No Fragments Archive 12: Textmags & Docs/nf_archive_12.iso/MAGS/TEXTMAGS/ATARI16/INFO91.ZIP/INFO91/354.TXT

Text File | 1997-04-16 | 26.4 KB | 616 lines

Info-Atari16 Digest         Wed, 26 Jun 91       Volume 91 : Issue 354

Today's Topics:
                     Amiga is better then what???
                  Another Atari write-in campaign...
                 Atari-To-Amiga Convert Info Source!
                    How is Atari doing in Europe?
                     Ian Lepore: e-mail address ?
                     Info-Atari16 Digest V91 #352
                  Problems with Ghostscript (2 msgs)
                           ST and Multisync
                      Sybex STe/TT systems book
                     This week's program (2 msgs)
                      TOS ERROR #35: What is it?
                               Whoops!

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

Date: 26 Jun 91 04:27:44 GMT
From: esseye!jdbbs!wybbs!therip![e-mail] (Rod Fulk)
Subject: Amiga is better then what???
To: [e-mail]

Tom, Apparently you have not really used an Atari computer...
There are many offerings available on the ST that are not available on any
other computer to date.
Since atari does not make the ST computer any more that I know of you must
compare the capabilities of the STe to that of the amiga.
A 1040 Ste compares VERY favorably to an amiga 500. The ONLY thing the amiga
500 has over the atari is the fact that the atari can not do as many colors on
the screen at the same time...
However there is a 24bit card available for $800 with a coprocessor of some
sort for really good graphics...
Adding things to the ST come alot cheaper over all then on the amiga and the
standard equipment atari sells is of better quality on average.
Compare....
An Ste with tos 1.6 and blitter performs pretty well...
Compared to an Amiga 500 the amiga only has a slight edge over the Atari..
(Note: for the price no other computer even comes close... )
Compare OS's... The St is built with a much more complete OS then ANY of the
amiga OS's.. (The 2.0 doesnt really count at this point since last time I
looked it was not available on amiga 500's yet)
If you compare the amigas 2.0 to the Mega Ste's 2.x and the TT's 3.X the atari
beats it hands down.
(Beats it in all areas of ease of use and of pure power...) Of course the
amiga does multi task but I have very little use for multi tasking..
(I use a 25 mhz '386 with desqview.. On the BBS multi tasking is nice..)
VERY few people I talk to use multi tasking more then ocassionally.
As to sound? Well The ST is the only one so far that has the capability of 3d
sound. The STe series computers have the capability of using 3 seperate
speakers with different sounds out of each.... 2 of those full 8 bit digital..
It is easy to use HD floppies on an ST.. I have yet to see on on an amiga...
Since the ST uses standard parts it is easy to get most of the items...
Comparing an ST to an Amiga at purely CPU intensive things the Amiga can not
be compared very favorably.
The amiga has a hand up on the serial port since the ST is limited to 19200
baud...

ALL the memory can be used in an ST as compared to the amigas limitation of
chip memory... (Note the ST does not waste memory... You must waste memory on
an amiga to do double buffered graphics and digital sound at the same time.)
Each has its own strengths and weaknesses.. The Standard ST is MUCH better
suited to bussiness then an amiga. However the Amiga is better suited to
games and higher resolution color work...

Start comparing at the TT to amiga 3000 level and the difference is alot less..
The TT can do some graphic modes the amiga would be jelous of and visa versa.
The sound systems are for the most part the same.. Differences can be over
come by the speed of the processor. If you REALLY push it the amiga can do a
few things better in the graphics arena though.. Over all though you have no
bussiness stating the ST is no where as good as the amiga.. It is not true..

