Full text of "Amiga Shopper Magazine Issue 62"

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7776 essential magazine for Amiga entliusiasts

Exclusive guide
4\^J f /^ A to the 1996 WOA

show inside!

CanDo 2.51

Full program. Original RRP £150

Plus mu
more - \
back co^

Over \

Issue 62 May 1996 £4.25 us$B.95»Gu.idersi7.5o

You can do

Create anything! There are no
limits. We give you the software
and show you how to use it.

ShopperReviews

• Epson EPL-5500: An amazing
new 600dpi laser printer for the
price of an inkjet,

• Wordworth 5: The latest
version comes under our
scruttnous eye,

• Loom: A brand new way of making music designed
for those with some programming experience.

• Aural Synthelica: Powerful sample creation, but is il
too complicated for its own good?.

• MasterlSO: The ability to create compact discs.

• Rexecute: A program that can transform your use of
the Amiga's inbuilt ARexx language.

• MacroForm; Organic modelling tool for LightWave.

ShopperTutorials

Introduction to CanDo

To get you started with our amazing Coverdisk, we
explain ali about its features and how to use them.

Music

The power of sound samples and how to make the
most of them in your musical creations.

Comms

A detailed look at IRC, the advanced features It offers
and why it can be used for more than just chatting.

HiSoft BASIC 2

Our second installment explains the use of tag lists.

Amiga

DIY
Part 2!

From the msliBra at

FORMAT

Ujuantum Leap

Experts in Digital Video

Proudly present the industry standard video digitiser for Amiga computers worldwide:

(24)

LTF

Grab pictures from any camcorder, VCR or TV directly into your Amiga!

Wide range of applications

Including DeskTop Publishing, Multimedia
Presentations, Animation, Video Titling, Databases,
Amiga Photo Albums, Newsletters, or simply Having
Even More Fun With Your Amiga!

Works with ali Amiga computers

A500(+),A600,A1200,A1500,A2000,A3000,A4000/30/40

Easy to install and use

Simply plug the VIDI Amiga 24RT into the parailel
(printer) port of your Amiga computer. Then connect
your camcorder, VCR, or TV tuner to the VIDI Amiga
24RT using the cable provided. The user friendly
software and easy to follow instruction manual and
tutorial allow you to become expert in creating
professional quality images on your Amiga!

• Three Video Inputs

Two composite (Video In) and one S-Video (S-VHS, Hi-8 etc).

• Compatible with all television formats

Automalically delects NTSC, PAL or SECAM,

• Real Time Image Grabber

Grab a video frame in a fraction of a second.

No need to pause the VCR or hoid the camera steady!

• High Resolution, True Colour

Capture images in 16 million colours at resolutions upto:-
760x604 (VIDI Amiga 24RT Pro).
380x604 (VIDI Amiga 24RT).

§\Mm(i4r ^49

'llfp

Incredible value at: Including VAT

I f~ nana _JS-Uideo

HI Int.rljc. I r Ulaeo !

Hula

[wage Ctrll tfltu I

Tuntp- I . I stare
_J_1_J_1 . "'<'"

Colour Preview

Preview incoming video in HAMS or greyscale.

Comprehensive Image Processing

Average, Balance, Blur, Briglntness, Contrast,
Edge Detect. Emboss, Gamma, Saturation, etc.

File Support

All AGA Modes, ILBM, BMP, TIFF etc.

Time-lapse and Carousel

Choose a time-lapse between capturing frames
from half a second up to ten iiours, then
automatically capture a sequence to the Carousel!
Applications range from animations of plants
flowering to security camera monitoring.

Tel: 01506 461917

;iij /^.rnipj 124) "" Pro (£249 '^^^- 01 soe 41 4634

Higliest resolution for professional use '"-'■■''■"" ^'"'^

Including VAX.

Deiigned and manufiicnired in Scotland by: QiuiiiUim Leap Software Lid., Lh'ingsloii EH54 6TS

Who's Who

Editorial

ShopperWeicome

77ii.' ««Hn1l4l niagazine for Amiga snthusjasls

Editor: Sue Srar^l E-midl sgrant^fiiluieneLcouk

Consultary EdHor: Nick Veitch

Art Editor N r^ A^pell

Covenll&k Editor/ltochnlcal Writv: David Taylor

ConlrlbutaFf:

Maft Evans, Lany Hid<mcia Gary Whileley, Danen Ifvine,

John Kennedy, F^iil Overaa and Graeme Sandiford

Photogi-Hphy; Pele Canning

Cover Hand Modol: Sat ah Uoody

Advertisemvnt Manager: Tnny Hickman

Senior Sales Eiecutive: Diane Clarke

ProducUon ManBger: N<chard Gingell

l^tKiuclion Co-ordlnators: Li^a Srnith

Productlan TvchnFcianB: Jor^ Moore, Mark Gover,

Sirnon Windior, Chn^ Srgckijr, Brian Hook, Jaaon Ttti^

and Oliuer Gibbs

GnHip Productlan Maiiag«r; Judith Green

Prim Servicas Manager: Matthew Parker

Print Services Co-ardinfltor: Janet Anderson

Paper Controller: f ora Deane

Production AdmfnJstrator: Calhy Powland

Circulation Manager: Jem Bickley

DistributiDn: Sue HdrUey

Overseas Lh»ncB«: Mark Wlliams* 0171 331 3920

Pubri«her: Simon Slanfiliefd E-maH ssta;isf leld@Julurenetco.uk

Managing Dirsclor: Gmq Ingham

Chairman: l^ick AJexander

Printad by; Southernprml Lid. Riale. Dorset

ISSN 0961 -7302 FVinlad m Ihe UK

Nawb T^vde Dlsblbutkin - UK and woridwJde:

Fulure Pjblishing ff 01225 ^A77AA

ytfor fluw*iH*B at vMiia

Thii magazin*? fiwne^ Prom Fulure Pulili^fung, b
miTipany loundEiI jusi lOyearg ego, buL no^
wllijig mnre cnmpuler niagailrw? fhan any olher
pLfbliGhtr bjj Bnlain.

WaoTfu:

B«tt«r adiricSi Oj' lltfit ere packed wiUi dps, 9ij^e9Uon& and Bipiinalory
., «nliBn by Uie bHl m (he business

d IndHpandEncE, and

uiure

^^EllJ^

Stannflvr rovlnn, V^ nave a cB^imr policy of a

0111 rtviBWE qive clear trii^ng recommfltylaliOns.

Ckanf d««l^b You nnd Ealid inlorrnBtan and you ncnr It tasl Sa our

dciignprs highlighj key element In Ihearllclcs b^ u^ing cheftE, diagrflms,

aummary boies, annoljled pnologrHphE anil so on.

Graator nltmnu. Al l^uluie, efll1oi& op«m1e undef [»^n giddefi ni'es--

1 Underaland pu' feadd' nundii aSabEryO^em.

Mara mdw UltarBCEIbi. ^ d'B« alirx^gly on reederE^ oinlilbuLICK^L

jp'.illl ni; ill llic livclic:?' Icttpra paqei and Ihe beiliaadp' tips.

Bathf vahl* FDrmnney. tMlfke pagcE, oaller qualily mag? you caf^ tfjli

Copyilshl i laSe FuUn PubBdilne LU. No part nl ttiia magazina
may tH leproduoad withoul vriillen peimiEUan Wa nelcpnie Ennththllons tor
putilitatlon bul ragjat IM *e cBnrml rfllurn srtf auhmi^Huns. Cnrbibuions are
Bccepletl only on tha ba?l? ol iud aaaignmanl uf ojpyngbl lo Future RjbI.Ehlng.
Any cnnaapondarice "il' be ton&iderea lor publicalion jnleaa you apacilically
Etsle Dlherv^^e, dnd wa raaar^ Iha ngnl Ip edil lullers published.

MBmber of th> Audit Suraau of ClrculaUoii

ABC

Audited circulalion J^nu^ry to Juris 1995:31,196

.■..•.•_.

Amiga Technologies are showing off the
prototype of their new machine, the "Super
Amiga" at the WOA. Be there!

Create anything. There are no
limits. Rather bold, you may
think, but our claims for the
power of Inovatronic's excellent
auttioring package, CanDo 2.51
are perfectly true! Which is why the complete
and unrestricted version of CanDo 2,51 can be
found on our main Coverdisk this month. And
just in case you are still not aware of how
powerful the program is, there are six pages of
^^^^^^^^^^^^~i instructions and tips
^^^^^^^^^BL* I spread throughout this
^^^^^^^^Ht I issue. We have plans

^^^^^^Kf^^M^ I

^^^H^F^fl^p' I for the next fevf

^^^^^^^k * I

^^^^^^^p L^ I Eicellenl news

^^^^^H^~ ^T I has been
^^^^^^L I announced by Amiga

^^^^^■^^^^1 Technologies. They will

be showing off
their brand new Amiga at the Worid
Of Amiga show. This new
machine has a quad-speed
CD-ROM drive, it uses a
6eOEC30 40MHz main
processor, it features two SIMM
sockets and has a flexible expansion
bus too. We don't have any details
about the price yet - but get down to
WOA show and you can ask Amiga

How to

't Amiga Shopper

EDfTORIAL AND ADVERTISING:

30 MDnmnuth Street, B^lh, Avon BA1 2BW.
n01225 442344 Fa*: 01225 446019.
E-mail: ?un^hDpper@cix.compu 11 nkco.uk

EDITORIAL: Send all press releases, feature

submissions and ideas to Sue Grant
E-mail: sgranl^futuranetco.uk

COVERDISKS: If you nsie a contributon, coinmari;ial
or otfierwise, that yair would like to submit for
consideration for the Coverdisks, send rt to Dauid Taylor,
E-mail; daveteylo rifflfuturen etco.u k

READER ENQUIRIES: Amiga Shopper is
auailsbie for phone enquiries every Wednesday
between lOam and 5.30pm. Please make SLirs your
call is necessary, S 01225 442244.

FUTURENET: You can also contact us, or browse
through a selection of Amiga articles, tutorials etc on
FutureNel Point your WWW browser at:
htlp ://www.f utu renetco.uk

ADVERTISING: If you want to place an
advertisement in Amiga Shopper, contact Tony
Hickman or Diane Clarke on H 01225 442244.
E-mail aliickman@fiiturenetco.uk

ADVERTISING COMPLAINTS:

II you have a complaint about an advertiser in
Amiga Shopper, then contact Sopliie Collins on
S 01225 442244
E-mall inops@futurenetco.uk

CUSTOMER SERVICES: » 01225 S226I0

SUBSCRIPTIONS/BACK ISSUES:

CaO our hotline number below for a subscription to
Amiga Shopper (or a back Issue). If you already have
a subscnption, bul have a query, write to:
Future Publishing Ltd, FREEFOST (BS49Q0),
SomertonTAll 6BR, or » 01225 62251 1.

Annual subscription rate: The subscription rate
for 1 2 issues of Amiga Shopper iricluding postage ts
£51 (UK), £58,92 (EC), £71,52 (Rest Of Wodd),

Issue 62

May 1996

Technologies

for more

details

yourself I The

new machine

will be on

display at the

CeBit show in

Germany too -

unfortunately, we

go to press just before that

show, but we will have a

full reporl neiit month.

There is a World Of

Amiga show guide on

page 24 to give you a

taste of what to expect;

and if you fill in the

special voucher on

page 27 and
hand it in to the

Future Publishing stand you could
win an Amiga Surfer pack - another
good reason to attend the show.
Back to the issue, there's the
second part of our Amiga DIY feature
on page 28. We want to make sure
that you really are getting the most out
of your machine and its penpherals.
Loads ol readers call up with similar
problems, many of which can be
solved easily with a little bit of advice;
which inspired us to write this
feature. We hope it clears up a lot
of your problems!

Digita's eicellent word
processor, Wordworth 5 is
reviewed this month, along with a
whole bunch of other new Amiga
hardware and software. And don't
forget our tutorials. Read on and enjoyi ■

Sue Grant
Editor

Turn the page for the
contents of issue 62

AMGA SHOPPER

^B$L^

n^A

b^ijijj

Our unique and highly rated external Clock Cartridge will enable

your Amiga to continually store Hie correct time and date In Its

own battery backed memory

Simply plugs onto the BboK of the Amga and does not Invalidate

the wananQ".

CompatlMe with ALL Amigas

ONLY £19.99

(plus £1.00 Mslage anti pact'ingl

A1200 trapdoor fitting memory expansions feature a
battery backed clock anO a socket fo; an accelerator FPU

2mb £99.99

4mb NOW ONLY £134.99

8mb NOW ONLY £259.99

b\nD DJii V.

These hard drives simply push onto tfs side of ths ASOO or
1 A500+ and will give your computer all the benefits that hard dfl-
\ ves offer. The drives are suoplied fisnnaned, partitioned and liaus
1 Workbench installed for immediate use.

I Full inslnjctions and software supplied.

'J TUB hand *ve also Has the tadlity to add 3, 4, 6 or Smb oi RAM

1 inside It.

iii

A500/+ 250mb HARD DRIVE £209.99

Additional RAM for the hard drive f89.99 per 2niii

KU--^-

.lj3d'/

[Msoology is the ultimaie in disk copying power for the
Amiga, Tiie package comprises Ibe Discolor Disk,
manual and DIscoiogy cartridge for making copies of
heavily protected programs with an external disk
drive, Discology will also format dislis, check disks
, for errors etc.

Now includes CD ROM drivers and instrucSons.

THe Dataflyer is a 16 bit SCSI II controller card that converts the signals
or the internal IDE interface to also run SCSI devices at the same Ijme as
the IDE hard drive.

, The Datallyer SCSI+ will operate upto 5 SCSI devices such as
\ CD^OMS, hard drives, SyQuest removeSile driues, tape
1 hack up drives etc.
^ 4 Unlike other SCSI interfaces, the Dataflyer SCSI+ is compal-

' IBIe with all known accelerators elc and it does not stop
you from utilising any of the important expansion ports on
your A120O/A6OO.

The Datafyet SCSIt easily installs into the Ai20O/A60O
(simply pushes in, no need to remove the metal shield)
and provides a 25 viiay D connector through the blanking
plate at the back of the A1200,

Full instructions and saHwaie supplied

DATAFLYER SCSI+ ONLY £69.99

SQUIRREL SCSI INTERFACE
ALSO AVAILABLE £59.99
PCMCIA fittrng SCSI Intarface

£19.99 EACH

wTftXlH© ^ OR BUY

'^ptClM- SbOTHfor£24.99
Of FE** ^ ■

I Anti Virus Professional is the most powerful
/ tool for detecting and removing viruses. Anti
/ Virus pro will check and device harci drives,
/ floppy tJisks and even CD ROM arives for
viruses, \fery straight forward to use, includes
a full 50 page manual.

Incredibly fast {upto An faster than a ZIP drive)
SCSI drive will store a massive 135mb per
cartridge. Comes complete with power supply,
SCSI cable, insUuctlons and cartridge.

ONLY £199.99

or £239.99 with a Squirrel or Dataflyar
135mb EZ cartridge £15.99

RE A VIRUS

PLEASE PHONE FOR A FULL INI^RMATION SHEET

DMA

-lOOU'j.X

A4000 SCSI controller expansion card that allows up to
7 SCSI devices to be connected to the A4000. Includes
fuil user manual and Installation software including CD-ROM
drivers. Includes connecting cable for internal SCSI devices
and rear mounting bracket with a 25way connector for
external devices.

DATAFLYER 4000SX
ONLY £59.99

Imb £39.99
2nib £77.99
4mb £99.99
Smb £159.99

33inliz 68882 FPU (picc) £49.99
40mhz 68882 FPU (pIcc) £69.99
SOmhz 68882 FPU (PGA) £79.99

All FPU's are supel'sO witn crystal osdiators

This superb package is a must for any CD-ROM user.
Includes CD32 & CDTV emulation, audio CD player software
including librarian features. Direct reading of ISbit audio
samples, fiili support for Kodak and Corel PhotoCD Discs,
Includes the 'FISHMARKET' CD-ROM disk packed with
public domain Fred Fish disks and a huge 115 page

information packed spiral

bound manual.

ASIM CDFS
ONLY £49.99

jVJ

Our highly rated, top qualilj featjre paokEd modems are ideal for
Amiga useis. All mocfems incljde our

CIS w

which includes a cable to corned Uie modern to Uie Amiga, NCOMM
oomms soflware, Amiga Guide to Comms ard a list of Suiletm
Boards from which you will ije able to download vast amounts of
free software as well as tiave access to E-MAIL facilities.
• MNP 2-4 Error Corrsclior
• MNP 5 Data Compression
'. • Fax Class I and 11
compatible, Group 3
■ Hayes Compatible
• Full BO page marLial
• 12 Months guarantee

SPEEDCOM+B

(14,400 V32bis) £?!

SPEEDCOM+BF

(2S,S00 V34) £159.99

5' HARD

Our high speed 2.5' IDE hard drives for
the Amiga A1300 & A600 comouters
corns complete with fitting cable,
screws, partitioning software, ftjii
instructions and 12 monUis guaran-
tee. Ail drives supplied by us are for-
matted, partitioned and have
Workbench (WB2 for the A60a and
WB3 for the A1200) installed lor
immediate use. Rtlang is incredibly
simple; If you can plug the mouse in
mouse socket, you will be able to
plug the hard drive into the
hard drive socket.

PLEASE PHONE FIRST!

'"=^ar.''"'a,

ete,

'-^^

-""''^'^^^m

Double speed
DRIVE complete with
power supply, SCSI
c^ies, docking statioi
and full Instructions.
Also includes stereo
headphones and car-
lying case for use as
pergonal CD player.

RENO CD

WITH SQUIRREL £164.99

WITH DATAFLYER £174.99

85mb £89.99
120rnb£l04.9»
ITOmb £119.99
250mb £139.99
340mb £174.99
540mb £284.99

■-.^.f

UJ:1j

tlltja low profile 3,5' dnves for A1200.
Come complete with cables etc (as per our
2.5' drives). Simple to fit, you do not need
tocutthecaseoftheA1200. Similar power
consumption to 2.5' drives.

540mb £174.99
SSOmb £194.99

b^smm

Amazing value quad speed eirterral SCSI CD ROM
drive In a tap qualHj enclosure.

PANASONIC QUAD SPEED EXTERNAL
WITH SQUIRREL OR DATAFLYER

ONLY £239.99

^Ji- UJll V

Highly rated SCSI drive will
store lOOmb per car-
, tridge. Comes Complete
"■., with power supply, SCSI
cable, instructions and
cartridge.

Amazing power for such a low
price. This superb accelera-
tor uses a S8020 njnning
at 28hz and comes com-
plete with a 68882 FPtI to
enable your A1200 to run
at 5 MIPS (million
instructions per sec-
ondll Uses standanJ
72 pin SIMMS and includes a
battery backed clock.
Simple trapdoor fitting.

Sir

FOR MAIL ORDER

No.l

FOR AMIGA
IN MANCHESTER

Order NOW for
immediate despatch

FREEPHONE
0500 340548

for enquiries
tel: 0161 796 5279

Send cheques or

postal orders

(made payable to

Siren Software)

or credit card details to:-

SIREN SOFTWARE,

178 BURY NEW RD,

WHITEFIELD,

MANCHESTER

M45 6QF,

ENGLAND

APOLLO
APOLLO
APOLLO

1220 ONLY £99.99
1220 +linb £139.99
1220 +4mb £199.99

ONLY £189.99
or £229.99 with a
Squirrel or Dataflyer

lOOmb ZIP cartridge
£15.99

An Incredibly powerful trapdoor filing

accelerator based around a 6803Q
complete with MMU, 2 SIMM sockets
\ (72 PIN SIMMS), socket for a floating
point unit and battery Backed clock.
Runs at Just under 9.5 MIPS (million
instructions psrsecondl)

APOLLO 1232/50 £199.99
4mb SIMM £99.99
8mb SIMM £159.99
68882 FPU £69.99

Altpnces Include VAT. Postage ana packing"
H will be charged atia-SODer- order (U.K.).
^E £7,50 Europe ana £12.50 rest of the WDrlQ,

ShopperContents

May 1996

Issue 62

The essential magazine for Amiga enthusiasts

ShopperFeatures

CanDo 2.51

Making the most of your CanDo 2.51 Coverdisk
is made easy with John Kennedy's helpful

instructions and advice. We've given you the
software, now we sliow you how to use it to
its fuli potential!

^4O^<0

World Of Amiga
show guide

_24

The Amiga show of the year! Get down to
the Novotel in Hammersmith on 13th and 14th
April 1996 and see the new "Super Amiga'
prototype on dispiay. Sue Grant investigates
what else is on offer at the show. All Future
Publishing's Amiga magazines will be there, so
come and meet the teams.

Uitimate DIY

We started our DIY series last month, and we
are running this feature over Ihe next few issues
to explore the various ways of expanding and
enhancing your Amiga. Dave Taylor and
Paul Overaa are your hosts this month.

The Epson EPL-5500 offers Quality printing ati
bargain price. It's nice and compact loo.

■ ;i :.:i Wprdwonh
i|lJOMpjO/X\ eilDIQ

Digita Wordwort

%"'%^,;;«-o^^,, ^

TPpsramffiF—

_3>

Wordworth 5 is quiclter and smoother in
operation than its predecessors.

ShopperReviews

Wordworth 5 36

Digita's latest release of Wordworth threatens to
out-perform Final Writer. Graeme Sandiford

finds out what changes have been made.

EPL-5500 printer 39

New printers are being launched on to the
market at a furious pace. Larry HIckmott tests
the new laser printer from Epson.

Loom

A new form of music creation for those with
some programming experience. Maff Evans
reviews Loom from Seasoff.

Aurai Syntlietica 42

Maff Evans tries out another music package,
this time a sound creation program which is also
from Seasoff Computing.

Rexecute 43

TTnis new ARexx compiler will appeal to
beginners and experts alike, Paul Overaa
explains its many uses.

ShopperServices

Amiga SHOrvER

Reader Ads

FutureNet

Back issues

IVIaii Order

IVIarlcet Place

Ad Index

May 1996

ShopperReviews

IVIasteriSO

Asimware Innovations has produced special
software to write information to a CD.
Larry Hickmott discovers how it works.

IVIacroForm 46

One tor 3D enthusiasts, Gary Whlteley

tests this new organic modelling tool for
Lightwave users.

CD-ROiVIs

There is something for everyone here,
David l^ylor reviews The Colour Library,
Aminet 10, Nothing But GIFs AGA, 3D GFX,
World Atlas and Texture Portfolio,

KhopperTutoria

HiSoft BASIC 2

In the second installment of our BASIC tutorial.
Paul Overaa explains the use of tag lists.

Music

Jolln Kennedy talks about how to make the
most of sampling music on your Amiga.

Comms

We looked at Internet Relay Chat (IRC) last
month, now Darren Irvine takes a closer look.

ShopperRegulars

Coverdisl(S
News

Amiga Answers

More of your Amiga problems solved by our
panel of experts. Plus, you could win £251

Public Domain

Great new programs from the Public Domain.

Letters

Win £25 for the letter of the month.

Next montli

On sale, Tuesday, 30th April 1 996. Reserve
your copy tod ay I

Purat Svnthgtica li1 .M (gfllachford Technolog'

q| fdtch

*roqranner

-ii

all-

£l2lf L

'AM

MIX

" Jll.5 Jl. .

BliUili

-^4J3]i|l

mih

ni_

J!l|
3I]iU-''^M]2l

MODF
" 1

^ijii

Discover whether Aural Synthetica can bring fall
synthesizer power to your Amiga.

Issue 62

May 1996

ShopperContents

You can

Pages 8 and 20

mmi^^P^tX^

ShopperDisks

Another month and another excellent
selection of programs on our disks. We
have oi/er 3Mb for you:

CanDo2.51 8

Well, believe it or nol, we're giving away
the full version of CanDo 3.51. You might
not have noticed. Anyway, details of what
it can do are here and then a lull guide

starts on page 20.

ApplicationZone 10

Generale ARexx code autorriatically,
compile it with RxGene 3 and get typing
with Blacks Editor,

MasterlSO 10

Try out the CD-R cutting software.

IkirboCalc 3.5 1 1

At last, the much sought-after demo of
TurboCalc 3,5 from Digita, Take a tour of
all the program's cool features.

UtilityZone.

Two brilliant utilities, including the sample
converter, MultiSample.

TechnicalZone

Seven excellent programs. There's a
package to let you unpack any file and a
guru interpreler. Plus: Floppy, LowFrag,
CenterTltles, RIe Sue and Drawer Siie.

^rogrammingZone_12

The code for the HiSoft tutorial and two
great programming utilities; MenuBuilder
and PLab.

I nformationZone 1 2

New and updated again, the guides that
give you all the information on PD Houses
and User Groups.

Issue 62

May 1996

AmSA SHOPPER

ShopperCoverdisks

CanDo

John Kennedy

"Anyone from a
complete novice
to a coding expert

can write real
Amiga programs."

Above, lop and below:
With full AGA graphics
support, you can
create your own
Amiga-friendly gomes
and sitare tliem witll
your friends, or even
sell t/iem: royalty free.

Goverdisks

CanDo 2.51

Not only is the full version of the powerful authoring program
CanDo 2.51 on our Coverdisks, but there's also a demo of
MasterlSO and loads more demos and Shareware too!

8 Amgashopper

CsaOo makes use of standard IFF
Image files, and overlays button
objects on lop. You can use Ihis to
create professional multimedia and
training applications.

anDo is a very powerful
Amiga authoring tool. It is
uniike any other
programming system you
have seen; it combines
incredibie power with total ease of use.
With CanDo 2.51 , anyone from a
complete novice to a coding expert can
write real Amiga programs quickly
and easily. And now you can try
this impressive program for
yourseif, because we are giving
away the full version of CanDo 2.51
free on our Coverdisks this month!

We reviewed CanDo 2.51 way bacl( in
issue 33 of Amiga Shopper, and we said;
"CanDo lakes away all the programming
headaches, leaving you to get your crealive

juices flowing and actually make somettiing
quickly and easily",

CanDo programs are totally Amiga friendly.
A CanDo program can make use of standard
! files and animations created in Deluxe
Paint or Personal Paint, and use sound
effects created with a sound
sampler. A CanDo program can
look exactly like every other
application, using standard
requestors and gadgets - Ihe
only difference being that you will
have written the CanDo program
■ by yourseif.
CanDo makes it easy to write all
kinds of programs. Its unique combination of
a "point and click" interface and a powerful
scripting language means you can choose to

canuc

A CanDo f

^^k image file

^^ Pai

1^:

^^^^^^^^^^^^ have
^^^^^^^ totally
^^^^^ CanC

Dodgy disk?

To avoid errors wfien installing to floppies,
ensure tlial youi destination disks are of high
quality. If an error occurs, try re-boaling and
using a different spare disk -■ tlie majority of
errors are causeii by faulty destinallon disks.

It your Coverdisk absolutely refuses to
woiJi and you are certain it is faulty, please

May 1996

return it. along with an S.A.E., to tlie address
below. Please do not send faulty disks to tlie
Amiga Stiopper offices.

Amiga Shopper Coverdisk

(insert the name of the disk),

TIB pic. TIB House,

11 Edward St., Bradford BD4 7BH.

Issue 62

John Kennedy

CanDo

ShopperCoverdisks

The top Amiga disk magazine

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'^11^ Oi^htntd U\v eclitur at ^iy.-k Oltapiipr •i.iqaziitp. At ynti'l]

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Left: Using the document
facililies of CanDo you
can spread the word by
creating your own disk
magazines- Combine
text, graphics and sound
samples to create an
easy-to-use diakmag.

fnr vfiv. .ill yc" iiteil

Rigljt: Each word in a CanDo document can trigger
a new event, which means you can create your own
Hypertext style documents.

write as lew or as many lines of code as you
want To start with you can use the icons to
create the program automatically. Almost. When
you gain confidence you can then start wrrting
scripts and start to take full control over your
Amiga hardware.

With CanDo, you can create many different
programs, like those listed below.

• MuHlniedla programs

Use CanDo to combine graphics, animations
and sounds into a single multimedia application.
Give copies to your friends or record the final
project to video tape.

• Workbench irtitities

With a powerful scripting language, file-handling
capabilities and a totally Amiga-friendly
approach you can create powerful applications.

• Gamss

CanDo is perfect for creating gsmes such as
complicated graphic adventures or desktop
toys. With the program's extensive graphics and
sound support, you can play back several
animations on screen at once with a
synchronised soundtrack.

• Application software

Don't let Can Do's easy-to-use interface put
you off. The program has plenty of power
under its bonnet, with built-in database
support and maths routines. You can create
your own personal information manager or bank
account monitor.

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CanDo offers full support over the Amiga's
tacitities. You can create applications which run
on the Amiga Workbench or open their own
screen - the choice is yours.

Issue 62

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With CanDo you can really start to make use of
ARexx, adding features la existing programs or
even writing new ARexx applications!

• Programming utilities

CanDo is also a powerful prototyping tool for
dedicated programmers. Create a "front end"
for your Shell-based applications, or anything
with an ARexx port. You can even write
programs to control other applications such
as Art Department

# Disk magazines

CanDo has full support for text documents, plus
user-defined buttons and gadgets. Create your
own disk magazines which will run even without
CanDo present.

CanDo is such a powerful and verBafile program
that we can't possibly cover every aspect of it
on two pages, so we have investigated its
features in much more detail in our special
feature on page 20. Plus, we will be running a

CanDo has all the power you need
to create your own Amiga
application software. Everything
from mathematical graphing
programs to home budget
systems (with full on-line help
facilities) are possible.

Beginners, took!

Before using elttier of this
montti's Coverdisks, please
be sure to back them up -
just in case. Simply tollOM
Itie easy instructions below.

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DBoot up from your Workbench disit or
partition, double-click on your Shell
icon - to be found in your System Drawer.

Nfru Shell procpss 7

7Tuorl<Iiench;> dlskcopv fron SfB: to dre

QHyou only have one disk drive, type in
the following line and then press Return,
Di'skcQR- firgm DFO: en DFO:
If you have two drives, place the Coverdlsk In
DFO: and a blank in DPI:, then type in this
line instead:
Diskcupy from DFO: to DFl:

B Follow the on-screen prompts and
remember thai the Coverdlsk Is the
source disk and the blank Is the destination,

□ If you used the two-drive method,
remember to rename the copy by
clicking on its icon and pressing right-Amiga r.

It you have Iwo drives, you can also
copy the disk from Workbench by

dragging the Coverdlsk icon over the

destination disk's.

Q Then place either of the Coverdisks in
DFO: and reset the Amiga to boat it. It
Is best to boot disk I (or the Subs disk if
you're a subscriber). This will let you install
all the disks to either floppy or hard drive.

six-part CanDo tutorial from the June issue
onwards, to make absolutely sure that you get
the most out of our Coverdlsk. And don't miss
our bargain upgrade offer on page 331 ■

Budget Dptions —

Transact ions

Muv

Prepare Budget
Print Reports
Jel£

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May 1996

AWQA SHOPPER

ShopperCoverdi||w~p

Instructions

David Taylor

Shopper

There's no point pretending
otherwise. This month's
Coverdisks are simply
fabulous. They boast over 6Mb
of programs; in addition to the
commercial software and demos, there's
also a stunning selection of applications
and utilities from the PD world. Admit it.
You're impressed.

ApplicationZone

RxGene 3

Author: Kare Johansson

There are few serious users of the Amiga who
can deny Ihe power of ARenx. If's a useful
language that can be used to perform repetitive
tasks or communicate between programs. Many
commercial programs tiave AReix support and
you can find lots of new scripts written to lake
advantage ol this.

However, there is no A Rexx -specific editor
supplied with the Amiga, nor any way of
compiling AReix scripts so that they can be
eiecuted. RxGene 3 enables you to specify
parts of the tricky code thai you want within an
ARexx script It then imports that information
from rls own GUI into a specially-created editor

MasterlSO demo

The last tew years have seen a remarkable
price drop in recordable CD-ROM drives.
Although they will never have mass appeal to
home users, small businesses are now finding
that such drives are within their reach and they
gi«e the advantage ot cross-platform
accessibility. Some submissions for
magazines appear on CDs and entire issues of
Amiga Shopper Are now stored on CDs-

Of course, to take advantage of CD-R,
even for audio work, you need software to
drive the hardware, which is where MasterlSO
Steps in. From Aslmware, creators of
AslmCDFS, the program is reviewed this Issue
on page 45, but you can take a look at our
demo version on Ihe Coverdisks. The program
has very high machine requirements, but if
you're looking at cutting CDs, you're likely to
have the necessary hardware. For further
details, contact Slitlersofl " 01908 261466.

Choice

You think that giving away the full CanDo 2.51 program is
enough? You're wrong. We have demos and Shareware galore
lined up too. David Taylor explains.

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which can position the scripts as you need
them. You can then fill out this skeleton to
complete the script. When it's finished you can
compile the script. As with Rexecute, the new
ARexx compiler from Horizon {reviewed on page
43), the scripts still need Reixmast to run, but
what results you can achieve!

A huge thanks to the author for sending this
program in so that AS readers can take
advantage of it.

Blacks Editor

Author: Marco Negri

Last month, Blacks Editor was awarded a Star
buy in our Internet Select section, this month we

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MasterlSO offers Amiga owners the chance
to cut their own compact discs.

10 AnaOASHOPfER

May 1996

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RxGens 3 (tar left) can
help you generate
ARexx code and then
compile it to create
programs like these
two (above and left),
ft shows how much
more you can do with
ARexx than just create
simple scripts.

just had to give it to you. This is a new text
editor which has features galore, and is ideal
for creating documents or editing scripts. This
version of the program requires Workbench 3,
but a Workbench 2 version is in development.

Blacks Editor has built-in ARexx support that
gives you options to count and save blocks as
well as record and use your own macros, so
repetitive tasks can be carried out automatically.

Of course, there are also many other
features included in the program, from the find
facility and the conversion of characters to and
from cases, to paragraph formatting and the
in-built document encryption for sensitive data.

It's astonishing to see a first release of a
program like this oflenng so many advanced
options. There are now quite a number of

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Blacks Editor is a new text editor with ARexx
support and masses of features.

Issue 62

David Taylor

Instructions

T|M|pperCoverdisks

different Freeware and Shareware tent
editors available, but Blacks Editor is sure to
find an audience.

UtilityZone

MultiSample

Author: Graham Dean

File formats are a bit of a pain. It doesn't matter
what medium you work with: documents,
pictures or sounds. They are all available in
different formats or even come from different
platforms. The problem is that most applications
can only deal witfi one or two types of format.
So what do you do if you have a sound sample
you want to use, but your editor won't load it?
You use MultiSample, of course.

This utility has an obvious GUI with the
input and output files and fomiats easily chosen.
It gives you greater compatibility for sound files
and music packages.

CRSnap

Author: C. R. Hahn

Taking screenshcts has always been pretty
much the job of Quicligrab. However, the
problem with Quicl^grab is that it doesn't take
any notice of any previous shots from earlier
uses so that it overwrites earlier files.

CRSnap overcomes this. It is a
screengrabbing commodity that enables you to

TurboCalc 3.5 demo

specify keys and save directories, but which
most Importantly will not ovenftrite earlier files.
It's also remarkably compact.

TechnicalZone

XFD

Authors: Various

Tliis package is a collection of libraries and
sub-libraries together with CLI commands that
give you access to de-pack just about every
type of crunched file that the Amiga uses.

There are so many different types of
packers used that there is no way you could

MulliSample is an
accessible utility that
can convert sound
samples foryou. This
picture was taken
using CRSnap - the
new screengrabber.

have every single package (even I don'tl), but
XFD enables you to unpack them all and
remarkably easily. Simple knowledge of the Shell
IS all that's needed.

Guru 3

Author: Emiel Lensink

OK, hands up anyone who's never had a guru
meditation. Thought so. They are supposed to
be there as a guide to the fault to let you
know what went wrong, but the fact is that not
many people actually know how to interpret
the eight figure numbers. Guru 3 is the
solution; tell it the number and it will report, in
English, the fault.

TurboCalc has become one ot the
Amiga's best spreadsheet programs.
The interface is configurable and
inserting functions into a ceil is simple.
Any dala can then be displayed in a
variety of visual manners using the
graph functions. An addilionai boon for
Digita users is ttiat Wordwortti 5 (see
page 3G) can import spreadsheets
directly on to the Wordworth page.

LrtHCiiEft— a.i t<i«-» nil

TiiboCdo^O

kiKii, rmi dwI Lm

Tfiere are full documents supplied
with our demo so that you can try out a
of TurboCaic's functions and get to
know the program, in this version, the
save and print options have been
disabled, but you'M be glad to know that
readers of AS can take advantage of an
enciusive upgrade offer.

For a limited period (until 30th April
1996), you can save
£20 off the retail price
of £49.99 and gel the
full version for only
£29.99. Digita is the
exclusive worldwide
distributor of the
Engiisii version of
'nirboCaic and
provides technical
support to its
registered users.

BMaiaaiWiiir f iiii ii hctj^i-i.^ -^'biii B.ii>ii.,h

Siirplm CalculitlDS

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Title _
Your address

Initials

Surname

Post code
Your signature .

Description

_Tele phone

RRP

TurboCalc 3.5 £49.99

_AS price
£29.99

Total (please add postage and packing) £

Method of payment (please tick one):

Cheque Hj Postal Order □

Credit Card (Vis a/Ac cess/ Eurocard/ Mastercard)

cardNoiDnnnnnnn

Expiry date: [ ^| \ \

Please make your cheques payable to Digita International.
Post your order to: Amiga Shopper TurboCalc 3.5 Offer, Digita
International Ltd., Black Horse House, Exmouth EX8 1JL
Or call Digita's Order Hotline on « 01 395 270273.

You may photocopy this form. Offer ends 30/4/96 ',

issue 62

May 1996 I

AWGASHOPPER 11

ShopperCovercli||Efi^

Instructions

David Taylor

Lett: PLab is an
image processor
for programmers.

Below: Another
utility for
programmers,
MenuBuilder
generates code
for menus.

Palelle

ScrHode

Hidth:e6>l8Height',82ee
Depth: 8

► Floppy

Author: OR

This is a utility that I mentioned last month in
our PD Select section. It enables you to create
disks according to a newi system; an
improverreni on the trackdisk. device, which
enables you to fit around another 1 per cent on
to a normal DD floppy.

The difference between Floppy and other
disk systems is that it provides a bootable
version. Obviously, you need to have the
system installed so that it boots from a
standard disl^ initially, but after the firs! boot,
the system is kept in RAM. even when you
soft reboot.

Disk contributions

This month's disks were compiled using files
from Aminet and from Walton's Mountain
BBS (» 01B1 G91 5730), and with the help of
the authors of the programs.

If you would lihe to contribute to a future
disk, whether you have a full application,
utility, 4DK demo, cllpart, font, 3D object, or
even a module, send it to:

David Taylor,

Amiga Shopper Coverdlsk Contributions,

30 Monmouth Street, Bath, Avon BA1 2BW.
Please only send the minimum distribution
archive. Also, please do not powerpack
(or similar) any files because it detracts
from the ariAivlng.

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LowFrag

Author: Eric Sauvageau

All computers tend to face the problem of
memory fragmentation, where one small file left
lying around in memory by a program causes
problems by separating two large blocks, so that
a new program cannot access the available
memory as a large block, There is no solution to
the problem, but there is LowFrag. LowFrag
improves the ordering of your memory so that
small files are kept out of the middle of memory
blocks. It will help solve some memory problems.

CenterTitles

Author: Massimo Tantignone

This little hack adjusts the titles in windows so
that instead of appearing shunted to the side,
they centre themselves. It's a small difference,
but one that makes your Workbench look a
great deal neater.

