********************* QL CLUB INTERNATIONAL ********************* ISSUE 105 DECEMBER 1997 M.A.KENNEALLY EMAIL.106114,710 COMPUSERVE.COM MIKEKENNEALLY1@COMPUSERVE.COM http://www.geocities.com/siliconvalley/vista/4807/ ALL SOFTWARE SENT TO THE CLUB IS ASSUMED TO BE PD UNLESS OTHERWISE STATED AND WILL BE TREATED AS SUCH. QXL2 WITH A PACKARD BELL ATTACHMENT 2XQL'S,1X3.5 DISC DRIVES,TRUMPCARD,CANON BJ4100 COLOUR PRINTER. HI EVERYONE, AS YOU CAN SEE WE NOW HAVE OUR OWN WEB PAGES,I DON'T YET KNOW HOW FAR BACK THEY GO,AS I HAVE LEFT THAT IN OTHER PEOPLES CAPABLE HANDS.IF YOU HAVE MISSED ANYTHING FROM THE LAST FEW ISSUES THEN PAY IT A VISIT. LET ME APOLOGISE FOR BEING LATE THIS MONTH,THE REASON BEING I HAVE BEEN FLAT ON MY BACK AND FEELING DECIDEDLY UNDER THE WEATHER.SORRY. LET ME THANK THOSE OF YOU WHO OVER THE LAST 12 MONTHS HAVE SENT VOLUNTARY CONTRIBUTIONS FOR MY EFFORTS,ESPECIALLY COLIN BASKETT. IT'S BEEN A FUNNY OLD MONTH,I GOT A CALL FROM AN 'OLD'FRIEND EARLY IN THE MONTH ASKING FOR A GENTLE REMINDER ON HOW TO USE HIS QL!YOU CAN IMAGINE MY SURPRISE AND DELIGHT,WHEN IT TURNED OUT TO BE NONE OTHER THAN THE ORIGINAL CLUBQL IDEA MAN,YES,BILL JOHNS! IT SEEMED VERY STRANGE GIVING ADVICE TO THE VERY MAN WHO USED TO GIVE ME ADVICE WHEN I FIRST GOT MY QL THOSE MANY YEARS AGO! HE WAS VERY SURPRISED ALSO TO HEAR WE WERE STILL GOING STRONG,AND TO BE HONEST SO AM I AT TIMES.HANDS UP,THOSE OF YOU WHO KNOW OF ANY CLUBS WHO ARE STILL WILLING AND ABLE TO HELP OTHERS OF A LIKE MIND?(THIS DOES NOT INCLUDE THE LIKES OF THE ROUND TABLE!) CHRISTMAS IS UPON US ONCE MORE AND MY THOUGHTS TURN TO THE FRIENDS I HAVE MADE OVER THE YEARS,THE HELP I HAVE BEEN GIVEN,THE ABUSE(ONLY KIDDING),THE NUMBER OF TIMES I HAVE TASTED LEATHER(FROM PUTTING MY FOOT IN MY MOUTH!).IF I REMEMBER CORRECTLY IT ALL BEGAN 105 ISSUES AGO IN JANUARY,IN THE GOOD OLD DAYS OF MICRODRIVES,128K,A BLACK AND WHITE PORTABLE T.V.,NO TOOLKIT AND NO IDEA!MY GOD,HAVEN'T THINGS CHANGED! SO THIS YEAR,I WOULD LIKE TO SAY A VERY SPECIAL AND HEARTILY FELT,MERRY CHRISTMAS AND A VERY HAPPY NEW YEAR,BE IT AS PROSPEROUS AND AS PEACEFUL AS YOU WOULD LIKE.(BUT DON'T FORGET THE NEWSLETTER AT THE END OF DECEMBER!) DILWYN HAS VERY KINDLY SENT IN A SMALL SELECTION OF CHRISTMAS CLIPART,THE FULL COLLECTION AND THERE ARE LOTS OF THEM ARE AVAILABLE FROM THE USUAL PUBLIC DOMAIN SOURCES,HE HAS ALSO SENT IN HIS CIA FILES 1996 COLLECTION,IF ANYONE WANTS THESE I HAVE THEM ON 4 HD DISCS. AS USUAL THE LOADING SEQUENCE FOR VIEWING THESE SCREENS IS:LBYTES FLP1_FILENAME,131072.ENJOY. AS USUAL I SHALL BE BACK IF I REMEMBER ANYTHING ELSE. MIKE. Greetings from: Ian Pizer e-mail 100675.632@compuserve.com ----------------------------------------------------------- My Gear: AURORA, SGC v2.49, Minerva v1.97, SuperHermes v1.05, QPAC2 v1.38 Prowess, SMSQ_GOLD v2.85. 2-key mouse via QIMI. 2 DD/HD/ED drives. QUBIDE v1.53, 2 Hard Disks (Connors 420MB, Seagate500?MB). All in a Mini-Tower. EPSON Stylus 800 BW Printer. ZyXEL U-1496E modem. Sony monitor Multiscan 200sf. I was in Ireland with my wife for the QL meeting - it was a pretty thin meeting but we have good memories both staying chez Darren as well as being tourists. I nearly tried Darren's idea of modifying DD disks to become ED but worried about bits of plastic getting inside the casing so decided instead to buy EDs from EEC.I was interested in the sort program in QLToday by Steve Poole.I made some errors copying it because of 1 (one) and an l (little L) looking similar but Steve straightened me out.I then modified the program so I could sort any unsorted list in a file (e.g.open_new#3,ram1_x:extras#3:close#3 which I used as an example). Steve has made a really smart sorting program. THE SAME PROBLEM USED TO ARISE WHEN TYPING IN PROGS FROM QL WORLD,I REALLY THOUGHT WE HAD OVERCOME THAT.IS THERE NO WAY ROUND THIS PROBLEM DILWYN.MAYBE GETTING THE WRITERS TO USE UPPER CASE L's AND POINTING THIS OUT TO PEOPLE IN THEIR WRITE-UPS? I would have liked to go to Eindhoven (already been twice) but decided to await a meeting in UK which hopefully will be well attended by programmers and hardware people. With no QL group nearby I find it very worthwhile to attend QL meetings.I keep dithering about buying a PC and QPC. Am I alone in having only one computer at home? I can surf the net elsewhere and even use WWW from home using LYNX (a browser without images) via a modem connection to my old institute. It would be nice if this was possible directly with AURORA and with images. NOT AS YET,BUT IT IS COMING.SO WE ARE LED TO BELIEVE. I had a curious "defect" with my monitor. At 10pm the image began to wobble badly, coinciding with the time when the electric hot-water system turned on. I called an electrician to inspect the house wiring and he found that there was a missing wire for the neutral for the mains feeding the boiler heating element. When he fixed it, no more wobble. Before I realised the source of the trouble I of course suspected AURORA (sorry, Ron) or the Monitor, to be faulty. Regards, Ian *! Martin Wheatley martinw@ndirect.co.uk QL, SuperQboard, Twin Disc Drives, Green Screen Monitor Mersey Mouse, PC running Xchange (QL not quite working at the moment) Hi everyone, Mike enquires ------------------------------------ I HAVE A QUESTION,THERE YOU GO FRANK A QUESTION!HOW DO YOU ACTUALLY GET ON TO A BULLETIN BOARD?I HAVE ACCESSED THE NENE VALLEY BOARD,SIGNED IN AND SET A PASSWORD,BUT WHERE DO I GO FROM HERE? ------------------------------------ I've not been on this one but if it is like Tony Firshman's there is a menu which tells you to type in a letter to go to the section you want I SHALL TRY THIS MARTIN AND AWAIT FURTHER DEVELOPMENTS. Mike writes about spreading the QL word on the Internet ------------------------------------ ANOTHER WAY OF DOING IT AND NOT VERY POPULAR AT ALL,I AM BOUND TO GET BLOWN OUT ON THIS,IS TO 'SPAM'THE NET.O.K. I CAN HEAR EVERYBODY,JUST A SUGGESTION.BUT THERE MIGHT BE SOMEONE OUT THERE WHO CAN DO IT.SEE NOTE IN MY LETTER. --------------------------------------- Consider yourself blown out! Non-Internet people are going to find the above incomprehensible and I'll leave it for someone else to explain If you want to give the QL a bad name on the Internet I can't think of a better way of doing it. This is really not something to be trifled with I KNEW YOU WOULD MARTIN,UNLIKE DENNIS,YOU KNOW ME TOO WELL! One of the legitimate ways is to get our newsletter more widely known. The ClubQL page is now linked to from a number of other QL pages. We aren't yet registered at any search engines unless Spike has done it but I think it may be possible in a couple of months when I get the software. I suspect that at least one of the pages linked to us is registered and therefore a search for QL and similar on the Net will eventually get to us. Some of the search engines may pick us up automatically since Geocities (the host for the page) would be registered everywhere. All of this is of course gibberish to most people reading this so now we return to English! This next bit is a bit unorthodox since it's replying to a letter which I hope will be in this issue from Malcolm Roberts. It's been printed in Quanta and I have asked Malcolm to send it on to Mike. If it's not here some of this could look a bit odd! ITS QUITE POSSIBLE MARTIN,I HAVE RECIEVED MALCOLM'S DISC BUT AM UNABLE TO LOAD IT,MERGE IT OR ANYTHING IT!QPACII SAYS THERE ARE NO FILES ON IT AND ITS NOT EVEN FORMATTED,IT JUST SAYS 'NO MEDIUM'. Malcolm was interested in an article on the PC Ql emulator QLAY. He asks Could I keep my data and dispose of the QL Most QL data files from Xchange can be switched to a PC and with maybe a little messing about can be used on a PC Does QLAY contain the Psion progs preloaded Let me describe how Qlay works. It is a PC software prog. When you start it up you specify a number of parameters (Although this is quite