Summer i960 onComputiiig Volume2 Number 1
Summer 1980 Vol. 2 No.1 $2.50 U.S.A. A McGRAW-HILL Publication
GUIDE TO PERSONAL COMPUTING
word
Processors
Choosing the Right One For You
With computers Reviews* Atari 800
UJQRD
PROCESSinG
Nestar’s Multiuser Computer Network
"The source computer pi Your Home
, --,7*. + i ?! ;■;* t
'5--: -•; v£3$C£t^££fl&^ ••.'
330 331 325 326 320 321 315 316 310 311 305 306 300 301 295 296 290 291 285 286 280 281 275 276 270 271 265 266 260 261 255 256 250 251
245 246 240 241 235 236
342 343 344 337 338 339 332 333 334 327 328 329 322 323 324 317 318 319 312 313 314 307 308 309 302 303 304 297 298 299 292 293 294 287 288 289 282 283 284 277 278 279 272 273 274 267 268 269 262 263 264 257 258 259 252 253 254 247 248 249 243 244 238 239
242
237
230 231 232 233 234
TOTAL PEACE OF MIND.
We are business people, just like you. We wouldn't stick our neck out unless we were certain we could back our claims and promises to the last letter. We wouldn't offer a legally binding long-term warranty on our Microtek MT-80, unless we were positive of its solid reliability.
We are sure that our versatile, alphanumeric line printer will provide you consistent, dependable performance. This is why we give you, not the usual 90-days in fine print, but an incredible 365-days warranty. We stand behind every product we make.
LOADED WITH INNOVATIONS
• 40, 80 or 120 columns (software selectable)
• Non-thermal paper, pin feed
• 125 CPS, 70 lines per minute 9 x 7 dot matrix Vertical format unit
96-character ASCII (upper and lower case) Adjustable forms width to 9,/z"
Parallel and serial (RS-232C) interfaces available
OUR UNIT PRICE $795 Parallel $895 Serial (RS-232C)
For more information contact:
MICROTEK, Inc.
9514 Chesapeake Dr. San Diego, CA 92123 Tel. (714) 278-0633 TWX 910-335-1269
Circle 210 on Inquiry card.
Solve your personal energy crisis. Let VisiCalc” Software do the work.
* Apple is a registered trademark of Apple Computer, Ine.
With a calculator, pencil and paper you can spend hours plan- ning, projecting, writing, estimating, calculating, revising, erasing and recalculating as you work toward a decision.
Or with the Personal Software'* VisiCalc program and your Apple* II you can explore many more options with a fraction of the time and effort you've spent before.
VisiCalc is a new breed of problem-solving software. Unlike prepackaged software that forces you into a computerized straight jacket, VisiCalc adapts itself to any numerical problem you have. You enter numbers, alphabetic titles and formulas on your keyboard. VisiCalc organizes and displays this infor- mation on the screen. You don't have to spend your time programming.
Your energy is better spent using the results than get- ting them*
Say you're a business manager and want to project your annual sales. Using the calculator, pencil and paper method, you'd lay out 12 months across a sheet and fill in lines and columns of figures on products, outlets, salespeople, etc. You'd cal- culate by hand the subtotals and summary figures. Then you'd start revising, erasing and recalculating. With VisiCalc, you simply fill in the same figures on an electronic ''sheet of paper" and let the computer do the work.
Once your first projection is complete, you're ready to use VisiCale's unique, powerful recalculation feature. It lets you ask "What if?7 examining new options and planning for contingencies. "What if" sales drop 20 percent in March? Just type in the sales figure, VisiCalc instantly updates all other figures affected by March sales.
Circle 10 on inquiry card.
Or say you're an engineer working on a design problem and are wondering "What if that oscillation were damped by another 10 percent?" Or you're working on your family's expenses and wonder "What will happen to our entertainment budget if the heating bill goes up 15 percent this winter?" VisiCalc responds instantly to show you all the consequences of any change.
Once you see VisiCalc in action, you'll think of many more uses for its power. Ask your dealer for a demonstration and dis- cover how VisiCalc can help you in your professional work and personal life.
You might find that VisiCalc alone is reason enough to own a personal computer.
VisiCalc is available now for Apple II computers with versions for other personal computers coming soon* The Apple II version requires a 32k disk system.
For the name and address of your nearest VisiCalc dealer, call (408) 745-7841 or write to Personal Software Inc., 1330 Bordeaux Dr,, Sunnyvale, CA 94086* If you favorite dealer doesn't already carry Personal Software products, ask him to give us a call*
Cambridge
VisiCalc was developed exclusively for
Persona] Software by Software Arts, Inc..
■ ■
JM-VisLCatc is a trademark of Personal Software. Inc.
im (tiicr
oco'nPfiiHturn’tW1
lrs§;s§:|§ss
SSgfeS sggJ
System leav/eH?iRlds with up KitbS sot Shakes this
wmmm
Wmmm
am0f L? Lbies. TP'S Printouts can be pro^ prjnter.
SsiiiiliSi
TEXTMEngllS%SS§2
lh1 .000 pe-s?"! ^enatte yoo » S™ «is!! “ “*?railfs. setose
m&ffl
MM
"rfwithir .the z'P a°nding your ''e eact,y onto
a ^shk to'^disKs Data '^0(T1pany Nan-
reached 3D 0pdon to use '■ nUmenc an Hisnlay with the w Name. Three sn search
l BUSINESS , Tandv Corpora"011
sareM'^' MAIL STO'-"
JSINESS uol the Tandy C°,pora"on
■mTRS-80 is a tradeo,ark
socwo^g^SSS!^
pCrtf
2 Summer 1980 onComputing Inc
Circle 20 on inquiry card.
Illustration by Sam Petrucci of Gunn Associates, Boston MA
Vol. 2 No. 1
— ^ ^ Summer 1980
onComputing
8 Understanding Floppy Disks
By Pamela Valentine The quick, efficient floppy disk is rapidly supplanting the cassette. Find out why in this introduction,
1 8 Computer Animation Helps Children to Learn
By Sam Bryan Children learn to recognize letters of the alphabet by "filling" an empty tank on the computer display.
20 apf imagination Machine
By Robert Pieffer This new personal computer is actually half video game and half computer,
24 Atari 800 Personal Computer
By Ken Skier This Apple II look-alike features some of the most ex- citing graphics in the personal computing field,
28 Nestar Lets Personal
computers Talk to Each other
By Chris Morgan This elegant multicomputer network lets users share programs and data.
32 Living With computers
By Jerry Pournelle Some thoughts to ponder before you wed your computer J 'spouse, M
38 Word Processors:
A Look at Four Popular Programs
By Larry Press Help in matching your needs to the word processor thatJs right for you.
60 The Source
By Ken Skier The New York Times data base on your home television screen? Itrs a reality with The Source-
69 A Do-It-Yourself Text Editor
By T, E, Levere A painless way to find out how line editors work, written in TRS-80 BASIC-
83 A writer Looks at word Processors
By Jerry Pournelle jerry Pournelle tells allr after having written over two million words of science fiction on word processors.
Departments 4 Editorial 6 Letters 16 Book Review 66 Article Policy
88 New Products
95 Coming Events
96 Reader Service 96 interAction
onComputing is published Eoiu Limes a yisar by onCumpuling Iek, 70 Main Si, Peterborough NH 03458, q wholly -owned subsidiary of McGraw-Hill, Inc. Address all mail except subscriptions lo above address: phone |603] 924 9281. Address all subscriptions, change of address, USPS Form 3579, and fulfillment questions lo onComputing, POB 307, Martinsville Nj 08636. Controlled circulation pending, Waseca MM 56093 and Peter borough, NH 03458, [ISSN 0 1.94 -807 5 1 Subscriptions are 1B.5Q for one year in USA and its possessions. In Canada and Mexico S 10 for one year. Other foreign couniries S 12 for one year surface delivery . Single copy price is $2.50 in the USA arid its possessions, $2.90 in Canada and Mexico, $4 in Europe, and $4,50 elsewhere, Foreign subscriptions and sales should be remitted in United States funds drawn on a US bank. Printed in the United Slates of America. Subscription WATS Line [8001 258 5485
Address all editorial correspondence lo the editor at 70 Main St, Peterborough NH 03456, Unacceptable manuscripts will be returned if accompanied by sufficient first class postage. Not responsible for lost manuscripts or photos.
Opinions expressed by the authors are not necessarily those of onComputing. Each separate contribution to this issue and I he issue as h collective work copy right © 1980 by onComputing Jnc, All rights reserved,
Summer 19S0 © onComputing Inc 3
PUBLISHERS:
Gordon R Williamson Virginia Londoner
ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER: John E Hayes
EDITORIAL DIRECTOR:
Carl T Helmers, Jr
BDITOR-in-CHIEF: CHRISTOPHER P MORGAN
PRODUCTION and DESIGN:
Nancy Estle Ellen Klempner
CIRCULATION MANAGER: Gregory Spitz fad en
ADVERTISING DIRECTOR:
Tom Harvey
NATIONAL ADVERTISING SALES REPRESENTATIVES: HAJAR ASSOCIATES INC
East:
280 Hillside Av Needham Heights MA 02194 1617] 444-3946
521 Fifth Av New York NY 10017 (212) 682-5844
Westr Southwest:
1000 Elwell Ct Suite 227
Palo Alto CA 94303 (415} 964-0706 or (714) 540-3554
Midwest:
2405 Lawndale Evanstown IL 60201 (312] 864-3467
Officers of McGraw-Hill Publications Com- pany:
Paul F. McPherson,, President; Executive Vice Presidents: James E. Boddorf, Gene W. Simpson; Group Vice President: Daniel A, McMillan; Senior Vice President- Editorial; Ralph R. Schuk; Vice Presidents: Kemp Anderson, Business Systems Development; Stephen C, Croft, Manufacturing; Robert B. Doll, Circulation; James E. Hackett, Con- troller; William H. Hammond, Communica- tions; Eric B. Herr, Planning and Develop- ment; John W Fatten, Sales; Edward E, Schirmer, International.
Officers of the Corporation:
Harold W. McGraw Jr,, President, Chief Ex- ecutive Officer and Chairman of the Board; Robert F. Landes, Senior Vice President and Secretary; Ralph J. Webbr Treasurer.
Editors
Taming the wild Syntax
What's all the fuss about word processors? And, by the way, what is a word processor? We'll try to answer both of these ques- tions in this issue of onCom- puting.
During the past year or so, advertisements have flooded the personal computer media for word processors of every type and description. Put simply, a word processor is a computer program that lets you go from an idea to the printed page quickly and efficiently — whether you're writing a letter, a novel, a report, or whatever.
For our part, we hope to sort out some of the confusion about word processors, text editors, for- matters, and the rest of the word- processing jargon in articles by Larry Press and Jerry Pournelle.
Larry has been working on this project for nearly a year, in con- junction with his company, the Small Systems Group of Santa Monica, California. Out of this research has come a detailed evaluation of four word pro- cessors: Auto Scribe, Electric Pen- cil, Magic Wand, and WordStar*
Jerry Pournelle's name will be familiar both to onComputing readers (he wrote an article about writing with a computer in our Summer 1979 issue) and to science fiction readers. Jerry's books have been on the best- seller lists many times. After writing two million words of fic- tion and nonfiction with various word processors during the past few years, he's become an expert by osmosis.
For do-it-yourselfers, we've in- cluded a simple (albeit slow ) line editor for the Radio Shack TRS-80 personal computer written in BASIC. The program is obviously
Message
no match for the sophisticated editing programs on the market, but it is a good way to learn how
some of them work*
* + *
Also in This Issue
The Source has received much publicity lately in the Wall Street Journal and other media. For a small hourly fee, subscribers can link their personal computers or terminals to a central, time- sharing computer over telephone lines and receive the UPI wire service and the New York Times data base, as well as hundreds of programs. Is it worth it? Read Ken Skier’s incisive review and find out.
The Nestar System previewed in this issue (see "Nestar Lets Personal Computers Talk to Each Other") lets up to sixty-four com- puters (Apples, in this case) talk to one another and share pro- grams and data on the same bus. (A bus is a set of wires that transmit data and addresses within a computer, or, in this case, between computers.)
Elsewhere in this issue, we cover floppy-disk drives for the beginner, computer animation as a tool for teaching children along with a review of APF’s new per- sonal computer, and much more.
You might have noticed that we've revamped the look of the magazine somewhat. Both the cover and the interior layout have been modernized by Nancy Estle and Ellen Klempner. We hope you like the changes, and we look forward to your comments.
4 Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc
“WTRODUCING THE HOTTEST TUNG Off THE DRAWING NURDS: A COMPUTffi TWO THAT TAKES YOU FROM SMALL TO Hl er**.***
If you're considering your first computing system, you need to know more than what it will do for you today. You need to know what it will do tomorrow.
Many businesses outgrow their first computer within a year or two. And when they do, they find their system is difficult if not impossible to add onto-because adding on requires a different manufacturer’s equipment, different operating system, different programming languages.
At ADDS, we’ve just solved this problem with Multivision, a compact trio of stacking computers with ADDS' CP/MP'-compati- ble, multi-user operating system. You can begin with one and expand as needed .
MU LT I VISION 1 (top module) is a get -started computer with 5 MHz processor, 64 K bytes of RAM (Random Access Memory) and floppy-disk storage capacity of 700K bytes. It’s available with a wide range of business application software. We even offer our own word processing package. A fully loaded Multivision 1 is list-priced at $3,785 without terminal.
MULTI VISION 2 (top and bottom modules) uses the new Winchester technology to provide 5M or 10M additional bytes of hard-disk storage. List-priced at $7,995 for 5M bytes of disk, it is thousands less than other hard-disk systems,
MULTI VISION 3 (entire stack) turns your computer into a multi-user system with up to 256K bytes of RAM that supports up to four display terminals. It allows four different parts of your business-i.e., accounting, marketing, purchasing, and shipping- to share data and simultaneously use the system. No other microsystem offers so much for so little.
Before you decide upon any small computer, look into ADDS Multivision. For years we've been the largest supplier of display terminals to computer giants.
Now we're making a system for you.
For information, write: Systems Division, Applied Digital Data Systems Inc., 100 Marcus Boulevard, Hauppauge, N.Y 11787 Dealer inquiries invited.
CP/M is a registered trademark of Digital Research, Inc.
flflted Ojtcl Data ^tems he
SOMETHING
IN
EVERYTHING WE DO
Circle 30 on inquiry card.
Summer I960 onComputing Inc 5
Letters Letters
Left-Wing Computers?
Dear Editor:
Having recently read the Spring 1980 onComputing, I felt I had to write and say how much I dislik- ed "An Apple in Hanoi," by Everett Hafner. The actions of the author bordered on treason, and you should be ashamed to have printed it. Is yours a left- wing magazine? If not, that's surely how it looks.
E E Careen Santa Barbara CA
Everett Hafner replies :
I very much appreciate the con- cern that readers like Mr Careen have expressed about the activities that Western scientists engage in with scientists of Socialist block countries. My article was not meant to imply any political alliance be- tween North Vietnamese scientists and myself In fact , none of the peo- ple I met in Vietnam had any sym- pathy for the aggressive policies of their country.
I believe that peaceful scientific interaction is one important way to bring countries closer together and avoid aggression.
Voicing an Opinion Dear Editor:
In the article "A Voice for Bill" by Mr Mark Dahmke in your Winter 1979 issue, there are a number of inaccurate and false representations concerning the Votrax Division of Federal Screw Works and its products. I would like to set the record straight for your readers.
Votrax does in fact manufacture a talking communication aid for nonspeaking people. It is called the Phonic Mirror HandiVoice. The two models were introduced in 1977 and are distributed and serviced throughout the United States and Canada by HC Elec- tronics Inc (a subsidiary of American Hospital Supply Cor- poration). The instrument comes
in two models, with 500 or 1000 prestored words, phrases, and phonemes. The microprocessor- based instrument is battery operated and completely portable. Each model currently retails for $2195.
Mr Dahmke refers to an " $ 1 1 , 000 communications machine," by which I assume he means the nonportable institu- tional model of HandiVoice which was introduced in 1976, not 1975, as Mr Dahmke er- roneously states. The system in- cluded a 400-word stored vocabulary, cabinet, power sup- ply, speaker, and two access devices (terminals). Mr Dahmke later states he purchased a $400 synthesizer "similar in perfor- mance," but neglects to say that this synthesizer was only a board, no power supply, no cabinet, no vocabulary, no amplifier, no speaker.
Mr Dahmke refers to "negotia- tions" between Dr Lois Schwab of the University of Nebraska and Votrax. Votrax has never negotiated with or stated an in- tention to negotiate with Dr Schwab, nor has she declared an intention to negotiate with Votrax for the development of a com- munications aid. We have discussed, and continue to discuss, a number of major development projects with Dr Schwab because of her great knowledge and concern for disabled people One such development project resulted in the portable Phonic Mirror Han- diVoice discussed above. Votrax relies heavily on input from authorities like Dr Schwab; it is only with the interest of experts in several fields from across the country that useful communica- tion aids can be developed.
There are a number of false im- plications in Mr Dahmke's arti- cle. such as the suggestion that his rather modest student design project is comparable to a two- year development effort by Votrax resulting in a finished, readily available product sup- ported in the field, but I will not belabor these. It is sufficient to
6 Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc
say that the bulk of Mr Dahmke' s representations about the Votrax Division and its products are false by statement or by implication. This information was not sup- plied by Votrax, nor did he con- firm this information with Votrax prior to publishing the article.
Votrax continues to be in- terested in developments of com- munication aids for the handi- capped. In that vein, we com- mend Mark Dahmke for his con- tributions to Mr Bill Rush. However, his overt or implied criticisms of Votrax in no way promote his project nor lessen the fact that Votrax does manufacture portable talking communication aids readily available to nonspeaking individuals.
Leonard H Magnuson Votrax Division Troy MI
Mark Dahmke replies:
When I said that the $400 Com- putalker board was comparable in performance to the Votrax $11,000 communication machine, I was referring only to speech quality and clarity. My statements concerning the price of the Computalker board were not misleading, since it is clearly stated in the article that $3000 was allocated to build the Bionic Voice system for Bill Rush. When the computer, power supply, amplifier, speaker, external mass storage device, keyboard, and either single-line display or full video display are added to the $400 Com- putalker board, the current price for my system runs from $4000 to $5600 with speech quality com- parable to the $11,000 Votrax model that was available in 1976.
Mr Magnuson apparently underestimates my involvement in the nonvocal, nonverbal com- munications field. The project described in my article was not a mere student design project, nor was it a class project. I operate a computer consulting business and am involved in a wide range of ongoing consulting activities. I am
currently developing a fully portable battery operated version of the Bionic Voice which will have a 40-character alphanumeric display (the HandiVoice has only a 3-digit numeric display), a full keyboard (or any variation desired by the user), plug-in memory modules with up to 1000 prestored words and phrases each, and room for 800 thru 1000 user-defined words and phrases that can be stored in inter- nal memory that retains data when the unit is turned off. Following the original design of the Bionic Voice, the portable unit will operate in the scan mode or in full English. Unlike the HandiVoice, the Bionic Voice will also operate as a portable com- puter terminal and as a Teletype for the deaf By interchanging plug-in modules, it may also function as an educational aid, with practice and drill programs to reinforce classroom education. This version will be comparable in price to the HandiVoice.
