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************************************************************************** * * * ~ CYBERNETIC SERENDIPITY ~ * * * * STEN's irregular P.D column * * * * compiled by John Weller * * * ************************************************************************** And what a long strange trip it's been since the last column... The original idea was that it would appear in every issue but, what with the pressures of putting STEN together, it's become the last piece to be written and the first to be missed out. This practice will now cease. Cybenetic Serendipity will shine from every future issue; an ornament, an inspiration, and a monument to egotism. Read on, gentle reader, read on. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~ PROGRAMMES OR PROFIT ~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The suits have scented profits to be made from the P.D scene and have launched two magazines to cash in on it. I'd dearly love to see some decent ST magazines with P.D news and reviews, but I'm afraid that these two rags aren't the ones that we've been waiting for. "Public Domain" is the least offensive of the two and makes the fewest mistakes, but the best that one can say about "Shareware and P.D Shopper" is that at least they get the page-numbering right; if you're looking for accurate reporting and fact-checking, then you're looking in the wrong place. "Shareware Shopper" was rushed out a month before "Public Domain" appeared, with the sole purpose of 'queering its pitch', and it's a mystery that it's survived to the fourth issue. Let's all do it a favour and let it die gracefully. The wider question is what effect will these mags have on the P.D scene? How will P.D programmers react when they see libraries paying £1000 for a full-page mono advert? Martyn Dryden of the South West Software Library has said that, "I personally blame these magazines for our Trading Standards' raid. If you're in a newsagents and see these glossy magazines, you would assume that the libraries mentioned are making sizeable profits. The people who are really making a profit are the magazine owners." Their subject matter costs them nothing, and they can use free programmes as 'come ons' to boost their sales. This has also had the effect that the P.D scene is now being co-opted into the commercial mainstream. A library that can afford regular full- page advertisments is surely no longer part of any alternative to the commercial software 'industry', and is subject to the same cliquiness and pressures as, for example, the games firms. "Shareware Shopper" received so many letters from readers who were unable to find featured software in their advertisers' libraries that they have come up with the wheeze of sending ALL discs recieved by them to one favoured library (Advantage), the idea being that they will then pass them on to other advertisers. Is STEN alone in finding this distasteful, and encouraging P.D programmes to be treated as 'product' to be bartered and exploited? ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~ MAGGIE COMMITS SUICIDE ~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ It's idiot time again. Not content with murdering the English language, those fun-loving kiddies at Maggie disczine have marked their eighth issue with an article called "13 Ways to Commit Suicide". The introduction reads, "Many people in the world are fed up with their situation. These guys know only one solution to their problem with the simple name: Death!!! If you are one of these potential suicides then the following text could be interesting for you, cos I give many examples how to kill yourself without making any mess or what is the safest way without much pain!" This issue of Maggie has proved to be the final straw for the good people at Budgie Software. Camy Maertens had become so fed-up with the bad language and juvenilia in Maggie that he has now deleted ALL licenceware disczines from the Budgie list, and has advised all P.D libraries to do the same. He had also had complaints from libraries and readers that too many issues had appeared with too little content, and that they were no longer worth the £2.95 asking price. Rest in Peace, Maggie, it's a far, far better world that you've left behind. