HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: goodwin@edieng.enet.dec.com (Pete Goodwin)
Subject: Re: !ModelPlus, !Rayshade and the Acorn show in Reading
Organization: Digital Equipment Corporation
Date: Mon, 6 Apr 1992 21:37:18 GMT


In article <39180009@hpopd.pwd.hp.com>, stuart@hpopd.pwd.hp.com (Stuart Hickinbottom) writes...

>> Anyone else go to the Acorn show in Reading?
> 
>What Acorn show???

The one in the Euro International hotel on Oxford Rd, on 5th April. Acorn, CC,
Minerva, 4Mation were there, as well as DYAD, a local Reading dealer. It was
billed as an 'Acorn Open day'.

I got a letter inviting me to this show - I also heard about it through DYAD;
the letter seemed odd since it started 'You may have heard of Acorn
Computers...' hmmm... I thought I was a registered owner of an A410/1 and some
software.

I got demo copies of !Vector, the commercial version of !DrawPlus. It looks
interesting, though I'm not sure I'd buy it.

Pete Goodwin
goodwin@system.enet.dec.com
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Re: >>>help! checkmap fails
From: banksie@khantazi.welly.gen.nz (Philip R. Banks)
Date: Tue, 14 Apr 1992 23:13:09 +1200
Reply-To: banks_p@kosmos.wcc.govt.nz
Organization: My Arc.

ssurawls@susssys1.reading.ac.uk (Mister E) writes:

> Nicko van Someren recently said "it seems that the real cost of useing the
> file core E format is that there is nobody at Acorn who understands it". I
> found this out about a year ago when I asked Oak if there was a defragmanting
> program for the archie, and they told me that no-one has written one as no-one
> knows how the format works, not even acorn! It seems that when doing anything
> low-level they just close their eyes and let the computer get on with it.

   Not to mention you don't *need* a defragmentation program. E format does
it for you.... Which is a much nicer way of doing it than have to run some
scummy defragment program over your HD and discs....

    Philip

--
Philip R. Banks                                                         @@@@@/|
Syntax: mail <banks_p@kosmos.wcc.govt.nz|banksie@khantazi.welly.gen.nz> @@@@/#|
                                                                        @@@/##|
What price the crown of a king on his throne,                           @@/---|
When you're chained in the dark all alone?  ---A.P.P.                   @/    |
From: banksie@khantazi.welly.gen.nz (Philip R. Banks)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Re: 8 bit stuff...
Date: Sat, 11 Apr 1992 18:53:26 +1200
Reply-To: banks_p@kosmos.wcc.govt.nz
Organization: My Arc.

rjb12@unix.brighton.ac.uk (Browning;f110or89;[05306) writes:

> Sounds great to me ... if someone can be bothered to moderate the group,
> then I certainly can be bothered to support it! :-)

   One point to be concerned about is the email costs. I happen to know that
Jason, and presumably Edouard as well, pays for all incoming email. And
binaries of any description are not cheap to recieve....

    Philip

--
Philip R. Banks                                                         @@@@@/|
Syntax: mail <banks_p@kosmos.wcc.govt.nz|banksie@khantazi.welly.gen.nz> @@@@/#|
                                                                        @@@/##|
What price the crown of a king on his throne,                           @@/---|
When you're chained in the dark all alone?  ---A.P.P.                   @/    |
From: aoliver@acorn.co.uk (Ashley Oliver)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Re: File Mgr / Keyplus ?
Date: 9 Apr 92 16:24:30 GMT
Distribution: comp
Organization: Acorn Computers Ltd, Cambridge, England

In article <17630001@hpbbi4.BBN.HP.COM> omoduser@hpbbi4.BBN.HP.COM (#Notes Login Ralf Klein) writes:

>Help ??
> I'm looking for a public domain file manager similar to dBaseIII, as a 
> replacement for something called Keyplus (?).  The local school, State-run
> in Conservative Wokingham, has been saddled with Keyplus on their Arc,
> and have no money to replace it.  Seems that Keyplus can only *just* be
> called a file manager, as it can't insert records.  

Hm, there's stacks of scope for confusion here.
KeyPlus as an RDMS is actually quite good and quite fully featured. The worst
thing I would call it is a little idiosyncratic. I suspect that you might be 
confusing an application using the RDMS with the beast itself.

There are two actual bits of software. !Key+ is a viewer. !KeyEdit is used
for creating/editing databases. You certainly can't create records using
just the former! If you haven't got !KeyEdit or it's broken, or whatever, then
try the help line on 061 339 6635. They will want to know the number of
your disc. Or write to Key Plus, Education Department, Anglia Television,
Norwich, NR1 3JG.