However Atari USA is missing the boat....
Actually someone shot the boat they were on while they were sipping a toast
to what they thought was going on... Then federated almost killed them..
From the current trends I would predict that the Atari will come on very strong
in the next five years.. If Atari ever gets over their fatuation of keeping
low graphics to keep the price down and offer a multi tasking environment then
there will be nothing any amigaite can say against the ST... ;-)
(Multi tasking doesnt make a better machine but since most people dont realize
they are not gonna need it they think they need it and might lewt it make some
sort of an effect on them..)


 * Origin: The R.I.P.  [phone]   [HST] (1:228/24)

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

Date: 26 Jun 91 04:14:48 GMT
From: fernwood!portal!cup.portal.com![e-mail]
Subject: Another Atari write-in campaign...
To: [e-mail]

WordPerfect IS succeeding in the US market... in fact, it's one of the
largest software companies in the entire world..!

It's Atari Corp which has screwed up the US market, virtually assuring
us that we will NEVER see an upgrade to WordPerfect 4.1 for the ST.

WordPerfect can't sell product to non-existant customers with non-existant
computers.

What may or may not have happened in Germany isn't going to affect the
US market much, if at all...

BobR

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

Date: 25 Jun 91 11:22:01 GMT
From: littlei!intelhf!agora![e-mail] (Robert Barton)
Subject: Atari-To-Amiga Convert Info Source!
To: [e-mail]

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Y.Tsuji) writes:
>This has been really horrible. Will you please use 'Amiga' word in the
>subject or in the summary so that we can ignore you easily?


  "Amiga" is in the subject line.  What are you talking about?

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

Date: 26 Jun 91 12:49:00 GMT
From:
 noao!ncar!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!swrinde!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!sol.ctr.columbia
 .edu!ira.uka.de!fauern!faui43.informatik.uni-erlangen.de![e-mail]
 (Claus Brod)
Subject: How is Atari doing in Europe?
To: [e-mail]

[e-mail] (Adam David) writes:

>From a historical viewpoint, TOS started off as a RAM based OS probably because
>it was still being written. It stabilised into TOS 1.0 the first ROM version.
>Since then we have had infrequent updates usually with only minor changes. A
 few
>bugfixes are made (sometimes in the wrong direction :-() and a few utilities
>added. Suddenly in recent times versions 2.x and 3.x appear with a few more
>bells and whistles. A completely new GDOS is arriving (in RAM of course). TOS
>and GEM almost became fossils in ROM. Some of the material in the ROM should
>(IMHO) rather be made RAM resident so that updates can be made available and
>to give better system flexibility. Manipulation of system-specific hardware
>obviously belongs in ROM but I would like to be able to load GEM when I need
>it, and reclaim its space when I don't.

TOS is making its way in just the direction you're pointing at; it is
becoming more modular. MetaDOS essentially replaces GEMDOS. GDOS is
disk-based and allows for external screen drivers. (NVDI is such a
GDOS/screen driver combo.) In fact, TOS is quite modular in itself due
to the hierarchical architecture.

If you like, you can work without GEM on your ST today. Just place a
command shell into your AUTO folder. Isn't MiNT meant just for purposes
like these?

>>The XBIOS floppy routines worked with HD drives from the day they were
>>created, likewise for BIOS and GEMDOS. Now, isn't that a sign of
>>thoughtful design?

>Yes. The low-level stuff for this is all in place, as it should be. Only very
>recent versions have a GEM format option for other than a simple choice
>between single and double sided disks. IMHO the only sensible sector size to
>use on HD disks is 1024 bytes (except for MSDOS compatibility when needed).
>If I understood correctly, only the first and latest versions have been able to
>handle these. In which version number was it fixed?

The current TOS versions cannot handle a physical sector size of 1024
bytes. It's not unreasonable to suppose that this won't ever find its
way into TOS again due to compatibility problems. Older TOS versions
won't understand the new format. It isn't even sure that new machines
will have a 1772 built-in that offers such capabilities.

