examined before one was found to be in compliance.
Such big name companies as Hewlett PAckard, IBM, and Mitsubishi
were found among the violators, Merle Coe, president of HAAR
Industries, told the newspaper.

The violators get fines of $2,000 but often continue to flaunt the
law, says the report.  That's because the FCC approval process
is lengthy and the competition in the computer marketplace is
fierce.  "The problem is the off-shore guys," reported one testing
official.

[***][8/23/88][***]
TROUBLE AHEAD FOR HIGH TECH STOCKS
SAN FRANCISCO (NB) -- Michael Murphy, author of the CALIFORNIA
TECHNOLOGY STOCK LETTER, predicts a second Black Monday market
crash REAL SOON NOW.  And when Murphy talks, people listen.  That's
because Murphy successfully predicted the last Black Monday
crash of October, 1987.  He's been liquidating the newsletter's
portfolio in preparation.

Perhaps it's also no coincidence that Computerland has just
postponed its public offering.  The Hayward, Ca.-based computer
retail chain, citing adverse stock market trends, has announced
its public offering will be postponed indefinitely.  Ken Waters,
Computerland president, says during the last few weeks, "the
market declined almost 100 points and companies comparable to
us declined by about 20 percent."

Computerland had hoped to raise $51 million by selling 2.7 million
shares of common stock priced between $16 and $19 a share.

[***][8/23/88][***]
DISK STORAGE BREAKTHROUGH
SANTA CLARA, Ca. (NB) -- Imagine one 3 1/2" diskette holding the
equivalent of a 20 megabyte hard disk drive.  It's not the stuff
of fantasy, but of reality, as Insite Peripherals has created a
drive that can store that much data on the small-sized floppy.
Such a high-capacity floppy could make data back-up, now a
lengthy process involving many diskettes, a simpler process.
The technology involves modification of the diskette to accommodate
a special stripe of optically and magnetically recorded data.

Unlike many new disk drive technologies, this one seems destined
to make it to dealer shelves.  The teams of Kodak and Verbatim,
and Xidex and Dysan, have licensed to produce the high capacity
diskettes.  Insite expects the first disks should be  available
by the first quarter of next year.

[***][8/23/88][***]
HP SEES PROFITS UP 30%, ALLIES WITH AUSSIES, HIRES NEW AD AGENCY
PALO ALTO, Ca. (NB) -- Hewlett Packard has announced a 30 percent
increase in profits over this quarter last year, welcome news
for a company betting on new RISC-based computer technology and
facing increasing competition in the minicomputer arena.  HP says
healthy sales of personal computers, engineering workstations,
and laser printers helped bring in a net income of $148 million
from revenues of $2.4 billion.  Overseas sales weren't so bad
either where revenues surged 25%.

Meanwhile, Hewlett Packard, aiming to diversify into telecommunications,
has just signed a deal with Australia's government-owned telephone
company, Telecom Australia.  Under the agreement, Telecom will expand
its product offerings to include a full range of HP business
computers including the HP 3000 family workstations and
networking products.

This is the fourth telecommunications venture for HP this year, having
also tied up with Northern Telecom, Octel, and Network Control
Systems SpA.

And finally, HP has awarded the San Francisco firm of Saatchi & Saatchi
DFS, Inc. its computer advertising.  The ad agency is already
doing HP's ads for calculators and technical systems.  Now it
will also be doing the ads for PCs, printers, plotters, scanners,
and networks.

[***][8/23/88][***]
ELECTRONICS EMPLOYMENT UP
SANTA CLARA, Ca. (NB) -- More U.S. workers are employed in electronics
than ever before in the nation's history, reports the American
Electronics Association.  In the trade group's latest survey,
2.61 million Americans are employed in electronics in June, compared
to 2.49 million one year earlier.  In computer companies
specifically, there were 459,700 employed compared to 430,800 in June,
1987.

"This steady upward curve is an indicator of healthy growth and
we expect more of the same throughout 1988 and into the next year,"
remarked Pat Hill Hubbard, the AEA vice president.

The biggest gains were in software programming, where 34,400 jobs
were added compared to last year, bringing the total number of
workers in this field to 280,400, an increase of 16 percent.

[***][8/23/88][***]
IN BRIEF --
ADVANCED MICRO DEVICES, San Jose, Ca., has filed a patent infringement
suit against four other chipmakers:  Cypress Semiconductor, Gazelle
Microcircuits, Atmel Corpoation, and Samsung Ltd.  The suit charges
that the four violated AMD's patent for a logic chip.  This is the
second suit in a week for Cypress, which has just been sued by
National Semiconductor for trade secret theft.

AST RESEARCH, Irvine, Ca., has opened a Japanese sales office in Tokyo.
The company has been very successful in selling its range of
computers products in the Japanese market for three years.  The
establishment of a Japanese sales office will enhance its
network of distributors and resellers.

COMPUTER ASSOCIATES, San Jose, Ca., is working on its first Macintosh
product, according to COMPUTER RESELLER NEWS.  The world's largest
software company has been one of the lone hold-outs in support of
the Macintosh, favoring to stick with MS-DOS, VAX and other machines
for its accounting packages.

MICRO MARKETING INTERNATIONAL of Williamsport, Pa., has purchased
ICON REVIEW, the mail order firm based in Carmel, Ca.  The purchase
price was reportedly $650,000.  The new company will be called
CMO Icon Review.  New catalogs are slated to be mailed out next
month.

MICROSOFT, Redmond, Wa., has settled its suit against Master Systems
Computer Corp.  The settlement involves undisclosed cash payments
from Master for allegedly copying Microsoft's MS-DOS operating system,
without paying royalties, onto a line of computers it sold through retail
stores in Oklahoma and Kansas.

NEC ELECTRONICS, Mountain View, Ca., is debating whether to expand
its Roseville, California plant in order to manufacture one megabit
DRAM chips.  Currently only 256K DRAM chips are produced at the plant.
A decision should be made soon.

WESTERN DIGITAL, Irvine, Ca., has entered the hard disk market for
Apple computers with a 20 megabyte and a 40 megabyte SCSI hard drive.
Prices are $895 and $1195, respectively.


QUOTE OF THE WEEK

  "Putting Presentation Manager on an IBM is like putting Bernaise
   on a hot dog."

             --Alan Kay, Apple fellow, at MACWORLD EXPO

[***][8/23/88][***]
MONTANA ONLINE NETWORK EXPANDING, POLITICAL EFFECT LIMITED
COLORADO CITY, Co. (NB) -- Dave Hughes, the online pioneer who
helped create the Big Sky Telegraph system in Montana, says his
concept is expanding rapidly. In an online conference on the
DCMeta system, he reports getting many inquiries following
publicity in, among other publications, NEWSBYTES. Big Sky, which
went online January 1 for the purpose of helping rural teachers
retain their certification, now handles a wide variety of topics
and has been used by people in California, New York, Canada, even
Japan. More important, they're coordinating with officials in
Wyoming, Colorado and Idaho to spread the system throughout the
Rocky Mountain West as "RURALNet." And Santa Monica will put its
city deliberations online through a Hewlett-Packard computer
running Unix and Caucus II software. Lisa Carlson, who's been
helping Santa Monica set up its system through her Metasystems
Design company, says she will be "putting the whole city online."

The impact of such actions on politics, however, remains unclear.
Let it be noted that on August 10 the first candidate to make
online conferencing a major part of a campaign, Brooke
Sunderland, lost her GOP primary race for the Colorado City
council to incumbent Marcy Morrison. Morrison had attacked
Sunderland for her online use, and Hughes himself suspects that
the bluntness of Sunderland's online comments may have hurt her
cause, although issues (notably possible controls on real estate
development) probably made the real difference.

CONTACT: Big Sky Telegraph, 406-683-7680, 1200 baud, 8 data bits,
         no parity, one stop bit.

[***][8/23/88][***]
WHAT IF A RUMOR FALLS ON THE MARKET AND EVERYONE HEARS IT?
ATLANTA (NB) -- A "Wall Street Journal" feature about so-called "rumor
wires," an adjunct of the market quotation systems on brokers'
desks around the world, points up the quickly-dissipating line
between fact and fiction in the online business world. Quote
services like Knight-Ridder's MoneyCenter, McGraw-Hill's "S&P
MarketScope," and even Dow Jones' own "Professional Investor
Report" need to chase down and report rumors immediately, because
to get scooped by 3 minutes can cost precious dollars on the
market. At the same time, these services know that many of the
reports they're rushing to press won't turn out to be true, and
some will turn out to have been planted by traders eager to make
hay on the resulting panic. The rumors, and panic, also scare
away small investors, which is bad for business generally.

WHAT CAN BE DONE -- Not a whole lot. But if anyone calculated,
regularly, the percentage of rumors these services print which
prove true later on, money could be made and customers served.

[***][8/23/88][***]
MSA PRESIDENT GRAVES IS FORCED OUT
ATLANTA (NB) -- First there were humiliating losses. Then there
was the abortive takeover attempt of Computer Associates Inc. Now
MSA, once the world's biggest IBM mainframe software house, is
looking for a new leader. Chairman John Imlay on August 18 took
the resignation of President William Graves. Graves had been "Mr.
Inside" to Imlay's "Mr. Outside" since 1979, and was a founding
member of the company in 1963. For now, Imlay takes the titles,
and the problems. To add insult to injury, MSA stock rose 75
cents per share on news of Graves' departing.

[***][8/23/88][***]
TANDY, DELL POSTPONE RELEASE OF PS/2 CLONES
FORT WORTH, TX (NB) -- Tandy became the third PS/2 clonemaker to
delay shipping its computers, following announcements by Acer of
Taiwan (which held up its entry into Japan) and Dell Computer.
All three blamed "chip problems generally." This comes on the
heels of a NEWSBYTES EAST report that Apple has caught up to IBM
in the share of PCs sold at retail stores.

Boca Research, Boca Rotan, Fl., however, says the IBM PS/2 market
is booming, despite appearances. It says its PS/2 Micro Channel
boards have exceeded sales expectations "200%" (from what, they
don't say) with two Scandanavian distributors placing orders on
its serial and serial-parallel cards while they were still
prototypes.