Subscnbers disk

Subscribing to your
favourite magazine
doesn't just mean saving
money off the cost of
each Issue. Nor simply
getting an exclusive
newsletter with special
subscriber discounts. And
It doesn't end with the
extra money savings from
our mail order either.

If you haven't guessed,
the big disk next to this is
a hint. Yes, every month we
produce a third disk
packed with an additional
3Mb of fantastic programs,
exclusive to AS subscribers.

This month, for instance, there's the
complete Fractal Pro package which Is one of

some money an
being an Amiga

the Amiga's uiosl powerful
fractal generators. There's
also the new version of
MagnlflCAD. file computer-
aided design program.
CGWB Pattern is a superior
update tor the WB Pattern
preferences. Then, there's
another four supreme
packages loo.

So. the question is,
how do you lake advantage
of all these exceptional
offers? Very easily. All you
have to do is pick up the
phone and dial our
subscription hotline on
= 01225 BZ2511. Give them
d eiperience the wonder of
Shopper subscriber.

12 AkOGASHaPPER

May 1996

File Size and
Drawer Size

Author: Robert Simpson

These two programs add themselves to the
tools menu on Workbench and enable you to
get real sizes of multiple files or drawers.

ProgrammingZone

We have a treat for programmers this month.
Not only does the ProgrammingZone conlain
the code that accompanies our HiSoft BASIC
lutonal (see page 5B), but there are also two
utilities to make your life dreamy!

iVIenu Builder

Author: Adam Dawes

This is a utility designed for programmers who
work within the Intuition environment. It enables
you to design menus from within a GUI and
then generates the source code for inclusion in
your program.

This version is its initial release and only
supports C, but the author has plans lo extend it
further based on feedback - so don't forget to
get in touch with him,

PLab

Author: Robert Simpson

This IS a package designed for programmers
who need to incorporate images into their
work. It can convert pictures into raw data for
yoy as well as add some compression and
perform a vanety of other useful, image-related
tasks. The documentation explains and details
all the options.

nformationZone

As always, the I nformationZone provides you
with details of User Groups and PD Houses.
We update it with new entnes every month, but
we are still receiving some entries on paper.
Please send in your text as ASCII on a disk - it
makes our life so much easier I

While this section of the disk is extremely
popular, there are limits to the amount of
information we can afford to supply on the
disk. To supplement the guide, you will have
doubtless noliced the launch of our new
Purely PD section (see page 77), which is an
advertising section specifically for the PD so
that you can find what you are looking for
easily and quickly, ■

Shareware notice!

Remember that a number of the programs
on our Coverdisks are some form of
Shareware. Amiga Shopper has compiled
both disks with the help of the authors, who
have received no fee from us.

So. if you keep and use these programs,
you must register. Some people only want a
postcard, so please put In the effort. They
did when they created the program.

Issue 62

MAKES YOUR AMIGA MORE THAN
2timesfa5ter-2.88MIP$

/HA^U/H RAMS n

' M2B0S/HB

fPU

33MHJ
FPU

Omb

£4999

£89.99

2mb

£11999

£159.99

4mb

£159.99

£19999

£24999

£28999

Speed Increase of neaklv 2.3 times • Avajiable wiih 0. 2, 4 or 3MB of

32-Bit RAM installed » Uses Standard 72-pin Simms • Optionai PLCC

TrPE FPU [floating point unit] • Battery Backed Clock/Calender

♦ Finger ClttOut to help Installation • 0-4mb - pcmcia compatible

(for use with overdrive, squirrel etc.) » Zero Waite State Design,

SSOppt

^BUTTON

MCE & MATS

(or all Amigas t Aietri STi
BEiGE £12.99

BLACK £14.99

MAT £2,99 OR £1 WITH

A Mouse

Aymrd winning 560dpi Resolution * 90% rating in CU Amiga
♦ Micro Switched Buhons ♦ Amiga/Atari ST Switchable ♦ All 3

BUTTONS CAN BE USED WITH MANY PROGRAMS SUCH AS DIRECTORY OPUS 5

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Peifcxm'nci • GP Fm Sofr««E Ophdn • ImEsrJET CoMpnnaLE *""''' ' '
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(LeGaili SEQuiilEn foIlisednaBT line) t MNP 2-5 ftv4;, imN!!B«
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Gold - 2Mb & Hard Disk Required - £1 49.99

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owners - Amiga Shopper 90% - £49.99

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A500 512k RAM ExPANSiow- £19.99 wftk FREE Opus 4 worth oveb £50

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ShopperNews

May 1996

Issue 62

■ ' ''ic^bl^y^^tS^i^A^

■^^'^v?.v'^^^•■ ^' ''?^'.'^'"':

■ - /j ■ ■'

AT show off new Amiga
prototype; special tiard drive
offer; SX32 upgrade for
CD32; Siamese prices;
PPaint update and more!

New Amiga model

unveiled by AT at CeBit

At last, it's the Amiga that we all
wanted. Since Amiga
Technologies were established
they ha«e been bombarded with
requests from Amiga owners for new machines.
We've all been hankering after a faEter, more
stylish and mere enpandable machine that
doesn't cosl the Earth (or two and a half grand
to be more eiact.

Now, at CeBit '96 (one of the world's
largest computer fairs), Amiga Technologies
have made their response - the Amiga Mind
Walker. Don't worry, the lame name is likely to
be changed. The prototype model on display is
quite a departure trorn the normal styling we
come to expect from the Amiga, Gone are the
beige tones and the wedge-like shape of the
A1 200 and even the boxiness ot the A4000 and
the other big-bo* machines. The new Amiga is
now a silver, svelte and decidedly futuristic-

"Gone are the
beige tones and
the wedge-like
shape."

looking thing. Starting from a square base the
casing gradually curves toward the lop to create
an arch. It also has a detached keyboard.

However, more irrportant than cosmetic
changes, are the changes made inside. Not only
is the machine faster than a standard A1200,
thanks to its 680EC30 processor, it is infinitely
more expandable due to a new modular design.
The motherboard features twin SIMM sockets

for fitting up to 1 28Mb of RAM without the need
for memory cards.

The most innovative feature of the machine
is its expansion bus which can except standard
Amiga Zorro slots and PCI ones. This means
that you can take advantage of existing Amiga
carels, cheaper PC peripherals and the new
PowerPC cards. The great thing about the
machine is that individuals can walk into a store
and choose the system they want - either
starting off small and building the system piece-
by-piece or going straight for a monster tower.

It will be supplied as standard with a quad-
speed CD-ROM drive, HD floppy and a 500Mb-
ish hard drive. Because rt is an "inbetween an
A1 20D-and-A4000'' machine, its pricing is
expected to be £700, Full production should
start this Summer in preparation for an
anticipated big "Christmas". The new Amiga will
be at the World Of Amiga show (see page 24),

ERfnT

r floppy users

The power of this month's Coverdisk,
CanDO 2.51 means that it requires a hard
drive. We know that a lot of you already have
drives, but we didn't want to leave you
floppy users out in the cold. We've been
working hard to secure a special deal
for you to get you a hard drive upgrade
for the best price possible.

We've finalised a deal at the twelfth hour

Name

[which is why this piece is here instead of
with our other offers), A1 200 owners
can obtain a 3,5-inch IDE hard drive
with an amazing 1Gb (1,000Mb)
capacity for only £1901 That's a
saving of £40 off the already
mpresEive RRP of £229, TTie deal
has been negotiated with Gasteiner, so
the quality is assured and we'll supply

Credit Card no

each drive with the
necessary cabling and a
selection of PD software for free,'
Because of its incredible value,
this offer is only available until
Tuesday, 30th April 1996. You can obtain'
it by completing this form or by phoning our
order hotline on ii 01 225 82251 1 and
quoting order code AS/Gig/03,

Address

Post Code_

Expiry Date

Phone Number.

I
I

tGb3.5" hard drive for A1200 £190 AS/Gig/03

Customers outside tlie UK add £4.00 for overseas delivery.

Method of payment Access F Visa l_' Cheque D PO iZI

Please make cheques payable to: Future Publishing Limited.

All prices include posting, packing and VAT.

Send form to: Amiga Shopper, Future Publishing Ltd, FREEPOST
(BS4900), Somerton, Somerset TA1 1 6BR

Do not send cash. Use the methods of payment listed above, EEC
customers registered for VAT, please quote your registration number;

EI Tick here if you don't want to receive special offers from other
specially-sBlected companies. AMS/62

14 Amisasndpfer

Issue 62

May 1996

ShopperNews

CD32 expansion

We haven'l heard much about the CD^' recently, but now Eyetech have announced a new internal expansion
unit for the rnaohine. The 3X32 is intended to turn your CD^^ Irom just a games console, into a real computer.
The SX33 iits within the CD^^'s FMV slot and includes all the standard ports, a VGA monitor connector and
provision for an internal hard drive and 8Mb memory expansion.

The SX-1 was the first expansion unit developed for the CD^', but its performance was disappointing in
that it was much too unstable and bulky to do its job properly. The SX32, on the other hand, is "ideal lor a
portable, low-cost, multimedia delivery platform," apparently. The SX32 will be reviewed fully in neKt month's

Amiga Shopper,
For further
information call
Eyeleoh on
w 01 642
713185,

Sound reduction

Do you want to improve the quality of your sound
recording? Well, you can with the Little Gem desktop
micro audio mixer that we reviewed back in our
October 1995 issue. And now you save £20 when you
buy the unit from Giilet Multimedia. They have slashed
the price from £69.95 to a mere £49.95.
Give them a call on w 01353 669203.

Fontastic!

The home and professional video enthusiast now have
another source of fonts for their video titling.
MovieFonts 2 Irom Diskotech is a collection of 18

f^r.i>^^pt||

■tmnSia, jm^

^^OU3 ^M}^

'^^^m

1 jj L'J - '-'-

/^>iMtM''''5?'''*-^

original animated titling fonts. The fonts are all in
colour and they work with all Amigas with 1 Mb and

Deluxe Paint 3 (or a similar art/animation program.)
Moviefonts 2 costs £40, If you want to know

more call Diskotech on » 01591 620242.

Titbits

Northern lights

Amiga nuts who live near Wigan
will be pleased to learn of the birth
of another new User Group. The
group meets every Sunday at 1pm
at Si, Thomas The Ivlartyr School
Hall, Highgate Road, UpHolland,
Wigan, Lanes. They offer free
advice, cheap hardware and have
an eitensive PD library. Entrance
fee IS £1 ,50 and you are urged to
bring your Amiga with youl

New books

Wiley have just released a new
book called the Programmer's
Guide To Online Resources.
Written by Bob Koohem, the book
aims to help you track down the
programming resources you need.
It covers programmer-onented
bulletin boards, the Internet,
CompuServe, America Online,
Delphi, BIX, GEnie, eWorld and
Microsoft Network,

The Programmer's Guide To
Online Resources costs £18.99
and is available by order from
major bookstores, or you could call
Wley themselves on -a 01 243
843294, but they charge £2 for
postage and packing.

Escom shares

Amongst rumours of financial
difficulties, fuelled by their
announcement of their DM1 25
million {$85m) losses for 1995,
Escom increased its capital with a
release ol extra shares. The shares
were "taken over by Commetzbank
AG for the issue consortium and
will be offered to shareholders at
the earliest possible date". This
increase was an agreement
between the company, its
associates and bankers so that
they acquired new resources
amounting to around DM100
million ($70m).

Blitz Basic 2.1

In the April 1996 Amiga Shopper
we reviewed Blitz Basic 2.1, we
also menlEoned the program in our
games creation feature in the
same issue. Unfortunately, we
quoted the price incorrectly in the
feature. Blit? Basic 2.1 actually
costs £34.99 from Guildhall
Leisure on » 01 302 890000.
We are sorry for any
inconvenience caused.

AWKMSHORPeR 15

THE MAN FROM ESCOM EHPLfllNS...

"How to get
A1200 for

Rmiga Magic Pack

"Now
that's..,
magicl

■ 1 X Amiga A1200 ■ 1 x Two Button Mouse " 1 x Power Supply

■ Workbench " Kickstart 3.1 ' 3 User Manual?.
SOFTWARE BUNDLE INCLUDES ■ Djgita Wordsworth 4SE
■Wordsworth Print Manager ■ Digita Organiser

■ Digita Datastore ■ Photogenics 1.2SE 'Personal
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NORMAL
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J.^,h^d,^i,HlK^,fi^1,»^*lm|n«llhdllt-lrln Wr"dM«ii7ddNiid.ai.rdir W*«lvjiljhlf WJ^-lnlffldlwlFlF^^dlW™l^n^ inESmUmBimimr.iBIJmdnlKuarnn^minanOddB^^^ M[ All bMkI! ™ rU « iralaW m II !Br!l

Issue 62

May 1996

ShopperNews

Windows

Microsoft

ing for different
on kit will, as
cost £129,95,
ed PCI SCSI-2
buy the PC itself
icluded wilhin
m DX2 with
costs £735 27
;e thfough to a Pentium
"" -*>" 0B1.97!To

The April issue of
the world famous
AMIGA POWER
is full. Of things.
We have an EXCLUSIVE review (that's "EXCLUSIVE"
as in "not reviewed anywhere else tor ages") of the
asloundingly impressive new pinball game from 21 si
Century, Slamtilt, We laugh heartily a( the feeble
attempts of Super Street Fighter II Turbo to be any
good. We conclude our complete playing guide to Alien
Breed 3D, We examine the complete and utter history
of pinball - both on and off the Amiga. And we
reminisce (in that tedious way people of our age tend to
do) about one of our favounte children's shows from the
1 970s, Canoe Squad. It's out now. Or soon anyway.

An Editor
AMIGA POWER

AMIGA

Our man in Germany
this month is young
Mr. Sandiford. He isn't
usually in Germany, but
he is this month, because he has been dispatched
with a notebook, camera, press badge and plenty of
sharp pencils lo bring us back all the details on the
exciting CeBrt show. Amongst other exhibitors,
Amiga Technologies will be there, showing off a
brand new Amiga! Graeme will be only too happy to
tell you all about it in the next issue of Amiga Format,
on sale I1th April.

Nick Veltch
Editor

T tbits

Personal
development

Cloanto have been continuing
development of their popular
Personal Paint program, PPaint,
they believe, is the ideal program
for Internet publishing, because its
colour reduction abilities make it
perfect for helping save download
time for pictures, and its support ol
new formats like PNG gives users
a program from a company With
"years of experience where PC
and Mac companies are just
beginning to introduce products,"

They have also released s GIF
module for PPaint, which includes
support and documentation for
Internet features. It is available
from Amrnet as gfx/conv/gif_io,lha,

Cloanto have also finished a
set of high quality datatypes for
GIF, JPEG, PNG and XBM
formats. They claim they are "fast,
system compliant and support
unusual format variants," They
support 24 -bit datatype tag
extensions and can pass true
colour data to applications such as
the CyberGraphX software. These
datatypes are included in the
Amiga Surfer pack and will enable
users to view 99.5 per cent of
pictures on the WWW,

iSBilL.

To make buying by mail order as easy and as
safe as possible, Amiga Shopper tias put
togetlier tlie following top 10 tips to buying
mail order products:

1 Before you send any money for goods,
telephone the suppher to make sure tliat tlie
item you require is in stock.

Ask questions about tlie mail order
company's policy on delivery and returns of
faulty equipment lUlake sure there are no
hidden costs such as postage and packing.
Find out when you can realistically expect to
receive your goods,

2 Always read the small print on
advertisements.

3 Beware ol companies that do not include
their address on their advertisements. Avoid

companies whicti do not answer or return
your telephone calls.

Pay by credit card where you can. If you are
■ ordering goods of more than £100 in total
value, you are legally entitled to claim
compensation from some credit companies if
the retailer goes bust. Chedt your credit card
company's policy. You can also try to get extra
insurance in advance.

5 Always keep records. If you are buying by
credit card, keep a note of ttie lime of the
order and ask for an order nurnber. When
ordering anything over the telephone, always
double-check the price.

6 If you are not paying for the goods by
credit card, pay by cheque instead. Never
send cash through the post, and avoid using
postal orders.

7 If you are sending a cheque, keep a note of
the cheque number, the date and the exact
value. Make sure you know the exact name of
the mail order company too.

8 When you receive your goods, check them
carefully. If anything is missing or faulty.
contact the supplier immediately.

9 Always order goods from the most recent
issue of Amiga Shopper.

Olf a problem arises, contact the supplier
in the first instance. Calmly and politely
tell them your problem. Most problems turn out
to be minor hitches or misunderstandings that
can easily be resolved without taking the
matter further.

It you think you have a grievance, contact
your local Trading Standards Officer. The
number is in the phone tiook.

Amiga SHOPPER

Open Sunday
Late Might Opening ^r I lam to 4pm_
Wpdneaday fi ThurEd-iy
c]H7J(Jpm

HOWTO ORDER

Order by telephone quoting your
CrEditCard Number. Ifpavineby

VM:IwJiif4it'i^!¥Kr:

correHjondercepiedise quote a '

working days ckiFC]i>e de arance

SHOWROOM ADDRESS:

DEPT. AS. UNIT 3, ARMLEY PARK

COURT, ST/INNINGLEV RD,

L£ED^LS(22A£

, f^ via

LOW COST DELIVERY Telephone 0113 2319444

•2-4 Week Days
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•All prices include VAT @ 1 7.5%
•Lsrge showroom with parking
•Multi-rTkillion pound cDinpany
•Overseas orders welcome
•Educational purcliase orders wekome

J Lombard Tricit/ low rate I
I finance now available, call. I

£3.50 24 HR MAIL

£5 95 NEW! BBS i

, I A AA t-Mniliir&tcDm^nrsincE.fa.uli

L I li.uU www.(ir^liicl.cQ,uk/nritcDni

COMPUTER CENTRE OPEN 7 DAYS A WEEK

24 HR MAIL ORDER SERVICE FAX: 01 II 231-9191
NEW! BBS Sales & Technical line Tel: 01 13 231-1422

AMIGA REPAIR
CENTRE

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I fflaj'iVrjIJunilinnlJ,«l!nflf|W,f piiBcy (mm SnliMir On DjttipB IjtAH.
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UK'S cheapest

Amiga's

A 1200

Magic Pacl<

Inc. Wordworth 4se

Personal Paint V6.4,

Phocogenics etc.

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Hardware

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Issue 62

May 1996

ShopperNews

DTP services offered

We have had an encouraging response lo our plea a
few issues ago for people who can offer Amiga printing
services to our readers. We have details of two more
companies this month;

■ Printout offer DTP services including scanning, film
and bromide output to a high resolution imagesetter
and colour Inkjet printing. For details and prices
contact them at Printout, Rock House, Wheatsheaf

Comer, Shiney Row, County Durham DH4 4QX, or call
f 0191 385 6591,

■ Enlightenment Systems can handle colour or mono
scanning, overlay ot artwork or high quality te«t on to
existing images, conversion of image files to Amiga or
PC format, high quality colour or mono printing up to
A4, lamination, binding and they can even produce
customised colour greetings cards for you. Contact
Enlightenment on w 01387 254195.

Future vision

The UK's leading Internet magazine
.net (published by Future
Publishing, of course), has brought
out three new books for Internet
users. Called the Future Visions
series, these books review every
site they can find concerned with
their chosen subjects; they also
contain
advice on
navigating
the Internet,
with all the
jargon
eiplained.

The first
of the
trilogy from
.net is

Music And The Internet which
"highlights the enormous synergy
between music lovers and
computer technology"! The book
takes a tour through every type of
music site you could think of which
can be found on the Internet.

The much more interestingly-
titled Sex And Tfie Internet has
been written by Dave Winder who's
name you may know because he
has contributed lo Amiga Shopper
on many occasions. It contains
material on anything connected to
sex and relationshrps on the Net:
from dating lo pornography.

The third book, SciFi And The
Internet covers - you guessed it! -
anything and everything that could

Three new
books from
the makers
of .net.

be classed as science fiction to be
found on the Net.

The books costs £1 2.99 each
and they are available fnim all the
major bookstores.

Titbits

Quantum Leap

Quantum Leap have obtained the
Vidi range of digitisers previously
available from Rombo and re-
released them. The Vidi 24RT will
sell for £149 and the Pro version
for £249. Quantum Leap can be
contacted on t 01506 461917.
AS will be looking at the models
in detail next month.

Towers and
Shuttles

Blittersoft have released details of
a set of new Tower systems and a
selection of Shuttle (daughter)
boards. The Shuttles are available
for A1 200, A1 500, A3000 and
A4000 models, As an example,
the A1200 version offers: 7»Zorro
III 15DMA), 6.PCISA, S.Video,
1 iiCPL) expansion slot, 1 xreal time
clock and 4!iSIMIv1 sockets for
memory. Coming with a choice of
lower units and 230 watt power
supply, that unit will cost
£499.95. For details of other
specifications, contact Blittersoft
on" 0198 261466.

Amiga Shopper readers can save £4.95

off the brand new ARexx compiler from
Horizon Software. Rexecute normally retails
for £14,95, and you can buy it for only £10
by taking advantage of our exclusive offer.

If you want to know more about
Rexecute turn to our review of the program
on page 43.

Please note that this offer is only valid
until Tuesday, 30th April 1996, Photocopies
of this form will not be accepted.

Name

Credit Card no

Address

_Post Code

Phone Number.
Rexscute

Expiry Date

_eio

Customers outside the UK add £4.00 for overseas delivery.
Method of payment Access Q Visa D Cheque D PO [
Please make cheques payable to: Horizon.
Ail prices include posting, packing and VAT.

Send forni to: Horizon Software, 15 St. Nicholas Road, Ttllingham,
Southminster, Essex, CMO 7S0.

Do not send cash. Use the methods of payment listed above, EEC
customers registered for VAT, please quote your registration number:

Photocopies ot this forni cannot be accepted.

A(WlS/62

AlflGASHOPrcf? 19

ShopperFeature

CanDo

John Kennedy

Programming

with

We are giving away CanDo 2.51 on our Coverdisl<s this month, and we asked John Kennedy to

help you understand just how mucli you can achieve with this powerful authoring system...

"CanDo is very
powerful, so

there is a lot of
information to try
and absorb."

CanDo is not like any other
programming language,
because of the way in
which it combines a point
and click interface with a
more traditional script-based approach.
For example, you can make CanDo display
an IFF image either by typing in the
command "ShowPlcture" into the script, or
by clicking on the Picture Icon. If you click
on the icon, the necessary script
commands are automatically inserted.

A CanDo program is called a "deck",
because it consists ot one or more "cards". One
card at a time is displayed on the screen, either
on a custom screen display or in a Window on
an existing screen. Some applications have one
card, some have many. The cands may contain
"objects" such as items of text, an image, a
button or some other element. Each object may
also have an associated script: for example, a
card may contain a button. When the button is
clicked it triggers a script which forces CanDo
to move to a different card.

CanDo decks can be saved and loaded to
disk. It IS also possible to convert a deck into a
stand-alone application which you can pass
around your friends. However, they will also
need to have CanDo installed on their system to
be able to run the application.

CanDo is very powerful, so there is a lot
of information to try and absorb before you can
be happy creating and running your own
programs. Before we get to a real, working
example program, here is a explanation of
some of the more useful icons. Remember that
there is on-line help available; position the
pointer over the control panel and press the
HELP button on the keyboard.

Example project

To gel started, we are going to create a deck
with two cards (see steps 1 to 1 2 pictured to
your right and on page 22). Each card will have
a different message on it, and there will be
buttons to enable us to move between them.
You should try and master this simple project

Guide to CanDo's mam toolbar

nil's switch enables
the user la either
test l/ie application,
(Broui/se it), or edit
tire application
(Design It).

Click here
to edit (or
add, or
copy) a

card.

Disk activity
object.

Error control
object

)eck: Unnar

Brouse

Deck navigation
tools. From left
to right, top to
bottom:
previous card,
goto card, next
card, first card
and lost card.

These buttons control
object creation and
manipulation. Select one
of the settings before
clicking on one of the
primary object icons to
the immedlote right.

ARexx

object.

Xtra tools menu. These are
where the less-used tools
are stored, including the
bookmark tool, general
preferences and settings
and joystick control.

♦♦e

DosNotify
6anePort
LastBookMark ▼]

Input field
object.

CanDo sub-routines object

Brush animation object

Sound object

Timer object

20 AlUBOa SHOPPER

May 1996

Issue 62

John Kennedy

CanDo

ShopperFeature

step 1: Starting from scratch, you'll see that you
already have a blank it/indow. This is the first
(and so far only) card in the deck. Click on the
card editing tiuiton. You should see a window
like this, a list of all the cards currently in the
deck. Click on EdIL

[jTJ/lditor

i iifillK,..

Stripts^M Objetts,,,
NKSjges... EeforgftlacM

nvfiritdrd

TrfliaSubM rfMtlxiNit

Fron Pirtnt-Dickj iefgre)eti[ln!nt

I9( im\

jii: Ir fifil li^' l-n/i: 'WlHili^lwl'

Step 2: Now we are in the Card/Edhar
screen. Click an the name of the card and
rename it The buttons on the light determine
which scripts associated with this card we are
going to edit. For the moment, cfrcfi on
"AllerAttachment".

a Hjllti; aii^ |*»|i

Ifl Tpl ind FiHil,..

tfl rULtLII.,.

step 3: The Script Editor. This script is started
every time the card is displayed. You can type in
commands on the left, but let's use the icons.
Scroll the list of tools to the right until you find
the letter "A". Click it. Now we can add text, so
click the "Set Text and Font..." button.

Step 4: Ybu should see the text editing window
appear. Here you can select the font you wish to
use, the colour and the actual text. As you
experiment, you should see the text appear In
the screen above. Get something close to this
and click on OK.

lili -Hi FInl lirl- f.i.l: -|tHflllilt.inr

!;[:a"TBiiii!r''

step 5: Now click on the Position Text button.
You can move the pointer around until you are
happy with where the text is located. Click OK
and you'll get back to the script editing screen.
Now look at what CanDo has automatically
coded for you. Click on the OK in the title.
Position the pointer over a keyword and press
the Help key for Information on each command.

MMit 1

tmiDIVIDO

Tsu im ttm'iti It iit i m M\m
First lit ^(Ed till mm if lb mi Ude,
M the i\tt fw M tullHi.

K i ImiW

Exit 1

step 6; We are back at the card editing window,
so click OK. We are back at the card selector
window, so click Exit. We are back at the control
panel. Make sure the Add/Edit/Copy button is
set to ADD and click on the Button object. Click
on ADD and you'll be asked to sketch out the
size of the button. We will use a special type of
button, so it doesn 't matter what size-

before being tempted to add embellishments, in
case you get lost. It is uital to understand the
basics before getting carried away and adding
interactive animations.

Script Editor

Ttie Script Editor is the most powerlul part of
CanDo because it is here where you create the

underlying programs which determine what
your program actually does. A thorough
understanding of all the commands is essential,
so you should read all the on-line documentation
carefully, and also look through the enample
decks to see how they work,

Ydu can either type commands into the
Script Editor, or use the Helper icons down the
right-hard side to write the script for you. You

CanDo is perfect for

creating helpful
multimedia application
software. You could
create a guide to your
local town, for example.

Use CanDo to make a slideshow of your holiday

snaps. You could even record the finished show

to video tape with a genlock.

Issue 62

May 1996

can edit the script created by the icons as
though you had typed it yourself, so the icons
are an easy way to get started.

The icons are shown in the "Helper icons"
bo« on page 23, along with a description of the
code they produce. Remember, you can scroll
the list up and down. If you want help on a
particular command in the script, place the
pointer ouer it and press the Help key. Press the
Help key from the main window for general help.

The Script Editor is called upon many times.
For example, you can wnte a script to occur
when a button is pressed (as in our eiample), or
when the button is double-clicked, dragged or
released. In fact, from the Button editor screen
you can write a script for ALL of these events it
that is want you want to do.

You can attach script to practically
everything that can happen in a CanDo deck,
and the most useful "happenings" are
represented by the icons which appear on the
main bar (displayed in the annotated diagram
on page 20). For example, when you click on
the Timer icon you can define the script to
lake place after a predefined delay or at a
particular time. Your associated script could
shuffle the deck to the next card in a slideshow
every 1 seconds.

In a similar fashion the Keylnput icon
attaches script to individual key presses, and the
DiskActivity icon attaches scripts to the insertion

AWGASHOnRER 21

ShopperFeature

CanDo

John Kennedy

luttoi/Cditor

,ftifii!rD-i .{fi;T?~\'.l

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5^ tort W,

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Imgi J CiFLBKI

Sdrrttd ^

Ihl llMlllHJ J

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bliiM 1

DnlltCIUtl

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...

Step 7: Edit the bullon. There are three types:
Area is a location on l/ie screen. Text is a w/ord
or words, and Image Is an IFF brush. Select Tent
and you'll see the Text Editor again. Enter "Click
me!" and OK it to get back. You can also choose
the colour and outline style of the button. When
you've finished, click on the "C/icfc" button in the
Scripts part of the window.

Step 8: Now we're at the script which is executed
when the button is pressed. At present this has
little to do (we want to make it move lo another
card, but we only have one), so let's add a
sound effect Click on the Single Speaker icon,
then select one of the supplied sound effects.
You'll end up with something like this. Click on
OK, OK, Exit to get back to the main panel.

Step 9: Make sure the Add/Edit/Copy is set to
Edit, and click on the Card Selector again. You'll
see your card listed. Now click on "Copy of" and
your first card will be duplicated. How we have
two cards in the deck, although at the moment
both are the same. Set the name of the second
to be "My Second Card",

[ant/EditDT

Cirdlw,..

kriris.M Ibjects,,,
Bksws,,, tofiKltticliiHit

WJv First (iHI

FrntPareolM iMitsiMj;

ft (wel

step 10: Now edit the second caret to make the
text read "My Second Card". Click on the
"AfterAtlachment" button again, and you'll see
the script we created. Try changing the fonts
and colours as well to make it as different as
possible. You can alter these by either deleting
the existing items or by using the Text Icon lo
make new ones.

Second card

CI If h Hm

Step It: Now we can add a little more action.
Go back to the main panel, select Edit and
edit the buttons, one at a time. In each, click
an the Decks icon in the Click Script and you
will be able to add some movement: In other
words, when the first button Is clicked, the
second card Is selected and vice versa.
Interactive entertainment!

'ri: * linl W0" !«it: "(llcl:"

■ \-^Mi

tMSfrsMtn^^^^^^ L

(^ hw* ir ittmi Ciri

Step 12: To try out your new deck, click on the
navigation buttons to get back lo the first card
and then click on the Browse/Design button.
Now yoa can try out your deck!

or removal of a floppy disk. You can also oontrol
what happens when Ihe right mouse is pressed
or a slider control is adjusted. Every action can
have an associated script, and every script is
created in the same way from the Script Editor.

Perhaps the most important scripts are
those which are triggered automatically when a

card is first used in Browse mode. In our
example project, we associate a script to the
"After Attachment" button. This means that once
the card has been displayed on-screen our
script goes lo work. You should use the "before
attachment" script to pre-load animations or
other data before the card is displayed and use

CanDo's easy to use
authoring system makes
It Ihe ideal tool lor
creating educational
software. It's easy to make
interactive applications.

If yoa run a shop you can use CanDo as a

"virtual shop assistant", or as an eye-catching

window display system.

22 AmmSASHOPFER

I May 1996

a "before detachment" script to clear this data
from buffers. TTiese, and the sub-deck options,
are advanced facilities which you won't
necessarily need to get started.

Workbench and
custom decks

As you can see from the screenahots, it is
possible to create decks which run on the
Workbench like normal Amiga utilities, as well as
using custom screens to display images with
hundreds of colours. To define what your cards
look like, use the Edit Windows icon on the
main menu {see annotation on page 30). This
option is very important, because it determines
how your card will look.

The options include opening the screen on
the Workbench in which case it will inherit your
particular Workbench settings such as the
resolution or number of colours. Alternatively
you can open it on a Custom Screen. This is
Ihe way in which my images of the car, skier and
city were created. On the right-hand side
of the Window control requestor you will see
a choice between "Normal Window' and
"Picture Window", Pick the first and you can
define the mode, number of colours and
resolution of your display. Pick the latter and

Issue 62

John Kennedy

CanDo

ShoDperFeature

you can load an image lo make the background
dispby of yoyr card.

The Attributes settings define if the
Window has particular features such as a
CloseGadget. As you would expect, it is
possible to associate scripts with each ot these
- the default causes the deck to quit when the
CloseGadget is selected.

Conclusion

If you have got this far, you are probably still
pretty confused, but don't panic! CanDo is such
a powerful program that it can be hard lo know
where lo start or what lo do next. There are so
many icons and buttons it is easy to get lost.
Don't expect to master CanDo in one sitting.
There is so much to get through, you will need
to invest some time. The rewards will be worth
it, though - no other programming system gives
you so much control over the Amiga in such an
easy-to-use manner.

For your first, solo CanDo program, try
creating a deck which acts as a slideshow
program for your favourite IFF images. All the
information you need is here, and our example
deck can easily be expanded. Once you get it
working, you can start to add embellishments
such as keyboard, mouse or automatic
operation. Tlien you can experiment with sound
effects, animations, ARexi control, hyperteit...
With CanDo you can do practically anything!

We will be running a serious of tutorials
explaining in more depth how CanDo
works and liow you can use it to write your
own programs, starling next montii. ■

Helper icons

AREXX

^@ir

1(18243)

=(19340]

DOS

WMli

CanDo 3.0 upgrade offer

ow you have the powerful authoring program
CanDo 2.51 from Inovatronics, given away free
on our Coverdisks this month, why not
upgrade to version 3? We have organised

some special, bargain prices which are exclusive to

readers of Amiga Shopper.

You can buy CanDo 3.0 from us for only £139;

that's a massive saving of £80 off the RRP of the

program. Registered users of CanDo 2.51 only pay £77

to upgrade to version 3.

IArexx: This icon enables you
to include ARexx support in
programs. You can botti send
and receive ARexx messages,
so your CanDo program can act
as both an AReu- friendly
application and as a controller
for other ARexjc programs-

2 Bookmark icon: Click on
tliis icon and the script is
"marked". Double-dick on the
"LastBookMark" or "Bookmark"
text on the right-hand side of
the main panel and the Script
Editor is operated where tlie
Bookmark was placed, Ttiis
gives greater speed when one
wants to edit particular scripts.

3BrushAnim hielper: Select
a BrushAnim (such as a
file created with Deluxe
Palnl) and control its position
and movement.

4 Debug: Check through the
script for errors, reporting
any bugs or programs.

5 Card Helper: Insert
references to other cards,
such as simply the name, or
more advanced options such as
moving (o other cards.

6 Co-ordinate Helper: Put up
cross hairs on the screen
and insert the co-ords at the
point when the button Is
pressed. Useful tor accuratefy
lining up objects entered into
the script by hand.

7 Rectangle Helper: Insert two
sets of co-ordinates as a
rectangle is drawn out on the
screen by the user.

8 DOS Helper: Enables the
user to select an AmigaDOS
command or program and
inserts the code which enables
it to be eieculed.

9 Field Helper: A field is
where the user can input
data Into the program. Tills
helper creates the necessary
script commands.
^ A File Help: Select a
I w filename and insert it and
its path into the script.

1^ Text Helper: Creates the
I script commands for
choosing and positioning text In
any colour and any style or tont.
It's useful because it generates
code which you'll often use.
4 n Layout Helper: If you want

I ^to display a lot of text on
screen this helper will make II
easier to position it. You can
wrap the text around existing
objects by altering the default
rectangular outline.
4 OPaint Helper; A complete

I OpaInt package for creating
shapes and objects on your
window. Draw what you need,
and when you click OK all ihe
scripting commands appear.
Edit them if required.
1 /I ''''^"'^ Helper: Select and

l4load an IFF picture file in
the Window. This is one way of
creating a slideshow program.
1 CSound Effect: Choose a

lOsound effect and play it.
1 C^o"'"' Sequence: Choose

I Wseveral sound effects, and
play them back In sequence.

You can also save lots of money when
buying CanDo 3.0 plus the debugger program
CanDeBug. 'Hiese programs are available
together for only £195, which means that you
save a huge £85 when you buy them both from
Amiga Shopper.

All you have to do to take advantage of our superb
offers, is fill in the form below with all your details and
post it to the address mentioned. Or just call our Mall Order
hotline on IT 01 225 822511 .

I Title _

I Your address

Initials

Surname

I Post code

' Your signature

I Description _

I CanDo 3.0

.Telephone.

CanDo 3.0 + CanDeBug_

Price

_£139_
£195 _
Total £

.Registered

.users upgrade price
£77

Method of payment (please tick one);
Cheque □ Postal Order Q

Card No: 0000 0000 ODOO ODOO
Expiry date: | || ^| 1| |

£107

I
I
I

I (Please add £4 for postage and packing outside the UK)

Please make your cheques payable to Future Publishing Ltd.
Post your order to: Amiga Shopper, Future Publishing Limited,
FREEPOST (BS4900), Somerton, Somerset TA1 1 6BR.
Or call our Order Hotline on s 01225 822511.

You may photocopy this form.

Issue 62

May 1996

Amgashopper 23

Shopp

WOA

Sue Grant

The prototype of a brand
new Amiga will be on the
Amiga Technologies stand at
the World Of Amiga 1996;
there will be plenty of other
new Amiga products at the
show too. Be there!

If you are serious about your Amiga,
the place you need to be on the
weekend of 13th and 14th April is
at the World Of Amiga show in
London. Amiga Technologies GmbH
are sponsoring the event which Is
designed to "relaunch the machine as a
key player on the UK computing scene".

Tlie show will fealure a games arcade; high
end applications; relaiiers and a technical advice
centre run by the Independent Commodore
Products Users Group (ICPUG). And you can
meet the Amiga Shopper team on the Future
Publishing stand {oh, and the Amiga Format and
Amiga Power teams tool).

We have listed all the exhibitors we knew
were attending the show at the time of going to
press on our floor plan, but there will be plenty
of others by the time you read this; apologies to
anyone we have missed out!

"All the components are in place for an
Amiga event, the like of which we have not seen
since the heyday of the machiner boast the
show's organisers.

If you turn to page 27 you can enter our
special WOA show competition to win an Amiga
Surfer pack Just fill in the voucher and hand it in
to the Future Publishing stand.

Where and when?

The World Of Amiga will be held at the Novotel
Exhibition Centre in Hammefsmith, London; and
the dates are Saturday, 13th April and Sunday,
14th April 1996.

How much?

Tickets to the show cost £7 for adults and
£5,50 for children, You can book in advance by
calling the credit card hotline a 01369 706346.

Show guide

E.M.ConLpu*erfl.^P'"<=

1 9G Media

Wizard
Develop tnei ts

EM ftp

Amiga
Technc logies

Amiga
Tecl

;hni rtogies

power
Cor tputi

Soft

Epic
Marketinc

Future
publishing

Silca

24 VfaimSd SHOPPER

Turn the page for your

May 1996

I Issue 62

Sue Grant

WOA

Who will be there?

There will be lots of Amiga companies taking
stands at the show - we have reproduced a
floor plan of the venue, indicating the companies
attending so far. There are too many exhibitors
for U3 to list all their details, but here's a brief
run-down of some of the highlights of the ahow:

Show highlights

Amiga TechnoFogies GmbH

Amiga Technologies have taken the largest
stand at the World Of Amiga, of course.

They will be demonstrating the prototype of
Iheir new "Super Amiga". This new machine
comes complete with quad-speed CD-ROM; it
uses a 680EC30/40MHZ, mam processor; it
features two SIMM sockets on the motherboard
which allows a memory of up to 1 28Mb and it
has a flexible expansion bus which can take
turbo cards, graphics cards [including MPEG)
and multi-senal cards,

"The new Amiga will be shipped with a
revised version 3,2 of the Amiga OS.The new
features and the many enhancements give the
system more power and flexibility," said Gilles
Bourdin of AT, We are dying to get our hands on

Siren
Softw^i

Eyete( h
Group

hAr.\}

Exhibition
Entrance

fVlfVl.