a complicated line to type in once you've settled on the way you want it the best is to put it into a PC batch file so you can just call it with a word) The parameters are an image of the QL ROM (supplied with Qlay), the amount of memory and microdrive images (you are supplied with a blank one which you can copy endlessly under different names and this can be empty or cointaining files. Each of these microdrive images is a PC file the size of a microdrive cartridge which QLAY sees as a microdrive. Also QLAY has what is called 'native file emulation' meaning that you prepare a file listing other files in the QLAY directory which QLAY will then recognise and which can therefore be loaded. A third method is that QL .EXE files that are saved on the QL as a disc image (don't ask me to expand on this - other people will have to - I don't really understand it). These can then be run by QLAY. XCHANGE is provided in the form of one of these disc images. QLAY has limitations. First it must be said in it's defence that it is still in developement and not completed yet and also that it is free so we can't complain! I find it very odd that microdrives have been emulated and not discs. Indeed I see no logical reason why the writer stuck to QL sized files in the first place since it is on a PC hard disc and so I would have thought that one size is as good as another - he could just have set a hard disc sized device onto which all files could go which would have made it a lot simpler to use. Also on my machine it is very slow - so slow as to be just something to play with rather than to use seriously. It may be better on a more modern machine YES,THAT IS STRANGE MARTIN.I ALSO WONDER WHY WITH ALL THAT MEMORY AVAILABLE HE USES MD SIZE SEGMENTS? How are QDOS files loaded onto a PC QLAY doesn't help in this but there are a number of ways which since they have been mentioned here may times I won't go into (I have written to Malcolm with details) If you can afford it QPC or QXL would be a better option than QLAY IS THIS WHERE WE START THE QXL/QPC WARS? Martin Wheatley Terry Williams GEAR: 2 JS QLs, 1JM QL,SGC,GC,TRUMPCARD,TWIN EHD DRIVES,TWIN HD DRIVES,TWIN DD DRIVES,14", QMIMI MOUSE, GOLD STAR COLOUR MONITOR , 9"SONY TRITRON MONITOR, 12" FERGUSON GREEN MONITOR, SPECTRUM 48K WITH TELETEXT ADAPTOR Hi Mike & Friends! Mike: Thanks for the photostat of Sir Clives latest triumph! It looks interesting. I have sent for one but I don't know if I can find another hole to plug it into! as I already sport two ear trumpets‘. May be in our next life we may be endowed with quadratic ear-holes to take advantage of all the Hi Fi offerings we have around us today!. I have a magnetic loop set up in the roof space, which covers the whole house, and the mike by the door bell as I found that when I was slaving about in the kitchen I could never hear it! It also picks up the sound of the telephone ringing and the radio I run in the "computer" room,which can be a bit embarrassing some times if I am on the phone and the radio comes blasting through! YOU GOT ONE OF ME BY YOUR DOOR,THANK YOU.I HOPE I'M INSIDE AND NOT OUT,AS IT'S BLOODY FREEZING OUT THERE! I decided I wanted a bit more exercise and got hold of a bicycle to ride to the local shop, but even though it is fairly flat around here there are a few slight rises which you don't notice in a car, which may be a problem in my state of health. BUT SIR CLIVE TO THE RESCUE! TARA, TARA, he has come up with ZETA 11 (Zero Emission Transport Accessory). It is a small electric motor whichh attaches to the front wheel and runs from a 7 ampere hour battery which it is claimed will help in climbing hills for short periods. I am in the process of fitting it up and have tried around the garden and hope to do a road test any day now!. Watch this space!! It is supplied by Vector Services as is Sir Clives Ear-hole Radio. AH!,BUT YOU DIDN'T TELL US YOUR CORNER SHOP IS JUST THAT,ON THE CORNER! Marcus: Welcome to the club but do not count on enough time to do what you want when you retire! I have been retired nearly 12 years now but even though I decided not to lie in bed late every morning (I get up between 6 &7 am) I still do not have enough!!. TTFN?,I THOUGHT THAT WAS JIMMY YOUNG. MARCUS?WHO HE? TTFN (As Tommy Hanley used to say) Terry FRANK MERRISON, GEAR includes 2 x JM QL's: Gold Card: DMP: Epson Stylus 800 printer: 2 x HD disc drives. 486 DX33 & Knee deep in paper & problems! Mike & friends.... As this is probably the last time of writing before the so-called festive season may I wish you all well, sober and not broke as a follow on! With my wife unable to go out of the house or move far without running out of breath it now falls to me to do all the shopping, among many other functions. Never was a more hateful job invented than shopping and Xmas makes it even worse. We now live in an age when the majority of people own all they really want or need and if such a need should arise they are most likely to go and buy it. Hours are spent worrying what to buy for presents and several changes of mind go by before a final decision is made. I sometimes wonder how high a proportion of marriages fail at this stressful time of the year. I originally intended to make a start on this job today until we went through the list of suggestions and crossed most out for one reason or another. That is why I am typing this instead! At least you will get something from me Mike and even on time maybe! THANKS FRANK,WHAT'S IT TO BE THIS YEAR,I COULD DO WITH A NEW SCALEXTRIC! Not a lot to do with QL's you might add. When I first moved into the QL scene it was for the purpose of "findin out what it is all about". Over the years I managed to slowly progress, beginning with the Psion suite, until I am now able to use my machine for a series of jobs to do with my various interests in several local volunteer groups. Membership on Archive and accounts in Abacus. I moved on from Quill, for letter writing, to PERFECTION which gave me lots of happy hours sorting out how to use it until the time when I was talked into trying out the PC world. With the purchase of an Ink Jet printer I now have this connected to the PC and this combination is mainly used for corespondence. The dot matrix being used with the QL for all other jobs. Having mastered these combinations to enable me to do what I want to do I often find myself at a loss for things that I can get interested enough in to want to learn about now-a-days. The newsletter seems to be full of others' interests that I neither understand or see a personal use for. Many of the writings, by others, are at a level that I do not understand now. I try to follow what is written (not only in the newsletter) about the "Net" but more and more terms crop up that mean nothing to me so that it becomes more and more like a partly understood foreign language. I am thankful for the explanations in last month's letter about some of the new programs and hardware now being offered. At least I have a grasp of what is being talked about. WHY NOT ASK FRANK,IT MIGHT BE THAT OTHERS ARE TO EMBARASSED TO ASK AND WOULD ALSO LIKE AN EXPLANATION. Two weeks ago Martin, Cyril and I went to the Annual London Radio & Computer Rally at Edmonton where there was tons of hard and soft ware on sale; very cheaply in some cases. I considerd the purchase of a second monitor and another set of disc drives. One stand even had a pair of ED drives on sale for `10.00 each. HD drives at `7.50 each by a firm not far from here. PC keyboards at `3.00 each or two for a fiver! I bought (among other things) 25 HD discs, with labels, for `6.00. I have formatted some with no trouble so far. In the post I received an advertisement newspaper from 'Greenweld' at Southampton with keyboards to fit on top of Epson computers (same size and similar fashion to the QL with 79 keys) for less than `2.00 and switch