My philosophy has been and will
continue to be that I market only equipment that has been customized to meet the needs of the user. It is also important that each unit be up- ward compatible with future needs of the user with a minimum of modifications and expense.
Mr Magnuson also states that no negotiations ever took place be- tween Votrax and Dr Lois Schwab. Although there may have been a misunderstanding of the term "negotiations, " he states that discus- sions have gone on and that development projects have resulted from these "discussions. "
Mr Magnuson claims that I did not confirm the information about Votrax and its products. On the contrary, all of my information came from their sales literature and from demonstrations of the Votrax voice synthesizer product line.
onComputing: Pro
Dear Editor:
I have had previous experience Letters continued on page 94
Low Prices
‘To the small volume user’
hi-yield correctable ribbon For IBM Selectric II
As
Low
As
$
18
90
per dozen
Plus: Elements • Correction tape Wite Out • Printer ribbons Print wheels • Cassettes Flexible discs
Shipment in one day • Satisfaction Guaranteed
“Run With the Thoroughbreds"
NCE Supply Corp. 915 W. Liberty Drive Wheaton, III. 60187
682-0001 outside Illinois 800-323-1780
Circle 40 on inquiry card.
Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc 7
by Pamela Valentine
If there's one obstacle to faster acceptance of the personal com- puter as a valuable tool, it's the aura of mystery about its com- ponents, programming languages, and accessories* Understanding these pieces of the personal- computer puzzle is made even more difficult because technical jargon, as unique as any foreign language, surrounds them, (The first time I heard the expression ''nested loop/' I thought that it was meant to describe a bird show- ing off on its return home.)
And so it is with disk drives. The very name conjures up thoughts of a company's large data -processing operation, complete with raised floors, controlled temperatures, and stacks of printouts* But do disk drives belong only in the computer room? Not any more, as increasing numbers of personal computer users are switching from tape cassette units to disk drives, which provide substantially higher per- formance at relatively low cost.
8 Summer 1980 © onCompulmg Inc
The Data Phonograph
Understanding the principle
behind disk drives is as simple as understanding the way a phono- graph turntable works, A disk drive operates in somewhat the same way, although it is enclosed in a special cabinet.
The "record/' or diskt fits on a spindle inside the drive, which turns the disk at much faster speeds than a phonograph turn- table* For example, the typical drive associated with a personal computer spins the disk at 300 rpm, while a standard long-playing album is turned at 33.3 rpm*
Within a disk-drive system, a record/playback (read/write) head replaces the phonograph needle, and it reads data on the disk in a similar way . The head is mounted on a positioner , the counterpart of the record player arm. The posi- tioner moves the head laterally across the disk to any area re- quested by the computer program.
This capability is called random access and allows users to store, access, and retrieve information from the disk much more quickly than is possible by sequential ac- cess, which must be used with tape drives. The disk -drive system is powered by its own motor housed in the same cabinet.
The Data Record
There are two types of "rec- ords/1 or disks (the "media"), used in disk-drive systems: flexible and rigid. The flexible, or "floppy," disk is a circular piece of pliant mylar plastic* It is coated on one or both sides with a magnetic iron ox- ide and is encased in a plastic jacket to protect it from dust,
About the Author
Pamela Valentine is a free-lance writer from the Silicon Valley area of Northern California.
understanding the principle behind disk drives is as simple as understanding the wav a phonograph turntable works. A disk drive operates in somewhat the same way, although it is enclosed in a special cabinet.
fingerprints, and other con- taminants*
The jacket, which has a cutout to permit the head to access the disk surface, is never removed from the disk. It is inserted with the disk in- to the drive* Since in floppy-disk drive technology, the head is in contact with the disk, some of the coating on the disk wears off. The soft, low-friction material that lines the jacket continuously cleans the disk surface, allowing the disk to rotate freely* The jacket also has an index hole for timing information and a write-protect notch for preventing unwanted or accidental erasure of information.
Floppy disks are available in two sizes, 514 inches and 8 inches, for use with their respective drives.
Rigid disks, also coated with magnetic material, are usually fixed inside the drive. That is, they are nonremovable. While this may appear to be a drawback, rigid disks are in fact a superior alter- native to floppy disks.
A floppy disk can rotate only so fast before centrifugal force begins to misshape the disk and damage data, A rigid disk can spin far more rapidly and, as a result, access to data is faster, while data integrity is better maintained. Rigid disks are currently available in 8-inch and 14-inch sizes.
Another essential difference be- tween rigid and removable disks is that, with the former, the read/
write heads "fly" over the media. While the disk is at the appropriate rotating speed, the heads float on a cushion of air only microinches above the disk. Because the heads never touch the data-bearing sur- face of the disk, the surface can never wear out.
Both flexible and rigid disks con- tain concentric flat rings or "tracks/' on which data is record- ed. These tracks, physically located on the disk surface, cannot be seen by the unaided eye.
The actual process of writing in- formation onto the floppy disk or reading from the disk is similar to that of recording music onto magnetic tape or playing it back, except that the read/ write head in a disk drive can get to any portion of the disk in far less time.
Track and Bit Densities
More tracks on a disk— and more bits per track— provide greater storage capacity. More data capaci- ty means less cost per bit stored. Since 1956, when IBM first an- nounced rigid-disk storage tech- nology, better disk surfaces and magnetic coatings, improved heads, and new data-coding tech- niques have resulted in significant increases to rigid-disk track and bit densities.
Because floppy-disk technology wasn't developed until 1971— again by IBM— increased track and bit densities for floppy disks have yet to be developed to their fullest capacities. It is estimated that before long, however, floppy-disk bit density will at least double through the use of thinner and higher-energy magnetic coatings and more sophisticated encoding and data- recovery techniques.
Increases in floppy-disk track density will be achieved through
10 Summer 1980 © onCompuliiig Inc
improvements in media and more sophisticated head positioning/ac- tuating systems.
Single versus Double
Single-sided floppy-disk technology, used by most personal computer manufacturers, was first introduced by IBM in 1973. Three years later, IBM announced the double-sided floppy-disk drive, which allows the user to read and update both sides of the diskette on-line. In addition, this technol- ogy is capable of reading and up- dating single-sided disks, so up- ward systems growth is possible. Most microcomputer manufac- turers view the double-sided flop- py disk as the next logical step in disk storage for their systems, although it is still not the dominant method.
Disk Drives for the Personal Computer
All disk drives operate in much the same manner, but there are various shapes, sizes, and capabil- ities available, depending upon the application.
Predominant today in the per- sonal computer industry is the 5-inch floppy-disk drive. Intro- duced in 1976 by Shugart Associates, it evolved as the result of market requirements for a very compact recording medium for both word-processing systems and personal computers. Because it uses removable, flexible media, it is practical, versatile, and, most importantly, affordable.
This floppy-disk drive, similar to its larger predecessors in design, consists of read/write and control electronics, a drive mechanism, the read/write head, and the track- positioning mechanism. These components interpret and generate control signals, move the read/
write head to the desired track on the floppy disk, and read or write data. (See photo 1.)
Interfaced to the microcomputer through a controller and formatter, the 5-inch floppy-disk drive is sim- ple to install and easy to operate. The controller, however, is not usually a physical part of the drive itself, although some drive manu- facturers have begun incorporat- ing "controller chips" (integrated circuits) on the printed-circuit board that contains the drive's con- trol electronics.
The controller performs func- tions such as interpreting and ex- ecuting status signals from the drive and the microcomputer; positioning the read/write head to the track specified by the micro- computer; formatting the data into
the particular format chosen; serializing and deserializing data to and from the drive; and perform- ing a variety of tasks to monitor and determine command, data transfer, and status conditions (referred to as "handshake" routines).
Media for Personal-Computer Disk Drives
The floppy diskette for the 5-inch floppy-disk drive is a scaled-down version of the 8-inch floppy disk. While the 8-inch flop- py disk generally has a total of seventy-seven tracks per side, the 5-inch usually has about thirty-five (although this can vary somewhat between various brands), designed to hold the equivalent of 25 to 35 typewritten pages of information.
Figure 1: The hard-sectored 5-inch floppy disk. The disk itself (at right) is nor- mally kept inside its protective jacket (at left), even during use. The surface of the disk is divided into thirty-five concentric tracks, much like a phonograph record. In this hard-sectored disk, the tracks are divided into thirty-two sectors each. Sector positions are defined by a ring of concentric small holes shown here. The position of the holes can be read by the drive. The index hole gives the drive a reference position for determining where a particular track is. The write-protect notch on the jacket prevents any information on the disk from being erased when the notch is removed. The layout of the hard-sectored disk is in other respects similar to that of the soft-sectored disk shown in figure 2.
Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc 11
Figure 2; The soft-sectored 5-inch floppy disk . Unlike the hard-sectored disk , the soft-sectored disk has no ring of many holes to determine sector position; it has only a single indexing hole , Sectors may he defined in any convenient way by the system, but a price is paid because information about the size of each sector must be stored in the sector itself, a process which robs a certain amount of storage space from the user , The advantage of soft-sectoring is flexibility; any number or length of sectors can be programmed up to the limit of the disk's capacity.
The index hole in the diskette jacket allows light to pass to an op- tical detector in the drive. This causes an index-timing pulse to be generated on each revolution, sig- naling the beginning of a sector. With the standard 5-inch floppy diskette, rotating at 300 rpm, this pulse occurs every 200 micro- seconds (200 millionths of a sec- ond). The timing pulse is an impor- tant factor; if it is not accurate, data cannot be read by the drive.
Hard versus Soft Sectoring
The index pulse is also used to begin track formatting, which divides the tracks into fixed-length sectors or records. Sectoring is ac- complished in either "hard" or " soft" sector recording format.
With hard-sectoring, the micro- computer may record up to thirty- two sectors per track. The diskette will contain an index hole, as discussed above, along with thirty- two equally spaced holes. Depend- ing upon the application, the thirty-two sectors can be subdivid-
ed into sixteen or eight sectors in the sector separator/divide cir- cuitry. With hard-sectoring, most of the work of sectoring is ac- complished by the sector holes and sector divide electronics, so little software is required for record identification. (See figure 1.)
With soft-sectoring, the diskette contains only the index hole. Each record or soft sector must then be preceded by a unique recorded or written identifier. This earmarks the particular sector and its data field. Obviously, a premium of data space is required for soft- sectoring, which makes this format the least effective recording format relative to data capacity. However, flexibility is greater since any number or length of sectors can be programmed as long as the soft- ware and hardware are added for decoding. (See figure 2.)
The 8-Inch Floppy Disk
The smaller, 5-inch floppy-disk drives are more often found in personal-computer systems than
the larger, greater-capacity, 8-inch units, but the 8-inch drives have always had a definite place in personal-computer systems. When MITS Inc launched the microcom- puter industry with the Altair 8800 microcomputer kit, one of the first peripheral devices offered for use with the Altair was a dual-drive, 8-inch floppy-disk system manufactured by Pertec, the firm that later bought MITS. The popular CP/M operating system was developed for use with Shugart 8-ineh disks.
These 8-inch drives used the same soft-sectored data-storage format that had been used by IBM with 8-inch disks in the 3740 Data Entry System. You may at times see a reference to a "3740-compatible" floppy-disk drive; the term comes from this first use by IBM. (IBM has never made a 5- inch floppy-disk drive.) In the never-ending quest for in- creased storage capacity, many manufacturers have developed other formats for storing data on both 8-inch and 5-inch disks; most of these have used the more com- pact but less flexible hard-sector system.
What's All This Talk About "Winchester Technology"?
All of the ballyhoo about "Win- chester" drives is the basis for disagreement as to the feasibility and practicality of a small rigid disk for personal computers. To understand why discussion is necessary, you must first know a little about the technology itself and how it came to be.
As mentioned previously, IBM first developed disk storage as an alternative to tape in the 1950s. Once a disk was full, data had to be "dumped" from the disk onto tape to create space for more data.
12 Summer 1930 © onComputmg Inc
James J Bochnowski President Shugart Associates
Although IBM continued to in* crease track and bit densities and access rate through media and head assembly improvements, it was clear that even more capacity was necessary.
In the early 1960s, IBM intro- duced replaceable rigid disks in the form of disk "'packs/' These packs contained as many as ten disks and, when mounted in the drive, required careful alignment with the head assemblies.
Meanwhile, improvements to the media and head assemblies continued to the point where only a thin layer of air separated each disk from its head. Contact be- tween the head and the disk was catastrophic and was to be avoid- ed. However, sometimes it did oc- cur—either because the drive failed or the disk was con- taminated. What happened as a result was called a "crash," an un- fortunately appropriate descrip- tion. Disks were damaged and, of course, data was lost.
Without further reduction in the flying height of the head (which would result in even more crashes}, improvement in data capacity was not likely. In addi- tion, the disks themselves— because of coating thickness, magnetic properties, and varia- tions in disk smoothness— didn't allow for any further increase in track and bit densities. A totally new approach was required.
In 1973, IBM announced a new 14-inch disk drive, the Model 3340, an indication of what new thinking about an old problem could accomplish.
In concept, the new product was to be a dual-drive configuration. Each drive was to have a capacity of 30 megabytes, making the prod- uct a "30-30." As the story is told, because the caliber of the famous
Disk-Drive Technology — At The Crossroads?
Microcomputer manufacturers are gearing up to accommodate the growing demand for personal computers. Sales in 1980 are an- ticipated by some to be three times those of 1979.
With this significantly expanded customer base, it is also ex- pected that the cost of computer power will decrease. And, in- deed, some manufacturers have already begun lowering prices.
But what about storage power? Are lower cost and in- creased performance in the floppy-disk drive's future as well? James J Bochnowski, President and Chief Executive Officer of Shugart Associates in Sunnyvale, California, believes that disk-drive technology—as it relates to personal computers—is nearing a crossroads.
"When the founders of Shugart developed the 5-inch floppy- disk drive in 1976, they expected to sell a total of 30 to 50 thou- sand units/' says Bochnowski. "Last year, we sold more than half a million. Although we've made changes in the manufactur- ing process to lower production costs, we've gone about as far as we can. The 5-inch was never really targeted as the high-volume product it is, and its assembly costs reflect that,
"That's not to say we won't continue to make improvements in the drive itself, however," Bochnowski continued. "Our product plans include increasing access times and capacities for both the single- and double-sided 5-inch floppy drives. We'll accomplish this through an improved drive mechanism and better head assembly."
Bochnowski, who is obviously excited about personal com- puting, recently ordered a desk-top computer system for his home. He believes that microcomputer users will redefine disk- drive needs and dictate industry trends. "I think that, eventually, the personal computer market will be segmented in the same way that the small business systems market is," comments Bochnowski. "The spectrum of disk-drive products for personal computers will include low-cost, low -performance drives at one end, higher-cost, higher-performance drives at the other end, and moderately priced products in between/'
What about 5-inch Winchester-type drives for personal computers? Bochnowski is not convinced that they're a cost- effective answer. "When we scaled down the 14-inch Winchester-type drive to 8 inches, we found that to uphold the Shugart philosophy and provide the lowest cost per function we had to make some performance trade-offs. To move down to 5 inches, more performance capabilities would have to be sacri- ficed simply to successfully utilize Winchester technology."
Bochnowski notes that the cost of a 5-inch hard-disk drive would not be much lower than that of the 8-inch. "Development
Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc 13
and special tooling economies have already been realized with the 8-inch Winchester-type drive, so no additional cost savings on the 5-inch unit are likely/' he said. ''And it's not clear yet that a 5-inch rigid drive would ever be a high-volume product, especially when you consider that the 8-inch product offers more capability at the same cost. How ever , Shugart has made no deci- sion on this. We're open to discussion."
Is Shugart committed to the personal computer industry? "No doubt about it/' claims Bochnowski. "The microcomputer market has; in a very short period of time, become a major ap- plication area for us. We keep dose tabs on how end users are applying our drives, and the personal computer market is one of the top three applications for us. I might add that we believe it may well become the number one market for Shugart within the next few years."
Bochnowski also observes that, regardless of media and drive improvements that will be made in the coming months, significantly higher disk-storage capacity at substantially lower cost will require "totally new products with a fresh approach to disk-drive technology."
Asked if Shugart is exploring any new technological avenues, Bochnowski replied, "We're putting the resources— people, facilities, and equipment— in place now to meet the needs of per- sonal computer manufacturers and end users both today and tomorrow.
"To sum it up/' Bochnowski stated, "where there's a need, we'll do our damndest to fill it/'B
Winchester rifle is 30-30, both the new drive and its technology were nicknamed "Winchester." And even though the dual-drive plans were abandoned, and capacity of the new, now single drive was in- creased to 70 megabytes, the ap- pellation remained and became synonymous with this unique technology.
The primary differences be- tween Winchester drives and earlier drives included moving the read/write heads and assemblies, as well as the disks, into a hermetically sealed disk-pack assembly, thus creating an enclosure within an enclosure. This was a radical departure from previous practices.
Also, the heads were designed to rest in a preassigned area on the surface of the disk when the disk was not spinning. No data is writ-
Photo 2: Four different types of floppy-disk and hard-disk drives. Shown from left are: 14-inch fixed- disk drive; 8-inch fixed-disk drive; 8-inch floppy-disk drive (double-sided in this case — see text); and the 5-inch floppy-disk drive.
14 Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc
ten in this landing area.
Aligning the heads and assem- blies with the disks before they are sealed in the disk pack eliminated the need for critical alignment dur- ing installation of the drive. The motor, actuator, and control elec- tronics remain outside of the sealed disk pack, added insurance against disk contamination through dust, heat, etc.
Of course, many other highly sophisticated technological im- provements were made in addition to the ones mentioned. Thus, the cost of Winchester drives was pro- hibitive for minicomputer users.
When IBM announced the first 8-inch Winchester drive, it offered hope for smaller users. There were trade-offs, however. Scaling down the 14-inch Winchester to 8 inches meant either decreasing perfor- mance (track and bit densities and
access time) to achieve lower cost, or maintaining the high perfor- mance and associated costs.
In the microcomputer industry, a 5-inch Winchester drive is being investigated. How much more per- formance would need to be sacri- ficed to bring the drive into an af- fordable price range? Since the ap- proximate retail cost for an 8-inch Winchester drive is $2500 + , is it even feasible to consider it?
How many personal computer users would appreciate the faster access, higher capacity, and in- creased data integrity enough to pay for it? Shouldn't double-sided floppy drives be pursued first? What about non-Winchester rigid- disk drives? Would they be prac- tical? In general, would rigid disks be less expensive for the user in the long run than any type of flop- py disk?
These and other questions are being asked by personal computer manufacturers. Only time and the demands of a growing customer base will provide the answers.
Summing It Up
As disk-drive technology evolves, enhancements that lower cost, expand capacity, and im- prove performance will encourage more people to discover the world of personal computing. It appears that, in the near future, floppy- disk storage will continue to be the primary choice of personal com- puter manufacturers and their customers for cost-effective data storage capability until the simplicity of operation and signifi- cant economic advantages of rigid- disk drives become as irresistibly attractive and affordable as the personal computer itself is today.*
Photo 3: 8-inch floppy- disk drive with cover and printed-circuit board removed. Note the read- write head at left of center.
All photos and figures in this article are reproduced courtesy of Shugart Associates.
Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc 15
An Introduction to Microcomputers, VoL 0:
The Beginner's Book by
Osbome-McGraw Hill $9,50 and
Understanding Microcom- puters by Scelbi Computer Con- sulting Inc $9.95
Review by: John A Lehman
Haw does a beginner learn about microcomputers? A degree in digital engineering might solve the problem, but this isn't prac- tical for most of us. To fill the need of the personal computer beginner for information, dozens of books have been published in the last few years. Some of these are excellent; some are terrible. 1 am going to describe two of the good ones— both published by respected companies. An Introduc- tion to Microcomputers, Volume 0f The Beginner's Book is published by Osborne/McGraw-Hill. The other book is Understanding Microcomputers , published by the Scelbi Computer Consulting Com- pany. Scelbi produced the first microcomputer kitr and was the first company to specialize in microcomputer software. One would expect these two com- panies to produce good beginner's books, and, indeed, they have done so. This review is a com- parison of the two from multiple points of view: that of a fairly ex- perienced microcomputer en- thusiast and two beginners who read the books and commented on them for me.
Adam Osborne and Associates originally produced books on computer hardware, and this background shows in their
Book
Review
Volume 0, The book presents the different parts of a microcom- puter system, its development and use, the peripheral options, how binary numbers work, the internal working of the hardware, and how It is put together. The first half of the book presents personal computers through the experiences of Joe Bitburger, the archetypal beginner who, in the course of the book, buys a kit and builds a computer.
Most people who buy com- puters today buy them ready- made and working. A few years ago most people bought kits— kits that generally did not work when first assembled. All of the terrible things which happen to Joe in the book also happened to me, so I can testify that the description is accurate. While Joe is shown building and using an old- fashioned kit computer, ninety- five percent of the discussion in the first half of the book is ap- propriate for those who buy consumer-oriented personal com- puters.
The latter half of the book is con- cerned primarily with how microcomputer hardware works; if you are going to work only with BASIC and not modify your computer, you do not need to read this section, and the book tells you not to bother. Neither of the beginners who read this for me found it very interesting. In summary, the first half of the book is very good in explaining
the hardware alternatives and what goes into a microcomputer. However, one complaint about the book is that it does not devote enough space to software and programming.
Scelbi Computer Consulting is basically a software company, so you might expect that they would have just the opposite bias. This is not really true. Understanding Microcomputers covers just about the same material as the Osborne/McGraw-Hill book, with less stress on nitty-gritty hard- ware and a little more space devoted to software and program- ming, I personally found the Scelbi book better balanced, but both of my beginners (neither with a hardware background) found the organization of the book somewhat confusing.
So which book should you buy? If I had to buy only one, I would choose the Scelbi book: not only because I feel it is better bal- anced, but with its larger type it is easier to read. I am not necessarily in the majority; the local computer store informs me that the Osborne/McGraw-Hill book is their best-seller with a wide margin. There is a simple solution, however: buy both!
Each has information the other doesn't, and you'll probably understand the common informa- tion better if you read two dif- ferent explanations of itM
16 Summer 1980 © onComputmg Inc
50C6
|
■
I
Please sign me up for the next eight issues of Home Video — and bill me for $9.97. If the very first issue doesn*t live up to my expecta* tionsi I may cancel my subscription imme- diately by returning my bill marked “cancel*' “and if at any time during my subscription I become dissatisfied with the magazine, I may cancel and you will refund the cost of all remaining issues.
Namt!
A dd russ - .
City_
Siaic __ — Zip —
Yes! I sure do want to get into
anc|
like your money-back guarantee.
Enjoy the lifestyle of the eighties.
NO POSTAGE NECESSARY IF MAILED IN THE
UNITED STATES
BUSINESS REPLY MAIL
FIRST CLASS PERMIT NO. 207 BOULDER, COLORADO
POSTAGE WILL BE PAID BY
Subscription Service Department
P.O. Box 2651
Boulder, Colorado 80321
If you're into home video ...Now get
TH£Hlln ***
^ATSO(jNd
Questions and Answers.
Every month, technical and non-technical prob- lems solved by experts. Example: 20 questions answered on video discs.
Which Camera Should I Buy?
When you start making your own programs — a detailed report on the specs, prices, special features of more than 35 makes of color and B&W cameras on the market.
What's On Tonight?
— or today? Regular pro- gram guide to best net- work, PBS, Pay-TV shows for the month ahead.
. . .the magazine that spearheads today's revolution in home entertainment, communications, lifestyle!
If you got a VCR for Christmas — or if you’ve subscribed to cable or pay TV — or if you’ve added projection TV in your game room — or if you’ve become a fan of video games —
— or if you’re just on the verge of joining the more than 2,000,000 U.S. families who are already enjoying the fun and benefits of this great new communications technology — Home Video magazine is the one magazine that brings you all the news and information you need to get the most out of your equipment.
On these pages you’ll see just a sampling of what readers are finding in Home Video (the first issue was a smash-hit on the newsstands) and what they have to look forward to in the exciting issues ahead.
Design for VCR Living.
Whether ''VC” means "very comfortable” or "very chic," how to design and decorate around your new home entertainment center. In full color.
75 Sources for Videocassette Programs.
Complete listing of practi- cally everything available, feature films, children's programs, lessons, X-rated, sports, classics, etc.
... Or use this full money-back guarantee coupon.
The Taping Game.
Interviews with VCR owners around the coun- try, "just plain folks” and celebrities. What they tape, and why.
Tape Me Out to the Ballgame.
How network sports directors shoot a game. Rules for major league, parks. Little League — make your own rules.
HOME VIDEO
P.O. Box 2651, Boulder, Colorado 80322
Please send me the next 8 issues of Home Video, for which I attach my check for $9.97. However, if at any time I am not completely delighted with the magazine, I may cancel my subscription, and you will refund the cost of all remaining issues.
50C6
Then, if you decide as hundreds of thousands of readers already have, that Home Video is for you, simply use the insert card — with a money- back guarantee if you’re not completely delighted!
L
|
Name |
|||
|
Address |
|||
|
City |
State |
Zip |
|
|
■ ■■■I |
■ Hi ■■■ ■ |
■ HI |
Circle 50 on inquiry card.
onEducation
Computer Animation Helps Children to Learn
by Sam D Bryan
How do you capture the imag- ination of a child using a personal computer? Why not try anima- tion!
I am the parent of a charming and exuberant young boy who, we have come to realize, is a "slow learner," My work as a computer systems analyst has brought me in contact with a variety of computer systems, and most recently with personal com- puters. I eventually bought one and began experimenting with educational programming.
For my first project, I decided to write a program that would teach a child how to match
lowercase and uppercase letters. I started with a simple drill-and- practice strategy and a multiple- choice response format. Our son has a relatively short attention span, so I needed an engaging way to announce success and track progress. The program I eventually created uses a colorful visual aid: an empty "gas tank" displayed on the screen. Whenever the child gets a correct answer, some "gas" is added to the tank. The object of the game is to fill the tank as quickly as possible. The game itself consists of a series of four uppercase let- ters selected at random by the
18 Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc
Photo 1; Animation learning game. The bucket will empty into the tank whenever the student correctly matches the lowercase letter with the corresponding uppercase letter . The four possible choices are shown in the boxes at bottom right It takes several cor- rect answers to fill the tank. If the student answers incorrectly , one gallon of gas is removed from the bucket as a penalty , and the student is given another chance ♦
Photos 2 thru 8: Progressive steps in the tank-filling game. The student correctly guesses f/H" in step 1, and the bucket empties into the tank * In step 2f 'B" is chosen , which is incorrect ; A gallon of gas is removed by the program After two more incorrect guesses , the contents of the bucket go dawn again, and the student succeeds on the last attempt j thus the game stresses positive reinforcement}. The last two frames show the tank being topped off This is followed by a still frame of Warner Brothers' Bugs Bunny congratulating the student by name . (The Bugs Bunny graphic was designed by Kai Lam of the Intecolor User's Group.)
5-inch floppy-disk drives, a light pen, and a serial interface* I chose this particular combination of equipment because it met the following set of minimal re- quirements:
• a color graphics display with enough resolution to display cartoon figures
• a light pen available from the same company
• easy access to the graphics and light pen features with the ex- isting software
• at least one year in the field and proven reliability
• ready repair available
• an active users group with a software clearinghouse
• an established company
• the computer can be used as a terminal
computer and presented to the child in boxes at the bottom right of the screen. One of these letters is then displayed in lowercase above the boxes* The child is then requested to choose which letter matches the lowercase let- ter * (In my particular setup, a light pen is used to simply touch the screen. The computer keyboard could just as easily be used*}
The presentation is designed to be fun to watch and to provide
motivation to the student not only to get the right answer, but to finish the job by filling the tank. Incidentally, when the tank is filled, a still picture of Bugs Bun- ny appears on the screen along with a note of congratulations.
Hardware
The computer I used is the In- tecolor 8052 personal computer, made by Intelligent Systems Cor- poration (ISC). It has a 19-inch, eight-color display monitor, dual
My program could also be writ- ten for the Radio Shack TRS-8G, the PET, Apple, Atari, or other popular personal computer, and it could also be written for ISC's less expensive Compucolor II computer*
This small project was carried out for my own education, and while it only scratches the sur- face of computer-aided instruc- tion, it achieved my immediate goals and taught my son about lowercase letters as well!*
Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc 19
Product Review
The APF
Imagination Machine
by Robert Pieffer
Photo X: The APF Imagination Machine > This $599 personal computer features 8 K bytes of program- mable memory (expandable to 16 K), 10 K bytes of read-only memory, color graphics, built-in cassette recorder, a 6800 microprocessor, and video game module.
Question: What has color like the Apple II , a built-in cassette recorder like the PET, a ROM-PAC slot and game pad- dles like the Atari 400, and a price like the TRS-8Q Level I?
Answer: The APF Imagination Machine!
The APF Imagination Machine is an unheralded newcomer to the personal computer scene, but it has some interesting and surpris- ing features for its $599 complete price. It is made by APF Elec- tronics of New York City, an
eleven-year-old company that started in the high fidelity business and later branched out into the calculator business.
My review machine arrived in good condition, and it worked im- mediately after I plugged it in. The photos reveal that the APF com- puter is actually a hybrid computer , combining a video game module (the APF 1000) and a separate com- puter keyboard module (the MPA 10). The two are connected by means of a U-shaped plug that is inserted between the slot normally
20 Summer 1980 © onComputing Jne
Photos by Ed Crabtree
reserved for video game cartridges and a special slot on the keyboard module. Before you can insert this plug, however, you must first in- sert a rather awkward grounding strip inside one of the two slots. This procedure took me nearly 20 minutes; fortunately it must only be done onpe.
Features
The APF Imagination Machine uses the Motorola 6800 microprocessor and comes with 8 K bytes of programmable memory and 10 K bytes of read- only memory. The keyboard is standard, with fifty-three keys. There are two game paddles with twelve buttons plus a fire button and joystick each. The built-in cassette recorder is turned on and off by the computer. APF has an- nounced a peripheral box for the computer that will enable the user to add an RS-232 serial interface so that printers and other peripherals can be attached. A floppy-disk drive made by MPI has also been announced.
The screen format is 32 characters by 16 lines, and the characters can be displayed in any of three different colors. In- terestingly, there are three levels of resolution on the screen for graphics: in the first, or base resolution format, the user can display up to eight different colors with 64 by 32 individual color rect- angles; in the second mode, called high resolution graphics mode #1, eight colors are available with a resolution of 128 by 192; the third mode, called high resolution graphics #2, features one color with a resolution of 256 by 192. The computer features a built-in sound synthesizer that plays music through your color television speaker.
BASIC
The BASIC interpreter for the APF computer is a fixed-point package, custom-engineered by APF. I would characterize it as be- ing somewhere between the Radio Shack TRS-80 Level I and Level II BASIC interpreters, The upper two rows of keys on the keyboard, in addition to the usual characters, contain all of the BASIC com- mands such as PRINT, GOTO, and so on, and are accessible by holding down the control key and then pressing the desired key. This can save time when you're pro- gramming in BASIC. The BASIC package, lacking such things as sine and cosine functions, is primarily intended for business ap- plications. However, the company is considering marketing a scien- tific BASIC package if there is a de- mand for it. I found the error messages to be particularly good with this BASIC interpreter.
Software
One clever feature of the APF
Imagination Machine is an audio track on each program cassette. While you're waiting for the pro- gram to load, a prerecorded voice tells you about the features of the program you're about to use. And, of course, if you don't want to hear the sound track after the first few times, you can turn down the volume control. One caveat: I discovered that some of the pro- gram cassettes I received with the computer would not load properly. I called the toll-free hot-line number supplied with the machine's documentation and im- mediately got through to APF in New York. The people were very helpful and suggested that some of my tapes were from an early pro- duction run. The leaders on the tapes were too long and were be- ing misinterpreted by the com- puter.
If you have this problem, try the following procedure: after typing 1CLOAD, RETURN, RUN, and RETURN, the machine will dis- play a message asking you to re-
Photo 2: The two main sections of the APF Imagination Machine: the videogame unit (at the left ) and the computer keyboard module.
Summer 1980 © onComputtng Inc 21
wind the tape and hit PLAY. At this point, wait approximately 2 to 3 seconds before hitting RETURN again . The tape should load cor- rectly. (Incidentally, the cassette recorder volume level is internally set.) The tapes loaded correctly every time after trying this trick. As I mentioned, the long leaders were in an early batch of tapes, and this problem has been cor- rected by the company. But there still might be a few left in some stores.
I received only four programs for review, but there is a sizable list of programs now available from the
Photo 3; Installing the connector that links the two parts of the Imagination Machine.
company. I particularly liked the Checkbook/ Budget Manager pro- gram. It's well-suited to keeping a monthly budget. The Artist and Easel program was fun, although very slow to draw lines on the screen. The Music Composer is ac- ceptable, considering that the cir- cuitry probably consists of an 8- bit digital-to-analog converter (ie; a
Of all the personal computers on the market, the apf unit s features prob- ably compete most closely with the Atari 400
type of circuit that lets a digital computer drive an audio amplifier). Eight bits is somewhat low for accurate music reproduc- tion, but at least the scale spans three octaves and is chromatic. I had some trouble getting the Typ- ing Tutor program to work to my satisfaction.
APF versus Atari 400
Of all the personal computers on the market, the APF unit's features probably compete most closely with the Atari 400, which costs ap- proximately $500. How do the two stack up? Well, they both have
low- and high-resolution color; the APF has a full keyboard, the Atari has a less elegant flat keyboard; the APF comes with a built-in cassette recorder, but the recorder is an optional extra with the Atari. One area where the Atari is going to be hard to beat is in software. There is a wealth of excellent Atari software available, including some impressive arcade-like games and educational games. However, APF seems to be making an effort to ex- pand their software line.
Conclusions
Although the APF machine is not a well-known or established per- sonal computer, it has some sur- prisingly good features, along with some quirks. Nonetheless, I sug- gest you give it an audition if you're looking for a computer in the $500 to $700 class. ■
Photo 4: Some APF software.
22 Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc
THE SEARCH FOR A SMALL COMPUTER SYSTEM ISTARTS HERE
|
/ - m |
I ' |
|
|
w m |
WE’VE TURNED MORE THAN 40,000 PEOPLE ON TO SMALL COMPUTERS— YOU’RE NEXT!
NATIONAL SMALL COMPUTER SHOW
October 30 ■ November 1, 1980
New York Coliseum
See more than 100 manufacturers of systems, peripherals, and software, and attend more thar thirty hours of free lectures. Don’t wait on line in October, register now!
r REGISTRATION FOR AMERICA’S BIGGEST SMALL COMPUTER SHOW 1
Please register me for the 4th Annual National Samll Computer Show, Oct. 30- Nov. 1, 1980 New York Coliseum.
NAME
COMPANY (If Any) ADDRESS
(Check main interest)
□ Banking/Insurance
□ Business office
□ Communications
□ Educational
□ Government
□ Hobby
□ Industrial/Manufacturing
□ Military
□ Professional
□ Stock Brokerage
□ Transportation
□ Utility
□ Wholesale/Retail
□ Other
BUSINESS TITLE (If Any) TELEPHONE
ZIP
(Check main job function)
□ Accountant
□ Administrator (Business)
□ Architect/Builder
□ Art Director
□ Banker
□ Computer technician
□ Consultant
□ Controller
□ Engineer
□ Industrial Designer
□ Lawyer/law office mgr.
□ Marketing manager
□ Medical doctor
□ Medical technician
□ Office manager
□ Programmer
□ Public Servant
□ Research/Development
□ Teacher
□ DP manager
□ WP manager
□ WP operator
□ Stock Broker
□ Systems Analyst
□ Student
□ Other
□ ONE DAY $10 □ TWO DAYS $20 1
□ THREE DAYS $30
Mail with payment of $10 for each day you wish to attend. Use one form per person. Registration badge will be sent by mail in early October. Check or money order only.
Mail prior to October 1, 1980.
National Small Computer Show, I 1 10 Charlotte Place,
Englewood Cliffs, N.J. 07632 201-569-8542
.1
Summer 1980 onComputing Inc 23
Circle 60 on inquiry card.
Product Review
Photo 1: The Atari 800 f as set up in the onComputing offices l The computer is shown attached to a Texas In- struments video monitorf but it can also he connected to a color or black-and-white television set . The Model 820 printer and Model 810 floppy -dish drive are shown at left.
24 Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc
The
Atari 800
Personal Computer
by Ken Skier
Photos by Charles Frieberg
Atari, the company that put video games in millions of homes, has been marketing two new per- sonal computers of late* The Atari 400 and Atari 800, with the generally advertised, respective prices of $549 and $999, are con- sumer computers, designed for people who may know little or nothing about electronics and pro- gramming.
Setting It Up
You open the box and it's all there: the hardware, the software, and the documentation. The power supply and cables are there, and they plug together in obvious, well-labeled ways- Furthermore, they go together only one way; you can't plug something in the wrong way.
The Atari 800 I received for review was up and running within five minutes after opening the box. As soon as it was set up I plugged in Basketball, a game cartridge that came with the computer. This game requires joysticks for each player's control*
There is no way a joystick plug can go into anything but one of the special trapezoidal joystick sockets.
Basketball
The game was great fun: I selected the "one-on-one" game and played until 1 was laughing too hard to continue. Little basketball players dribble, shoot, steal the ball from one another, block shots, and pass.
Those who already own an Atari video game may be wondering whether cartridges for your video game will run on the Atari com- puters, Unfortunately, cartridges for the video games are not com-
patible with the Atari computers* The only cartridges that will run on Atari computers are those specifically designed for them. But it seems reasonable to expect that most of the games already available on cartridge for the Atari video games will soon be available on cartridges for the Atari com- puters.
I cannot speak as a connoisseur of home video games, but I wouldn't be surprised if the Atari 400 and 800 are the ultimate home video games. Yet even if that's true, is it worth $500 or $1000 to have the best video game on the block? But they are more than video games. Each unit is, in fact, a computer designed as the heart of a computer system. So let's see how the Atari system stacks up, in each of three critical areas: hardware, software, and documentation.