CONTACT: Sylvia Fagiana, BOCA RESEARCH, [phone]

[***][8/23/88][***]
CARTER COUNTRY: LAST OF THE RED-HOT WINDOWS PROGRAMMERS
NORCROSS, GA (NB) -- This is absolutely the last story you're
going to hear out of the Democratic Convention. Jeff Carter, a
Windows programmer, is back in the Atlanta area after a stint in
Washington, DC, but remains loyal to the operating system he left
behind. After a few years contracting for out-of-town firms, he
looked up Microsoft in the Atlanta phone book a few months ago.
Carter, a geography major at George Washington University, asked
if there were any jobs around where he could program in Windows.
Geovision, which produces mapping data on CD-ROM disks under
Windows, jumped right out at him. It's been a marriage made in
computer heaven.

Carter says his old outfit developed software for IBM PCs, and "we
all just naturally gravitated to Windows." Of Windows 2.0, he
says, "I love it." It means "full employment for all Windows
programmers." On OS/2, he says, "the whole thread structure is
different" for multitasking, but "the rest of it, the
Presentation Manager, is all Windows." He's happily taking over
the Windows programming work at Geovision from an incumbent who
just couldn't stay away from the Macintosh any longer.

NEWSBYTES SOUTH/MIDWEST found this story of faith in a failed
operating system touching. Why tell it at all? Jeff took his
second week at Geovision off to hang out at the Democratic
Convention. Had a nice family reunion. Jeff has big teeth. He
has his dad's smile. And by now you've guessed the rest of the
story.

CONTACT: Geovision, [phone]

[***][8/23/88][***]
THE DCA/INTEL COMMUNICATION APPLICATIONS SPECIFICATION
ALPHARETTA, GA (NB) -- Digital Communications Associates Inc. of
Alpharetta turned out to be the brains behinds the new
communications interface put into the public domain by Intel on
August 16. The Communicating Applications Specification is on a
new Connection CoProcessor board which can communicate with
mainframes, share that information with PCs or fax machines, and
do it all in the background. If all of this works as they claim
it will for about $1,000 with a modem option priced at under
$300 (available in September), it should be an unique product. But if
this interface can really become a standard, you won't have to
worry about modem, fax, or mainframe connections again. Lotus,
Microsoft, and Borland all claim they're supporting it.

CONTACT: Bill Marks, DCA [phone]

[***][8/23/88][***]
CORRECTION: MR. PEROT WOULD LIKE US TO GET THE H OUT
In recent editions of NEWSBYTES, we reported on the trials and
tribulations of H. Ross Perot. He's the founder of EDS Systems,
a hostage-rescuer, and a Texas education-reforming. He finally
sold EDS out to General Motors and got fired for criticizing the
bosses. THAT H. Ross Perot. We've learned that Mr. Perot, whose
new Perot Systems company is trying to unseat EDS everywhere and
who got jobbed out of a signed Post Office contract by GM
pressure, doesn't like to see the H. (stands for Harry) anywhere
near his name. Ross Perot would like NEWSBYTES and the rest of
the media to get the H. out of his name, and keep the H. out of
it. NEWSBYTES says "What the H?" and will do all it can to
comply.

[***][8/23/88][***]
PECAN CHIPS

BELLSOUTH, Atlanta, served the Republican National Convention in
New Orleans with an audiotex service called "RNC Bigcall." Using
both RNC announcements and Dow Jones news, the voice-mail system
told where the Party was partying, what the Party was saying and
how the world was Quayle-ing before them.

EQUIFAX, Atlanta, reached a deal with Computer Science Corp.
under CSC credit bureaus will convert to the filing system,
called ACROPAC, used by Equifax' Credit Bureau Inc. unit. Equifax
also gets the right to buy CSC's 31 credit bureaus in 1991.

INTELLIGENT SYSTEMS, Norcross, announced it is selling its
Peachtree Software division to management for $20 million plus
20% of the resulting firm. The Quad-folks have been severely hurt
by the memory chip shortage.

MICROGRAFX, Richardson, TX, added four Clip-Art libraries, ready-
to-use pictures under Microsoft Windows at $80 each, or $250 for
the set. Choose from Anatomy, Sports, Business Forms, and
Headline Typefaces. Micrografx also got a big write-up in
"Infoworld."

PRODIGY SYSTEMS, White Plains, NY, says it's added a business
simulation once used at the Wharton School to its service.
Meanwhile, last we heard, the Atlanta IBM PC Users' Group was still
finding bugs in their beta test of the service.

TEXAS AIR, Houston, formally complained to the Department of
Transportation that United Airlines and American Airlines are
conspiring to drive its computerized reservation system out of
the market.

ZENITH, Glenview, IL, cut prices on its 386-based machines by
$1,100, but cut out half the 2 megabyte memory to do it.
President John Frank blamed the memory chip shortage.

[***][8/23/88][***]
YOU READ IT HERE FIRST/WEEK OF AUGUST 23, 1988
Copyright 1988/Written by W. A. Yacco, Exclusive to NEWSBYTES

In this week's installment...

 - WORLD TURNED UPSIDE DOWN BY GENTLE GIANT...IBM quietly introduces
                                              copy protection

 - IBM DROPS DUAL MEDIA POLICY...PS/2 and PC user offered separate
                                 DOS products

 - NORTON OFFERS QUICK RESPONSE TO DOS 4.0

 - ZIFF DAVIS SLICKS THE HICKS..."PC Computing's" "free" diskette

 - INVISIBLE SOFTWARE TAKES OFF THE WRAPS...New release to debut

 - SHIRKERS INFEST NEW ORLEANS...Fastback--Cheetah or Cheat'ah?


WORLD TURNED UPSIDE DOWN BY GENTLE GIANT
WHITE PLAINS, NY (NB) --IBM has quietly introduced a mild form of
copy protection with the shipment of DOS 4.0.  To my knowledge, it
is a first for Blue.  Operating systems, language products, Display
Write and other IBM software have never been protected in the past
even at a time when all of the major PC software vendors protected
their products.  Now that the major players have foregone the odious
practice, the bootlegger's most cooperative victim has seemingly
decided to turn everything around.

So many problems have been noticed by early reviewers of the product
that the point has gone all but unnoticed.  However, the new DOS
can't be copied to a hard disk or to other than the original media
type.  If it is, the installation process required to create the new
DOS shell, the product's major innovation, will fail to work from
the new media.

The copy protection employs a hidden directory entry and other
strategies that allow the user to use the DISKCOPY command to
reproduce backups but not to copy the installation files to a
different media format with COPY or XCOPY.  Furthermore, at least
some earlier versions of DOS will not DISKCOPY the new format.  And,
users with compatible machines may find that their system will not
start from the installation diskette in any case.


IBM DROPS DUAL MEDIA POLICY
 . . . Coincidentally, IBM is no longer shipping both media formats
with this version of DOS as it originally did when DOS 3.3 was
introduced with the PS/2.  This may be an effort to make it clear
that each package has only a single license.  Dual media may result
in too great a subconscious suggestion, to install both copies, for
even the honest to overcome it.


NORTON OFFERS QUICK RESPONSE TO DOS 4.0
SANTA MONICA, Ca (NB) -- It's true that some applications don't yet
work under the new DOS.  Perhaps the most notable that has, very
recently, been reported elsewhere as falling into that category is
Peter Norton's *Norton Utilities*.  Apparently, the new diskette
format is foreign to more than old versions of DOS.  Norton just
couldn't do anything with it.  NU wouldn't even start.

Frankly, I wouldn't install an operating system on my DOS machine
without *Norton Utilities.*  So, it's good news that Norton is
already shipping a version that works with 4.0.  Don't leave
C:   HOME> without it.  Sorry, wrong commercial.


INVISIBLE SOFTWARE TAKES OFF THE WRAPS
SAN FRANCISCO, Ca (NB) -- Invisible Software is nearly ready to ship
the new release of the Invisible Network.  I suppose its operation
is relatively transparent to the user so we have to tolerate the
name.

The new version will add security at individual and group levels
which controls file access on the server's directory.  It will also
allow network servers to support multiple printers.  That could add
up to a lot of printers for a system where every node can be
configured as a server.

Invisible's 1.8-megabit-per-second network hardware uses the NETBIOS
API and is Novel *Netware*-compatible  Invisible also claims easy
installation, low memory requirements and low cost.  At $299 per
node, including hardware and software, that might not be an idle
boast.  Contact: Vincent Woo at [phone].


QUOTE OF THE WEEK: SHIRKERS INFEST NEW ORLEANS
NEW ORLEANS, La (NB) -- Presidential campaigns weren't the only
thing on the minds of people in New Orleans.  Barry
Bellue, Sr., president of 5th Generation, and most of the firm's
other executives were out of the office at a conference and the
staff was concentrating on having a good time.

Meanwhile, I have a drive that's old as oxide and just about to quit
for ever. It was giving my old copy of *Fastback* fits.  When I
called customer support, part of my problem turned out to be that I
hadn't upgraded for too long.  The old *Fastback* isn't being sold
any more and my copy wasn't even close to the latest available when
sales stopped.  Even so, the company still supports it faithfully on
its toll-free line.  Considering the age of both the drive and
software, the only likely solution for me was an upgrade and a time-
consuming file-by-file backup that skipped problem areas on the disk
by brute force.

"Well," I told the young-sounding woman on the other end of the
line, "I've had a copy of *Fastback Plus* for a very long time that
I just haven't bothered to install."  The ysw had a genuine southern
drawl that I've been finding increasingly endearing lately.  "You
should be careful that it's not version 1.00.  If it is, don't even
bother," she laughed.  I joked back, joining in the festive spirit--
my boss was out of the office too, "Should I give it to someone I
don't like very well?"  "Only if you want them to lose all their
data," she said.  She was still laughing but I could tell she really
meant it.  I turned serious, "Won't that put you folks at risk of a
suit?"  "No," she quipped, still buoyant, "just read the disclaimer
in the front of the manual--the part where it says ha, ha, ha."  The
way she said it, it sounded like little bells tinkling.  Some years,
it's a shame that certain people don't get to cover politics.

Perhaps drunk on her own cleverness, she then gave me the following:
Fastback 2.00 will be out in approximately three weeks.  Let's hope
it still has the ha-ha-ha clause.  One occasionally needs to have
such things explained and it's such a convenient justification to
call customer support and ask for . . .  Sorry, there are some
things that journalists just have to keep confidential.