As I stated a while ago, I tested a third-party floppy driver some time
ago which offered 1024-bytes-per-sector support. I also haven't given up
the idea of writing a floppy driver on my own. It's not impossible.
The German magazine 'ST-Computer' recently had a full-featured listing
of a replacement for the standard floppy driver allowing for up to
ten disk drives connected to one ST.

>Wouldn't it be sensible to have reasonable control over disk format
>built into the desktop?

A choice between 9, 10, 18 and 20 sectors per track would be nice, yes.

>Shouldn't a decent ramdisk be included in the ROM?

Dunno. I don't like the idea very much to include such a beastie into
ROM. I would like to have some more RAM disk support in TOS when it comes
to making memory reset-resident.

>A simple text editor would not be out of place in the ROM.

I disagree. This would be completely out of place. Except perhaps as
a new GEM object type. (NeXTStep offers things like this.)

>It could be worked on in-house as a non-optimised version and then run through
>an optimiser for production. Both speed and space are at a premium even in
 these
>days of multi-megabyte accelerated systems (Whoever thought back then that 4 MB
>wouldn't be enough RAM). Optimisation could be made almost automatic, the only
>handwork necessary would be to mark which parts of the code must not be changed
>because they are in some way critical.

The time-critical sections are already written in assembler, especially
the BIOS and the lower screen driver routines. They could and should
be faster, however.

>Just eliminating redundant reassignment of variables and making absolute long
>references into absolute short where possible would save enough space to fit
>STE TOS versions into older ST computers without having to move ROMbase to the
>newer (and lower) address.

D'accord again.

>Enough said for now. This is meant as constructive criticism.

And, IMHO, it is!

----------------------------------------------------------------------
Claus Brod, Am Felsenkeller 2,                  Things. Take. Time.
D-8772 Marktheidenfeld, Germany                 (Piet Hein)
[e-mail]
[e-mail]
----------------------------------------------------------------------

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

Date: 26 Jun 91 08:00:58 GMT
From:
 lll-winken!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!sdd.hp.com!uakari.primate.wisc.edu!caen!spool.mu.
 edu!cs.umn.edu!thelake![e-mail] (Steve Yelvington)
Subject: Ian Lepore: e-mail address ?
To: [e-mail]

[In article <[e-mail]>,
     [e-mail] (L.B. Brown) writes ... ]

 > I need to know Ian Lepore's (author of the Gemfast AES and VDI bindings)
 > e-mail address so I can bring to his attention some small bugs I have
 > found. I can't find one in the gemfast V1.5 documentation. Does he have
 > an e-mail address? Does anyone know how to contact him?

Ian doesn't seem to have an Internet address, and mail sent to the Citadel
BBS in Denver that he used to call has not been answered.

However, Mike Dorman, the person from whom I obtained GEMFAST 1.5, seems
to have a channel to him (perhaps through BIX). If you'll send the report
to me I'll try to have it forwarded to Ian via Mike.

(Oh, by the way, I now have the MadMac source code for GEMFAST 1.5, and
I'll mail it off to atari.archive sometime soon.)

Here's a note from Ian that was reposted on GEnie.

|Category 3,  Topic 23
|Message 13        Mon Jun 24, 1991
|M.DORMAN2 [Mike Dorman]      at 22:24 EDT
|
|The official word from Ian Lepore:
|
| GemFast is one of the few things I'm willing to put a lot of support effort
|into.  If folks want to pass bug descriptions along to me, I'll do my best to
|fix them.  I don't require source code fixes.  GemFast is a strange and
|convoluted critter internally, it'd be unfair of me to ask other folks to wade
|through it and find my bugs.  If they can't give a good description of the
|bug, I'm willing to accept their executable file and a description of how to
|navigate my way in their program to the point where the bug happens.  I have
|good tools for logging what the AES and GemFast are doing internally, so I may
|be in a better position to debug than they are.
|
| The first thing to ask folks when they mention a GemFast bug is: what version
|are you using?  If not v1.5, all bets are off, I *know* there's bugs in
|earlier versions. :-)  I don't guarantee 2-day turnaround on bugfixes or
|anything, but I can often find a workaround real quickly, and if it's a major
|bug, I start thinking about a new release.  (Speaking of which, I've been
|thinking of v1.6 for a while now anyway, I have no bug reports in yet, but I
|do have some outstanding requests for new functions.  Now would be the time
|get those bug reports in...)
|
| In fact, a new GemFast release is the next thing on my to-do list after I
|finish the 'heat-and-serve' release of Sozobon, which ought to be within a
|week or so.  (That's what I said a week ago, however!)


