                              SitComm Magazine
                             ------------------
                          Issue Number 1 - May 1990

      * Eye Witness Report from CeBit '90 

      * Comments from STeVeN and a Hacker

      * Reviews of Quartet and Waterloo

      * Guide  to getting Public Domain Software  and  a  start  to 
        Comms.

      * Smiley Faces from Usenet

      * Interview with The Assembly Line

      * You want to be a SysOp?

      * The Disk Version contains a load of programs  to  complement 
        the above.

--SitComm-May-1990--------------------------------------------------------------

             Editors: Matthew Miles, Lucien Oppler, Steven Green

                       Disk Editor: Laurence McDonald

                     Contributions : Marcion, Frank Dunn

                       ---------------------------------

      Disk Magazines can be obtained directly from us, by writing to:

           10 Oak Farm Gardens
           Headcorn
           Ashford
           Kent
           TN27 9TU

      Enclosing a cheque or postal order for 1.50 Made out to  Matthew 
      Miles. This pays for postage and the disk. No Profit. 

                 Subscriptions will be on offer next issue. 
    

--SitComm-May-1990--------------------------------------------------------------

Editorial
This Months Editor is Matthew Miles

      Hacking, once again, is showing it's face again. 

      Marcion  writes  that he has some form of political right  to  be 
      able  to  Hack,  to  make  sure that he does  indeed  live  in  a 
      democracy.
      New Computer Express writes on the arrest of thirteen people  and 
      we hear that BT is coming down hard on phone phreakers,  and on a 
      side line F.A.S.T is getting very tough on pirates.

      All i seem to hear is complaints of this,  why?  You might  argue 
      that  you enjoy the challenge of hacking  another  computer,  and 
      that you don't to any harm - anyhow i'm doing  everyone a  favour 
      by making sure that we live in a democracy and that it's a  great 
      big  mainframe  so what difference does it make  ?  Has  it  ever 
      occured to you that you (as the hacker) are actually, as a group, 
      destroying the BB community? 

      About  a month ago someone hacked a bulletin board  in  Scotland, 
      managing  to  wipe it's message base.  The Hacker  did  not  gain 
      anything  by doing this,  in fact it would of cost him a  lot  of 
      money. Full details of this this will be available next issue.

      The  very same people who are the hackers are the vandals of  the 
      bulletin boards,  by giving them a hackers closed user group, you 
      are giving them ways of hacking another bulletin board. I used to 
      run  a Hacker area on my board,  I closed it because people  were 
      trying to hack into my Bulletin Board,  and found that the people 
      who were hacking were not always just reading  information;  they 
      might try to change it or destroy it.  

      The frightening thing is that the method that the hacker used  on 
      the  board  in  Scotland  can be used on  almost  every  type  of 
      bulletin board software.

      The Bulletin Board world is full of deceipt and fraud.  I make it 
      clear on my bulletin board that I must have a users real name and 
      address,  but many users refuse to obey this.  Why ? One can only 
      assume that they are interested in something for which they would 
      not  like to be identified,  I now have no areas on my  board  to 
      hide; so why? 

      Too many people are intersted in breaking the system; rather than 
      flowing  along it,  and anything that is happening in  parliament 
      which could aid the stopping of these people is of great benefit.