mode 5 volt power supplies (suitable for disc drives) for `5.00. They also had a number of laptop Epson screens offered very cheaply. It occured to me that this was the sort of thing that Richard was looking to use about a year ago on a proposed portable QL. I'M SURE IF ANYONE IS INTERESTED,YOU CAN GIVE FRANK A RING FOR THE ADDRESS. Last month Martin quoted the case of a new member at the London sub-group who is still sucessfully using his QL in it's original state and it reminded me that, although I am often tempted to upgrade my machine to a tower case along with the newer motherboard and a PC type keyboard I do not consider that the cost and time taken can be justified in giving me an easier to use machine that will do anything more than the present one. Can anyone tell me the size of the Aurora motherboard? Does the Gold Card plug into the end as in the original? Does it actually fit into a QL casing or has a PC style to be used? I THINK FRANK THAT THE AURORA CAN FIT INSIDE THE ORIGINAL CASING,BUT THERE AGAIN I HAVE BEEN KNOWN TO BE WRONG ON OTHER OCCASIONS. Well, well! Another page + that "I don't know what to write about....." Best wishes to all Frank Merrison. # Michael Kite 11th November 1997 Equipment: Gold Card; QL Minerva 1.97 mk.1; Hermes; Two 3.5" Disc drives; One 5.25 Disc Drive; Philips colour Monitor; SERMouse; Seikosha SP-1000AS 9 pin printer with serial port. Epson RX 80F/T+ 9 pin printer with parallel port (added serial port board removed) 486 PC with 540 meg hard drive: The PC is only used for things which are compatible with the computers at work. Mike Thank you for sending last months mag to me. PLEASE NOTE THE NUMBER 3 HAS NOW BEEN ADDED TO THE BEGINING OF MY PHONE NUMBER. Please send me the QL105 mag. NO PROBLEM MIKE,IT IS DULY NOTED. Well its only 40 odd days to christmas so hers wishing every body a happy christmas and a prosperous new year. Reference the printer problem artical I sent for the QL100 mag. It seems that some people could not understand what the problem I had was, so I will repeat it: I have a Epson 80F/T+ Dot matrix printer which has a parallel port and a serial port that has been added some time before I brought it. The serial port is a board which plugs directly into a socket on the parallel port board. I have used this printer with my QL plugged into the serial port and it has always printed without any problems. I then had a Amtrad 386 PC which I plugged into the parallel port of this printer and it also printed with out any problems. Next the PC was changed to a 486 using parts obtained from a colleague at work and some new parts. When I went to use the printer with the new 486 PC it would not print anything. I checked all the printer settings in the PC which were all correct. Also the PC showed that it had sent the information to the printer. I then took the PC to work and it was checked on a inkjet print which worked alright. All connections in the printer to PC lead were checked as well as the connections on the parallel port board. these were all correct. After a lot of thought I decided to unplug the serial board from the printer and try it with only the parallel board, the printer then printed without any problems. So it would seem that the newer PC,s are not so tolerant as the older ones. Well thats all for this time Mike Kite. # #! Colin Baskett 28 November 1997 EQUIPMENT: QL FITTED WITH SUPERGOLD CARD; MkI MINERVA - version 1.82; SUPERHERMES; 170 MB HARD DISK; SINGLE 3.5" HD DISC DRIVE; ED DRIVES; PHILIPS COLOUR MONITOR; SERIAL MOUSE; PRINTER BJ10sx; XCHANGE 3.90L, etc.. Dear Mike, I have at long last produced a cock-shy for Bill Newell re- "the "old" QUANTA mailing lists". The initial idea is to try it out on a small number of lapsed members to take the temperature of the water before attempting something on a larger scale. It will be important at that stage to get the message right. Any suggestions? WHAT ABOUT SOMETHING ALONG THE LINES OF WHAT I SENT OUT TO YOU,IT GOT YOU INTERESTED AGAIN DIDN'T IT?I SHALL SEE IF I STILL HAVE IT ON FILE AND LET YOU HAVE A COPY,IT MAY NEED A LITTLE CHANGING BUT YOU CAN DO THAT. Just had a longish telephone conversation with a QUANTA member who now mostly uses a PC. For his purposes he finds PC software much faster and slicker (i.e. it carries out operations at a key stroke which require a great deal of fiddling with QL software). This is in addition to your point about Windoze being fancier (than QPAC2) and looking good. I HOPE YOU POINTED OUT TO HIM THAT SOME QL SOFTWARE DOES EXACTLY THAT!BESIDES LOOK HOW MUCH IT COST BILL GATES TO DEVELOP AS AGAINST THE QL AND HE NICKED SOME IDEAS FROM SIR CLIVE! You said: "I SAID IT LOOKS GOOD, NOT THAT IT'S BETTER. THERE ARE FAR TOO MANY MENUS TO GET YOU TO WHERE YOU EVENTUALLY WANT TO GO.THEREFORE MAKING LIFE THAT LITTLE BIT HARDER. ESPECIALLY IF YOU ACCIDENTLY HIT THE MOUSE BUTTON TOO EARLY AND YOU LOAD THE WRONG BIT OF THE PROG!" Windows may get it right eventually. I am told it is now better than Windows 3.0! We MUST identify the QL's plus points, satisfying though it may be to knock the competition! I USED WINDOZE 3.11 BEFORE '95 AND TO BE HONEST I PREFERRED IT AS IT WAS EASIER TO USE.EVEN NOW I SOMETIMES WISH I STILL HAD IT INSTALLED! Any offers? QL pluses, I mean. Is it true that our software (or some of it) lends itself to programming by the user more easily. What do other users have to say. You said "THIS IS TRUE,WITH QL SOFTWARE,IF SOMETHING GOES WRONG IT TELLS YOU WHERE AND WHAT PART OF THE LINE THE PROBLEM IS,THEREBY AT LEAST GIVING YOU A CHANCE TO 'HAVE A GO'.THE ONLY PROBLEM IS WHEN IT IS CODED IN ANY FORMAT.THEN I'M KNACKERED!" We have your earlier points about making the emulators INEXPENSIVE AND SOME OF THE "OLDER"SOFTWARE FREELY AVAILABLE TO THEM,SO THEY CAN SEE HOW GOOD IT IS AND MAYBE PERSUADE THEM TO BUY THE "MODERN"PROGS. You also said "HOW ABOUT SENDING THEM ONE OF THE FREE ISSUE EMULATORS(PD)WITH INSTRUCTIONS ON HOW TO LOAD AND USE IT,WHEN YOU GET IN TOUCH WITH PAST MEMBERS! WHAT WILL IT COST? PENNIES ONLY,AS DD DISCS CAN BE PICKED UP FOR SONG AND IT ONLY COSTS A 2nd CLASS STAMP TO SEND THEM! ANOTHER WAY OF DOING IT AND NOT VERY POPULAR AT ALL, I AM BOUND TO GET BLOWN OUT ON THIS,IS TO 'SPAM'THE NET.O.K. I CAN HEAR EVERYBODY,JUST A SUGGESTION. BUT THERE MIGHT BE SOMEONE OUT THERE WHO CAN DO IT." You said re- the cumulative cost of all the bits and pieces you need to put together to get a state of the art 'QL'. "THE CUMULATIVE COST IS DECLINING SOMEWHAT OF LATE,BUT IT IS STILL EXPENSIVE.WHEN YOU THINK NOW YOU CAN BUY A PC FOR LESS THAN `500 NEW AND SECOND HAND EVEN CHEAPER,STICK QPC,QXL OR QLAY IN IT AND STILL SAVE MONEY. WHAT'S THE ANSWER?" Sorry if that seems repetitive. I am trying to keep all the points together otherwise they will get forgotten. NOT A PROBLEM MATE,JUST CONFUSING! Dilwyn wrote: "we have to present the QL in a positive light. It's something I've tried to do with QL Today, .... Those QL users who are on the Internet can help here, but extolling the virtues of the machine and its operating system especially. The rumoured new windowing system from Tony Tebby will give us a new edge, and once Web browsing facilities arrive there'll be little we can't do for ourselves. As it is, we may have to use the PC to actually access the Web at the moment, but there are HTML and Lynx readers courtesy of PROGS and Jonathan Hudson, while someone else is working on the libraries needed to implement full browsers. The likes of Dave Walker are working on library managers, so the whole thing is coming together, albeit gradually. THIS WILL BE A GREATLY NEEDED ADDITION TO THE QL AND WELCOMED BY A GREAT NUMBER OF USERS,WHO MAYBE THINK THEY ARE BEING LEFT BEHIND ON THE INTERNET HIGHWAY! .... the sheer fact that QDOS/SMSQ is now available for so many platforms is a positive selling point for trying to attract