Hardware
The hardware of the Atari 400 and 800 is a self-contained com- puter in a sealed case, including a full-size, typewriter-style key- board; at least 8 K bytes of pro- grammable memory for the 400 and 16 K bytes for the 800; cir- cuitry and sockets that drive a television display [you supply the color or black-and-white TV] and let the computer "talk" to other devices such as joysticks, cassette recorders, printers, and floppy- disk drives; and one or two slots for program cartridges. Most of the differences between the 400 and 800 are in the hardware.
For this review, I had access on- ly to an Atari 800, and therefore cannot comment on the Atari 400 from hands-on experience; but the Atari literature indicates that in many ways they are the same. The
Summer I960 © onComputing Inc 25
most important differences lie in their keyboards and in their poten- tial for expansion.
Keyboards
The Atari 400 has a one-piece, flat plastic keyboard. I imagine itJs more like typing on a picture of a keyboard than on the keyboard of a manual or electric typewriter, because there could be little or no tactile feedback to each key- closure, The larger, full-stroke keyboard on the Atari 800 prob- ably has a more comfortable feel, especially for a touch-typist like myself, than does the flat keyboard on the Atari 400. Other- wise, the two keyboards are similar: they have the same layout, and, with the same programs, will respond to the same keystrokes in the same way.
Television Display
The Atari 400 and 800 have the same video display circuitry.
Photo 2: Atari software.
which puts text and graphics onto a standard television screen. A cable coming from the Atari com- puter plugs into a switch box on the back of your television. The switch box, supplied with the Atari
computer, is the same as the switch boxes supplied with other Atari products, and it connects in a minute or two. It lets you switch your television reception from the antenna to the computer-generated signal and back again.
The Atari computer produces a color television signal for channel 2 or 3, so you do need a color television to show off the Atari's display, though color isn't essen- tial. A black-and-white set works fine: it displays colors as shades of gray, and this is suitable for most programs.
The display consists of 24 lines, with 40 characters per line. This character density is not outstand- ing: a number of personal com- puters, including the Radio Shack TRS-8Q, have 64-character lines. Some systems feature 80 or more characters per line, but such character densities usually require a video monitor rather than a television set, and few systems with such character densities offer color. Even so, a 40-character line is not likely to handicap you in any application except word process- ing, where it is desirable (but not necessary) to have a screen width as great as the width of the ultimate typed or printed page.
On the plus side. Atari gives you many ways to display each character. Each character on the screen may have any one of six- teen different colors. Any character may be displayed in nor- mal mode (ie: light characters on a dark background), or in reverse mode [ie: dark characters on a light background). And you have 255 characters to choose from, in- cluding uppercase and lowercase letters of the alphabet, numbers, punctuation marks, and many special graphics characters. Thus, a wide range of characters and
display options is available to the programmer and, ultimately, to the user.
Sound
The Atari computer drives not only the television screen but the television speaker as well. Com- puter-generated sounds can be directed to the television speaker, as can prerecorded voice or music as it is played back on the cassette recorder. Atari's Educational Pro- grams exploit this feature by com- bining prerecorded cassettes with program cartridges to make the Atari a mixed-media teaching machine. Thus, a seemingly minor hardware feature, such as the capability to direct audio from a cassette to a television, can enable the development of a significant software feature. This may ultimately produce a richer ex- perience for the user.
Joysticks
I love video arcade games because they're so detailed: cowboys draw and shoot; basket- ball players have all the real moves. But arcade games are also fun because, unlike conventional computer games, they don't re- quire you to communicate via the keyboard. In an arcade game you fire torpedoes while looking through a periscope and pressing a red FIRE button; or, in an arcade gunfight, you draw, aim, and fire your gun by drawing, aiming, and firing a full-size pistol with a wire coming from it.
Thus, even if you can duplicate the display and sounds of an ar- cade game on your personal com- puter, you won't have the richness of an arcade experience if you have to communicate to the com- puter via the keyboard. Submarine commanders don't type out their
26 Summer 1980 © onComputlng Inc
orders— neither do gunfighters.
Likewise, the Atari doesn't re- quire game players to type. Up to four joysticks may be plugged into an Atari 400 or 800. A joystick doesn't require any concentration or any training. With a joystick, even a first-time user can control a ping-pong paddle, a sports player, or virtually any other image on a video screen without having to look away from the screen or think about which keys to press.
Expansion
The Atari 400 and 800 are both very easy to expand, but an 800-based system can be expanded further than a 400-based system.
The Atari 800 has sockets on its side enabling you to plug in a number of peripheral devices (ie: accessories such as cassette record- ers, printers, and up to four floppy- disk drives). The Atari 400 offers similar input/outpuf sockets, but lacks the capability to connect to a disk drive.
In addition to peripheral units, another kind of system expansion involves plugging in more memory. There are two kinds of memory: programmable memory and read-only memory.
Programmable Memory
The Atari 800 can contain up to 48 K bytes of programmable memory, all of it internal; no exter- nal expansion unit is required. Ap- parently the Atari 400 cannot be expanded beyond the 8192 bytes of programmable user memory that come with the basic 400.
1 expect that most consumers will buy the Atari 800 with the desired memory installed, or will have additional memory installed by the dealer. If you wish to add more memory on your own, it's a simple matter of getting the
l played basketball with the computer until l was laughing too hard to continue playing.
memory modules and plugging them in. Pictures in the owners manual show where the modules go for any desired memory con- figuration.
Program Cartridges
Read-only memory is even easier to add or replace than program- mable memory. The Atari 400 con- tains one slot for a program car- tridge, and the 800 contains two such slots. One program cartridge,
about the size of a deck of playing cards, may be inserted into each of these slots, thus adding in an in- stant a large bank of read-only memory containing one or more ready-to-run programs.
Such program cartridges are not original with Atari. For example, the Exidy Sorcerer has had such JiROM-Pacs" for over a year now, but they're an excellent feature for any computer, and the Atari 800 is the first personal computer featur- ing slots for two such cartridges.
There are many advantages to program cartridges. First, they are fast. For most personal computers, a typical program or operating
Text continued on page 54
TRS-80 MOD II
WORD PROCESSING
'#
yjpDcilsv
WORD PROCESSOR
The best is now even better...
New Features New Commands New Capabilities New Manual
SPECIAL PAC: INCLUDES:
• Wp Daisy™ word processor
• Mail Merge™ mailing list package
• I/OS operating system full CP/M™ &CDOS compatability
Includes
— Diablo, Spinwriter and Qume support
— Printer spooling
— 30 programs
CP/M™
TM ol Digital Research
Circle 70 on Inquiry card.
Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc 27
Personal computers will be a fixture in the classroom of the future, and Nestar Systems, a small company in Palo Alto, California, could have a big effect on the way they are used.
Nestar is located in California's "Silicon Valley/' a dense pocket of computer and electronic com- panies south of San Francisco. I went to the Nestar offices recent- ly to meet with President Harry Saal and see the Nestar system in action.
Next door to Harry's office the Nestar Cluster/One system was set up. It consisted of a master control box connected by cables
to a dozen personal computers, such as PETs, Apples, TR3-80s, scattered around the room. Among other things, the Nestar system allows all of the students in the classroom to request the same program, if desired. It's a deceptively simple idea, the kind you probably thought had been implemented before. But the fact is that the Nestar system is the first of its kind.
Computer Headaches
At a recent symposium on per- sonal computers in the classroom held at Harvard University, I heard teachers expressing some
frustrations about using personal computers in their classes. A ma- jor problem was pointed out by the Lawrence Hall of Science's Arthur Luehrmann: with each student having his or her own cassette machine and cassette, it sometimes takes 15 minutes for all of the students in a classroom to enter their programs because of cassette loading errors, and so on. Very few schools can afford the luxury of equipping each stu- dent with his or her own floppy- disk drive — one way to speed things up. And there's the prob- lem of lost or stolen student pro- gram cassettes.
Nestar Lets Personal Computers Talk
To Each Other
by Chris Morgan
28 Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc
Figure 1: Nestar 's Clustershared Model A computer network , composed of up to sixty -four independent Apple H personal com- puters in a local communications, data, and resource-sharing network.
A central system for disseminating programs is the ob- vious solution* Two such systems have recently come to light, manufactured by Radio Shack and Nestar. I'll let you know more about the Radio Shack system later.
The Nestar System
Nestar makes two different systems: the Cluster /One Model 1, their earlier system, and the new Cluster/ One Model A. (The A is for Apple.} The original system allowed one to mix several brands of personal com- puters together on the Nestar bus [ie: a multiwire communications cable linking the network together). The system had limita- tions to the total number of com- puters that could be hooked together, and programs only, not data, could be sent back and forth.
The Cluster/One Model A is the
newest Nestar system. It is a remarkably sophisticated network that allows up to sixty-four Apple computers to talk back and forth, exchange data, and share resources.
Using the Nestar System
Harry gave me a demonstration of the system. Imagine the following situation: your Apple computer is hooked up to the Nestar bus along with several other users. You can request a program from the central control module, which features two S-inch floppy-disk drives and an optional hard-disk drive; you can send a program to be stored in the main memory and the pro- gram can be in BASIC, Pascal, assembly language, or whatever; you can request that something be printed out on a printer that is connected to another Apple com- puter on the system; and the list of possibilities goes on.
Resource Sharing
The Nestar system is an exam- ple of resource sharing on a local data network. It's not unlike time- sharing, but with several impor- tant differences. In time-sharing, several users share the same master computer. However, only one user can be serviced at a time; the busier the users get, the longer each may have to wait to get a job done. In the Nestar system, each computer maintains its own autonomy and its full computational ability at all times. However, all of the computers on the network can share, for exam- ple, a large, expensive line printer located at one of the sta- tions, Only one computer can use the printer at a time, but each computer is free to do other tasks while waiting to use the printer.
Most of the time, the system is transparent to its users — that is, they are not conscious of its presence, because of its speed.
Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc 29
APPLE
PASCAL
APPLE n
NESTAR
OPERATING
SYSTEM
APPLE n
APPLE n
APPLE
DISK-
OPERATING
SYSTEM
APPLE n
|
EXPANSION SLOTS |
||
|
APPLE PASCAL |
||
|
APPLE n |
|
DISK |
|
|
NESTAR DUAL 8 in. FLOPPY |
|
5 1/4 in. |
|
|
FLOPPY |
|
|
DISK |
|
DISK |
|
|
NESTAR 1/4 In. WINCHESTER |
|
GRAPHICS |
|
|
TABLET |
Figure 2: Details of the Nestar bus system.
Physical Setup
In order to hook up to the Nestar system, each Apple com- puter must be outfitted with a special printed-circuit card that plugs into the computer. This "buffered communications card," which costs $395, contains all of the necessary electronics to enable the computer to talk to all of the other computers on the bus, as well as the central module. A cable is connected to the card to complete the hookup procedure.
Harry Saal described some of the clever engineering built into the system: "One Apple com- puter in the system is used as the 'disk manager' — responding to data and program requests, directing 'mail/ and processing commands for each user station."
I asked what happens if several people want to read the same program from the central system
at the same time. His answer was detailed: "If several people are either reading the same data or loading the same program, the system detects this and sends some or all of this information to be stored in the disk manager Ap- ple. Each requester looks first in the disk manager computer for the desired program before tying up the main control-unit disks. So we have a one-level buffer that keeps the system from bog- ging down. In fact, the Nestar system is similar in concept to a new computer network plan from Xerox called Ethernet."
Additional Features
Any peripherals supported by the Apple computer can be used with the Nestar system, including speech-recognition devices, appliance-control devices, etc. And if any of the user computers
fails, it doesn't affect the rest of the system. Users can secure their data files with password protection to prevent others from reading restricted information or changing programs.
Price
The Model A costs $6000 for the basic system with 1,260,000 bytes of storage. The optional 16.5- and 33-megabyte hard-disk systems cost $8000 and $10,000, respectively. And, as mentioned earlier, each station must be out- fitted with a $395 communica- tions card. For a typical ten- station system, the unit cost of the Nestar system (including all of the Apple computers) is about $2800. The price may seem high, but when you consider that it costs over $40,000 to educate a child from kindergarten through college today, this amounts to on-
30 Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc
Radio Shack's Network I Controller
The Network I Controller from Radio Shack is a $499 device that allows up to sixteen Radio Shack TRS-80 Level II computers to send and receive BASIC programs via a central 32 K-byte TRS-80 computer with at least one floppy-disk drive. (Therefore, it requires the expansion interface.) There are several con- straints and limitations to the system in com- parison to the Nestar system, but the prices of the two systems are significantly different.
In the case of the Network I Controller, the central TRS-80 computer system connects to it through the cassette interface. Sending a pro- gram to the central computer requires some synchronization of effort between the sender and receiver, preceded by the preliminary disabling of interrupts at both ends. The receiving system operator types CLOAD, then the sending operator types CSAVE. The pro- gram is transferred at the 500 bit per second (bps) cassette-data-transfer rate, considerably slower than the Nestar data-transfer rate of 250,000 bps. Following this, the receiving operator must save the program on disk. No other resource sharing is possible with this system. Nonetheless, it is a definite improve- ment over the individual loading of cassettes in a classroom.
ly a 7.5% increase in the total money spent.
Where Are We Headed?
We are only beginning to see the rich educational possibilities inherent in the personal com- puter. Sophisticated new hard- ware ideas like the Nestar system mean new hope for the future of computer literacy.*
Note: The Nestar system is being marketed through Apple dealers. For more information, contact Nestar Systems Inc, 430 Sherman Ave, Palo Alto CA 94306; telephone, (415) 327-0125.
DYNACOMP
Quality software for: PET
Apple II Plus TRS-80 (Level II)
North Star
All software is supplied with complete documentation which includes clear explanations and examples. Each program will run with standard terminals (32 characters or wider) and within I6K program memory space. Except where noted, all software is available on PET cassette, North Star diskette (North Star BASIC), TRS-80 cassette (Level II) and Apple cassette (Applesoft BASIC). These programs are also available on PAPER TAPE (Microsoft BASIC).
FLIGHT SIMULATOR Price: $17.95 postpaid
(as described in SIMULATION, Volume II)
A realistic and extensive mathematical simulation of take-off, flight and landing. The program utilizes aerodynamic equations and the characteristics of a real airfoil. You can practice instrument approaches and navigation using radials and compass headings. The more advanced flyer can also perform loops, half-rolls and similar acrobatic maneuvers.
SIMULATION. Volume II (BYTE Publications): S6.00
VALDEZ Price: $14.95 postpaid
A simulation of supertanker navigation in (he Prince William Sound and Valdez Narrows. The program uses an extensive 256X2S6 clement radar map and employs physical models of ship response and tidal patterns. Chart your own course through ship and iceberg traffic. Any standard terminal may be used for display.
BRIDGE 2.0 Price: $17.95 postpaid
An all-inclusive version of this most popular of card games. This program both BIDS and PLAYS cither contract or duplicate bridge. Depending on the contract, your com- puter opponents will cither play the offense OR defense. If you bid too high the com- puter will double your contract! BRIDGE 2.0 provides challenging entertainment for advanced players and is an excellent learning tool for the bridge novice.
HEARTS 1 .5 Price: $14.95 postpaid
An exciting and entertaining computer version of this popular card game. Hearts is a trick -oriented game in which the purpose is not to take any hearts or the queen of spades. Play against two computer opponents who arc armed with hard-to-beat play- ing strategies.
DAT A SMOOTH ER Price: $14.95 postpaid
This special data smoothing program may be used to rapidly derive useful information from noisy business and engineering data which are equally spaced. The software features choice in degree and range of fit, as well as smoothed first and second derivative calculation. Also included is automatic plotting of (he input data and smoothed results.
FOURIER ANALYZER Price: $14.95 postpaid
Use this program to examine the frequency spectra of limited duration signals. The program features automatic scaling and plotting of the input data and results. Prac- tical applications include the analysis of complicated patterns in such fields as elec- tronics, communications and business.
MAIL LIST I Price: $18.95 postpaid (available for North Star only)
A many-featured mailing list program which searches through your customer list by user -defined product code, customer name or Zip Code. Entries to the list can be con- veniently added or deleted and the printout format allows the use of standard size address labels. Each diskette can store more than 1000 entries.
CHESS M ASTER Price: $19.95 postpaid (available for North Star and TRS-80 only)
This complete and very powerful program provides five levels of play. It includes castl- ing, en passant captures, and the promotion of pawns. Additionally, the board may be preset before the start of play, permitting the examination of '‘book" plays. To max- imize execution speed, the program is written in assembly language (by SOFTWARE SPECIALISTS of California). Full graphics are employed in the TRS-80 version, and two widths of alphanumeric display are provided to accommodate North Star users.
TEXT EDITOR I (Letter Writer) Price: $14.95 postpaid
An easy to use, line-oriented text editor which provides variable line widths and simple paragraph indexing. This text editor is ideally suited for composing letters and is quite capable of handling much larger jobs.
GAMES PACK I Price: $10.95 postpaid
Seven entertaining games for less than a dollar a kilobyte! Play CATAPULT, CRAPS, SWITCH. HORSERACE. SLOT MACHINE. BLACKJACK and LUNAR LANDER. This is an excellent and economical way to start your games library.
All orders are processed within 48 hours. Please enclose payment with order. If paying by MASTER CHARGE or VISA, include all numbers on card. Foreign orders add 1 08b for shipping and handling.
Write for detailed descriptions of these and other programs available from DYNACOMP.
|
DYNACOMP |
(dl Bfr |
|
|
P.O. Box 162 Dept. N |
Webster, New York, 14580
(716) 586-7579
New York State residents please add 7% NYS sales tax.
Circle 80 on inquiry card.
Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc 31
32 Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc
Illustration by Robert Tinney
Living
with
Computers
by Jerry Pournelle
"Computers are great/' said my friend, a famous author. "I've got to have one."
"Sure," I said, "but there are ways and ways to go about getting one ..."
He didn't listen. And he's sorry now. A story goes with it ... .
Whenever the Jet Propulsion Laboratories (JPL) hosts one of the solar system's great shows— Mars landings, en- counters with Jupiter, whatever— there's usually a gather- ing of the science fiction clan, and we throw a party here at Chaos Manor. Of course I take every possible oppor- tunity to show off my friend Ezekiel (who happens to be a Cromemco Z-2 computer with a lot of nifty extras); and the result is almost always the same. Everyone who sees him at work wants one.
The problems come when they decide to buy their own. Take four cases.
Case One is my writing partner Larry Niven. No fool he; when I first got Ezekiel, Larry came over and worked here. He liked what he saw, but he did nothing in haste. He waited until I had a system I was happy with; then he hired the same consultants (Proteus Engineering of Pasadena, California) to build him an exact copy, and bought the same software I had. The result was instant satisfaction. His system worked almost from the first day.
Almost: there were a few shakedown problems, mostly hardware, with one particularly plaguey failure cured only after spraying all his carpets with an anti-static goo because he kept zapping the encoder chip in his keyboard; but the important thing was the software. Even using the software I use he got in trouble a few times and almost lost some files— but because we both used the same stuff,
I could tell him by phone how to cope. Incidentally, his result has been similar to my own, a near doubling of Larry's productivity and a sharp increase in quality of writing output— with the latter being by far
Summer 19S0 © onComputing Inc 33
the most important. (See my com- ments on word processors in A Writer Looks at Word Processors in this issue.) The important thing to note is Larry's nearly painless transition to computers.
There's another approach, and it's disastrous.