I don't know what he means by heat-and-serve Sozobon C, but it does sound
interesting, doesn't it?

 ----
 Steve Yelvington
 [e-mail]

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

Date: Wed, 26 Jun 91 08:16:57 CDT
From: Mike Dorman <[e-mail]>
Subject: Info-Atari16 Digest V91 #352
To: Atari List <[e-mail]>

On Tue, 25 Jun 91 14:30:18 MST Info-Atari16 said:
>Date: 25 Jun 91 11:14:24 GMT
>From: mcsun!ukc!newcastle.ac.uk!turing![e-mail] (L.B. Brown)
>Subject: Ian Lepore: e-mail address ?
>To: [e-mail]
>
>Hi,
>
>I need to know Ian Lepore's (author of the Gemfast AES and VDI bindings)
>e-mail address so I can bring to his attention some small bugs I have
>found. I can't find one in the gemfast V1.5 documentation. Does he have
>an e-mail address? Does anyone know how to contact him?

You might try sending mail to [e-mail]--this might not work, though
and I *do* know that it's not likely to get you a response, since it's
a premium service to send to the Internet from BIX.

However, I am sort of responsible, indirectly, for the postings, and
have taken the responsibility to move messages back and forth about
GemFast, so feel free to mail me, with as good a description as you
can manage (or a binary and a description of the problem--Ian says
he could probably track the problems down with a low-level trace
through the binaries).  Ian's in the process of working on another
project (I'm beta testing it), and has a day job, but he's planning
on working on a GemFast upgrade as soon as this other project is out of
the way, so get in those bug reports!

Mike.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
: Michael Alan Dorman   :                                                     :
: [e-mail] : Hobbies are things people do when they should be    :
: BIX: syssupport       :   sleeping.  --M.A.D.                               :
: GEnie: M.DORMAN2      :                                                     :
: PostalNet:            :                                                     :
:   Box 8068            : Stonehenge was built by two drunks with no          :
:   Tuscaloosa, AL      :   witnesses.  --P.S.McGhee                          :
:               35486   :                                                     :
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

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

Date: 26 Jun 91 10:06:46 GMT
From:
 noao!ncar!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!sdd.hp.com!spool.mu.edu!cs.umn.edu!uc!shama
 sh!timbuk![e-mail] (Marc Bouron)
Subject: Problems with Ghostscript
To: [e-mail]

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Patrick
 Haggood) writes:
> I just downloaded ghostscript the other day and have loaded it into
> my E: drive under \ghostscr.ipt directory.  In my cli (MT-C shell) I've
> set GS_LIB to both e:/ghostscr.ipt and e:\ghostscr.ipt in the profile.
> I try to print one of the example files as 'gs chess.ps' and get:
>
> reading ghost.ps (Printing in memory, please ..etc)
> ghost.ps read
> Cant find Fontmap!
> (copyleft info)
> GS<4> (and a prompt)
>
> What am I doing wrong?  What's this fontmap it's looking for?

The fontmap file maps between the PostScript font names (e.g. /Times-Roman) and
GhostScript font FILES (e.g. ptmr.gsf).  It live in the ./fonts subdirectory.
Now, to make the rest of it work, you need to modify your GS_LIB variable:

GSLIB=e:\ghostscr.ipt\fonts,e:\ghostscr.ipt\ps

Basically, it's a search path for any file GS wants to open.  Can't remember if
the slashes face forward or back (forward in the variable, backwards on the
command line?).