back the many users lost to other computers - ... We're probably being over-optimistic in hoping to attract new users, apart from a few tinkerers who relish the challenge of implementing a new operating system on their PCs or whatever, but it ought to be possible to attract back former QL users if we do it in a positive and co-ordinated way. You wrote: "IN THIS DILWYN,I AM IN TOTAL AGREEMENT.ALTHOUGH WE MAY ATTRACT A LOT OF EX QL USERS BACK IF ONLY WE COULD LET THEM KNOW WHAT THEY CAN DO WITH QLAY,QPC AND QXL IN THEIR PC'S.EVEN THOUGH THEY MAY HAVE GONE ON TO A PC,THEY WILL MORE THAN LIKELY STILL HAVE THEIR QL SOFTWARE AND LONG TO USE IT AGAIN." Back to Dilwyn: "In terms of what makes SuperBASIC a good programming language, QL users are quite used to being able to write their own applications in a short time, rather than have a team of programmers take weeks to produce something on a PC (albeit, the PC one will probably look prettier and be finished to a higher standard, until it goes wrong anyway). We shouldn't be competing with that kind of computer software, the type which takes several people months to prepare, but look at the QL scene where good software is produced by one-man operations (witness SMSQ/E by Tony Tebby, a complete operating system produced mostly by an individual). You wrote : "THE PC PROGS ARE AIMED AT THE MASS MARKET AND THEREFORE ARE UNLIKELY TO DO EXACTLY WHAT YOU WISH THEM TO DO, WHEREAS IF YOU CAN PROGRAM IN SUPERBASIC YOU CAN GET EXACTLY WHAT YOU WANT. OR IF LIKE ME YOU CANNOT PROGRAM AT ALL AND YOU WANT SOMETHING SPECIFIC, YOU COME TO A GREAT CLUB AND MEMBERS LIKE THIS LOT." Am I being over optimistic or are we beginning to draw together a list of selling points for the "QL" ?? NO YOUR NOT,THERE ARE A GREAT MANY GOOD POINTS ABOUT THE QL,MAYBE AN IDEA WOULD BE TO GO TO A FEW OF THE PC SHOWS WITH A QL BANNER AND QXL/QPC UP AND RUNNING ON PC'S SO THAT ANY FORMER USERS WHO GO TO THESE CAN SEE FRO THEMSELVES,ALSO TO SHOW THE PC CROWD WHAT REAL MULTI-TASKING IS! More QL pluses or pithyer ways of putting it please, PLEASE! Dilwyn, thanks for the Canon Help-Line number. Although I wasted a long time trying to get help on colour printing from Canon for my daughter's BJC-210, it is probably worth while asking them about changing emulation on the 4200. After all that is the machine they recommended to me, through John Lewis plc, when they decided they weren't prepared to release the colour printing codes to me. The bit in the manual on printing in colour doesn't work and was, say Canon, carried over by mistake from the manual for another unspecified machine. Sorry to go on about this but I still feel sore. Frank points out, correctly, that my daughter is presumably using the Epson mode and will have no need to change. Our only worry was the possibility that she might accidentall switch it to BJ mode and not be able to get back Presumably there is some combination of code which, if sent to the printer, will cause it to change mode - and it might get sent accidentally, - possibly in a crash ? I THINK IF YOU LOOK IN YOUR PRINTER MANUAL IT WILL NEED A MULTIPLE KEY PRESS TO GET IT TO CHANGE MODES.YOUR PRINTER DRIVER IS STILL THERE EVEN AFTER A CRASH. Thanks for the offer about the manuals. My daughter has the Programmers manual as well as the ones supplied with the machine. If she had a PC there would presumably be no problem. Printers are getting trickier for QL users. Darren:- Have you tried DDtoED? There would be no HD hole to fill in and it seems unlikely that the manufacturers would deliberately produce DD disks to a lower quality since they are presumably now only a minor part of the market. Worth a try?? Andrew Halliwell (Spike ?) wrote: " The "reading the function keys" problem. Well... They way I'd do it is to simply do something like... 10 a$=INKEY$(0) 20 IF a$=CHR$(code for F1) 30 THEN whatever 40 ELSE IF... etc etc etc... (Remembering the END IFs )" Sorry, I haven't tried this yet but I don't think it will work in my case. What I want to do is to read the initial key-stroke on start-up. Surely, if I put this in my boot programme the QL will be looking for a subsequent key-stroke? I know it looks a simple thing to try but with SuperHermes and a separate key-board if I jigger up my boot progam I am left with no means of communicating with the QL. No keyboard ! And then I have to look for my emergency boot floppy. QUANTA is about to publish two articles on C68 (in successive issues). Any chance that you might have anything to say on this. Snags, improvements in doing things or whatever. Grateful, if you could. Everyone:- Please keep us all posted about your printers and about your favourite software. Or dodges that will help others use it better. Also, I am keen to put news about sub-groups in QUANTA. Where you meet, when and what you get up to !! Also experiences with QLAY. That's all for now. Cheers! Colin B. #! Mike Dodd 25 November 1997. Gear Now Working; QL + TRUMP 896K Minerva 1.98 or JS 3.5" and 5.25" Drives Plus a Sinclair QL Printer. Dear Mike + Members, Where has the year gone ? Could someone tell me if the year 2000 is a true leap year. As my video machine jumps from 28 Feb to 1 March, but if I put up a calander or set my clock on the QL to the same dates. I can get 29/2/2000 . I had seen somewhere that if the year is divisible by 400, (which 2000 IS), then it is not counted as a leap year. I would like to wish all members a very merry Christmas and a Happy new year. All the Best , Mike D. -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Darren Branagh, Rep. Of Ireland. 21st November, 1997. QL & COMPUTER GEAR INCLUDES: One Gateway 2000 Pentium PC running QPC (demo), A Philips Pro-286 PC running an 8 Meg QXL 2 card, 2 QL's one JS and one Running MINERVA v1.97 (also JM Roms), Miracle Trumpcard, Ferguson Monitor, Twin NEC 3.5" DS/DD Drives & Twin Miracle DS/HD Drives both joined by a Miracle Disk Adaptor (flp1_ to flp4_), 150+ Disks of Software, 3 Epson EPL4100 Laser Printers, Serial 8056 Thermal Printer, Joysticks, DIY SERmouse, Tandata 3 stack Modem, Zenith Minisport 286 Laptop PC, Cambridge Z88 Laptop, Sinclair ZX Spectrum 128K +2a, Sinclair ZX81. Dear Mike & The Gang, By the time you all read this, it will be rapidly heading towards Xmas, so firstt things first - may I wish all of you a peaceful and happy one - Beannachtai na Nollag, agus na hAthbhliana, as we say here in Ireland. OK, where to start - all of the QL today subcribers out there will no doubt be having a good 'ol giggle at the photo of me in the latest issue, taken at the Irish show. Actually, the photos came out quite clear and all where easily recogniseable, (Well done Dilwyn, much better than some of the previous photo attempts.) Enjoyed Jonathan's Qascade piece too, although I haven't had time yet to try Qascade myself. Glad you liked the Sir Clive miniature Radio Mike, It certainly captured my interest, and I sent off for one as an early pressie for myself - hasn't arrived yet, but I'll keep you posted. I've seen an advert in PCW (yeah, I know, a PC mag!!) about the new LS-120 floppy drives from Panasonic. these seem to be wonderful little devices because they are exactly the same dimensions, size, fitting, and connectors as a normal 3.5" floppy (DD or HD, or ED) and they will also accept any of these three disk types. The real difference is that they also accept Panasonic's new LS-120 disks - which are exactly the same size and weight as a DD or HD or ED floppy (actually, you have to look closely to notice any difference) but with one crucial difference - these will format to 120Mb on a LS-120 drive unit!!!! Seriously!! they are smaller than EZ disks or ZIP disks, and they hold much more!! Access times are quicker too, and they are still compatible with all your other DD, HD or ED drives - Not bad Eh? (as a matter of fact, they will read DD/HD/ED