HiSift

BHt^ersoft
HiQ

Gas einer

)igita

nterni ition; i1

Smp

Coi fiput^rs

Tci Amiga
Theatre

Reire
Area!

shff snt

Floorplan of
Novotel Exhibition^

Centre

this new Amiga, There will also be the chance to
examine the Amiga Surfer pack, for those who
haven't seen it yet.

Digits international

Digila will be showing off the power of
Wordworth 5 (reviewed on page 36 of this
issue]. They will also have Wordworth 5SE,
which is a special version of the program
developed for A1 300 users with only one disk
drive and 2Mb of memory. We will be taking a
look at Wordworth 5SE next month.

Also on show will be Organiser 2, the new
version ot their personal information manager,
which we awarded 91 per cent and a Star buy
to when it was reviewed in our January issue.

The there's Datastore 2, the new version ot
Digita's successful database program.

Epic Marketing

Ever wanted to make movies like Jurassic Park?
That blockbuster's success was down to the
excellent special FX used. You may not have the
budget needed for such a huge venture, but for
more modest projects, Epic Software's new
Special FX CD-ROM could prove invaluable.
This new CD contains advice on how to make
movies on the Amiga; it is the first in a series
and concentrates on explaining how to produce
low-cost special effects. And it will be seen for
the first time at the WOAI

Tfie Special FX CD costs £29.99 and will
be available fnsm Epic on o 0500 1 31 486.

Future Publishing

Meet the teams from Future's three market-
leading Amiga magazines; Amiga Shopper,
Amiga Format and Amiga Power,

We will be running a round table
conference with around 20 key players in
the Amiga market place. We will also have back
issues of all our magazines, plus special
subscription offers on the stand. And don't
forget to hand in your competition entriesi

Gasteiner

Gasteiner will have 15 new peripherals on show.
These include a new controller for the A500; a
PCMCIA controller tor the A1 200; three
accelerators tor the A500/1 200/4000 and a
range ol new mice and trackballs.

HIQ

On the HiQ stand will be the Siamese System
for the A1 200, which integrates the Amiga and
the PC (reviewed in our March 1996 issue). The
main programmer of Photogenics, Paul Nolan,
will also be on the HiQ stand, Why7 Because
he is writing the Siamese software for Hi-Q,

The excellent range ol JTS hard disk drives
will also feature on their stand.

HISofi Systems

HiSoft have a packed stand, including the first
public showing of the Surfin' Squirrel, which is
their new SCSI interface. The Squmel MPEG

chance to win an Amiga Surfer pacl^!

Issue 62 I

infinitiv

suitable for all AMIGA™ models

through mamboard exchanging frame

drive bays expandable as you like , ..

onl/ limited by your controllers' capabilities ■- ' '•Sfif^ —

modular expandable •?"' ***■

through Top-Casi/"'' system

easy access from all directions

through SNAP and CLICK system

„plug and play" drive mounting-frames

And new for some technical

the left pictures give you an imagination of the internal con^
struction of the infinitiv"^"^ tower system. The red marks and
lines show some extended drive frames in both the front- and
the back area of the tower. Further, you can see an Top-
Case™, mounted on the towers' top, which explains the
expandability of our solution. Each Top-Case''''^ expands your
infinitiv'^'^ tower for an 5.25"/ 3,5" drive bay, ready to use
and easy to assemble. Additional drives such as CD-ROMs,
I harddisks, streamer tapedrives etc. will snap in easiely by
using our sophisticated .,ctick and snap" system.

R/W card, e)q>andable up Co BMB,

ind. clack and matli co-pro socket with sundard

PS/2 SIMM modules

Ke/board case for AMIGA™ 1200,

for the original keyboard, solderfrcc assembly ...£29

micrenih^ infinitiT - tower

.lAl

RAM card widi 4 MB RAM,

incl. clock and math co-pro 5Dcket £ 109

FCkeyboard interiacE for the AMIGA™ 1 200.
Installation through solderfree flexcable £■ A2

AMIGA™ 1200 Interfece/keyboard extension,

installation through solderfree flexcaWe, both inter-
faces are connected ibrough an 5-polc plug... „ £ SS

3-wa/ ROt+switch far the AMIGA™ 1200,

suitable for ROM V 1.3.2,0)i» 3,0 or 3.1 (pair) 120

AMIGA™ 1200 battery backed up realtime- clock,
(prevents your A1200 from beeing loo!ing its' mind after
restart ! )., - ^ 8

Double IDE-bus harddrive adapter ,

for using 2.B" und 3.5" liarddisk drives at

tbe AMIGA'"1200, incl. powercable £■ 10

Keyboard case for AMIGA™ 1200,

incl. Interface, spiral cable and flexcable for external
connection of the oi'iginal internal keyboard, £ 75

AMIGA™ 1200 internal keyboard,
original keyboard for the A1200

infinitiv™ A 1200 tower, £ 169

infinitiv™ PC-tower. £169

infiniDV™ A 1200 Z tower case,

inci. ZORRO -H'" bus board. PC Keyboard £ 295

..£ 20 A1200 Infinidv™ tower. (AMlGAkeyb,4lnterfecE)...X 190

VGA-adapter for AMIGA™ 1200/4000.

from 23 pole on 15 pole mjlti synt/VGA .£ 8

POWERSTATION external powersupply,

for the AMIGA™ 1200 | i,e, ASOO, A600, througb
standard plug ). 33 amperes, featuring on/ off-switch
and additional coii-nectors for 1 x 3.5"and 3 x 5,25"
devices ' .,.,.£ 55

A 1200 inteTTial original disk drive.

suitable ftjr the A1200, 880 kb, Incl.

mounting material -.- - £29

External disk drive,

suitable for all AMIGAs™ ( maximum 4 drives ),
featuring on/otf switch and connector for aditional
drives on the back, SaOkb ^ I 38

A1200Z MAGIC infinidv™ cower,

featuring 5 ZOftRO"^ll slots and 3 PC-ISA

slots, 170 MB bdd, magic software-package £ 680

BUS 1200 Z1, AMIGA™ 1200 bus board,
featuring 5 ZOBROT"-II slots and 3 PC-ISA slots.

BUS 1200 Z2, AMIGA™ 1200 bus board, __„

featuring 5 ZORRO™-ll slot!, 3 PC-ISA and an optional™*'.

video-slot, additional this version contains even an

PS/2 - SIMM-socket „ _ £ 199

A4000 infinhiv™ tower,

featuring 7 ZORRO™-ll slots, 3 PC-ISA and

an video slot -,.,..,,,.,. £275

BUS 4O00 Z, AMIGA™ 4000 bus board,
featuring 7 ZORRO™-ll / -111 slots. 6 PC-
ISA and 2 video-slots £ 169

tfP We arc present aC THE WORLD OF ANIGA in London / 1 1th to 1 4th April !

_we accept the following payment:

^^^^ Prices subject to change without notice. All
VISA prices include VAT but exclude delivery !
All trademarks acknowledged.

Tel- 00 49 2171/72 45-60
Fax 00 49 2171/72 45-90

MicroniK Computer Service

BriJckenstraBe 2 • 51379 Leverkusen

Sue Grant

WOA

will also make its debut at the show. This
add-on enables you to play MPEG format full
motion video CDs,

Termite TCP, CinemaFonl. CinemaWorld
and CinemaTree will be shown off for the
first time on the HiSott stand too. There will
also be their latest range of Squirrel SCSI
peripherals: hard drives, CD-ROMs, zip drives
and Jaz drives.

ICPUG (Independent Commodore
Products Users Group)

Members □! ICPUG will be on hand throughout
ttie exhibition offering advice on all things Amiga
to anyone who asks for HI

LH Publishing

The publishers of DTP magazine EM
(incorporating JAM) will be sharing a stand with

E.M.Computergraphic, They intend to have
several competitions for showgoers to enter -
they will also have some special show offers.
They also want to meet Iheir subscribers - and
to give advice to anyone who needs it.

Power Computing

Power's stand will feature the first public
showing of its 1 996 range of products,
including the DKB rapid-fire SGSI-2 controller,
the Power Tablet, Breathless (their first game),
an A2000 040/060 accelerator and an A4000
040/060 accelerator. Power's managing
director promised that visitors could also take
advantage of the "many bargains' on his stand.

Zeus Development

Another Amiga development to have its debut at
the WOA is a brand new bulletin board software

package from Zeus Developments. The program
ia actually called Zeus and contains many
induslry-slandard communications protocols;
there will be a hands-on demonstration of the
program available so you can try it for yourself.

Other big guns

All the other big guns in the Amiga world will be
at the show too, including Blitlersofl, Eyetech,
E.M.Computergraphic, Golden Image, IDG
Media, Wizard Developments, EMAP, PD Soft,
Micronics, Siren Software, Silica and Snap
Computers. There will be other Amiga
companies there who haven't been mentioned
here - only because we go to press too early to
get the final list in! See you there.

(If you really can't make it, you won't miss
out, because we will have a full report from the
World Of Amiga after the show.) ■

Win! AIJOO Surfer pack!

If you want the chance to win an
Amiga Surfer pack, get yourself
down to the World Of Amiga show
at the Novolel and hand in your entry
coupon to the chaps on the Future
Publishing stand.

All entries to this competition
must be received by 3,30pm on
Sunday, 1 4th April 1 995. The winner
will be drawn on Monday 1 5th April
and will be notif ed by post.

Get connected!

We have one Amiga Surfer pack to

give away; it is worth £599.99
and consists of an A1 300 fitted
with a 260Mb hard drive and
2Mb RAM, and it includes all the
Internet software you need, plus
a 14.4bps modem. And it's
pictured on the I eft I

Amiga Shopper A1 200 Surfer pack competition

Enter your details here and answer the questions. Then cut VWiich of the following do you own/intend to own?

out this form (or photocopy it) and take it along with you to
the World Of Amiga show where you can hand it in to the
Future Publishing stand. Please do not send it to the
Amiga Shopper officesi

Name;

Address:

Post Code

PlayStation

Saturn

3DO

Jaguar

CD-i

SNES

Mega Drive

Ultra 64

Own

D
□

n
n
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n
□
a
n

Intend to own

D
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D
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Tel no:

Are you already a subscriber to Amiga Shopper?
Yes D No n

Are you already connected to the Internet?
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LJ Tick here if you don't wish to receive details of other
special offers from Future Publishing and other companies.

Issue 62 I

May 1996 I

AHKMSHOPPER 27

ShopperFeaiure ^

How to...

David Taylor

Ultimate DIY..

In the second part of our DIY feature, Dave Taylor
looks at even more ways to expand and enhance
your Amiga. "How to..." aims to
show you all the things you
need to know to get the most
from your machine.

Mi--

David Taylor

How to...

^"ShopperFeature

j*«-

1^-^'/

Use a
hard drive

Dave Taylor is your guide on
our tour of hard drives and how
to do anyttiing with them.

ast month, we showed you how to
physically (it a hard drive. Following
on from that, here is a guide to
maintaining your new drive. Most
drives, so long as they are bought
from an Amiga dealer, will come ready
prepared for use with your Amiga. However, if
yours hasn't, or if you ever want to make a
change to your drive, you'll need to set it up
using hard drive software.

To do this, you need to use the

HDToolBoK program that can be found
on theHDInstalldisl(for

Workbench 2,1+ users.
Other users will
need to
obtain
a similar
program
from a PD
library.
The best
alternative is a
program called
RDPrep 3.91 and,
if you have access
to Am in el, can be
found in disk/miso as
a file called
rdp391.lha. We will
assume that you will be
using the standard
Commodore HDToolBox,
although the basics are the
same for both programs even
if the interfaces are different.
Load the HDInstall disk
and open the HDTools drawer to
locate HDToolbox and load it, (If
you are working on changing a hard
drive, you should find the program on
your dnve in the Tools drawer on your
boot partition,) Once it has loaded,
click on the dnve you want to operate on
(if you only have one hard drive fitted then
it will be the only one to show), Rernember
that it will only show the number of physical
drives attached, not individual partitions.
Now click on Partition Drive and you will

Issue 62

move to the screen where you can adjust the
properties of the drive. At the top, the entire
drive is represented with a bar, split into
different sections. These are the partitions. It is
easier to cope with a hard drive, especially a
large one, if it is split sensibly into sections.
Each of those will show as a separate disk icon
on Workbench. A sensible split would be a boot
partition to contain all the Workbench programs,
fonts and libraries, etc; one for application
programs and, if you play them, one tor games.
You might also want a separate one tor you own
data. This is a good idea if you produce a lot of
material, such as multimedia, or if you want to
have a machine that can be used by other
people but with your data locked away safe from
prying eyes or deletion. If you don't produce that
much, then a separate folder, or drawer, on your
serious partition should suffice,

To set up the partitions, click on an area to
activate them and then size them. It you are
re-sizing an eiisting disk, you will find that you
need to make space by reducing an existing
partition before you can enlarge another or
create a new one. It might be easiest to delete
all existing partitions and start from scratch.
Clicking on New Partition will add one that can
be then sized using the slider. You can change
the name of the partition by clicking in the text
box and deleting the default name.

When you create your boot partition (the
one that will contain the Workbench files and
Start Up- Sequence - in other words be the
equivalent of booting your floppy Workbench
disk), remember that you will need quite a lot of
space because when you start to install
software to your new drive, you will find that
some files have to be installed to that partition in
order for the software to run, 1 0Mb will quickly
be filled up, but s'\ie the partition according
to the capacity of your drive.

The boot partition must have the
bootable option enabled or your
hard drive won't load automatically.
You might want to make more
complex changes to the drive,
such as the file system used. If
your drive is formatted to the old
WB1.3 0FS, you won't get the most out
of your drive it you are using a WB2 or
above machine. To change these options,
you must click on the Advanced Options
button and the window will show a new
selection. For most people, the only ones
that should be of interest are the boot priority
and the Change button for the file system.

The boot priority is only applicable to the
bootable partition and should be set to zero.

HDToolbox recognises Ihe drives attached and
lets you pick ttte one to work on.

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31 1«F t btikur PInnllilt,
4) Itm Ivit,

RDPrep is the alternative disk prepping software
that can be obtained train Aminet.

FPPrrp Ji^i; IlBid Diik line* Prn Ultlilw : 1LI17 luNlDlii^, in'

Ml Mils miiiinDii

liWrtt 'in I HI-

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:i Draq Thr pirtllitn 'IvidlrdI Milh Ihr muit la iiii tti riplilitni,
II lUn nlirn Id Iirxn I li urili thi diid Bill lltrk Id tti Ilil.

May 1996

RDPrep works in a Similar way to the official
HDToolbox from Commodore.

"When you create
your boot partition,
you will need quite
a lot of spacei"

This means that the Amiga will first attempt to
load a floppy disk before booting the hard drive
- if you change this, you will find it hard to
boot a floppy disk and it will not speed up
the booting of your hard drive.

When you click on the Change
button, you will move to the screen that
controls the file system used. For Workbench 2
users the most likely system you will want to
use IE the standard one set to Fast RIe
System (WB3 users may want directory
caching, which removes a liny amount of
capacity from the drive, but speeds up
usage). This is also where you can adjust
the MaxTransfer rate of ihe drive. This
option is a hex number that sets the
maximum number of bytes that can be
transferred in one transfer It might seem
strange that you would want to limit this, but
there are occasions when having this set loo

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Selecting a drive and moving to the partition
screen enables you to make any changes.

AhKUSHDPPER 29

ShopperFeaiure

How to...

David Taylor

r spit**" OJrK i^ TsLI r

ism

01 n*Pfliri Till lyifl I
Fill Fllr mill*: ^

]nl<rtvillifiil I1g[|»i |

BLr*EI*rv [»[lt»! I

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IdHlLflir ■ n^MWgn iHirvrd blgiki «t

btiLBnLtm [T*

Advanced options enable you to adjust the
filesyatem used, even to use a custom one.

high causes problems with software. If you don't
have any problems or haven't been advised to
change this, leave this option alone!

When everything is set to your satisfaction,
clicls on OK until you return to the initial screen.
You must then save the changes to your drive.
WARNING! This will destroy any data that has
previously been stored on your drive. It will be
lost. It is then perhaps best to click on the
Low-level Format button. This may not always be
necessary, but it will ensure that the disk is
ready for use with the Amiga.

You must then boot your Amiga with a
Workbench disk and format the individual
partitions. A quick format may suffice, but a
full format will also make sure that there are
no errors on the disk before you start. When
the partitions are formatted, you have a set of

large, blank disks. The bootable Mi.n..

partition must have the Workbench
files and programs from the other
standard disks. This can be done
from the HDInstall disk, or you
could do it manually.

Your disk drive is now set
up to your own specifications.

...maintajr^^your drive

/ (CIS

Once your drive is set up, you
need several programs to
keep eve ryt fling working. The
first one is DiskSalv, which is
a must. This program can
recover files thai you delete
by accident and repair a lot
of errors that can appear on
disks. A version of the
program is available from PD
libraries, although the new
version is commerclai.

The second is ReOrg.
W tie never you use a disk, the
data is fitted on to the drive
any way it can, wliidi means
ttiat it might be split into
sections. This doesn't ma lie
much difference to you and
you may never notice it, but
with large hard drives, it will
mean that opening a tile
might send the drive head all
over the place, which will be
slightly slower tttan it it could
read the data In a continuous
stream. This fragmentation
becomes more trequeni as
you write and delete files
from the drive. ReOrg will
optimise your drive and fit
these segmented files back
together. Be aware that this

Hard drives tend
to gel very

fragmented
because of writing
and deleting so
many files. ReOrg
will rectify titis.

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ia» inmiinniM

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mftK iOI 11417 IVC DPTJhlT'iTlIV f1-

Phw oI l^^nnUtiiMi : SI '.

operation carries a certain
risk of loss of data, although
VvG never had a problem.

Last, but most important,
you need a backup program.
This will help you back up
partitions that store data you
can't afford to lose. Normally,
this will mean storing files on
floppy disks, although other
methods are available (see
storage feature in AS55).
These programs not only
copy files, they also calculate
the best tit and include
options to archive the data
so it takes up the least
amount of space possible-
There are plenty of backup
utilities available, many of

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Using file packers
enables you to get
more on to your
/laftfd/sfc.

which are PD/Shareware;
such as MRbackup; included
on AS54's Coverdisks.

There are programs that
can expand the capacity of
your drive. They invisibly
pack and unpack data as it is
read and written to the drive.
One of the better programs
of this type is Arctic, (on
ASSS's disks). You can save
space by keeping your
programs stored on a
partition in a packed format
like PowerPacker
(StoneCracker is even
better). These methods will
mean that using your hard
drive is a little slower.

As for protecting your
drive or partition for privacy,
there are some password
programs, but these are
normally easily circumvented.
The most secure is Enigma II,
(on AS61's disks). It renders
a partition no n- DOS until a
password is entered (never
put it on to a boot partition).
The program contains some
risk, but is reliable.

*^ep!ace a floppy ^rive ^^

Unscrew the
Amiga's casing,
including t/ie
screws l/ia( hold
tl>e drive in place.
Open up the Amiga.

Lift the drive up and

out. II should be

easy, if not check

you have removed

the right screws.

Remove the power lead;
you will need (o use
something to flip the
little catch. Unplug
the data ribbon.

Bring in the

new drive and

reconnect the two

leads. Place the

drive in the bay and

screw everything

bacif in.

30 AmSA SHOPPER

May 1996

I Issue 62

David Taylor

How to...

ShoDoerFeature

Connect to
the WWW

So you have decided to fork
out for a modem, but how do
you get to those fabulous-
looking Web pages?

This is one of the most
frequently -asked questions
at Amiga Slioppet. The
prablems mainly arise
from the tact that in
order to get connected, you need
to install three packages correctly,
tn fact, getting up and running is
easier than it sounds.

First, you need to get a suitable Internet
account (we're going to assume Demon,

.install AmiyCi

because it's the most common). Before starling
to install the software, you need three bits ot
intormation about your account. You need to
know your account name, its password and your
IP address. You should obviously know the first
two already, but the third can be obtained by
logging on using a normal Comms package, like
NComm; or it is available from Demon, who
should notify ycu of it.

The first program that you need to install is
Magic User Interface (MUI), without which the
other programs won't run. The installation tor
this is all done aulomatically through the
Commodore Installer,

The next program needed is the heart of the
World Wide Web (WWW) browsing, AmiTCR
This package takes a little time to install,
although it's not actually difficult as long as
you follow the on-screen instructions. For a
step-by-step guide through the installation see
the box below.

When AmiTCP is installed, you need to
install the actual browser, which is called
A Mosaic. Again, this is simple to install

using the Commodore Installer.
' -* Before using the browser,

you should also check that your
Amiga has several other things
set correctly. You will definitely need
a JPEG datatype (and possibly
same others), because a lot of
pictures that appear on WWW pages
are JPEGs and so the datatype is
used to view them. The datatype can be
obtained from PD Houses or Aminel (it may be

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mi: |>.lli.:;A»i,.c,A«.riara7~

Q S J

If am.... K&a.

ftreNef

starling the
script opens the
dialler window.
Now you can
link up to
FutureNet.

labelled as JFIF). You should also make sure
that your Workbench is displaying as many
colours as possible so that you can see the
pictures properly. This is done through the
screen mode preferences.

With all the software installed, it's best to
reboot. Then turn on your modem and double
click on the AMosaic program, A window will
open, but will have nothing in it. Open a Shelf
and type "Link up". The Amiga will jump into
action and send oft all sorts of commands.
When it has connected to the Web, which it will
do automatically, you can enter your first
destination by clicking on the Open button.
Obviously, your first stop will be the Amiga
Shopper Home page at: www,futurenet,co.Lil^
computing/amigashopper.html!

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fill fuL ■!■■ in tor E-IBII man

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Uriv*

H.ld.

This is a standard Commodore
Installer script Start by choosing
a destination.

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1 MifcbllBIl 1

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^ mi,... i

Enter your proper name. This
does not have to be anything to
do with your E-mail address.

Your user will be added to your
actual E-mail address, e.g. Dave
at amigashopper®demon.co.uk.

The node name la the name of the
E-mail account. Ills (fie "real"
part of your E-mail address.

iqi«ir jbiiRF mrssi ip

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>H» D- w,iw ovwmttM on hm dliwl^ >iiii ■*,

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■* 11.1....

jmitjai'

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Ei4a- IP BrtflT btlw IM»;

Another additional bit of
information for your "signature".
You can add anything you want.

You are given the opportunity to
check ait the details and go back
if you've made a mistake.

You should already know your
password! tt is the one you use to
log on for normal E-mait.

The tP address should have been
given to you. All you need to dots
enter the last two digits.

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b*lc*: fDrba].*«lH> tf<u IK 3>^

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If your local number isn't shown,
pick one and then manually edit
the dialler scrip! after installation.

Again you are given the chance to
review your entries and correct
any errors Ibat you've made.

There are then questions about
your actual modem. You sliould
be able to just "OK" all of them.

The software is then installed and
the option to add the necessary
commands to SlarlUp is offered.

Issue 62 I

May 1996

AWGASHORPER 31

How to...

David Taylor

OWtO...;^

^:^P^^v-::^:7;t-"

Choose a

programming

language

Paul Overaa guides you
through the computer
programming languages
available for the Amiga.

All languages have good and
bad points, but in practice you
need only ask three questions:
can you learn it? Does it suit
yout purpose? Will it still be
around when you've finished learning about it?
It's also important to choose a language that
you will be 'technically comfortable' with. If, for
example, you are new to prograrrming and want
lo find some way of making a start, then BASIC
is a very good choice, Assembly language is
not. On the other hand, if you are a competent
coder who has moved to the Amiga from

\\i\m

Bli

!5:!i«i.

'-"- tl!!!l*'"

*"*■' Calu»*n!

mm'

At Its current price.
Blitz BASIC is good

value tor money.

1 1 »T.YEBl ^^ l^l 'B

Devpac 3 is (fte undisputed champion
Willi the majority of 680x0 coders.

another machine then you might well be
interested in trying some of the other
programming languages listed here.

BASIC

BASIC was originally designed
specifically tor teaching programming,
but over the years the language has
become much more powerful, yet it has
remained easy to learn. A few years ago
a powerful games-oriented BASIC-style
language marketed by Europress Software and
called AMOS became very popular, but support
for the language stopped when Europress
moved into the PC software arena. These days,
you can't buy AMOS, although versions of the
language have been released on magazine
Coverdisks from time to time and an AI^OS
compiler add-on is still available from F1

Language contacts x^

^.., ■

Contact numbers

AMOS Compiler Supplier: Fourth Level

Price: £14.SS (plus SOp P&P) Developments

F1 Licenceware

Supplier: F1 Licenceware HeliOE Forth

Contact: ^ 01392 493580

Blhlz BASIC 2.1 Price: £65

Fourth Level Developments

Price: £34.99 Supplier: Helios Software

Contact; u 0117 9B5 4455.

Supplier: Guildhall Leisure GT Prolog

Grange Technology

HiSoft BASIC 2 Price: £89.95

Conlaclir 01235 851B18

Price: £99.95 Supplier: Grange Technology

Gulldliall Leisure

Supplier: HISoft Macro 68

Contact: « 01302 390000

Devpac 3 Price: £130

HiSofl

Price: £99.9S Supplier: Helios Software

Contact: « 01525 718181

5upplier;HlSaft HIghSpeedPascal

Helios Software

Dice C Price: £99.95

Contact: ■" 01623 554828

Price: £9S.9S (plus 6.50 P&P) Supplier: fliSofl

.a_— --rai-T-*^

'_ P# r B_ n I- I *^ pert- n

HiSoft BASIC 2 Is a

solid, well supported
Micrasoft-slyle BASIC.

^^3J r^ ^ £^

Licenceware. (AS reviewed AMOS Pro
Compiler 2 last month.]

Another BASIC, which has an enthusiastic
band of followers is Blitz BASIC, and a new
version has only just been released. Blitz is
unusual in that it provides a number of
language extensions including
Q NewTypes (C-style stnjoturas) and

list handling. It's powerful, now
^T^ good value for money, and a fair

choice il you are into games coding.
The third choice for potential BASIC
coders, HiSoft BASIC 2, has not been
specifically aimed at games programmers. It is
simply a good, well supported, compiled BASIC
whose core facilities are broadly compatible
with Microsoft-style BASICs found on many
other computers. Ideal if portability
considerations are important!

C language

is the most important of all Amiga languages,
but learning to use a C compiler for the Amiga
is quite a big commitment. The main problem is
not understanding the C language but learning
about the way you interface with and use the
Amiga's library routines. At one time the C
package that all others were judged by came
from the SAS Institute. Development of SAS C,
however, has stopped and the C package now
getting some well desen/ed attention is Dice C
by the Obvious Implementations Corp, C++
(C plus plus) is a more powerful, object-oriented
version of 0. The SAS C package included a
C++ translator. Dice C does not.

32 AWKSASHOPPER

May 1996

The Dice C compiler is very powerful and going
from strength to strength.

Issue 62

David Taylor

How to...

Assembly language

Assembly language is popular amongst the rnore
dedicated Amiga programmers but it is difficult
to learn. Without a shadow of a doubt, the most
popular Assembly language environment
amongst Amiga owners in the UK is HiSofl's
Devpac 3, It's a good, well supported product
which has stood the test of time. Another
commercial offenng, Macro 6B, though providing
many facilities which advanced coders would
find useful, has never been able to mount any
real challenge to topple Devpac from its throne.

The others

Although BASIC, C and Assembler are the main
languages used for Amiga programming there
are many others available. HiSoft offer a Pascal
compiler called Highspeed Pascal that txiuld
prove useful if, tor example, you are studying
programming at college and Pascal is being
used as the main language. A good
implementation of Forth, called HeliOS, is
available from Helios Software; and for those of
you interested in artificial intelligence
applications, there is a version of Pnjiog
available from Grange Technology.

There are also quite a lot of PD and
Shareware offerings around, including the PD C
and North C compiler packages. There's even a
Gnu C++ available for the more ambitious
among you. Charlie Gibbs deserves a mention
here because he produced what is now a firmly
established, and respected, freely distributable
Amiga Assembler package, called A68k. A68k
forms the basis of a lot of PD Assembler
^^^^ packages. On top of this there are

ij^^^^^K^ some new languages, including

^^^^^^^^k^ one called E which is gaining

^^^^^^^kjk ground, plus a vanely of

^^^^^^M> fringe languages

^^f^W such as Secal.

Jargon

Core facilities:

The main parts of the language wilhout the

AmlgB-spedtlc extensions.

Porlabie pragram:

A program Is portable II Its source code can

be transferred from one type of computer to

another and made to run with iittle or no

change. Ttie mare work needed to get the

program running on a new machine, the less

portable the code Is considered to be.

Write an
AmigaGuide

You want documents that
enable the user to work their
way through levels?
AmigaGuide is the answer.

This Is another area that we get
frequent requests for help with.
The beauty of these documents is
that while they offer some neat
tricks for eKperienced users, they
are still easy to get started with for
the beginner. Let's go through
the basics behind writing an
AmigaGuide document.

These documents are nothing
more than normal ASCII files; the
normal output standard to word
processors across platforms. These
files don't contain any of the flash text
effects that are signalled in specialised file
fonnafs like a Wordworlh document.
However, they do store different styles by
means of a set of codes denoted by letters. This
means that if you load an AmigaGuide into a
normal teit editor, you will see not only the text,
but also a set of additional characters
surrounding certain parts.

What happens is thai a special program,
either Multiview on earlier machines or
AmigaGuide in more recent ones, will be used
to view the document Making use of the
AmigaGuide, library (in Libs:), this interprets the
codes and instead of showing the codes it
shows the teW in the specified fomiat.
All that you need to do is create a
document in an editor and save it, than add an

icon and ensure that its default tool is either
AmigaGuide or Multiview. (To change the default
tool, click once on the icon on Workbench and
then select Information from the Icon menu,) The
following is a guide to some of the codes:

Guide to guides

This is a short listing for an AmigaGuide,
followed by explanations of the codes, For your
reference, line numbers have been placed next
to the lines, but when typing a guide you do not
include line numbers.

1) ©database My Guide
S] ©wordwrap

3) @node Main "The Main Page"

4) @(fg shine}The first line of the tent as a
title(g{fg text)

5) Some normal text

6) @|b)Teit in bold@(ub}

7) @[i}Text in italics@{ui)

8) @{u}TeKt underlined® (uu)

9] @("My first link" link linkl) This is a button
linked to another node
10) ©{"My picture" link Mydisk: picture/main}
This is a button linked to a picture

1 1 ) @{"My sound" link Mydisk; sound/main}
This is a button linked to a sample
12)@endnode
131

1 4) ©node linkl 'The new link"
5) Whatever you want to say
12)@endnode

1) The first line of the document needs to
inform the computer what type of
document it is. "©database" informs it
that it is an AmigaGuide. "My Guide" is
simply the title of the document; you can
call it whatever you want.
2) "©wordwrap" turns the automatic
sizing on. This means that lines can be
written as one long string without any
returns and the guide will fit the words
on to the line and adjust the lines if the
window is resized, so that you don't have to
scroll across to read the full line,

3) The first page of the guide has to be flagged.
Each page is called a node, so the first page is
flagged by "@node Main', The text in quotation
marks is what will appear in the titlebar of the
document for that page.

4) You might want the first line of your document
to stand out as a title, "©(fg shine}" makes the

AmigaGuldes
can link to
pictures and
use datatypes
to show any
supported fi/e
format

*v*]KrKtl l^creen

(Image by

Alex

Thomtiill.)

1>1^

Horfcbencti Moreen

Dj sound

lEIle

'^isMm

tt^w&mtS'^

Help

Retrace 1 me/mmi\ f

kafe^:^*:

_J<I>I^

aoove: AmigaGuldes can also link to
sound ffles, if you tiave the right datatypes.
Right: Using the wordwrap option means
thai guides will reformat the text as the
window is re-sized.

D| Itie Main Page IBIgi

Sone nonul tevt
IbA in bold

Fetci in italics

Hy fir-st lirJil Uiis

iHitton linked
to anatfvr node
My picturel This is a

twtton I iiAed to a

picture

My samj This is a

button liniied to a
saiple

A
V
ulvi y

Issue 62 I

May 1996

Amoashdpper 33

WHILE-U-WAIT!!

COMPUTERS AND MONITORS

Attention Dealers

Ring/Fax Now for best trade prices

and terms on Repairs, Spares, Floppy

Drives, Hard Drives, CD Rom Drives

and Memory Upgrades.

NEW LOW FIXED PRICE

■• FAST TURNAROUND

"» 90 DAYS WARRANTY ON ALL REPAIRS!!

"- £1 EXTRA CHARGE FOR WHILE-U-WAIT SERVICE

'■■ COURIER CHARGES £600 + VAT EACH WAY

— A1 500/ASOOO/A3000/A4000 fiQUOTATION

A500, A500+ & A600

lliK W'K

A1200

2-5" HARD DRIVES

For A600 & A1 200

80Mb £69-95 170Mb £99.95 340Mb £169-95

120Mb £79-95 250Mb £129-95 510Mb £249-95

All hard drives are pre -formatted, partitioned witfi Workbench

loaded and include 2-5" IDE cable and softv/are

2-5" IDE Cable and Software (if bought separately) £9-95

ACCELERATORS

Apollo 1220 . £99-95
Apollo 1232. £199.95
SIMMS £POA

MODEMS

X-Link
14.4k .

X-LInk
28.8k .

. £129.95

. £219-95

EST AFTER-SALES SERVICE

A600

A1200

Upgrade ,o I M<a UNBEATABLE
PRICES

iHfa flMb

Ut-M C1D4-f5 E14I-H Linn

HMMlirapliuCFisUI ^ Ut45

INTERNAL fLOPPY DRIVES

A500/A500+ £29-95 A600/A1 200 . . .£34-95

«1o'« Genlocks

DRIVE Hama 291 . . £280.00

Including Q||jy) SPEED Mi-iC^m

ffMITfiR

Squirrel

SCSI
Interface

£249.95

L500 £69.95

L1HH) £169.9S

L2000S . . . £349.9S

CHIPS 4- SPARES 4- ACCESSORIES

1 Meg fetter Agnus £1900

2 Mag Folter Agnus £24-00

fl362Deni5e £900

83/3 Super Denise EIBOO

5719Gnry £/-50

8520 CIA A500/A5OO+ £1SOO

8364 PduIq AS00/A5O0+ £12-00

Kickstort ROW 1-3 £15-00

Kick5lDrlROM2-04 £22.00

Kidslorl ROM 2-05 £2?-00

A500/A500+ Keyhoord £50-00

6570 KevbQDrd Ciiip £20-00

68000 Processor £8-00

Power Supply A500/A400/A1 200. ..£3500
Exchonge A2000/A1 500 Pwcr Supply ...£70-00

' All chips are available ex
* Please call for any chip o

8520 CIA A6DO/A1200 £14-

5374 AliceA1200 £30-

8364 Paulo A6O0/AI20O £16

Video DACA120D £!?■

A6O0/AI200 Keyboard £60-

LisoA1200 £35

Goyle A600/A1200 £25

Budgie A1200 £30

Alouse (290dpi) £15

SCARlleod £15

Mouse Moi £4

10 Boxed Brnnderi Dislis £6

Prinler Coble £6

100Disl;Boi; £7

Squiriel SCSI Inlerfoce £59

-stoch

r spare not listed here

A1 200 without hard drive £299-95

A1 200 with 1 70Mb hard drive . . .£379-95
A1 200 with 340Mb £449-95

A1 200 with 51 0Mb £549-95

* Call for more good deals

ANALOGIG Analogic computers ^uk; Lta ^^ „,,^ opihino times ** new opening times ##

ANALOGIC Unit 6, Ashway Centre, Elm Crescent, ^■j»g_ A^O«tf EA^ OK7E

^[[^/^LOGIC Kingston-upen-Thames, Surrey KT9 6HH IVClS V lO I ^'W ^^ M ^

♦ All pricesincludeVAT* All prices subject to cliange without notce * Fiied charge for repair does not include disk drlve/keyboard ^^

* We reserve trie right to refuse any repair * pap criafg^s £3-50 by Royar Maii or £6-00 + VAT for courier * Piease aliow 5 working days for cfieque ciearance |v,sj | W

* Aii sales are only as per our terms and condition? of sale, copy avaiiable on reauest, ^^M :^r_

David Taylor

How to...

ShopperFeature

□ I Uwh;Oa^/e

lEite

MySuide. guide (Ppojett>

4!(

t3-Har-?« 13:28:88

lanigaguidt

Hen l i
Sane

"You can link to
any datatype

supported, so not
just pictures."

n» Niln F^~

I yti^«"L^rtr-ti r^inrtft jT

h bold

, IHL* li J iultoi llifrhd tJ» BHlWr i\
it n I nulUn imrd Id a pIeHTV
ill li 1 butlm llnkfd La « wvl*

4ncf /lere is the guide file when viewed with
either Multlview or AmigaGulde.

.replace a keyi^fd

Cancel

Selecting the icon
from Workbench
enatJies you to enter
the tool that will
read your guides.

FdHord Pro U5.B - UorkiPjue^yGifidg

dfltabasf Hv gui<fe

uordurap

node riairr 'Tht Main Page"

one narnil tpxE

{bHeht In bold?<Jb>

ti>T9iit in LlaUcsP^uU

cu>Tevt under UnEd(ifuu>

t Mt- first linr link tinkO Tbit li i button linked to another nD>

inv piitiire Unk T1vdL5if:picture/n*in> This is a button linked to

( nv sound link Mi<k:aaun(I/nflin> This is a button linked to a s.

endnodf

lode Iink1 "Thi n«u link"
..atcver v^ij uant lo sav
vndnode

node

a picture
sanple

The guides are simply

ASCII text lilBs written

in an editor with the

codes included in the

text Itself.

text a different colour - white by default. Any
text after this will appear shine, so the text
needs turning back by using the "@(fg text}".

5) Just typing in teil will appear as normal text
as in any document. This is just how the majority
of the document needs to be entered.

6) Text can be made into a bold typeface
using the "@{b)" command, and as in (4)
needs turning off again, which is done with the
"©{ub}" command.

7) The same as (6) except that text is italicized,

8) The same as (7) except that text is
underlined. Combinations ot the commands can
be used. You could have ''@{bl@{il@(fg
shine)Flagh Textl@|ub]@|Lii]@(fg text)", which
would put the words "Flash Text!" into bold,
italic, shine and then reset the font,

9) This is where AmigaGuide comes into its
own. This is how lo include a button that you
can click on to move to a different part of the
document. The text in quotation marks is what
will appear within the button. Tfie word "link"
tells the guide what the button will be linked to;
i.e. where to go in the document if the button is
pressed. The word "linkl" is (he name I have
given lo the node (page) that it should go to;
you can call them anything, e.g. "Chapterl"
After the button and commands, signalled by the
closing "1" you can put some text thai will
explain to your readers what the button links to.
This way you can also simply incorporate
buttons into text. You could type "Amiga
Shopper is the only choice for serious

©("Amiga" link amiga) owners" and have the link
to the node "Amiga" where there would be more
information about the computer.

1 0) AmigaGuides can deal with more than juat
text. This type cf link displays a picture called
"picture" from a disk called "Mydisk" The "/mam"
is needed for it to open up what is essentially a
separate document lo display the picture.

1 1) You can link to any datatype supported, so
not just pictures, which you could have in IFF,
JPEG, TIFF, etc format as long as you have the
datatypes. You can also link (o sounds, such as
this 8SVX sample. When the node is selected,
the sound will be played,

1 2) In order for nodes, or pages, to make sense,
the program needs to know where a node ends.
So, every single node must be finished with
"@endnode"

1 3) A spare line between nodes will help you to
look through the guide later.