--SitComm-May-1990--------------------------------------------------------------

The ST Abroad
-------------Report by Lucien Oppler

   CeBIT '90
   ---------     The week beginning the 21st March saw the staging of  the 
   second  'CeBIT'  exhibition  - the  largest  exhibition  of  computers, 
   computerised  industrial machines and software products in  the  world. 
   The setting was just outside Hannover, in the Northern part of Germany. 
   Twenty  three  halls  -  each the size  of  Earl's  Court,  twenty  two 
   restaurants, a large hotel and a heliport go to make up the grounds for 
   the event and the fields around it afford parking accommodation for two 
   thousand cars.
       This  was one exhibition Atari could not afford to miss being  the 
   most  important  showcase for products of the year  (whilst  they  have 
   dropped  support for specific Atari exhibitions in the UK).  Atari  and 
   its entourage of supporting firms made their appearance in Hall 7,  one 
   of the larger halls. Unfortunately, for all the grandness of the event, 
   Atari  had little more to offer in the way of new products than it  has 
   in  recent  shows in the UK - namely more detailed information  on  its 
   'soon-to-be-released'  machines:  the Atari TT and its Abaq  Transputer 
   Workstation (the ATW).
       Of the latter two, numerous were on show displaying their powerful 
   number-crunching abilities and their zippy GEM interfaces.  Three  TT's 
   were on show.  For those who have forgotten Atari's specifications  for 
   these, here is a short review:-
   Processor:                Motorola 68030 CPU with clock speed of 16Mhz.
   Graphical Capabilities:   1024 x 1024 monochrome.
                             1024 x 748 16 colours.
                             Other  combinations with more  colours  from 
                             pallet of 16 million.
                             Standard ST resolutions.
   Operating System:         TOS 040 (extended version of TOS 1.4)
                             UNIX system V OS provided as standard.
                             Optional MS-DOS emulation running at 12Mhz.
   Hardware:                 40 meg hard drive.
                             Optional multi-sync monitor.