disks over 3 times faster than a normal drive will too!!) They come pre-configured as the A: drive for PC's, so I don't yet know if they can be "jumpered" to work as FLP1_ on a QL, if they could, I think hard drives would virtually become defunct - if you fill 120Mb, you just buy another 120Mb disk!! The drive units cost around `85, while the disks are `10+-ish, so would be a load cheaper than EZ, ZIP or QubIDE setups. I know - the first thing I though was how reliable are they? Well, I have just heard that COMPAQ, the big PC manufacturer are going to be fitting them as their A: drive on all their machines AS STANDARD from early next year - so they must be good. Now, begs the Question - could they work with a QL?? remains to be seen, if they have jumper switches, they I suppose its possible.... Ok, now to a few points raised last month.... SPIKE: Opps. Problems with MULTI-DOS and IBMDISK. My fault I suppose. If you couldn't get IBMDISK to do a directory on a PC disk then you must have been using a HD or ED disk, unfortunately the version I had (v.2.00) only works on DD disks (Actually Dennis pointed this out last month.) I'm sure the wonderful J.Hudson esq. has fixed this in a later version, but I don't have it - This version suited my needs as I had a Trumpcard QL when I did the review of it for Ql today a few issue's back, so I couldn't have tested Hd anyway - as I only had DD drives!! Sorry!! Now that I have a QXL II, I use the Dos reader faciliy of SMSQ, like Dennis. Dennis was also back to his 'ol ideas that everyone has SMSQ or SMSQ/E, so why don't they use that - dead easy. As I said before SMSQ/E costs around `100, and not everyone is at that level (If SMSQ hadn't come Built-in to the QXL I got, I doubt I'd have bought It - I'd still be using IBMDISK or MULTI-DOS, or my preference - XOVER, which is commertial of course. Oh, nearly forgot - Private Haliwell (TEN-SHUN!!) also had a problem with MULTI-DOS. Well, I didn't realise that Outln_rext was needed for this to work, sorry. I can't give you a copy of this as it is not PD, but part of Jochen Merz QMENU package. I think it has something to do with controlling and configuring the outlines of windows or something like that, but don't quote me. Mike - I think you got the wrong idea regard the news I gave last month about Steve J's hard drive Virus problems. You see Steve uses a QXL just like me, with a QXL.WIN on it. The QXL.WIN file is a DOS file NOT a QL one!! It contains lots of other QDOS files when read by QXL, but as far as MS-DOS is concerned it is a big file just like any other, and therefore just as easy to infect with a virus. You were quite correct what you said about QL viruses, there aren't any yet ie. an Aurora system or a native "real" QL system couldn't pick up a virus, but any of the emulators that use the PC as a host (QPC, QXL or QLAY) could!! Especially when connected to the internet, as Steve's was at the time!! Talking of viruses, I wiped one out only last week on a friends machine, using the Dr.Solomons software that I got free when I bought my Pentium a couple of months ago. It was identified as "Cascade 1701" by the software - hopefully this is no relation to Qascade, by Jonathan Hudson!! Oh, the effects of cascade 1701 - it made letters in Word processors or text files fall off the screen!! seriously!! COLIN BASKETT: Colin, by the time you read this you should have got a letter from me "pledging" my support to QUANTA. I already do a lot of reviews for QL Today (Just ask Dilwyn) so if you want me to review a few things for you, no problem - Just ask. (Dilwyn has no problem doing this!!! ;-)) Also, colin, you said as regards to my HDtoED bodge article that you only had good results when you used Polyfilla and not Cellotape to fill the hole on the HD disk. To answer your quiry, YES THE CELLOTAPE IS AT FAULT!! It would seem to me that your ED drive is one of the newer ones, with what is called an "optical light sensor" - basically means that you ED drive shines a small beam of light at the point where the ED hole should be (or HD, to sense which is which). If the light shines all the way though, and is picked up on the other side, logic dictates that the hole must be open, or the light wouldn't have got through!! By using Cellotape, which is clear, the light went through anyway, (the cellotape just acted as a window) and the disk was taken to be Write-protected, to a degree, which is why the polyfilla worked much better; this was thick and dark - blocking the light completely, so the disk formatted OK!! Even the other ED drive types are a bugger is this regard; as they have a little "feeler arm" that pops into the hole if its open, or is held back if the hole is covered - the cellotape can sometimes get 'indented' by the arm, thus having no effect!! Polyfilla or araldite or some industrial filler such as silicone sealant are the best to use. Anyway, totally un-formatted brand-new disks are the best to use, I haven't had any problems yet with these. (I'm speaking via Hilary's ED drive or course - I don't actually have one myself!!) I use thick, black insulating Tape, as on black HD disks it is barely visible - if cut neatly to fit with a pair of scissors or a stanley Knife. Right... thats QL104 looked after, now some queries of my own. Does anyone know if it is possible to start a BASIC program from the FILES menu of QPAC2? I mean EXECing a file is dead easy - click on it, select "execute" from the pop-up commands menu, window setting, and there you are...... Is something similar available for BASIC progs? Like an "LRUN" selection or something, going back to the basic command line seems pointless to me. Oh, and how do I have all my program available on Buttons so I can just click them to start 'em?? I can minimize them to a button after booting and loading them(thanks to a quick line from Dilwyn - Thanks Pal!), but I want them all loaded and on a button on Booting the machine, if you know what I mean. HOT_whatever commands are a real obstacle to me, (although a booklet Dilwyn sent me helped a great deal) as is the button frame. anyone care to do a tutorial on this?? Anyway, must go. I hope to make it over to the Bristol Workshop on Nov. 30th, so I might just get to meet some of you all there - depends on work and this new job........ MERRY XMAS!!! Darren D. Branagh _________________ ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Email : dilwyn.jones@bbc.co.uk GEAR: JM/Minerva QL+Gold Card+ED drives; Aurora, Super Gold Card v2.49, Qubide 1.37, 420MB Conner Hard disk, ED and DD drives, HP Deskjet 320; Amstrad ALT286+QXL+Zoom modem+Canon BJ10sx; P90 Black PC and QPC;Toshiba T2100 486DX2/66 with QPC. Dear Mike, First of all, members will probably be glad to hear my anti-PC wingeing is all but over, and at last I'm on fairly good terms with my PCs, thanks to actually finding someone local who actually uderstood them properly. I got my old Black PC out of the garage, dusted it off and made a determined effort to bring it back to life, as it's never really worked reliably. I nearly gave Jochen Merz a heart attack when I told him this by email, something like: "I've had my black PC fixed, and for the first time have fallen in love with a PC." The next day came an email saying something like, "This is a bad joke, who is that sat at Dilwyn's keyboard pretending to be Dilwyn Jones?" What caused this sudden change of heart was meeting the helpful guys at a company called PSU Ltd in Bangor. This was the third company to try to fix the never ending problems with this PC, and after a two day struggle (to quote, their engineer said, "boy did we have 'fun' with this PC!") The problem all along was that there was a timing problem between the RAM cards and the graphics card, and the graphics card was operating at borderline tolerances. So they threw it away, put another card in, upgraded