Case Two involves my friend the famous author— he really is famous, and I'm withholding the name because you'd recognize it and I wouldn't want to embarrass him. Thinking that Ezekiel was marvelous, he couldn't wait to get his own. His problem is that he has too much money. When he got home he fell into the hands of consulting engineers who told him all of the great things computers could do, marvels far beyond Ezekiel's more modest capabilities, and he believed every breathless word of it. He called me to tell me what my problems were.
"You didn't spend enough money," said he. "I've been studying what these machines can do, and just wait until you see what I'm getting."
He was so enthusiastic that he went out and got a contract to write a book on microcomputers.
I haven't seen the manuscript, but his outline said he would tell how the machines work, what they can do, how they'll change your life, how his microcomputer changed his life ....
Only one trouble. A year went by. His book was due. And the engineers were still telling him how great his system would be when he finally got it. He ended up writing his book on a typewriter, and as far as I know his system isn't working yet.
Now that's an extreme case, and most people shopping for a microcomputer aren't rich
enough to generate themselves that kind of problem, but it's il- lustrative all the same.
Case Three is intermediate. It involves another famous author (Gordon Dickson) who confessed he knew nothing about com- puters, but liked what mine did. If he'd lived in California, he'd probably have done as Larry Niven in Case One did and sim- ply bought a copy of Ezekiel, but given that he's a good thousand miles away that wasn't possible. As the next best thing, his consul- tant spent some time on the telephone with Tony Pietsch (owner of Proteus) before buying the system.
Unfortunately the two engineers didn't discuss the right subjects. Engineers never do. What's important to them is not necessarily what's important to the user. The result was a system that works, and works well. Gordon Dickson will never go back to a typewriter after using a word-processor program. But what he has is a system more adapted to a programmer than to a creative writer, and although he's only working about a third as hard as he did with his Selectric II typewriter, he's still working twice as hard as he would with the proper system.
Case Four is much like the third. Screenwriter David Ger- rold, who used to work with a magnetic-tape Selectric, decided to get a full computer. Being a writer and not an engineer, he wanted something off the shelf. Not wanting to sink loads of money into a system, he got only the essentials. The result is similar to Dickson: he loves the system, but he's working harder than he ought to.
Neither Dickson nor Gerrold are in unrecoverable situations. They bought machines that can be upgraded to full capability. That makes them a lot better off than some writers I know who got nonstandard equipment and soon ran up against inherent limits that can't be overcome without scrapping everything and starting over. (I could tell a number of horror stories like these.) It's a trap that's all too easy to fall into, and worth a lot to avoid.
Which brings me to the point of this article: if you decide to live with a computer, how do you go about choosing one?
The Micro Is an Attractive Mistress . . .
First, please understand something very clearly: for most people— certainly just about all of the professional writers I know —buying a computer is not at all similar to buying any other durable good. It's more like get- ting married. You will find that you spend a lot more time with your computer than ever you did with a typewriter. There's something attractive about the machines; as Gordon Dickson says, a typewriter and blank paper tend to force you away, to make you think of other things that need doing, like sharpening pencils and carrying out the gar- bage. The computer, on the other hand, draws you into it.
Not that you'll spend all that much more time writing. Again with few exceptions, most writers who have acquired machines probably spend less time actually writing than they did before they bought them. They turn out more copy because the machine makes it so much easier to write. They
34 Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc
turn out better copy because a good text editor lets you endlessly rewrite without pain. You can change words and lines without retyping a whole page. You find yourself doing minor touchups here and there that you'd never do on a typescript; playing with words, trying this phrase and that to see how it looks before making a final choice— and no choice is really final until you've mailed the manuscript anyway. So yes, computers let you finish more work and get it better, and do it in less time, because they take most of the mechanical work— which is half the pain— out of writing.
But they don't give you more time, because the machines themselves are fascinating, and they eat up all the time they've saved and more. They're fun, and they're hard to resist playing with.
Marriages Aren't Made in the First Computer Store
You wouldn't marry the first woman you saw just because she looked good in a sweater (for the women reading this, change sexes and adornments appropriately). Similarly, you shouldn't buy the first microcomputer you see demonstrated. I know the tempta- tion is great, because I very near- ly did it. But don't. Give yourself a few days. A few weeks, even, if you can wait, although I know that's asking a lot from someone in love. But please, try to be ra- tional.
Rationality consists of getting some idea of what you want a computer to do. It's not easy, because few beginners have any idea of what these machines can do; the analogy with marriage is a good one. Until you've tried it
Computers let you finish more work and get it better, and do it in less time, because they take most of the mechanical work — which is half the pain — out of writing.
you don't know what it's like; until you've been happily mar- ried you don't know what it can be like. And until you've lived happily with a computer, you can't even guess how they can change your life.
So the first rule is, look at a number of systems. Visit friends who have one. Join a local com- puter club. Spend a bit of time in a reputable computer store; if possible, visit several computer stores, even if that means a weekend trip to a big city. (Take your family along and make a holiday of it. They'll see little enough of you after your system is installed.)
Above all, read the better com- puter magazines. This one, of course, and its sibling, BYTE. Get An Introduction to Microcomputers, Volume 0: The Beginner's Book, by Osborne/McGraw-Hill books, and read it.
When you've done all that, you will still know no more about liv- ing with a computer than mar- riage manuals can tell you about married life, but you'll know a few questions to ask when the marriage brokers— uh, excuse me, computer-store salespeople— try to sell you a machine.
What Do You Expect,
Anyway?
Rule One: Whatever you ex- pected from your computer, the good ones will be able to do more.
Rule Two: However much you get from your computer, it won't be quite enough.
On these two rules hang all the leisure and the profits.
Who Is This Guy to Tell Me About My Future Wife [Hus- band]?
My qualifications to give pon- tifical opinions: First, I'm a pro- fessional writer. I work at home, and for the past two years I've spent an average of eight hours a day with Ezekiel. Nowhere near all that time is consumed with creative writing. When I bought my system I was determined to remain a user and not get in- volved with programming and hardware, but I'm temperamen- tally unable to do that, as I sup- pose I ought to have known; you don't become a science fact/fic- tion writer unless you're driven by insatiable curiosity. Thus I read all the magazines, I eagerly play about with other people's systems, I go to computer shows,
I own nearly every programming language capable of being run on the Z80 processor, and I've writ- ten a lot of programs that work.
Of necessity I run a small business. Most writers neglect the business details of their profes- sion, and thereby lose a lot of money; if you put too much time into business you don't write, and if you don't write there's no business to manage. Fortunately I've found that Ezekiel can take care of an awful lot of the detail work, letting me do both. Mean- while I've become familiar with a great number of business-oriented programs, and I know something of the computer requirements of small businesses: keeping books and records, keeping track of con-
Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc 35
tracts, generating contract changes, keeping files of books in print, making sense of data files, answering correspondence, generating the myriad of required government reports, and in general handling the time- consuming chores.
I also know what most com- puter enthusiasts find out too late: the machines can do all that, but most of them won't because there's no software; and even if there is software, it seems to be a law of nature that computer hackers can't write English, so you'll never figure out how to use the software that does exist without becoming something of a hacker yourself.
So: with all that experience behind me I know something of how to live with computers, and I've become a maniac on the sub- ject. I love them. I can't conceive of life without one, and when my machine is down— fortunately a very rare situation— I feel totally lost.
Thus this article. Not everyone who reads onComputing is going to become a true computer nut, but the percentage of those who buy machines "just to use" and then find the darned things tak- ing over their lives is larger than you'd suppose. Be warned.
Random Personal Recommen- dations
Up to now I've kept it general; but I was taught in the only writing class I ever took, Intro to Journalism, that one ought to be specific wherever possible. The trouble with recommending specific systems is that it's a bit like telling someone whom to marry; as long as you keep the advice general you're fairly safe, but when you get down to names
you can have trouble. Similarly, if I recommend specific systems I'm going to be accused of slighting some just as good as those I like— and some of the ac- cusations may be well-founded.
The following, then, are per- sonal opinions based on over two years of experience with micro- computers. I don't think someone buying a computer would do well to ignore them, but they are not gospel either.
(1) Since in my experience your computer is going to absorb far more time than you think it will, and will be asked to do far more than you ever thought it would, it's best to get as versatile a system as possible; and in the Z80 field that means a system with an S-100 bus, using 8-inch soft-sectored floppy disks, and running under the CP/M operating system. There's as much software for that configura- tion as for the next three put together.
(2) Get as large a box as will fit where you intend to keep the machine. Be sure there are plenty of empty slots for circuit boards. There are an amazing number of special-purpose boards, including clocks, telephone answering devices, music boards, speech synthesizers, and gizmos to let your microcomputer control your house; unless there's room in your system you won't be able to add bells and whistles. My own system resides in the Cromemco Z-2 "black brick" box, which is built to withstand small atomic weapons, and I'm very satisfied with it. Doubtless there are many others as good.
(3) It's worth something to have the shop install a larger fan in the box. Over 75% of the hardware
problems I've seen in microcom- puters have been heat dependent.
(4) If you've got to save money now and you're not in a business that demands pretty print, save on the hard-copy device and plan to replace it later; don't stint on the basic electronics.
(5) Get one of the Big Three text editors (Electric Pencil,
Magic Wand, or Word Star) and get it operating immediately. Also acquire Word Master; you prob- ably won't use it as a primary editor, but when you do decide to do programming there's nothing to equal it.
(6) Right now do something nice for your family. They're go- ing to miss you after your com- puter moves in . . . .■
About the Author
Dr Jerry Poumelle has for the past nine years been a full-time writer of science fact and fiction. He is the former direc- tor of the Human Factors Laboratories for the Boeing Company, and was in- volved with projects Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo, as well as military aerospace systems.
Dr Poumelle holds degrees in engineering, psychology, and political science, and was the successor to the late Willy Ley as science editor for Galaxy Science Fiction magazine, where his column was a popular feature. At present he is a regular col- umnist for Ace Books' Destinies magazine and Analog Science Fiction, and will shortly begin computer equip- ment and software reviews for BYTE magazine.
With Larry Niven he is coauthor of the best-selling novels Lucifer's Ham- mer and The Mote in God's Eye. Winner of the first John W Campbell memorial award, he has written a dozen novels of his own. His latest novel is Janissaries (Ace Books), and his latest nonfiction work is A Step Farther Out (Ace/Grossett).
36 Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc
Everybody’s making money selfing microcomputers. Somebody's going to make money
servicing them.
New NRI Home Study Course Shows You How to Make Money Servicing, Repairing, and Programming Personal and Small Business Computers
Seems like every time you turn around, some- body comes along with a new computer for home or business use. And they’re being gobbled up to handle things like payrolls, billing, inven- tory, and other jobs for businesses of every size.. .to perform household functions like budgeting, environmental systems control, indexing recipes, and more.
Growing Demand for Computer Technicians...
Learn in Your Spare Time Even before the microprocessor burst upon the scene, the U.S. Department of Labor forecast over a 100% increase in job openings for the decade through 1985. Most of them neiv jobs created by the expanding world of the computer. NRI can train you at home to service both microcomputers and their big brothers. Train you at your convenience, with clearly written “bite-size” lessons that you do evenings or weekends without quitting your present job.
Assemble Your Own Microcomputer NRI training includes practical experi- ence. You start with meaningful experiments building and studying circuits on the NRI Discovery Lab® Then you build your own test instruments like a transistorized volt-ohm meter, CMOS digital frequency counter... equip- ment you learn on, use later in your work.
And you build your own microcomput- er, the only one designed for learning. It looks and operates like the finest of its kind, actually does more than many commercial units. But NRI engineers have designed components and planned assembly so it demonstrates important principles, gives you working experience in detecting and correcting problems. It’s the
(Please Print)
Street
City/State/Zip
Accredited by the Accrediting Commission of the National Home Study Council 177-050
□ Computer Electronics Including Microcomputers
□ TV/Audio/ Video Systems Servicing
□ Complete Communications Electronics with CB • FCC Licenses • Aircraft, Mobile, Marine Electronics
□ CB Specialists Course
□ Amateur Radio • Basic and Advanced
□ Digital Electronics • Electronic Technology • Basic Electronics
□ Small Engine Repair
□ Electrical Appliance Servicing
□ Automotive Mechanics
□ Auto Air Conditioning
□ Air Conditioning, Refrigeration, & Heating Including Solar Technology
kind of “hands-on” training you need to repair and service units now on the market.
Mail Coupon for Free Catalog No Salesman Will Call
Send today for our 100-page, full- color catalog. It describes NRI’s new Mi- crocomputer Technology course in detail, shows all equipment, kits, and lesson plans. And it also tells about ■— — — — other NRI courses...
Complete Communi- cations with 2-meter
transceiver... TV/Audio/Video Systems Servicing with training on the only designed-for-leaming 25” diagonal color TV with state-of-the-art computer programming. With more than a million students since 1914, NRI knows how to give you the most in home training for new opportunity. If coupon has been removed, write to NRI Schools, 3939 Wisconsin Ave., Washington, D.C. 20016.
RUSH FOR FREE CATALOG
NRI Schools
McGraw-Hill Continuing Education Center 3939 Wisconsin Avenue Washington, D.C. 20016 Please check for one free catalog only. NO SALESMAN WILL CALL
All career courses approved under GI Bill. □ Check for details.
Circle 90 on inquiry card.
Summer 1980 onComputing Inc 37
Word Processors
A Look at Four Popular Programs
by Larry Press Small Systems Group
Word processing— what is it, and what can it do for you? Today's personal computer media are filled with word-processing advertising. It seems that every package has its own set of special features, and the beginner may have some trouble in sorting things out.
To help you get started, I will compare four word-processing packages: Auto Scribe, Electric Pencil, Magic Wand, and Word Star. With the exception of Auto Scribe, all of the programs re- viewed in this article are CP/M versions. The Auto Scribe package we evaluated is designed for the North Star Horizon computer. CP/M is a popular disk operating system for use with 8080- and Z80-based computer systems. (Electric Pencil is also available for the Radio Shack TRS-80 personal computer.) But before turning to these specific programs, we need to consider a few background fac- tors—the types of programs available, the ways in which a word-processing system can be used, and some hardware con- siderations. Once the stage is set, I will review the programs.
Types of Programs
There are three types of pro- grams used for processing text: editors, print formatters, and word
word processors let you edit and format text quickly and effi- ciently using a per- sonal computer.
processors. An editor is a program used to create and modify text for subsequent printing using a separate program called a print formatter. For example, in prepar- ing an article I would begin by key- ing in the text using an editor. Once it is entered and corrected, the session would be terminated and the resulting file saved on the disk. I could then use a print for- matter to read the saved file and prepare the final printed output. If I wished to make subsequent changes, I would use the editor again to modify the original file, and produce an updated version for reprinting. (See figure 1.)
A word-processing system pro- vides the editing and printing func- tions in one package. Some com- panies choose to do this with one integrated program. Others pro- vide a separate editor and format- ter designed to work well together. You may have heard a distinction made between line editors and screen, or context, editors. Line editors are generally designed to work on printing terminals, and are not as well suited to word pro- cessing. All of the systems re-
viewed in this article use screen editors.
Screen editors assume that you have a video display which lets you see a portion of the text in memory. In a sense, the video screen is a window that can be moved around on the text. The user moves or scrolls the window to the appropriate position in the text file and makes changes by retyping what appears.
This is an intuitive and direct way to work. You don't spend time checking to see where you are, checking to see what you've done, and composing commands, as you have to do when using a line editor. You're free to concentrate on composing text, so learning to use a screen editor is relatively easy.
Despite their limitations, a number of line editors have features which are useful for com- posing rigidly formatted files which consist of separate lines; for example, computer programs. It is also possible with some line editors, if you are an advanced user, to write programs of com- mand sequences, enabling you to do some tricky things.
There are also two general philosophies regarding print for- matters. At one pole is a program in which you format the document
38 Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc
Word Proceszors Word Proceszors
Word Proceszors
Word Proceszors Word Proceszors Word Processors Word Processors Word Processors Word Processors Word Processors Word Processors
being worked on so that it appears on the screen exactly as it would be printed. Auto Scribe and Word Star lean in this direction. At the other end of the spectrum, the ap- pearance of the text on the screen bears no relation to the way it will appear when printed, and various commands are embedded in the text to control print formatting. Electric Pencil and Magic Wand are more reliant upon embedded commands than the other two packages; however, all systems fall somewhere between these poles.
The first extreme— what you see on the screen is what you get on the printer— sounds great. It would simplify your job: you would never be surprised by any quirks in your printout since you would have previewed it on the screen, and there would be no print for- matter commands to learn. Unfor- tunately, there are some problems that keep us from achieving this goal.
For one thing, the hardware which is commercially available at reasonable prices is not up to the task. In general, video screens are not capable of displaying material as it will eventually be printed (unless we severely limit what we can do with printers). For exam- ple, my high-class printer is capable of superscripting and subscripting, of printing lines which are 160 characters wide, and of varying the widths of printed characters, the spaces be- tween characters, and the spaces between lines. My video display cannot do any of this, so it really cannot show me exactly what is going to be printed out. And in many applications, the material to be printed is supplied at the time the document is being printed, not while it is being composed. The operator might be supplying
amounts owed in the case of an accounts-receivable dunning let- ter, or names and addresses may be read in from a data file on the disk at the time a letter is being printed.
A print formatter that allows for embedding commands can also be made to do some sophisticated decision making at print time by allowing the experienced user to essentially write small programs of command sequences. Finally, it takes some processing time and perhaps operator action to refor- mat text so that it appears as it would be printed. Given these sorts of factors, all systems allow for some embedding of print com- mands in the text, although they vary in degree.
There are editors and print for- matters, but what about full word- processing systems? With a word-
processing system you're able to create and modify files (ie: to edit them) and to print them out. This may be achieved either by having you compose your document, then save it on the disk for printing (as with Magic Wand or WordStar); or it may be possible to print a document while it is in the process of being edited (as with Auto Scribe or Electric Pencil).
Who Are You?
The first step in shopping for word-processing software is to ask yourself what sorts of things you plan to do with your system. A small business which sends out much repetitive mail will look for different things than a journalist who uses a word processor to write articles. Let's look at some people who might use a word- processing system.
40 Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc
An Author
The author is going to use a system to write and revise relative- ly lengthy, unique documents such as articles, stories, and proposals. Jerry Pournelle discusses word processing from this point of view in his article on page 83 of this issue of onComputing. An author keys in a large quantity of text and makes repeated revisions, so there is great interest in editing features. It is advantageous to be able to move the cursor quickly around on the screen and to have a system that scrolls the text rapidly. Dele- tions and insertions must be sim- ple and quick.
Print formatter features, such as the ability to read names and ad- dresses from a disk file at the time a document is being printed or be- ing able to vary the printout depending upon what an operator
There are three types of programs used for processing text: editors, for- matters, and word processors.
keys in response to a fancy prompt, are not important to the author. On the other hand, some print-time features such as automatic page numbering, headings, and footnotes are impor- tant.