   The  price for the above set-up less the monitor is expected to  be  in 
   the  region of 1500.  The monitor will add another 600 or so to  this 
   figure.  Regarding release dates,  Atari were obscure. The lady I asked 
   said  that release on the continent was 'imminent'.  When asked for  UK 
   release dates,  she made as if she did not understand.  However,  there 
   could  well be some truth in the TT's 'imminent'  arrival.  Next  month 
   sees  the first magazine to be published here in Germany  dedicated  to 
   the  TT  and the products that are available for it and rumour  has  it 
   here  that  this  is partly funded  by  Atari  themselves.  At  present 
   however,  it  seems that only developers have been lucky enough to  lay 
   their hands on TTs.
       The  compatibility of the TT and the ATW with present ST  products 
   was  being  pushed strongly at  the  show.  Calumus,  the  professional 
   Desktop Publishing package was being displayed on both the machines and 
   showing off their machines' superiority in speed over the ST.  The  ATW 
   looked  extremely  impressive if a little on the large  size,  its  box 
   being  about one and a half times the size of early IBM  XTs.  However, 
   this size seems to be necessary if Atari's claim of the ATW being  able 
   to  address  64 megabytes of RAM is to hold true.  Also space  for  the 
   large  number of transputers it can take also seems  necessary.  I  had 
   doubted that the ATW existed at all and was not just the realization of 
   Atari's wish to move into the more serious,  powerful and expensive end 
   of the computer market. Once again, release dates were a little sketchy 
   with  the  answer of 'all over Europe by the end  of  the  year'.  Once 
   again, developers have them at present.
       On  the ST front,  the main causes for interest  certainly  didn't 
   come from Atari who were trying to interest the German ST-using public, 
   of  which  over  85% are monochrome users,  that the  new  4096  colour 
   palletted STE was a good thing.  By far the most of interest came  from 
   the  German firms which Atari housed under its stand's  roof.  Alot  of 
   extremely  interesting  software  was  being  displayed  by  'Markt   & 
   Technik',  Germany's  largest book and software  publisher/distributor. 
   Amongst the translated English products it was showing (Hisoft software 
   mainly),  it displayed a number of fresh new German titles - a new  DTP 
   package  sporting  the features of Calamus at a fraction of  the  cost, 
   vast  amounts of new MIDI software and a veritable downpour of new  ST-
   related books (from Data Becker for whom they distribute).
       GFA  Technik were there showing their four new  products:  a  fast 
   assembler,  a  GFA  Basic  to C converter,  version 3.5  of  GFA  Basic 
   sporting  new Algebraic and Combinatory abilities as well as  a  better 
   built-in editor,  and finally GFA-Strukto described as (translated from 
   German)  'a  dialog-orientated structured programming  and  instruction 
   system'.  Numerous forms of networking were also on show, both the MIDI 
   and DMA kind.  One firm was showing off one of the latter together with 
   STs which they had somehow upgraded to run at 2.5 times the speed  with 
   the  aid  of a 'power-box'.  They were guarded when I  asked  what  was 
   inside  this box,  however,  as they were not intending to  release  it 
   commercially for a while. The network itself literally flew though.
       And finally,  on the communications front,  a more interesting and 
   new  concept  -  a  high-speed  modem  (offering  V21/22/22bis/32  with 
   V42/42bis and MNP 5) with a Motorola 68010 CPU, 512k of RAM and 256k of 
   ROM...(!).  Hayes compatible of course,  it has built-in advanced comms 
   software  and  comes in a MegaST-sized case.  This is  the  entry-level 
   model,  other models having higher amounts of RAM (up to 16  megabytes) 
   and  built-in hard disks.  All models have a 1.44Mb 3.5" drive and  the 
   option  to install FAXing abilities in the machine.  Could this be  the 
   Sysops' machine of the future?  No price as yet (but don't expect it to 
   be low!) - Look out for it under the name of the Fury 9600 TI.
        And  that was it really!  It must have been one of the  few  shows 
   where the surroundings were more interesting than the new ST  products! 
   Beside this, there were numerous 'PD-pushers' who seemed to be making a 
   VAST amount of money from the notoriously enthusiastic German  PD-using 
   populace. 
   The General ST Scene in Germany
   -------------------------------
        To  get  an  idea  of what the German ST  scene  is  like,  it  is 
   necessary to give you an idea of what the Germans like to do with,  and 
   to,  their computers.  The Germans like power and speed in LARGE doses. 
   When the ST came out, its 8Mhz offering at the price it was offered was 
   was extremely attractive to the Germans and a large ST userbase  sprang 
   up.  Nowadays,  however, 8Mhz is about the lower limit that any serious 
   computer  user  can  tolerate  and so the  market  changed  to  one  of 
   'serious'  upgrade.  This fits in very nicely with the Germans love  of 
   customizing  their computers.  Many of the products that are  for  sale 
   here  have  sprung up from clever individuals attempts  at  customizing 
   their computers in the way of upgrading speed and performance. Upgrades 
   for every aspect of computing abound here.  There are upgrades for  the 
   ST's graphics capabilities, upgrades for its sound capabilities and, of 
   course,  its raw processing power.  There seem to be a large number  of 
   processor  caches here and some are even sold in department  store-type 
   shops (yes!  Just like Woolworth's I hear you say!).  For those of  you 
   not  acquainted  with processor caches,  these are extremely  fast  RAM 
   chips (about 40 ns or so) which store the last few instructions sent to 
   the processor.  Since most programs operate on loops,  this means  that 
   data  is  sent to the processor much quicker when  repetitive  data  is 
   needed  again  (as compared to the 100-120ns RAMs that  most  computers 
   use).
      Also very popular are customized keyboards with completely PC-like 
   replacements  for both the ST and the Mega ST.  However,  its when  you 
   realize  that over 85% of ST users in Germany have  monochrome  systems 
   and  its when you see the speed and size of hard drives for the  ST  in 
   Germany  that  you really realise that the ST here means  BUSINESS  and 
   SERIOUS  work...  none  of this game-playing rubbish for  the  Germans! 
   There  are a huge numbers of firms here making hard drives for the  ST. 
   In the UK,  it boils down to 4 or 5 competitors (ie. Third Coast, Power 
   Computing,  Frontier,  Atari  with  Triangle more or less  out  of  the 
   running  these  days).  Here there must be maybe  15-20  with  products 
   ranging  from  5ms  access time,  800k per second  transfer  rate  type 
   systems  to the new 'Gigafile',  an optical Write-Once-Read-Many  times 
   laser-disk system with a 600 Mb capacity.  These,  however,  might well 
   take  time to hit the UK with the exchange rate being so appalling  and 
   these type of products being VERY prone to exchange rate fluctuations.
        The  ST  is big here but not as big as I had  thought.  The  games 
   market  is dominated by the Amiga,  the ST games scene being  virtually 
   non-existent. This is reflected in all four of the regular ST magazines 
   here  which  seem  to be made up  solely  of  serious-product  reviews,    
   serious-product advertising, and programming courses. Only one magazine 
   here comes with a disk, its name 'ST-Plus'. The whole magazine (and the 
   disk which accompanies it and only works in monochrome) is dedicated to 
   programming methods, help and tips.
        With  the ST being put almost totally to serious use,  the  public 
   domain flourishes. It is well-known that the Public Domain is not noted 
   for  its  quality  games but its  quality  applications  and  utilities 
   packages in the ST scene. With so many programmers around to create the 
   demand for such things and,  indeed, to write such things, the PD scene 
   here  is  brimming with exceedingly good quality software  for  serious 
   applications:  MIDI programs, utilities, PD CAD and DTP packages all in 
   good  quantity and quality mean that PD libraries here thrive  and  are 
   vast  in  number.  Once again,  where there are maybe 6-8  good  public 
   domain libraries in the UK,  here there might be over 40 each  boasting 
   libraries of over 2000 disks.  Whatsmore,  people here DO send money to 
   deserving  shareware writers and there are many who make a living  from 
   such things (!).
        One would think that with all the incredible PD software here  and 
   the interest of programmers to share their work and discuss programming 
   that Atari BBS would flourish.  However,  this is not the case. The few 
   that  do exist seem far behind in complexity and  technology,  most  of 
   them  being run on about 10 megs with modems that just make it to  V22. 
   Most  of  these  also  cater for specialized  areas  such  as  MIDI  or 
   computer-aided design. Perhaps the Germans think that they should leave 
   the shareware- and pd-pushing aspects to the PD libraries who do such a 
   good job... who knows.
        Although it may seem that Germany is far advanced to us in the  UK 
   in  many  aspects  of the STs' uses,  the price  of  hardware  here  is 
   extremely  high,  even after taking into account the  present  exchange 
   rates.  If you want to buy cheap,  it is best to look to the UK or  the 
   USA ST markets.  The lack of ST games players must also be hurting  the 
   Atari market.  It is the games players who by far make up the gross  ST 
   population in the UK and are themselves ensuring the emergence of  more 
   software  for serious users and well as leisure users.  Computer  users 
   often start off as games-players and develop a more serious interest in 
   their computers when they learn more about it.  Hence I would say  that 
   the  German  market is slowly killing itself and unless  something  new 
   turns  up and things take a radical change,  the ST here has a  limited 
   future.  Prices  in the PC market here,  in the meantime,  are  already 
   endeavouring to ensure that the ST is a shortlived phenomenon,  sad  as 
   it may seem.