the memory to 16MB, reformatted my hard drive and put Win95 back on. What a difference, having struggled so long with a pathetic machine, it's now in a completely different league. This means I now have another PC for sale. This is an Amstrad Integravision PC-TV, P75 processor (upgradeable), 8MB RAM (upgradeable), 14.4K fax modem, various bundled software, all manuals, 850MB hard disk, hard disk download CD-ROM and bootup floppy, built in TV tuner card and teletext, microphone, built in speakers, sound card, CD-ROM, remote control for the TV functions, and it runs QPC happily. Never tried a QXL in it. The asking price is only `400.00 The snag is it's a big heavy machine, so personal callers only please, though I'd be prepared to lug it to a workshop to meet someone, for example. Don't anyone think I'm starting to prefer PCs over QLs, though. It'll be quite some time before things get that bad! There was some mention of wildcards (in connection with the UNZIP program) in the last issue. What wasn't very well explained was how to use the wildcards themselves. The asterisk and query (* and ?) characters are used to represent two types of symbol which can mean any sequence of characters or a single character respectively. The ? wildcard is easiest to understand, because the question mark can stand for just about any single character. Suppose you wanted to specify all 4 character filenames which start with P. This could be represented by P??? and the system would match any filenames such as P100 or Pete, for example. Alternatively, you can use an * to specify a vague sequence of characters of any length to match that part of the filename. For example, to match just Quill _DOC files you could specify *_DOC, so any filenames which begin with anything and end with _DOC can be matched. Imagine that like me you give filenames for letters to people which consist of their initials and a reference number or date, e.g. a letter to Mike might be MK251097_DOC. Using this knowledge, I could select all letters to Mike by using MK*_DOC. Unfortunately, the operating system has no support for all this, it is provided purely by the application. C68 programs can access parameters in this way, like the UNZIP program. Solvit Plus from Geoff Wicks also uses a similar technique for word searching to solve word puzzles. I've now sent the 1996 CIA World Factbook to the PD libraries, and also sent Mike a copy. It's on 6 DD disks, so too big to distribute with the newsletter. And speaking of disks, now that we have various members drilling the hell out of floppy disks to double their capacity, one thing worries me. It may work in that disks become 6400 sectors (or whatever Colin's QL says), but how do they get rid of the dust and particles drilling causes - surely if these get on the surface of the disk, that's bye bye to your disk and probably your heads as well, or am I missing something? My offer to act as back issues librarian still stands if we want to do this. I'm sure there'd be enough demand for back issues to warrant a complete collection being held, or perhaps a PD service like Steve Johnson might keep a complete set in a separate collection within their libraries. Darren suggested I put some of the Christmas clipart with the next newsletter. Fine, but there's so much of it. I've sent Mike a photocopy of the printouts and he can choose a few to put in the December issue. Don't forget, it's freely available from the usual source of freeware/PD if you want the complete collection. I've also got some Christmas clipart for Line Design if anyone wants it. In addition to the problems mentioned last month, Steve Johnson got himself a completely different problem - he had some unexpected visitors while he was away, who "kindly" removed all his QL gear for him without his permission. As you can imagine this caused all sorts of problems. He has backups of his software library thank goodness, but it's going to take him time to get re-equipped and to reinstall all his software on his hard disk. I suspect that the virus probably infected his PC hard disk, Mike, not a QL hard disk, I've yet to meet a real QL virus even though I looked into how such a virus might be programmed some time ago. Basically, it's much harder to write a QL virus than a PC one, thank goodness! Darren, I'm not the best person to ask about SMSQ/E. Just ask Jochen Merz how often I ask him things when I get it wrong or run into a problem! QLay now has one useful extra little feature, there is a version which can multitask under Windows 95, meaning that unlike QPC you don't have to quit from it to use another Windows application. Bristol Portishead workshop coming up on 30th November, hope I'll have seen a number of you there! Dilwyn Jones #! Martin Burke, 24th November, 1997. Dear Mike and Friends, JM version + Trump 768 + twin 3.5" disks, Philips CM8833 colour monitor (under repair) and its Tandy twin, 8056 printer, Epson RX80 F/T, and Brother HR10 daisy-wheel printer; PSION3a, Z88. So it's Merry Christmas to all our readers already? And wishing you all a Happy and preposterous ... I mean prosperous New Year. But I may have to exclude Uncle Clive from that: I sent for one of his radios, they took the money but so far no radio. Thanks to Spike(less) for the zip info: like much else I won't fully absorb it until I use it: most month's it is as much as i can do to read QLCI. Darren Branagh's comments about SMSQ/E made it seem more desirable - certainly if I start doing more work on the the QL. As for my SGC and QL: I took both to the London QUANTA meeting and they worked fine. This seems to suggest some problem with my power supply - either the black box or the mains supply itself. Yours, Martin Burke. #! 17th November 1997 Hello SYSTEM: QL+SGC, MINERVA 1.97, HERMES, 2XHD, {QUBIDE+170M DRIVE} ETC. ETC. OK- here goes again. Firstly, I gather from newsletter #104 that you can handle HD format - great - that should save both of us some bother! I've enclosed several discs with this, so you can fill me in on the other issues I've missed since #100. I know you sent #102 all neatly zipped up, but I'm afraid it won't unravel itself, so could you please repeat. The QLAY.zip "unzipped" O.K. - so it's not my "unzipper" at fault. I've actually suffered quite a bit from corrupted files in the post, so it doesn't suprise me that #102 "went west". Then again, it might just be me old disks... On the subject of zippers etc., Dilwyn seems to have had some problems, as answered by Martin Weatley. Yes, a file with a ".T.*" suffix indicates a TAR archive. QUBBEsoft "specials disk 48" contains an "un-TAR" routine. This may be of some help, if Dilwyn hasn't sorted it already. With reference to Frank's letter, yes, I agree that some sort of explanation of what a program is supposed to do is essencial - especially when it starts crashing around you ears. Also, a lot of demo versions of commercial software seem to be sent out with little or no explanation. This really can't help the sales figures. With reference to his comments on compression routines, it would be worth his while persevering and learning how to use them, especially zip/unzip, which is also an archiver, i.e. it can stick a load of associated files together into one (much smaller) file. Excuse me if you've heard this all before, but worth repeating. In the good ol' days, when mdv cartridges cost 3-4 quid, and floppy systems needed a bank loan, compression saved space, and therefore money. Today, with floppies at ha'penny each, this may not seem relevent, but I think that there still are good reasons for using these routines. As programs grow and get more complex, it can be difficult to stick all the necessary files (progs, data, docs/txts) onto a single disk, especially DD's. Also, how many of us, after countless years of keyboard- slogging, now find ourselves drowned in disks