A Marketing Manager
The marketing manager of a small business will use his or her word processor in different ways than an author. He or she may wish to send a new product an- nouncement to 150 magazine editors or send a "personalized" letter to 3000 past customers. Since the announcement or letter is fair- ly short and a new one is com- posed infrequently, the manager
Word-Processing Programs Reviewed
|
Program |
Manufacturer |
Price |
|
Auto Scribe |
Micro Source |
$400 |
|
1425 W 12th PI |
(suggested |
|
|
Tempe AZ 85281 |
retail) |
|
|
Electric Pencil* |
Michael Shrayer Software |
$250 thru $300 |
|
1198 Los Robles Dr |
(depending on the |
|
|
Palm Springs CA 92262 |
printer used) |
|
|
Magic Wand |
Small Business Applications $400 |
|
|
3220 Louisiana St Suite 210 Houston TX 77006 |
(approximately) |
|
|
WordStar |
Micro Pro International 1299 4th St San Rafael CA 94901 |
$495 |
*A new character-oriented version of Electric Pencil, called Electric Pencil II, is available for the Radio Shack TRS-80 Model II (and other CP/M systems having the DMA feature) for between $275 and $300. It was not available in time to be included in this review. . . ed
can live with an editor which is a little slower and more confusing to use. On the other hand, the sorts of print formatting features which are of little interest to an author are critical to the marketing manager.
This formatter should be able to accept inputs like names and ad- dresses from customer files on the disk or from the operator while it is printing. Features which give a degree of programming flexibility are important in cases such as this. For example, the marketing manager's system may be used to generate different letters for dif- ferent sorts of people in the customer file, so the print format- ter must be able to read informa- tion into variables and then test their values. If the word processor is used to prepare and maintain mailing lists and other data files, there will be interest in having a system that can prompt the operator and which can write to the disk, as well as to the printer.
A Secretary
A secretary falls somewhere be- tween the writer and the manager. In doing general correspondence, many unique documents will be composed; however, they will be relatively short and will not be subject to much revision. Therefore, editing features will be somewhat less important to a secretary, and it is okay if the system slows down when editing long documents.
While each letter is unique, each has a relatively similar format (date, address, salutation, body, etc). So, features that automatical- ly position various parts of a letter are useful. Being able to display a close approximation of what will eventually be printed is also handy for this type of work, as is the abili-
Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc 41
Figure 2: Viewing the text. The video display acts as a text window into memory , allowing the user to see a portion of the text at a time. Within this area , the cursor can be moved around to add or delete information.
ty to print copy without saving a file on the disk or leaving the editor to run a separate formatter.
A Newsletter Composer
A word processor may be used to prepare camera-ready material for printing. In this case, the documents will be fairly large and unique. Like an author, a com- poser will be interested in editing features during input and while correcting typographical errors, but won't spend as much time on revision. On the other hand, there will be more interest in print for- matting features.
In composition, the ability to utilize the special features of the system printer is critical. For ex- ample, proportional character widths (ie: wider spaces between wide letters than narrow ones), precise control over the distance between successive lines, boldface printing, superscripting and subscripting, and justification (ie: lining up the left or right hand edges of the text, as in a newspaper text column) are needed in this case. In addition, it is convenient for a composer to have control over formatting at the time of printing, in case some trial and er- ror is necessary. For instance, if an article is printed and it is discovered that it is slightly too long as formatted, the composer might want to reprint it with 1/48 of an inch less space between each line. Again, a composer would like to see a good approximation of the way the material will eventually be printed while it is being edited.
After comparing the programs under review, I will make some specific recommendations for each of these users. First, however, let's look at hardware considerations for word processing.
Hardware Considerations
The toughest decision in putting together a word-processing system is choosing software; however, there are a number of hardware choices which must also be made. How much memory do you need? What size disk drive? What sort of printer? Should you get a terminal or a direct memory access (DMA) video display? (We'll define DMA later in the article.) Let's look at these questions.
Memory
The question of how much memory to get is easily answered: get 64 K bytes unless you absolute- ly cannot afford it. If the documents you work on are all short enough to fit in your com- puter's memory (along with the program), your word-processing system will be fast. However, as soon as your document length becomes greater than the size of memory, things slow down because the system must begin saving parts of the material on the disk. This may be done automatically or may require operator action. In either case, it will be slow and bothersome. The other obvious bonus to getting the maximum amount of memory is that other tasks you may want to do with your computer can prob-
ably be accomplished more quick- ly and easily.
Disk
With floppy and hard disks you have a wide range of choices. (See "Understanding Floppy Disks" elsewhere in this issue.) A CP/M- based system may have 5-inch floppy-disk drives with about 90 K bytes of memory capacity per drive or a hard disk with up to 30 million bytes capacity. I won't ad- vocate that everyone get the max- imum amount of mass storage.
If you are the only one using your word processor, I can't imag- ine the need for a hard disk. A library of floppies would probaby be more practical. Whether you need the increased capacity available on 8-inch floppy disks depends on your use of the system. Will you have many documents or relatively few? How long will they be? Don't forget that you should have backup copies of each, as well as the current versions. If you're not used to thinking of the number of characters in a docu- ment, it might help to know that this article has approximately 44,360 of them (not including the tables and figures). If you plan many small documents, such as letters, you may run out of direc- tory space before you run out of
42 Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc
storage capacity, since in some systems a CP/M disk may have on- ly sixty-four files on it.
Regardless of your decision on 5- versus 8-inch drives, I have two suggestions: unless you have a good reason not to, get a two- (or more) drive system. This will dou- ble your on-line capacity, and more importantly, it will enable you to quickly copy files for backup purposes. The other sug- gestion is to get double- or quadruple-density drives if you can afford them. This will increase your storage capacity and speed up data reading and writing at a small marginal cost.
A word-processing program provides the editing and printing functions in one package.
Printer
Your printer choice will be determined by the things you plan to do with your system. Personal computer printers come in two types: dot matrix and formed character. In the case of a dot- matrix printer, each character is made up of a pattern of dots. The most common grid size is 7 by 9 dots. A formed-character printer works like a typewriter, striking type against a ribbon.
Formed-character printers are generally slower than dot-matrix printers. They typically print at a rate of 55 characters per second (cps), while dot-matrix printers print at 150 cps and up. Formed- character printers are also more expensive than dot-matrix printers. What do you get for the extra investment? Print quality.
Print quality in a formed- character printer is about the same as that of a good office typewriter. With a carbon ribbon and propor- tional spacing, the results look pro- fessional. You won't convince any of the 3000 people on your mailing list that they've received a per-
6 SOUTH ST., i MILFORD, NH 03055 | (603) 673-5144
OCESSING PACKAGE
The HARDSIDE WORD PROCESSING PACKAGE includes everything necessary to have a complete Word Processing System in your home or office.
'TRS-80, 16K RAM, Level II 'Percom TFD-100 Disk Drive
'Upper/Lower case modification 'Dual Drive Cable
'Video Reverse modification 'NEC SpinWriter 5530
'Expansion Interface, 32K RAM 'Scripsit Word Processor Software
'Percom Data Separator
This package saves you $750. off regular list prices. The Video Reverse allows the TRS-80* to print black letters on a white background, much easier on the eyes. The Scripsit software includes a complete training course on audio tape. The complete package is only $4419.
OPTIONS:
Removable Tractor Feed Option $195.00
Additional Percom Disk Drive $389.00
System Desk $1 79.00
Printer Stand $89.00
TO ORDER, CALL TOLL FREE 1 -800-258-1 790 (in nh can 673-si44)
Circle 100 on inquiry card.
Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc 43
|
Word Processor |
Editor |
Print Formatter |
|
Auto Scribe |
20 |
19 |
|
Electric Pencil |
30 |
24 |
|
Magic Wand |
49 |
76 |
|
Word Star |
69 |
48 |
Table 1: Number of features of the four word processors under review. The author looked for the presence of 164 features (too numerous to list in this article). This gives a rough measure of each system's power, but the results can be misleading. Many of the functions done with a single command on one system may be done us- ing two or more commands on the others, and complexity can intimidate a beginner and slow down even an experienced user.
sonal letter if you use a dot-matrix printer.
The formed-character printers on the market today allow for a good deal of control. The computer can usually move the print head 1/120 of an inch horizontally and 1/48 of an inch vertically. This means that boldface printing (ie: overprinting with a slight shift in position), superscripting, and sub- scripting are possible. Character pitch and line spacing may be set to very fine tolerances and propor- tional spacing of characters is possible. A formed-character printer allows the program to justify text by making slight ad- justments in the spaces between letters, rather than insert- ing blanks between words. They can even back up, allowing for printing multiple columns on a page.
Are you going to use your system for fancy business letters or for writing important proposals? Will you be using it as a composer, creating camera-ready copy to take to the printer? If so, you will need a formed-character printer.
Terminal or DMA Video
A final hardware choice has to do with the manner in which the keyboard and video display are built for your system. A terminal is an all-in-one device. It has both a keyboard and a video display. [A video display is sometimes re- ferred to— incorrectly— as a CRT, which stands for " cathode ray tube. " A video display contains much more than just the screen itself.... ed\ The computer displays information on
the video display by writing it from its memory to the terminal memory. This transfer goes at a high rate (at least 960 cps), but in computer terms this is still slow. In the case of direct memory access (DMA) video, the computer changes the screen display by merely changing the contents of its memory or changing the values in a few internal registers. This is much faster and the difference is noticeable, though not overwhelm- ing, when doing word processing.
Not surprisingly, terminals do offer some advantages over DMA systems. They've been around for many years and are sold in vast quantities in the industrial world. Thus they are standardized and have established maintenance sources. There are well- established, highly competitive channels of industrial distribution, so discounts are readily available. You can also shop around until you find one with a keyboard you like.
Regardless of which method your system uses for displaying in- formation, you'll need a keyboard for entering it. If you have a DMA system, some provision will have been made for an independent keyboard. Some DMA-based systems come with built-in keyboards— for example, the Radio Shack computers. In other cases, you will need to get a detached keyboard, or order the optional keyboard that is offered on a number of printers. In either case, your range of choice will be limited.
Don't take this choice of
keyboards lightly. Make sure you like the feel of the keys. If you are an experienced typist, be sure the keys are where you like them to be. You'll be using the "control" key very often in word processing. Be sure that it is well located. Finally, a small but crucial feature: make sure that your keyboard repeats a character after the key has been held down for a half sec- ond or so. This is most useful dur- ing editing.
Software Again
Software is the most important step in putting together a word- processing system, so be sure that whatever hardware you settle on is compatible with the program you select. If you buy from a dealer, make certain that he will assume responsibility for getting the soft- ware running with your system. If you do it on your own, the soft- ware manufacturer should be con- tacted to be sure that the hardware you plan to buy is compatible with their program. The ideal situation is to get hands-on experience with your hardware and software before buying it, but that isn't always possible.
Program Comparisons
With this background informa- tion in mind, let's take a look at the four programs. I have used each of them for at least a month and have used them all for real work. A detailed comparison on 164 features was made, and the follow- ing summarizes that study. (See table 1.)
Auto Scribe
Auto Scribe has been designed for the computer novice, and has been kept relatively simple. The manual assumes no knowledge of computers. It is the only package
44 Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc
in which the operating system (ie: the internal ' 'controller" program in a computer that takes care of the many technical details involved in computer operation) is even hid- den from the user. When the system comes up, the operator is presented with a "menu" list on the screen, and may choose to create, revise, or view a document or perform disk operations. Disk operations include copying files, deleting files, displaying direc- tories, etc.
Creating, revising, and viewing of documents differ only in the way files are handled. In creating a document, a brand-new file is pro- duced. In revising a document, an
old file is revised and a second file with a new operator-assigned name is created. When viewing a document, it may be altered, but no disk file changes are made. In all cases, the operation of the editor seems to be identical.
When working with a file too large to be contained in the memory buffer, portions of it must be kept on the disk and brought in- to memory when needed. In keep- ing with the goal of serving the computer novice, these disk-to- memory transfers are handled automatically in Auto Scribe. Once a portion of a document has been automatically written on the disk, it is impossible to go back to it
without restarting the operation.
The editor and print formatter are integrated into one program. A document is printed by turning the printer on while scrolling through it a screen at a time. The editing philosophy leans toward on-screen formatting prior to printing, though a number of formatter commands are used.
Electric Pencil
Electric Pencil is the "granddad- dy" of personal computer word processors, having been available for several years. Like Auto Scribe, the system is designed for easy use by the novice. When the system is activated, it is in editing mode and
<0
Got floppy disk problems?
Here’s a new four letter word
to use:
The word is KYBE. Because KYBE will ship you the same high performance products they’ve built for OEM’s for years. Consistent quality media that meets the most demanding specifications. OEM’s won’t risk the performance of their system to less than the best media. Why risk your data either? Especially when the price is competitive.
Get two day shipment on any model floppy disk, data cassette or
mag card. Each is backed by an unconditional 90 day warranty and inventoried for fast delivery. Call toll free (800) 225-8715. Dealer inquiries invited
Offices & representatives worldwide
KYBE
Dennison KYBE Corporation
132 Calvary Street. Waltham. Mass. 02154 Tel. (617) 899-0012: Telex 94-0179 Outside Mass, call toll free (800) 225-8715
Circle 110 on inquiry card.
Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc 45
Word Processor Editor Buffer Size (in bytes)
Auto Scribe 32 K
Electric Pencil 46 K
Magic Wand 50 K
WordStar 31 K
Table 2: Editor buffer size. This is the amount of memory space set aside by the program for text. Magic Wand has the largest memory area for text during editing. This is achieved by using a separate program for the print formatter— thus the print formatter does not take up valuable memory space during editing. Because of this Magic Wand avoids the long delays that would be necessary for disk transfers if the document being edited is too big for memory. On the other hand , you are not able to see the final page and line lengths while editing because the formatter is not active. To do this you must leave the editing program and run the formatter.
it is possible to enter and revise text. In order to print material or perform disk operations, you strike a control key to switch modes. To return to editing after printing or disk operations, you merely strike the escape key.
The print formatter and the editor are fully integrated. At any time it is possible to stop editing and print all or part of the text or to stop printing and resume editing.
When a document is revised, you must explicitly save the new version. You are free to rename it, but if you use the same name, no backup copy is kept. If a document is too large to reside in memory at one time, it must be broken up into several smaller documents since Electric Pencil makes no provision for such cases.
Electric Pencil is able to operate only on systems using DMA video displays. Each of the others is capable of using a terminal as well.
Magic Wand
Magic Wand, like WordStar, is considerably more ambitious than either Auto Scribe or Electric Pen- cil. It has more editing capability than either of the former packages, and many more print formatter features. The editor and main print formatter are two completely separate programs; however, the designers of Magic Wand have compromised by including a rough-draft print routine in the editor.
You bring the system up by run- ning either the editor or print for- matter. The editor comes up in an edit mode which is similar in facili-
ty and style to that of Electric Pen- cil; however, by switching to an extended edit mode, you have a much wider range of capabilities, particularly in the area of examin- ing text which has been prestored on the disk and selectively in- cluding it in the document. You may also make draft copies of all or any portion of your document while in the extended editing mode.
When a file is revised, the operator has the option of giving it a new name or using the old one. If the old name is used, the new ver- sion is saved automatically and a backup copy of the original re- mains on the disk. The second time a file is revised, the first original is automatically deleted.
Documents which are larger than available memory are al- lowed, but you must explicitly save all or part of memory when it becomes nearly full. Once saved, you cannot back up to it without rerunning the editor. However, Magic Wand has the largest memory buffer of any of these systems. (See table 2.)
When running the print format- ter, the operator may automatical- ly print a file, set or change any print control variables (such as margins and spacing), or input data to determine what will be printed. In fact, the operator is free to issue any of the formatter commands available on the system.
WordStar
WordStar is also a very am- bitious program. It has more editing features than Magic Wand,
but fewer print formatter features. The editor and the print formatter are run as one program, as with Auto Scribe or Electric Pencil; however, they are not as tightly in- tegrated, because a file must be saved on the disk before it can be printed. While it is not possible to print the file being edited without first taking the time to save it on the disk, keeping the editor and formatter as one large program is a good idea, since it is possible to preview margins, page breaks, and line lengths during editing. Word Star, like Auto Scribe, leans toward formatting text as it will be printed, and away from using embedded commands.
When WordStar comes up, it is in basic editing mode, like Magic Wand. In order to perform other editing operations, disk opera- tions, or print, it is necessary to enter one of five subsidiary modes. This is a bit overwhelming, especially if you are not experi- enced with computers. To help deal with this complexity, Word Star displays "help" menus at all times. These may be suppressed once you become proficient, and subsidiary menus do not appear at all unless you pause for a second or two while deciding what to do.
As in Magic Wand, it is possible to either give a file a new name after it has been revised, or to save it under the old name with a backup copy. It is possible to edit documents larger than memory, and the system handles transfers to and from the disk automatically, as in Auto Scribe. This is a good feature and there is no limitation on being able to back up when the early part of the file has been saved.
Comparison Summary
As mentioned above, I compared
46 Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc
these four programs based on 164 features. This section summarizes those comparisons in the general areas of documentation, ease of use in learning and editing, and printing power.
Documentation
The first thing any word- processor user encounters is the system manual. At first it functions as a teaching tool. Then, after the operator has learned to use the system, it is a reference. The prompts and diagnostic messages that the program provides while it is running are also a part of the documentation. In looking at documentation, we must
remember that Auto Scribe and Electric Pencil are relatively sim- ple compared with Magic Wand and WordStar, so the authors of their manuals had easier jobs.
The Electric Pencil manual is clear and well-organized. It will not intimidate a beginner, and serves as a perfectly adequate teaching tool for the new user. It is poor as a reference because it has no index; the reference card sum- marizes the editing commands but not the print commands or disk operations.
The Auto Scribe manual is designed for the beginner, and since the system is relatively small, it could have been as good
as Electric Pencil's manual, but it isn't. It is poorly organized and verbose. Essentially identical descriptions of the editing com- mands are given three times, under the creating, modifying, and viewing of documents. More is certainly less in the case of a teaching manual. As a reference, it is better than Electric Pencil because it has an index.
The Magic Wand manual is unique. It is typeset, bound, and contains many screen photo- graphs. That alone makes it im- pressive and inviting to the begin- ner. The author of this manual had a rough job. He had to teach the beginner about complex print for-
HOBBYUJORID
glCCTRONICS, INC
19511 BUSINCSS C€NT€ft DRIV€ Dept. OC6 NORTHRIDGC, CALIFORNIA 91324
Coll Toll-Free: USA (800) 423-5387 In Colif: (800) 382-3651 , S
Local & Outside USA (213) 886-9200
BBB
America’s Largest Mail-Order Computer Store
TRS-80 /FIPPIG/GXIDY
16K Memory nn Add-On Kit $6500
Everything needed to upgrade your TRS-80, Apple or Exidy! An additional 16K includes illustrated instructions. RAMS. and preprogrammed jumpers. No Special tools required. Wt. 4 oz.
CAT NO.
1156
1156-A
1156-B
1156-C
1156-D
DESCRIPTION TRS-80 Keyboard Unit TRS-80 Exp. Interface (prior to 4/1/79)
TRS-80 Exp. Interface (after 4/1/79) for APPLE II for EXIDY
Fuller Qectronics
TRS-80 l PRINT/ LLIST PLUG
Many users are faced with the pro- blem of running programs with LPRINT or LLIST, but they do not want a print out. In this case, all LPRINTS have to be removed from the program before it will run, and this takes time and ties up your keyboard. But there is an alterna- tive! Simply connect the TRS-80 LPRINT/LLIST plug to your line printer port, and the program will run just as if there was a printer connected to your machine. Easy installation and detailed instruc- tions. Wt. 2 oz.