        -Ashley Oliver
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
:Breac aig na h-uile fir-stiuiridh!!:
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
From: adamd@rhi.hi.is (Adam David)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Re: High Density Floppy Drives
Date: 5 Apr 92 21:02:30 GMT

crj10@phx.cam.ac.uk (Clive Jones) writes:

>The applications discs are probably E format because A5000 owners are
>going to install them on their hard discs anyway, and DD discs are
>cheaper per unit storage than HD ones.

This last statement is simply not true. Last time I bought quality DD and
HD disks from the same manufacturer, there was a 2:3 price ratio. Therefore
you can get more bytes per penny on HD than DD disks. Cheaper quality disks
might have a ratio closer to 1:2 but who wants to have to junk their data
without warning? Not me for one.

--
Adam David.
(adamd@rhi.hi.is)
From: banksie@khantazi.welly.gen.nz (Philip R. Banks)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Re: VIDC independant tracker play routines
Date: Thu, 9 Apr 1992 20:46:46 +1200
Reply-To: banks_p@kosmos.wcc.govt.nz
Organization: My Arc.

torq@hal.gnu.ai.mit.edu (Andy Mell) writes:

> 6 Watts? hoho, I've had my Arc hooked up to an 8KW amp rig, It was a nice
> sound really made you jump in your seat, but theres a rather annoying
> little buzz in the background wwhich I couldnt get rid of, even with gold
> plated leads.

   Well one uses what one can afford. If you want to make donations of
larger speakers I'll be happy to use em...

   A friend of mine hooked his A3000 up to 100W speakers and that was
*plenty* loud enough. Chocks Away has never been the same for me since...

   Actually to digress to the Logarithmic vs Linear sound type debate. I was
under the impression that the human ear tended to hear sound in a
logarithmic fashion which was why Logarithmic sound had been picked by Audio
engineers. Which would mean that the extra preciseness of Linear data 
compared to a similar number of bits of Log data would have the Log format
winning out wouldn't it?

   Finally someone was saying the Arc actually has 1 sound channel
pretending to be eight channels occasionally. Actually it has eight sound
channels pretending to be one sound channel alot of the time. This is why
sound volume per channel drops so much when the channels are reassigned to
play different samples...

    Philip

--
Philip R. Banks                                                         @@@@@/|
Syntax: mail <banks_p@kosmos.wcc.govt.nz|banksie@khantazi.welly.gen.nz> @@@@/#|
                                                                        @@@/##|
What price the crown of a king on his throne,                           @@/---|
When you're chained in the dark all alone?  ---A.P.P.                   @/    |
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Re: >>Personal Computer World
From: Gavin.Flower@comp.vuw.ac.nz (Gavin Flower)
Date: Wed, 8 Apr 1992 22:31:44 GMT
Organization: Dept. of Comp. Sci., Victoria Uni. of Wellington, New Zealand.


In article <25126.9204081519@susssys1.rdg.ac.uk>, ssurawls@susssys1.reading.ac.uk 
(Mister E) writes:
           [...]
|> Who was it who said he would co-ordinate slander-bashing attempts? I think I
|> will keep an eye out for future anti-arcness. Actually most of it seems to be
|> here, in comp.sys.acorn! And I was one of the culprits.... A reformed man I
|> think, as I have been forced onto macs recently.
|> 
|> Ian


Now I know why Acorn doesn't sell Arcs to universities - they prefer them to buy
Macs, that way, when these Arc owners, that complain so bitterly, get to 
university, they are forced to use Macs and become "born again" Acorn converts! :-)

(Yes I HAVE heard rumours that some universities DO have Arcimedes.)

Gavin



-- 
                     Tomorrow's Society
                         Depends on
                     Today's Children  - help us raise them properly!
******* These comments have no known correlation with dept. policy! *******
From: lithgow@uslp.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Re: Unix on the Arc
Date: 14 Apr 92 03:11:10 GMT

[In message "Unix on the Arc", Andy Mell writes:]
>        I was thinking to myself the other night, it would be nice if 
>someone/some people got one of those sources running on the Archimedes.
>...
>The PC 386BSD is being written by several people all over the world, take
>a peek at comp.unix.bsd to see what is going on. Obviously a lot of work
>and experience is involved to get a whole OS running on the archimedes.
>
>        Do you think its possible to embark on such a venture? and do you
>think its worthwhile? I do, and I know a few other people who read this
>newsgroup do too.
>
>How about a healthy discussion? :-)

OK. How's this for healthy:

I think we would be *much* better off writing an inovative, leading edge
(ie. crashing every 2 minutes) OS with POSIX.* compatibility rather than
porting a derivative, primitive, and unstable (ie. crashing every 2
minutes) OS such as PC 386BSD, or the GNU beast, etc.

