991 lines
31 KiB
Plaintext
991 lines
31 KiB
Plaintext
FIDONEWS -- 26 Aug 85 00:17:57 Page 1
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Volume 2, Number 28 26 August 1985
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| / \ |
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| - FidoNews - /|oo \ |
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| Fido and FidoNet _`@/_ \ _ |
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| Users Group | | \ \\ |
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| Newsletter | (*) | \ )) |
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| ______ |__U__| / \// |
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| / FIDO \ _//|| _\ / |
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| (________) (_/(_|(____/ |
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| (jm) |
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Publisher: Fido 107/7
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Chief Procrastinator: Thom Henderson
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Fidonews is published weekly by SEAboard, Fido 107/7. You
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are encouraged to submit articles for publication in
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Fidonews. Article submission standards are contained in the
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file FIDONEWS.DOC, available from Fido 107/7.
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Disclaimer or don't-blame-us:
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The contents of the articles contained here are not our
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responsibility, nor do we necessarily agree with them;
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everything here is subject to debate. We publish EVERYTHING
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received.
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This week we have a guest editorial by Robert Mitchell.
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This editorial was originally published in the February 1984
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issue of The Underground Grammarian.
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A Sense of Ease
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Computer literacy doesn't require speaking a computer
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language, nor does it require programming skills, nor does
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it even require extensive knowledge of already-written
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programs. All it requires is a sense of ease around
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computers, and the knowledge that personal computers are
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powerful tools, and not menacing characters from science
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fiction.
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--Peter McWilliams
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The advanced [ETS] placement course in computer science
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includes such topics as recursion, operations on stacks,
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lists, and trees, and the heap sort. These are complicated,
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machine-independent abstractions that are not learned while
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sitting at a terminal. They are learned by hearing competent
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lectures, studying a textbook, and by sitting alone gleaning
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insights from drawing diagrams and walking through
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FIDONEWS -- 26 Aug 85 00:18:01 Page 2
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prospective codes.... Replying to the question, What is the
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best single indicator of an applicant's programming ability,
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one of today's most respected computer scientists, Edsger W.
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Dijkstra, wrote: '...an absolute mastery of his native
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tongue.'
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--Merrit & Stix
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Here's what we wish: We wish that we were running a very
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expensive private school for little children, and that
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McWilliams wanted us to take his sxi-year old daughter and
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provide her with a good dose of literacy, the antiquated
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kind, 'book literacy,' they probably call it nowadays.
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First we'd take his certified check for our standard,
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large, unrefundable deposit, and then we'd tell him about
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our real neat, absolutely painless, and invariably effective
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Book Literacy Education Program.
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The yoke of book literacy is easy, we would tell him, and
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its burden is light. Quite contrary to the foolish notions
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of self-appointed reformers, book literacy does NOT require
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reading and writing in book language. Nor does it require
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any noticible knowledge of already-written books. All it
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requires, as you would surely be the first to understand,
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McWilliams, is a sense of ease around books!
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Little children, you see, are afraid of books. Yes,
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afraid. They see them as menacing characters from the walls
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of doctors' waiting rooms and quiet, dreary libraries, where
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fun is not allowed. Our program teaches children that books
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are powerful tools, good for building walls and castles, and
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for keeping drawings from blowing away, and even for
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standing on to reach the good stuff that grown-ups like to
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keep to themselves. Why we actually let our young scholars
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PLAY with books, open them, close them, even turn some of
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the pages, and all by themselves. That's the REAL
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education, you know, learning by doing. You just leave your
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precious little tyke with us, and in no time at all--say
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ten, twelve years max--she will be the most book-literate
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kid on the block, chock full of a sense of ease. And all of
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that for a measly fifteen thou a year!
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And may the future bring you a million RETURNs without
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GOSUB, buster.
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We are, you see, ready to consider 'computer literacy.'
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We suspected, mostly because the educationalistic faddists
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were so enthusiastic about it, that it was all bunk. Now,
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having done some homework, we can reach a better informed
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opinion: It IS all bunk.