1 4) Any new nodes have to be noted. This is the
node referred to in (9), As with the main node
(3), the text in quotations appears in the titlebar.

Extra help

There are several utilities available in the PD that
will help to make sure that nodes link up - such
as Badlinks, You can also convert guides into
normal documents, using utilities like Heddley
(on AS55's Coverdisks), so that you can strip
away cedes and having written a guide, also
have a normal ASCII document. ■

Open up the casing and lift
bach the keyboard. You may
need to remove the power
lead to the power light.

All you need lo remove is the plastic-coaled
ribbon. This is also the procedure for

repairing the ribbon, as
. . descritied last month.

The ribbon

should just

come free. Hold

down the white

plastic casing

when freeing it.

Reverse this

process for the

new keyboard.

Issue 62

May 1996

>hflQA SHOPPER 35

ShopperReview

Word processing

Graeme Sandiford

Wordworth

Two powerful word processing programs are fight'mg for supremacy. Can Wordworth 5 finally triumph
over Final Writer? Graeme Sandiford is the adjudicator...

As far as Amiga word
processors go there are
only two main camps; the
one with users who relish
the power of Final Writer,
and those who appreciate the interface
and niceties of Wordworth. These two
mighty applications have battled for word
processor market-supremacy over the last
few years. Up until now the struggle has
been pretty even, but Digita are making a
decisive move towards Final Writer's end
of the market by substantially beefing-up
version 5 of Wordworth.

Despite the new, powerful fealutes, one
feature rernains unchanged in Wordworlh 5 - its
interface. Wordworth's HIP (Human Interface
Protocol] interface and its unique Digisense
system are two of the biggest reasons for the
program's popularity. In recent years, Digita
have been working with Swansea University to
develop and refine the jnlertaces □! their
programs to ensure that they are intuitive to use
and provide a productive environment. This
continued hard work has paid off in a big way.
A pleasant surprise in the package is three
extra disks containing 50 CompuGraphic fonts.

Diaita Wordwonh

Digita Wordwort

"v'^cr'^Hv

Wordworth's Text Ettects are a match far Final
Writer macros like Final Wrapper.

"Digita are making
a decisive move
iowards Final
Writer's end of
the market"

These are supplied tree with Wordworth 5 and
are welcome because choosing the right
typeface can influence how readable or
attention -grabbing your text is when printed out
If you are confused by the term CompuGraphic,
the best way to relate to these fonts is that they
look the same no matter what si^e they are
because they're not based on bitmap images,
When they print out they are also printed at your
printer's maximum resolution. Wordworth has
support for Adobe Postscript, TnjeType and
Amiga fonts too.

Installing the program and the fonts is
painless because they both use Installer, so you
can have as much or as little interaction as you
want. A full installation including items such as
clipart, takes up just over 3Mb of hard disk
space. If you have a fetish for swapping disks
you can still install Wordworth to floppies.

You may be hard pushed to noticed any
changes to Wordworth 5 immediately because
the default screen is nearly identical to
Wordworth 3. To save you hours trying to find all
these new features there is a section under the
help menu that details them.

You will also find one of the new features
under the help menu, Wiiards are best

Here's the Toolbar - il
enablesyou to access
commands with your
mouse. You can
customise it too.

Pictures can be inserted
in a variety of different
file formats.

iq<^f Lilqup FnT grnolhonol

IJiiitJk lUrlai

Drag-and-drop style
sheets make light
work of formatting
paragraphs.

36 Amqashopper

TVip ilMflrKPfl
bctmren the aloci
Kotlcrcd

air pnoTfnOui
E«Tn Lfi mr ioiar
ifilmt. wh^h \i
thp name gli»eri if
ibc iitin and the
planCK diilannr*

*hw rcpJ«enl«l
]h« tanli by m
goll ball, ihe fun
would be equiMflltnl lo

ipherc -1.5 mcli« aoQsi and
ly. In lad iht diil^fxv between Ih*
h«sun 13 oboul 1^.000,000 km T^is
js «cmFtim« <ncd *1 a unil ol mpmJjrwi^Hil
n»e Ipghl-year. inihKh ii ihc dulflnrt travelled
loul 5 5 rrnllNOn millic*^ km.
|i tiphingi It called Ih' Milky Way Ilea

^1 yeart aaoii akd 10.000 liqhl ^ath
jiy. Alpha.Ccnlflun. la 40 million milliQJ> km

The Ribbon bar provides
you with access to text
formatting features,
Including Ihe Bullet
point command.

This garish headline
was created surprisingly
quicldy with the new
Text Effects tool.

Using this window
you can add a variety
of objects including
text boxes, images
and tables.

May 1996

I Issue 62

Graeme Sandiford

Word processing

ShoDDer Review

ir^t^V!*^^^ .s

described as interactive tulorials and are great
for getting inexperienced users to use the
prograrn effectively and quickly. On running a
Wizard (such as the invoice Wizard), you are
taken step -by-step Ihrougti the process you
inave chosen to be dernonslrated. The Wizard
aslfs you to make entries when needed and at
the end you will have learnt a new aspect of the
program and have something to show for it.
Unfortunately, there are only four Wizards
included at the mornent; however, you should
eipecl to see more appear in the Public Domain
because they are basically AReio; scripts and
therefore quite easy to make.

ARexx support

Yep, that's right, Wordworth now has support
for ARexx. Hurrah! Excuse me tor that outburst,
but this is a major addition and it could lead to
the development of even more new tools.
Despite being overlooked by a surprising
number of software developers, an AReii port is
a big asset to pretty much any type of program,
because it enables it to be controlled externally
and it can also control external programs.

However, as demonstrated by several keen
Final Writer users, ARexx can be used within a
program to create new features. These tools
take the form of macros; all you need to make
your own is a good understanding of the Amiga,
Wordworth and the ARexx programming
language. Although well-hidden, the Help Guide
file contains most of the program's ARexx
Command set and is still being worked on.

It's a drag!

Another welcome addition are the drag-and-
drop style sheets which Rnal Writer doesn't
have. Style sheets are extremely handy because
they can change the format of text quickly and
easily, A style sheet contains formatting or
styling information such as text and background
colours, kerning, tracking, underlining, the
typeface and the size of text. In practice this
means creating a style sheet that has the desired
attributes in the style sheet editor, then applying
it to the target paragraph by dragging and
dropping it from the style sheet window,

Wordworth's implementation of this feature
ia impressive and is comparable to the system
found in QuarkXPress (used to lay out AS and
many other magazines). When creating a new
style sheet you can base it upon an existing one
and even determine which style is applied to a
new paragraph (each time you press <return>).
As with Xpress you can import style sheets from
other documents, but you can also apply them
to selected areas of a paragraph and enjoy the
benefits of a preview of your style sheet as you
create it, which you can't do in Xpress.

There are several other formatting tools in
Wordworth 5, including a Fast Format option.
This enables you to copy a paragraph format
and then paste it over and over on to other
paragraphs. This is useful because you can
simply select a paragraph that is formatted the
way you want and then make any other
paragraph share that formatting without having
to create a style sheet, or find out exactly how
it is formatted.

Issue 62

MgM: This is a 258-
colaur preview of a
document containing
a 24-bit image.

Below: It is easy to
create your own
custom toolbars with
this editor.

It is also possible to create paragraphs with
hanging indents by simply clicking on a button.
Similarly, you can add bullet points to a
paragraph by clicking on the Bullet Point button.
Doing so brings up a requester that enables you
to specify the font and character of your choice.
Your paragraph is then indented to the first Tab
stop and your chosen character is inserted.

Font Effects have been added which can be
used to modify fonts. The available functions
include stretch, oblique, small caps, strike-
through, double-underline and superscript. The
program's tabling features have been improved
as well and it is now possible to load TurboCalc
spreadsheets as a table within your documents.

If you have a high-quality printer then you
will appreciate the enhancements that have
been made in Wordworth's image handling and
printing capabilities. It is now possible to import

Auto Correct
is not a spell
checker; it
expand
abbreviations
for you.

,1 ?MiTpcon<pl

lEJIg*

Irtt- Pu

p- I

_^]^

"Wordworth 5 is
the ideal choice
for the beginner."

Here's the new
and improved
Find and
Replace tool
in action.

h-,:K □

1 1^" rpi>- _

' — POOBCouiI

- '-n*' u III LRhWiIQ DoIw

1 Ikri

n bul il hv<L^<
■■■□nal pull

-I. Ihi high 1
m. rtup |4l

IKdiI^Id

MtfKU
WW

1CKM

May 1996

24-bit images and have them displayed at the
best quality of your display It also improves the
quality of the images that are printed out.

There is also intelligent pnnter font support
for laserjet printers, So thai the program
automatically use the available fonts without
having to switch to a separate mode.
Background printing is possible too, so you can
continue working on a document as it is being
printed out. As with previous versions,
Wordworth's pnnler support is excellent and the
installation script has an enormous list of
available printer drivers that can be installed
with pretty much every printer I've heard of.

One of the features of Wordworth that has
always drawn me to it is its excellent support for
different file formats. It can now open text in the
following formats; Final Copy II, Final Writer,
ASCII, RTF (particularly useful). Word Perfect
5,1 for DOS, MS Word for DOS, MS Works
(text files only), Wordstar and MS Write for
Windows. It can also save files as ASCII, RTF
and Word Perfect 5.1 for DOS, Several
graphics formats are also supported and you
can load pictures saved in EPS, IFF TIFF, GIF,
PCX, BMP and IMG formats.

Feature perfect

Wordworth 5 is quicker and smoother in
operation than its predecessors, most notably
when saving and loading tiles. All of the great
features of previous versions are still there too.

While Wordworth doesn't have the extensive
DTP features of Final Writer, it can be used to
create attractive documents relatively easily with
its own collection of tools, With the addition of
an ARexx pert the program has every chance of
gaining as many power features as FW4,

Thanks to its excellent intertace and helpful
on-line and printed manuals, Wordworth 5 is the
ideal choice for the beginner who is looking for
a good balance of power and ease-of-use; it is
definitely worth upgrading to for experienced
users of earlier versions too. ■

Wordworth 5

Price: £69.59

(upgrade Wordworth 3,1 £39,99)
( upgrade any other program £39,99)
Su pp fier: Digita International

Contact; 01395 270273

Veniict: 94%

Stvbuy

AHXM SHOPFER 37

Hi Q M^inntcd serving the Amiga User since 1988

Why not try our Internet site at www.hiq.co.uk

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3- Five drive hays, various mounting conl^igu rations.
4, Ideal monitor stand and cables slide underneath,
■i. SONY 2.4 speed CD Rom drive,
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8, DOES NOT VOID WARRANTY.

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The golden age of steam
explored in our mysterious
12 page encounter

Heresy

This year's most gorgeous
card game gels the full
arcane treatment

Read <iur full and frank review of Wliite Wbtf s
most fantastic roleplaying game yet

Larry Hickmott

Printer i

ShopperReview

Epson

Now you can buy a laser
printer for the price of an inf^jet.
Larry Hickmott tests tfie new
EPL-5500 from Epson.

Peripherals like the Epson
EPL-5500 make me feel old.
That's because i can
remember the days when
you needed a warehouse to
store your computer and a huge desk the
size of an office door for anything that
resembled a printer. The story is so
different nowadays and you have to look
no further than the EPL-S5D0 for proof.

Here is a 600dpi printer that costs just over
£■^30 in the High Slreel. It's not tinat long ago
that a 300dpi model would have cost a lot more
than that, so the EPL-5500 is a bargain. It's also
very small. Most of my printers tend to absorb all
the desk space given to them, but the Epson
has plenty of desk visible around it.

When in use, the desk space required for
the EPL-5500 increases because the in-tray for
(he paper folds out in front of the printer to take
up to 1 50 sheets of paper. Out-going paper
spits out of the top and on to an angular tray
that doesn't appear to be very strong.

Getting Ihe EPL-5500 up and running with
the Amiga was simple. Making such a statement
after having used so many printers may appear
to be assuming too much but with TurboPrint 4,1
and Studio 3 already installed on my Amiga, it
was plug and play using the printer. Using
TurboPnnl 4.1 and Studio 2 also introduced me
to some differences between the two programs.

First, they are two packages you will need
to consider if you intend using this printer with
your Amiga. This is because the printer has no
control panel and all its internal functions like
the number of copies and so on are controlled
from Workbench. Both Studio 2 and TurboPrint
do it differently though.

Whereas Studio 2 comes with a separate
desktop control panel called SetupPJLto set
the various functions in the printer, these same
controls in TurboPrint are controlled from vanoua
panels and some controls do not enist at all. Of
the two, I prefer Studio 2's approach which has
them all in the one place.

Quality toner

One item that caught my eye was the separate
toner cartridge and drum assembly. In th[s day
and age of all-in-one toner cartridge assemblies,
this two-piece job is refreshing because, while
the printer is producing good quality output, you
don't need to replace the drum. It has a life
expectancy of 20,000 sheets, while the toner
carlndge is supposedly good for 3,000 sheets.
Expect around 20 per cent less for real use.

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of the printer has to be done
through so Aware like Studio's
"Setup PJL" utility.

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£49.95-

W<i

Above: With a suitable DTP program and the Epson EPL-55D0,
you have the beginnings of your very own DTP business.

Lefl^ The latest printing enhancement package in the UK,
TurboPrint 4.1 has support for laseis that emulate the
HP LaserJet 4; the Epson is one svch printer.

Issue 62

May 1996

Bear in mind that the toner cartridge is likely
to cost upwards of £50, When you consider
that a toner cartridge for my LaserJet 4MP costs
the same but also has an imaging drum in it, you
have to wonder why the Epson loner cartridge
costs so much without the drum. It is after all
the drum which contains all the valuable metals
and that's now separate from the toner in the
Epson model.

To be fair to Epson, if you compare the
costs ot the Epson in a run of 20,000 copies,
to the HP LaserJet 5L (the EPL-5500's closest
competitor), the EPL-5500 comes out ahead of
the 5L by around £90.

The EPL-5500 is also ahead of the 5L
when it comes to expansion because it will take
an Epson Script module so you can print
PostScript. Consider that my first prrnt test with
this printer, a landscape A4 page, took well over
an hour to print, but when pnnled using
PostScript (on a different printer), it took only
two and half minutes, it's not hard to see why
PostScript is so valuable for the Amiga owner.

The printer comes with 1 Mb of memory as
standard, although other memory versions are
available and the PostScript model requires
5lv1b of memory. Going back to the EPL-5500's
paper handling, as well as the 1 50-sheet paper
feed already mentioned, you will also find a slot
for the manual feed above the in-tray, where
card of up to 1 57gEm can be fed.

Overall, the EPL-5500 is cracking printer, I
had it running until I had drained it of all its toner
and at no time did I have any problems like a
loss in quality, overheating or paper jamming. At
the price and with its Posts cnpt option, I would
look at it more closely than the Hewlett-Packard
5L which is a great printer but doesn't take
PostScript, Don't forget that you will also need
to spend £49.95 on either TurboPrint 4,1 or
Studio 2 to get the most from the EPL-5500, ■

Epson EPL-5500

" Price: RRPE399

Supp lier: Epson UK

Contact: 0800 220546

Verdict: 91%

star buy

AtHQd SHOPPER 39

ShopperReview

Music

Maff Evans

versions

As new forms of music appear and evolve, so too does music
software. Maff Evans finds out whetfier It's all for the better.

Objects are controlled by variables, which can be
global or local. Here we see a window containing
the current local variables available.

"Problems that
hound Loom to
embarrassing

levels.

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In the Irtstrumenls window, you can load IFF
samples, tune them and map them to a particular
scale. There's no support tor MIDI instruments.

40 Amgashopper

Algorithmic composition is
by no means a new
phenomenon. Ciassical
composers such as Bach
dabbled In translating
mathematical formulae to acceptable
musical forms and many electronic artists
have come up with similar
Ideas. This is no surprise, since
computers can both carry out
complex mathematical
functions AND link to music
equipment. Loom attempts to
bring the two worlds together,
by presenting you with a series
of maths-based functions
which can create random or
ordered pieces of music.
This is done by stringing
together 'Objects' in a tree-like
arrangement, each of which has
its own function and attributes.
At Its simplest level, an Object
can consist of a string of notes to be played as
a pattern until the next Object is triggered, but
all manner of colossally comple); manipulators
can also be created as Objects, themselves
transforming other parts of a tree to create
transpositions, arpeggiations, recursions and...
well, almost anything, really, Sound
complicated? Believe me, you have no idea.

Window cleaning

Loom is supplied on two disks - one with the
main program and another with difterant types of
Objects to be loaded in. When you get past the
title screen and enter the program, you are just
given a blank screen, a strip of icons and a few
windows with which to begin editing. That's
about if really. From here the mind-boggling
complenrty starts to show.

The actual parts (the Objects mentioned
earlier) of a composition are arranged in the
Object window, with different shaped boxes
depicting the Object types. Other windows are
used to navigate your way through the 'tree',
including a visualiser window to show data
within an Object, an instruments window
displaying sounds and another window for
playing and looking at Objects,

Rather than having a menu strip at the top
of the screen, each window has its own set of

May 1996

..t\n:i Prtsi I Kit..

pop -up menus, all pertaining to the functions of
the active window.

Tfie most simple composition you could
create would just be a stnng of mono phrases
or chord Objects strung together alongside a
drum beat, but to use Loom as it was intended,
you'll need to grasp the theory of algorithms in
composition. The best way to
describe this is in terms of a
series of events like a computer
program. You set up Objects with
parameters that can be triggered
by variables (Loom can handle
variables that are local to a
particular process or global to an
entire composition). You then set
up a senes of conditions thai the
Objects must adhere to and
mathematical progressions that
affect the conditions that the
Objects delect. Lost you? Well,
think of everything being a series
of IF.„THENand
WHILE,, .WEND loops, with the progressions
and Objects sitting inside.

Chain reactions

The next step up is to use recursions. This
enables Objects to use other Objects or even
themselves to define how an Object will act In
basic terms this is either how a musical phrase
will play or how another Object will be affected
by a series of calculations, all in a nested series
which can produce wild results. Getting things
to produce listenable music takes a lot of time
and effort, since everything can exist in a chain,
Ivlake one change and EVERriHING can be
thrown out of whack.

Most of the work done in Loom will be with
transformations, which involves placing special
Objects alongside musical phrases to affect
them in certain ways. The actual transformations
used vary wildly, from simple transpositions of
notes to maths functions and randomisers. Even
when you use the random Objects, there's a lot
you can do with the functions on offer. For a
start there are various types of distribution you
can use (linear, enponential. bell curved and so
on), which in turn can be controlled through the
vanous effects - all of which can be tracked in
the visualisation window (which gives a
graphical representation of what you're doing.
When you've got a handle on all this, things can

Issue 62

Maff Evans

Music

ShopperReview

be linked up into huge networks, producing
long, evolving pieces of what Is often called
process music. Well It is for the first few bashes
you take. Later, you may create something which
Is more akin to the usual forms of music. All very
complicated stuff, I trust you'll agree. In fact I
had to refer to my Mathematics degree-holding
girlfriend and her text books (which, incidentally,
featured te:(ls on the algorithmic compositions
of Bach) to put some of the theories into
practice. Some of those books only just covered
the maths involved, and the chaos theory
sections of Loom I'm told are loo complex for
degree courses - It's a complex brand of
mathematics in its own right.

When you consider the amount of
processing that has had to go into Loom to
create these processes, the programmer must
be a maths wizard to have been able to translate
these theories Into musical tools.

Yes... but

Loom Is a brave attempt at coming up with a
new way to compose music. Unfortunately it
falls on a whole slew of levels. The first is that
the system is very unstable. Attempting tc run in
a number of ways (from floppy, from hard disk,
with or without extra RAM, accelerated and non-
accelerated and even on different Amigas) quite
often presented glitches and complete lock-outs
(either a freeze or just quitting the program). If
you've spent time trying to manipulate Objects
this is much more than frustrating.

The second problem is in the operating
system. File-location, moving Objects, operating
windows and structuring the system is far from
straightforward, Windows refuse to close,
confusion between file types gets annoying and
navigating even a simple algorithm is fraught
with difficulty. Expecting any musician to cope
with an unwieldy interface places a stumbling
block in the creative process. Not good at all.

The third, and probably most heinous,
setback is the environment Itself, Even basing
music around algorithms, recursions, formulae,
random distributions, transposition maps and
patterns needs to build up from a basis. Simply
placing controls on a blank canvas and
expecting you to plough through the manuals
and learn the maths is a bit much. If you're going
lo program music using such a system, you

The processors

1 1

Algorithmic composition

Pianos'). A name which will

the Beach and Koyanisquatzi,

usually results in a very

probably trigger more

His work has been very

characteristic farm ol music,

peoples' memories is Richard

Influential in the field, and he

usually called 'process'

lames, also known as Aphex

even worked with Richard

music. Many composers have

T^Nln. His 'Selected Ambient

iames to produce a cross

produced sudi pieces, the

Works Volume Two' CD

between the techno of Aphex

most lamous of these being

featured many process-type

Twin and classical recursive

sudi artists as Michael

tunes, some of which are

themes. Get hold of Issue 3e

Nyman (who has produced

extremely challenging to

of Shopper's sisler

scores (or Peter Greenaway's

usual music forms. Perhaps

magazine, Future Music, and

film work) and Sieve Reich

the most well-known artist In

listen to the cover- mount CD

(who recently performed the

the field is the prolific Philip

lo hear Icct Hedral - the

acclaimed 'The Cage' and 'Six

Glass, creator of Einstein on

results of their collatioration.

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Drum patterns are predefined
and distinctly non-algorithmic.
This page allows you to provide
a set ot samples of your
choosing for the various
percussion sounds.

might as well do it in C or something.

There are a number of other pnriblems, such
as limiting the way you create instruments to a
specific map with a certain type of sample, no
support for MIDI (MAJOR mistake], poor filing
support, a ragged, undisciplined structure - not
open, just ragged, and instructions which take
impenetrability to new levels.

This isn't just an argument against
algorithmic composition or process music, since
there are programs on other platforms that allow
you to use formulae, arpeggiations, recursions
and random distributions to create music
algorithms - and they work properly. Admittedly
they're more expensive, but you get a solid
piece of code that won't tall over, a good user
interface, sample and MIDI-based tools and the
ability to create music that people will want to
hear. That's worth paying more for. Loom isn't
worth buying at all.

Glitchy software, a confusing environment,

limited output possibilities and too many
assumptions on the knowledge of musicians are
all problems that hound Loom to embarrassing
levels. All the good Intentions, brave inclusions
and complex tools in the world can't overcome
all this.

What could be a better alternative would be
tc contact Seasoft for a copy of the acclaimed
[and rightly so) OctaMED Pro and spend some
money on maths books and a reference guide to
the work of modern East European composers.
Other musicians have managed with this kind of
material, so why shouldn't you?

Loom versions

Price: £31 (incP&P)

SuppHer? Seasoft Computinq

Contact: 01903 850378

Venlict: 15%

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TJie 'family tree' type structure of a typical Object. This one provides
harmonies to input note structures - all controlled by a string of variables.

Loom's operating page consists at windows far controlling Objects,
instruments and structures. A control strip an the left holds the edit icons.

Issue 62

May 1996

Ahkmshdpper 41

ShopperReview

Sound creation

Maff Evans

Aural Synthetica

Maff Evans discovers whether
this program can bring full
synthesizer power to the Amiga.

The Amiga has always been
considered a very able music-
making machine, witli cheap,
bill still more than reasonable
sampling on offer and some
very powerful MIDI applications. However,
there has been little in the way of true
sound creation programs. Aural Synthetica
attempts to bring the quality of a full
analogue synthesizer to any Amiga, not
just those with expansion board
capabilities. It still needs a pretty pokey
Amiga to run properly, including an '020
processor (an '030 is recommended) and a
couple of megs of tree RAM, but it means
that anyone with a 1 200 or up can use it.

Model maker

So why does it need all this processing power?
Well, ralher than just using the Amiga's byilt-in
sound to play the synth tone, you construct a
'patch' by linking modules together and
adjusting their vanous settings, which the
program then uses !□ construct a 'rnodel' of the
sound. The model is then used to generate an
audio sample which can be saved to disl^.
Although a novel approach, Aural Synthetica
isn't the first program lo adopt such a system.

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of tools tor
rrtaniputaling
(fie raw
wavetarms i5
impressive
and they can
produce
great results.

Masses of
floating
windows can
be brought
up for
individuat
settings, but
they don't all
work as you
would expect

mural Svnlhtlifi bI.H B CliiMorJ Tfihnalmf f11^

Left: Even on the main screen a huge
bank of buttons Is on show lo access
the edit screens.
Below: Synth sounds are built by
linking modules In the patch screen.
Plan carefully or suffer frustration.

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42 AmOASHOPPER

Users of other platforms have had this kind ot
technology for years - the classic example is
Turbosynth on the Apple Macintosh, although
Turbosynth's operating system is more fluid than
the complei interface used by Synthetica.

How it works

At the most basic level, you use an oscillator to
generate a sound wave. This is probably
Synthetica's strongest point, since you can use
a lot of powerful tools to generate almost any
type of waveform. Unfortunately, it's a cortiplei
process and only those who have a strong
grounding in synthesis or audio physics will be
able to manipulate it with any kind of dexterity. A
certain number of standard
waves have been supplied, but
coming up with new ones will
mean a trip to the library to get
a tell book for many users.

When you've finally got
your wave, you can flip to the
Patch window, where the
actual synth sound is set up.
This attempts to recreate the
original modular analogue
synth architecture, with a load
of on-screen boies that you
link together with red lines (simulating the patch
leads). What you do is click on the output of one
section (say, the wave output of an oscillator) to
the input of another (such as the input of an
amplifier), which in turn can be effected by an
envelope generator. Unless you understand how
the structure of a synth works, this could
bamboozle you, so a few examples of how
things link up in real synths have been included.

Sadly, it's still far too complicated to operate
in practice, because the screen is so cramped,
cluttered and confusing that it's easy to make a
mistake. If you do, the computer comes up with
a 'PATCH ERROR' message. Yeah, really helpful.

Er... That's not right

The complicated palchmg isn't the only problem
that dogs the program though. One snag that
crops up from the off is that when a sound is

May 1996

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Some help is given by example
synth configurations. It's a pity
thatyou couldn't put patches
together like this.

generated, it attempts to fill the entire memory,
so you have to work out how much memory a
sample is likely to need before you start. Call me
picky, but that's a bit o( a chore lo attempt
before starling work.

Unfortunately, the way that many other edit
screens work is also unusual. Not just in terms
of the user interface, but in the performance. For
example, rather than the cutoff of a filter being
varied over time (as every other synth does), the
amount of filtering is affected, often giving
unpredictable results. When you have lo do all
your editing then wait a few minutes (not

seconds) to hear the results,
this kind ot quirk is frustrating.
You often forget the kind of
sound you were trying to
create in the first place.

The delay in rendering is
inherent in such a system, but
it shouldn't mean that creating
sounds has to be such a
chore. Take Turbosynth for
example. That does the same
thing, but you create sounds
by dropping the required
modules on to a grid, linking them with an easy-
to-use cable system and clicking on them to edit
their settings, thus letting you decide how
complex you want to get rather than setting an
extremely rigid operating practice.

I thought these criticisms would mellow with
time, but the longer 1 tried to use the program,
the more niggling points started to annoy me.
The fact that this is the only Amiga program to do
the job isn't enough. Music is a creative process
- not an exercise in physics and programming.
Aural Synthetica's power is buned too deep to
make it an intuitive musician's tool. ■

A urai Synthetica

Price: £30(-t-PSP) "

Supplier: Seasoft Computin g
Contact: 01903 850378

Verdict: 54%

Issue 62

Paul Overaa

ARexx compiler

Shop per Review

ARexx scripts are sometimes a
little slow. Can this new ARexx
compiler speed things up?
Paul Overaa investigates...

ARexx is an interpreted
ianguage and one of its few
faults is that ARexx scripts
can be slow when running.
This guarantees that the
words 'ARexx compiler' always generate
Interest amongst ARexx users.

Rexecute is an ARbkx compiler in the sense
that it can produce standalone, sxecutabie
ARexx programs, i.e. programa that do not have
to be run using the RX command, it is also easy
to use. Just specify your script file, aak Rexecute
to 'compile' it to executabie form, and you end
up witin a version that you can run by double-
eliciting its icon. This is of immediate benefit to
those ARexx users who find that malting their
scripts Worltbench runable by playing around
with IconX (and supporting AmigaDOS script
files] either tedious or awiiward.

The Rexecute compiler produces four types
of output: the executable files mentioned; library
object code files that can be added to link
libraries of external ARexx functions; object code
modules that can be linked to C and Assembler
programs; and Rexecute script files, If you're
wondering why you would want to compile an
existing script file into another script file, it's
simple - the Rexecute front end enables you to
specify a variety of interrupt and trace options
and, when you let Rexecute output a script file,
it adds all the appropriate interrupt and trace
code statements to your code. If also removes
comment lines, making the script more compact.

Save time!

The main advantage cf Rexecute, however, has
nothing to do with speed. It's that it has a nicely
organised scheme for using routines stored in
link libraries, where you can create your own
libraries and bring particular routines into your
scripts by using an #e*tern compiler directive.
Serious ARexx coders will find this feature
useful in reducing program development times,
A disassembler that enables you to turn an
executable program back into script form, plus a
separate librarian utility are also provided as part
of the package, if you are programming using C
or Assembler then there are other advantages to
be had loo. For example, you can add your
compiled script to a program and execute it as
an ARexx command slnng. One nice touch is
that Rexecute itself is fully ARexx controllable

Issue 62

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and has a list of over 75 ARexx commands
which cover practically all cf its operations.
There is an introductory demo provided that
shows Rexecute's front end controllability to
good effect.

The documentation [AmigaGuide based),
could be improved; although quite extensive, the
basic ideas concerning the purpose of the
package aren't explained clearly enough for
AReii beginners to understand.

It's not what it seems

There are disadvantages that become obvious
immediately you start 'compiling' scripts,
including the fact that compiled versions can
end up significantly larger than the original
scripts. One 2K script of mine ended up as a
1 4K executable! Another disadvantage is that
executable files still need to have ARexx up and
running in order to run. It was while looking at
the reasons for this that I found that Rexecute

DISExec,

the
Rexecute
disassembler,
can re-create
ARexx scripts
from etecutatile
versions.

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Jargon buster

Interpreted Language: A computer language
which works by reading, interpreting and
then executing program statements on an
effsdively line-by-line basis.
Link Librsry: A collection ol existing
routines that can be added to a program
during a special stage called linking;
performed prior to running the program.
RX. The ARexx utility that is used to run
ARexx scripts from a Shell window.

May 1996

Left: Rexecute has an easy
lo-use front end.
Below. H enables you to set
tilings like the editors you
wlsti to use for reading and
editing files, using tool type
entries stored in the
Rexecute icon file.

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==svs--™---

Above: The Rexecute AmigaGuide manual is
comprehensive, but beginners would probably
prefer extra help with some basic principles.

doesn't really compile scripts at all - it just
wraps a directly runable execution environment
around them.

In fact if you look at the executables
produced by Rexecute using a debugger, you
will find the onginal ARexx script buried inside
the executable form, ARexx needs to be present
then because ARexx is running the script under
the surface in much the same way as always.
This explains why there are no speed
advantages to speak of, and why Rexecute is
unable to catch syntax errors in your coda
during the compiling stage (ARexx is left to
catch these at run-time).

I am duty bound lo look at Rexecute from a
number of different technical viewpoints, but do
keep what I've said about the program in
perspective. Rexecute is not expensive and
ARexx beginners looking for an easy way to
produce directly executable scripts, or a more
advanced user who likes the idea of using
Rexecute's library facilities, will find the program
good value for money, ■

Rexec ute

Price: E14.95~

Supplier: Horizon Software (UK)

Contact: 01621 778778

Verdict: 82%

JXlMOnSHOPPER 43

SuperDouble CD Pack

Squirrel MPEG

£189

includm
Squkrol SCSI

The superb SuperDouble (JD-ROM is back? Using an exeellent 2.4 speed drive
from Sony, [tiis CO-ROM provides oulstanding perfonnaTice s,t an amazing
priee. With£i3G0iQysdflta transfer rale and a 230ms access time, the SuperDouble
CD-ROM provides all ihe spted for the power user

TheSupcrDuuble is fuLy compatible with the new Squirrel MPEG card, supporting
the industry standard VideoCD (While Book) formal.

The SuperDouble CD-ROM pack includes the award-winning AGA Experience
CD-ROM -rated 93% in issue 79 of Amiga FormaL This CD-ROM is crammed
full of pichjres, utilities, demos, animations and tools for ACA Amigas, The
SuperDouble pack also includes the latest Aminet CD-ROM, Thb disk is brimming
with the latest PD, shareware, utilities, demos and picture files from the Aminet
archives on the internel.

A fti(( classic Squirrel is also Included In the pack This allows easy connection
of any SCSI peripheral to the A1200. The package has all the necessary drivers
and software for easv connection of hard drives, CD-ROMs and removable disk
drives, such as the Zip' ' Drive, to vour .^niigj.

|az IS a revolutionary 1Gb
removable hard disk system
for anv Amiga wilh SCSL
Like a Zip drive on
5teroids, ]az provides
astonishing
performance. Offering
data transfer rales of
up to 6MB/5 and access
times of under 12ms.

For full information on this
amazing SCSI peripheral

contact HiSoft Systems,

• 1Gb Carts

• &MB/sec

£599

Olul P*P

Cinema4D

Professional Ray-Tracing and
Animation for your Amiga

VhA.

Ciiiema4D is the easy-to-
use ray-lradng and animation
system for your Amiga.
Equipped with an intuition-
based multi- tasking editor,
Cinema4D is replete with every
conceivable option including
window-based real-time
interactive modelling, direct
modelling in 3D, basic and
complex primitives with infinite
variations, easy object
manipulation, floating toolbars,
user-defined menus, object and
texture lists, definable ob}eci
liierarchies, optimised versions
for fi8(120 (M200 etc.] & FPUs,
and much morel

The Cincma4D animator brings
you even closer lo the world of
"virtual realily ", breathing life
iota objects and scenes.
Whether you have your
spaceship dock with a
spacestation. or take a tour
around the darkest dungeon -
witli Cinema4D it's so simple.
Jusl a few mouse clicks and you

will have your objects
move realistically through
time and space.

Cinema4D also includes
MagicLink, the flexible

object converter.
MagicLink converts all
popular object formats
{Imagine. Sculpt, DXF,
Reflections, etc.] to
Cinema4D format & back.

Squirrel

I hi SCSI Mf'fCi rlnivtr lift VfHir .^iiiift.5. Aliirb, M:)dnLL)^h k IHXI-F't." CompHiLiLiI^.'

Brii^g the cinema inio vour home and onto your computer with Squirrel
MPEG'". Plapng the popular VideoCD and CDI CD-ROMs as well as
rav^ MPEG streams, Squirrel MPEG brings high quality digitally mastered
images and 16-bit stereo sound to you and your Amiga-
Squirrel MPEG is a SCSI peripheral that can be used in conjunction with
any SCSI controller, such as the Classic Squirrel" or Surf Squirrel", and
any VideoCD compatible CD-ROM. Squirrel MPEG can also be used as
a stand-alone unit, with a SCSI CD-ROM, as an addition to your TV,
Video and Hi-Fi setup.

Available from March 1996. Squirrel MPEG is the latest in an established
line of ground-breaking products, for you and your Amiga, from HiSoft
Systems.

Studio V2 Professional

The original colour managsm^t ,..
system for your Amiga ~>^i

Use Studio 2 to get the most out
of vour printer. With its powerhil
Workbench drivers, you will gel
outstanding printed results from
your applications, every lime.

Studio 2 brings professional
colour managemenl lo ihe Amiga,
ensuring thai the colours on your
screen match the colours on your
printer.

Studio 2 is also directly supported
by the popular printer
manufacturers, and always
includes drivers for Iheir latest
printers.

Set evety concek'ahk yrinS opSion
from ihe'Sindio preference program

DiskMAGIC

Easy file & Disk Management

Constantly doing battle with the
ShelVCLI? Stop this hitile struggle with
EJiskMAGlC, the easy-to-use file and
disk management utility from HiSoft.

DiskMAGIC simplifies every task you
perform, from the copying of disks and
files, to the viewing of pictures and
anims. In fact, after using DiskMAGIC,
you'll wonder how you ever used your
Amiga without it.

Order Hotline ^
(D 0500 223660

To order any of the products shown on this page
(or any other HiSofl title) - just call us, free of
charge, on 0500 113f-t^, armed with your credit
or debit card; we will normally despatch wittiin
4 working days (£4 P&P) or, for only £(i within
the UK. by guaranteed next day delivery (for
goods in stock]. Alternatively, you can send us a
cheque or postal orders, made out to HiSoft. All
prices include VAT. Export orders: please call or
fax to confirm pricing and postage coats.
e 1995 HiSofl. E&OE,

ttE^

HiSsft

SYSTEMS

The Old School, Greenfield
Bedford MK45 5DE UK
Tel: -hM (0)1525 718181
FaxH-44 (0)1525 713716

email: hisofl@cix.computmk.co.uk

All prices indiidi' UK
VAT S' 17J%

Zip, laz are (rodemnrfa 0/

hniega tnc

Larry Hickmoii

ISO image writer

ShopperReview

Master

Writing information to a CD
needs special software - lil<e
MasterlSO from Asimware.
Larry Hickmott checks it out.

The CO player is one of the
most fashionable peripherals
these days. It has become
standard issue on the PC,
alongside the floppy disk
drive and hard drive; and it's starting to
become popular on the Amiga too.

However, while Ihe 'rormal' CD player gains
in popularity, another mote interesling CD-ROM
device is starting to take off in a big way. One of
the world's largest cornputer suppliers, Hewlett-
Packard, tell me they are already al full stretch
trying to meet demand for their CD-writer, the
40201, which costs less than £800. However,
these units are destined mainly for PCs.
The HP 40201 and others like it, will
nonetheless work with the Amiga, although the
path to compacl disc Utopia is far from easy.
The problem is hardware. Software such as
MasterlSO already supports many CD writers.
The real limitations lie with the SCSI port you
may have on your Amiga.

Not all SCSI interfaces are
the same, and while people with
boxed Amigas and a SCSI card
like the 409 1 , Fastlane Z3 or
Warp Engine, shouldn't have a
problem using these cards with CD
writers, other SCSI cards for boied Amigas and
the Al 200 are an unknown quantity.

When reviewing MasterlSO, I expected to
be able lo use my Squirrel wJth the Hewlett-
Packard 4020i CD writer, which is quite happily
(and brilliantly) working on the PC.

However, initial tests in trying to gel the CD
writer working with the A1 200 failed; I will be
testing various other SCSI cards to see if this
can be overcome. Talking to some SCSI eiperts.

'*'• "■"-■ "1

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they tend to agree Ihat it's not surprising that
I've had problems, because a CD writer is a
demanding piece of kit, and the SCSI port has
be something special, with a full DMA, to cope.

Therefore, you may have to look a little
harder when buying a SCSI card because some
of those available for boxed Amigas and the
Al 200 will not automatically be compatible with
all SCSI devices, including CD writers.

iViaster software

MasterlSO from Asimware Innovations is
compatible with many CD writers, providing you
have an acceptable SCSI card. Unlike other
devices such as floplicals, floppy disks
and hard disks, writing
intormation to a CD requires
special software that can write
an ISO image,

A few years ago I thought
process must be really high tech,
but after using a CD wnter on the PC and the
software on an Amiga, 1 found 'burning CD
images' is almost as simple as copying files
using a file manager

MasterlSO takes a set of files and puts them
together in one big file called the ISO image.
This is then written to CD. When you look at the
disk with a file manager, or on Workbench, it
appears just like any other disk -based device.