from long-ago, full of back- ups, letters to tax-men, bank-managers etc. etc.... All important stuff, maybe, one-day, who knows .... so why not collect up all those letters or whatever, and zip 'em all up onto one disk, instead of 2-3. Using archivers for backup copies saves a HUGE amount of space. Also, and finally, with telephone lines becoming more important everyday, compression is a must for up/down-loading.... Oh yeh Mike, you asked what it's like down here - well, I wouldn't stay if I didn't like it, now would I??? {;-))} Also, you got it right 1st time - just JC.... Keep well, and cheers for now, JC - Plaza Santa Agueda,9 - Aizoain - 31195 - Nafarroa - EUSKADI (not spain) P. McPHERSON, 20th November 1997. Fraternal Greetings Everybody, Current equipment includes: 3xQLs (AH roms), one fitted with a Gold Card and twin Cumana 3.5" floppy drive, one with a Trump Card and a single 3.5" and the third is a bare 128K machine, an Amstrad DMP 3160 printer c/w a Miracle Serial Interface. I suppose you all thought that you had got rid of me, well the proverbial bad penny returns after four more stints in hospital since my last contribution to QLCI. I was due for a transplant but it was cancelled because my diabetes and asthma are too unstable, meantime my doctors have found a 3cm tumour in my gallbladder (which is normally only 9cm long). The usual procedure is to whip the whole lot out but the surgeons are not prepared to operate because they don't think I would survive the anasthetic - so now you know as much as I do. Unfortunately, I am a couple of issues behind the rest of you because I couldn't get issues 102 and 103 to load via Xchange, Quill or Perfection, I am suffering the consequent withdrawal symptoms and I am writing this "blind" as they say. I owe Darren a grovelling apology for not getting in touch after he kindly sent me some PD Giff and Tiff programmes (see above for excuses Darren - I will be in touch). They worked well with Line drawings such as cartoons and clip art but I am still extremely dissapointed in the resolution they are capable of. Will the day ever come when we can get genuine "photo quality" images on the QL? As an aside, can any of the flatbed scanners on the market be used with a QL? For those interested in producing photographic images on their computers (on a PC or Mac) there is, at long last, a decent consumer digital camera on the market which produces good quality images. Having just tried one, it's the only consumer digital camera that I would be prepared to recommend to anyone at the moment. It's the Olympus C4100L which features a 35-110 zoom lens, a shutter speed range of 1/4 to 1/10,000th second, a sophisticated flash system and a 1.4 million pixel CCD which, when paired with an Olympus P300E printer yields a finished print quality of 300 dots per inch which is fairly close to 35mm photo quality when enlarged to 10x8". It comes bundled with PC or Mac cables, Kais Photo Shop software package valued at `300, Teo 4Mb smart media card and a rechargeable battery pack. The down side is that the camera costs `1300! but I have beene reliably informed by a trade insider that this price is to be reduced in price by as much as 40% by the summer of next year. I don't know how many of you are aware of the situation, but Steve Johnson of SJPD fame was burgled recently and had all his QL gear, most of the harware mentioned in his "For Sale" section of his catalogue disk, `760 worth of power tools and `2700 worth of fishing gear nicked. Fortunately enough he was insured and had backup copys of his PD software (a lesson for all of us there I suspect). Nevertheless it represents not just a major blow to Steve but to anyone who uses a QL or a QL compatible like myself that got much of my PD collection from him. I suspect that Steve could do with a bit of morale support right now to encourage him to continue supplying QL users with software and hardware, especially since there are so few suppliers left these days. Having passed his 10 GCSEs with good grades, our Bob has settled into college doing "A" level Maths, Physics, Computer Studies and Electronics so I havn't a clue what he's talking about half the time. His latest project is to construct a prototype railgun and devise practical, non-violent uses for it. Apparently a railgun fires a projectile using electrical current as opposed to using a chemical such as gunpowder which makes it more economic and yet the projectile travels at such a velocity that it is capable of sinking a warship. Bobs idea is to scale the whole thing down so that it can be used in engineering, building demolition and as a pile driver for the construction industry, as opposed to a weapon. Nobody at his college, including his tutors, have ever heard about the QL which I found a bit disconcerting. They all seem to be so PC oriented, that even the Mac doesn't get a look in. Thats a whole generation of would be computer experts that have never heard of the QL, makes you think doesn't it? Incidentally he has invited you all to leave him a QL related message or information on his college web site, his address is: robert@smsuk.solis.co.uk As you might expect Bob has had to learn to programme on his "A" level computer course, using Pascal which came as a bit of a suprise. I would have thought they would have used something like MSDOS, ROOT CPM, one of the versions of BASIC or "C". Having seen Bob write an accounts package in a couple of hours and looking at the listings, I was able to see why they chose Pascal. It really is a suprisingly easy computer language to get to grips with, even for a dunderhead like me. Which neatly leads me to the questions of the month: Is it possible to run Pascal on a QL, are there any Pascal programmes for the QL and where can I get hold of them? Just in case the next issue of QLCI is not produced before Christmas, can I take this opportunity to thank Mike for his stirling service and wish him and all the other members a very happy Christmas and hoe that Santa brings you that piece of software or hardware that you always wanted! Yours Fraternally, Paul & Bob Malcolm White Another go at putting fingers to the keys. It is now November 8th and I have just got round to reading QL/100 from start to finish (disgusting, I know). As I get older I seem to be getting busier than ever - Oh to be back at work for a rest!!!. I must admit that QL/100 left me feeling depressed - I realised how much I had lost touch, and most of the technical reports went way over my head. I just plod on using the four QL basic programmes, with Taskmaster, and must admit they do all I seem to require. Mike, I did try using QpacII, got into a mess - and guess what - went back to Taskmaster. Will have a go at using Xchange and see if I get any better results. Having said that I do use DTP and LineDesign which I find very good. I have got further involved with our Community Centre, having taken over the day to day running of it, and a lot of my work is on their computer - using mainly WordPerfect, although we are hoping to have Windows95 up and running shortly. Having missed a few months again, can I please have copies of QL/101 onwards as I have not seen any answers to my queries in QL/100 yet. I have just been trying out some of the other items on the disc with QL100 - did not get a single thing!!!!! In case you do not remember what was on the disc, I am enclosing a list from Superdisc Labeler. Short report I am afraid, but I must get on with some Club accounts that require updating. Until next time, Cheers..........Malcolm #! Dennis Smith. NET1(downstairs) = (installed in a mini tower) Aurora, Super Gold card, SuperHermes, Qubide, 420Mb hard disk, EZ135 removable hard disk, 2 ED drives, (SER3)Pace 33.6 modem, (SER6)3 button serial mouse, Printers: (SER1)Star LC10, (PAR)HP 540 Deskjet, 15 inch SVGA monitor. Operating