Cat No. 2480
VCRBATIM 5%" DISK€TT€S
|
10 |
per box |
||
|
CAT NO. |
TYPE |
DESCRIPTION |
PRICE |
|
1147 |
525-01 |
soft sector, TRS-80, Etc. |
$33.00 |
|
1148 |
525-10 |
10 hole, hard, Apple, North star 16 hole, hard, micropolis |
$33.00 |
|
1149 |
525-16 |
$33.00 |
|
|
2330 |
577-01 |
soft sector certified |
$49.95 |
|
2331 |
577-10 |
10 hole, hard, certified |
$49.95 |
|
2332 |
577-16 |
16 hole, hard, certified |
$49.95 |
DISKCTTC DfllV€ H€AD CLEANING KIT
Diskette drive heads, like your 8 track car stereo cassette heads, need peri- odic maintenance to assure efficient and error-free operation. Unlike other peripheral devices, the read/write head(s) on diskette drives are ex- tremely difficult to clean without par- tially disassembling the drive. The unique concept of the diskette head cleaning kit allows the user to clean the drive heads without disassembly in just minutes. Available for 8" or 5’/j ", both single and double sided disk drives. Kit contains 2 cleaning diskettes, a 4 oz. bottle of CS-85 cleaning solution and easy-pour dispenser. Weight 12 oz.
Cat No. Description Price
2499 8" Disk Drive Cleaning Kit $30.75
2534 5V4" Disk Drive Cleaning Kit S30.75
MflTCHLGSS MS-80
TRS-80 MINI DISK DRIV€
Plugs into the expansion inter- face. Complete factory tested drive includes installation in- structions and software listing to
Cat No.
1375 2964 1396 1938 1485 D 1147
access 3 times faster than Radio Shack drives. 40 tracks instead of 35. Existing 35 track software completely compatable.
|
Description |
Weight |
Price |
|
MS-80 Disk Drive |
8 lbs. |
$464.25 |
|
2 Drive Cable |
8 oz. |
$ 25.75 |
|
4 Drive Cable |
8 oz. |
$ 41.95 |
|
Accessing Software, tracks 36-40 |
4 oz. |
$ 10.50 |
|
MS-80 MPI 51 Manual |
2 oz. |
$ 1.75 |
|
Verbatim Diskettes, (box of 10) |
8 oz. |
$ 33.00 |
Page after page of exciting products. Computerized toys and games, per- sonal computers, disk drives, in- tegrated circuits, semi conductors. Add new dimension to your Apple, Atari, TRS-80, etc. with our special ap- plication boards and comprehensive software library. Hundreds of pro- ducts available at terrific Hobbyworld prices. Circle our reader service number or write/phone for your free illustrated flyer today.
HOUJ TO ORD€R
Pay by check. Mastercharge, Visa, or C.O.D. Charge card orders please include expiration date. Payment in U.S. dollars only. Order by phone, mail or at our retail store. MINIMUM ORDER $10.00. Please include phone number and magazine issue you are ordering from. Prices valid thru last day of cover date. SHIP- PING: USA: Add $2.00 for first 2 lbs., 35e each addt’l lb. for ground. For AIR add $3.00 first 2 lbs., 75e each addt l lb. FOREIGN: sur- face: $3.00 first 2 lbs., 60c each addt l lb. AIR. $11.00 first 2 lbs., $5.00 each addt l lb. CODs: add $1.25 addt'l. Not responsible for typographical errors. Some items subject to prior sale or quantity limitations. 120 day guaranteed satisfaction. Exception: partially assembled kits.
Circle 120 on inquiry card.
Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc 47
Using the Apple Pascal Text Editor As a Word Processor
by Jef Raskin
While not designed as a general-purpose word processor, Apple's version of the UCSD Pascal system's text editor does a creditable job. Apple Computer Company uses the system to produce all of their manuals. Some outstanding examples are the new, spiral-bound Apple II Reference Manual, in which the output device was a phototypesetter, and the Apple Pascal Reference Manual, in which the output device was a Qume printer. Dr Bowles' books on Pascal were written on this editor, and it is used by Personal Software (who produce MicroChess and VisiCalc) as well.
As a text editor per se, it is fair-to-good in terms of features. To name a few of its abilities, it will:
• align margins left or right, or center lines
• automatically put in returns as you type
• indent (or outdent) paragraphs
• allow you to insert or delete freely
• move paragraphs (or any portion of the text) from place to place
• allow you to undo a deletion
• remargin and reparagraph if necessary
• do a wide range of search and search-and-replace operations
Where it excels is in its command of the Apple/UCSD filing system. You can pull in parts from many disk files to make a new document, or send parts of an existing document to different places. Programs and text are edited by the same editor, so you need learn only one set of commands to do program editing as well as word processing. This is especially convenient when you want to embed extensive documen- tation in a program or have a program appear in some other docu- ment.
The main drawback of this system is that it does not have a very good human interface. While it is average in this regard when com- pared to some of the other personal computer word processors, it could be much better. Even though Apple provides a fine reference manual, which has more than enough information to allow you to use this editor, beginners may find it difficult to get started. A tutorial manual would be much appreciated.
One last feature that I especially enjoy: when you turn the machine on in the morning, and you wish to continue working where you left off the night before, the computer remembers your place— all you need to do is type the letter "E" (for Edit) and there's your document just as you left it.B
matting and programming, as well as the more straightforward editing and printing features, and he has done an excellent job. Two thirds of the manual is devoted to leading the user through a series of lessons. These utilize increasingly complex sample text files which are included on the disk. This is a unique and successful approach. The last third of the manual is a reference guide, and it is clearly written; however, the index is in- complete, so I have wasted much time skimming. The Magic Wand
reference card is excellent and nearly complete. If it included an index into the manual, Magic Wand would have been the best reference manual.
The WordStar manual is a thick loose-leaf book. It is well-written and quite complete, but it's a bit overwhelming even to an ex- perienced computer person. It would intimidate a novice. Ironically, it is full of typographical errors, and like all but Magic Wand's documentation, it is a printout composed using the
system.
The authors of WordStar also faced a difficult task in teaching the beginner to use its complex editing facilities. Rather than writing a teaching-oriented manual, they have provided exten- sive menu prompting during editing. The top half of the video display is used to display brief ex- planations of the meanings of available commands. When you change modes, you get a new prompt screen if you take more than a second or so to give a com- mand. This is a unique and ex- cellent approach. At first, you're overwhelmed by the explanations, but you soon learn to use them. Later, when you no longer require them, they disappear. The ex- perienced user eventually sup- presses them altogether.
As a reference, the WordStar manual could also have been im- proved substantially by the inclu- sion of an index. There is a list of control commands with their page numbers, but no index and no reference card.
Auto Scribe rates ahead of the others as a reference manual, simply because the index is more useful. The others could easily im- prove. On the other hand, as a teaching manual, only Auto Scribe is notably insufficient. Both Magic Wand with its lessons and practice files and WordStar with its on-line help facilities are innovative and effective.
Ease of Learning
As with documentation, the simplicity of a system makes it easy to learn. Electric Pencil is the easiest to learn. Cursor movement, text entry, and revision are straightforward. The conceptual separation of the print- and disk- handling subsystems is clear and
48 Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc
sufficient. My eleven-year-old daughter was able to use Electric Pencil to create, revise, and print simple documents after about fif- teen minutes of instruction and practice.
Auto Scribe is more difficult to learn to use because the text is presented in screens during editing, rather than as one con- tinuous document, and because separate modes are required for cursor movement, inserting characters, and deleting characters. In addition to being somewhat confusing, these restric- tions inhibit learning because they slow down editing.
The basic functions of the Magic Wand editor are as easy to learn as those of Electric Pencil. I gave a secretary a twenty-five-page manuscript to type, along with the Magic Wand reference card and a five-minute demonstration. She was able to input the manuscript, revise it, and print a draft copy without asking a single question. The advanced editing features which deal with blocks of text, searching and replacing, and ex- amining and including information in disk files are also clearly de- signed and easy to learn.
The advanced print formatting and programming features are more complicated and therefore more difficult to learn. The lessons mentioned above are very good, but they take time. An experienced programmer would probably read the lessons without actually run- ning them, but would still require time to become proficient in the use of these features.
These advanced features may also be used to build custom ap- plications, which can be used by complete novices. Since Magic Wand provides much facility for operator interaction, it is possible
Electric Pencil is the "granddaddy" of personal computer word processors.
for an advanced user to set up the system so that it prompts the operator, telling him exactly what he needs to do. There is no analog to this capability in any of the other systems.
WordStar is the most difficult of these systems to learn to use. As mentioned above, the designers of WordStar have leaned toward for- matting material as it will be printed during editing, rather than embedding print commands in the text. As such, they have chosen to provide many editing commands, and have been forced to include
others. Therefore, for even simple editing, there is more to be learned than with any of the others. Many of the simple editing commands re- quire two keystrokes rather than one. The complexity is mitigated by the help menus, but it is still there.
Because of reliance on format- ting during editing and the omis- sion of programming features, the print formatter commands in WordStar are easier to learn than Magic Wand. They are harder to learn than Auto Scribe or Electric Pencil because there are more of them.
For editing, Electric Pencil and Magic Wand are easiest to learn,
SUPER-TEXT™
The Professional Word Processor
for Apple II and Apple II Plus
STANDARD FEATURES
• single key cursor control
• automatic word overflow
• character, word and line insertion
• forward and backward scrolling
• automatic on screen tabbing
• single key for entering “the”
• auto paragraph indentation
• character, word and line deletion
• ditto key
• multiple text windows
• block copy, save and delete
• advanced file handling
• global (multi-file) search and replace
• on screen math and column totals
• column decimal alignment
• chapter relative page numbering
• complete printer tab control
• line centering
• superscripting and subscripting
• two color printing
• underscoring and boldface
• user defined special functions
• displays UPPER and lower case on the screen with Dan Paymar’s Lower Case Adapter REQUIRES 48K $99.95
FAST EDITING
Super-Text was designed by a pro- fessional writer for simple, efficient operation. A full floating cursor and multiple text screens facilitate editing one section of text while referencing another. Super-Text’s advanced features actually make it easier to operate, allowing you to con- centrate on writing rather than remembering complicated key sequences.
FLOATING POINT CALCULATOR
A built in 15 digit calculator performs on-screen calculations, column totals and verifies numeric data in statis- tical documents.
EXCLUSIVE AUTOLINK
Easily link an unlimited number of on-line files on one disk or from disk to disk. Autolink allows you to search or print all on-line files with a single command. Ty pical files of items that can be stored in this way include per- sonnel files, prospect files, main- tenance records, training records and medical histories.
MUSE.
THE LEADER IN QUALITY SOFTWARE
330 N. Charles Street Baltimore, MD 21201 (301)659-7212
Circle 130 on inquiry card.
Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc 49
Auto Scribe is next, and WordStar is most difficult, because there is so much to learn. Learning to use all of the advanced programming and formatting features of Magic Wand will be more difficult than learning Auto Scribe. Finally, a novice could easily learn to use Magic Wand for sophisticated ap- plications if an advanced user had programmed it with prompting ability.
Editing Power
All of these editors allow you to key in text, to make insertions and deletions, to scroll the screen over the text in memory, and to move the cursor around on the screen. They also allow you to search through the text for a specified character pattern and possibly replace it with another. In some of them, you may mark blocks of text in order to move, copy, or delete them, or you may include blocks of text which have been stored on the disk in your document. Each system also allows you to control the display on the screen to some extent and to control the naming and backing up of files after they are created or revised.
Table 3 summarizes editing power of the four systems. In general, the ratings are based upon the number of features available in each category. Where the function of a command in one system can- not be achieved even by using combinations of commands in another, or if it can only be done very awkwardly, it was subjective- ly weighted higher.
A quick glance at the table shows that WordStar has more features than any of the others. Auto Scribe is ranked above it in inser- tion/deletion power because of the unique way in which deletes are performed. It is possible to delete
A Note About Auto Scribe
We were informed at press time that Micro Source will soon be marketing a new, greatly en- hanced version of Auto Scribe for CP/M systems. (The Auto Scribe package reviewed in this article is actually a North Star Horizon ver- sion.) The new package will feature boldface, superscripting, subscripting, block move, block copy, double underlining, etc.
Not all details about the system have been unveiled, but the enhanced version is expected to be competitive with the Word Star system.
from the cursor position through the next occurrence of a designated character. In addition, deletions are not executed im- mediately, but are displayed in lowered intensity until the operator verifies them. Magic Wand enjoys a substantial advan- tage over the others in its ability to selectively examine and include material stored in disk files. The user is able to create his own help menus, which guide the operator in the selection of text for insertion into the copy being edited.
Editing Speed and Ease
While WordStar has more editing features than any of the others, it is not necessarily the fastest and easiest to use since many of the editing commands re- quire two keystrokes and can be simulated using multiple com- mands in the other systems. If a two-keystroke command is used and the operator hesitates for a second or so between keystrokes, the system gives a help screen, which takes time because the disk is read.
WordStar also slows down con- siderably when its memory buffer becomes full. As table 2 shows, WordStar has a relatively small memory buffer. This is part of the price paid for having the print for- matter and editor in memory together. As mentioned above,
WordStar is fully automatic in transferring text to and from the disk if the document is too large to be held in memory at one time. This simplifies your conception of the system and enables you to back up to the start of a file even if it has been written onto the disk; however, editing is slowed for files which are over 31 K bytes of memory in length.
There are also questions of style, which are highly subjective. Auto Scribe and WordStar both restrict cursor movement to portions of the screen where there is text, while Electric Pencil and Magic Wand allow it to go anywhere. With Electric Pencil and Magic Wand, you have conceptual clarity— the cursor never surprises you by where it ends up— but you pay the price of needing extra keystrokes at times to get it where you want it. These extra keystrokes might be exasperating to people whose keyboards don't repeat when keys are held down. Electric Pencil is roughly equivalent to Magic Wand, but Magic Wand can perform many editing functions that Electric Pen- cil cannot. Therefore, Magic Wand ranks above it. Auto Scribe has to rank at the bottom of this category since it has the fewest features and they are awkward to use. Inser- tion, deletion, and cursor move- ment are all carried out in separate modes. It is also slow for large documents, when it is necessary to read and write the disk. Unlike WordStar, it is not possible to back up to material once it has been saved. Like WordStar, Auto Scribe attempts to preview margins, line, and page sizes, but doesn't do it as well.
Because of stylistic differences and differences in document sizes, it is impossible to come up with a
50 Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc
Feature
Table 3: Editing power rankings, shown by categories. "1" indicates the highest ranking; "N" means "none available. " In some cases two programs tied for third.
strict ranking of the programs. At times the power of WordStar will make it the fastest and easiest to use, but in other cases Electric Pencil or Magic Wand will beat it.
Table 4 summarizes the printing power of the various word pro- cessors. Again, the ratings are primarily based on the number of features in each category.
The page layout features have to do with controlling the physical size of the page and margins. Page and paragraph control have to do with headings, footings, page numbering, and automatic indent- ing and spacing between paragraphs. Line control refers to various sorts of justification and options for spacing between lines. Type control includes special font shifts, like boldface and double striking, as well as spatial shifts like subscripting and proportional spacing.
Programming features, which are found only in Magic Wand, are the inclusion of variables, simple assignment statements, and condi- tional branching. Variables may get values either from the operator, from a disk file, or by assignment. Magic Wand and WordStar are also able to write their formatted print output to disk. This capability complements the programming features of Magic Wand and it is more power- ful than WordStar.
The printer control features have to do with operator control over the printing process. Such things as starting and stopping printing and issuing formatter commands at print time are included in this category. I also considered eight miscellaneous features.
As WordStar dominates in the number of editing features, Magic Wand dominates in the area of print formatting. This is partially a
reflection of the differing philosophies regarding formatting during editing versus using embed- ded commands. There are many things which Magic Wand and WordStar are able to do which cannot be done with Auto Scribe or Electric Pencil.
Who Are You?, Revisited
With these comparisons behind
us, let us return to the four hypothetical users described earlier.
The author usually creates and revises relatively large documents, so less emphasis is placed on print- ing than editing. Any word pro- cessor obtained will be far superior to a typewriter, and I don't think that an author can go wrong with either Electric Pencil,
- . Texas Instruments --- To Be A Genius
W Home Computer Ti-99/4
Math Speech Diet Modem
Thermal Printer RS 232 Interface Disk-Controller Disk Drive
Joystick (pair)
Dual Cassette Cable Video Graphs Early Learning Fun Beginning Grammar Early Rdg & Spch Diet Diagnostic Home Financial Decisions 29 95
Football 29 95
Physical Fitness 29 95
Household Budget Mgt 44 95
Tax/ Invest Rec Kpg 69 95
Investment Analysis 54 95
Personal Record Keeping 49 95
Statistics 54 95
Video Chess 69 95
Number Magic 19 95
Speech Editor 44 95
Speech Synthesizer 149 95
Terminal Emulator 44 95
tki4»r.v.u..i.i,iisn
Send $1.00 for 12 page Color Brochure. (Refundable with your TI-99/4 order.)
Superior color, music, sound and graph ics--
and a powerful extended BASIO-all built in
Plus a unique, new Sol id State Speech Synthesizer .
fO
FACTORY DIRECT SALES Dept. 4 7
1317 E. Colorado St. Glendale. CA 91205 Phone: (213) 245-1417
ORDER TODAY
VISA*
• 26K ROM
• Up to 72K total memory capacity
• 16-color graphics capability
• Built-in equation calculator
$
Main Console Unit
$S99
Color Video Monitor
399
California residents add 6% sales tax Delivery subject to product
SATISFACTION GUARANTEED OR YOUR MONEY BACK! availabilit>' bV manufacturer
■ hi hi mm wm mm m hi wm ■ ■■ ■■ m hi hi ■■ ■■ hi hi mm m m m
Price subject to change without notice Refunds guaranteed
Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc 51
Table 4: Formatter power rankings, shown by categories. “1" indicates the highest ranking; "N" indicates " none available. " In some cases two programs tied for third.
Magic Wand, or WordStar. If it is possible to adjust to its style and complexity, WordStar will pro- vide the most powerful editor. Also appreciated will be the fact that words and lines are in the same position on the screen and printout when revising from marginal notes. This makes it easier to find one's place.
If documents are consistently long, it will be necessary to break them into parts or an author must learn to live with the slowdowns due to the limited memory buffer size with WordStar. If the author doesn't like the WordStar style, I would advise the use of Magic Wand. The editor is more power- ful than that of Electric Pencil and it is faster than WordStar for documents which are between 31 K and 50 K bytes.
The marketing manager is con- cerned with printing multiple copies of similar documents— for instance, in doing mass mailings. The manager does relatively little editing but needs print-time power. This is the clearest choice of all. The programming features of the Magic Wand print formatter and its flexibility at selecting infor- mation from the disk during editing are designed with this per- son in mind. Futhermore, the capacity of Magic Wand for presenting user-defined help screens and operator prompts
makes it possible for an experi- enced user to set up specialized ap- plication packages that can be used by clerical workers with no train- ing. Even if the marketing manager prefers the editing style of WordStar, I would advise the use of Magic Wand.