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To begin with, it is not 'literacy' in any reasonable
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sense of the word. 'Literacy' has become nothing but a
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pretentious title for an 'awareness' conjoined with any
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modicum of acquaintance. If you know that slide-rules exist,
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you have achieved slide-rule awareness, which is already
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FIDONEWS -- 26 Aug 85 00:18:06 Page 3
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quite enough to earn you a splendid grade in a mathematics
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education course. If you can actually use a slide-rule, or
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even if you have just slid one a bit, you have slide-rule
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literacy.
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(That's just for now of course. The school people have
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obviously not yet received the pedagogical doctrine of Peter
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McWilliams, who is a 'syndicated computer columnist,' just
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the kind of expert they take from. When they hear the word,
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they will discover that slide-rule literacy calls for
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nothing more formidable than a sense of ease around slide-
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rules.)
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And then there's all that bunk about computer
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'languages,' which are languages in just the same way that
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the 'language of the flowers' is language--not at all. They
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are codes, ingenious and elaborate codes, which is what they
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must be if they are to work. Computer languages provide the
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possibility of an exact and precisely limited correspondence
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not only between what is said and what is meant, but also
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between what is meant and what is so in the strictly defined
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system about which, and ONLY about which, statements can be
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made.
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For computing, that's good, and it works. But those same
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attributes are characteristic of the very least of the
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powers of language, communication, a power also wielded by
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wolves and crows. If wolves and crows do not devise
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computers and computer 'languages,' it is because they have
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none of the higher powers of language, especially meatphor
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and discourse. It is in those powers that we grow when we
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study language, and to pretend that the study of computer
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language is the study of language is primarily a convenience
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for those who pretend that they teach the powers of
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language.
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And then there's another thing--that bunk about 'fear of
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computers.' It is, of course, possible that there are
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certain people who do fear computers, even as there are
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probably people who fear shredded wheat or party hats. They
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are loonies. Computers are no more likely than rulers, or
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even sextants, to provoke fear in people who are not
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loonies. What we see at work here is a longstanding
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educationalistic con job that has been eagerly adopted by
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peddlers as well as politicians, who also make their livings
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by preying on emotions.
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It is the pose of the big-hearted giver, who so
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charitably understands your shortcomings, and so selflessly
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seeks only your good. He kindly tells you that there IS a
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little something wrong with you, maybe just a little
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learning disability, or an unraised consciousness, or this
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irrational fear of computers, that you can't seem to
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overcome all by yourself. But don't worry. Your deficiency
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is 'perfectly natural' in one who has not yet had the
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inestimable benefit of his ministrations, which he will be
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only too happy to provide.
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FIDONEWS -- 26 Aug 85 00:18:11 Page 4
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And there is yet one more thing--the pernicious notion
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that learning to work a computer has something to do with
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education. One of its versions suggests that no one can be
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educated without learning about computers, which confuses
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training with education and information with knowledge, as
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is the custom in the schools. An alternative version
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pronounces, as is also the custom in the schools, that NOW
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we know what to do. NOW we can teach those students who have
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stubbornly refused to be taught by 'traditional' methods,
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i.e., the LAST few paroxysms of innovative thrusts.
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The other quotation is from a letter to the NYT by Susan
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M. Merritt and Allen H. Stix, members of the computer
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science department at Pace University. When they say
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'science,' they seem to mean SCIENCE, which is neither a
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pleasant feeling nor a vocational skill, but a discipline in
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the mind. It is to be learned just as they say, which is
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just as ANY mental discipline is to be learned, by hearing
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competent lectures, studying books, and sitting alone.
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Those things are not allowed in the schools. Competent
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lectures are elitist and authoritarian, books are just NOT
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experiential, and sitting alone is aberrant behavior. The
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schools will have to teach computer science in THEIR way.
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Spending somebody else's money brings a great sense of ease.