---------------------------------------------------------------------

Wayne Yacco is an editor, columnist and writer specializing in
business applications and microcomputers.  He was the founding
editor of The Inputer and currently publishes the Computer PR
Advisor, an advisory on communications with the computer press.  Hot
tips wanted (he is also interested in computer-related consumer
complaints) -- send them to IP2005, call 818-842-8581, or put him on
your press mailing list: W. A. Yacco, PO Box 269, Burbank, Ca.
91503.

---------------------------------------------------------------------
[***][8/23/88][***]
NEWSBYTES REVIEWS
-----------------


PRODIGY: $50 down, $10/month, Prodigy Systems, White Plains, NY
10601 Online service available in Atlanta, Hartford, San Jose,
and other selected cities. National roll-out due in 1989.

This may become a great home shopping service. It will
certainly go down in history for its efforts to make IBM PCs
user-friendly. At $10/month, supported by advertising and
transaction charges, Prodigy is a bargain you should really look
into, especially if you have an IBM PC AT and a mouse. If you
do, you'll find here all the color and ease-of-use the designers
of this service wanted you to have.

But I don't guarantee you'll like it. My view is biased
because I use, and like, ASCII-based information systems like The
Source. I like to type, and can scan with some comprehension at
1200 baud. Prodigy was not designed for me.

Prodigy is designed around thousands of painted screens,
each with a menu of choices for further action, each with not
much more than 100 words, and each with art loaded from your copy
of the Prodigy software besides. Trouble is, each of these
pictures take 10-15 seconds to paint on the screen, and the best
ways to navigate the system, typing pathwords and jumpwords,
require knowledge to learn.

Since Prodigy is "for the rest of us", and not the
computer elite, I gave it the ultimate test. I grabbed a friend
who hates computers after going online, handed him the keyboard,
and left the room for 15 minutes. He was still there (he usually
leaves) when I returned, but he was lost on a screen with two
menus and a prompt asking him to type a "jumpword."

Some of my own problems with the system could be
corrected. Give us a command which would download complete
columns, in ASCII, so we don't just get, say, 100-word snippets
from the likes of Jules Germond, Robert Novak, and Stewart Alsop,
but their entire columns. (If you want to take your time
downloading and show ads in the meantime, you might even get
away with it.) Adding Gannett as a partner and moving editorial
to "USA Today" is the suggestion here which might make the most
sense to Prodigy's owners. With those additions, and
clarification on the privacy rules I've been told Prodigy has
(its legal boilerplate to the contrary), this system might just
have a chance.

But what do you think? We'd like to know. Fax them, if
you want, to 404-378-0794.

---Dana Blankenhorn



[***][8/23/88][***]
SEMI-TECH HAS AGREEMENT TO BUY CANADA SYSTEMS GROUP
MARKHAM, Ont. (NB) -- It's official.  A company that began in the
early 1980s making a personal computer based on the CP/M
operating system, and later got into the IBM-compatible business,
has become Canada's largest data processing service bureau.

On August 16, International Semi-Tech Microelectronics Inc.
announced it has a final agreement to buy Canada Systems Group of
Toronto, one of Canada's top service bureaus.  The announcement
comes as loose ends are still being tied up on Semi-Tech's
purchase of Datacrown Inc., another of the country's largest
service bureaus.

International Semi-Tech said it will integrate the companies.
Combined, they are expected to have annual sales of more than
C$200 million to more than 700 customers across the country.
That would give International Semi-Tech about the sixth-largest
revenues from computers and data processing among Canadian
companies -- up from 87th in the 1987 ranking by Evans Research
Corp. of Toronto.

CONTACT: INTERNATIONAL SEMI-TECH MICROELECTRONICS INC.,
         131 MacNabb, Markham, Ont. L3R 5V7, [phone]

[***][8/23/88][***]
LOTUS GETTING SERIOUS IN CANADA
TORONTO (NB) -- Colin Wyatt, the first general manager of Lotus
Development Canada, says he has a mandate to expand the company's
presence in Canada, and he's doing it.  Wyatt joined the company
last month, and one of his first acts has been to start hiring.
Lotus is advertising eight jobs, from sales representatives to
national retail and corporate accounts managers.  Filling those
jobs would increase Lotus's Canadian staff by nearly half, from
17 to 25, and expand its presence from Toronto to Montreal and
Calgary.

Wyatt told NEWSBYTES CANADA further expansion is probably in the
cards, but "it's almost too early to tell right now."  But he did
say he is working on a plan to make the Canadian operation a full
subsidiary of Lotus Development Corp., not just a branch office.
Offices will probably open in more Canadian cities in the future,
Wyatt added.

CONTACT: LOTUS DEVELOPMENT CANADA, 200 King St. W., Suite 1712,
         Toronto, Ont. M5H 3T4, [phone],
         Fax [phone]

[***][8/23/88][***]
CRTC TELLS PHONE SERVICE COMPANY TO SHUT DOWN
OTTAWA (NB) -- Call-Net Telecommunications Ltd. of Toronto is
providing competitive long-distance service, the Canadian Radio-
television and Telecommunications Commission has decided.  That's
illegal in Canada so on August 16 the CRTC told Call-Net to cut
off service to its 800 customers by the weekend.

The CRTC ruled last November that Call-Net's service was a basic
long-distance service and must stop.  The company argued that its
service -- it provides long-distance service on lines leased from
Bell Canada and CNCP Telecommunications and gives its customers
reports listing their outgoing telephone calls -- was an enhanced
telephone service, which is allowed.  The federal cabinet
intervened to keep Call-Net in business.  But the CRTC, after
holding hearings on the subject, reaffirmed its ruling.

Mike Kedar, president of Call-Net, did not return NEWSBYTES
CANADA's telephone calls.  A Call-Net representative said a press
release would be issued Aug. 18, but called on that day to say
the release had been cancelled.  Kedar was reported to be
considering legal action to keep the company in business.

[***][8/23/88][***]
STUDY FINDS 16.4-PER-CENT GROWTH IN PERSONAL COMPUTERS
TORONTO (NB) -- The personal computer market in Canada grew 16.4
per cent in 1987, according to International Data Corp. Canada.
That made it the fastest-growing part of Canada's information
technology industry.  IDC Canada says the PC market grew to
C$1,536 million in 1987.  The over-all information technology
industry grew 8.5 per cent to C$12,443 million.

IDC's report lists six major "industry stories" of 1987.  It was
a slow year for mainframes.  IBM continued to have problems in
mainframes and mid-range systems.  IBM's 9370 got off to a slow
start.  Digital Equipment, Tandem, Stratus, Apple and Compaq
enjoyed a good year, IDC said, but at the same time the research
firm points to increased pressure on traditional minicomputer
vendors, a category that presumably includes Digital.  The final
points is renewed enthusiasm for Unix.

IDC says these developments reflect fundamental, longer-term
forces, particularly a shift toward standardized systems,
consolidation to a few key hardware and software architectures,
and smaller systems continuing to drive the industry's growth.

CONTACT: INTERNATIONAL DATA CORP. CANADA, 7 King St. E.,
         Suite 1000, Toronto, Ont. M5C 1A2, [phone]

[***][8/23/88][***]
KINBURN IN NAME BATTLE
OTTAWA (NB) -- Kinburn Corp. is in a legal battle over the name
of a U.S. subsidiary.  Kinburn's subsidiary in Aurora, Co.,
Geovision, has the same name as an Atlanta company that started
at about the same time.  Not only that, but both companies are in
the same business -- they put mapping data onto CD-ROMs.

John Owens, spokesman for Kinburn, said his company's subsidiary
and the Atlanta company "started, unbeknownst to each other,
within three weeks of each other."  Initially, he said the
Atlanta company registered its name only in the state of Georgia,
and when the Colorado company tried to register the Geovision
name and found it already taken in Georgia, "we said well, that's
fine, we're not planning to do that much work in Georgia anyhow."
Now both companies are expanding and coming into conflict over
their common name.  The only answer is for one of them to change,
and Geovision of Atlanta has filed suit in federal court to make
Geovision of Aurora do so.  Owens said the issue will probably be
resolved in six months or so.  "Both of us want it to be worked
out," he said.

[***][8/23/88][***]
USERS GROUP EXECUTIVES QUIT OVER SPENDING DISAGREEMENTS
TORONTO (NB) -- North America's largest Commodore computer users'
group has lost its two top officers in a disagreement over the
club's direction.  The monthly tabloid TORONTO COMPUTES! reports
that president Ann Gutz and vice-president Carl Epstein of the
Toronto PET Users' Group resigned July 31.  They did so because
the club's board of directors had, in defiance of their advice,
held an expensive annual conference that attracted only 60 people
and lost C$5,000.

The TPUG board of directors has closed the club's office and laid
off three full-time employees, TORONTO COMPUTES! reported.

[***][8/23/88][***]
GEAC BACK IN THE BLACK
MARKHAM, Ont. (NB) -- Geac Computer Corp. has reported its first
quarterly profit in two and a half years, with net income of
C$100,000 in the quarter ended April 30.  That comes less than a
year after the company emerged from receivership (for American
readers, that's the Canadian equivalent of Chapter 11).

For the fiscal year, Geac reported a net loss of C$2.1 million on
revenues of C$68.5 million -- not wonderful, but better than last
year's loss of C$19.4 million on revenues of C$64 million.
Donald C. Webster, chairman, said in a press release that the
company has "re-established its growth pattern," has increased
its book value from C$11.8 million to C$37.5 million, and has a
net cash position of C$4.4 million.

CONTACT: GEAC COMPUTER CORP., 350 Steelcase Ave. W.,
         Markham, Ont. L3R 1B3, [phone]

[***][8/23/88][***]
NETRON WILL BRING CAP TO OS/2
TORONTO (NB) -- Netron Inc. says it will make its CAP (Computer-
Aided Programming) application development system work with OS/2
in 1989.  The company also says CAP -- which already works on a
variety of minicomputers as well as 80286- and 80386-based PCs --
will be made to work with IBM's Systems Application Architecture
(SAA), a blueprint for software portability and cooperative
processing across IBM's range of computers from micros to the
largest mainframes.