Before you leap up and down about how much extra time that would take:
think about how long it took to write Minix, then think about how long it
takes to port 386BSD, and then compare the usability (ie. speed, resource
use, cost, and robustness) of each system, and finally compare how much
you learnt in each case. I think you'll find that Minix wins hands down.
(386BSD's terminal driver doesn't even work!  What's more, it doesn't
even use Streams!)

(Personally, I think we'd all be better off writing
extensions/modifications to RISC OS, itself, than wasting effort on
something else. For example, engineer pre-emptive multitasking into RISC
OS, modify the graphics subsystems so that they can handle multiple
clients simultaneously, a POSIX compatible file system, etc.)

-Malcolm    lithgow@usl.com    These are my opinions.
From: banksie@khantazi.welly.gen.nz (Philip R. Banks)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Re: Scandal: Acorn betrays customers! (:-)
Keywords: A3000 disk change signal
Date: Mon, 6 Apr 1992 12:40:15 +1200
Reply-To: banks_p@kosmos.wcc.govt.nz
Organization: My Arc.

kai@nicedel.north.de (Kai Schlichting) writes:

> As this is all so easy,I have to ask: How could this all be done by Acorn,
> when there's just 0.1 pence to save ? It might even be cheaper to insert
> 34-way cable into a 34-way plugs,as it is more accurate and therefore less
> work to do, the user just hasn't got to be frightened of the 'purring' drive,
> while there is no disk in it,and track 0 not yet hit.
> Should we call this marketing ? Just the field where Acorn is the weakest
> of all it's departments. I strongly recommend the guys in the tech department
> to complain about 'cutting away' useful features when there's no ,or almost
> no cost,because I'm sure the drive doesn't get hurt by just a stepping head.
> I remember the Amiga clicking like a typewriter,when I saw one with 4 drives.

   I believe this was done as a marketing decision because it was felt that
a clicking drive, especially when there is no disc in it, would confuse new
users. The validity of this decision is a little dubious. (If indeed it was
the reason for its removal.)

    Philip

--
Philip R. Banks                                                         @@@@@/|
Syntax: mail <banks_p@kosmos.wcc.govt.nz|banksie@khantazi.welly.gen.nz> @@@@/#|
                                                                        @@@/##|
What price the crown of a king on his throne,                           @@/---|
When you're chained in the dark all alone?  ---A.P.P.                   @/    |
From: dhmyrdal@SOLAN.UNIT.NO (Dag H}kon Myrdal)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Re: A little joke from CC ?
Date: 11 Apr 92 15:18:01 GMT
Organization: University of Trondheim

In article <3941@mercury.brunel.ac.uk> Joust writes:
>>    Has anyone used impression today ? Lets say that the
>>   Carrots, oops I mean carret, is interesting.
[...]
>Apparently it was in there for nearly 9 months until Charles Moir noticed
>it :-)
[...]
Actually, it was there for last years april-fool, too...
CC even announced it in their users newsletter, Archimedian one  year ago!


--Dag
From: nizar@concour.cs.concordia.ca (SABRA nizar.)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Arc serial port wiring
Date: 11 Apr 92 02:17:00 GMT
Organization: Concordia University, Montreal, Quebec

Hi again...

	Well, I'm back with the solution (and problem) to the serial wiring
on the A3000. I had a glance at the FAQ listing and re-wired my cable. It
seems to work fine, in the sense that it now accepts the AT&C1 command.
I managed to get RiscBBS to answer once, but as for the fax software running
under the PC Emulator, it still does nothing. It accepts the modem init. string,
but does not like the fax commands, e.g. AT+F1+T1, which the program tests the
fax part with. This might be an incompatible fax/modem, but why won't it work
with the software that came with!?

	Anyways, there were two solutions to fix/patch the one-to-one PC cable.
(as demonstrated in the FAQ). Both seem to work fine, although I find that the
method used by the 4th Dimension is actually more stable.

	Are there any other ways to wire the cable? Thanx.

Nizar.
From: sloft@cix.compulink.co.uk (Steve Loft)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Comp.Sys.Acorn and Newcastle
Date: 15 Apr 92 23:41:22 GMT
Reply-To: Steve Loft <sloft@cix.compulink.co.uk>
Organization: Gated to News by demon.co.uk

Can anyone help with the following queries from a friend who has access to 
Mail (via some sort of Unix gateway) but not News?
 
Firstly, is there any way he can receive Comp.Sys.Acorn with this setup?
 