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The Underground Grammarian is available from:
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R. Mitchell, Asst. Circulation Mgr.
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Post Office Box 203
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Glassboro
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New Jersey 08028
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for $15 per year to Persons in USA & Canada. (It is $25 for
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Institutions.)
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FIDONEWS -- 26 Aug 85 00:18:14 Page 5
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============================================================
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NEWS
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============================================================
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Bdale Garbee
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Sysop of L5NET Gateway, Fido 129/13
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Some Utilities I'm Looking for and Haven't Found
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There are a few public domain utilities I would like to
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locate for my Fido host, which I have unfortunately not yet
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found in my random wanderings around other Fido systems.
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I'm running a Tandy 1200HD, which is an IBM XT-clone.
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If you have any of the things I'm looking for, either send
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them to me by Fidomail, or send me a message detailing how
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I can get them. Emphasis on public domain. Sources
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desirable but not absolutely necessary (beggars can't be
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choosers!)
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1 - A disk utility like DU for CP/M. When setting up my
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system, I was faced with the need to patch ATDT to ATDP in
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Fido, and ended up Kermiting the file over to my CP/M box
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to make the patch. Not too hard, but someone out there
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must have a good disk patch utility. The search command in
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particular has been usefull in DU.
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2 - A full-screen filer similar to the VFILER program
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distributed with ZCPR3 for CP/M compatible systems. What
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would be nice is a full-screen view of the files in a
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directory node, with commands to do individual and group
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file manipulations, as well as printing, bouncing up and
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down the directory tree, etc.
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3 - A good incremental backup utility. Something that
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would allow me to do an occasional full backup, and then on
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a daily or weekly basis cut a floppy with all of the files
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that have changed or appeared since the last full or
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incremental backup.
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4 - A directory entry raw editor. Something like FDBED
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under Tops-20. You give it a filespec, and it puts up all
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of the information contained in the directory entry on the
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screen and lets you move around and edit the entries with
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absolutely no error checking. Usefull when directories get
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trashed, or when you do a file transfer that bombs before
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the file gets closed, and you want to hack on the directory
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entry. I'm not yet experienced enough on MS-DOS to know
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how practical this particular utility would be.
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I suppose that's enough for this time. If I get enough
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responses, I will summarize what I find out, and how the
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things I get actually stack up to what I want, in a future
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article for the news...
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FIDONEWS -- 26 Aug 85 00:18:19 Page 7
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This article has two purposes! The first one is I have a
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friend who is looking for a bbs that works on a Ti pro and
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TI's internal program and the second is some response to
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this article. I think it is self explanatory! Contact me
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at fido 437 net 117 or call the people that wrote the
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messages directly at the RCP/M I found them on wich is
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RAPID (409)-845-8931.
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Date: 08/06/85
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From: JIM COBURN
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To: ALL
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Re: KAYPRO LIVES
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No matter their stock doesn't appreciate in value at any
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fast pace their is one masterful use for kaypros. Put TBBS
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Bulletin board on a 2700 10m machine and show me something
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more powerful for major companies to run their in house
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BBS's for terminal users from around the country . salesmen
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etc , sure it can't except 12 incomming lines but $ 2800.00
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beats the pants off of having your big mainframe 40-50-60-
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100000.00 computer played around with by hackers. Cp/m will
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live and will resurface because most people haven't the 1st
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idea of what computer to buy but run out and buy IBM or
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clones and spend fortunes to run What. Simple programs
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excluding Lotus etc but then again they usually aren't the
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buyers of Lotus. As soonn as some advertising exec gets
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smart and sells the idea of all the wonderful prgms for cpm
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that exist plus the p/domain prgms you will see c/pm again.
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Really how many of the users of 16 bit computers know the
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difference between 8 and 16 bit and for sure the home buyer
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isn't going to be the programmers of the future except for
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a few. Kaypro is now the largest selling C/pm system in
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the usa and it won't be long before some one figures a
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marketing stradgy out to renew interest. How many IBM clone
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programs came from c/pm.