Masted SO makes the process very simple
and it only takes a few minutes to set up.

You may be forgiven for thinking that
when you buy a SCSI port for your
Amiga, you will be able to use it
viritli ail Ihose SCSI devices out
there in PC and H/lacintosh land.
Not so. In the space of a tew t

days, J had difficulties getting the '
H-P CD writer lo work with the I

Amiga and then a SCSI version of
the GT-5000. Until then it had been
fine with a number of normal CD
players and hard disks.

Those most at risk from pOBsible

incompalibility problems are Amiga
k 1200 owners. If you have a boxed
Amiga tike the A4000, tlien a

Engine tend to be quite reliable
(although nothing's perfect).
The moral of this is to
check and double check thai the

work with the type of SCSI devices
you intend to use.

Issue 62 I

May 1996

taft: Creating a CD is as simple as
choosing the files you want, and then
having MasterlSO build an ISO image
ready to be written to a blank CD.
Below: On the second of two screens
in MasterlSO, you can give your CD a
volume name and set many other,
more specialised attributes.

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I.K— 1

41 1 "-ifirirl

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liiijiiiiji;..

while the writing ot the ISO image takes a lot
longer. Hardly surprising when you can write
600Mb of data to a disc, However, the longest
process by far is compiling the data on your
hard drive ready for MasterlSO.

I have used MasterlSO to create ISO images
which are transferred on to CD on the PC and a
few things about the software are noticeable.
One is that it can't do a direct wnte to CD like I
can on the PC The ISO image needs to be
'built' on the hard dnve and then written to CD.
This is being changed for version 2, I am told,

Speed control

Another function that MasterlSO lacks is a
feature to set the speed of the write. In some
circumstances, it is useful to slow down the
write from a dual-speed write to a single-speed
write in case of buffenng problems. The
publishers of MastedSO tell me thai speed
control will be implemented for version 2, As will
multisession support.

However, I found MastedSO easy lo use,
although I fell Asimware could have provided
more information and functions for creating
audio CDs, Not everyone will want to create |ust
data CDs, which are dead easy anyway.

From what Asimware have implied,
version 2 of MasterlSO will be the one to look
out for, so check out what the upgrade options
are first, because although version 1 does the
job, it lacks a number of key features which
should appear in version 2. ■

MasterlSO Version 1

Price: £129.95
Supplier: B litters oft

Contact: 01908 261466

Verdict: 85%

AWIGASNDPPER 45

ShopperReview

3D modelling

Gary Whiteley

Macro

Modelling curved or complex
models in LightWave can
be frustrating. MacroForm
aims to make this easier, as
Gary Whiteley finds out.

^B am H hile Lightwave is a
^H flH ^V heavy duty 3D package,
^H^V^ft^V there are inevitably
^|V V^f times when it comes up
^F short. One area in

particular where it fails to measure up to
competition like Real3D Is in its modeiling
of complex curved objects. Not only can
such objects be difficuit to create, they
often don't iook as good as the smooth
spline-based models created witli ReaiSD.
Now, i can't say thai the results of rendering
MacroForm objects measure up to the output of
RealSD, but ttvey bring LiglilWave users closer
tlian models made witliin LiglitWave alone.
Ultimateiy, this is because Real3D uses spiine
and mathematical CSG (definition) procedures
to produce rts models, wliereaa LightWave is
almost entirely dependent on polygonal objects;
so unless your LightWave model is divided into
a very large number ot polygons, it is unlikely
ever to looli as smooth as s RealSD object.
MacroForm helps LightWave modellers
achieve a smoother look, as well as providing
help when modelling objects with complex
curves and curved edges. However, the
program's makers say you shouldn't use it with
LightWave 4, because LightWave 4 makes
MacroForm run very slowly. They recommend
using Lightwave 3,5 until further notice.

it's an ARexx thing

One ot the hidden strengths of the Amiga is its
ARexi capability, v^hich LightWave makes good

The slice and dice Railforming variant segments
an object ready for further manipulation.

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46 AHfOASHOPPER

use of with its Modeller Macros. MacroForm

extends this capability by providing a range of

modelling procedures which operate via

compiled ARexx scripts. Not only does

MacroForm build on Modeller3D's existing tools,

but it adds several new ones to

turbocharge your modelling. These

include a range of powerful

Railforming variants including

twist, mould, scale and rout, slice

and dice (to chop existing objects

into bite-size chunks ready for

further manipulation), align and

centre functions, and distance

and angle calculators.

For your money, you get three

disks containing MacroForm and a

range of tutorial examples to

plough through in tandem with

Macro Form's extensive,

but rather technical and dry manual.

MacroForm isn't for beginners. You
need a sound understanding of
Lightwave's modelling concepts,
especially more complex ones like
spline curves and free form modelling.
It also requires plenty of patience to
get through the manual; although it
offers many tutorials, most of them
load their objects and examples
without need for any user intervention.
In fact, because the concept of
MacroForm is quite difterent to most
of the built-in functions of LightWave

May 1996

it seems hard to get to grips with using it as an
extension to M3D. Sadly, MacroForm's manual
doesn't explain how to do your own thing with it,
relying instead on self-contained tutorials which
never give the feeling that you're fully in control.
There isn't room lo describe all of
MacroForm's many functions, but you
can see from the objects in the
rendered illusttation above that the
possibilities are there. A good
starting point for many shapes is
the NewBox tool, which enables
the user to build segmented and
round-edged boxes ready for
sculpting further. By using Rail-type
tools, segmented objects can be
moulded in diverse ways by using
control and free-form curves to
bend, twist, mould and shape
simple fomis into complex curved
objects. Many of these functions can be
changed interactively during the modelling
process, though some are n on -reversible.

MacroForm is a tool for serious
Lightwave modellers who are not happy with
Modeller's shortcomings and want more cont'd
over their objects. ■

MacroForm

Price: $215 (about£165)

Supplie r: Activa UK S Anli-Gravity Products

Contact: 0181 402 5770

Issue 62

"The Internet
was invented
by a man

called Irving.
By mistake "

urure

VQur guaranlBG of
InlErnel ivilhoul Laars

.net reveals the true history of the Internet
and shows you how to get on-line.

Plus UrI Geller, Anita Roddick, Internet
widows and the on-line spy society.

Britain's best-selling Internet magazine.

http://www.futurenet.co.uk/

Spring Issue on sale now.

is bachi

Namco revives the golden
age of '80s coin-ops on
PlayStation - gaming
greats or rancid oid tat?
Find out in ^5^ issue 5!

On sale now!

PSIifs exclusive CD boasts playable
demos of Total NBA '9B, Mickey's
Wild Adventure, Thunderhawk 2,
Lone Soldier, and Striker^

i fimmm ^

PlayStation

' Mag azines

41.

Cliacli nul flup ItomE psjes on fuluPeNei m litI|?:.'.'iiiiwiv.lutupBiiEi.cn \ii i i- i

dure

TheTS' logn uHl 'PlaySlalNo™" an uadfrrufLi nPSnny Ccmouler EmpnHnrMni me. "'""I"

CD-ROMs

David Taylor

out

check

Harvesting a bumper crop of CD-ROMs, David Taylor separates the corn from the chaff.

Our post bag is overflowing
with new CD-ROMs again,
so we thought it was about
time that we covered a
whole batch and cleared
the decks for the next wave. Ever popular,
there are a couple of picture library
CD-ROMs, plus a new Aminet CD. There
are also a couple of CDs for 3D users and
one multimedia presentation.

The Colour Library

There was a time when picture libraries were
being released for over £20 each. That's quite
a lot for home users to pay for what are
supposedly PD pictures. But now, more and
mote discs are appearing at the much more
reasonable £1 mark.

The Colour Library is a multi-format CD, but
unlike some it caters very well for Amigas.
There's a complete selection of the necessary
system files as well as a couple of PD
programs, like ImageStudio, for you to use with
the images. There's also a custom front end
which enables you to search the index, browse
through the pictures and view them.

There are 1 ,700 pictures in total, supplied in
a couple of different formats, including IFFs for
Amigas. The selection is certainly varied, but so

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Inr

TTie Colour Library has a large
selection of pictures, over 1,700 in fact,
and 3 custom
front end to
enable you to
browse and view
the images. It
includes
pictures of
puppies. Aah!

is the quality. Some of the pictures are very
good, such as the animals selection, but others
are poor-quality scans whose moire patterning
betrays the printed source. This is a decent
photo library and DTP users are likely to find it
useful, but do you really need another picture
CD? It's up to you.

The Colour Library

Price; £9,99

Supplier; PDSoft

Contact: 01702 466933

V^idlct: 80%

Aminet 10

Aminet is as good a source of new Shareware
as ever. It seems that a fair proportion of
software uploaded is merely an update of
previous software and not original stuff, but
there are some brand new utilities and besides,
it's always best to have the latest versions of
things anyway. The Aminet CD compilers
have realised thai to justify the frequent release
of their CDs, they need to offer a little bit more;
so the last few releases have also contained
some full commercial software for free. This
time it's PageStream 2.1 and a special edition
of TypeSmith.

'i ^:: ;:^-' - xzrz:r....~i q

FBii)Tech

The complete PageStream S.2 as well as a
functioning TypeSmlttt are on Aminet 10.

What can I say? All the quality of Aminet for
you to browse as well as PageStream. It's a bit
of bargain really.

Aminet 10

Price: £)1.99

Supplier: Active Software

Contact: 01325 352260

Veniici: 90%

star buy

Nothing But GIFs AG A

It's strange that a CD designed for the Amiga
with its own AmigaGuide-based interlace and
everything working directly from the CD should

48 AmSASHOPPER

I Way 1996

3D-GFX has a set of objects (or many different

3D programs as well as a host of utilities and a

lot of example

pictures of

renderings. It's a

fine CD, but

might be found a

little lacldng or

incomplete by

some people.

Issue 62

David Taylor

CD-ROMs

contain GIFs. But this one does, so there you
go, II means that you might need some software
to change the format it you want to use the
pictures in some pacl<ages. Anyway, the
AmigaGuide is easy to navigate and well
ordered, The pictures are well chosen and look
very good. There are sections for real and
rendered, each divided into obvious categories.
Amongst some of the finest are the abstract
irnages that are simply enchanting.

Nothing But GIFs AGA

Price: EI 9.99

Suppler: 1 7-Bit Software

Contact: 01924 366982

Vemict: 84%

3D-GFX

Here's another well-ordered CD, It contains
objects, te/tures, scenes and pro|ects as well as
a selection of utilities. The utilities are very well
compiled, but you get the impression that there
is actually less here than meets the aye. The
textures directory contains remarkably lew
textures and too often you look into a plurally-
named directory to find a single item.

Having said all that, this CD does have a
hell of a lot on it, jusl not as much as it could
have done. The directory structure has its clarity
to commend it. All in all, 3D-GFX is a very
good CD and wall worth investing in, but the
12 rnonth development time should have turned
up more material.

3D-GFX

Price: £21.gg

Supplier: PeeJay

Contact: 0181 985 3850

Verdict: 89%

World Atlas

Well, I did say that M.M. Experience was very
capable of creating a professional release and
sure enough, here is one. World Atlas is a
multimedia CD that must have taken a very long
time to compile. There is information on each
country presented in a variety of ways. There's a

little teil about each, as well the national flag
and then a set of maps showing lots of different
details and positions. The maps are of excellent
quality and the final round up of details including
population, religion, languages and GDP are
very interesting.

The text introduction to each part is the only

downside. Although it contains some things that
I never knew, even about England, it looks a little
sparse. In terms of presentation too, this is the
worst area, because of M.M. Experience's one
failing - its boring text handling.

However, the index is extremely thorough,
linking not only countries and capitals, but
dates and products so that you can find out
who, what, where and why from almost any
angle. When you first start the package you
come to the main map, but I found it hard to get
back to that map after I'd worked my way
through a few levels. It's always possible to
move using the Index, but I liked the graphical
part for browsing.

This is not a research CD, but more a
leisure one to browse through, ff you're
wondering whether it's worth getting lor the
educational value for children, I'd say yes, but
only if they have a penchant lor geography.

World Atlas

Price: £29.99

SuppHert Wi se Dome Limited
Contact: 0171 702 9823

Venfict: 90%

Star buy

Texture Portfolio

Lots and lots ol royalty free textures. High
quality supplied in J PEG, PICT and Targa
lormat. If you want to use them in commercial
renderings you need Ground Zero's written
permission. If you're not a 3D artist {or possibly
2D), you'll not be interested. II you are, what
more can I say? Nothing. II you need more
textures, here you go. ■

Texture Portfolio

Price: £29.99

Supplier: Ground Zero

Issue 62 I

May 1996

Contact: 0117 907 6733

Vemict: 93%

star buy

AWGASHGPPER 49

ShopperReader ads

May 1996

Issue 62

Turn your excess equipment into cash, or find a true bargain. Sell, buy, swap, exchange... no matter
what your intentions are, these are the only pages that reach the truly devoted Amiga users.

FOR SALE

• Amiga 40OO/040 compulei, c/w

1 0Mb RAM, 240Mb hard drak, 34-bit
graphic cajd, genlock and mjltisync,
high reaolution monilor, plus AdPro,
Morph PIja, Scala 300, Real 3D 2.
□eluie PainI 4, Scroller 2. A3A Adobe
Font Maker, Ouarterbai* Tools,
Simpatica Machine Controller, £3,000.
"0114 25B5O0O,

• 68020 A2000, 300Mb HD,
SCSI inlerface, monitor. V34 Supra
288 fa) modem, 5Mb RAM and Iota ot
original software, Internet ready wilh
registered AmlTCP, £500. E-mail:
Jonathan .Mod rag M I RA.co.uk, or call
n 01303 355289,

• Ctfi^ plus SX-1, plus black
keyboard. Network CDs 1 + 2. mouse,
joypad, serial and parallel leads, sii
games, including Tower Assault and
Super Stardust. Worth over £600, will
accept £300 ovno. Call Stuart on

1 01 B1 69B 4276, or E-mail on
stuart@draught.demon.co.uk

• SIMM* 6 X 1Mb 32-pin. Offers.
ir01780 721893, or E-mail:

dmcl ean@world5Cope.net.

• Amiga 4B6/50MHz SLC
bridgeboaid with 4Mb RAM, 1 fl-bit
sound card, VGA card and multi
I/O card. Puce £400. Call « -t-3531
820 9529 now.

• Amiga 12D0, Zappo CD-ROM
drive, fiigh quality colour printer. Loads
of software including Page 4,1 .
Profeaaional sale due to upgrade. All
for £400 ono. Mike w 01 452 780402.

• Power PC1208 RAM card, uses
32 SIMMs and PCMCIA fhendly,
includes BB clock and FPU socket.
£40, PCMCIA card suit AeoO/Al 200,
4Mb. £1 50. CDS' £95^ ga^aa
included, -0 01865 375767.

• CD-ROM quad speed Mitsumi IDE
internal drive with Audio Eicel 1 6
sound card or Tandem conlroller. Price
£150. Call « -f-3531 820 9529 now,

• Amiga 4000, 6Mb RAM,
120Mb HD, 1942 monitor, LiglilWave
3D and all system software, all bored
Will split. Contact CPL Moffat.

BMM Rinlein, BFPO 31, n 0049 5722
5953. evenings,

• DICE C Compiler v3,01 , unused,
£80; or will exchange for Real 3D v2.i.
E-mail: U9401 438@boum8moutli.ac.uk,
or phone » 01 202 789433
(Bournemouth), ask for Rob.

• For sale! Mag CD-ROMs, £2 each,
including PSP, or five CDs for only £B.

50 AHX3ASHDPPER

Phone Mattfiew on " 0973 301 882,
or o 01 81 523 B05B (office hours),

• For salel 50 3,5-inch high density
disks, £10 including PSP. Phone
Matthew on « 0973 301 882
(evenings),or « 0181 523 8058
(office hours).

• Supra faa modem 1 4400
baud, up to V,32 bis. Includes modem
software, £75 oro. Phone Mario
"01203 386947

• Power supply unit for A500,
A600, A1 200. Only £1 5, Call Trev after
6pm on 110181 S51 0317

• A2000 2Mb RAtvl A2091 SCSI
controller, 60Mb hard drive, A20a8
PC XT bridgsboard. Call Dave on
"01395 263754, £!00.

• Zappa CD-ROM with power
supply, two joypads and startup
software, £95 ono, f 0181 467 2516,

• For sale) 1 00 3.5-inch high
density disks. £1 0, including PSP
Phone Matthew on »■ 0973 3018S2
(evenings), or " 0131 523 8058
(office hours).

• Pe ir oi'ina 4S0, B/1 20 one
year old, colour, 1 4-inch Parf Rus
monitor, vgc, bo^ed, ClariaWorks 3
and Fiiemaker Pro 2, £800.

11 01780 721598, or E-mail:
dmclean@worldacope.net.

• For sale: two Amiga 6O0s, one
Wild Weird Wicked, one Epic with
HD, £l 90 each or £350 for the two!
Ouick sale required. Offers considered.
■B01646 683411.

• Tandem IDE MD-f CD-ROM
conlroller for 1500-4000. Price £50,
Call « -^3531 820 9529 now,

• Amiga A1200, 10Mb RAM, a5Mb
internal hard drive. 40 MHz GVP

A1 230-11 accelerator and FPU £600
ono. Contact: Mike" 01626 321315.

• Power Computing oiternal
quad speed CD-ROM drive, two
months old. Cost El 99, will accept
£1 65, Mint condition, boied with
manual, leads, etc. Call after 6.30pm,
ffOiei 230 6914. Steve.

• Amiga 1200, Blizzard 4Mb with
FPU, 420Mb hard disk, HD disk drive,
Microvitec 1438 monilor, fast modem.
Squirrel SCSI-ll. CD-ROM dr^ve,
speakers, sound sampler, mouse, two
joysticks, hand scanner, over 1,200
disks ot software, CD software. £1,100
ono. Phone Redcar " 01 642 474599,
ask for Andrew,

• GVP HCB-II, 50Mb HDD, 2Mb
RAM, £1 20, A22B6 emulator, 3.S-inch
and 5. 25 -inch floppies, £80. Future

Domain smart SCSI I/O PC card £25;
all with manuals, software and cables,
"01298 22669

• Imagine 4, just arrived trcim
Impulse USA. Bargain at £75. Also
LW3D for good offer. Call o- 01405
860798, evenings or weekends.

• A1200 Desktop Dynamite, 6Mb
RAM. 540Mb HD, 50MHz 68030. ugc
eiternal floppy, all boxes and manuals
£750 plus postage. Call Mike n 0131
346 7665, after 7pm.

• Megaiosound 8-bH stereo
sampler, brand new, still shrink-
wrapped in original bo:( with full
software, manuals, etc. £1 5,
Write to: David J, M. McCorkell, 27
Dalriada \Na\K Ballymana, Co, Antrim
BT42 40y.

• SIMMs, 1Mb, 72-pin SIMMs,
£1750 each, or four for £60, Phone
n- 01362 694976, ask for Barry.

• A1200 with 1 20Mb HD, software
worth £300, plus games and
magazines, eicellent condition. £300.
Goliath 22Watt power supply, new,
£40. Amiga Computing since 1 994
with disks, £1.25 each. Kiran» 0181
575 3489.

• Amiga Video Back-up v3.0 and
v1 .5, store 1 50 disks to taps or
back-up H/D. £25 P5P free, w 01 61
790 0962.

• Amiga 1200 as new, plus eitra
disk drive, only £250. Price includes
pay on delivery service by Parcel Fores,
Sieve » 0973 814123.

• Amiga genlock for sale, I have
two and one must go, Rendale 8302
or Rocgen Plus. Call for details. David
= 01247 274408.

• ASOO-I- 5Mb with hard disk
conlroller, SOMb hard drive and antra
momoiy. Phillips monitor, loads of
software (serious and fun], with
manuals, £360 and Amiga games. Call
Kiran after 6pm » 01 81 575 8489,

• PC Ibsk 3.1, boned with manual,
£45; Amiga Shopper's with disks since
1 993 £1 ,25 each the lot; Amiga
Fomiat with disks since 1 994 £1 ,25
each the lot, Kiran = 01 81 575 3489,
after 5pm.

• aSMb Seagate 2,5 hard disk
£40, 4Mb 72-pin SIMMs £30, Phone
=■01273 553266, ask for Patrick.

• A1200 wRh 127MbH/D
packed with application and games
software. Original boies, manuals, etc.
included. Joystick, etc, etc. Phone for
details; asking price £330. Call David
= 01247 274403.

• A4000/30 1 0Mb RAM, 1 20Mb
HD, Picasso II colour card.
Commodore 1 942 monitor, Co-Pro,
second drive with LightWave,
Photogenica. Final Writer, TV Paint Ir,
AMOS Pro, plus games, all manuals
supplied, £1 ,500 ovno. Phone evenings
on Southampton = 01703 443907

• A4000/40 with 214Mb hard
drive, 8Mb RAM, multisync monitor,
CD-ROM, LC200 printer, including
Scala MM220, DP4, PageStream,
DirOpus 4, Wordworth, eicellent
condition. £1,500, Phone Julian

= 01865 376S97 evenings.

• A4000/040 68882 FPU, 1 0Mb
RAM, saOMb HD, Philips monitor,
eicellent condition, original software,
including LightWave 3D, Colour
digitiser, 1 ,000 misc, floppies, books
and magazines, £1 ,200 in total,

= 01424 446359.

• For salel 100 5,25-inch high
density disks, £750 including PSP.
Phone Matthew on = 0973 301 832
(evenings), or = 0181 523 8053
(office hours).

• A1200 420Mb hard drive, US
Robotics 1 4,400 ta( modem, original
software and games. Immaculate
condition, £330 ono. Call Carl on

= 01455 552409.

• Memory: 4x1 Mb SIMMs (30-pin),
£1 5 each. PPage 3 4- 40 CG fonts
£1 5, Amiga educational software,
three-disk games, nine CD games,
priced £3 £3. Amiga BASIC book
£6. For details call (Cobham)

= 01932 865057

• AMOS Pro Compiler, IntOS £35;
Direciory Opus v4 £1 0, All complete
with boxes and manuals. Mastering
Amiga DOS 2 books, volumes 1 and 2
£10, ir01206 573634,

• A1200, 250Mb HD, 50MHi,
SCSl-ll, 6Mb Fast FPU accelerator,
monitor. Citizen 240C printer,
external drives, Vidi 24RT. Zappo
CD-ROM, AMOS Pro Compiler,
Imagine 3, Essence II, Forge, Vista 3,
games. Separate offers welcome,

= 01332 273879.

• Alpha Data HD drive, 40Mb for
A500, £100, Theme Park, AMOS 3D,
AMOS Compiler, all £1 5 each, all
boxed; Action Replay III, £1 5, Phone
Baz = 01302 337839, Doncaster.

• CD" for sale. Diggers, Oscar,
Microcosm, Now Games 1 and Lamb
American Challenge. 14 Coverdiscs,
Phone Roiy on = 01 343 542096,
Offers around £90 ono.

Issue 62

May 1996

ShopperReader ads

• DCTV 24-bit digitissT and 24-bit

paint package. Plays back hi-res
24-bit anima in real time. Records
etraighl from bon. Great for 3D
anjinators, £100 including postage.
Martin 1101238 22362.

• Amiga 1200, plus GVP 6830
Tjrbo acceleralor, 1 0Mb RAM, 1 20Mb
liacd drive, Zappo CD-ROIul drive. Plus
3D programs. Total worth £1,100, will
accept £650 n 01924 8S2063.

• Amisa 4000/030 with 1 6Mb
RAM, 249 HD, fulycrovitec 1438
monitor, artemal disk drive, GVP 4008
SCSI board, colour hand scanner, plus
games £2,000 ono. Call « 0161 2B4
9435, ask for Mike.

• International One Day Cricket,
good condition, fully boxed with manual.
£B, Ring Philip on 01702 714174.
Please phone between 9am and 7pm.

• A40D0 030, 6Mb RAM. 320Mb
HD, 68882 FPU. Microuilec multisync
monitor. Citizen HOP-40. 24-pin colour
printer and eiternal floppy drive. Also
4Mb GVP RAM and software. £1 ,200
one. Phone Derek" 01483 505801.

• Amiga msmory SIMM lor sale.
For more inlorniaticn please phone Lee
on = 0956 451 748 any lime, oi I can
phone you back after 705pni for a free
chat, problem solving, etc.

• Amiga 4000/40 6Mb RAM.
400Mb HD, e>lra internal HD disk
drive. HD full of games, art programs,
various utilities. Boxed with all disks,
manuals, keys. As new. £1,175.
"0181 579 8388.

• Wordwarth 2 plus The Publisher,
Interbase; all original disks, manuals.
Also manual only for Kindworda 3. £50
the lot. Scala HVT1 00 with manual
£30, or swap lol/Blmard 1 220M 4Mb
RAM add-on. "0181 575 7558.

• A1200, 6Mb RAM, 240Mb hard
disk. BOMHi 68030 and 68862,
Phillips CMB833-I1, Canon BJ-200,
Re dec Re elite. GVP D558+, software
and magazines. Excellent for DTP.

£1 ,000 ono. Phone Oliver on
"0121 354 7843.

• CD^i with SX-1 expansion module

and keyboard, mouse. 80Mb hard
drive, one floppy drive, 3Mb total
memory. All for £300. Call David on
"01257 400431.

• Amiga S00+ for sale. 2Mb RAM,
GVP 52Mb hard disk, Philips
CM8833-II colour monitor. Much
software, gold disk office. Deluxe
Paint IV. Plus Naksha mouse and disks.
£325. Phone n 01252 713822.

• A1200 4Mb RAM on Hawk board,
540K HD. Archos duel speed CD
external disc drive, B/W hand scanner,
games and DTP software galore. £650
ovno. Call Ray " 0256 497 518.

• A1200 t27Mb hard dnve. 4Mb
F(AM expansion, eiternal floppy dnve,
genlock. Ideal for DTV software,
includes applications and games. Vi/ill
split. Best otter takes the lot. Call David
on "01247 274408.

• A1200 Workbench 3.0, MUl 3.2.
WB 2.0, registered versions, 120Mb
hard disk, external floppy, A1 230
68030/68882, 40MHz, 8Mb RAM,
Microvitec monitor 1 438 200,
PowerCD drive (2i) with CD's (two
weeks old). Squirrel SCSI interface,
Megalosound, two joysticks. Fnal
Writer 4, Imagine 3 0, DirOpus 4.1 1,
ImageFX 1.5, Zyxel 14.4 modem.
software and games. All in perfect
working order, included a one month
warranty. All this for £1 ,400 ovno. Ciive
Hollans, E-mail: te940192@nowi.ac.uk,
or" 01352 759722.

WANTED

• GVP A530 HD/acceierator wanted.

Any spec, any condition, even broken!
Call Keith on " 01567 820816 now!

• Wanted: Workbench 3.0 OS. Write
to: Marcus Lord, 60 Bedford Avenue,
High Crompton, Shaw, Oldham, Lanes,
OL2 70W "01706 6401 16 between
5pm -6pm. All week.

• Hiisoa Udo £9.39, Sim City 2000
£1 5, AMOS Pro £1 5, Gloom £1 2.
Roadkill AGA El 0, Tornado AGA £10.
Contact Dave Hogben at 1 28 Gaston
Way, Shepparton, Middx. TW1 7 BES.

9 Wanted: Pcwerscan 4 colour, or
Epson flatbed, ProGrab 24RT and must
be latest version, A1 200 Btoand 030
accelerator, with or without RAM Gail
Paul before 5pm on t 01 1 3 255 55B5.

• Amiga 2000/3000/4000
keyboard, reasonable price paid.
Any condilion considered.

If 01 203 675299.

• Wanted: ADIJunior reading 4/6
6/7 Please write to: Randall, 1 07
Hornhill Road, Maple Cross,
Riokmanaworth, Herts. WD3 2TG,

• A3640 040 daughterboard to
upgrade 4000/030 to 040CPU. Cash
waiting for your chance to upgrade.
Call David " 01 247 274408.

• Amiga 500 users from anywhere
as contacls or would sell or swap. Lend
me an operating manual for the Zappo
SCSI 3. 5 -inch HD. Please drop me a
few lines: Steven P. Hyde, 20 Charles
Street, Rugby, Warks. CU21 2EW.

• intemot usars! I need my anims
uploaded on to Aminet. Want to help?
Jonathan, RM21, Hampshire Block.
North Hampshire Hospital, Aidermaaton
Road, Basingstoke RG24 9NA.

• ExcelienCG word processor with
thesaurus and dictionary. Please ring
Leicesler»0116201 1323.

• AlWOS Pro Compiler. Will pay fair
price. Call me on " 01 S92 404642.

• wanted lor Amiga A500, DataFlyer
or GVP or similar SCSI hard disk
(Basically to run a Quantum type hard
disk,) Call Dave" 01522 5S4590.

■ Aiaddin 4D must be Ai condition.
Will make good offer and pay P&P
with manual. " 01469 5764B7 home
» 01469 577088, South Humbatside.
Ask for Mac.

• Analog Joystick for AI 200. Please
nng" 0151 355 8763.

• GVP HD8+ hard drive for Amiga
SOO.nOI 758612615.

PERSONAL

• Pen pais wanted to swap games,
software and tips for Amiga 1 200.
Send your lists to: Zoe Green, 35

Conslantine Place, Baldcck, Herts.
SG7 6ST

• Want to got more from Blitz
BASIC' Wnle to: Blitz, M. Tillet, 27
Hillside Avenue, Worlingham, Beccles,
Suffolk NR34 7AJ. Monthly magazine
on paper.

• Pentrisoft, the programmers' user
group. Tips, advice and contacls. Free
membership. Write to: Mark Harman, 3
Hrghlea Close, St. Leonards, o/a. East
Sussex TM37 7SS for details.

fanzines/BBSs

• Visions. A new SF/fantasy/horror
famine (printed) needs fiction and
artwork for isaue one. Send S.A.E. for
full details to: S. Kennedy. 41 Larwcod,
Worksop, Notts. S81 OHH.

• No Limits BBS 01293 413663,
v34+, 1 .2Gb, Xendrii Pro software,
very friendly SysOp, free call to other
Eurobefl subscribers, complete Fidonet
backbone, many other networks, perfect
for points. Binarynet HQI

• Eclioes BBS, Camberley, Fidonet,
Sportsnet, plus many more. Always the
latest Aminet CD-ROM online. Free
pointing all networiis, Xenolink Pro
software, friendly, helpful SysOp. All
welcome, 24 hours 01276 62099.

• EnHty's a new diskmag that aims to
keep Amiga alive by getting you
creating. Issue one and two ready.
Contact: Jono, 25 Denness Place,
Llandudno LL30 2UX, lor more info.

• New Amiga diskmag. Only £2 for
two disks on AMOS, Imagine, PD and
lots more. Conlact me via post for info:
Jono, 25 Denness Place, Llandudno,
Gwynedd, Wales LL30 2UX.

• Mogsy'S BBS. Contact Anthony
Morris on h 01 772 495590. Amiga
onlyl Over 1 ,000 hies on-line and CDs
to clioose fn^ml Speeds 2400 to
28,800. 24 hours. Call todayl

• Black Magic BBS. Online
midnight till breakfast 1 4400, full
graphic (IFF) adventure game with
sound. Online soon! It's a new BBS so
spread the word. " 01 482 473458. ■

Sell your used hardware and software in Amiga Shopper... for free! AS62

The editor reserves the right to refuse or amend ads. We accept no responsibility for typographical errors or losses
arising from the use of this service. Trade ads vt/ill not be accepted, including PD advertising.

Name:

Address: (Not for publication) .

Telcphotie

.Post code_
Date

Tick to show required heading
IH^ For Sale Vlfanted

Personal

Fanzines

Return to: Reader Ads, Amiga Shopper,
30 Monmouth Street,
Bath, Avon BA1 2BW

Unfortunately we cannot guarantee insertion in a partictilar issue.
I have read and underslood the conditions for the inclusion of my ad

Signature

Use one space for each word. Only the words in this section will be printed.

jOMRSASHORPER 51

Shopper Answers

Q&A

David Taylor

Gary Coulter' lovely picture shows the quality achievable when different machines work in harmony, instead of being separate
entities. The renderings were done in LightWave on the Amiga with textures done in Photoshop on the PC. Remember, even
if your picture doesn't win here, we may still use your efforts elsewhere in Amiga Shopper. If you want to win £25, send your
picture as a JPEG to: David Ibylor, Amiga Shopper, Future Publishing, 30 Monmouth St, Bath BA1 2BW.

If you are stuck

with a problem

on your Amiga

and you just can't

find a solution,

write in to Amiga
Answers, where our panel of
experts are here to help you.
They can deal with all sorts of
problems; DTP, video, music,
Operating Syslems, monitors,
word processing, programming,
Workbench, networking -
anything that you can do with
your Amiga, in fact. Just fill in
your details in the form on page
57 and send it in!

52 AHOOA ANSWERS

Paul Overaa is our
Operating Systems
pragramming expert. He
has writ ten several
hooks, including:
Mastenng Amiga
Assembler, Mastering
Amiga ARexx and
Mastering Amiga C.
His main interest is in program design and
he is heavily into the music side of Ihe
Amiga. Paul's other interests include red
wine, maths and wind-surfing!

Gar>' Whiteley is our
expert on video and
graphics. He regularly
produces work for
films and TV. Gary has
also written several
books on his favourite
subjects - amongst
them is Amiga
Desktop Video, published by Future
Publishing (call « 01225 822511 to order a
copy). Gary also regularly reviews new
products for Amiga Shopper.

May 1996

John Kennedy is our
hardware and music
expert. John has wiitten
Supertests and features
alike for Amiga Shopper
in the past, including
the CD-ROM Supertest
in issue 49 and our
monitor Supertest in
issue 5S. He has written our CanDo
Coverdisk instructions this month, and he is
co-wiiting our music tutorial with Darren
Irvine (see page 60).

Larry Hickmott is our
DTP and word
processing expert.
He produces his own
DTP maga/.ine called
Em and has written
several books, including
The Woi-dwoi-th
Companion for Digila
and Future Publishing's books division. This
month Lan>' answers your queries in Amiga
Answers and has also written the review of
MasterlSO on page 45.

Issue 62

David Taylor

Q&A

Shop per Answers

'•:•»:

ij_ay

Softw

are

Adding fonts to PPage

have recently purchased a CD
with thousands of CompuGraphic
and PostScript type 1 tonts and
want to know how I can use them
with Pro Page, Can you tell me
what I need to know to install the tonts and also
whether I need to convert the PostScript fonts
when I already have the CGFonls.

Lawrence Sparks
Stevenage

ProPage can maks use of Iwo types of fonts,
Amiga bitmaps and CompuGraphic fonts. If you
intend using a PoslScripi printer, ProPage also
requires a PSFant wftich is Itie PostScript
equivalent of a CGFont used on-screen.

Forget about tlie Amiga bitmap fonts tfia!
come Willi ProPage, unless you ivan( to use
Ihem as your screen fonts wfien using a
PostScript printer In other words, on-screen
you would use the Amiga bitmap font Times,
and tfsen when tfial page Is printed to a
PostScript printer, the PostScript type 1 version
of Times in the printer is used to print the page.

To Install CGFonts for use with ProPage 4,
you need three files lor each font. Using the
example of Times again, the three files would
be called; Times.dat, Times.melric and
Times.llb, As you can see, the name of the font
remains, while the extension changes. When

Answers contents

H you're looking for a particular
problem, this handy index will help
you find the answers you need:

Fonts and ProPage .
Fountain

ProGrab problems

Gadtools Buttons

Modifying Start -Up_

HiSoft BASIC 2

Grabbing advice

Genlock advice

Psion 3 link

ProGrab problem
RTTY solved

Recording samples _

_S3
_53
_54
_54
_SS
_5S
_55
_56
_56
_56
,57
57

Issue 62

Installing a font for ProPage you have to make
sure that you hai/e one of the three extensions
present after each of the three files. Older
versions of ProPage used an e/iension called
".ate" but this Is no longer required.

To install the CGFonts, use a file manager
such as Opus or DirWork to copy the three
tiles to the directory called CGFonts. Now go
to Workbench and find the utility in ProPage's
drawer called CGJJpdate. Double click on this
and it will update a couple of files In CGFonls
so ProPage can use these new fonts.

In some instances, you may find that when
you run ProPage, the new fonts are not listed.
To correct this, go to CGFonts using your file
manager (Opus, etc) and delete the file called
"fonllisLpp". Now reset your Amiga and run
ProPage again. The fonts should now be visible
in your typeface requester.

The final question about whether to use the
PostScript type 1 fonts on your CD depends
on whether you use PostScript printers or are
ever likely to in the future. II the answer is yes,
then use Font fulanager !o canved the Type 1
fonts to a CGFont for use with ProPage, as
well as answering yes when asked if you
would like the downloadable printer fonts
copied to CGFonts:PS.

That way, you will hai/e your CGFonts for
use on-screen and if you ever print to a
PostScript printer, and you select "Include
Downloadable Fonts" in the "Print to

PostScript" requester, the PSFont created by
Font Manager will be included In the PostScript
tile tor use by the PostScript printer My advice
is don 't burn your bridges and click yes to this
option in Font Manager, At worst, it you want to
save on disk space, you can copy all your
PSFonIs from the PS drawer in CGFonts to a
floppy disk until the day comes when you
require them. Larry

Fountain

My son has tried to load Fountain
from the Eilras 2 disk of his A500
Plus (Workbench 3.04). No matter
what we do it comes up with an
"unable to open library 37" error
message. We've tried running the program from
hard disk and from the Workbench floppy.
Any ideas on w/hat is going wrong and,
more importantly, how we can fii it?

A. Jarvis
Southsea, Hampshire

Fountain is the old version of the Amiga outline
font utility that is now called Inteilitont. You
need at least version 37 of a library called the
diskfoni library to run the program. This library
should be In the libs: directory of your hard
disk, but the error message is telling you that
the library isn't there! Although I haven't got a
Release 2 Amiga around, I believe that the

ProPage can
make use of
(wo types of
fonts, Amiga
bitmaps and
CGFonls.

Horduorth i ^ Wb Dtgita International

-T33PH

fl I untitlgd 1

..P^v,

I*. ■ ■ ' ■

. ^ ^. j l. f . . . i .l l' .l. i ... f ... i .l. f . . . i . . . f .l. i .l. l' . ^ .l.... ft

IS d Compi graphic

Fo'iii

1 V/nt« « I •

rnm Left: 1,U in rrm Tw 1.H in Colunn 1 Page 1

mi ?m '*'"

i<i>i':

May 1996

AHOOAJmSWERS 53

ShopperAnswers

Q&A

David Taylor

ProGrab problems

I recenllv bought a
ProGrab 24RT Plus
video grabber and
was so Impressed
with the stills I got
from it ttiat I thought
I would Invest in the PCMCIA
intertace as well,

I was particularly drawn to
the fact that it (apparently)
allows anirnations to be grabbed
direct to hard disk. Tlie problem
is, however, that this feature
does not appear to function on
my machine.

The equipment I'm using is
as follows: A1200 (circa 1993);
aoMb IDE hard disk with
approximately 30Mb free; 4Mb
32-bit Fast RAM; Panasonic SD40
video recorder (with SCART
input); ProGrab 24RT Plus with
PCMCIA intertace.