CONTACT: NETRON INC., 99 St. Regis Cres. N., Downsview, Ont.
         M3J 1Y9, [phone]

[***][8/23/88][***]
BITS, EH?
-- BEDFORD SOFTWARE  of Vancouver says its "Comfort Card"
guarantee will ensure that anyone who buys its small business
accounting software gets the current version.  Customers will be
asked to complete the card that comes with each package and
return it to Bedford.  If the version number on the card isn't
that of the current version, Bedford will send out a replacement
free of charge.

-- IBM CANADA LTD., Markham, Ont., has announced five-per-cent
price increases for its older products and services, but excluded
its newest products, including the latest models of the PS/2.

-- NEWBRIDGE NETWORKS CORP., Kanata, Ont., has announced a
strategic alliance between its U.K. office and DMC Telecom U.K.
Ltd.  The companies will integrate their network management
systems.

-- WYSE TECHNOLOGY (CANADA) LTD., Markham, Ont., has appointed
GEAC COMPUTER CORP., also of Markham, its first value added
reseller.  Geac will resell Wyse terminals as part of its library
automation system.

-- NORTHERN TELECOM CANADA LTD., Mississauga, Ont., is inviting
75 teachers from schools across Canada to its National Institute
in Montreal August 22 to 26.  NorTel said the institute is
designed to increase teachers' awareness of telecommunications
and information management.

-- CMQ COMMUNICATIONS INC. of Toronto will offer users of its
stock quotation service access to MAX, the Midwest Automated
Execution system operated by the Midwest Stock Exchange in
Chicago.  Users will be able to trade listed and over-the-counter
stocks electronically using the system, CMQ said.

-- SYNERLOGIC INC., Calgary, is being acquired by Arthur Andersen
& Co.  Synerlogic is a national information systems consulting
firm with offices in eight cities across Canada.


[***][8/23/88][***]
M A C W O R L D  E X P O ....August 13, 1988

3M SHOWS SIMPLE SOLUTION TO THE PROBLEM OF COLOR PRESENTATIONS
Boston, Ma.(NB) -- A partial solution to the high cost of color
presentation graphics was on show at MacWorld.  3M, the tape giant,
had on display its model 4550 transparency maker and a new film
which can take output from a laser printer or photocopier and
within seconds transfer the black and white image to transparency
in red, green, blue or violet.

The 3M system is remarkable speedy and produces mono color
transparencies at a reasonable price.  Multicolor graphics are
solved in a rather primitive fashion -- stacking up mono
transparencies on top of one another.  While the product represents
a step backwards from the colorful and complex graphics available
in new presentation packages from Aldus, Cricket Software, and Ashton
Tate, it may satisfy the simple requirements of that old-fashioned
presenter who just wants to get his words on the screen with a
little bit of flair and a very low price.

-- Jon Haber, Special to NEWSBYTES
[***][8/23/88][***]
M A C W O R L D   E X P O  Special Reports....August 13, 1988

ADOBE ANNOUNCES A NEW COLLECTOR'S EDITION OF ILLUSTRATOR '88
CLIP ART AND HYPERCARD TYPEFACE CATALOG
Boston, Ma. (NB) -- Adobe Systems, creator of the Postscript
page description language and popular illustration and font
technology, had two mini-announcements at this year's MacWorld.

A second edition to their Adobe '88 Collectors Edition graphic
library is expected to appear in September.   The collection
will contain various pictures, boarders, font outlines and
specialized graphics.  Where the first collector's edition, released
in January, contained general graphics for design professionals,
this new edition is targeted toward more specialized markets,
cartographers, architects, and engineers with a variety of
requirements for specialized symbols.

The package will contain weather patterns, map symbols, engineering
and scientific characters and devices.  The entire collection,
containing several hundred easily-manipulated graphics all created
with Adobe '88, will retail for $125.

Adobe also introduced a HyperCard catalog of its collection
of typefaces.  The stack is available immediately and can be ordered
through Adobe or any authorized Adobe dealer.

-- Jon Haber, Special to NEWSBYTES
[***][8/23/88][***]
M A C W O R L D  E X P O  Special Report....August 11, 1988

APPLE ANNOUNCES NEW SCANNER, 4 MB MAC II, UPGRADES, BUT NO 68030 CPU
BOSTON, Ma (NB) -- Apple's rumored scanning device was announced
at MacWorld Expo on Wednesday August 10th.  The 8.5" by 14" 300
dots per inch flatbed scanner is capable of importing pictures
into PICT, TIFF of MacPaint file formats supported by most
Macintosh applications.

The scanner, long anticipated by Apple watchers, comes bundled
with software including AppleScan, a flexible imaging program
which can capture grey scale at 4 bit/16 levels per scanned
pixel.  This package has a useful "preview" feature which allows
users to quickly manipulate brightness and contrast on a 75 line
"preview" version of an image setting parameters before a final
scan.

The package also comes with HyperScan, a program written by
HyperCard author Bill Atkinson, which allows photos, pictures or
line art to be scanned directly into HyperCard stacks increasing
the ease of integrating graphics into HyperCard stacks and
applications.

The Apple Scanner has a suggested retail price of $1,799 and is
available immediately from authorized dealers.

Apple also announced a top of the line version of its Macintosh
II computer, the 4/40, coming with four megabytes of RAM and a
fast 40 megabyte hard disk.  Included in this announcement was
the immediate availability of 1MB, 2MB and 4MB extension kits for
all Mac Plus, SE and Mac II computers.  Lest you think the DRAM
drought over however, memory has its cost.  Prices on all of
Apple's RAM extension kits have gone up as a result of increased
costs of supply.  The price of 1MB is $499; 2MB, $1199 and 4MB,
$2399.  The Mac II 4/40 retails for $7398 complete.

No end to the rumors of a new Mac CPU based on Motorola's top of
the line 68030 microprocessor.  No answers either except the
statement of an Apple developer who, remarking on Apple's
enormous surplus of R & D funds, told reporters "if it sound's
like it's a good idea, assume the company is working on it."

--Jon Haber, Special to NEWSBYTES
[***][8/23/88][***]
M A C W O R L D  E X P O  Special Reports....August 11, 1988

CLARIS ENTERS A NEW MARKET WITH COMPUTER-AIDED DESIGN PACKAGE
BOSTON, Ma. (NB) -- Claris Corporation, Apple's software
subsidiary, made a bold move to define itself in the Macintosh
application market with the announcement of Claris CAD, a
powerful computer aided design package for the Macintosh.

The product represents a venture of the company into new
territory, as opposed to the upgrades of well entrenched products
which have been their hallmark up until now.  Claris CAD is an
interesting package offering a variety of drawing and geometric
construction tools useful in the architectural and engineering
design fields.

The company hopes that the package's firm foundation in the Mac
user interface (as opposed to other products which Claris points
out only port CAD products from other environments) will give it
an edge over the competition in an increasingly populated field
of products.  The company drew upon the expertise of co-developer
Computer Aided Systems for Engineering (C.A.S.E.) a Cincinnati-
based CAD software developer to ensure the product answered the
long term needs of users and fit in with major CAD standards such
as ANSI Y14.5, ISO, DIN, JIS and BS308.

Price may also work in Claris's favor.  The package's retail price
of $799 makes it one of the cheapest 2-D CAD packages on the
market.  As an added benefit, authorized MacDraw II owners can
upgrade to Claris CAD for $399.

--Jon Haber, Special to NEWSBYTES
[***][8/23/88][***]
M A C W O R L D  E X P O  Special Report...August 13, 1988

NEW CONNECTIVITY AND DATABASE PRODUCTS ANNOUNCED FOR THE MACINTOSH
Boston, Ma. (NB) -- The power of the Macintosh as part of a serious
business system has been enhanced by a number of new products designed to
connect Macs to other kinds of computers in a network.

Oracle  Corporation of Belmont, California announced a Macintosh
version of its powerful SQL database, indicating Oracle's observation
that the Mac is becoming part of corporate mainframe environments
and needs to be connected with Oracle databases located on IBM and
DEC minis and mainframes.

This announcement was in addition to Netware products on display by
Novell to connect Macintosh computers into Novell local area
networks of PCs, minis, and larger computers.

Network giant 3Com announced high performance networking solutions
for both the Mac SE and the Mac II, including a line of products
to connect the Mac to Ethernet and heterogeneous computing environments.

The Apple-DEC alliance, while not producing a stream of products, has
a great deal to do with the Mac (until recently only considered a
graphics and desktop publishing machine) suddenly entering the world
of high-end business applications.  The two companies' recent joint
servicing agreement goes a long way to enhance Apple's long-term
strategy of making powerful personal computers like the Mac II
part of corporate America's data processing systems.

-- Jon Haber, Special to NEWSBYTES
[***][8/23/88][***]
M A C W O R L D   E X P O   Special Reports  August 13, 1988

DAC SOFTWARE ANNOUNCES THE INTRODUCTION OF DAC EASY LIGHT FOR THE MACINTOSH
Boston, Ma. (NB) -- Dac Software  of Dallas, Texas formally announced
the introduction of a Mac version of its popular PC accounting
program Dac Easy Light.

Long heralded in the PC community as a maker of low cost, easy-to-use
accounting packages, Dac released Dac Easy Light, a scaled-down
version of its business accounting package introduced last year to
capture the small business and home office PC-based accounting m arket.

The new Mac version of this package can be used as a general
ledger system, it can generate invoices and statements, do invoice
processing, write checks and handle most of the tasks involved with
day-to-day small business accounting.

Written in object Pascal, Dac Easy Light will take full advantage
of the Macintosh interface as well as bring to the Mac accounting
field Dac's major attributes of high performance and low price.
The package, slated for shipment in September, will retai l for $69.95.

Jon Haber -- Special to NEWSBYTES
[***][8/23/88][***]
M A C W O R L D   E X P O   Special Reports...August 12, 1988

MACWORLD EXPO HIGHLIGHTS PRESENTATION PRODUCTS, FILE MANAGEMENT
PROGRAMS AND HYPERCARD APPLICATIONS
Boston, Ma. (NB) -- Last year's MacWorld Expo featured advances
in color hardware, mass storage devices and, of course,
HyperCard.  This year's convention is best characterized by the
industry rising to meet the challenges offered by last year's
revolutionary additions to Mac technology.