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Date: 08/06/85
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From: DON BUZZINGHAM
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To: ALL
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Re: Jim's comments
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Too true, unfortunately most purchase decisions are made on
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the basis of information derived from some marketing jock
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who may never have even put a disk into a computer. All he
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is doing is pushing a product. Think about it! How many
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computer salesmen are competent users? How many computer
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salesmen even own a personal computer (purchased with their
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own cash, not provided by the employer)? Come to think
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about it, how many people here at A&M have invested their
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own cash in a microcomputer? I have decided to postpone
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buying a new computer until a decidedly superior product
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appears. Until that time, and it ain't here yet, I'll keep
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running my Kaypro. After all, why should I pay a premium
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to SLOW DOWN?
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Well you've heard there side now lets hear yours!
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FIDONEWS -- 26 Aug 85 00:18:23 Page 8
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Mike Ringer
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Fido 437 in net 117
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FIDONEWS -- 26 Aug 85 00:18:24 Page 9
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FIDO 19/918
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An Idea for FidoNews
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I am a Fido user in Lubbock, Texas. I have a
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suggestion for the newsletter that I am sure many people
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who are in the same fix will agree with. Here is my
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problem: I own a low speed (300 baud) modem. I don't have a
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dedicated line, either, so I use our one phone in the
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house. We also have this diabolical thing called "call
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waiting" that is one of AT&T's attempts at destroying
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useful telecommunications. Last, I would love to be able to
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read all the issues of Fidonews when they come in, but for
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one problem: They are so long!
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It seems as though everytime I start downloading one,
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an incoming phone call fouls up my carrier, and I have to
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re-download the whole thing, read and unread articles, all
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over again. What would be nice is a feature that would let
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the user jump around in the newsletter, reading only the
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articles they want to. I know this would entail lots of
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modifications to Fido, but surely it wouldn't be that
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difficult? The newsletter could be packaged with a "Table
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of contents" at the beginning describing article titles,
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authors, content, and a logical record offset in the file.
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(Page number!) Then they could be called up via a special
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command, and the user could read only the articles he/she
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wanted to, or read some and read the rest later, and so on.
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For die-hards that wish to download the thing w/ Xmodem and
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print it out later (It saves eye strain) they could still
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go into the File area and download...the table of contents
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file format structure shouldn't be any problem, it may even
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help them, too!
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I don't have a Rainbow or PC or anything nearly
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compatible, so I don't know what sort of modifications this
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would require, perhaps the file format would not make it
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possible to jump around like that. But, I believe that
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FidoNews is the best thing to come around since local
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bulletin boards.
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--------------Also possibly of some interest---------------
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I have written a freeware bulletin board that has a
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network system similiar to Fido but incompatible, called
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TI-SUB. You can call the headquarters board, sysop Matt
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Storm, at 806-792-5831 if you want to look around. Number
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two is in Philadelphia PA at 215-676-7393, sysop Mike Bell,
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and a major magazine is looking into it right now. For more
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info, write to Erik Olson, 3712 68th, Lubbock Texas, 79413,
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or FidoMail to 19/67 or 19/918.
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FIDONEWS -- 26 Aug 85 00:18:28 Page 10
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From Spiv's Fido #346 in Region #10 (408) 972-8164:
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(The ONLY FIDO devoted to the IBM PC AT)
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********************************************************
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Part of an article in PC WEEK:
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GTE's PC Pursuit Offers Users Electronic Links Via Local
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Call:
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GTE Telenet last week introduced PC Pursuit, a service that
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will allow PC users to connect to database services,
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bulletin boards, or individual computers by making a single
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local phone call.
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According to GTE Telenet Vice President Floyd Trogdon, PC
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Pursuit "links the user's terminal to any off-network phone
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number... that he wishes to call, whether it's a free
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database in Boston, a specialized bulletin board in Los
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Angeles, or his brother in Denver."