OK, what happens is this: I
select the options to grab a colour
animation lo disk. Then I go to Ihe
grabber interface and, sure
enough, it is standing ready to
grab. So - I can now do one of
the following:

LUsethe RECORD button:
which generates a series of
numbered files on my hard disk
In an unknown file format (even
the ProGrab software cannot
re- load Ihem). The decoded
animation is blank (completely
black) and when saved to disk
using the SAVE ANIM option
the resulting files are full of

garbage (and often software
like Viewtek refuses to play
them). The anim file is usually
surprisingly short, suggesting to
me that it may be incomplete.

2. Click on the preview window: in
which case 19 or so numbered
files are written to the disk (as
above). This happens despite the
fact that I asked for more than 19
frames. The frames do appear to
have stuff in them when decoded,
but once again the SAVE ANIM
option produces a garbage/
unusable/incomplete(?) file. (Oh,
by the way, the hard drive isn't
anywhere near full after the grab
and save is finished!)

The strange thing is that when
grabbing animations to RAM It all
works tine. The animation (black
and white or colour) Is grabbed
and decoded correctly, and the
resulting Anim file is fine.

IWly only suggestions could be
that faster hardware is needed
(i.e. faster CPU, HAM or HD), or
that the software is incomplete
and that this feature simply does
not work! However, the ProGrab
advertisement and documentation
do not comment on either of
these things!

K you could help me out I
would be veiy grateful. If not, do
you know an address to which I
can write (or E-mail)? The only
details I have are for the mail-
order hotline. I've also tried

Gordon Harwaods ProGrab 24RT Plus digitlser was reviewed in our
September 1995 issue where it was awarded 95 per cent!

asking for advice in UseNel Amiga
newsgroups, but to no avail.

Simon Morris

Liverpool via E-mail

fish@cscliv.acuk

Since you say Iftat grabbing to
RAM works line there's obviously
no problem with your ProGrab
Pius functioning correctly (at
least as a video grabber). On the
other hand, it may be that there is
a problem with the way thai your
hard drive is set up. Perhaps your
MaxTransfer value needs
changing to enable the data to

be wrillen correctly to the drive.
My advice would be to call
Harwoods (makers of the
ProGrab) on =■ 01773 836787.
explain your problem and ask for
technical help. OK, it's the sales
hotline, but I'm sure that they
could be persuaded to pass you
on to someone more
knowledgeable, or at least give
you another number to call tar
technical support. After ail, if
there's a problem with a piece of

their kit. there should be some

way to contact them to try and
find a solution! Gary

diskfonl library used to be stored on 1/ie Amiga
Fouls disk and, presumably, your hard disk

installation didn't install tliis library in the libs:
drawer tor you.

If this is tlie case, the missing library
problem is easy to fix. Insert your Amiga fonts
disk, double dick on it, and then select the
'show all files' option from Ihe Workbench
menu. This enables you to see files and
drawers even if they do not have icons. Look
through the drawers and files present and
locate the file called diskfoni.hbrary (if this file
is not on the Amiga fonts disk, rest assured Ihat
you will find it on one of Ihe other Amiga
system disks).

Hailing healed the diskfontlibrary file,
double click on your Workbench icon and use
the 'show all files ' menu option again in order
to display Ihe normally-hidden Workbench
drawers. You will see a drawer called libs.

inteilifont Is the new version of the Amiga
outline font utility.

54 AHOOA ANSWERS

Double click on it la open its window and then,
if necessary, rearrange the positions and/or
sizes of the libs window and the one containing
the disklontiibrary so that you can see both
windows at the same lime.

Now, use your mouse to move the
Workbench pointer to Ihe diskfontlibrary file
and press and hold down the left mouse
button. If you keep the left mouse button
depressed, you'll find that you can drag the file
over lo the libs window. If you do this and
release the left mouse button the diskfonl
library will be copied to your hard disks libs
directory and your missing library errors
should stop. Paul

Gadtools buttons

I have a question regarding C,
Intuition and Gadtools and,
because you are the only real
technical Amiga mag, I thought
you might be able to help me out.
I'm writing a program thai, as part of its user
interface, needs a pop-up gadget similar to the
ones found on the Mac. I know I could simply
use a cycle gadget and cycle to menu, but I
don't like the way C2M works.

I've already written the code that pops the
gadget on lo the screen, waits for the user to
select an option, and than returns the selection
back to the main loop. The routine doesn't use
BOOPSI because I don't understand it yet.
Instead, I coded the gadget myself and use

May 1996

mouse co-ordinates to find out where the user is
within the gadget, However, after a user selects
an option, I want to change the name of the
button gadget (this is a standard Gadtools
BUTTON_KIND gadget), to reflect the selection
that the user has jusl made.

I tried removing the gadget in question and
changing the ng,ng_GadgetText pointer to the
new string, adding the gadget back again and
refreshing the gadget list, but to no avail, I also
tried changing both the ng.ng_GadgetTe)!t and
the Gadgel->GadgetTeit->ITe«t pointers, but
the gadget still keeps the same name as when it
was originally created.

So, where does Gadtools keep the pointer
to the string of the Gadgets text?

Matt Corner
Radford, Coventry

( have no idea, but I do know Ihat it isn't in the
gadget's inluitext IText field. The button gadget
text pointer, and most other Gadtool gadget
structure fields, are private to Gadtools and as
such are not published. They shouldn 't be
altered either, because these internal lieid
arrangements could change with subsequent
OS releases.

As you've probably realised, there are no
lags to dynamically alter Gadtool's button text
via the GT_SetGadgetAltrsO function, but there
IS however, slill a way to do what you want. You
will need lo remove the gadget from the list,
free it so that Gadtools releases whatever
associated resources it was using, alter the text

Issue 62

David Taylor

Q&A

ShopperAnswers

in the NewGadget structure, and then make
another call to the Gadtool CrealeGadgetQ
function to produce the new gadget

You will, of course, hat/e to clear the
NeiftGadgel Held o/ (he gadget you remove,
otherwise the FreeGadgelsO call will remo\/e
the gadget nodes further down the list
Because ol this the gadget remo\'al fragment
will actually end up looking like this:

gaaget_p-iNextGadge t^WULL ;
FreeGadgets (ga^Cji) ;

Once the gadget has been dismantled in this
way you can modify the text in your
NewGadget structure and create a new gadget
using Ihis sari of code:

n™ga(ige[.ng_Gaa9ecTeKC="SC»raEMTE(T"i
previDQs_gad9eC_p=CreaceGa(3geC (BUTTOWJIND,
laat_3adget_p,sn9,TW_ElJII);

Having done that, you will then need to use the
RefreshGadgetsO function lor RefreshGListQ if
you like], followed by a call to the Gadtools
GT_RefreshWindowO function:

RefresrrGadgetB(gadgetli3C_p,window_p,N[llrL};
BT_HefreshWindow(wiiid™_p,NULL) ;

This will update your gadget display and give
you your new button gadget text label! Paul

Modifying a Startup
Sequence

When I use my A2000
(Workbench reuision 27.75,
Kickstart 2.1 ) for rendering,
multitasking or any memory-
intensive application, I like to keep
memory overheads as lov^ as possible and so
use a Startup with the bare minimum, i.e. MUl,
ASSIGNWEDGE, ARQ and FASTMEMFIRST
only. When, on the other hand, I wish to do my
'housekeeping', lor which I use D0pus4, I would
like to switch in other utilities like Blanker. Is it
possible to add a branch somewhere in the
User-StarlUp to query current requirements on
boot up, 3nd if so how?

Simon Smalley
Devon port, Plymouth

You're running Release 2 of the Operating
System, so il you look al the main StartUp-
SequencB file in the s: directory, you'll see,
biwards the end of the script, some lines that
read like th!s:

IF EXISTS siUser-StarCup

eiKCute SiUsec-Stactup
EtldlF

In other words, the commands in your User-
StarlUp file are being performed near the end
of the main StartUp-Sequence via the
AmIgaDOS Execute command. You can easily
alter the appropriate StartUp-Sequence lines to
erecute any number of separate User-StartUp
scripts it you wish.

For your purposes all you need is a couple

Issue 62

of independent script files. Lei us suppose you
create two different User-StartUp script files
called User-StartUpl and User-StartUp2. To
gel either, or both, of these files executed at
boot up time just use ED (or some other text
file editor) to alter the StartUp-Sequence
fragment that I mentioned above. Change it so
that it uses this sort of conditional test scheme:

IF EHOTS Bjleei-Scartupl

ASK "Run Usei-Startupl (Y/N)?'

IF WARN

execute 5 : User-Startupl

EndlF
EndlF

IF EKIOTS s_UBer-atartiip2

ASH "Run U$er-Startup2 (V/HIS"

IF mm

execuCE s:User'Stactup2
EndlF
ElidlF

When you next boot your machine the two
prompt lines will appear in turn asking you
whether you want to run, or not run each
particular script. Just enter Y or N accordingly
and you'll get only the User-StartUp(s) that
you choose! Paul

HiSoft BASIC 2 snag

Helpl I think 1 have found a
'genuine problem'. I'm grappling
with HiSofl BASIC 2 and have
been playing around with the
Intuitext example on the Work disk.
There is a line In the listing (line 51) that calls a
subroutine called lnitlntuiText{). I was sure that
if I changed the drawmode being used, from
JAM2S to INVERSVID&. the te« would be
printed in inverse mode but for some reason
this doesn't happen.

I rang HiSoft, but although they managed
to reproduce the problem, they couldn't
figure out how to fii it and suggested I hit the
RKIvl manuals, I am desperate - upon more
playing around it seems that the pens cannot
be set properly!

David Storey
Horsham, West Sussex

I've taken a look at the HiSofl example you
mention and you are right - the lines that do
the IntulText printing stuff, namely:

InicTncuiltKC irvTtBtfjJ.nyhHchpen.irytackpen,

JflM26,0,D,csxcactr(l,'hella there",
Print I text
PEEKL(wlnitrport) ,mRPWlitiitej;C(0) ) , 50, 50

...sfen'f working properly. By replacing JAM2&
with INVERSVIDS you would etpect the te/t to
show in inverse characters and it doesn't

The reason lies in an error in the
InittntuiTextO subroutine which I've reproduced
in listing 1 so thai other readers can see the
sort ol code that you are talking about The
suspect line is the one that pokes a drawmode
value into the IntuiTert structure:

PC*£W tt+IntuiTextDradfodejdrBHiDDde

May 1996

The IntuTText DrawMode structure field is byte
sized, nol word sized, so the routine should be
poking an 8-bit value into the structure, nol a
1 6-bit value.

Listing 2 shows the change needed to gel
the routine working and you'll find that with this
alteration in place your inverse text will appear
when you use the INVERSVID& flag in the
subroutine call.

SUB InitlntulTextlTdliBYVAL frontpen, BYVAL
fcaclipen, BYVAL drawmode,
BYVM, lefteflge, BYVH. ti^etfee, fontll),
tertstringS, BYVAL nextptrs) STSTIC tt

EOKEB tS,£rontpen

EOKEB tS+IntuiTextBackPen.baclgiBn.

EOKEM CS+Ir,tulTextDraitMode,draMnDife

c THIS IS WRCNG!

EOKFW tStlntulTortLeEtfflge, leftet^e
POKEW tStlntuiTexcTopEdcr^.td^dge
PXEL tt+ITexcFont, VMPTR(fQnt(OM
POKEL tStlTexc, SADDItextatringS+OffiSIOI I
ECKEL tt+HextText.nextpttS
END SUB

Listing 1:

The original InitlnluTTextO routine.

SUB InitlntulTeKtlT(l), BYVAL frontpen, BYVAL

Isckpsn, BYVAL drawncde,

BYVSL leftedge, bWAl tcpedge, £onr(l|,

textecrincr$, HYVAL nexcpcrt)

STATIC C6

FAQ

The best way to grab

I need to gel some tOxS-indi
colour photographs into my
Amiga (A3000, GMb RAM, HD).
Wtiidi is the best approach -
video grabber, hand scanner
otilatbed scanner? I already

have an S-VHS camcorder, so would a video

grabber be the way to go?

The answer lo this dilemma is mainly
dictated by how much you can afford to
spend, since in this case money is directiy
related to quality. Flatbed scanners give
the best result, because they provide far
more resolution than all but (he very best,
broadcast quality cameras. Althougli video
grabbers are more flexible, since they can
usually capture stills or moving sequences
from camera or tape, the overall quality will
generally be noticeably worse than your
average flatbed scanner. Hand scanners
don't do such a bad Job, but because of the
limited size of their scanning head and the
lad that they are manually controlled,
you'll probably find it difficult to make the
several passes required lo scan all of your
photograph and then accurately join the
strips together into a finished image. So
the best solution Is to plump lor a good
quality flatbed scanner.

Take note, however, that SMb of
memory may not be enough, especially If
you want to past-process your images with
a 24-bit paint program or image processing
software such as Art Department, since
high resolution scans can gobble up
memory. Think about adding at least 4Mb
of extra RAM. Gary

AnoGA ANSWERS 55

ShopperAnswers

Q&A

David Taylor

'irllHifiliq

nia

s(!i iddiHi I, in I (,i

sliTl (vL: )i I
IW (yl: (Tt7~|

nfi 1

(Ittv Fill iiltlll

(lwi>...

i.tiic,i;(!K::|H»«i>:E !•"'"' -1 I

hfliri: la I iHt PfLirltr: I^SI ' till I

Make sure that the drive is nol selected as
bootable; this stops the DH5: icon from
appearing on Workbench,

c5=VARPIE(t(ul)

FOKEB tS.frontpen

FOKEB es+IntuiTextEackPai.backpm

FOKEB c&+IncuiTexcDrdwHnde,dtaMiicde <— - CHSNGE

NEEDED

FOKEW tS+IntuiTexcLefbEdge,leftEdge

FOKEW tS+IntuiTextTopEdge.topedge

FOKEL CS+HextFant, VARPTBIfont (OH

FOKEL u+iTent, SADDite!!Cet£ing$4CHRS(DI)

POKEL cttNeHCText , nexcptrs

sm SUB

Listing 2:

The modified IrjillnluiTentO routine. Paul

A happy genlock
owner

This response is intended to offer

a little help and advice to Nick
Grundy {"More genlock thoughts',
AS 5 9}, with regard to his genlock
difficulties, I now have an A1 200,
along with an Archos Overdrive (54Qtv1b)i Turbo
2tvlb memory eipansion, a Rombo digitiser and
a Rendale 8803 genlock.

After using the genlock for three years.
inilially with an A600, I experienced a
compatibility problem with a recently- purchased
monitor and the through port on the genlock.

I called Rendale in Northampton, who dealt
with my enquiry over the telephone almost
instantly, very professionally and, even more
rarely in these times, knov^l edge ably. What's
more, the answers they gave were in terms
which even I could understand - not in some
jargon-laden, technical gobbledygook.

The outcome was that [ took my genlock to
Rendale's workshop, where the necessary
upgrade was undertaken with the same
courteous attitude.

My findings convinced me that if I ever
needed to upgrade my genlock, and if Rendale
made it, then I would probably buy from them.
Their aftercare is not only second to none but
also vastly in advance of my general eiperience
of dealing with nlher suppliers.

1 must emphasise that my only
connection with Rendale is that of a highly-
impressed customer who owns a three-year-old
8803 genlock.

John W. Hateley
Dunstable, Bedsfordshire

/ am glad that someone has been getting some
salislaction from their geniock, and good
sefw'ce from their supplier loo. Wouldn't it be

56 AWGA ANSWERS

I'MiHnlm

Filillvi:

uriuF DiriniiLDu

IhnBficLtirtri NvC

fl^4&l

Urm MniC

Itlvi iFDiiinn:

y;,y

iHd CHllmriMni

Ciltcdiri; [THT"

ttita; US — liii: \llim tW tin}

lliinJtr; Smfi]
llrHf tntm

SupiDrti rfiilfclion ^

Use the "change drive type" screen to read
the configuration for blocks per track and
heads/surfaces-

nice if every Amiga supplier could be
recommended so highly? Gary

PC Format

I am using PCTask (v2) on my
Amiga as a way of linking my
i^\ ~i Psion 3 palmtop, I have
^™'"° successfully created a hard disk

partition (DH5:) for PCTask to use
as drive G: and installed MSDOS6 on it. The
link software works fine but the icon name on
the Workbench screen turned from DH5: to
DH5:-I- garbage characters,

I am now trying to set up a CrossDOS
device so that AmigaDOS can also access the
partition and hence the files from the Psion.
Following the instructions supplied with PCTask
and using the information supplied by PCTask
and Syslnfo, I have created a DOSDriver file
called PHO;,

This seems to mount OK, but I cannot
access PHO: because I keep getting system
error requestors informing me that this is not a
DOS device. What am I doing wrong?

Niall Hallett
Slough, Berkshire

It's tun playing ^ilh multiple tilesystems on the
same hard drive isn't it? The garbage alter the
name is understandable, because the Amiga
really doesn 't knoiv what to make ol the HD5:
partition. It has no way ol reading it at all, and
merely tolerates it

My system also has PCTask on it set up to
use a partition ol a hard drive as drive C: - it's
the only sensible way to use PCTask, in my
opinion. You can see Irom the shot ol
IHDToolbox (see pic above left) that I make
sure that the drive is not selected as bootable.
This seems to keep the DH5: icon from ever
appearing on the Workbench.

imiB

-Li«r,, B IJ,HIIIIIII^^^^^^^^^^S„,„, g

™^. iiiiiin^^^^^H^!f^

i.'Hl >.^\ 4^1 J.-HI ^-ll

^ji L^'i ^^i aai

LaHr4' iifBW w- Bill III i!« 1

As you can see, the PCTask hard drive is now
readable from AmigaDOS.

May 1996

Now for the other problem. I use a similar
Seagate hard drive (an ST3145A), and have
discovered that Syslnfo can get a lot of the
drive geometry values wrong. Always use the
HDToolBox program lo get the start and low
cylinder values, and then use the "change drive
type" screen to read the conliguration for blocks
per track and heads/surfaces.

Use these in your mountlist and try again.
This is e/actly what t did five minutes ago and
as you can see, my PCTask hard drive is now
readable from AmigaDOS. (See pics.)

Here are some tips:

• Check you have the CrossDOSFileSystem
installed properly and that you can read and
write la PC format floppies.

• C/iecfe with HDToolBox (not Syslnfo) that
you have the right drive settings in your special
PCTask mountlist.

m Try a different name: sometimes if the drive
name ends in a number other than a letter such
a "C" there are problems. My drive is called
PPC: as far as the Amiga is concerned.

• Make sure that you are using two different
names: my drive partition is catted IHDPCO; but
the AmigaDOS mountlist is called PPC:.

• Ouoting Irom the manual: if the parameters
given for Heads times Biocl<sPerTrack do nol
equal BlocksPerCylinder, assume the Heads
value is one and the BtocksPerTrack is the
same as BlocksPerCylinder.

if you still can't get the drive to mount,
the only thing t can suggest is an upgrade
lo version 3. because thai is the version of
PCTask I am using. John

It's all Greek to me

Hello to all Amiganauts! Today
{7th February 1 9961 a purchase
which I had made from England
arrived - my new FrcGrab 24 with
the PCMCIA interface to go with
my Amiga 1200.

The problem is that I don't know what kind
□f cable I need to connect my video (which is
VHS, not S-VHS, but I don't think this really
matters), or to my 1 4-inch PAL Sony TV with
SCART output, or my 8mm camcorder, to the
ProGrab's input.

I have tried it with a cable which I had
been using for copying video tapes irom one
video to another by connecting the source
video and audio outputs to the recorder video
and audio inputs.

1 used the same cable with the digitiser by
connecting one end of the cable to the video
out and the other end to the digitiser, but the
software tells me that there is Mo Video Signal,
What is happening? Am I using the wrong
cable? Am I connecting the cable lo the wrong
input of the digitiser [it has two and I don't really
know which I should be using).

I also bought a SCART cable which I
connected from my Sony TV to my digitiser fto
the same input as I tried above), but the
software still tells me that there's no video
signal present. I have tried connecting the
digitiser to both the parallel and PCMCIA
sockets on my Amiga, but I still get the same

Issue 62

David Taylor

Q&A

ShopperAnswers

results - Ihat is, nothing! I intend to use my
Amiga with a Bli;;ard 12301V [SMb RAM)
professionally iot graphics.

Menis Malaxianakis
Greece

The mast likely cause ol your problem, since
you do not say which video connector you
are using to output the signal from your
camcorder, VCR or TV, is that you are
stlempting lo use an RF signal (the one that
comes either out ol your VCR or camcorder's
aerial-type socl<et), with your ProGrab. This mil
not work, since it isn't the kind of video signal
the ProGrab Is expecting.

What you need to use is either a composite
video signal (aka CVBS or FBAS in certain
parts ot Europe) connected to the Phono
socket on the ProGrab, or an S-VHS one
(using a special S-VHS cable to connect Irom
your camcorder's S-VHS output) connected lo
the ProGrab's S-VHS (lour-hole) socket. Note
that it is unlikely that your TV will have a video
output at all, unless it is a prolessional-style
monitor, rather than TV.

I would advise you to buy an S-VHS cable
(if you haven't already got one) and connect
one end to your camcorder's output and the
other to the ProGrab's S-VHS input

Mafce sure the camera is running, with the
lens cap ofl, or with a tape playing back, if you
want to test the ProGrab, Check that you can
see an image in the camera's viewfinder, then
try to grab it using your ProGrab. The software
will automatically sense which input the video

RTTY? No probi

Regarding the query trom
Monsieur Breul (ASeO) and
the reception of RTTY
transmissions. One can
certainly use the Amiga tor
General ajrt. If requires a TNC
(Teimlnal Node Controller) and one rirm in
England who specialises In digital
transmission and reception equipment is
Slstlm Electronics Ltd, Unit 1A. Hampton
Lane, Biacklieid, Southampton S045 1WE.
I hope Ihls is of some help.

Reg Holland

Our readers come to the rescue again!
Many thanks far helping us out! John

signal is connected to, so there's no need for
you to change any saftivare settings here.

II this doesn't work, try connecting a
composite output Irom your VCR lo the
ProGrab's phono socket (the one with just one
hole in it). You may either need a SCART to
phono cable, or some other cable depending
on the video (not RF) output Irom your VCR.

II both the above suggestions fail to work,
see if you can find a friend with an Amiga
1200 and try the ProGrab on their machine,
just in case there is actually a hardware
problem with your Amiga itself

It none ol my suggestions work (and they
should, if all the hardware is working correctly),
check your cables again, and, if they are OK,
you might well find that you have a faulty

ProGrab, which you will need to return lo your
supplier for replacement.

If you need lo contact Gordon Harwaods
(makers of the ProGrab) lor more assistance
you can E-mail them at gharwood@eworld.com.
Good luck! Gary

The sample facts

I am looking at recording samples
into my A 1200 from a tape
recorder and direct from a "line
out" on an amplifier, I am using
Technosound Turbo 2. I noticed

thai my computer hasn't got an audio input.

Do I need to buy some hardware? Is it possible

to do what I wart it to do, and if so how and

what do I need?

Divo (an enthusiastic beginner)

First the good news: yes it is entirely possible
to achieve what you want to do with your
AT200, Unfortunately, as you noticed, the
Amiga doesn't have any "audio In" facilities as
standard. You will need to buy a sampling
cartridge which costs about £20,

It wasn't so long ago that everybody was
advertising samplers, but at the moment they
are surprisingly difficult to find. In fact. Date/
fa 01782 744707) are the only company I
know about However, many dealers may still
have some buried in a store room somewhere,
so it's worth asking. Alternatively, ask around
for a secondhand unit or look up Aminet where
there are plans for DIY versions, John ■

Fill in and get answers to your questions

AS62

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Send your form and question to: Amiga Answers, Amiga
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Name:

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Kickstart version (displayed at the "insert Workbench" prompt)

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D U L_i 1.3 i I 1.3.2 I I 2.04/2.05

Dz.i Ds-o

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Now, use this space to describe your problem, including as much
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sheet if necessary.

Issue 62

May 1996

Anaaa >insivers 57

ShopperlUtorial

i Programining

Paul Overaa

HiSoft

BASIC2

In the second part of his
HISoft BASIC 2 tutorial
Paul Overaa explains the
use of tag lists.

Last month's Installrnent should
have convinced you that the
mechanics of using Amiga
library functions from HiSoft
BASIC 2 are not particuiariy
difficult Before we can discuss gadget use
and event handling, however, there is one
subject that needs to be put to rest. It
concerns the way parameters are passed
to some library functions.

In order to provide Ihe enharcemenfs that
arrived with OS Release 2, (he functions used
to perfotm many established operations, like
window opening, needed additional parameters
to be specified. One possibility, namely the
eirtending of many eiisting system structures,
would have been an easy solution; but the
next time OS enhancements were made the
same problem would anse. Some structures
would doubtless need to be modified again. In
the end. Commodore wisely opted for a more
long-term solution based on the use of arrays
tfiat contain self- identifying parameter values.
Since these lists provide a way of tagging
additional parameters on to existing OS
structures, they were called tag lists.

Tag lists

Tag list entries consist of a pair of long word (i.e.
four byte) values. Tiie first long word provides a
32-bit identity field, the second a corresponding
32-bit data value. Most tag identities are library
specific and their definitions tend to be found in
the .be constants files of the appropriate library.
For example, one asl library tag is called
ASLFR_TitleTextS, and this enables you to
specify the title text tliat is used when an asl file
requester appears.

A few general tag item values have also
been defined and can be found in the utility.bc
file. There's only one you need to worry about
and that's a tag called TAG_ENDfi - this
signals the end of an array and needs to be
placed at the end of any tag list you prepare. To
use this definition you need to include the
utility.bc constants file (or the utility ,bh header
file which, as explained last month, would bring
in the constants file automatically]. If you look in
the HiSoft utility,bc file yau will see that this has
a value of zero; programmers often terminate tag
lists with an explicit 0& to avoid having to
include the ulility,bc or ,ulility,bh files.

58 AimOASHor^'eR

The best way to come to terms with tag lists
IS to see them being used and, in preparation
tor this month's discussions, I made use of one
tag list-based function call in the second
(test2,basl example of the last tutonal. Now it's
time to both explain in detail what was going on
and extend the ideas a little bit.

If you look back at the code you will see that
asl requester use followed this type of scenano,
Rrst an AllocAslRequestSQ function call was
used to allocate the main data structure for the
requester The program was then able to bring
up the requester by calling an AslReques(&()
function as many times as was necessary, and
this function was fied to a 'Load f^le' menu
option. Before the program terminated a
FreeAslRequestO function was used to hand
back all the resources allocated by the original
Alloc Asl Request&O call. The original call to
allocate the file requester structure looked like:

g_f i Le_reque3c_i:& =A1 IccAs IBequest K flSL_F 1 1 eEeqaes t
t,VARPTR(rei!ueEtei_csqB5(Ill ) )

The more adventurous of you will have noted
from the function box outs provided that the
second parameter was a pointer to a tag list

Tho easiest way to prepare a tag list
with HiSoft BASIC 2 is first to use a DIM
statement to allocate a long word array. I
arbitrarily set up space for six pairs of tags by
using this statement:

DIN [eque3Cer_tagss(l3)

May 1996

To get a set of tag entries into this array,
HiSoft BASIC 2 provides a TAGLIST instnjotion.
This requires a pointer to the array that is
used to hold the tag list along with the tag
pairs themselves.

The address of the array can be obtained
using BASIC'S VARPTRQ function on the first
element of the array, VAMTOIrequester.tagBStO)},

in the above example.

The pair of tag items used last month
consisted ot a ASLFR_TitleTextS tag identity and
an "Amiga Shopper Requester" text string. With
the TAG_END& label being used to terminate
the entries, tag list creation looked like this:

TAGLIST VABprmreiji9SCer_tagE6(01), _

ASLFHjritleTeHifii'Ainioa Shopper Flerriieater', _
TMLEHDt

Notice how HiSoft BASIC'S underscore '_'
continuation character at ihe end of each line
enables the various sections of this statement to
be written on separate lines. This is important
since it helps keep longer tag lists readable.

If this is the first time you have come across
these ideas, you might think that fiddling around
building tag lists is a pain. But you must
persevere with it. Tag lists have been adopted to
solve the problem of adding additional
parameters to function calls once and for all;
from Release 2 onwards they have become an
integral part of the Amiga's programming
environment. If you are interested in getting into
up-to-date Amiga programming you MUST
understand how they work!

Now the good news

First, once you know how to build one tag list;
you will be able to build ANY tag list. Second,

Issue 62

Paul Overaa

Programming

Shopperllitorial

once you are using a tag list-based function call
you can make many changes simply by
modifying the tag entries. Let me convince you
that this is true by expiaining about some of the
tags availabie in the HiSoli asl.bc file.

For exampie, the tags ASLPRjniciaXLeftE^si,
fiSLFB_IiiitlaJTopEdgs4| AELfP„Ini;ialWld;hs and
ASLFFLinitialHeights enable you to specify the
position and size of the asl file requester
window. .■■.;i.rR_Dcaii(frsOrilyS is another useful tag.
Setting this tag to if'jHs causes the file
requester to have nc file gadget and to display
only directory names in the file list. Ycu can use
this tag if you want to have the user select a
destination directory for a particular task.

Another useful item is the ssuFPjs^sctlCOTsd
tag. When this is set to iRUEi, this tag prevents
,info files (icons) from being displayed in the
requester. You should use this tag in all your
software because Workbench users should
never have to see .info files.

Suppose that we wanted to make an asl file
requester appear at lop left screen location
(50.50), be 400 pixels wide, and have a height
of 200 pixels. We would set up these tags;

ASLFILInlrialLeftEdges, SOt
SSLFiLInitlalTOpEdgeS. 50i
ASLFiLInitlfllWldthS, 4(10&
ASLFIUInitial Heights, 2Wk

In other words the TAGUST statement needed
would look something like this:

TflGLIST VftRPntirequester.bagsSiOM, _

ASLFB_TitleTeKtii, "Amiga Shofper

Requeater", _

ASLR?_lnicialLefcSigei, 506,

ABLF[l_InitislTopEdgeS, SOS, _
AaLFR_InitialWidth6, 4Q0t, _
ASLFR_InitlalHeightS, 200i, _
TfEJKXc

In practice, it's not always advisable to throw
loads of 'magic numbers' into your code - it is
better to define constant values near the start of
the program. If for instance, the file requester
was to be the same size as the window being
used we could define these constants;

COJST W_XS=5(1

OMST W_VS=50
CONST W_WItTHS=4DD
COUffT W ilEIGHT'I=300

A word of warnini

One ol the reasons that BASIC coding is great
fun is that you can use variables without
declaring or initialising them. Past that stage?
Well, most people think that bul don't you
believe it - everyone inadvertently does it
occasionally simply by making the odd typing
slip. With tag lists this is fatal; let me explain
why by looking at this tag entry:

ASLFR_lnltall.eftEaaes, WJS

Whaf s the problem? It doesn't work because
there is an 'i' missing in the tag identity name.
We should have written:

,\iLFR_liutialLeft£ageS, W_X6

OK, so Ifs an easy mistake to make when

typing tag Identities and an easy mistake to
miss as well. The interesting thing is that when
a tag list containing a misspelt identity is usod
It, and all subsequent tags in the list, stop
working. What happens of course is that
BASIC regards the Identity Item as a variable
and then initialises it to zero (In true BASIC
fashion). Now you ought to know what
happens next - the library function using the
tag list encounters this zero identity value
and interprets the entry as the end of the
list. All subsequent tag pairs therefore get
ignored. I've mentioned this because if you
find tag entries don't seem to be having
any effect during your HlSoft BASIC 2 tag
list experiments, look very carefully at the
entries you prepared to make sure you
haven't slipped up.

Both WINDOW OPEN and TAGLIST
statements could then use these symbolic
values. For instance:

TAGLIST vaEEimre(]uester_tagES((])l, _

fiSLFRjrit 1 eTextt, ' i^ga
Stiofpet Requescer", _

ASLFR_IilitlalLefcEiige6, W_Ki,

ASLFILInitialTopaiges, W_YI, „
ASLFB_InitiaIWidth5, W.WIimiS, _
ASLFlLlnitialHeighti, W_HEIGHTS, _
TSG.BBBi,

I have done this with the first example on this
month's Coverdisk (test3,bas), (See page 1 2 for
details of the disks.)

The code is based on the tests, bas enample
from last month and the significant point to bear
in mind is that the only real changes that have
had to be made is the inclusion of the additional
tags shown above.

TtJTO*l^_>

14*11 f=i1l

Above: The new menu options used in the
Iesl4.bas example program.

A second example

A fie requester's initial position and size
characteristics are normally specified just once
when the AllocAslRequestSO function is used.
However, the AslRequestSQ function used to
bring up the requester can also accept tag
parameters (see last month's tutorial for
function details),

For the second enample I have tied
AslRequestSO calls to separate menu items and
incorporated additional tag lists that make use
of the MfRje-ecc Icons s tag. In one case the tag
value supplied is fm,ses (so .into files are not
shown), and in the other case the same tag is
set to TPiJEt so that ,into files are displayed
(you'll find this example code on disk as the
program test4,bas). For the eWra tag data I've
specified an array using dim a(tro_tagsi.(4j; but
instead of initialising this array at the start of the
program, it is done within the case statements
which handle the menu operations.

Make the most of the fact that much of the
code will be familiar from last month's tutorial
and concentrate on the small changes
associated with this month's tag list
discussions. From now on I will assume that you
understand the use of lag lists. Both of the
enamples on the disk, incidentally are again
using HiSoft BASIC'S conventional high-level
menu/close-gadgeteventhandling.

Unfortunately, this approach has inherent
limitations and so nest month I will explain what
they are and how to avoid them. ■

"-""HiifoBi" ■—-"-"

niima-

left: T/ie
modHled case
statements
code from
lite test4.bBS

Right: Dont
forget to set
appropriate
Include and
library paths
before compiling
the examples.

.1 Pki. A.*k«.

liiiiT;:

™,

Kti nil::;;

ifiiaSii-

-^1

*-■ ■ ■
■al . , .

FFs;'r=:r-inv>

ma*. . .

ffcoT'- — ■IHJ"

H 1

f'^fWIM L>M^r-

l^US

.m.. <^ .m..

- - ll

•Pbk«nfh

■

Issue 62

May 1996

AmQA SHOPPER 59

ShopperTUtorial

Music

John Kennedy

AmigamUSIC

In part three of our music tutorial, John Kennedy discusses the
power of sound sampling on the Amiga.

Sampling is so
popular because
it is so powerful."

ITIiis is the origins! waveform. It varies
smoothly with no steps. This is the
waveform we will sample.

Sound on the Amiga is produced
using sound samples: real
sounds replayed at different
pitches. Samples are eitremely
useful throughout modern
music, because they are eitremely flexible.

On the one hand, samples forTn the
basic bull ding -block of almost all modem
synthesizers, which use a "wave table" of
sampled sounds and then process them to
create realistic sounds. On the other hand,
dedicated samples can store drum kits, vocals
and media snatches, and replay them exactly
like the original, or processed in some way.
Samplers are also used as digital tape

2 With only three sampling levels, the
resultant sample (the green shape) is pretty
rough. The sampling level is high (the markers
on the horizontal access), but there isnt enough
resolution to capture the waveform properly.

recorders: capturing sounds to hard disk for
editing, processing and mastenng.

Sampling is so popular because it is so
powerful. Converting an analogue sound source
into digital data means it can be processed,
stored and replayed with excellent qualrty. The
music stored on a CD is digital, and it sounds
much better than analogue vinyl records or
analogue compact cassettes ever do.

The process of converting the sound into
digital format (which is often called "sampling"
or "digitising") and vice versa is earned out by
electronic chips. There are two quantities
which determine the quality of an audio
sample. The first is the sample rate, the second
is the resolution.

Quality of sound

Taking the resolution first, it soon becomes
obvious that the more detail you use to store the
sample, the better it will sound. You can see this
it I quickly change into some flared trousers, pu!
on a kipper tie, grow a strange beard and adopt
my best Open University lecturer-type voice,
(See pics 1 to 4.)

You can see that the resolution is important,
and that's why CD players have 1 6 bits of
resolution: that's up to 65,536 different levels to
measure the sample. The Amiga has 8-bit
resolution, but even that means 256 levels, so
the sound quality is pretty good.

Making the most of Amiga sampling

Tlie Amiga's built-in sampling
hardware may be only tour
channels with a resolution of eight
bits, but it stills sounds excellent.
In fact, it can occasionally sound
better than cheap, 16-blt
sojndcards used on PCs.

However, there still comes
a time when the quality simply
isn't enough. Sadly, it isn't
possible to unplug the Amiga's
sound hardware and slot in a
new card. The Amiga just doesn't
work like that.

Do you really need sampling?

It you only need high quality
instruments, it is possible to
buy an external MIDI synthesizer

for a lot less than an external
MIDI sampler.

Will you be using sampling
mostly for "media snatches"?

If you plan on using the sample
replay function tor short bursts
of voice from films and so on
(ahem, cough, cough, copyright),
then you probably don't actually
need 1 6-bit stereo sampling. If you
sample from radio or non-NICAM
TV tlien the Amiga's eight bits will
do very well indeed. You can
process the samples for echo,
phasing and filter effects with a
sample editing program and Ihen
play them back for very expensive-
sounding results.

Do you need many samples
replayed at once?

Dedicated lullDI samplers can
replay many samples at the same
time. For example, the EMU ESi32
which we use can replay 3Z
samples at the one time - this
makes the Amiga looks decidedly
weedy. There are ways around
this, though. The easiest way is to
fabricate the samples yourself: if
you are always (or mostly) going
to be playing certain samples at
the same time, create a new
sample from the two originals by
using the "MIX" feature of any
sample editing program. Another
solution is to use another Amiga -
you can pick up a used A50D very

cheaply these days, and hey
presto! another tour voices.

Will you be using sampled
drums?

With a dedicated sampler, you can
keep an entire drum kit in memory
at one time and trigger eadi
sound individually. This is a
tremendous luxury, but you will
rarely have the same capability on
the Amiga. One way around this is
not to sample drums individually,
but sample entire drum riffs; the
kick, snare hi-hats and everything.
Sample the entire rifl and trigger
it at the start of every bar or four
bars. This is a great way to create
Jungle music!

60 AimBASHOPfER

I May 1996

Issue 62

John Kennedy

Music

ShopperTUtorial

Why sample rates are important ^^

' 1

It Is Important to pick a sample rate which is fast enough to capture all

the detail in a sound. The sample rate at choice is defined by the

"Shannon -Hartley Sampling Thereom" as twice the highest frequency in

the sound. This Is also known as the Niquest Rate. If you sample at less

than this rate, detail will be lost as you can see from this example below.

Stop 1: Here is the original audio

step 2: How we digitise it at a

signal. It's not digitised yet, so like

sampling rale defined by the marks

k A

any analogue signal, it varies over

/\ /

along the borizonlal axis. For each

/\ /

time: there are no steps. It's the

t\ \ . /

marker, we put a dot at the closest

A, / \ . /

sort of signal you would see if you

\J \a /

point to the original signal. We

/ V \a /

connected a microphone to an

/ \y

can only space the dots

/ \y

oscilloscope and i/vaiched the

' V

horizontally at the rate of the

' V

waveform bounce up and down.

markers on the axis. (We are not
dealing with resolution here).

/
'1

Step 3: Now we can remove the

Step 4: To replay the sample, we

original waveform and leave the

re'Create the original waveform.

samples behind. These are the

The only way we can do this is to

!\ /

only pieces of data we store,

make use of the samples we have.

^ / \ /

because we know that each

t 1

You can see that at the start of the

/A/ \^ /

sample is a "snapshot" of what

< 1 1 1

waveform where there is a lot of

--/ V vw

level the original waveform was

movement, our sample rate wasn't

at for each point in time (or at

enough to capture all the detail.

least eacit paint in time separated

by the sample rate).