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~ SHAREWARE WORKS! ~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Hot on the heels of the news that Jeff Minter has earnt £7000 from his Llamatron shareware game, I hear that Dave Henniker has had £500 worth of registrations in six weeks for his Kosmic 2 psychedelic screen generator. Add to this the £100 that ST Format magazine paid him for the right to feature a cut-down version of the programme on their March cover disc, and you can see that shareware really does work. The downside of the shareware ideal is that Mick West's excellent Mono Emulator, which is now at version 5.1 and has been supported by him since 1987, has yielded him a total of £10 in contributions. To quote from his Doc file, "Every ST owner in Britain now has a copy, but I have recieved only two contributions for it, one from the USA, the other from Sweden. I sometimes wonder if making it Public Domain was a good idea. How many copies would it have sold at a tenner a go?" Each of these three programmes proves a point. Llamatron was distributed as a full version of the game, but Jeff Minter's reputation, and the fact that he was offering another high-quality game in return for the £5 registration, meant that he got the maximum return from it. Kosmic 2 was distributed as a cut-down version, with the promise of a full version and the STOS source code in return for the £5 asked for. The Mono Emulator was distributed as a full version with only a request to make a donation to Mick if you found it useful. Despite all the appeals for honesty and trust, shareware only works if there's an incentive for users to register, either in the form of a full version of the programme, or some other goodies. Let's hope that we see more programmes released in this way. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~ NEW CATALOGUES ~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Goodman's, the ST Club and the South West Software Library have recently issued new copies of their P.D and Shareware catalogues, and I'm pleased to see that the standard of presentation and information offered are increasing with each new issue. All three are in A4 format and offer a welcome change from the disc-based catalogues that many people find awkward to use or irritating. How do you circle an entry in an electronic catalogue? The solution would be to have an option in the programme that highlights any entry that you're interested in (with another option to save your selections either to disc or printer), but I've yet to see any programme that offers this. In an ideal world, you'd simply highlight the discs that you want and the catalogue would then print them out as an itemised order form. Would that be neat, or would it be *NEAT*? To get back to the subject in hand (as the Bishop said to the actress), all three catalogues have been desktop published and commercially printed, and are a joy to use. I'll review each one in a couple of paragraphs and, if you wish to send off for them, the addresses are given at the end of this column. The ST CLUB catalogue runs to 60 pages of five column text, and is divided into 24 categories. It'll cost you £1.95, but is free of charge if you subscribe to the excellent "ST Applications" magazine that they also publish. There is a page and a half of the usual "what exactly is P.D and Shareware", which should be enough to get new users going. I haven't got space to detail everything that's available in all the categories (most libraries carry a similar stock anyway), but one area where the ST club shines is in its Fonts section. They have fonts available in GEM, Pagestream, Calamus, Signum, Hewlett Packard and Mac formats, and carry the full range of Jeremy Hughes' Fontpac utilities. This makes it well worth checking out if you're into DTP. The ST Club also publishes a range of low-cost commercial utilities (low-cost being £9.99 to £14.99) for graphics, fonts and desktop uses. If you care about the future of ST software, then this is something that you ought to be supporting. Paul Glover has kindly sent me review copies of Imagecopy and C-Font, and a ful write-up of these will appear in the next STEN. Watch this > < space! The SOUTH WEST SOFTWARE LIBRARY catalogue is now up to version 7.0 and runs to 36 pages of four column text, covering 19 categories of P.D, Shareware and Licenceware. All Budgie and Shoestring Educational licenceware is now described in the catalogue. The design is much improved over previous versions and has screenshots which make it far easier to understand what is being described. All programmes are listed with symbols to indicate which system they'll run on, and whether the programme has been updated since the previous catalogue. There are also heart symbols to mark particularly recommended programmes - a nice touch! Because of increased postage and production charges, the SWSL is now asking £1.00 for their catalogue, but this is deductable from orders, making the catalogue effectively free. The GOODMANS' INTERNATIONAL PUBLIC DOMAIN AND SHAREWARE GUIDE runs to 84 pages of three column text, in 16 categories, and is available for £1.95. Each programme is described in detail and many of them are illustrated with screen shots. An interesting development is the articles which give a guide to particular categories, or which cover independent reviews of particular programmes; these will be of particular interest to newcomers to the P.D scene who are trying to find their way around the thousands of programmes that are available. Like the ST Club, Goodmans also publish a range of independent low- cost commercial programmes, and all of these are detailed in the catalogue. They have also recently aquired the British distribution rights for the cover discs from the American Start magazine. This ceased publication in 1991, but the discs are particularly worth seeking out, as they contain high quality programmes commisioned by, or written for, the magazine. I can remember seeing an excellent GFA Raytrace programme on one of their discs. Each of these libraries is run by an enthusiast who genuinely cares about the ST and P.D scenes, and the standard of cataloguing, back-up and testing of programmes is far removed from the cut-price disc shifters who disfigure the P.D scene. Support the best, forget the rest! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~ THIS ISSUE'S RECOMMENDATIONS ~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The last few months have seen a whole range of excellent programmes being released. But, if you expect me to review them then I'm afraid that you're in for a disappointment! The idea of P.D is that it's freely available and that even if you obtain it from a library, it's still cheap enough for you to try several similar programmes before settling on the one that's right for you. My aim in this column is to rave about programmes that I've personally found to be indispensible or amusing, and to try and infect you with my own enthusiasm for them. Rave on! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~ ARCHIVARIUS V2.2 ~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ It's German, it's mono, it needs 1 Meg to run in, and it's so good that it could easily have been released as a stand-alone professional programme. So what does it do? Well, it's a utility for cataloguing and displaying all the pictures or clip art on a disc, with the option of adding comments to each filename and storing the result as a permanent catalogue file. The only drawback is that as it's German, it only reads the PIC or PAC formats that were used there before the IMG format became universal. This obviously limits its usefulness, but it's so good that it's worth converting your pictures to the compressed PAC format just to be able to display them from it. The programme comes with 23 beautifully scanned pictures of photographs and paintings, a database file with filenames and comments, and the inevitable German readme file (see below for ways of translating this into English). This programme is Shareware, *not* P.D, and the author, Thomas Muller, is asking for a 20DM registration for the full version with extra options. If you're interested in mono graphics or have a clip art library, then this would be an essential registration. To use the programme, you copy it onto a disc of PIC or PAC graphics and then run it. You will then be presented with a very professional looking screen with a picture window, a series of small icons, and a vertical work area that looks like a sheet of lined paper. The programme reads the directory of your disc and then prints the picture filenames onto the 'lined paper' area. You can then add comments to each filename and save the text onto the disc as a database file. When you next run the programme, the annotated filenames will automatically appear on the screen. Database files can be deleted or altered at any future time. The way that Archivarius displays pictures is a particularly nice touch. The topbar of the picture window is always visible on the screen, no matter how many lines of text are being viewed, and a click on its top left up/down icon makes it quickly scroll up the screen and display the current picture. The set of icons can be moved to any position on the screen and there are keyboard shortcuts for all actions. As I've said, it's very, *very* professional, and a joy to work with. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~ GERMAN TO ENGLISH TRANSLATION PROGRAMMES ~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ One of the problems with using German P.D is that not only are the utilities themselves in German, but so are the instructions that you turn to when you need help! In an ideal world we'd simply run the text through a programme and end up with perfect English, but what with programmers using slang and allusions, I'm afraid that this just isn't on. Not even the best programme can deal with a programmer who writes in jive. What I propose to do here is to test two P.D translators with the same piece of text from the Archivarius text file, and see how they perform. Both programmes work on the principle of replacing a recognised German word with its English equivalent; brute force rather than Artificial Intelligence, but they work, so let's not knock them. A point to notice is that neither programme can translate the grammar or syntax of the original text - you'll always end up with verbs at the ends of sentences, and will need to juggle the sentences into readable English. ~ The Programmes ~ On the test-bed are GER_3235 v1.2 by Carlos Varela, and TXLAT v0.2 by Graham Steel. Both of these programmes are on disc 1648 from the South West Software Library (address at the end of this article). GER_3235 is a very simple programme that looks as if it's been written in compiled Basic. It comes with brief instructions in the programme itself, and has a 3235 word dictionary that cannot be added to. I must say that I've got doubts about whether a dictionary of that size can handle the type of technical German that we come across, but I'm willing to be convinced otherwise. TXLAT is far more sophisticated. It comes with a 34K manual, a German dictionary that can be added to, plus a programme for adding new words or creating dictionaries for other languages. It's a far more flexible programme, and one that will improve with age (assuming that you regularly update the dictionary with any words that it won't recognise). To perform a translation with TXLAT, you simply boot the prograame up, select the file that you wish to translate, and let it run. It will deal with a 10K text file in one to two minutes, and gives a continuous display on the screen of how many words have been succesfully translated, and how many are unrecognised. When it has run through the entire file it saves both the translated version, plus a list of words that it didn't recognise. The next stage (should you want to take it further) is to look up the unrecognised words in a German to English dictionary, and type the English translations into the text file. This file is then merged into the main dictionary, and the German text is once again run through the programme. The second pass should produce an almost complete translation. ~ The original German text from the Archivarius txt file ~ Zur Version 2.1 ist eine komplett revidierte Anleitung erhältlich. Wer noch für die Version 2.0 registriert war, kann die neue Anleitung (24 Seiten, mit TeX gedruckt, mit zahlreichen Abbildungen und Vierfarbcover) für DM 20,- frei Haus bei mir bestellen. Außerdem sende ich Ihnen automatisch die aktuelle Version zu. ~ An English translation using GER_3235 ~ To VERSION 2.1 is one KOMPLETT REVIDIERTE ANLEITUNG ERHäLTLICH. Who still FüR the VERSION 2.0 REGISTRIERT was, can the new ANLEITUNG (24 SEITEN, with TEX GEDRUCKT, with ZAHLREICHEN ABBILDUNGEN and VIERFARBCOVER) FüR DM 20,- free House at me BESTELLEN. AUßERDEM send I IHNEN AUTOMATISCH the AKTUELLE VERSION to. ~ First pass through TXLAT ~ To_the Version 2.1 is a komplett revidierte Instructions available. Wer still for the Version 2.0 registriert war, able_to the new Instructions (24 Seiten, with TeX gedruckt, with zahlreichen Abbildungen and Vierfarbcover) for DM 20,- frei Haus at mir bestellen. Außerdem sende i Ihnen boot the up_to_date Version to. ~ Second pass through TXLAT, after adding to German dictionary ~ To_the Version 2.1 is a complete revised Instructions available. Who still for the Version 2.0 registered wen, able_to the new Instructions (24 Sektoren, with TeX gedruckte, with numerous Abbildungen and four-colour cover) for DM 20,- free House at mir order. Außerdem sende i Them boot the up_to_date Version to. ~ Conclusion ~ I wouldn't exactly call those full English translations, but at least you can get the gist of what's being said. To be fair, the German text appears to be rather difficult to translate; GER_3235 claimed a 41% success rate, and TXLAT assumes that any untranslated words will be translated with the aid of a dictionary, and then added to the programme's dictionary for future use. You would thus build up a dictionary that could handle almost anything and could cope with slang, proper names and abbreviations. To go by the above example, TXLAT is the better programme and one that with regular use and concientious updating would take most of the hard slog out of translating a text word-by-word with a paper dictionary. GER_3235 and TXLAT are available on disc 1648 from the South West Software Library (address at the end of this column). ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~ MOZART'S DICE ~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ A marvellously pointless mono programme written in GFA Basic by Chris Earnshaw. The best way to describe it is to quote from the author's introduction in the manual supplied on the disc: "Mozart's "INSTRUCTION To compose without the least knowledge of Music so much German Waltzer or Schleifer as one pleases, by throwing a certain Number with two Dice", the "Dice Waltz" for short, was first published by J Hummel in Berlin and Amsterdam in 1792, the year following Mozart's death. It was a sort of game, played by throwing a pair of dice. Depending on the value thrown, a different bar of music would be chosen from a large table and written down. When this had been repeated sixteen times, the new "composition" was complete, and could be played." Mozart's Dice is a computerised version