> --
> Patrick B. Haggood
> Wayne STate University
> Detroit, MI
> Physics - Class of 1991 (-2?)

Hope that helps :-)

[M][a][r][c]


################################################################################
#                           #  [e-mail]           #     .   .     #
#  Marc CR Bouron           #  [e-mail]     (ARPA)  #    _|\ /|_    #
#  Cray Research (UK) Ltd.  #  [e-mail]  (DOMAIN)  #   (_|_V_|_)   #
#  [phone] x2208     #  [e-mail]    (JANET)  #     |   |     #
#                           #  ...!ukc!crayuk!M.Bouron (UUCP)  #               #
################################################################################

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

Date: 26 Jun 91 10:31:20 GMT
From: otter.hpl.hp.com!hpltoad!ghiggins![e-mail] (Graham Higgins)
Subject: Problems with Ghostscript
To: [e-mail]

++ What am I doing wrong?  What's this fontmap it's looking for?

If anyone else sees this error, it's covered in the readme file. The GS_LIB
env-var hold the pathnames to the subdirectories 'ps' and 'fonts' and should be
(in the example) e:/ghostscr.ipt/ps,e:/ghostscr.ipt/fonts.

BTW - The postscript generator in the software suite accompanying the Yale
Bright Star catalogue appears to generate valid PS files. Ghostscript
successfully produces prn_1000 files from the PS output. Looks good.

Graham
======

------------------------------------------------------------------
Graham Higgins                  |  [e-mail]
Hewlett-Packard Labs            |  [e-mail]
Filton Road, Stoke Gifford      |  [e-mail]
Bristol, U.K.                   |  ...!mcvax!ukc!hplb!gjh
Tel: [phone] x24014         Fax: [phone]
------------------------------------------------------------------
Disclaimer: My opinions above are exactly that, mine and opinions.
------------------------------------------------------------------

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

Date: 26 Jun 91 10:20:56 GMT
From: IFI.UIO.NO![e-mail] (LarsErikOsterud)
Subject: ST and Multisync
To: [e-mail]

That's right... The monochrome image is small and placed to one side.
The best soulution is a multisync with individual adjustment for EACH
mode on the back panel (my friend has one like that).  Else you have to
adjust HEHT, HORISONTAL and VERTICAL offset all the time :-(

 Lars-Erik  /  ABK-BBS [phone]  /   ____ ______ ________________________
  Osterud  /  [e-mail]  /   /___    /            The norwegian ST
__________/ ______________________/   ____/   /   Klubben,  user association

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

Date: 26 Jun 91 09:35:50 GMT
From: psuvax1!psuvm!dearn!dmswwu1c![e-mail]
Subject: Sybex STe/TT systems book
To: [e-mail]

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Jack W.
Wine) says:
>
>Has anyone in Germany purchased the new 1500 page Sybex book on the Atari
>STe/TT?  The author is Reschke and the German edition ISBN is 388 745 8885.
>To order, contact:
>

Smile. Nobody has it -- yet. It's not finished.

>                 Sybex Verlag GmbH
>                 Vogelsanger Weg 111
>                 D-4000 Duesseldorf 30
>                 West Germany
>                 Phone: [phone]
>                 FAX:   [phone]
>
>If you have it, could you please elaborate on the contents?  Also, I would
>like to know the price and if there is any indication that it will be trans-
>lated to English (or your willingness to do so!).
>

It contains all information you need about TOS and GEM (well, I HOPE so...),
including all new features up to TOS versions 2.05 and 3.05. The second half
of the book contains lots of technical details about the hardware (again
including the STE/Mega STE and TT hardware; SCC, SCSI and so on).

The price will be DM 89.- oder 99.-. And yes, we (the authors) and Sybex
*ARE* interested in translations. Please contact Sybex U.S. or an other
US book company, if you are _really_ interested that this will be done.