3 Double the resolution and things start to get
better Only a little, mind you. Deciding
which level to put the green bar to is difficult
when you don't have much to c/toase from.

'nines, please

We have explained how a sample can be made
and replayed, but how is il possible lo play back
samples at different pitches? It's all very well
sampling a piano playing Middle C, but do you
need to sample all the other notes as well in
order to be able to play a tune?

Thankfully not: the trick is lo replay the
Middle C sample at drfferent rates. Play it
slightly faster and it goes up in pitch, play it
slower and it drops in pitch, A single sample
can therefore be made lo play an entire tune.
You can see this yourself easily with an Amiga
tracker program such as OclaMED, The Amiga
keyboard is used as a music keyboard, and
depending on which key you press, the sample
is replayed at different rates and therefore
different notes are created.

You might be thinking that since the
samples are played at different rates, the

Issue 62

4 With increased resolution the sample starts
to get closer. With a high enough resolution
and a fast enough sample rate, the sample
would look pretty close to the original,

samples would all last different lengths of
time. The higher-pitched samples would
sound for a lot shorter than the lower-pitctied
samples. Also, after taking so much time to
get the sampling rale right, won't playing it a
lot slower {to gel s deep, low-pitched sound)
effect the quality?

The answer is, of course, yes on both
counts. Higher-pitched samples don't last as
long and very low-pitched samples can sound
rather ropy, A dedicated IvIIDI sampler gets

Next month

In next month's music tutorial we will look
more in-depth at sample analysis, and
some of the software and hardware tools;
which will help you make the most of them
on your Amiga. Stay tunedl

"A single sample
can therefore be
made to play an
entire tune."

around this problem because it can
automatically loop each sample. Every sound
has an attack, a sustain and a decay to a
certain extent. With careful editing you can
loop the sustain and SO extend the sound. The
MIDI sampler hardware can keep the loop
happening for as long as the keyboard is
pressed down, which makes a big difference.
(MIDI samplers can do all sorts of other tricks
such as adjusting the amplitude, pan, tuning
and filtering as well - but that's what you pay
your £1,000 plus for).

The best way to get around the sample
length/quality problem is lo create multiple
samples. Obviously, it would be best to sample
each note individually: and so have 48 or 49
separate samples for a four octave keyboard. In
practice you can usually get away with one
sample per octave, and use Ihe altered replay
rale trick lo create the extra notes. ■

, J^^aGASHOPPER 61

ShopperTutorial

Comms

Darren Irvine

features

Darren Irvine takes a closer
look at IRC, and explains some
of Its more arcane features.

Last month, we covered the
basic principles behind the
operation of IRC, and looked at
common commands used in
normal IRC operation. In most
situations, those commands will be
enough to see you through, but knowing
the ins and outs of some of the more
obscure features of IRC can be useful.

Creating a channel

When someone first joins a brand new channel,
that person becomes the channel operator or
"chanop" o! that channel. This person has the
power to affect the way in which that channel is
perceived by other IRC users, and can also
make other people chanops for thai channel.
The command which does most of the work in
terms of changing the status of a channel is the
IMODE command. One of the most significant
things that can be done to a channel is to use
/MODE to make the channel "private", rather
than the default "public" mode. As we've seen,
anyone can see who is on a public channel and
anyone can join that channel. Private channels
on the other hand, can't be joined by just
anyone, and normal users can't obtain
information regarding the people on a private

■Chw ltode>
<Bc-tion»

TheK

CJoins

■Actlon>

Users on ttireland: darsy TheK nstn2693 tippet eUralth BJawJaBot

Halich et1ulr_WoEf

End of /MRNES list.

Current modes for Hlreland: topic protection, no messaging,

Halioh bugs tippet, doesn't matter. I like <j more

Halioh: l^hal do you study?

muggy (guest 139192, 197, 190, 13) has Joined the channel.

darsy Suddenly kakes up

illil darsy

Above: You can use the /ME command to give
some feel of animation to your presence on IRC,
rather than sticking to simply chBttlng.

channel - use of the /NAMES or the /LIST
command usually returns something like "Prv: "
when examining a private channel. The format of
the /MODE command is as follows;

/MODE [Channel] [-t-j-llniodecontrols]
[parameters]

This looks a bit complex, but it can be broken
down into simple sections.

The channel bit is fairly obviously the name
of the channel which you want to affect with the
/MODE command. Of course, you must have
chanop status for that channel for the command
to work, Neil, followed by a plus "+" or minus
"-" sign are the mode control characters, each
one of which affects a particular aspect of the
channel. "+" adds the effect ot that mode
control character, and "■" cancels it. The last
parts of the /MODE command are any optional
parameters which are needed for some of the
control characters.

Note that the channel name must be in
uppercase, and the mode characters in
lowercase. The valid control characters and their
associated parameters are listed below,

/MODE control
characters

b [person] Bans Iperson] from this channel.

The Iperson] parameter must usually be in

nickname luser@host format for the "b" control

character to work,

■ Sets the status of the channel to invite-only In

other words, only nicknames who have been

/INVITEd by the chanop can /JOIN this channel,

I [number] Limits the number of possible

users to the parameter supplied,

m Defines that channel as a moderated

channel. This means that only users who have

been given chanop status can talk.

ti Forbids the use ot the /MSG command from

another channel into this one.

o [nickname] Makes Inickname] a channel

operator for (his channel. If you do this, then

leave the channel, the newly-created chanop

can ban you from your own channel,

More than just a chat system

Allliough IRC was designed as a
method of communication
between Internet users, it's been
eipanded into a more versatile
system using what is known as
tlie Client To Client Protocol
(CTCP). This system enables two
users who's IRC clients both
support CTCP to perform client-
specific actions across the IRC
network, such as transferring files.

The main /CTCP command
itself can be used to find out
various information about the
client software being used by an
IRC user, and the general format
of its operation is as follows:

/CTCP [nickname] [command]

The commands that can be used
with /CTCP are:

VERSION: Displays information

about the version and release
numbers of the IRC client being
used by [nickname],
FINGER: Displays information
relating to tiie amount of time
[nickname] has been idle on IRC
and which server is being used.
CLIENTiNFO: Used without a
nickname to return information on
the CTCP commands lliat are
supported by your particular iRC
client software. Use it with a
nickname to see if the person you
want to communicate with also
has software whidi supports the
command that you want to use.

Although new CTCP commands
are being developed ail the time,
the most commonly used one Is
the /DCC or Direct Client
Connection command wtiich is
used for tile transfers. One word
of warning: never send or receive

a file from someone unless you
know exactly what file is being
transferred - it is possible for
unscrupulous IRC users to gain
control of, or damage, your local
system by sending bogus
password files, or getting you
unwittingly to send your own.

The options available for the
/DCC command are:

/DCC SEND [nickname] [Riename]
Initiates a file transfer procedure
between your machine and that
belonging to [nickname] - In the
first instance [nickname] will be
informed thai you want to transfer
the file. It is up to the remote user
to continue the transfer using the
next /DCC command:
/DCC GET [nickname) [filename]
Accepts the file transfer which was
initiated by the remote user's
/DCC SEND command.

/DCC LIST

Shows the current DCC

connections with details of

their types, status and the

nicknames involved,

/DCC CLOSE [type] [nickname]

[arguments]

Aborts an unwanted DCC

file transfer request. The

arguments siiouid be the same

details as siiown using ttie

/DCC LIST command for liiat

DCC connection.

/DCC CHAT

Establishes a direct client-to-client

diat which, unlike normal IRC

communications which pass

through any number of IRC

servers, enables secure

communication directly between

two users. Once the /DCC CHAT

connection is established, the

secure messages are sent using

the normal IRC /MSG command.

62 AimGASHOPPER

I May 1996

Issue 62

Darren Irvine

Comms

Shopperflitorial

p Defines the channel as private,
s Defines the channel as secret. Secret channels
are an extension of private ones, and can'l be
seen at all using a /LIST or /NAMES cominand.
t Defines the channel to be "Topic Limited", In
other words, only chanops can change the
channels' topic. This is the default on most IRC
servers anyway.

Using the /MODE
cominand

/JOIN #mychannel Join my rather
egotistical ly-n am ed channel.
/MODE #inychannel +p Make the channel
private - so I can be in my own little world,
/MODE #mvchannel +1 1 Just to make sure
i won't be bothered, I'll limit the number of users
on my channel to 1 . Normally, you will want to
consider a higher limit than this. Unless you like
talking to yourself.

Advanced IRC
commands

Once you start using IRC a lot, you'll need to
know some of the more exotic commands, so
you can appear to know what you are doing.
This is important il you have created your own
channel to be a chanop on, or have been
granted chanop status on an existing channel,

/AWAY [reason] This command marks you as
being away from your temiinal, without ending
your IRC session. Vou can use this command
when you want to pop to the loo or go and
make a cup of coffee, or pour a beer, without
actually logging off the channels you are on,
/IGNORE [nickname] I [user ©address]
[type] Sometimes you will wish to not see
messages from a particular nickname or
address, and the /IGNORE command is the
one to use. The type parameter specifies
which types of IRC message to ignore -
MSG, NOTICE, PUBLIC, INVITE, ALL, or
NONE. If you precede one of these with a
minus sign, you will stop ignoring that type of
message from the specified nickname or user
Using the /IGNORE command on its own with
no parameters lists who you are currently
ignoring. For ewmple:

Below: The results displayed when using the
available CTCP commands wittt Grapevine.

fVapevlne Amiga InTernel Helay Chal Uienl 1 .53. ft>5&4 Brian J. Cerveriy.

Q I Grapevlrw Too|-i - AcUve prciBct □ jllDABSYCHftHHEl)

ti^iffi^ -sig \Mmmr^\mm

gj_ IP rrc] Charfftel tPARSYCHANr^EL (pl> 1 LoerS. I chanop:

pN iJaray

ltt>act buffer clear*d.
You have joined i^har^nel aOARSYCHRhliEL .
Users on VDRRSYCHRhHEL , iMarcy
ErUJ of /MU1ES Uit .

dar&y ofiarrges ttte ohaitine^ no4* to prlvatA
dAr>y dhongea [he chaivteir miMm to UnU 1 UfttfTB
d*rsr A*tM banfsJ on JVITTBlaP*.

lejlfs

Q I UMlBJlta

dOflREYCHFlNnE

^ ^^

Above: Using the /MODE command to configure
my newly-created channel.

/IGNORE jimbob ALL Ignores all messages
from the user with the nickname "jimbob"
/IGNORE *@dunibass.OKy.edu This will
ignore any "INVITE" messages from any user
using the server dumbass.oxy.edu.
/INVITE [nickname] [channel]
Sends an "INVITE" message to the specified
nickname to join the specified channel. If no
channel is given, the current channel is used.
This command is handy if you want to speak to
someone on IRC, but you don't know which
channel they are on - you can simply ask them
to join your current channel.
/KICK [channel] [nickname]

Kicks the specified nickname of the specified
channel. You can use this if someone is
behaving in an abusive or otherwise
unacceptable manner. Note that unreasonable
use of the /KICK command will get you a bad
name on IRC, and it's probably a good idea to
leave any /KICKing that has to be done to
expenenced IRC users - in other words let
someone else do the dirty work. Plus, you will
only be able to kick someone from a channel if
you have chanop status,
/ME [description] PnDduces a

description type message on the screens of

cvwt A;Wgj Ifilgral Pelay tJiaHJgil l'3g aiWdlhanJCai

&jgBV1fgTwu-*£llvatr[^»,ct ptaOAPS-^CHAMBr"

^tTfrTal

l.plBCIOMfnaaPMSVQtfJML^iOlMJMflMHfyt

i[ CLEQiTlrrD
E. eLr€rti||*o

I LTTCPt «rr FFhOOi. ^>EIISIOn. UKKTlFll,

ijr'lwr liBlp Lk v«l ajbLLiIiI*
-■■ (AfPfl^D Ltcr-A iBir |pMii4 V llw I rt'DrBB I iDfi &V4miVv>T

■« ^•*- ■>" "Jri^fH tlM» or. ini« hQ«| li yrdwwiBr I2-Ht-50

..[gj

i| laalmlgi

S3I^^ ^dl.^

RflniD*, 'r^Or J,Uei^l'i WUrk ."ul^

BS^HWIKJIISE

darsy
LLaJ^
\ Mag Ik
Shokudue
RaspuUn

■X_8ball
'xTrudcet

ruldjerban
■\LSD
■\ tutA^

-\unctead

Issue 62 I

Above: In Grapevine's
Userlist window, users
witti Channel Operator
status appear with a
tittle wand beside
their nicks.

May 1996

everyone on the current channel. For example, if
your nickname is "Fred" and you type the
command; "/ME falls off his chair laughing"
the other users will be treated to a message
like: * Fred falls off his chair laughing.
/NICK [nickname]

Changes your currently- used nickname to
whatever you like. If you do this too often other
users will think that you have a bit of an identity
problem - in general the rule is to pick a
nickname and stick with it every time you use
IRC. The only usual reason for a change of
nickname is when two users with the same one
try to use IRC at the same time - whoever is
first on will be allowed to use the name.
/NOTICE [nickname],[channel] [text]
Works in a similar way to "/MSG" but puts "-"
characters around your nickname as it appears
on the recipient's screen. Ivlany automated IRC
processes (known as "Bots" which will be
covered later on in this senes) use /NOTICE,
so it is probably best to stick to using /MSG
unless you want to give the impression that you
are nothing more than a program.
/NOTIFY [nickname],,
Adds the specified nickname(s) to a list of
names who you'll be warned about when Ihey
start or stop using IRC. Including too many
names in this list can slow things down, both for
you and other users using the same server.
Unless you are really looking out for someone,
it's best to avoid using /NOTIFT.
/QUERY [nickname],[Channel]
Starts a private conversation with the supplied
nickname or the optionally-specified channel. To
cancel this private mode, use /QUERY with no
parameters. In effect, using /OUERY is like
issuing a senes of /MSG commands. Be aware
however thai no conversation, even protected
by /OUERY, is secure on IRC. Any
unscrupulous operator on any IRC server
anywhere on the Internet can eavesdrop on any
messages, so be careful what you say
/TOPIC [channel] [topic]
Changes the channel topic for the specified
channel, as seen when using the /LIST
command. In general, you'll need chanop status
to be able to change the topic, ■

AtflGA SHOPPER 63

Netscape: FutureNet - Indei

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I contTDller torn Alfa Dfl
I m the card aM poveri

Utn

OieJ

AMIGA

M14 38S

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■■ c:

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Issue 62

May 1996

ShopperOffers

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will piracy be Ihe dealh of the Amiga?;
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Dssue 53

All the advice and software you needio
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10 MB Oisk/HDlools

5 MB Hard^vare related

B4D MB Music modules

150 MB Camm jnicatiors ^^C\

30 MB Music software « fit/*

4CD!ROM=SEhT

Aminet 11

Aminet CD 11, doled April 1996, consisli
of approximately ^,1 gigabytes oi soft-
ware in 3700 archives. Since ihe release
oF Afflinet CD 10 more ihan 700 MB new
software hos appeared. The current edi-
lion hos a speciol Focus on pictures, more
ihon 1000 pictures from ihe internel were
included' User friendly access iohv/are
mokes ihe Aminet CD 11 o pleasure to use.

18 MB

Business &offv/are

34 MS

Cammunkalions

189 MB

Graphics & sound demos

21 MB

DevelopmBnl soffwnrB

2MB

DIsk/HD taoli

52 MB

Documents

72 MB

Games

d3MB

Graphics software

UMB

MiscelloneDus

156 MB

Music modules

122 MB

Pictures & animations

25 MB

Utilities

10 MB

Music softv/are

XiFaiiitV4

XiPoJnt 4 is the r^ev^ version of ihe leading
edge, 24'bil^ paini program. IT'S suited to
ihe demonds of novice and expert alike,
and wilhin a ^harl time, you loo wfll be
oble \o produce colourful ond creative art
in 16-3 million colours. This version of Xi-
Point features arimarions as well as easy-
to-use raytracing-copobililies.
Overview oF Features: ■ Diverse point
functions including colour, contrast and
saturation adiuslment ' Mosk, OLitllner
recotour ond fill Functions ■ Airbrush vKilh
cdj us table sproy Functions ' Light-toble
function for monipulating montages and
onimotions ■ Text functions with anti-alio-
sing using Compugrophic fonts ' Support
For o voriely of gropfiic formats ^ Unlimited
Undo - Diverse manipulation of olpho
channel - Supports mony graphic cords ■
Layers to combine different projects -
ARexx port ■ Drag fi Drop colours - Exter-
nal fil}er module ■ Extensive documenta-
tion ■ 60 texluresn 50 londscopes, 30 other
pictures and many fonts includef^.

5A'

,9^

Wnrkbench Add-On Vol. 1

The Workbench Add-On CD-ROM is the
Ideol companion Ta your workbench. On
this CD you will nol only find the best pro-
grams, that ore available For the Amiga,
but you will also get them reody-to-run
from the CD. Tbe CD covers oil oreas of
interest, all, the programmer, the user, the
creotive and the gamer will find what they
ore looking lor. On this CD-ROM there ore
many shareware programs, some of them
at a special price, if you get registered.

.95

£24-

All produds are ovoMobEe in youf local

Amigo-shop or through notional

mailorder-companies

International Distributor:

Grenville Trading Internationol Gi^bH

Zirrmersmuhlenweg 73

61440 Oberursel ■ Germany

Tel +49-61 71-859 37

Fax +49-6171-83 02

EMail: CompuServe 100336,1245

Issue 62

May 1996

Mega Mouse 2 and
scanning pad

Broken your mousje? Why not replace it with
the Mega Mouse 2. And our new pad will
help make your scanning a doddle.

De^cripLnn

Mega Mouse 2/scannlng pad

AS price

Moga Mouse £a^0

Special subscribers

pnco

M,-^3 Mou!,t 2 £7.99

ASpnce

Scannmg pad £G,99

Special subscrjbeis

pnce

ScJ.nn.ni^ p,i.- £6.&(}

AS price

Mega Mouse 3 and scanning pad £14.99 |

Special subs pfice

Mega

Mausp 2 and bCiinr.i.ig u.i.:: £14-20

Order cods

Megd Mdusb 7 AFMM02

Order cods

Scanning pad AF5P0?

AMOS Pro
Compiler 2

Speed up your AMOS

programming with the

AMOS Pro Compiler 2

from Europress, which

Fi Lieenceware have

re-released for a limited i

period. If you wanl to know more

about the program, we ran a review of it

in the April 1996 issue, where we gave il a

respectable 87 per cent.

Descripbori

AMOS Pro Compiler 2

ASpnce

£14.99

Older code

AS /AM /I

Soecisi SLibsLnbers Dncn

£13.99

Tkirbotecii Clock Cartridge

Your Amiga vmll always know what day il is with this handy device
- even when it's switched off! Once the software is installed, boot

up and the time
and date are aSready
set. Fits into the
disk drive port (or
on the back of your
second drive).

DRSc^n\'.Dn

TutbotBch Clock Carlrldae

RRP

£19.93

AS pr.iie

£17.99

Order code

A5CL0

Special subpayibcrs p'icii

£16.ge

Amiga Slnopper reader offer order form

'SUBSCRIBERS: Please place a Q before each order code.
Name

ShopperPromotions

Phase 1 , 2 and 3

E.M.Computergraphic's excellent CDs are
full of fonts, clipart and images. Save £4 off
each CD or £15 when you buy all three!

DeBcnpllon

Pluse 1, 3 and 3

AS price

Pack □[ Siiee £59.99 (RRP £75)

AS pricH

Ftir CD £21.39 (RRP £24.99)

Order code

AS/PH/1

Special Qub^cnbars price

Pack ot three £56,99

Special acbscnbers pnce

Pa CD £19.99

fflLAl

Data Elirwi^

zMM"

--iHMl

■*

■"

1 II 1

1 VI«K 1 1 -WIOU 1

a □

1 II II

Mini Office

A collection .of database, spreadsheet,
graphics and word processor programs
from Europress that you shouldn't be
without. It can be especially useful if you
are planning to set up a small business.

Description

Mini Office

AS price

£34^9

Order code

CB9S

Special subscnber^ pr»ce

£22,93

AS62

Address

Method of payment Access H Visa Zl Cheque D
Please make cheques payable to: Future Publishing Limited,
All prices indude posting, packing and VAT.
Credit Card no

POLI

_Post Code

Phone Number.
Description

-Price.

_£

.Order Code*

Expiry Date

Total order £

Customers outside the UK add £4.00 for overseas delivery.

Send form to: Amiga Shopper, Future Publishing Ltd, FREEPOST
(BS4g00),Somertan, Somerset TA11 BBR

Do not send cash. Use the methods of payment listed above. EEC
customers regislered for VAT, please quote your registration number:

I — I Tick here rf you don't want (o receive special offers from other
specially- selected companies. AMS/62

AmOdSHOPFER 67

ShopperPublic Domain

■:'ii:Jsssi£JisJis:JiJfii^^

Domain Choice

David Taylor

.-'•iiit-ViVifVi-:.

David Taylor tunes into PD-FM once again and picks the hits from the misses in this month's
selection of toptastic Public Domain software.

There has been a rather odd
development in the way
magazines treat PD recently.
It seems that a number of ouf
rivals don't seem to think that
there is enough stuff to review. We're
somewhat bewildered by this, because we
have more than enough. So while
everyone else cuts their coverage, you can
rely on us to keep bringing you as many
PD reviews as we can possibly cram in.

Gourmet And Wine
Steward

This disk comes from the Lifestyles series which
provides programs that are not computer
orientated. It's refresliing to find packages that
use the Amiga lor something other than just
plain old WP'DTP/DTV, etc. Essentially, the two
programs on here are specialised databases,
but although they are custom created tor the
purpose, they are not simpiy files running
through a database program,

Gourmet is a demo and has three areas.
The first is a recipe database, which has some
good ideas for entertaining, but is a bit iimited.
The second is a bartender area that has the

Lelsureware rears its head
with two culinary programs:
Gourmet And Wine Steward.

ajlBtJorlBS

"i * !s!.;-"

<n »*a IIMh 10»r "in. tanbb.,B now ita^c, 1«,4,ri JVii-*. O-r-IJc g.njcr,
aw. tvbanfl avadi and pn.O. IhraBd h"! an IB \b itt «.x .nih |.4n|iL.o

tlt'.tnl. broil 1.1 to i nlnula*; lUT, t>> Bre b L f nLnuta ^a

recipes for cocktails, i tried to convince Sue that
for a thorough review we should try making each
and every one to check the authenticity of the
mixes, but she remained unconvinced. The other
part is a section for keeping track of your own
wines that you have in stock. For this to be of
use, you've got to have an entensive cellar.

Wine Steward might be titled second, but it
is the more intriguing of the tv/o programs.
Moving through menus and submenus, you can
select a course and an actual dish and Wine

Steward will then select the wine that it thinks
best accompanies your meal. The downside is
that the database of dishes is not exhaustive; it
gives you a fair selection, but there's no real
section for mam courses. Still, it's a pretty good
starting place if you need ideas about
integrating food and drink.

Verdict: 80%

Who, what, whe

fhy, how...

pTDduCI

Gourmet And Wine Steward
Liars

Noofdriia

one

two

IVpb of pradud

^bb^>

SUDDilW

Contact

VMdkt

PBfl.

Applications

90p + SOp

Roberta Smith DTP

0131 455 1BZ6

ZO'ih,

Demo

£1.50 4- 75p

Online PD

01704 S3433S

9D<Mi

ShapeShifter 3.Za

one

Application

75 p + 75p

Online PD

01704 834335

8S4ti

Manic Selector

one

UlJIity

£1.50

Kew=ll

Oiei S57 1617

9(M

Final Wrapper 3.11

one

Utility

75p + 75p

Online PD

01704 G34335

92%

TUrboCAT-Pro 2

one

Application

75p + 7Sp

Online PD

01704 834335

70
71

Chaos Pro

ei9K

AppllcatlOD

n/a

aminet/gtx/fract.

ChaosPro.lha

96H

X- Password E

one

Utility

SOp

Saddletramps PD

01709 383127

20W

VMM 3.3

one

Utility

£1.50

Kew=ll

Olfll 657 1617

9S'Hi

72
72
73

Roswell Crash Slides 3

two

Slideshow

£1.50 + 75p

Online PD

01704 834335

20%

Ultimate Memory Tools

one

Utilities

7Sp + 75p

Online PD

01704 834335

60%

Flummv Utils 5

OctaMEDTedinique

AGASSM7,22

Tell Tlie Time

Paint, Paste And Draw

Some pnoes listed here include

of the program with the PD Hou

one

Utilities

75p + 75p

Online PD

01704 B34335

75%

one

Educational

£5.50

See PD directory

n/a

70%

one

Application

£Z.9S

5D Licence ware

01709 383127

BSU

one

Educational

£3.90 + SOp

F1 Licenceware

01392 493580

75%

one

Application

£3.50

HorizoniSjSeasoft

01903 850373

96%

oostage and packing c
ie before purchasing, 1

harges; buying more than one disk from a PD house is likely to reduce the price per disk; check compatibility
(lore irfomiatior on all the PD Houses and their prices can be found in the PD Direclory on the Coverdisks.

68 AWOA SHOPPER PD

May 1996

I Issue 62

David Taylor

Domain Choice

ShopperPublic Domain

Liars

Is this a slideshow, education, fiction
or a demo? The truth is ojt there.
This two-disk set fades in sets of
high quality pictures and text that
eiplain the US Government's cover
up of alien contact. Apparently, Eisenhower met
up with aliens who needed humans to keep their
race alive. In exchange for advanced technology
for the Americans, he promised to keep the
aliens' visits secret. The plot thickens from here
on and I'll not explain it all. I'm not sure how
seriously you're supposed to take all this, but it
does make compelling viewing. When it's all
over, it finishes off with a small demo sequence
of sv^iriing and spinning effects that have
absolutely nothing to do with the rest of the title.
Some of the demo pari might not be eiactly
inspired, but the burning plasma is still nice.

I'd say that of all the slideshows, diskmags
and demos about aliens that we've seen
recently, this is one of the best. It might not be
crammed with text or pictures, but it's not reliant
on the Roswell film for footage and although it's
really no more than rolling demo, it is
fascinating, A must (or aci-fi and UFO fans,
although it may fall short of the mark for fanatics.

Verdict: 90%

star buy

SiiapeShifter 3.2a

This program is still causing waves
and, as we reported last month, has
been more than just noticed by
Amiga Technologies. If is an Apple
Macintosh emulator for the Amiga. It
is completely software driven and relies on
software versions of the Mac's F^OIvIs that you
take from a real Mac yourself. For legal reasons,
you must own the Ivlac too. Because the Amiga
runs on the same processor family as the Mac,
the speed of emulation is astonishing. This is no
gimmicky program; you can use it for serious
work. It means thai if you own an expensive
Amiga set up, but want or need to run Mac
software, you can just get a cheap, secondhand
Mac and then use the Amiga and ail its power
and peripherals as a faster Mac.

This is a Shareware package and has a very
cheap registration fee of only DM50 (appro*.
£30). Because of its Shareware status, the
author is constantly updating and improving the

Liars may or may not be true, but it
is snlertaining. The aliens are
already among us. Apparently.

program {sometimes dramatically), which means
that a version you get from a PD House can
soon be superseded. Indeed, this version has
already been supplanted by 3,'^, although 1
expect that if you order it you will get the latest
available version. These newer versions are
always worth keeping up to date with. For the
sake of the cost of a PD disk, don't make do
with an earlier version, because essential parts
like the PrepareEmul command and the speed
of the emulator have been improved, as well as
additional support being added.

The unregistered version of ShapeShiffer
3,2a has a tew of the options disabled, but it is
still perfectly usable for you to try it out in real
operation, H you want to use it, then register,
because the Amiga must have continued
development for this program.

Work bench iEcreen

a Morkbenoh

HagicSelector PreFerencES

IBIQ

Pattern

SounO

ielprHoiiflBI
Rcnapping Bl

Rdndon

S snapping

Kdit I B j r^inutes before r^eu patterns.
Horkliench I Hindous j Screen

Uorkilriuriph Patlepns/Tpiunph_
Uopkirriunph Patterns/Triunph_
Uorkilriuhph Pattepiis/Triunph^
HorklTricjnph Palterns/Triunpli_
UorklTriunph Palterns/Triunph_
Uorkiyriunph Pattepn5/Tpiunph_

Tap

Dour

Bottcn

Sort

J Renaue Rll

Rdd 1 Renove 1

Save

Canrel

iBlB

laip

UBiTieii, CGWBPittwn

®-

-1<IH£

New backdrops and
sounds for your

Workbench that
change every lime
you boot up.

Issue 62

May 1996

If you want to know more about how
ShapeShitter works and how it Is installed for
use, check out this month's DIY feature on page
28, which has a section covering the program.

Verdict: 95%

star buy

ilAagic Selector

It appears that several programmers
have noticed how poor the original
WBPattern preferences are. Forget
the fact that it only uses IFFs, but
consider that it doesn't actually put
the backdrop pattern up correctly. An update
called CGWBPattern has been included on this
month's Subscribers disk, which has datatype
support and a random option.

Magic Selector takes a slightly different
slant , It consists of programs for the
WBStartup drawer and a preferences interface
that enables you to choose a set of backdrops
to be picked at random, or in order; it also has
a set of samples for the system to use for
things like alerts - do something wrong and
a crowd might show its amazement. The
package requires WB3, MUI and, realistically,
a hard drive.

The disk also has a small selection of
patterns and samples archived on there by the
author to star! you off. It might not be the most
exciting utility ever, but it's easy to use, well
programmed and it brightens up your Amiga in a
oustomisable fashion.

Verdict: 90%

star buy

Amsashopper PD 69

ShopperPublic Domain

Domain Choice

~T^

David Taylor

<z>

<^°

o
o

'^.

.v^

Fma\ Wrapper has been updated a
little bit, but the disk has more
interesting stuff on offer.

tT 3.0 ^

Arexx Macro for Final WrHer""^
(c) 1SBS by Andreas VWelaa

Final Wrapper 3. 11

This disk contains ttiree programs.
The main one is Final Wrapper, an
excellent selection of macros for use
with Final Writer to create tart
effects. We included version 3,1 on
the Coverdisks of AS56 and this version is only
0.01 on from that. It offers little more of interest
if you already fiave our disk - just one small bug
fix and an additional catalog. If you don't have
our disk, but you do have Final Writer, eitfier this
disk or that back issue are a must-have. The
nev^ features this gives you are what led Larry
Hickmott to say; "Quite simply, anyone v^ith Final
Writer should get their hands on Final Wrapper".

However, also on this disk is a patch to
speed up FW4 by up to 400 per cent for users
with 030 Turbocards. If you've got one, then the
author claims that the speed increases are
excellent, which makes it a pretty interesting
disk, I would have thought.

Lastly, packed away as an Lha archive in the
FW patch directory, I found an archive that I
have seen before, but I have not had the time to
play with. It's by the same author as the patch
and it contains a set of updated maths libraries
that replace the original Workbench ones for
people v^ith FPUs or 040 and above processors
(there are two versions). So, if you've got an
A1 200 with accelerator and FPU, or just a
memory board with FPU, you can get an even
better performance; and A4000 owners are in
for a real treat.

There are acme benchmark test programs

supplied and using them as guides, the results
are amazing. So amazing in fact that I've
reproduced them (see box below). I accept that
I have an 060 processor, but the difference in
times on this same processor using the new
libraries is staggering. Of course, it's a big
difference between the author's benchmark
programs and real usage. I fried to find a
program that uses the libraries intensively, and
after an afternoon's testing, concluded that
these libraries are used so briefly by programs
that testing by stopwatch is almost impossible.
All I can say is that if you concentrate, you will
notice a slight increase. Judging by the

benchmarks, anything that does use them
intensively should be really moved up a gear.

The libraries have so far proved stable, but I
have kept a backup of the original libraries in
case any problems arise and would strongly
advise everyone to do the same.

I get the feeling that this archive just found
its own way on to this disk, because it's not
mentioned anywiiere, In tact, the disk feels a
little sloppy, The Installer is left totally unpacked,
when it almost always supplied crunched to
save space. A ReadMe file is missing, which will
reaily annoy the author (nghlly so). However, the
three programs that are on here are useful,
which means that even though it could be
better, it's still a good disk.

Verdict: 92o/o

star buy

lUrboCAT-Pro 2

It's back againi Dave Hill, the author,
is obviously determined lo develop
this program so that everybody likes
it. The last version was reviewed in
issue AS59, but there have been a
number of changes since then, TurboCat is a
disk cataloguer and can manage a number of
databases (restricted to two in the PD version)

n| TurtiQi:flT-Pni VZ By Oauid Hill. Feb 1996, (Deno VErsiolia

-FiuBwjJt lists

m\ mi\

aajjiijj byu

Nort Disk IU>n-: 4

A new version of TurboCAT solves
some of its earlier prolilems and
surfaces as a very competent utility.

l)ilabi^e Hanagenent- , , ^

hj-^ii.i;ii= [=.;i^: i^;iidi

fl^fw E'^ilinn fiiii Una

Fdil VuLin Hwi

[»ib^9 Ddlfi&e EnlMs?

niMr UVahBt Loa^leiflv

H-^ i mtfiil lo i d^sk..

9,inrih flvi^hiw roi»n1^

Srovw e'isUra canertii.

Bxh

D I Search For Title....

J©

Type in the nsne of the fileis) yau are looting for:

Ready

23. Total

Wt-

Igrore (^se:

Disk

Disk
Disk
Disk
Disk
Disk

tidied File:

lai(Sied File:

Hatched File.

Hatched File

> m

> hitle,vinin

> liifo.vnu

> ^ow.vui

> Jtatjff,'

rnalhieeesingtrans.librarv

350000 iteta lions

V37.1

SPAcoS

23.21 sees

SPAsIn

24.11 sees

SPAtan

30.5S sees

SPCos

30,5S sees

SPCosh

34.24 sees

SPExp

Z9.B7 sees

SPLog

30.10 sees

SPL09IO

31 .eo sees

SPPow

2.27 sees

SPSin

29.99 sees

SPSIncos

34.19 sees

SPSinh

36.49 sees

SPSqrt

0.47 sees

SPTan

28.59 sees

SPTarh

37.97 sees

Total Hme: 404.53 sees

v4D.e
1.01 sees
1.42 sees
Lie sees
1 ,45 sees
1.B3secs
1.24 sees
1.29 sees
1.37 sees
1 .23 sees
1.50 sees
1.77 sees
0.79 sees
0.47 sees
1.84 sees
1.77 sees

20.03 sees

raries tesi results

i ^

mathtrans.library

matliieeedoubtrans.llbfaiy

250000 itetations

250000 iterations

V37.1

V40.6

V37.1

V40.6

SPAcOS

G.20 sees

1.0 s sees

DPAcos

42.14 sees

1.2 s sees

SPAsIn

6.50 sees

1.56 sees

DPAsin

40.50 sees

0.93 sees

SPAtan

2,45 sees

1.25 sees

DPAlan

35.85 sees

1,00 sees

SPCos

2.13 sees

1.55 sees

DPCos

38.15 sees

1 .28 sees

SPCosh

5.21 sees

1.B9 sees

DPCosh

41.30 sees

1.66 sees

BPExp

4.13 sees

1.35 sees

DPEip

37.39 sees

1.23 sees

SPLog

1 .60 sees

1.3G sees

DPLog

40.66 sees

1.2s sees

SPLog 10

2.51 sees

1.51 sees

DPLoglO

42.37 sees

1.38 sees

SPPovif

2.03 sees

2,62 sees

DPPow

74.45 sees

2.64 sees

SPSin

2.13 sees

1.59 sees

DPSin

38.21 sees

1.28 sees

SPSineOS

2.47 sees

1.S7 sees

DPSineos

40.74 sees

1 .60 sees

SPSInh

36.49 sees

O.SS sees

DPSin h

42.26 sees

0.79 sees

SPSqrt

1.19 sees

0.5s sees

DPSqrt

0.52 sees

SPTan

3.21 sees

1.94 sees

DPTan

34.2 a sees

t ,44 sees

SPTanh

5.55 sees

1.82 sees

DPTanh

43.42 sees

0.77 sees

Total time

53.05 sees

22.8S sec

s Total lime

592.82 sees

19.16 sees

70 AWKSA SHOPPER PD

May 1996

Issue 62

David Taylor

Domain Choice

ShopperPubiic Domain

internet Choice

Aminet has been offline for most o( this month am
is only (ust bacli up, so I'm just floing to deal wi**^^
one program hete. A& luck would have it,
subscribers can find Chaos Pro on their

Subscribers disk this month. If you're not '

subscriber, the details for downloading a
found in the box on page GB.

Chaos Pro

jt/bflQjg There is sirll something very alluring ',
^^^™ about fractals, and although Iheie are
quite a tew fractal generators on the
Amiga, none have offered the level of
competence of Chaos Pro. Iliis iaootB
new package, bul we haven't (" ' '

before because it had a fov» pi
This new version is now much faster; al'

just how complex Ihe calculations required are. It.

libraries that I discussed in the review of the R
Writer disk this month, Ihe whole program still
seemed to run faster after t had run Ihe external
preferences program and ajlqtyed It lo generate

files. Odd, but who's ^ " -.-.— ....

mad, bul I'd recomm

think that yo

and there ate so (nsny options that you

bul gel invotrad.

Verdict: 95%

No 3|> picture

Pr^'n^ti'-

Bidth H44

Hei9ht fiir

List Q\

Black.hDle

A
V

Deep Space
Firestar
Float 1119
Flouep

|Black_hote |

Delete Picture

Calculate Picture

fiuplicate Picture

tlose Hindous

of your floppy disks. A number of enhancements
have been made, including a cleaner inlerfsce
and a couple of additions that I had [polish rny
halo] suggested. The program now scans below
root level into directories and has support lor an
enternal drive. It can also ignore the system
directories so Ihat your database doesn't
become cluttered with things such as multiple
scans ol C directories.

The program can also automatically scan
and add the contents ol Lha and Lzn archives.
The former worked fine, but I had problems with
Ltx (I suspect that is down to our special,
licensed version of Lzx). I still gel the slight
problem with the program trying lo rescan disks
slraighl after scanning it; although this is easy to
cancel, it's a bug Ihat needs rectifying.

Still, I think that this is my favourite
cataloguer and if the bug gets sorted then it
would happily notch up a lew more percentage
points. Anyone who looks at the program will
see CanDo in the credits, so il you are looking
for the level of competence that this month's
Coverdisk can attain, here's a pointer.

Verdict: 90%

star buy

Issue 62

X-Password 6

II is with a heavy hear! Ihal I'm writing this
review. With PD, you often find Ihal there are
parts that can be improved, but that there is
something good al Ihe heart of the program. But
X-Password has nothing lo recommend il. The
author has produced a lot of other utilities, some
ot which show promise, but quantity does not
equate to quality, II is better lo produce one
polished program than 10 useless ones.

In the hope that it will be useful, I will lisl Ihe
flaws ol X-Passwotd. It does not work as it
should for a slart; icon tools are set incorrectly.
When you do gel into Ihe interface, ihe lejl has
been displayed with a bad choice ol colours
that makes il hard to read. The password
chosen must be eight letters. You and up
installing the X-Password program manually and
in such a smalt utility, its 40K size is
unacceptable. The real problem though is Ihal
circumventing the password is too easy. Either
remove the X-Password line Injm Ihe StartUp-
Sequence or read the data file stored in S;,
which tells you Ihe username and password.

"fbu need adequate knowledge ol the Amiga
to install Ihe program and yet anybody, certainly

May 1996

a child, can remove it. In comparison to the
sophisticaled Enigma II system, reviewed in
AS60 and included on the Coverdisks of AS61 ,
which actually makes a disk or partition non-
DOS until a password is entered, X-Password

PD submissions

If you have some exciting PD disKs that you
would like to be considered for review in
Domain Choice, send them in to Amiga
Shopper, Future Publishing, 30 Monmouth
Street, Bath BA! 2BW, clearly marked as a
PD submission. We welcome any type ol
disk, except games.