of this jeu d'esprit that has the computer rolling the dice and playing back the resulting waltz, either through the monitor's speaker, or downloaded to a MIDI instrument. On running the programme you are presented with a a rather crude picture of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, a series of notation bars, and a set of small option and action boxes. You first click on 'Compose', which results in a roll of dice for each multi-part bar of the waltz. As the die roll, the resulting musical notation appears on the screen. The die rolling is completed within 30 seconds, and you are then ready to play back the waltz by clicking on the 'Play' option. I don't have a MIDI instrument to check it out on, but the results through the monitor's speaker sounded like a rather tinny harpsichord. George Malcolm once described the harpsichord as sounding like, "two skeletons copulating on a tin roof", and this certainly proves him right! I'm not carping - it sounds pretty damn good to me. If a printer is attached, you can save the notation onto paper. You can also select a MIDI instrument and alter the tempo of the piece. The programme comes with a 10K instruction file which carries the warning that, "The Dice Waltz is able to compose more than 350,000,000,000,000 different pieces of music. To play all of these at 120 beats per minute will take over 500,000,000 years, so you'd better get started!" You have been warned - a lot of fun can be had with this programme.... Mozart's Dice is available from the South West Software Library as disc 1841. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~ PUBLIC DOMAIN and SHAREWARE ~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ PUBLIC DOMAIN programmes have been written by fellow enthusiasts who have waived the right to make any profit from them. The author retains the copyright of the original programme (to guard against anyone passing it off as their own work, altering it, or trying to sell it), but users are free to copy it and pass it on to anyone else. The SHAREWARE concept is based on trust. The programmes are written to make a profit, but may be copied by anyone and passed on as many times as they wish. The author retains copyright, and if you like the programme and use it regularly, you are entering into an agreement to pay for it. This is known as registering, and involves you sending a named fee to the author. Registering entitles you to the latest (or in some cases, the full) version of the programme and you will normally also get a full printed manual for it. Public Domain is free, but Shareware is 'try before you buy'. Please respect the difference and register for any Shareware programme that you use for more than a month. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~ Recommended P.D Libraries ~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ This is a very brief selection of the ones that I deal with regularly and know to be reliable. A point to bear in mind is that one reason why the commercial libraries ask for a copying charge of £3.00 per disc (most offer discounts if you order more than five discs) is that they have to take out regular advertise- ments to ensure a sufficient flow of orders to keep running. They also have to pay all the usual small business overheads, wages, and VAT, plus cover the time involved in cataloguing and testing new discs. £3.00 is a reasonable charge for a generally very good service. FLOPPYSHOP ST PUBLIC DOMAIN LIBRARY: 1 to 9 discs, £2.75 each; for every 1O ordered, choose 2 free discs. Will also copy to your own blank discs for £2.00 per disc. Telephone: (O224) 312756 (O9.OO - 16.OO). Address: Floppyshop P.D Library, 45, Provost Graham Avenue, Hazlehead, Aberdeen. AB1 8HB. Run by Steve Delaney, a true enthusiast. Floppyshop's list is only available on disc (send your own for a free copy), as it now covers 1,933 separate P.D discs. The quality of some of the discs is variable, but Steve is currently going through it and weeding out the 1O% which he considers substandard. The list is updated by an average of 100 - 150 new discs every month. Very highly recommended. SOUTH WEST SOFTWARE LIBRARY: 1 to 3 discs, £3.OO each; 4 and over, £2.5O each. Telephone: ? Address: South West Software Library, PO Box 562, Wimborne, Dorset. BH21 2YD. Run by Martyn Dryden, who puts a lot of hard work into the library. A good list with regular additions and update sheets, plus reports on compatibility problems with programmes. CALEDONIA P.D LIBRARY: 1 to 9 discs, £2.5O each; 1O or more discs, £1.9O each. Access and Visa cards accepted. Telephone: O463 225736 Address: Caledonia PDL, 250, Oldtown Road, Hilton, Inverness, Scotland, IV2 4PT. Another library run by an ST enthusiast. Jake Bain produces an excellent disc-based catalogue and provides a fast and efficient service. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ -oOo- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~