The secretary comes next. In do- ing general correspondence, many short unique documents are created. Much editing is done, but not as much revision as the author. Complex print formatting features aren't really necessary for this sort of work. Any of these systems can be used. The relative simplicity of Auto Scribe and Electric Pencil will be appealing; however, the editing power of Magic Wand or WordStar will probably make a secretary more productive once their use is learned. On the other hand, being able to print while editing, without saving the text on the disk (as in Auto Scribe and Electric Pencil), will make the job go faster.
The newsletter composer works with relatively large documents, but doesn't revise them as fre- quently as an author. Thus, the editor will be less important here than it is to an author; however, the print formatter will be much more important.
This choice should be limited to either Magic Wand or WordStar because of their print formatting
52 Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc
capability. The choice will hinge on some of the same factors as the author's. Editing style, power, and disk speed will be important. The composer will tend to lean toward WordStar for the ability to see page and line breaks on the screen during editing. To do the same thing in Magic Wand, the text must either be printed or written on the disk in its final form, either of which requires running the separate print formatter program. On the other hand, the formatting power of Magic Wand will be ap- preciated, and also its capacity for interaction during printing, for ex- ample, to make quick changes in pitch and line spacing in order to stretch or compress a column. This is a difficult choice, but happily, both alternatives are good.
In short, all of these systems have advantages and disadvan- tages. Armed with the information in this article, I hope you will pick the word processor that's right for you.B
About the Author
Larry Press is president of the Small Systems Group, a software evalua- tion organization in California. He has been involved with personal computing since its inception. With a PhD in information processing, Larry has taught computer science and business administration at various colleges around the country. His most recent project has been a detailed evaluation of word pro- cessors, out of which this article grew. Readers wishing to obtain more information about the full report should contact the author at the following address: Larry Press, do Small Systems Group, POB 5429, Santa Monica CA 90405.
ALMOST
PERFEC.
MAGIC WAND
The IVIMV7IV. VVMIXL/ is the most powerful, most flexible, most reliable, most usable word processing software available for a CP/M-based computer.
That’s not bragging. That’s just telling it like it is.
The MAGIC WAND is the best word processing software ever written for a microcomputer. It can do more work in less time with higher quality than any other product you can buy.
The MAGIC WAND is a rock solid piece of software. The command structure is simple and logical and complete. We have not tossed in features without thought to the overall design of the package. Nor have we included any feature that is not thoroughly implemented. The programs are crash-proof and completely reliable.
And the system is supported by what we are told is the best user’s manual ever pro- duced for microcomputer software. It contains a step-by-step instructional pro- gram designed for the novice. The trainee uses sample files from the system disk and compares his work to simulated screens and printouts in the manual.
Support doesn’t stop when you buy the package. As a registered user, you receive our bi-monthly newsletter which answers questions, reports upgrades and teaches new applications of the MAGIC WAND.
It’s through a lot of hard work that we are able to offer you a product that is “almost perfect,’’ but we aren’t about to stop working until we can say that the MAGIC WAND is perfect.
Full screen text editing
The MAGIC WAND has probably the most responsive and easy-to-use editor avail- able for either a serial or DMA terminal. It uses only single stroke control keys to give command and takes advantage of the special function keys on your terminal whenever possible. In addition, you can set up library files with coded sections that you can merge by section name.
Full text formatting commands The MAGIC WAND allows you to set the left, right, top and bottom margins, page length, indentation, paragraph indenta- tion, (incuding “hanging” paragraphs), text left flush, right flush, justified (two ways), literal or centered, variable line and pitch settings, variable spacing (including half lines), bold face, underlining (solid or broken), conditional hyphenation, sub- and superscripting. You may change any of these commands at run-time without reformatting the file.
Merging with external data files You may access any external data file, with either fixed length or sequential records. The MAGIC WAND converts the record into variables that you define and can use like any other variable. Of course, you may use the data for automatic form letter generation. But you can also use it for report generation.
Variables
You may define up to 128 variables with names of up to seven characters. The cur- rent value of a variable may be up to 55 characters, and you may print it at any point in the text without affecting the cur- rent format. Although the MAGIC WAND stores the variables as strings, you may also treat them as integer numbers or for- mat them with commas and a decimal point. You may increment or decrement numeric variables or use them in format- ting commands.
Conditional commands
You may give any print command based on a run-time test of a pre-defined condi- tion. The conditional test uses a straight- forward IF statement, which allows you to test any logical condition of a variable. You may skip over unneeded portions of the file, select specific records to print, store more than one document in a single file, etc.
True proportional printing
The MAGIC WAND supports proportional print elements on NEC, Diablo and Qume printers. Other formatting commands, including justified columns, boldface, underline, etc., are fully functional while using proportional logic.
Available on 8" soft-sectored and 5 14" Northstar or Micropolis (hard or soft sectored) diskettes, as well as ONYX hard disk. Terminals supported include— ADDS. Beehive. Cromemco. Dynabyte. Hazeltine. Heath. Imsai, Intertec. Lear Siegler. Microterm Act V. Perkin Elmer. Sol VDM1. Soroc. TEC. TEI. Televideo. TRS80 Mod II. Vector Graphics, plus a variety of video boards.
Also available in OASIS
suxaM business appiicaXions, vuc.
3220 Louisiana • Suite 205 • Houston, Texas 77006 • 713-528-5158
CP/M is a registered trademark ol Digital Research Com
Circle 140 on inquiry card.
Summer 1980 onComputing Inc 53
Text continued from page 27:
system might be 8 K bytes long. To load in such a program from cassette can take anywhere from 4 to 15 minutes, and if any one of the bytes is missed or read in wrong, then the whole 8 K bytes must be read in again.
On the other hand, an 8 K-byte program stored on a program car- tridge may be loaded into an Atari computer in a few seconds. Plug- ging in a program cartridge is easier than placing a cassette into a cassette player or a disk into a disk drive. When you want to insert a program cartridge, you lift the lid to the program cartridge compart- ment. Lifting this lid automatically shuts off the computer, so no cur- rent is live anywhere near your fingers when you reach in to replace one cartridge with another.
Nor do you have to treat car- tridges with extreme care, especially when compared to the care that must be exercised with magnetic media. An entire disk or cassette can be made unusable by one fingerprint or a stray magnetic field, not to mention the owner who unintentionally erases a cassette or disk by recording over it. But program cartridges store data in the form of read-only- memory circuits, which are unaf- fected by magnetic fields. The car- tridges themselves are almost totally sealed, protected from dust and fingerprints. The program car- tridges allow the computer to be a mathematics tutor at one moment, a basketball game the next, and a computer that runs programs in BASIC after that. Such cartridges may be the most practical medium for program storage in a consumer computer.
Software
I have already mentioned the
high quality of video game car- tridges for the Atari 400 and 800. Many more such cartridges are becoming available, and I assume that they will be very good. But there's more to computer software than games. What happens when you remove the game cartridge from an Atari computer and turn it on? Is there any software left? Does the computer shut off? What happens when you turn on the computer without first placing a program cartridge inside?
Fortunately, the company has done some careful thinking about these questions. When the com- puter determines that no program cartridge is in place, it activates a program that is always available, because it's part of the Atari's per- manent memory. It's called NOTEPAD, and it lets you place letters, numbers, and special graphics characters wherever you like on the television screen. You can type messages on the screen, intermixed with elaborate patterns and pictures.
NOTEPAD may not strike you as particularly impressive (although your children may be thrilled with the idea of putting messages onto the television screen), but this little performance demonstrates a lot of care and development on the part of Atari. If nothing else, NOTEPAD tells you that the Atari system is working and displaying properly on the television screen. More significantly, since there is no program cartridge in place, NOTEPAD shows you some of the capabilities of Atari's operating system : the software that is part of Atari's permanent memory.
Features in the operating system are an integral part of the Atari computer, as much as the colors in the display, or any other hardware feature. The operating system is
very important, because it pro- vides the means for the user to communicate with the computer. The operating system reads the keyboard and the joysticks, and it writes to the television screen. Because the operating system makes it easy for the user to com- municate with the computer, the computer becomes a useful tool.
Text Entry
The text-entry system on the Atari computers is well designed and well executed. You type, and your characters appear on the screen. Initially, the keyboard yields only uppercase letters, but pressing the CAPS LOCK key unlocks the shift. The keyboard then behaves exactly the way a typewriter keyboard behaves: shifted keys yield punctuation marks and uppercase letters; un- shifted keys yield numerals and lowercase letters.
Other personal computers have keyboards that look, but fail to act, like typewriters. On some systems, the shifted keys yield lowercase and the wMshifted keys yield uppercase. On some other systems, the left and right shift keys yield different characters even when used with the same let- ter keys!
The text-entry system on the Atari computers lets you enter up- percase and lowercase text as easi- ly as if you were typing. If you make a mistake, you can back up and delete with a single keystroke.
Some of the keys have arrows on them. These arrows enable you to move a cursor about the screen. The cursor is in reverse intensity from the character underneath it, so there's no mistaking the cursor's current location— it stands out as a white box on a black background, or vice versa. The
54 Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc
cursor indicates the place on the screen where the next character will appear.
It's extremely easy to move the cursor about the screen, because the consequences of any keystroke are immediately visible on the screen, and any such conse- quences can be undone with another keystroke. If you make a mistake, you can correct it im- mediately or some time later. Nor are you limited to editing a single line: you can move the cursor about and edit anything on the screen— a definite plus.
Not only can you put the cursor anywhere on the screen and over- strike anything, but you can also make room for new characters by pressing CONTROL INSERT. You can also close up space to delete unwanted characters by pressing CONTROL DELETE. These character insert and delete func- tions are very powerful and are made available to the user in a clean keyboard configuration. By sitting at the keyboard and typing for a few minutes, you can learn how to talk to the Atari. Atari lets you learn quickly and painlessly, in a manner that allows you to make mistakes and to recover from them gracefully.
Because these screen/keyboard editing functions are part of the operating system, they are always available to you, whether you want to write a program or simply enter data into a program that has requested it. Now that you know how to communicate with the Atari, you will probably do so in BASIC.
BASIC
BASIC comes with the Atari 400 and 800, in the form of a plug-in program cartridge. In most ways it is like most BASICs available on
Atari lets you learn quickly ... to make mistakes . . . and to recover from them gracefully.
personal computers, performing mathematical and trigonometric functions with nine-digit preci- sion, and understanding such statements as LET, PRINT, RUN, CSAVE, CLOAD, IF . . . THEN, FOR . . . NEXT, PEEK, POKE, and others. The aspects of Atari BASIC that differ from most other BASICs are the special commands to con- trol color graphics and the audio channel to your television set. Sim- ple commands such as "PLOT (X, Y)" and "COLOR = "let the BASIC programmer put any
character at any X,Y coordinates on the screen, and in any color. [In this regard, Atari BASIC is similar to BASIC on the Apple II computer.... e d] Similar commands let the BASIC programmer generate sounds for the television speaker, without the need to PEEK and POKE special memory loca- tions with special values. (PEEK and POKE are BASIC commands that let you examine and change the contents of memory directly from a BASIC program. Some com- puters require this somewhat un- wieldy method for graphics pro- gramming.)
It's one thing to have a fancy col- or display, but quite another to
TRS-80 JOYSTICK INTERFACE*
(COMPLETE WITH TWO PROGRAMS, POWER SUPPLY & INSTRUCTIONS)
• PLUGS DIRECTLY INTO TRS-80 EXPANSION INTERFACE
• NO MODIFICATION REQUIRED
• ALLOWS YOU TO CONNECT ONE FAIRCHILD™ OR TWO ATARI™ JOYSTICKS
$65 (PLUS $3.50 SHIPPING)
Joysticks - FAIRCHILD™ OR ATARI™ - $15 EACH Many other Creative Software products are available for the PET and TRS-80. If your local dealer doesn’t carry Creative Software products or program in- formation, write directly to the address below.
Creative Software
P.O. BOX 4030, MOUNTAIN VIEW, CA 94040
‘REQUIRES 16K LEVEL II: JOYSTICKS NOT INCLUDED
Circle 150 on inquiry card.
Summer 1980 © onComputing Inc 55
Atari BASIC Isn't Perfect (Even Though It's Close . . <}
Most of the major microcomputers— the Apple II, the Radio Shack TRS-80r the Commodore PET, the Ohio Scientific Challenger computers— use basically the same dialect of BASIC, written by Microsoft. Although each has some exten- sions particular to that individual computer, programs can often be written so that they will execute without modification on any of the above computers.
Unfortunately, Atari has provided its own BASIC version that, for all its wonderful graphics, color, and game com- mands, will make the conversion to Atari BASIC moderately difficult. In particular, there are three differences between Atari BASIC and most other BASIC dialects— two are minor and one is major.
The first minor difference is that subscripted variables can- not be used in READ or INPUT statements. For example, in Atari BASIC, to input a number from the keyboard into array variable A{3) (an array is an orderly arrangement of numbers, characters, and/or symbols], you have to write:
120 INPUT X
130 A(3) = X
Writing INPUT A[3) in an Atari BASIC program is not al- lowed. It will generate a syntax error. (The numbers 120 and 130 are program line numbers.)
The second minor difference is that Atari BASIC allows ar- rays up to only two dimensions. Thus, A[3,2] is valid in Atari BASIC, but A (3, 2, 2) is not. (Microsoft allows arrays of any number of dimensions, although it is only occasionally that a program uses an array of three or more dimensions. Still, that third dimension will not be available the one time you do need it.)
The third, and major, difference is that Atari BASIC does not allow string variables to be dimensioned; in addition, its nota- tion for substrings will confuse people familiar with Microsoft and other BASICS. For example, in Microsoft BASIC, you can dimension a string variable A$ to have five entries and each can be up to 256 characters long. This can be done with the statement:
10 DIM A$(5)
You can then make assignments such as A$(l) = "THE ANSWER IS" and A$(2] - "THERE ARE NO ANSWERS TO THIS PROBLEM".
Atari BASIC allows you only one variable with name A$. It must still be dimensioned, but the above DIM statement now means that A$ is a string variable that can have a maximum of five characters. So, if A$ = "ATARI", then A$(l) refers to the first character of the string, "A", A$(2) refers to the second character, "T", and so on. Also, A$(3,5) refers to the substring of A$ given by the third to the fifth characters. This is quite different from Microsoft BASIC, where A$[3,5) refers to the string that is in the third row and fifth column of a two- dimensional array variable A$.
Other aspects of this fundamental difference in string handling between Atari and other versions of BASIC will not be covered here. But, with these differences, Atari has perpetuated the confusion of novice (and not-so-novice) pro- grammers by presenting them with yet another version of BASIC that doesn't act the way they think it should. . . ,ed
give even the beginning program- mer easy access to that display and control of its appearance. Atari has managed this feat. Without soft- ware to put the reins of power in your hands, even the most power- ful hardware isn't of much use.
Incidentally, the Atari manual shows you how to write chained programs. When a program is too big to fit in your computer's pro- grammable memory, you can break it into two or more segments; each one is small enough to fit in the available memory. The Atari computer will then load the next program seg- ment from cassette or disk and run it. Chaining programs lets you sur- pass some of the limitations of your computer's memory. (And no matter how much memory your computer has, sooner or later youil write a program too big to fit inside it!)
Peripherals
The peripherals (ie: the printer, cassette recorder, and disk drive] connect very easily, more like the way stereo components intercon- nect than the way most personal computer systems do. Instead of soldering wires or pushing a large circuit card into a socket, you need only plug a cable from the peripheral device into a socket on the Atari marked Peripheral, If you have another peripheral device, you plug it into the first one. The plugs and sockets are all unique so, for instance, you can't plug a power supply cord into a video socket. They are also labeled and asymmetric, so you can't put a plug into a socket upside-down. This is perfectly reasonable and what you would expect from a good consumer product; but it's quite unusual for personal com- puters.
56 Summer i960 © onCompuling Inc
*
JADE. INFLATION! FIGHTER FOR THE
ATARI 800
Don’t Miss Out on Our Special Sale Price
At Iasi there is a machine designed to give serious competition lo Apple and Radio Shack. This computer contains many advanced technical features such as: built in RF modulator for use with a standard TV;
8K of internal RAM (expandable to 48K), 8K BASIC language included; extremely sharp high -resolution color graphics: and built-in peripheral 1/0 ports Software is available in plug-in paks and cassette tapes, with many programs available in the areas of entertainment, education, and business/ home management.
Available accessories include a printer, disk drives, game controller paddlesF and memory expansion cartridges.
And JADE has the Atari 800 in stock at a special introductory price,
ATARI 800 , S82 5,0(1
810 DISK DRIVE $575,00
820 PRINTER .. $550.00
16K RAM EXPANSION KIT $1*05
CX20-04 PADDLE CONTROLLER $19.95
CX40-04 JOYSTICK CONTROLLER $19.95
ATARI 400 $599,95
Circle 160 on inquiry card.
S' D Systems
Z-80 STARTER
Complete Z-80 Microcomputer
On-board keyboard, display. EPROM programmer, and cassette interface On board S-100 interface
Wire- wrap area and room for 2 S-100 connectors Two 8-bit parallel I/O ports. 4 channel CTC,
5 programmable breakpoints
Examine & change memory. I/O ports, or register
C PS-30 01 OK (KIT) $299,95
CPS-300IOA ( A&T) $369.95
I PLACE ORDERS TOLL FREE
' Inside California Continent aM'.S.
I 800-262-1710 800-421-5500
For customer service or technical inquiries mil 2 1 3-^679-331 7
I Write for our FREE 1980 catalog
I COMPUTER PRODUCTS
| 4901 W.Rosecrans. Hawthorne, CA 90250
I TERMS OF SALE: Cash, checks, credit cards money orders or from recognised institutions | Purchase orders accepted. Minimum order $
I California residents add 6% sales tax.
I shipping and handling charge $2.50. Prices are | U S, and Canadian delivery only and arc subject . lo change without notice. For export prices and | information send for a JADE INTERN ATION A I I CATALOG.
W!»4 i
__ Egg ssw
ROUND #1.
JADE has been selling low-cost name brand merchandise for more than 5 years. In that time we built a long list of satisfied customers for our mail order computer products as well as making JADE a name respected throughout the nation. Order your computer systems directly from JADE’s full line including Apple products. Jade carries an extensive selection of other supplies for the electronic/computer lab.
Leedex
VIDEO-1 OO
12 Inch Monitor
Have you noticed your eyes beginning to water after several hours in from of that converted 1939 Atwater- Kent Kinescope you're using for a monitor? Well, maybe iCs time lo gel a real video monitor with 12 MHz band- width, reliable solid-state circuitry, and a 12 inch (diagonal measure) screen. Front panel controls include power, contrast, brightness, horizontal hold, and vertical. VDM-S0I210 . S139.O0
Special Package Price
ROCKWELL AIM-65
The Head-Start in Microcomputers
KIM-I compatible On-board printer Full ACSJ1 keyboard AIM-65 w/ IK RAM.. $395.00 AIM4S5 w/4K RAM. . $439.95 »K BASIC ROM, . $100 ,00 POWER SUPPLY. . $59.95 CASE for AIM-65. , $49 .95 4K Assembler/ Editor, , SS5.O0
Special Package Price $599.00
4K AIM-65. 8K BASIC ROM. Rower Supply, and Caw.
Jade Memory Expansion Kits for
TRS-80 APPLE EXIDY
Everything you need to add I6K of memory to your computer. Your kit comes neatly packaged with easy to follow instructions. In just