Presentations
-------------
Color applications have moved well beyond gratuitously tinting
scroll bars and icons.  The most promising color application,
desktop presentations, have several new proponents including
Aldus with its Persuasion package, Ashton Tate with Applause,
Cricket Software with Cricket Presents and Microsoft with its
newest version of Power Point.  All of these programs boast a
wealth of color and layout features.  While manufacturers argue
the differences between products, the upshot of their competition
is that presentation planners and artists will be spoiled for
choice during the months to come.

File Management
---------------
Twenty, forty, eighty and two-hundred megabyte storage devices
and the promise of mammoth storage with CD-ROM have prompted an
emphasis on file management products and utilities.  Alpha Micro
of Santa Ana, California released a Macintosh version of its
Videotrax hard disk back-up system which allows the use of a VHS
video cassette recorder as a tape backup unit, saving up to 80
megabytes on a two hour standard tape cassette.  Disk searching
utilities such as GOpher by Microlytics, Inc. were also on
display.

HyperCard
----------
Finally HyperCard applications abounded including a new version
of Danny Goodman's Focal Point, HyperDialer, a phone dialing
accessory from DataDesk International, Hypersource CD from Prism
Technologies of Canada, which contains over 400 megabytes of
useful information on the Macintosh industry, and (they're
back...) new additions to Smutstack, the X-rated HyperPornography
product.

--Jon Haber, Special to NEWSBYTES
[***][8/23/88][***]
M A C W O R L D  E X P O .....August 12, 1988

JASMINE INTRODUCES A NEW POSTSCRIPT-COMPATIBLE LASER PRINTER
BOSTON, Ma. (NB) -- Jasmine Technologies, a leading manufacturer
and distributer of hard disk drives and other mass storage
peripherals, formally announced the introduction of DirectPrint,
a 300 dot per inch Postscript-compatible printer for the
Macintosh.

The new printer competes with Apple's own LaserWriter II series
with an expected price tag below $4000 (lower than Apple's NT
which is priced at $4,500 and the NTX which sells for $6,500).
The device uses a Postscript clone driver developed by Qume Inc.
and manufacturers ensure compatibility with all Macintosh
Postscript applications.

This announcement heralds Jasmine's first foray outside of the
hard disk market in which it has thrived during two years since
it introduced its first 20 megabyte external hard disk.  During
that time the company has developed a range of external and
internal hard disk drive units, tape backup systems, and the
popular MacBackPak portable hard drive.  This line was enhanced
today with the addition of new SCSI devices, a new DirectTape 40
megabyte hard disk backup system and an enhanced set of BackPak
disk drives with optional removable modem.

Jasmine's new move into the printer market is part of that firm's
strategy to broaden its base, using the reputation for quality
and good will it has developed over the years to try and become
the world's leading manufacturer of Macintosh peripherals.

The new printer comes complete with three megabytes of RAM and
operates at a rate of 4 million instructions per second (MIPS).
The machine is loaded with thirty-five typefaces and will sell
for under $4000.  This lightweight unit (35 pounds) is expected
to ship in October from San Francisco-based Jasmine Technologies.

--Jon Haber, Special to NEWSBYTES
[***][8/23/88][***]
M A C W O R L D  E X P O  Special Report  August 13, 1988

KEYNOTE ADDRESS BY BILL GATES STRESSES HIS COMMITMENT TO THE MACINTOSH
Boston, Ma. (NB) -- Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates keynoted the second
day of MacWorld Expo in Boston, highlighting his continued commitment to
the Macintosh line of computers despite the continued you know what over look
and feel.

Discussing his company's recent new products, QuickBASIC, and a new update of
Microsoft Works, Gates let it be known that his long-term dedication to
creating applications for the Mac's line of computers is unshaken and
that he is looking forward to creating new, more powerful applications
for Mac machines entering new business and entertainment environments.

The lawsuit reared its ugly head only in response to a reporter's
question.  Gates dismissed speculations of the suit dragging out for
years, stating that he hoped the suit would be expedited, leaving the
company's agenda by the end of the year.

-- Jon Haber, Special to NEWSBYTES
[***][8/23/88][***]
M A C W O R L D  E X P O   Special Reports...August 13, 1988

KEYNOTE PANEL DISCUSSES THE FUTURE OF THE MACINTOSH
Boston, Ma. (NB) -- Bill Gate's keynote address was preceded by
a panel of blue ribbon experts discussing the future of the
Macintosh in a talk entitled "The Next Five Years of the Macintosh:
Visions of the Future." The panel featured Jonathan Rotenberg,
president of the Boston Computer Society, David Bunnell,
editor-in-chief of "Macworld," William Campbell, president of
Claris, Guy Kawasaki, former  Apple evangelist and president
of ACIUS, Robert Metcalfe, chairman of 3Com and Apple Fellow,
and visionary Alan Kay.

In tribute to Apple President John Sculley's vision of the
future, their description of tomorrow's Mac bore a striking
resemblance to the "Knowledge Navigator," the portable, networked,
"hyper-linked" computer powerhouse which has been the buzz
vision around  Apple for the last year.

Metcalfe, whose company is a leading provider of computer
networking products, discussed the diskless computer.   Alan Kay
(who was part of the Xerox Parc team which originated many of
the Mac's user interface concepts) hoped for a portable machine
freed from the desktop, possibly freed from the laptop.
Boston Computer Society President Jonathan Rotenberg, ever the user
advocate, called for a cheaper Macintosh computer ("somewhere
around $200").

"Macworld" Editor David Bunnell used the time given him before
Bill Gates spoke to slam OS/2 against a few walls.  Too big...too
complicated...too wasteful...who needs it, were phrases tossed around
the hall by speakers and press.  Never let it be said that visionary
talks of the future should interrupt partisan issues of the present.

--Jon Haber, Special to NEWSBYTES
[***][8/23/88][***]
M A C W O R L D  E X P O  Special Reports....August 11, 1988

MICROSOFT ANNOUNCES SIGNIFICANT UPGRADE OF WORKS
BOSTON, Ma (NB) -- To the surprise of almost no one, the long
anticipated release of Microsoft Works 2.0 was announced during a
press conference on Wednesday August 10th during industry day at
MacWorld.

Microsoft has enhanced its tremendously popular integrated
software package for the Macintosh by adding a 60,000 word
spellcheck program to the word processing module, expanding the
packages spreadsheet to 256 columns by 16,382 rows, adding color
support for the Macintosh II, Print Preview to view each page of
a document before printing, and recorder macros to automate
keystrokes of often-repeated tasks.

Support for columnar text and an enhanced set of object-oriented
drawing tools give Works the potential for limited desktop
publishing.  Microsoft representatives displayed logos,
presentation graphics and a newsletter created using the
program's word processing and drawing tools.  While not award-
winning works of art, they demonstrated quality work needed by
the small business customer who are primary purchasers of Works.

Works 2.0, scheduled for release in October, retains its original
price of $295.  Upgrades are available to users of earlier
versions of the program for just $75 and Microsoft is offering
free upgrades to anyone purchasing version 1.0 after August 1st.

Alongside this newly-enhanced version of Microsoft's integrated
software, the company demonstrated upgrades of Microsoft Word,
Power Point, and recently-released products like Microsoft Mail,
demonstrating that lawsuit or no, the world's largest software
company is not about to give up its dominant share of the
lucrative Macintosh software market.

--Jon Haber, Special to NEWSBYTES
[***][8/23/88][***]
M A C W O R L D  E X P O   Special Reports  ...August 13, 1988

MACWORLD DAY 2
Boston, Ma. (NB) -- The second day of Macworld Expo ran smoothly
with all systems go despite record-breaking crowds and outdoor
temperatures in the high 90's.  Other than long lines at Informix's
"time machine" booth, this year's MacWorld is the most navigatable
in recent memory. (Informix publishes Wingz, a major new spreadsheet,
which has become this MacWorld's FullWrite Professional with elaborate
time-related displays promising marvels yet to be delivered.  The same
promises were promised at the January MacWorld Expo in San Francisco
where the time machine booth touted Wingz).

A certain confidence radiates from the show floor this year as the
Mac seems to have proved its case that it is a serious business machine.
Oracle, Novell, and 3Com's delivery of their high-end database and
networking products into the Mac environment has helped make the
Mac a serious choice as a mainframe front-end or network node (see related
story).

While no one is substantiating rumors of an upcoming Mac II based
on Motorola's top-of-the-line 68030 processor, Motorola itself
is on the show floor pushing the new chip and little doubt
remains that 68030 is part of Apple's plans to push the Mac II
into the range of workstation-class machines.  With Apple's
booths stressing the company's  commitment to education and a
030 machine in the wings, Steve Jobs had best get his NeXT
educational workstations out of the lab and into the classroom
before his old company cuts him off at the knees.

-- Jon Haber, Special to NEWSBYTES
[***][8/23/88][***]
M A C W O R L D  E X P O  Special Reports....August 11, 1988

MACWORLD EXPO OPENS IN BOSTON TO PRESS AND INDUSTRY V.I.P.s
BOSTON, Ma. (NB) -- Before the deluge of the 30,000 attendants
expected to attend this year's Boston MacWorld Expo, exhibitors
from the more than 350 companies displaying at the show opened
the doors to give press and invited guests a sneak preview of
what to expect over the three day industry show opening Thursday
August 11th.

Ever increasing in scale, this MacWorld Expo is expected to be
the largest Macintosh-related computer event ever with exhibits
and conferences filling three major facilities and every hotel in
the city of Boston booked through the weekend.

Apple, Microsoft and Apple's software subsidiary Claris all
announced new products during industry day (see next stories)
and over 100 new releases or upgrades are expected to be unveiled
during the course of the show.  Some new products come from old-
time Mac players like Jasmine (makers of hard disks and other
peripherals) which has announced a new Postscript printer, and
Mediagenic (formerly Activision) which has released new Hypercard
applications including an upgrade of Dan Goodman's Focal Point.

Other new products come from recent additions to the Macintosh
family of software and peripheral manufacturers.  These include
Dac Easy, makers of PC accounting software, which has released a
Mac version of its popular Dac Easy Light accounting package,
and Compugraphic, the world's largest manufacturer of
computerized typesetting equipment, which is showing off its new
range of typefaces available for the Mac.