Secondly, he retrieved some files from the Newcastle info server, but 
somewhere along the way all the 'hash' characters got stripped out.  Any 
clever ideas as to what can be done about this (other than find out what is 
stripping them and get it to stop!).
 
Any help gratefully accepted.
 
Steve
From: ssurawls@susssys1.reading.ac.uk (Mister E)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: BLOODY MAC DISC READING
Date: 13 Apr 92 17:07:28 GMT

OK SO WE COULD DO IT!

I'm never going to mention mac discs again!

Seriously it's great to see so many positive people, so is anyone out there
planning to actually *write* one if it's so easy? I am very busy with exam
failing and can't program my way out of a damp paper bag, so I can't do it
yet.

Ian


Posted Mon Apr 13 18:07:19 BST 1992

=+=+=+=+=+ 8< =+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+ 8< =+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+ 8< =+=+=+=+=+=+=+
Mr Ian Rawlings, Telephone Reading (0734) 662301
	EMAIL ssurawls@susssys1.rdg.ac.uk

>Why do they use powder soap on submarines?
>Because it takes longer to pick up.
From: ssurawls@susssys1.reading.ac.uk (Mister E)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: >Acorn
Date: 8 Apr 92 15:43:10 GMT

Positive time! :-)

We know that acorn marketing have made some "strange" decisions in the past,
but I am sure that there is a good reason. eg.

No 3D icons. Acorn are small and can't even BEGIN to risk any law suits
brought about by nasty companies like Apple.

Secrecy. Acorn can't risk denting sales at all, so they keep secret, keeping
company health before the satisfaction of a few customers who bought a machine
just before a new release. Better for us all.

Advertising. Money doesn't grow on trees y'know! TV advertising is very
expensive, as is advertising in most large circulation magazines.

And I don't know if anyone has noticed, but acorn seems to be picking up
speed. It seems that they are releasing some new bundle or software feature
each month, eg the learning curves, Replay, the A5000, the deals on the ARM
chips, the DTP bundle, more ARM manufacturers and so forth. Looks like they
*are* trying to sell machines and make money!

As for the worry that they will stick to the education market, they made that
mistake before and went under. They were selling BBCs to schools like hot
cakes, but once all the schools had as many BBCs as they needed or could
afford, they sold few and *ooops*, help someone! That will stick in memory...

Ian

I think that was fairly positive!


Posted Wed Apr 8 16:43:05 BST 1992

=+=+=+=+=+ 8< =+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+ 8< =+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+ 8< =+=+=+=+=+=+=+
Mr Ian Rawlings, Telephone Reading (0734) 662301
	EMAIL ssurawls@susssys1.rdg.ac.uk

        I went down the street to the 24-hour grocery.  When I got
        there, the guy was locking the front door.  I said, "Hey, the
        sign says you're open 24 hours."  He said, "Yes, but not in a
        row."
From: lithgow@usl.com
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: I18N and OS's (Was Re: Personal Computer World)
Date: 15 Apr 92 01:21:15 GMT

[In message "Re: Personal Computer World", Felix ANDREW writes about Win 3.1:]
>Oh yeah - it also shipped in 7 languages simultaneously (that includes
>the documentation) Neat huh?

What I've seen of Window's Internationalization (I18N), it's not
particularly 'neat'. And shipping in 7 languages is no big deal -- how
many did System 7 ship in, more than 7, I bet. And our UNIX's ship in
more like 50 languages simultaneously.

I won't even mention the fact that, unlike Adobe's Type-1 fonts,
Microsoft can't get TrueType to handle outline Chinese Characters (as
used in Japan, China, Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, Taiwan, etc.) Adobe
have only had outline Han Characters for, oh, four or five years, I
suppose (it would be interesting to see if !T1toFont could covert them
:->).

(Of course, Acorn hasn't invested/wasted any effort on the various Han
Character sets, and has concentrated on European stuff, a wise move as
far as I can see, since the only really succesful non-Japanese PC over
here is the Mac -- NEC has a pseudo-IBM clone that owns most of the
market, running a version of DOS, not Windows. The Asian markets aren't
worth the investment for a small company like Acorn. In Japan, NeXT,
which is handled by Canon, is predicted to soar to a shipment of 9000
units this year!! What a joke.)

Out of a purely techinical interest (it's my job), what new I18N features
does RO3 add? Can anyone tell me?

To get the ball rolling, RO2 supports a range of European alphabets and
keyboards, and msgtrans implements a messaging system.

