September 1984
SEP TEM BER Byt es
From
the
Pre s.
This is my second •Bytes • and alread y crazy. There 's just a lot going going I'm I-land. So, there' s a lot to ATAR on in etter. Much of the stuff newsl a in cover that anyone (even a thing of kind the is beginn er) can do, such as rumors, demos, magazine info, etc. So, give us a hand and get us some articl es, help, etc. First, I'd like to \hank Jon Nelson for an excell ent news1et er last month. This was Jon's first newsl etter and he did a fine job. Let's be sure to give Jon some help with those articl es. Either give Jon the articl es at the meetin g or call him to get the articl es to him. Articl es should be on disk using a common word proce ssor. Deadli ne is two Mondays before the meetin g. Keep up the good work, Jon! Second, I'd like to thank Joe Danko for taking an intere st in some hardware Joe will go offers at the last meetin g. into more dttail (than I did) at this group organi ze a meetin g and perhap s purcha se of sent sort. Third , I'd 1 ike to thank Frank Haug in advance for working on the casse tte and is He listin gs. the month disk of ms progra past all of g listin a compi ling This with a one line synop sis of each. future a at t handou a as issued will be meetin g. The BBS is up and runnin g, but on old softwa re. You will have to get a pasSlllord by callin g the BBS at 544-9058 using the •p• option as explai ned by
the new and the
198 4
BBS. Phil Seifer t of TAIG is still working on new softwa re to overcome shortc oming s in Phil asks that us•rs be the old versio n. old messages on the their delete to sure curren t BBS. A New Star At the last minute , SPACE was called upon to be on radio KSTP-AM's •computer Talk• show. Since I was tied up, Bruce Haug got to be on-the -air live during Commodore's usual week. Bruce came through with flying colors (or was that rainbowing colors ?) and showed those C64'er s a thing or two. I'm sure Bruce will let us all know about his meetin g. radio guest -star role at the on our update an Bruce should also have Charli e ve, entati repres Atari ex-loc al Danie lson. 400 Keyboards
The chick let type keyboards for the 400's are here. Price is $12.25 . There are only them. keyboards for those who ordere d to order in you Bring your money with es deserv Krack Bob think I yours. e receiv a lot of thanks for handli ng this. If some of You missed out, please let us know. Perhap s we can ask Bob to handle anothe r purcha se, if necess ary. S.ptm btr DtllOS De~os this month should be very good. Jim G!•~h, of Control Data Corpe ration , will be g•~•n~ us a demo of the •Learn ing Phone•. This ts the new cartri dge program to be releas ed by Atari later this year for access to CDC's PLATO netwo rk. Jim will For demo severa l lesson s and notef iles. CONTINUED
--c-
more information, read the articles in the July and October issues of Antic. 1 ✓ ve also got a Synapse demo disk with two soon to be released games on it -- •New York City-The Big Apple• and •AJ1ey Cat•. 1 ✓ ve also sent for a light pen demo that utilizes Micro-Illustrator software. This is the same software used by Koalapad and Atari Touch Tablet. i ✓ m not sure this will arrive tn time for the meeting. 1 ✓ m sure the dealers will also have some programs to demo.
I called up Mainframe Micronet database on 429-6929. This is a very good database BBS. I recommend all of you with moderns to give them a call. You can get a lot of information while logged-in. I will have a few copies of their handouts at the meeting. You can also arrange for Micronet to send you information with option 13. In a nutshell, Mainframe offers information on weather, video, theater, restaurants, books, sports, arts, etc. Advertisements and user groups are also supported. Try them out. Hise.
I am interested in having October. How about it? That ✓ s
a swap meet
in
all for this month. Bob Floyd The Pres.
Magazine Man a By Bob Floyd What ✓ s happening to our ATARI magazines? i ✓m not sure it ✓ s safe to subscribe anymore. A few months ago, I_, lost money on Softside when they filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Maybe 1 ✓ 11 recover a few dollars of this, And now, it appears Hi-Res has bit the dust, along with my subscription. I only got issues 13 and 14 of my subscription (although I got 13 twice) after I had purchased 11 and 12 at the newstand. I really 1 iked Hi-Res. Their last issue, 14, started featuring Commodore too. Maybe this was their demise. Perhaps Atari subscribers asked for refunds? Does anyone know? The September issue of Compute! features a description of the industry in turmoil in the •Editor ✓ s Notes• column. Robert Lock, the editor, reports that the December, 1983 issue of Compute! had 393 pages, 215 of which were advertising. In comparison, the September, 1984 issue has i only 164 pages, 60.5 of which are I I advertising. This illustrates the ! ~shakeout• going on in the computer I i industry, Magazines are feeling the pinch ! ! advertising revenues, in reduced i the magazines can adjust~ I Hopefully, I Compute! says that they have come up with I I a good formula for the future. I hope so I I s i nee I 1 i ke it a 1ot. I I
j
1
I
------------------------------------- ! WANT ADS Now it is possible for members to place ✓ want Ads ✓ in this newsletter. The ads may be for selling used harc:Mare, used software, tutoring services, or just about anything that has to do with Atari. The rates are as follows: 6 Lines $1,20 216 Letters 1 Line .25 36 Letters The following is a list of advertising rates for vendors or individual members. Full page $18.00 7-1/2• X 10• Half page 10.00 3-5/S• X 10" Half page 10.00 7-112• X 5• 1/4 page 5.50 3-5/8" X 5u All advertisements must be paid for when they are submitted. Deadline for ad placement is the last Friday of each month. To place ad or for more info, ca11 the editor.
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I I I
II
Analog seems to be doing fine, but has shrunk in size fron a high of about 150 pages to 98 in the October issue. The content is still excellent. They are taking a •wait and see• and •we ✓ 11 report it• attitude on the recent changes at Atari.