Show planners in Boston, a city of long traffic jams, short-
tempered drivers, and a major convention center still under
construction, are counting on the efforts of several valiant
shuttle bus drivers to unite the far-flung branches of what
promises to be one of the most enjoyable and well-attended trade
show in the city's history.

--Jon Haber, Special to NEWSBYTES


[***][8/23/88][***]
COMPUTER WITHOUT SOFTWARE
TOKYO (NB) -- One of the world's leading digital watchmakers,
Casio Computer, has developed a revolutionary new computer process
that does not require an operating system.  Called the Automatic
Data Processing System (ADPS), actual data operates the computer
without operating systems nor application programs.

Merely from input of various data from a keyboard, ADPS can
construct a database and, at the same time, output the information
according to a predetermined configuration.  It is the hardware
alone which processes the data, not software.  Data is the entire
content of the system's memory and data is replaced whenever new
information is entered via the keyboard.

As a result, ADPS saves the time of taking in and out programs from
a memory unit, so the system realizes high-speed data processing.
The operation only requires addition, deletion, correction,
collection, and retrieval.

Casio has not revealed more details of the machine, but promises to
announce an ADPS office computer this October.

CONTACT: Casio Computer, 2-6-1 Nishi-Shinjuku, Shinjuku-ku,
         Tokyo 163

[***][8/23/88][***]
TOSHIBA'S REAL-TIME TELEPHONE TRANSLATION OF ENGLISH/JAPANESE
TOKYO (NB) -- Toshiba has developed the world's first Japanese-
English automatic character translation phone, taking advantage
of AI and satellite communications technology.   The phone
translates conversations from Japanese to English and vice
versa when the chats originate via keyboard.

For instance, Japanese sentences written in Tokyo are translated
in real-time into English by an engineering workstation, and the
translated sentences are displayed on the screen in London through
satellite communications.  In the same way, the process goes from
London to Tokyo.   Japanese sentences appear on the upper part of
the screen and Japanese-translated replies appear on the lower
part, so you can make a conversation by comparing the sentences.
Toshiba calls it, "Global-scale simultaneous interpretation."

The translating procedure is being hailed as speedy and precise,
able to grasp even vague meaning.

CONTACT: Toshiba, 1-1-1 Shibaura, Minato-ku, Tokyo 105

[***][8/23/88][***]
MITI READY TO DEVELOP NEXT-GENERATION COMPUTERS
TOKYO (NB) -- The Ministry of International Trade and Industries
(MITI) will launch a major new  research and development project
in the area of next-generation computers next year.  MITI has
announced it has the cooperation of major computer makers such
as NEC and Fujitsu, and the Electrotechnical Laboratory.
Actual development of the next-generation machines is expected to
begin within a few years.

The study covers three areas: a neurocomputer which imitates the
human brain, a biocomputer made from biological materials, and
an optical computer capable of ultra high-speed data processing
using optical signals.

The neurocomputer and biocomputer have several features MITI
will develop, including parallel processing of information and
self-learning. MITI claims that the recent developments in
physiology, biology, and information engineering have made
possible an in-depth analysis of the way the human brain works,
and that such knowledge can be applied to computing.

MITI's executive officer told reporters, "We want to achieve
development in ten years, investing 40 - 50 billion yen or $ 0.3
- 0.5 billion."

CONTACT: Ministry of International Trade and Industries,
         1-3-1 Kasumigaseki, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo

[***][8/23/88][***]
FUZZY COMPUTER LAB TO BE SET UP
TOKYO (NB) -- Details of the coming Laboratory of International
Fuzzy Engineering (LIFE), to be set up by MITI and major Japanese
companies, are finally being revealed.  MITI says the lab will
spend eight years, starting next year, researching the so-called
fuzzy logic and applying the research to the creation of special-
purpose computers. MITI will also receive the participation of
colleges and national research institutes.  44 companies are
participating in the project, including NEC, Toyota, Kawasaki
Steel, and foreign capital firms.

In the world of fuzzy computers, vague terms such as "almost," "old"
or "probably" are understood, unlike current computers.  The
study will include the application of fuzzy logic to a control
system and other data processing systems, and will make a prototype
of a fuzzy computer.  The expenditure for the study is expected to
be 5.47 billion yen or $41 million by 1995.

[***][8/23/88][***]
AI-APPLIED COMPUTER NETWORK
TOKYO (NB) -- IBM Japan and Sumitomo Metal Industries have jointly
developed a system which automatically operates computer networks
using artificial intelligence (AI).  The system, which replaces many
functions previously performed by  humans, automatically starts
various application programs such as power-switching and personnel
management.  In case of system failure, the AI application infers
the cause and prints out the result on a printer.

The system includes a mainframe, peripheral units, and
terminals, and interactively connects computers from each facility
by an online system.  Even if one computer is down, the system can
prevent other computers from shutting down.  The system is currently
being tested and is scheduled to start factory floor operation this
November.

CONTACT: IBM Japan, 3-2-12, Roppongi, Minato-ku, Tokyo 106

[***][8/23/88][***]
NEC TAKES INITIATIVE TO PRODUCE 4M CHIPS
TOKYO (NB) -- NEC has announced its 4M DRAM production schedule.
According to this long-term plan, production and shipment of
commercial samples will start in January 1989 at Yamaguchi
NEC, with output amounting to a few thousand units per month.

Hiroshima NEC will participate in the production starting in early
1991.  This is NEC's chance to beat rival Toshiba which has gotten the jump
on NEC in the 1 megabit DRAM business.

But Toshiba isn't NEC's only rival.  Competition in the 4M DRAM
market is already heating up between these players and
Fujitsu, Hitachi and Mitsubishi.  Meanwhile, Sharp
has also entered the race with the development of technical
sample of 4M DRAM chips and says it is prepared to ship its
products at the same time.

CONTACT: NEC Corporation, 1-4-28 Mita, Minato-ku, Tokyo 108

[***][8/23/88][***]
<< SUSHI BYTES >>

TV PHONE VIA ISDN -- Japan's telecom king NTT is planning to
release a black & white 64K bps still-picture TV phone using ISDN
technology. The price per unit promises to be 70,000 yen or $530.
The shipping date and more details have not been announced.

AX TO BE CONNECTED WITH UNIX -- Chiyoda Joho Kiki (CJK), Tokyo,
and Taiwan's PC giant Acer will jointly develop a program which
connects Acer's AX personal computer with a UNIX-based
minicomputer, by the end of this year.

NTT TO HOLD AN INTERNATIONAL SYMPOSIUM -- NTT will hold an
international symposium with the theme of "ISDN and Future
Developments in Telecommunications Networks" in Tokyo this
October.  NTT started its original ISDN network this April.


[***][8/23/88][***]
IBM RESEARCHER ANALYZES BACH'S MUSIC WITH AN EXPERT SYSTEM
BRUSSELS, BELGIUM (NB) -- An IBM researcher is being aided by
Bach's music to create an expert system which is designed to
listen and examine music. Music found to be out of harmony, or
out of tune, even though the changes may be very small, will be
corrected automatically.

Kemal Ebcioglu developed CHORAL, the program responsible for
the music analysis. Being a master of music and a holder of an
Informatics degree, he used the Backtracking Specification Language,
which performs fast logic analysis using a computer.

Bach's music, which was written in the 18th century, is mainly
composed of musical harmonies. Each one of these is designed to
be performed by a male and female choral group with the soprano
as the major sound heard. CHORAL, which is composed of 350
rules of deduction, each one of which is subdivisable into many
more rules, corresponds to the way our voice track actually
works.

Although such a job may seem simple, it takes an IBM mainframe
about 30 minutes to run the program and perform an analysis on
sounds. It executes 23 billion instructions.

Kemal Ebcioglu stated, "CHORAL is a test to see whether the
artificial intelligence software available today is capable to
analyze sounds, which are among the most difficult analog
signals to be examined by computers. The success of CHORAL,
however, affirms my position that computers, and especially
software, are finally able to tackle extremely complex
projects."

[***][8/23/88][***]
COMPUTERS ARE EVERYWHERE
BRUSSELS, BELGIUM (NB) -- Do you know how many computers exist in
your house?  NEWSBYTES EUROPE was amazed to discover that there are many
more than we thought. Computerized components are becoming such
common items, they no longer advertised.

Our radio, cooker, microwave oven, dishwasher, photocopier,
tranceiver, clock, telephone, video deck, television, washing
machine all have some computer elements.  The most-used
device is the Z80 (it is still alive), followed by the MC6805
which includes ROM on chip. "Microprocessors are used by many
companies to offer additional functions at very low cost," said
AMD's Patrick Broucaert. He added, "However, we are
beginning to see powerful CPUs making inroads into the average
household item. I feel that the 8088, although one of the most
successful in the market, will probably replace the Z80 in control
applications."

[***][8/23/88][***]
NCR ANNOUNCES MCA-COMPATIBLE SYSTEMS
AMSTERDAM, HOLLAND (NB) -- NCR, reportedly skeptical of the
prospects for IBM's new PS/2 Micro Channel Architecture, has
succumbed to market factors and announced a series of MCA-
compatible systems to be available Q4 1988.

This turn-around came as a result of the new IBM licensing
agreement which permits companies to offer MCA-compatible PCs as
long as a license fee is paid to IBM. No one knows how much NCR
paid for the fee but insiders suggest it was more than $1 million.

NCR joins Tandy and Dell in offering MCA-compatible systems. Most
other vendors are playing a waiting game to see if they should
offers MCA compatibles or AST SMARTBUS compatible systems.

[***][8/23/88][***]
FIRST 486 SYSTEMS OUT IN 1990
BRUSSELS, BELGIUM (NB) -- NEWSBYTES EUROPE has learned that 80486
samples have been delivered to IBM, COMPAQ and DELL which are
expected to announce new '486 systems for delivery in 1990.

The chip, which has been covered previously in NEWSBYTES, offers
'386 compatibility and faster speeds due to its denser
manufacture.

One source close to Intel said to NEWSBYTES EUROPE that these
systems will have ESDI hard disk controllers running at 15MHz
(against 5MHz for MFM and 10Mhz for today's ESDI) and thus will be
able to use 760MB hard disks. Prices are naturally high and
these supersystems should cost about $30,000 and offer about 10 -
15 MIPS.