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The new service, though officially launched to allow PC
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users to contact other PCs in distant locations, also was
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designed to take advantage of Telenet's nationwide
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distribution network.
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The PC Pursuit service will make use of the excess capacity
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of GTE Telenet, and as a result is only available at night
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and on weekends. During the day, Telenet's network capacity
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is dedicated to large corporate uers.
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To use PC Pursuit, a caller dials the PC Pursuit access
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number in his area. The GTE computer asks for the caller's
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number, and the city and number to be called. At this
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point, the caller hangs up.
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Shortly thereafter, the PC Pursuit service calls the user
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back, and makes the long distance connection requested.
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While the connection is being made, PC Pursuit keeps the
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user informed of the progress of the call through periodic
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status messages. A call can last up to an hour.
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GTE charges subscribers $25 for using the service regardless
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of the amount of time that the service is actually used.
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Users can pay by credit card.
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Currently, only 12 cities have access to PC Pursuit:
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Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Denver, Detroit, Houston,
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Los Angeles, New York, Philadelphia, San Francisco, and
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Washington.
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The system supports 300 and 1200 baud modem operation. 2400
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baud service will be available in October.
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On-line sign-up for the service is available by calling 800-
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835-3001 or 703-689-2987 (in Virginia.)
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FIDONEWS -- 26 Aug 85 00:18:32 Page 11
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Analysis:
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GTE is offering an off-hours, flat rate ($25 per month)
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gateway to any dial-up system. For the cost of a local
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phone call, any dial-up system is now reachable from 12
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cities.
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Shades of FidoNet! Just think what will happen when
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outbound hosts are formed in these 12 cities! Nationwide
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FidoMail/FidoNet forwarding of unlimited message traffic for
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a flat fee of $25 per month!
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I don't know if the 800 number listed above is voice or
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data, but I'm waiting to get through (busy tone) to get all
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the details.
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Those of you not in the selected 12 cities, get on your
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local BBS systems and start lobbying everyone to call GTE
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and request that your city be added as soon as possible.
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Unless I am wrong, this is the first time a major company is
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creating a product/service that shows they fully understand
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the potential of the hobbiest/hacker telecommunciations
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community.
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Let's prove their right.
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(Typed in and comments by: Robert E. Spivack, Fido 10/346)
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------------------------------------------------------------
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FIDONEWS -- 26 Aug 85 00:18:34 Page 12
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Review of Alpha Software's "Keyworks" keyboard macro
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software.
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By Mark Perloe, for the National PCjr Users Group
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Alpha's KEYWORKS lets you redefine combinations
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of keystrokes to customize any operation. You can
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personalize your software with up to 380 macros and save
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7000 keystrokes. KEYWORKS also lets you easily customize
|
|
menus that can be called up for a variety of functions.
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|
Although these features alone justify the purchase price,
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the few extras are also appreciated. The ability to encrypt
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files, copy files, format disks, and search directories is
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|
very useful. KEYWORKS comes with suggested macros and pop-
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up menus for many programs. If you are presently using
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PROKEY, but wish to switch, Alpha has included a simple
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conversion program.
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WORDSTAR is a breeze with KEYWORKS. It loads its
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macros from the autoexec file but macros files can be
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interchanged without even exiting from the file you are
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writing or you might choose one set to use when writing
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reports for school and another for writing letters.
|
|
Paragraphs for form letters can be stored as separate files
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on the floppy disk and called up with two keystrokes.
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Menus are provided for WORDSTAR but in less than one hour
|
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you can customize or create additional mouse compatible
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pop-up menus for any command you wish.
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KEYWORKS can come to the rescue when problems occur.
|
|
More than once I've had Wordstar files too big to fit on
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partially filled disk. Rather than lose the files, KEYWORKS
|
|
allowed me to format a new disk. When logging to another
|
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drive in Wordstar you are required to have overlay files on
|
|
the logged drive or the program may freeze. This can be
|
|
easily solved by using KEYWORKS copy command to transfer the
|
|
necessary files. File encryption and test window creation
|
|
can be valuable aids for any user.