>Thanks,
>Jack
___________________________ cut here _____________________________________
Julian F. Reschke, Hensenstr. 142, D-4400 Muenster, Phone: ++49 251 861241
fast eMail: [e-mail],    slow: [e-mail] (++49 251 77216)
____________________ correct me if I'm wrong _____________________________

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

Date: 26 Jun 91 00:49:18 GMT
From:
 noao!ncar!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!swrinde!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!hobbes.physics.u
 iowa.edu!maverick.ksu.ksu.edu!kuhub.cc.ukans.edu!wsuiar.wsu.ukans.edu!mwjester@
 arizona.edu (loki)
Subject: This week's program
To: [e-mail]

In article <[e-mail]>,
        [e-mail] (Jwahar R. Bammi) writes:
> [...]
> Actually, what would be infinitely more useful (to me anyways) would
> be a short technical description of all the neat tricks you guys come
> up with, how you did it etc, and maybe the source.
> --

Hear, hear!  Have you considered writing a book on system programming on the
ST?  If you ever do, put me down for a copy.

Max

[e-mail]
mwjester@twsuvax

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

Date: 25 Jun 91 14:52:58 GMT
From: rlgvax!ccicpg!dorjam![e-mail] (Owner and User)
Subject: This week's program
To: [e-mail]

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Warwick Allison)
 writes:
> >This week's program will copy a file that has a bad sector(s) somewhere in
 the
>
> >100% assembly
>
>
>       ~ Oh.  In that case, I will not use it.

  By all means,   PLEASE DON'T!  :~)

  I guess I just don't understand that line of thinking......


--
---------------------------------------------------------------------
                                \  Paul Moreau  Orange, California
 UUCP:  ..!ccicpg!dorjam!paulm   \
---------------------------------------------------------------------

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

Date: 26 Jun 91 04:46:07 GMT
From: fernwood!portal!cup.portal.com![e-mail]
Subject: TOS ERROR #35: What is it?
To: [e-mail]

TOS Error 35 generally means the program is corrupted somehow...

Your FLASH disk has probably developed a bad sector which renders the
program useless...

The best defense against this happening is to back up every disk and only
run programs from the backup disk...  if anything happens to the programs
on that disk, you can always copy the original disk onto a new disk and
use that...

BobR

(Sorry for not quoting the original message, but my ST has died, and
I'm being forced to use an IBM system with PROCOMM..  about 10% the
functionality of an ST with FLASH...)

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

Date: 26 Jun 91 10:06:39 GMT
From:
 noao!ncar!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!sdd.hp.com!spool.mu.edu!cs.umn.edu!uc!shamash!timb
 uk![e-mail] (Marc Bouron)
Subject: Whoops!
To: [e-mail]

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] writes:
> Hello...
>
> I was reading through some of the messages here and saw a phone number
> for the U.K.  (44-344-485971)  Thinking there was a modem at the other I
> called
> with my modem and got a person instead of a squeal.  I wasn't able to
> apologize in voice so I hope you accept my apologies here in print for the
> disturbance.
>
> Regards,
>
> Jonnie Santos
> San Diego, California

Apologies accepted :-)   Please email rather than try to connect to our non-
existent modem if there *is* some way I can help you!  BTW, excuse the bandwidth
wastage, but the return email address does not work :-/

[M][a][r][c]


################################################################################
#                           #  [e-mail]           #     .   .     #
#  Marc CR Bouron           #  [e-mail]     (ARPA)  #    _|\ /|_    #
#  Cray Research (UK) Ltd.  #  [e-mail]  (DOMAIN)  #   (_|_V_|_)   #
#  [phone] x2208     #  [e-mail]    (JANET)  #     |   |     #
#                           #  ...!ukc!crayuk!M.Bouron (UUCP)  #               #
################################################################################

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

End of Info-Atari16 Digest
******************************