[***][8/23/88][***]
PANASONIC RELEASES NEW LASER PRINTER
BRUSSELS, BELGIUM (NB) -- Panasonic's newest laser printer,
capable of printing 11 pages per minute, offers double paper
loading bays, collated print-outs, either 512K or 1.5 MB of
RAM, and emulation of HP LaserJet, FX-240, IBM Proprinter,
Diablo 630 or Panasonic printer emulation.  The price is
slated to be around $3,800.

Designed for large offices and high turn-over users, the printer
is scheduled for delivery in September.

[***][8/23/88][***]
FIVE HIGH TECH COMPANIES FORM ETC
DUBLIN, IRELAND (NB) -- Five high tech companies have formed ETC,
European Technology Corporation, to capture the emerging, and
potentially lucrative European markets of 1992, when borders in
Europe will cease to exist.

The five, AI Computer of Dublin, ADI of Taiwan, Investment
Associates of Toronto, Compass Computer Group of the United
Kingdom, and Softec GMBH of West Germany, will set up a
manufacturing plant based in Strassburg, France. The plant will
produce about 10,000 terminals per month with revenues expected
to rise to about IRL8 million (about $12 million).

[***][8/23/88][***]
IBM TO SHOW AS/400 AT BUREAU 1988
BRUSSELS, BELGIUM (NB) -- IBM is to show a plethora of new
products during the upcoming Bureau 1988 show which will be held
here from 21 through 28 September.

Products scheduled to debut include the new AS/400 operating system,
connectivity devices, fault-tolerant systems/88, and software
developed under the new "education loan program" in which IBM loans
systems and equipment to people who would like to write software
for IBM products. Bureau 88 will be covered by NEWSBYTES EUROPE.

[***][8/23/88][***]
SHARP RELEASES NEW COLOR LCD
DUSSELDORF, GERMANY (NB) -- Sharp has announced that it has
manufactured a color LCD said to be 15 inches diagonally. Although
color LCDs have been available for quite some time, this is the
first time that a 15" color LCD has become available.

The LCD, which will cost about $800, offers sixteen RGB inputs and
is designed to replace color screens on laptop computers. Sharp
is currently looking at the possibility of producing a VGA-
compatible color LCD which will offer 256 colors. When that
happens, expect to see many monochrome devices, such as the
fast-moving picture phones,  offer color.

[***][8/23/88][***]
EUROBITS...

      ...Microsoft WORD 3.0 is now available for IBM XENIX 2.0
and XENIX 286/386. The program, which is almost 100% user-
compatible with the DOS version, will retail for $595...

      ...POSITRONICA announced that it has become distributor
of BITSTREAM FONTWARE for Benelux (Belgium, Netherlands and
Luxembourg). Bitstream provides true WYSIWYG capability for
Aldus, Lotus 1-2-3, Word 4.0 and Word Perfect...



[***][8/23/88][***]
DEJA VU ALL OVER AGAIN AT IBM?
ARMONK, N.Y. (NB) -- Listen for the jungle drums. Scan the sky
for smoke signals. The IBM rumor mill is grinding again, with the
word from the Big Blueologists that the PC-AT is about to come to
life again. It's the Coke Classic gambit -- brought back by customer
demand. "PC Week" says the new machine will be called the PS/2
Model 35. "The Wall Street Journal" says the new machine will
abandon the controversial Micro Channel Architecture in favor of
the good old AT bus. Stewart Alsop, editor of "P.C. Week," is
skeptical. "It would kind of give the lie to everything they've
been saying," he told the Associated Press. IBM,
characteristically, is mum. Remember, dear readers, IBM has the
power to cloud men's minds. Only the Big Blue Shadow knows for
sure.

In other IBM news, the company has rolled out a comprehensive
line of expert systems software, for users of IBM products
ranging from novices to artificial intelligence mavens. The
software guides the user through a series of questions in order
to extract the lists and rules needed in the software. The
software is available for a full range of computers from PCs to
mainframes. The products include a new version of the Expert
System Environment, aimed for users with few computer skills, a
complementary program called Expert System Consultation
Environment-PC, and an update of KnowledgeTool, aimed at computer
pros. For AI gurus, IBM is offering IBM KEE, developed with
Intellicorp. Inc. of Mountain View, Calif.

[***][8/23/88][***]
AT&T TAKES AN AX TO 80386 PRICES
MORRISTOWN, N.J. (NB) -- AT&T has moved to position its high-end
personal computers to compete with the machines based on the new
Intel 80386SX chip. The 80386SX is a somewhat disabled version of
the 80386 that is a little bit slower but a lot cheaper. "This
reduction shows customers and the industry that AT&T intends to
be an aggressive player in the personal computer field," says
Francisco Albququerque of AT&T's personal computer division.
Prices on the flagship 6386 WGS, which runs at 16 mHz, have been
slashed by more than 20 percent. The basic model has been knocked
down from $4,899 to $3,495.

[***][8/23/88][***]
VIRGINIA HIGH SCHOOL WINS SUPERCOMPUTER
ANNANDALE, Va. (NB) -- Remember when it was a big deal if a high
school had a few Apple IIs for students to use with science
projects? Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology
now has a supercomputer. The school for gifted students has won a
nationwide contest sponsored by ETA Systems of St. Paul, Minn.
The prize is an ETA 10-P supercomputer, with a street value of
about $1 million. ETA spawned the contest as a publicity device,
promising to award the machine to the school which could come up
with the best uses for the mega-machine.

A team of four TJ students -- Eric Scheirer, 16; Manish Tuteja,
16; David Rosen, 17; and Peter Thomas, 18 -- each worked on a
different problem during the competition at Macalester College.
Tuteja's paper on finding the roots of equations was judged the
best in the competition. Rosen, who explored ways of using
computer resources more efficiently, was also singled out for
mention. Scheirer looked at planetary behavior in a binary star
system, while Thomas studied the chemical reaction between two
complex chemicals to determine the correct concentration for a
controlled reaction.

ETA will send a technician along with the machine for the first
two years. After two years, Thomas Jefferson will have to meet
the annual operating cost of the machine, which is about
$100,000. TJ officials expect to have no trouble raising that
kind of money, through renting time to area high tech companies.

[***][8/23/88][***]
INTERLEAF UNVEILS NEW VERSION FOR THE MAC II
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. (NB) -- Interleaf Inc. has a new version of its
high-end desktop publishing software, Interleaf Publisher, for
the Macintosh II. Version 3.5 supports the Apple Font Manager,
can convert typed-in text to graphic fonts that can be sized,
stretched, rotated, and filled/ and can run under Multifinder.
Also, the new version of Interleaf Publisher makes it easier for
the Mac to share documents with all the other platforms the
program runs on, including engineering workstations from Apollo,
Digital Equipment, IBM, and Sun. "The new release of Interleaf
Publisher for the Macintosh II demonstrates our ongoing
commitment to the powerful Macintosh platform, a commitment we
plan to continue into the future," says Interleaf President David
Boucher. The price is $2,495, the same as version 3.0. Upgrades
for registered 3.0 users are free.

CONTACT: Interleaf, Inc., Ten Canal Park, Cambridge MA 02141,
         617-577-9800.

[***][8/23/88][***]
ADMINISTRATION ESCALATES WAR WITH JUDGE GREENE
WASHINGTON (NB) -- U.S. District Court Judge Harold Greene is
"preventing American telephone subscribers from receiving all but
the most rudimentary information services at least through 1990,"
charges a report by the Commerce Department's National
Telecommunications and Information Administration. For months,
the agency has been criticizing Greene's seamanship as he guides
the AT&T breakup through difficult legal shoals. The latest salvo
accuses Greene of preventing the development in the U.S. of
systems similar to the Minitel data service in France. Greene is
blocking the emergence of mass market information services by
forbidding the Bell regional operating companies from making
cheap terminals or offering electronic yellow pages. "It is as if
a court had enjoined the provision of mail delivery or voice
telephone service to all but the largest businesses and wealthier
citizens," said the report. For his part, Greene told a lawyers
group in Canada recently that freeing the Baby Bells would hurt
competition "unless it be assumed the addition of a wolf to a
flock of sheep would maximize competition in the flock."

[***][8/23/88][***]
POSTSCRIPT CLONE FROM CAI
BILLERICA, Mass. (NB) -- Custom Applications Inc. has announced a
software interpreter that will read PostScript files and print them
on ordinary printers. The $495 product, Freedom of Press, will
offer 35 fonts, through either BitStream's Fontware or
Compugraphics Intellifont fonts. CAI President Jeff Moore says,
"Freedom of Press will change the way people conceive of using
the PostScript language. By eliminating costs as the determining
factor, overall use of this powerful page description language
will increase greatly."  The product supports a variety of 24-pin
dot matrix printers, ink jet printers from H-P, Siemens, and
Canon, and laser printers including the H-P LaserJet Plus and
Series II, the Canon LBP8-II, Olivetti PG-108, and the JLaser
card. The software runs on ATs, PS/2s, and 386 machines.
According to Mark Hastings, vice president of sales and
marketing, the product will run on XTs, but it is very processor
intensive, and will run very  s l o w l y. Freedom of Press is
set for delivery in late September.

CONTACT: CAI, 5 Middlesex Technology Ctr., 900 Middlesex
         Turnpike, Billerica MA 01821, 800-873-4367, Ext. 10.

[***][8/23/88][***]
BURNLEY: GM SPEAKS WITH FORKED TONGUE
WASHINGTON (NB) -- Transporation Secretary James Burnley says
General Motors Chairman Roger Smith told him GM's Hughes Aircraft
Corp. would not protest the awarding of a $3.6 billion air
traffic control computer contract to IBM. Just days later, says
Burnley, "the protest came in." Burnley said Smith telephoned him
shortly after the giant contract, the largest in IBM's history,
was announced. Smith said Hughes wouldn't appeal, according to
Burnley, and that Hughes would turn over its data to IBM. Then
Hughes complained to the General Services Administration's Board
of Contract Appeals. The contract is on hold while GSA ponders
the matter. The contract is a key to IBM's plans for its RT
reduced instruction set workstation, which will be the basic
terminal in the system.