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A single macro can call other macros or pause for
|
|
fixed or variable lengths which is great for designing
|
|
forms. This has made data entry a much faster task with
|
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DBASE. Frequent entries can have their own macros which
|
|
pause for certain fields. For instance, recurring monthly
|
|
checks can be recorded easily with minimal keystrokes. You
|
|
can design the macro to pause only for entry of the date and
|
|
amount. The remainder of the data fields will be supplied
|
|
by the macro.
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|
|
KEYWORKS `USER GUIDE' is short and sweet. The way
|
|
to learn KEYWORKS is to use it. The menus are so well
|
|
designed that you can easily learn to edit, list, create,
|
|
change macros or menus without ever opening the manual.
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FIDONEWS -- 26 Aug 85 00:18:39 Page 13
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Compatibility has always been a problem for those
|
|
of us using expanded PCjr's. If I had a dollar for every
|
|
supposedly "compatible" program that crashed my IBM PCjr's
|
|
RAM disk or erased the video memory, I would be able to
|
|
afford a real PC! Alpha Software has come to our aid with
|
|
KEYWORKS. This program is an invaluable tool just waiting
|
|
to make life with Jr a little bit easier. It coexists
|
|
happily with ramdisks, print spoolers, and Racore expansion
|
|
boxes. This is not true for PROKEY and SUPERKEY, its
|
|
competitors.
|
|
|
|
If versatility, user friendliness and price are
|
|
important in your software decisions, then KEYWORKS is a
|
|
powerful program that you will want in your autoexec.bat
|
|
file.
|
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|
|
Mark may be reached for comment or question at FIDO
|
|
No.15 in Region 900 PCjrUserGroup Tulsa, OK
|
|
(918) 496-2055 300-1200-2400.
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FIDONEWS -- 26 Aug 85 00:18:41 Page 14
|
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|
|
============================================================
|
|
WANTED
|
|
============================================================
|
|
Help Wanted for SEAdog
|
|
|
|
System Enhancement Associates, the developers of the popular
|
|
ARC utility, have developed a full-featured electronic mail
|
|
system for the PC. This is a fully developed system for
|
|
sending and receiving messages and files which includes the
|
|
following features:
|
|
|
|
o Full Fidonet compatibility
|
|
o Automatic message routing
|
|
o Message forwarding
|
|
o Return receipts
|
|
o File requests
|
|
o File update requests
|
|
o On-line, context sensitive help
|
|
o Easy installation
|
|
|
|
We are now seeking sources of venture capital so that we may
|
|
begin our marketing operation. Interested parties should
|
|
contact Jim Kennedy at (201) 575-5144 or send Fidonet mail
|
|
to SEAdog Leader at node 107/8.
|
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FIDONEWS -- 26 Aug 85 00:18:43 Page 15
|
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============================================================
|
|
NOTICES
|
|
============================================================
|
|
Fidonews Bugs
|
|
|
|
We made a mistake in the last editorial about Fido user
|
|
lists. The output from SHIPUSER should be sent to Matt
|
|
Kanter at node 107/1, NOT node 107/7.
|
|
|
|
------------------------------------------------------------
|
|
|
|
The Interrupt Stack
|
|
|
|
|
|
27 Nov 1985
|
|
Halley's Comet passes closest to Earth before perihelion.
|
|
|
|
24 Jan 1986
|
|
Voyager 2 passes Uranus.
|
|
|
|
9 Feb 1986
|
|
Halley's Comet reaches perihelion.
|
|
|
|
11 Apr 1986
|
|
Halley's Comet reaches perigee.
|
|
|
|
19 May 1986
|
|
Steve Lemke's next birthday.
|
|
|
|
24 Aug 1989
|
|
Voyager 2 passes Neptune.
|
|
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|
|
If you have something which you would like to see on this
|
|
calendar, please send a message to Fido 107/7.
|
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