system = Minerva 1.97, SMSQ/E. NET3(upstairs) = (installed in a mini tower) Gold card, Hermes, Qubide, 540Mb hard disk, 1 HD drive, 2 DD drives. Printer: (SER1)Brother HR5 thermal with fax roll paper. Operating system = SMSQ/E. Hello all, As you can see above I have just stuck a second hard disk in the main computer, it is a SyQuest EZ 135Mb. If you didn't know these have a removable cartridge and works like a floppy disk except the storage area is very much larger. Spike: In QLCI 104 you mentioned the Qubide checksum command WIN_CSUM 1,1 and WIN_CSUM 2,1 Well done. I had forgot to do it on the new hard drive and only remembered about it whilst reading through QLCI (again). I've just set it now, good timing! You also mention outln_rext - what is it? It's part of QPTR and sometimes thrown in with software that you buy to get that software working. LRESPR 'qptr' and all the pointer toolkit commands are there, you don't have Qpointer toolkit do you? I can't give it to you as you know it's commercial. Is this a wind-up Spike? You know what OUTLN is don't you. I thought you of all people would know!!! The Goldfire thing and simms. To simms or not to simms. Lets say the maximum ram this time will be 128 Meg. Will you buy 128 Meg., I don't think anyone will. The Goldfire will probably come with 16 Meg. already on it. If you want zero Meg. or greater than 16 meg. this will be an option. So if I have 16M and you have 128M in the initial years this will make no difference at all, the machines will work the same, with the same programs running, imagine 16M giving an out of memory report!! Remember this, there will be a lot of extra bits and pieces on the Goldfire that will make it very desirable. The ability to scan documents, anyone interested in that? etc. etc. I still say its the colours that are in Aurora that will make the big difference. People will see high resolution with plenty of colours, it will make a world of difference when comparing the QL to the Aurora/Goldfire. As I have said before the Goldfire card will (at the moment) plug into a QL motherboard. The penalty of backward compatibility is that we will lose a few percent of speed. Using this method (QL motherboard and Goldfire) you are building an unreliable computer, don't do it. The QL motherboard really is old now, the ones I use give no problems at all that is because I 'fiddle' with them from time to time (you didn't know I was musical did you?). I think people should now be looking at owning a low power consumption computer that may be left switched on continuously and be as near to 100% reliable as possible, day after day, week after week, month after month. This means new circuit boards and the latest components on these circuit boards. This is new thinking, new ideas put into practise. The QL motherboard is beginning to be a bit of a lead weight around users necks now. When is it going to 'pack in' again? I have not mentioned multi-processors, I don't need to, do I? Comments on that lot everyone? Before I leave Spike there is one last comment. I thought your 'definitions of QL thingies' was very good, informative and good reading. Martin Wheatley: Sub-group expense. Quote Frank and Mike:- or even the arranging sub- group, might well assist with the costs in some way. I AGREE FRANK,LOCAL SUB GROUPS COULD WELL SUPPORT THE LOCAL MEETING AS THEY BENEFIT FROM THEM AS WELL --------------------------------------------- Quote Martin:- I'm curious about this. In what way does the local group gain? --------------------------------------------- Yes exactly, we (three of us) run the local sub-group. A Quanta workshop might cost 200 pounds or more. If I give some money to pay for some of this how do we get it back? Or we don't get it back and just accept this. Should we give 50 pounds each for allowing us to organise the workshop? Organising a workshop is all about spending your own money anyway. I used my phone, my fuel and my time, there is no return. I have already spent my money for the benefit of others, do you want me to spend more? How much would you like me to spend for your benefit? This is what it comes down to. Spend your money on being a Quanta member and make the effort to go to Workshops. Meetings like this bring together great minds which sparks invention, which leads on to products that you can purchase to improve YOUR computing, it's a circle, don't break it. Darren Branagh: Make HD disks into ED disks. Yes this does work but I have heard that you cannot format them down to HD again. Someone must want to do it one day! Last year I purchased a load of new IBM branded ED disks and was selling them for a pound each at Quanta workshops. Up North they sold like hot cakes, down South hardly anyone took any notice of them. What a strange bunch. Top quality disks at give away prices. Perhaps they thought they would 'wait and see', well they are still waiting because I'm not going to do it again. I'm sure there are people that if someone was to offer to save their life they would still have to think about it. The File info 2 question. Get the latest version v3.02(?). LRESPR 'FileInfo2_bin'. EX 'FI2config_obj ', this version is v2.01. You will need to patch Qpac2 to get the full benefit of FileInfo 2, the patch is provided. Execute something in Qpac2 that cannot be executed like a text file for example. Lets say the file 'win1_mytext_txt'. This generates an error which is picked up by FileInfo2 and the 3 or 4 character suffix of the file name is examined. In this case it would be txt. What you have configured in the FileInfo2 configurator to happen when _txt is encountered will then happen, like start QD (a pointer text editor) and load in that text file for you to read immediately. Recap, Qpac2 execute _txt file, QD starts with 'win1_mytext_txt' already loaded. Less than half a second for a small text file and your reading it, quick and no messing. It is completely excellent. Imagine instant view screen pictures, start GIFs, etc. Another example, Qpac2 execute QL105_doc, Xchange is started, Quill is started and QL105_doc is loaded, all on one click of the mouse, job done. Colin Baskett: Polyfilla verses cellotape. The check on your drive may be optical, as you can see through cellotape... Mike: Would the QL be able to access the external modem on your PC, yes, pull the modem cable out of the PC and plug it into the QL (25 pin D usually). OR do you mean QXL access the modem. Yes it can. Do you have your QL/Aurora in a mini tower case or are you thinking of building one? If so have I got good news for you. SeQueL (our sub-group) have cured that very annoying problem of having to chop various holes in the rear of the case to accommodate various connectors like 9 pin and 25 pin "D" serial connectors, VGA, SVGA, network jacks and DIN sockets. We can now supply a plate with these cut-outs already done. The plate screws or bolts to the rear of the mini tower. It will accommodate 16 various connectors. Interested?, phone me if you want one (some). Miracle have announced that the Ultra Gold card will now not be manufactured. Take notice, that's the loss of a major project. See you next time. Dennis. Graham D Lutz e-mail:Graham.Lutz@virgin.net Gear includes:- Minerva 1.93 AURORA QL with Super Gold Card, ED and HD disk drives, 40Mb IDE HD, SyQuest 128 HD, Goldstar EGA monitor, Canon BJC-4100.Various other QLs. New addiition:- 200Mhz MMX PC. Dear Mike and fellow Quantum Leapers, As you can see, I've succumbed to buying a new PC. This is mainly for 2 reasons, one being the Internet but mainly for the kids. I'm now saving for a copy of QPC, but until then my trusty machine is not far away. I cannot contribute much this month, as my schedule at work gives me less time than ever, but I should be back to normal for the new year. Until then, I wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Have fun !! Graham