[***][8/23/88][***]
AIRLINES CROSS SWORDS OVER COMPUTER RESERVATION SYSTEMS
WASHINGTON (NB) -- Texas Air Corp. has told the Transportation
Department that American Airlines' Sabre and United Airlines
Apollo reservation systems "are purposely designed not to provide
consistently reliable information about other carriers." The
airline complains that Sabre diverted $7.1 million in revenue in
flights serving Los Angeles in May to American. Apollo diverted
$8.7 million in the same period. The systems are "designed to make
it either very difficult or impossible to find out flight or seat
availability of competing airlines," says a Texas Air spokesman.
As a result, travel agents tend to book passengers on American or
United and eschew rival carriers. No response from American or
United.

[***][8/23/88][***]
IS WANG FINALLY SERIOUS ABOUT PCs?
LOWELL, Mass. (NB) -- Wang Laboratories has hired Graham Beachum
to a new position of vice president of personal computer sales
and marketing. Wang stole Beachum away from Dell Computer Corp.,
where he was vice president of marketing and sales. Frederick
Wang, president and chief operating officer at Wang, said the
move "underscores the seriousness of our intent to capture a
significant share" of the PC market. Wang established its
personal computer division in May. Beachum, 40, has had senior
marketing jobs at Tandy and IBM.

[***][8/23/88][***]
STROLLING ON THE MODEM MALL
ROCKVILLE, Md (NB) -- GE Information and Modem Media have signed
an agreement that will allow online shopping on GEnie, GE's
online information system. Among the first merchants in the modem
mall at Long Distance Roses, an overnight delivery florist;
Godiva Chocolatier; Florida Fruit Shippers, distributors of fresh
Florida fruit and seafood; and Crutchfield, marketer of audio,
video, and telephone products. Buyers will pay by credit card. GE
says it has more than 115,000 personal computer owners
subscribing to GEnie.

[***][8/23/88][***]
NEWS NIBBLES

A Gallup poll done for the ELECTRONIC INDUSTRIES ASSOCIATION in
Washington estimates that 18 percent of American households now
own personal computers. Households with children are more likely
to have computers than single-person households.

GTECH CORP., Providence, R.I., has signed a five-year contract to
triple the size of Mexico's lottery and expand it beyond Mexico
City. GTECH is the world's largest maker of lottery computer
systems. The contract will add 1000 sales terminals to the 500
already in place.

LOTUS PUBLISHING CORP., Cambridge, Mass., has named Mark Flanagan
as president of the Lotus Development Corp. subsidiary.
Established in 1984, Lotus Publishing develops and markets
information products and services.

GENERAL ELECTRIC, Fairfield, Conn., has sold its semiconductor
manufacturing business to HARRIS CORP., Melbourne, Fla., for an
undisclosed amount. GE has been shopping the chip line for two
years. GE picked up the chip business as part of its merger with
RCA.

LSW, Inc., of Landover, Md., will become the primary contractor
for PRIME COMPUTER's minicomputers in the House of
Representatives.


[***][8/23/88][***]
RACING TIPSTERS GO HI-TECH
LONDON, UK (NB) -- Subscribers to Telecom Gold, the UK Dialcom
affiliate E-mail service, now have access to Turfnet, the first
racing tipster service with tips delivered by E-mail.

The service, which costs between #25 and #72 a month, provides up
to the minute information on the best bets of the day, delivered
to your mailbox on the morning of the races.

Conventional tipster services have to post their newsletters out
the night before the races, so if it rains overnight, the 'going'
on the course can upset the calculations. Turfnet beats this
problem and aims to line the pockets of its subscribers too.

Doe the service work? NEWSBYTES UK fancied a flutter, so we
staked #11 on a four horse 'Yankee' bet, based on Turfnet's four
selections on last Saturday's racing. The result? One winner @
10/1, two seconds and a non-runner. We broke even. Better luck
tomorrow...

* Telecom Gold users (and other Dialcom subscribers) can try out
  Turfnet free of charge for seven days by E-mailing the company
  on 74:SDR004.

CONTACT: TURFNET UK LTD, 11 Cedric Chambers, Northwick Close,
         London NW8.               Email (Dialcom) 74:SDR004.

[***][8/23/88][***]
TURBOCHARGED HARD DISKS WITH OVERDRIVE
SPELDHURST, KENT (NB) -- Hard disk accelerators aren't new, since
most of them work using a disk-caching facility within software.
Business Simulations has gone one step further with Overdrive, a
hard disk accelerator that improves on Dos's speed (or rather,
lack of it).

Overdrive is a TSR (terminate and stay resident) package that
sits in about 30K of main memory and intercepts normal Dos-driven
disk calls such as save, load and dir. On intercepting a Dos
call, the package uses its own optimised code to perform the same
function, but faster.

Does it work? First reports suggest so, with a 100 per cent speed
increase recorded on floppies, and around a 50 per cent speed
increase on hard disks. Even better, the package costs #69-95. If
disk speed is your bag, Overdrive could be the answer.

CONTACT: BUSINESS SIMULATIONS, Scribenton House, Speldhurst,
         Kent TN3 0TU.                     Tel: [phone].

[***][8/23/88][***]
MOTOROLA MOVES INTO OPEN SYSTEMS
MAIDENHEAD, BERKSHIRE (NB) -- Motorola wined and dined the
computer press last week, as well as telling the world that it's
really into open systems. Dr David Tanner, European marketing
manager, said that Motorola is committed to open systems
architecture, since that's where the future of high power
computing lies.

What's good for the industry, however, might not be good for
Motorola. NEWSBYTES UK suggested to Tanner that users might buy
cheaper, but compatible, third-party kit in preference to
Motorola's (self-confessed) high-priced hardware.

Tanner's reply? "If we didn't do it, someone else would," he told
NEWSBYTES UK.

A resigned attitude maybe, but Motorola is taking a calculated
gamble. If it pays off and most high-powered hardware conforms to
Motorola's lead in open systems, then the company stands to make
a mint. If not, the company could lose a slice of its market
share. Either way, the customer looks like winning, so who's
complaining?

CONTACT: MOTOROLA COMPUTER SYSTEMS, 27 Market Street,
         Maidenhead, Berkshire SL6 8AE.
         Tel: [phone].

[***][8/23/88][***]
NEW COMPUTER MAGAZINE DUE NEXT MONTH
LONDON, UK (NB) -- Watch out for a new magazine on the news
stands from next month. East Midlands Allied Press (EMAP) is
launching PC Tech User, a technical version of its existing PC
User bi-monthly magazine.

Like PC User, PC Tech User will be a controlled circulation
magazine - i.e, a freebie if you fill the card in correctly. The
magazine will feature technical evaluations, technical hints and
tips and Mayday, a technical help line. In addition to this, the
new magazine is edited by David Allen, previously assistant
editor on PC User magazine.

The first issue of PC Tech User is datelined for October, so it
should be out in time for the PC Show at the end of next month.

CONTACT: PC TECH USER, 3-4 Hardwick Street, London EC1B 1TR.
         Tel: [phone].

[***][8/23/88][***]
IBM AND COMPUTERLAND SECURE ITV OLYMPIC CONTRACT
LONDON, UK (NB) -- IBM and Computerland, one of Big Blue's
largest dealerships, have landed a prestigious contract to kit
out ITV Sport's television studios for the upcoming Seoul
Olympics.

The TV company's Olympic coverage, which lasts from 16 September
through to 2 October, will be assisted by several IBM PS/2 Model
50Z and 70 machines. The PS/2 machines will be used by TV studio
staff to compile and support a database on all the competitors
and results from every event of the 26 Olympic sports taking
place in Seoul.

With over 15 hours of scheduled programming coming out of ITV
Sport's London studios, the Olympics should be a good test of how
the PS/2's stand up to almost constant use. Let's hope they're
using branded diskettes...

CONTACT: THAMES TELEVISION - 01-387-9494.
[***][8/23/88][***]
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
+ BRITBYTES - Bytes of news from around the UK... +
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+

APRICOT (021-456-1234) will launch a new range of computers next
month. The machines, code-named 'Chi' by several sources, are
said to include PS/2 and MicroChannel Architecture (MCA)
compatibility as standard on the 80386 microprocessor-based
models. The lower-priced machines are expected to be based around
Intel's recently-unveiled 80386SX microprocessor...

ARNOR (0733-239011) will announce version 4.0 of Protext, its
popular PC word processor, at next month's PC Show (London -
14/18 September). Protext 4.0 will cost #99-95. Existing users of
the package can upgrade for #35-00...

ASHTON-TATE (0628-33123) has told its UK dealers to expect dBase
IV sometime during October. The long-awaited rework of dBase III
was originally announced last February for shipment in July. Last
April, A-T announced a revised shipment date of September. The
October release date could be third-time lucky for Ashton-Tate...

ATARI (0753-33344) is said to be developing a hand-held PC,
according to MICROSCOPE, a UK computer trade weekly. Details of
the machine are scarce, but it expected to be similar to the
Psion Organiser II, and be MS-Dos compatible...

BRITISH TELECOM is said to be about to cease its small usage
rebate for customers who don't use the phone much (e.g. senior
citizens). The rebate, which allows up to #5-00 off the #13-50
quarterly phone line rental, is expected to be phased out during
the fourth quarter of this year...

The DATA PROTECTION REGISTRAR (0625-535711) is sharpening his
pencil. Sources suggest the Registrar's office is about to
dramatically increase the number of prosecutions for non-
registration of personal data by companies and individuals. To
date, the Registrar has taken two firms to court - and won...

MICROPRO (01-643-8866) has appointed John Speller as vice-
president of international sales. Speller is currently Micropro
UK managing director, and is the first non-US citizen to reach
such an exalted status within the company...

The ONE-TO-ONE E-mail service (01-240-8751) has abolished its
connect time charge of 10 pence per minute in favour of a flat-
rate #12-50 per month. Previously, the company imposed a #5-00
monthly cover charge on subscribers...

ORACLE (0800-678222) is now selling developer's versions of its
Oracle Professional package. The #399 special offer package
includes Oracle's Structured Query Language (SQL) relational
database system, as well as four development utilities, a screen
based applications generator, report writer, spreadsheet and a C
pre-compiler...

The first COMPUTERISED UK PASSPORTS were issued last week by the
Glasgow passport office. The British passports are smaller and a
different colour (lilac) than the current manually-produced blue
ones. The other five UK passport offices are set to install PIMIS
(Passport Issuing and Management Information System) within the
next year...