If you are a PD house, make sure you
include all the information necessary, such
as how to contact you, how much the disks
cost and how people can pay. ft you are the
author of Ihe program, slate where people
can get your program from, and whether
you would like us to consider it lor inclusion
on a future ShopperChoice Coverdisk.

Information about new PD houses
or PD authors Is accepted for Inclusion in
the PD directory (see box on page 73 lor
further details).

Amiga SHOPPER PD 71

ShopperPublic Domain

Domain Choice

David Taylor

lAnigaOS 3.0 AGA 1, 202, 5fcti (b/z> Chip 11, SH7, 249 (73k) Fast vmjmjs^

SlQ

Virtual nenory free!
Public Fast Men free:
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Nunber of pages read:
Nunber of pages uritten!
Nunber of page franes:
Pages used on deuice:

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Virtual memory is incredible, it slightly
unslable. Still, look at all the images opened
In Phologenicx on an A1200,

i:(IIISTH.2J.Bn : TSSi^B t1.9tbl

736KZ83 (813Kb>

BIB

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' Drao an Icon over herp to Hake rt the current Iiast

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looks very silly indeed. Why is a program so
lacking in its sixth version? Earlier versions, and
possibly this one too, should never have been
released and without a complete change there
is no reason for V.7, because it is so outclassed
by others. Abandon this and concentrate on one
powerful program.

Veidlct: 20%

ViHIVia^

Virtual memory. It's like memory for
free really, ian'l it? You've only got a
4Mb SIMM on your A1 200
accelerator, but you want to be able
to use 1 2Mb of RAM, VMM is the
answer. You need MUl. a hard drive, an 030
processor and a maths co-processor, but then
you are away. The most amazing thing is it
actually works. Well, most of the time.

Virtual memory works by using a handler
that makes the Amiga believe that a section ol
the hard dnve or a file on a hard drive is actually
an eitension ot RAM. Of course, when a
program uses virtual memory, il works a lot
slower than real RAM because it has to access
your hard drive.

This sort of memory cannot be a
replacement for as much proper RAM as you
can afford, but it is an amazing supplement that
enables you to work on projects larger than you

72 AWRMSHDFPER PD

would normally be able to from time to time. So,
for 3D renderings and graphics, it's essential.

The last version refused to work with an
060 processor (not that there are that many
people with one yet), which caused me some
grief. However, one of the improvements with
this version was supposed to be 060 support.
After four hours of trying every permutation and
sitting through a lovely B500 0835 gunj every
five minutes, I was beginning to think that
perhaps it didn't work with OBOs after all. In a
final attempt, I decided to adjust the partition it
uses for the virtual memory and suddenly it
worked. It crashed again when I overloaded it,
but apart from thai seemed to work fine.

Oh, a clay head, how convincing! Please stop
sending in Roswell slideshoii/s.

May 1996

There are one or two bug fixes from the
last version, but several important fines since
version 3, so do upgrade if you haven't had this
program for a while, If you use and keep VMM,
don't forget the Shareware fee, which is only
$20(appro». £15), Pretty cheap for 10Mb of
memory. Or 50Mb. Or 100Mb, Or 500Mb!

Verdict: 95%

star buy

Roswell Crash
Slides 2

Oh, the aliens are coming lo get mel Oh, stop
them! The aliens are coming to get me! I'm
scared... Blah, blah, blah. Stop it! Please, stop iti
I can't stand another slideshow of the Roswell
incident, I'm beginning to believe that this is a
secret US Government plot lo bore us all so
much with tedious photographs that we simply
don't care if aliens are annually holidaying in
the Algarve weanng G-string bikinis, never
mind just visiting Earth.

What adds insult to injury with this
slideshow {apart from the fact that the
pictures have mostly been seen elsewhere),
is that the whole thing runs from a simple and
slow GIF viewer that runs from a Shell script,
and that they have tried to disguise this fact
and make it look like there's more to it than
there actually is. This is a poor quality slideshow
that could have had everyWiing fitted on to one

Issue 62

David Taylor

Domain Choice

ShopperPublic Domain

USt in use

^i-^^\!\

^ .rw-.f -^ ^, ijr*-^ rr^, 1 "Vf "^^

ChpckHtn , re^nt

!■;;■!!

LaMudiPad gl?^ b^ -utjlj MTrHagtcfWE i.T

Dl tKirldwncli

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TrtHKhc jtt'

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UW ^^ *E ^lU FttJG ] B» _

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disk by using a differeni file format and which
shouldn't have been dumped on us in the
first place.

Verdict: 20%

Ultimate Klemory Tools

Ah, the idea of Essentials disks and Ultimate
compilations. Wish I'd thought of that. Anyway,
this disli purports to contain all the memory-
related utilities that you might want. The snag
being that, while it has a couple of good
programs on there, 11 falls a long way short of
containing all the programs.

HDEnv is a useful way of gaining some
memory back by having your Env: directory
based on your hard drive and it can save
hundreds of Mbs of RAM if, like me, you have
masses of software installed. There are also
ones for scanning memory for errors and for
mapping out the errors, and ones for letting you
actually look at memory or access it directly.
There are then masses of memory meters, but

The PD directory

You will notice
references to the
PD Directory In the
"Who, what, when,
wliere etc" boioul
on page ES. Tills
directory used to be
printed within the
magazine, but liad to
be in very smaFI text because of the amount
of information it contained. To solve this,
we have updated and recompiled ttie list
and put it on our Coverdisks as a text file In
tiie InformationZone.

The InformationZone contains both the
PD Directory and the list of User Groups
(wtiicti also used to be in the issue}. Tliey
are both in two formats, AmigaGulde and
ASCII. The Am [gaGuide enables you to point
and click your way to the information,
making It mucli easier to find the details you
require. Read the ReadMe file for more
Information. See page 10 for details.

Issue 62

1199. 6K Chip 1SM.3|B|t&

Fast
'Chip

:e}

Real Tine Hen

Fast Ifenorr :ZZ9Z7SZ
Chip Hefwry : 1228368
Total Nanory :376S384

imia

Thursday B7-Mar-96 17:29:81

5Bk i 1.I7B H

Mk igg; I 1 .942 H

TVre m&maiy utitities are not awe-
inspiring and repetitive, but Flummy
offers more useful programs.

that's one of the problems. Why so many? One
or two of the best would have been enough to
give people a choice. In addition, there are some
utterly useless programs, like the one that just
sucks memory. In the words of Wayne the Wise.
"It certainly does suck,"

What is most annoying though, is that this
wasted space could have been used
constructively. Where is FastECS, the program
that remaps the exec.library in RAM? What
about LowFrag, the program that improves
memory management? The aforementioned
VMM could also have been fitted on as an
archive and an Installer script written. Or
WBExtender which can show more information
about what is held in RAM in your WB title bar
and flush unused libraries from RAM,

There are some good programs on here, but
too many of them are old and pointless. The
good ones have been included on AS
Coverdisks in the past, so regular readers
wouldn't benefit from this disk at all. Come on,
put some effort in. It would be easy to produce
a genuinely comprehensive selection of useful
memory tools that could help users. Follow the
instructions above!

Verdict: 60%

Hummy Utils 5

Unlike the other disks in this series, this one only
has two programs on it. The first is a very large
package called, ironically, TinyMeler. It's a
memory meter which has masses of options and
looks pretty neat. The second is a new interface
for the Disk Masher System called MagicDMS.
This interface looks prelty good. It's large and
clear and has lots of options, including the
ability to de-archive to RAD.

This is supposed to be a beta release,
which detracts from the disk's attraction, but
anyone looking for a memory gauge may be
better going for this disk rather than the
memory utilities one because at least you get
another useful program. ■

Verdict: 75o/o

May 1996

Details of individual
PD Houses can now
be found in our new
Purely PD advertising
section on page 77.
Amiga Shopper's
1000/0 PD page tias
been included by
popular demand so
that you can find the
details you need as
quickly as possible.

AmoASHo rrcR RD 73

Nobody Undersells US!!!!!

WE WANT YOUR BUSINESS!!

WE WILL MATCH OR BEAT ANY GENUINE

QUOTED PRICES.

A1200 RAM CARD WITH
CLOCK & FPU SOCKET

0MB
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STAR

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£45
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£199

SIMMS FOR A4000, VIPER,

APOLLO & MANY OTHER

CARDS

72PIN SIMMS

iMts £29

2MB BEST £49

4MB £55

BMB BUY £119

16MB £249

32MB POA

30PIN SIMMS

1MB £20

!'^^ £89

64PIN SIMMS

4MB £159

ACCELERATORS FOR
A600,A1200&A4000

A600 £109

A120Q

VIPER 28MHz £119

VIPER 50MHz £199

APOLLO 28MHz £109

APOLLO 50MHz £199

APOLLO 040 30MHz £399

APOLLO 040 40MHz £499

A- . .

Blizzard 2060 £699

FPU
MATHS-CO PRO

28MHz £24

£33
50MHz £89

WORKS WITH RAM CARD
AND ACCELERATORS

2.5" HARD DRIVES
FORA600,A1200&SX1

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30MB

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COMPLETE WITH
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290 MICE
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MONITORS
FOR ALL AMIGA

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SAMSUNG 17" £529

WITH SAMSUNG FREE
SOFTWARE ALLOWS YOU
TO PLAY GAMES

SYQUEST DRIVES

EZ1 35 DRIVE £199

EZ1 35 CARTS £13

CD-ROMS

FOR A800&A1200 {

25PEED CD-ROM

£155

4SPEED CD-ROM

£245

RENO

£159

EXTERNAL SCSI CD-ROM

WITH FREE SQUIRREL

CD-ROMS

FOR A4000 & A2000

IDE CD-ROM & TANDEM

2SPEED

£89

4SPEED

£109

SCSI CD-ROM & OKTAGON

2SPEED

£199

4SPEED

£299

EXTERNAL SCSI HARD
DRIVES

540MB £199

1GIG £299

2GIG £550

WITH SQUIRREL FOR
A600&A1200ADD £39
WITH OKTAGON FOR
A4000 & A2000 ADD £79

FLOPPY
FOR ALL AMIGA

1MB EXTERNAL £39

1.76 EXTERNAL £79

A500 INT £33

A600 INT £33

A1 200 INT £33

RAM FOR A500,
A500 PLUS & A600

1MB FORA500+ £18.95

1WE ?=0R AeOC V.&.OG

1/2I\/IBFORA5D0 £14.00

GASTEINER

^G WAY, NORTH CIRCULAR ROAD,
--yiONTON N18 2YZ

ALL PRICES WCLUOevftT. SMALL CONSUMABLES AND SOFTWARE
rTEMS UNDER THE VALUE OF E59 PLEASE ADD £3 50 PaP OTHER
ITEMS EXCEPT LASERS, NEXT DAY COURIER SERVICE E10 PER
BOX. OFFSHORE AND HIGHL-^NDS, PLEASE CALL FOR A
QUOTATION IN ADDITION WE OFFER THE FOLLOWING EXPRESS
SERVICES: SATURDAY DELIVERY NORMAL BATE PLUS E15 PER
BOX MORNING, NEXT DAY NORMAL RATE PLUS £10 PER BOX,
E8.0E PRICES ARE SUBJECTTO CHANGE WITHOUT PRIOR NOTICE.
ALL TRADEMARKS ACKNOWLEDGED.

David Taylor

Domain Choice

ShopperPublic Domain

Licenceware Choice

Far some reason Sue thought Ihal me making a
coftee tor her was more important than writing
this section, just because i haven't made one
yet this month. Rest assured, I didn't foid
immediateiy and continued to grumble for
hours aCtenvards and also made sure that It
wasn't a very good cup anyway. The one good
thing to come out of the whole episode was an
ideal way lo introduce the selection of superb
Licenceware titles that we've got tor review this
month, and you've just read It,

OctaMED Technique

Last month, we looked at the modules designed
tor games programmers from the author of this
techniques package. Technique comes as an A4
booklet with accompanying examples disk. The
booklet covers creating reverb, echo and
chorus, using loops and breaks, time stretching,
digitising lips and some miscellaneous topics.
This package is like an addendum to the
OctaMED manual.

While I'm sure that the techniques will be
of use to budding musicians, I'm not sure that
the teit and disk offers enough coverage. What
there Is is good, but the examples disk is
sparse and the manual thin. The price of £5 is a
little steep, but I'm sure that some people will
find it worthwhile.

Verdict: 70%

AGASSiVi 7.22

A sildeshow creator. Wow. OK,
another one of my biased views
bites the dust. This is a great little
program. It reminds me of the
excellent Nucleus, In that It
combines power with a really easy
to use interface. Essentially, it comes with a
creator and a player. You create the project and
then distribute it with the player. As standard,
the player can deal with IFF pictures and
animations and a couple of module types.
Doesn't sound too advanced? Well, it also has
ARexK support so that should you want to use
something that it can't deal with, all you have to
do is use a program that does support the
format and use ARexi to communicate between
the two programs.

It that sounds daunting, then don't worry.
because you can still produce some excellent
pieces without ARexx. Within the Interface is
the ability to dioose the files and select how
they will be shown, whether faded in or shown
using a set of special effects (a little like
M.M. Experience). The program automatically

FUN

ORAL

Another excellent paint
package forkids of all
ages appears and our
editor becomes
"otherwise engaged."

recognises the file type, so it knows whether to
play a module or show a picture. In fact, if you
were starting out, you need know little more
than how to select a file with a requester. II
even supports powerpacked files to save disk
space. At the moment, the system requires
WB2.1 or above, but the author is trying to fix
the system to work on lower machines.

SO Licenceware are showing that some
quality software can be released for a price that
anybody can afford.

Verdict: 95% star buy

Tell the Time

This educational program is a bit of a mixed
bag. On the one hand, there are some
genuinely useful games that will help children
to work out the time. Although some of the

Tell The Time sufers in the looks department,
bill is aimed at the younger audience.

graphics are poor, I would have thought that
the age range that are learning the time
probably won't worry about them, they'll just
like being allowed to play on the computer.

However, some areas of Tell The Time are
simply games like Breakout, which has some
time- related questions tagged on the end; other
areas have been badly thought out. One shoot-
out type game has a whole screen of text
explaining it all before the game. Because the
game consists of adding up times and picking
the answer from a set of three. I would have
thought that any child who can read all of that
can also work out that they only need add up
the final digits and match that with the one that
ends with the right number. Still, there is
certainly some good stuff in this program.

Verdict: 75%

Paint, Paste And Draw

I have been relegated to writing
about this program, because
everyone else has kicked me
off my computer to play with it
Huh. Paint, Paste And Draw Is very
similar to Magic Paint Box, the last
Licenceware paint package to bring the AS
offices to a halt.

Like MPB, this is aimed at children, but it
takes a different slant. You are provided with a
set of black and white line drawings that you
can fill in with colours, which is fun in itself.
Then, you can select a set from cllpart that
relates to the picture - there are several
different backgrounds with themes like
farmyard, outer space and seaside. When you
select a piece of cllpart It magically pings on lo
the screen and you can then colour it in.

There's also a small freehand drawing
section for you to design your own
backgrounds, or to use to add the final touches
to a piece. The whole program is tied together
with fun samples and basically what I'm saying
is that kids and immature adults (which means
most of us) will love this program.

Dirt cheap and in the words of the editor
"Fab"! More backgrounds is all we ask. ■

Verdict: 96%

star buy

Issue 62

May 1996

AnaASHOPRER PD 75

hopper's 10

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Thousands of disks sualhb!^ from only SOd each.

Muiliiis ouer one inousand Fred Bsh and

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Amiga Shopper 77

Shop per Views

Letters

Sue Grant

This month In Talking Shop: changes
at AS; C64 emulator; the Amiga
overseas; the backlash begins; and
our DTP compo prize winner!

The main reason
why the Amiga has
carried on despite,
rather than
because of its
owners is the loyalty and
downright devotion of the
people who use the machine.
And here is where you have
your say - in our letters pages.

What's going
on?

I am writing this letter
wanting lo know
whal is going on, i
have been buying AS
since it first split from
Amiga Formal way back in May
1991, Up to last year I had not
one complaint to mal<e about this
sacred mag. But that was a year
ago, things change - the weather
plays up a little more and things
get deater and slimmer. Now the
weather I know you can't
influence, but the length of your
mag is getting a bit of a joke isn't
it? Future publish a lot of
magazines and I think that price
par page AS is one of the most
expensive. Could you plaase
explain to me why items such as

AT contacts

If you want to contact Amiga
Technologies, write to the
following addresses:

John Smith,

Amiga Teclinologies GmbH
(UK), Hunting Business
Aviation Buildings, Ist Avenue,
Stansted, Essex CM24 IQa
f 01273 680617.

Petto lyschtschenko,
Amiga Teclinologies GmbH,
Berliner Ring S9, D-64G25
Bensheim, Germany.
Fax: 0049 6252 709 520
E-mail: gbo@lisa.amiga-tech.de

PC mags are full of reviews and
end up costing less than AS.

Are we the Amiga community
having to fork out extra so that the
others don't go up? Needless to
say that 1 am a bit unhappy with
the situation and I would
appreciate your views on this
matter. Apart from the high price
and the slimness of the magazine,
it is still quite a good read. Thank
you for listening.

Stuart Hall
London, E-mail

It's a hard fact of lite in the

publishing world that

advertising pays lor

the production costs

of magazines.

Copy sates help,

of course, but it

is mainly

down to

how many

adverts a

magazine

features euery

issue that

determines its

success.

And. a you think
about It, the reason why PC
magazines have pages and pages
of reL-iews and ads is because the
PC market is huge and expanding
further every day.

Amigas have only recently
returned to the shelves of High
Street stores - after a lengthy
absence. II will take a while for
people to realise that they are
back. However, there is plenty ol
new hardware and software still
being produced for the Amiga -
jus! loal( at all the reviews we
hai/e in this issue.

And read our World 01 Amiga
show guide on page 24; there will
be loads more new hardware,
software and upgrades launched
at the show - the Amiga 1200+
amongst them. Probably.

More support

I want to congratulate your work
with Amiga Shopper, this mag is
GREAT!, and your WWW home
page is better that the expensive
Amiga Format, with more support
for us overseas customers, loo.

Recently I saw an advert of a
software house (Software 2000),
who sell an interesting C64
package for the Amiga; and they
claim that you reviewed it and
scored It 88 per cent. I really
want to buy this package, but
first I want to ask you, What kind
of games it has? I saw

screen shots from
Spy vs Spy and Hole
In One. Can you
tell me some
more titles?
Rene Soria
Mexico
E-mail

Thanks for
your kind
words Renei
The C64 program
you are referring
to is called
C64v3.0 and it
is an emulation
package from
Software 2000. We reviewed the
package in the PD section of our
October 1995 issue.

This Ce4v3.0 si/'disk set
contains the latest release ol A64
and 100 C64 games, including
Boulderdash, Nemesis, Stellar 7,
Monty Mole, Falcon Patrol 2 and
Hunchback 2. You are right in
saying that we gave it 88 per
cent. Hope that helpsi

You may also be interested to
know that we have included
Magic 64, which is another C64
emulator, on the Coverdisks of
our April 1996 issue.

If you can't gel hold of the
latest issue ol Amiga Shopper or
you want a back issue, call our

AS on

FutureNet:

look at

page 64,

special Order Hotline on
■B 01225 322511.

Thanks, AS

Thank you for including my math
program Funky 5.2 on your
Subscribers disk in the March
issue of Amiga Shopper,

I never thought that any
computer magazine could be that
fast in publishing new software
from the Amine!,

It is a very nice gesture to
send me a free copy of your
magazine as well. Thanks,

Peter Gath
E-mail

You're welcome! Please keep
sending your programs in to
David Taylor

I'd just like to
say...

I'd just like to say keep up the
good work on the magazine; and
I'd just like to say that it is an
excellent idea to have the 1 3
issues per year (as opposed to
what AP said),

Simon Richards,

A loyal reader since Issue 1

E-mail

Many of you may not realise that
we published 13 issues of Amiga
Shopper last year; and we intend
to produce another 13 this year.
Most of the other Future
Publishing magazines will be
doing the same.

Do you think this is a good
idea? Would you buy 13 issues of
your favourite Amiga magazine
loo? Write in and let us know.

Serious power

I read Amiga Shopper very often
since it is the only serious Amiga
magazine for power users. It is a

78 AimoASHOPPEn

May 1996

Issue 62

Sue Grant

Letters

ShopperViews

pity that two or Ihree Greek
magazines are interested in Amiga
but only for its gaming abilities and
only one (PIXEL), has pages for
serious users. The other mags
ignore the existence of the best
computer ever made, although it
has a strong professional
presence in ttis local and national
TV stations; ANT1 and MEGA -
the two most popular private
Greek TV stations - use A4000s.

MEGA used Scala MM300 for
the live presentation of the last
national elections; while an ARexx
script was taking data from the
national network without any
human interference, an Apple sign
was in the bottom of the screeni

The low budget TV stations
have remained in the age of ECS
chipset, 68000 CPU and Scala
500. This is because there is no
advertising, no technical back-up,
hardly any people who know Amiga
in depth and no reliable sen/ice
from the official representative. I
had to wait three months for my
A40C0/030 to be repaired, despite
tfie fact I needed it to produce
graphics for local TV stations.

In September 1 995, Blue Sky
TV spent £3,000 on a 90MHz,
16Mb RAM, Stealth VGA card, 4i
CD-ROM drive, 2Gb HD, Pentium
etc., believing that it can give
1 5KHz PAL video signal from its
video card through a TBC
corrector! The result was
disastrous because they didn't
know that a special and expensive
PC video card was needed. But it
is a shame that Amiga lost a buyer
due to inadequate inlormafion - an
A4000/060. 18Mb RAM for
£3,000 would do the job a million
times better, cheaper and easier.

Amiga Technologies must give
the Amiga international support
and show the power of this
computer, A price reduction for the
A4000 would help because
professional users depend very

How to contact us

Write in lo Talking
Shop, Amiga
Shopper's letters
pages, and you
could win yoursell
some cash. Tlie Star
letter published every month
receives £25.

So, put pen to paper and
send your letters in to:
Talking Shop,
Amiga Shopper,

Future Publishing,

30 Monmouth St,
Bath, Avon BA1 2SW.

Alternatively, you can E-mail your

letters to:

amshopper@cix.compullnkj:o.Uk

sgrant@futurenet.co.uk

All the letters received at these
addresses will be considered
lor publication, unless you
specifically advise us otherwise.

much on CPU performance and
PCs are ahead on this point.

Can overseas readers enter
AS competitions?

I think that a column with
international, Amiga-related
activities and news all over the
world is missing from AS. Don't
forget that after the closing of
Amiga World, AS is the only
choice for power users worldwide.
Theodoropoulos Kostas
Athens, Greece

Oi/erseas readers are welcome to
enlei our competitions - we wilt
lengthen the closing dates as you
suggest, so you have plenty oi
time to gel your entries to us.

Your suggestion lor an
oyerseas column is a good Idea;
however, we are a UK magazine.
Amiga Shopper is just not big
enougli to cover all the news from
all the different countries we sell
copies of the magazine In; which
include the US, Australia, Mexico.
Ireland, the Netherlands. Belgium,
Malaysia. Switzerland... Do you
see our dilemma?!

The backlash

And so it starts; the somewhat
unfortunate bui perhaps wholly
predictable backlash against
Amiga Technologies, I suppose we
were all led such a merry dance
during the dreadful Commodore

DTP poster competition results

tp,'>i,i^'""vi'";«

We ran a competition In our DTP
tutorial in issue 59 to design a poster.
The prize for the best poster was a
DTP program of your choice. We
received lots of entries, tiut there
were two thai we liked the most.

The poster on tiie left is Irom
John Ward of Derby and the other is
from Anne Weyens from Belgium.
We thought both were good enough
to show you, but we can only have
one winner, who is John Ward. 141s
poster is stylisti, atmosphenc and
does its job very well. Please write
in and tell us which of ttie (our DTP
programs we offered you want as
your prize, John!

years that we cannot control our
inbuilt and painful cynicism about
the gurus (no pun intended] who
are now responsible for the
welfare of our chosen machine.

It is all too easy to hunch over
our computer and complain bitterly
about the mistreatment being dealt
out by AT, but could I just beg
everyone to stand back, take a
deep breath and for god's sake
chill outi it ain't that bad.

People were disconlenl that
the Amiga had not been on sale
for over a year; there was concern
that the new buyer would just
pinch the technology
and be damned with
the home computer
market; an upgrade
was needed urgently;
dirt cheap prices
were required; the
future path of the
technology was in
some doubt.

I think it's fair to say that
Commodore were at fault over the
sale of the company. Typically, they
were unable to organise their own
funeral effectively because they
were too busy frying to screw the
biggest buck out of some sucker.

There's no doubt that the UK
management buy-out was the
most favourable option from a
user's perspective - better the
devil you know - so when Escom
pipped it at the last moment the

^__ ..

trepidation was palpable. And
yet, Escom/Amiga Technologies
have shown a remarkable
commitment to the technology.

Let us put ourselves in AT's
shoes. Having just spent $10
million on a product everyone
thought was dead, what were they
to do? AT owned the Amiga, but
at the time it comprised a few bits
and bobs of hardware scattered
around the globe with no guarantee
that AT could get their hands on it
So, with a logical eye on the
Christmas market, AT resolved to
put Amigas back in the shops in
time for the Yuletide celebrations.
They were in effect starting from
scratch, and lo and behold they
did it. Even then, grumblings were
afoot about pricing, but given that
production was ramped up so fast
I think we should count our
blessings, particularly as the blow
was softened by an excellent
software bundle,

if the term cock-up can be
levelled at AT so far, there are only
two areas that spring to mind;
incompatible floppy disk drives

AMIGA

?«^

I'Mctmol

■ OjJ»[irv

and Scala MM300. The first is
forgivable as incompatibility arises
only with certain games and AT
have made moves to sort out
problem machines - the onus is
now on AT to ensure that the fixes
are made quickly and efficiently.

The second is a bit more
thorny. There is no doubt that
Scala MM300 is a magnificent
piece of software and the option
to bundle it couldn't be ignored,
but AT really should have foreseen
the lack of memory problem with a
stardard A1 300 and made it clear
from the outset that the program
won't run in 2Mb of memory. This
is most definitely a customer
service cock up worthy of
Commodore, but even so I don't
believe it is insurmountable.

Readers may remember that
Scala HVT10D (the bottom of the
range version for the uninitiated)
was given away on a Coverdisk
soma time ago. I have used it on
my A1 300 ever since as it is one
of the most intuitive and user-
friendly programs I have ever seen.
OK, so it doesn't exactly stretch
the AGA chipset - in fact, it
doesn't use it at all - but it does
emphasise that the Amiga is the

Issue 62

May 1996

AHKU SHOPPER 79

You may have read a few details

about Amiga Technologies new

machine, but what does the new

Amiga look like? What does it

mean for the future of the

market? The next issue of Amiga

Format contains exclusive

pictures and comment.

On Sale
Thursday,
11th April

PLUS Lightwave 4 has finally arrived - but
does the most famous Amiga application still
have what it takes?

Sue Grant

Letters

ShopperViews

most friendly tool for tfiis kind of
work, Mosl people who see my
home videos gasp in wonder at
the professionalism of the titling,
even though I only choose from
four fonts and work in a maximum
of 32 colours.

If, therefore, Scala HVT and
MM300 were both bundled with
Al 200s, then users could get an
immediate glimpse of the
capabilities of the machine.

Maybe I'm just being naive, or
maybe I've just owned my machine
too long, but I believe that the
Amiga has a strong future, both as
a games machine (which is still
where Ihe main user base is], and
as a home productivity tool that is
second to none for ease of use
and tlenibility. Just wait for the
Power Amiga, it's gonna be a killerl
Jamie Winter
Waterlooville, Hampshire

Your views on Escom and Amiga
Technologies' treatment of the
Amiga are certainly worthy, 11 not
entirely justified.

Amiga Technologies intended
to sell 60,000 Amigas in the UK
aione around Cl^ristmas 1995 -
but, because ol various set-backs
(including Ihe fact that SDL, the
distributors of ttie Amiga, applied
for an Administration Order and
were then lal<en over), they only
sold 5.000 new Al 200s in the
UK. You may be interested in Ihe
interview with AT's Gilles Bourdin
that we ran last month.

Also, because of "economic
reasons", Amiga Technologies
GmbH UK moved to the Escom
HO in Slansted and shed most of
their UK staff.

Amigas are certainly back in
the shops, but they are also in
Escom shops where, it is reported
by many people wanting to buy
them, they appear to be overlooked
by the staff in favour of the PCs.

However, on the bright side,
the World Of Amiga Show is
going ahead as planned, which
should help sales of the machine.
And there will be plenty of new
hardware and software on display
there, which will make people
realise that AT and Escom are
backing our favourite machine.
See out show guide on page 24
for more info.

Coding clues

I've followed many of your tutorials
on C and Assembly language.
However, they did not actually
teach people to program. They
only guided the user through Ihe
specific features of the language.

Whilst this may be necessary
to teach the way a language
handles the basics of programming,
it results in the amateur thinking he
can code an application without
any design or forethought. This
results in poorly written, bug-
ridden programs with no hope of
ever being updated successfully.

This applies to your recant
AMOS tutorials in which the user
is supplied with useful routines to
use in his or her own programs.
This IS useful but can hardly be
called a tutorial and does not
teach the user to program
correctly. However, it has to be
said AMOS does encourage
disastrous programming
practices. How this language

claims to be of "professional"
status is anyone's guess.

Any modern, high-level
language which only allows one
parameter to be passed back from
a procedure, therefore encouraging
the use of global variables, and
has no support for dynamic data
structures without resorting to low-
level coding, is surely a poor man's
version of BASIC with some clever
hardware tricks.

I suggest a generic tutorial
based around successful software
engineenng; programming is
basically problem solving and
requires an overall problem to be
broken down into individual

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stages. Toby Simpson touched on
such a subject in his C tutorials.
The emphasis should be on design
of a program not Ihe coding of
one in a particular language.
Since, if the design is correct, the
risk of errors is reduced.

How particular languages
support data structures, modular
programming and syntax ol the
basic building blocks of coding
should also be covered. This will
allow the user to make an
educated decision as to which
language to code in.

Graeme Blenkinsopp
Bishop Auckland, Co. Durham

We ran our AMOS tutorial as a
response to readers requesting it.
It is fery difficult
to include every
element of
programming in
a six-part
tutorial.
However, we
will bear your
comments in
mind for future tutorials. Readers '
commants are always welcome!

A waste of
money?

I read in Amiga Format that there
is an incompatibility problem
between some software and the
floppy drive in Ihe new Al 200s. A
hardware feature, the DSKRDY
line, is not supported by the
mechanism used in the machines.
It seems that games, Citadel and
Zeewolf 3, were only saved from
incompatibility at the last minute
due to quick action by AF,
Does this mean that my

collection will be lost to me if I

purchase a new A1200?

R. Hemmingway
Tooting, London

If you read our interview with
Gilles Bourdin of Amiga
Technologies in our last issue, you
will know thai they hai/e arranged
lor a "little hardware fix that can
be easily installed by the Amiga
dealer upon request".

In praise of Dave

I have jusi
finished
reading the
Shell feature
in AS59,
What an
excellent
piecel I used
to think I knew a fair bit about the
Shell but reading this article has
dumped me firmly back in novice
class. It is much more powerful
than I imagined. And Mr Taylor's
article was eminently readable and
therefore far more valuable than
some incomprehensible and
weighty tome,

Coverdisks, feature articles,
Amiga Answers; is there no end to
this man? Promise him anything,
but don't let him get away. Chain
him to his desk if necessary - I'm
sure AS readers will send him food
parcels (does he like Vegemite?].
Graeme Goodes
Australia

No, he doesn't like Vegemite, but
he loves digestive biscuits. And
shortcake. And anything with
chocolate in it. Oh, and beer and
burgers, of course. ■

1st Computer Centre ..........Oil

Amiga Format 01225 442244 80

Analogic 0181 546 9575 44

Dart Computer Services 0116 247 0059 77

Escom 18

Futurenet 01225 442244 64

Gasteiner 0181345 6000 ....74

Golden Image 0181900 9291... 77

GTI Grenville Trading Int Gmb 0049 2017 88778 66

Hi Q Ltd 01525 211327 38

Marpet Development 01423 712600 83

Micronik Computers 0049 2171 72450 34

Owl Associates 01543 250377 66

Quantum Leap Software 01506 461917 2

Siren Software 0161 796 5279 4+5

Wizard Developments 01322 527800 ...13

Issue 62 I

May 1996

AWGASHOPPER 81

The essential magazine for Amiga enthusiasts

Next month 4Ejr

Video

The Amiga is the
cheapest way to
get started in
video. We will
be looking at all
the equipment
used for
anything from
amateur video
through to
professional level.
Everything from
using just a plain
Amiga to setting up a
video suite. All you
need to know.

MA6*BI

Name.,.

Addiess,-

Phoneno -.

Tb the DFWsagtnl: Amiga Shopper la published by
Fulure Publishinii IT aiZZ5 442244.

AnmsA

Reserve your copy today

Remember that the easiest wny lo ensure thai
you get hold of the Jime 1996 issue of Amiga
Shopper is to reserve yourself a copy at your
local newsagejll. Fill in and cut out this form,
or photocopy il, and give it to your newsagent

Dear Newsagent,

Please reserve/deliver a copy of Amiga Shopper
magBJine each morlh.

..*

Wordworth 5

We loved version 5. Next month,

we'll not only be looking at 5SE,

but we'll also have an exclusive Test

Drive version on our Coverdisks, It

will be packed with as many

features as can be crammed on

and will enable

you to load,

create and

save your

documents.

Of course, the

disks will be

packed with

lots more

stuff too.

Animation

Both 2D and 3D animation come
under the AS microscope. What
features do the packages offer and
how can you make the most of
your software? We'll help you
unleash your hidden artistic talent.

Why not take advantage of our special six-month subscription
deal? Telephone the order hotline on ^ 01 225 82251 1 .

June issue 63. On sale Tuesday, 30th April 1996

No 57 & 58, Top Floor

Glasshouses Mill

Nr Pateley Bridge

Harrogate

North Yorkshire

HG3 5QH

Marpet

Tel: +44 (0) 1423 712600 Fax: +44 (0) 1423 712601

Lcadinjj matiufkcturers of RAM expansions to all major disTrihitoTS and dealers, are offeriyig a
SPRING SALE!! of all their products, SLASHING tip to 20% off recommended retail prices.

Why not purchase your requirements direct from the manufacturer?

We guarantee despatch within three days Don't hang around. ORDER NOW!!

RRP Our price

A500 Expansion to 1Mb £19.99 ...£16.99

Also available witli clock £24.99 ...£20.99

A500 Pius

Expansion

to 2Mb

RRP £29.99

Our price £21.99

RRF Our price

A600 Expansion to 2Mb ...£29.99 ...£24.99
Aiso availabie with ciocli £39.99 ...£32.99

A1200 Ram Accelerator

prices
include

VAT

and

RRP Our Brtcc

External Drive £59.99 ...£43.99

■ (Ali Amigas)

Uses 32bit, 72 way Simms

Built in real-time clock

Optional maths co-processor

Various configurations

Our Price

0Mb ....£59.99 £49.99

1Mb £99.99 £85.99

2Mb £129.99 £110.99

4Mb £189.99 £147.99

8Mb £309.99 £267.99

33MHz F.P.U .£49.99 £38.99

(and crystal}

Also S-port (connect CD32 to Arnica). With CD and networking software £21.99

A1200 internal real-time clock £10.99

Rin^for best prices on 30 and 72 way SIMMS, bard drives, jnodems, mice etc and we will try to beat any ^genuine deal.

ACCESS/VISA welcome. 3 YEAR WARRANTY ON ALL OUR PRODUCTS!!!

®m

i/\]^(i>®mifs^ v\m(i>m

Shopperdisks

ShopperChoice

The disk that makes a tin of sardines look like a
spacious, 20-bedroom flat occupied by a bachelor.

ApplicationZone

RxGene 3

A complele package Ihat can
aolomalically wrile the Ificky parts
Of ARexx scripts for you. Also
Included is a compiler to turn your
code into an executable form. This
brings the power ot the underused
ARexx [o yout linger! I ps.

Blacks Editor

The new text editor that's already
attracted a lot of attention. With
amazing AReix support, this version
requires Workbench 3, but offers a
whole host of features normally
associated with commercial
releases. Superb!

9l RxOn 3,1 ill rmhiM ciwvl*... Iff

Lint

RirtB

Fill

Ctrelt

EIHPH

iKltnqit

A-BiflKlanQl*

*viClrcl<

i^voElhpH

Onta Picliir*

ij ramocHi |

iN y.i^ jjii P.J i.ii>i

11 nmi 1"'^ —*'
f4. . - «*

I.IIIH. '

iiliA l#

U. »,fl~

uiFi nil Li«

-' i' ■■ bP* ■ l.f —

i.^'i^^'

M-l U— ■•••

vz^%' c;'!-*:s f.^*:

Im-r- I Hb

"*•" £t"^m' ^*"*"f^

flLfc::.;; *,

TechnicalZone

Seven amazing programs thai can
make a real difference lo your
computing. XFD will unpack any type
of crunched file; Guru 3 offers ar>
English interpretation of guru
meditations: Floppy is the new
disksystem we raved about last month;
LowFrag optimizes memory usage, and
there's much more besides!

ProgrammingZone

Not iusi the code lor the HiSoft BASIC 2 tutorial, but two eicellent utilities tot
programmers. There's MenuBullder Ihat can create a menu through its GUI and
then output the code for you; and PLab which can convert pictures into raw data
for inclusion in programs as well as offering masses of other features.

Plus: InformationZone: all you need to know.

Yes, honestly, we are not joking. There really is the full £150
CanDo package on our disks, as well as a TurboCalc demo,
other derDos and essential PD and Shareware. 6Mb in total

CanDo 2.51: complete!

we are going on about it a bit. but we
are honestly so excited thai we can't
help ourselves. CanDo enables you to
create anything from multimedia to
application programs or games. You are
limited only by your imagination. To get
you started, we have a special feature
helping you to get the most out of this
amazing Coverdisk.

And when you've seen the power of
2.51, allow yourself to be tempted with
the amazing £S0 saving you can make
on the upgrade to versron 3!

Please nore Because ol iiiv poivsr of
CanDo 2.5 1, it requires a hard drive.

MasterlSO demo

The program for real power users. Reviewed this issue on page 45. you can try out
the new software that enables you lo cut your own compact discs. With CD-R
coming down in price, could this be the way forward lor serious storage?

TlirboCalc 3.51 demo

mi-w, ■ TrirfT^ — jflu^L miiE T!an r.M

B I [ J g

Mm/H9 Mf • Ml

Popular demand has finaJly
enabled us to gel out hands on a
demo for this popular spreadsheet
program from Digila. You can now
see loi yoursell the amazing
power and versatility of this
package. Example files and lull
on-tine help will guide you
through; when you've found out
what it can do, you can save a full
£20 off Ihe retail price in our
second exclusive offer.

UtilityZone

Two excellent utilities this
month. One for converting
sounds samples easily and
quickly between different
formats and the other lor
grabbing screen pictures. Utility
fans won't be disappointed
with Ihe Technical Zone either.

I-S5.U. aa u,

"y '996 VMui

™ *« OEB«_I

fi!2PPerChoice

New, TMb

u.i< ARe„ programs.

' P'usr ^,,

Wortcbwich

'■-= ess en dill

»*«bow.

P'ograms'

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