However, Antic is apparently taking a new stand. Antic has also shrunk from The about 146 pag~o 92 in October. difference here is that they appear to be i I taking a leadership role in the changes at I First, they are trying to fill the i ATARI. i void due to the demise of APX. Antic is i) contacting a11 APX authors so that they can They wi11 also m.arket their programs. market new APX-type software. Second Antic is setting up a user group BBS for ' product reviews, teleconferences, etc. Third, Antic is prepal"ing to offer - ·· •selected products directly by maiJ.• AJ'T-" subscribers will receive catalogs. Listings will also be updated in each magazine issue. They are also adding new features such as disk subscl"iptions, a I I I I
!
removable program listings section, a new It sounds like a good typo program, etc. plan to me. '-'
. (Incidentally, Antic does not offer special deals on disk subscriptions to user subscribe must Individuals groups. separately, Analog is still the best deal in town,)
The last 5 listings are new. The last item for this meeting. be ready may not Donations are gladly accepted - you will receive a disk or cassette of the month in If you have exchange for your donation. any purchases to suggest, please write them down and give them to one of the officers at the mee t i ng •
EDUCATIO NAL SOFTWARE LIBRARY Here is a listing of what is currently in the SPACE educational software library. too. handl i ng this, Bi 11 Ster 1 i ng is Arrangements are the same as the paper 1 i brary above. Visicalc Agent USA Trains Because of the cost of software, we are not Instead, we depend on purchasing these. donations from the venders and members. Often times, educational software has a limited lifetime because you're done with it once you've learned from the program. So, if you have an educational program you ~no longer use, please donate it to our or you a disk We'll trade 1 ibrary, cassette of the month for it, which is better than nothing.
------------- ------------- -----PAPER LIBRARY Here is a listing of what is currently To use the in the SPACE paper library, library, see Bill Sterling at the meetings in the back of the room or phone him in between me.etings. Pol icy is that you can keep the book for a week and then must make arrangements to get it to anyone who is waiting, If no one is waiting, you may keep it until the next meeting. De Re ATARI ATARI Technical Users Notes ATARI Demo-Packs 1 to 8 ANALOG Magazine Rctt-Magazine #4 & 6 ATARI Garnes & Recreations Picture This Computes First Book of ATARI Computes Mapping the ATARI 24 Game Programs in BASIC Hi-Res Magazine 13 Best of Creative Computing Your ATARI Computer
Rumors,
Etc.
Have you heard these rumors? the latest and the greatest XL-ent from •Pokey• the Bookie,
Here's rumors
Wall Street Journal , 8/23/84 approximately: Atari is suing Commodore and Amiga over a •super-set of chips• for a next generation computer. Atari had given towards Amiga one-half million dollars returned Amiga Later developing the chips. the money and said the technology didn't work, Then Amiga sold the technology to (Some Commodore. So says Atari, anyWay. hit the was Amiga that of you may remember CES.) of last June's l)
2) ABC World News Tonight, 8/26/84: Atari will introduce a new low end computer in the Commodore 64 to compete with January, 1985. 3) Unknown, but reliable, 8/27/84: Atari will compete in three markets: video games, family computers, and small business computers. thinks 4) Analog, 10/84: Analog and 800XL the of price the cut Atari will Christmas the for software substantially season and sell a bunch. 5) Antic, 10/84: Antic also thinks Atari will sell a bunch of B00XLs at prices below Commodore 64s for Christmas. 6) Unknown and unreliable: There will be a new 800XL with a new sound chip <music synthesizer quality), built-in disk drive, 128K RAM, and the 16 bit version of the (Maybe they could 6502 microprocesser . sell it for $1000 with a $1100 rebate, too.) Have you heard any good ones Well, let us know at the meeting!
lately?
MON TH MS-PROGRA S --THIS MONTH' up side Down DNSDUP Sorter STSRT Timer TIMEALL Auto. screen editor ASCR Disk read/w rite DWRT * Data file * DRMSG Data file * EXl.DAT Format ter * FRMTR * ABMAK * FILELIST Reads file, prints on screen TAPETIME Casset te timer TPDP2 Great tape copier CHGEN EPSILCN MAZE Maze game FLASH Math ~lash-c ards CL~S DISK
OF
TI PS
THE
*
Asteris k . indicat es program.
100 POSITION 3,18:PRINT A$ 110 POSITION 2,18:INPUT A$ The only hazard I've found, pointed out by Frank Haug, is that SHIFT-CLEAR can erase the whole screen .
Presid ent: Bob Floyd - 487-26 27 Vice Pres: Bruce Haug - 774-62 26 DisK Lib: John BenKe - 459-66 55 Paper/ Educ Lib: Bill Sterli ng - 291-77 10
Next SPACE Meeting: Friday , September 14, 1984 8:00 P.M. Minnesota Federal Savings & Loan Lexington Ave. near Larpen teur Rosevi lle, Minnesota
TRIC KS
One trick I 1 ike to use is editir.g the.._, using program a strings within keyboa rd. The best way I have found (using BASIC) is to PRINT the string to the screen the the cursor to and then POSITION one string minus the of beginn ing to Then you don't have X-coor dinate. you re-ente r a string to change it. Plus, have the editing keys at your dispos al. An example would be as follows :
disk-on ly
St. Paul ATARI Computer Enthus iasts 2589 Fisk St. Rosevi lle, tt-1 55113
_.,N_.,
Bob Floyd Edito r: Jon Nelson - 484-90 27 Treas urer: Max Feuer - 483-38 95 Cass Lib: Bruce Haug - 774-62 26 Bulle tin Board - 544-90 58