Does RO3 provide any these facilities:

1) A collation table for each locale.
2) A character type table for each locale.
3) A table specifying number handling for each locale.
4) A table specifying monetary number handling for each locale.
5) A table specifying the date and time formats for each locale.
6) The ability for the user to change to different messages, simply by
changing the language, rather than having to physically replace the file.
(Applications can already do this, if they store a message file for each
language, and then read the current language and use the appropriate
file.)
7) The ability for a user (not a programmer) to create a new locale, with
all, or parts, of the above information.

Also, does Acorn plan to support the emerging ISO 10646 universal
character standard in any way?

Any information on this would be greatly appreciated.

-Malcolm    lithgow@usl.com    These are my opinions, and my questions.
UNIX is a registered trademark of UNIX System Laboratories, Inc.
From: banksie@khantazi.welly.gen.nz (Philip R. Banks)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Re: Karma
Date: Thu, 9 Apr 1992 20:35:46 +1200
Reply-To: banks_p@kosmos.wcc.govt.nz
Organization: My Arc.

dbh@doc.ic.ac.uk (Denis Howe) writes:

> Mail me if you have Karma - I'm feeling lonely!
> 
> And where the hell is a world warmed by gravitational tidal forces?

   I would try small dim stars with worlds close in or perhaps moons of gas
giants. You will be looking for either a tidally locked world or one in a
process of constant deformation due to a *close* orbit...

And no I don't have Karma.

    Philip

--
Philip R. Banks                                                         @@@@@/|
Syntax: mail <banks_p@kosmos.wcc.govt.nz|banksie@khantazi.welly.gen.nz> @@@@/#|
                                                                        @@@/##|
What price the crown of a king on his throne,                           @@/---|
When you're chained in the dark all alone?  ---A.P.P.                   @/    |
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Re: 8 bit stuff...
From: banksie@khantazi.welly.gen.nz (Philip R. Banks)
Date: Mon, 13 Apr 1992 12:03:48 +1200
Reply-To: banks_p@kosmos.wcc.govt.nz
Organization: My Arc.

jwil1@cs.aukuni.ac.nz (TMOTA) writes:

> The other thing is that both Edouard and myself are more likely to have more
> time (and interest) than the current moderators in which to serve.
> We are also already involved in running the ABUG II BBS, and have between
> us one of the best collections of PD in this hemisphere (I'm sure), so we
> know what is good and what is not, and we know a virus when we see one
> and we know how to organise/post/etc binaries properly.

   I wouldn't be so sure about having the best collection of PD.... :-)

> Oh, yeah... and we will definitely include a short description of each file
> at the top of the posting so that you don't have to decode all 20 parts
> of a huge post just to find out what the hell is in it!

   All sounds good. To which addresses etc should we send stuff? And what
will be your scheme for posting? First come first serve? Or a priority
system....

    Philip

--
Philip R. Banks                                                         @@@@@/|
Syntax: mail <banks_p@kosmos.wcc.govt.nz|banksie@khantazi.welly.gen.nz> @@@@/#|
                                                                        @@@/##|
What price the crown of a king on his throne,                           @@/---|
When you're chained in the dark all alone?  ---A.P.P.                   @/    |
From: rjb12@unix.brighton.ac.uk (Browning;f110or89;[05306)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Personal Computer World
Date: 8 Apr 92 11:07:04 GMT
Organization: Brighton Polytechnic, UK

Already there've been contributions about PCW's attitude problem - please
keep them coming in. The more the merrier! As was suggested by Ian Rawlings,
I'll be posting soon a list of offending articles (page nos & issue). I
haven't got time to type and post the articles proper - there's just too many
:-)

Thanks again.

Rich.
-- 
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Rich Browning (rjb12@bton.unix)   *   Madness ...
Department of Computer Science    *   ... is merely a state of 
Brighton Polytechnic              *       intellectual independence
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
From: ssurawls@susssys1.reading.ac.uk (Mister E)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Reading acorn show
Date: 7 Apr 92 17:02:45 GMT

>>Pete goodwin;
>S Hickinbottom

>> Anyone else go to the Acorn show in Reading?

>What Acorn show???

I got a letter from acorn (nice to know you care!) about the show but couldn't
make it. I was told that artworks was demoed there amongst other things, and
was most annoyed that I couldn't get down to it. Wouldn't mind a summary, and
I don't expect everyone else would mind  if you posted it for us all to
read..

PS Is rayshade going to be present on thursday night?

Ian


Posted Tue Apr 7 18:02:39 BST 1992

=+=+=+=+=+ 8< =+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+ 8< =+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+ 8< =+=+=+=+=+=+=+
Mr Ian Rawlings, Telephone Reading (0734) 662301
	EMAIL ssurawls@susssys1.rdg.ac.uk

>>        You are ALL individuals...
>
>Yes. We are all individuals.
 
I'm not.