--SitComm-May-1990--------------------------------------------------------------

                    Waterloo sunset

      As the French tourist once queried why do you British name 
your railway stations after defeats? The Iron Duke himself made 
Waterloo out to be  "...the most desperate business I ever was 
in." Once having played Peter Turcans' second innovative wargame 
the reviewer can only agree, its a knife contest playing either 
side in a battle that's much smaller in area and units than Borodino
(ST World 37). A quick recap though on why this system is the best thing
yet for computer wargames.

                    At the speed of horse?

      Before the advent of radio the main way to command an army in 
the field was by rider. Commands and information back from the front 
went as fast as the rider (about 5 1/2 miles per hour). By the time 
the order to attack had arrived the corps in question might be in 
full retreat. The other limitation was that nobody could see further 
than the next ridge - no all seeing AWACS here. So not only the 
commander couldn't react to the event in real time they often didn't 
see it happening either. The vast majority of wargames before Turcan 
have simply ignored these factors and have presented the gamer with 
god like powers and senses.

                    Its all in the AI 

      The Turcan system gives you a realistic static perspective 
view of the battlefield from the point of view of the commander 
and limited in range by the Eye Ball Mk1 - usually up to 2 miles 
for a land battle. Combined with this is an excellent parsing 
module that allows the entry of English commands that are relayed 
to the corps commander by rider and are thus subject to fortune 
on the battlefield - they get lost, killed or confused. 
Driving the whole is the artificial intelligence (AI) at the four 
levels of command; Commander in Chief, corps, division and 
regiment - the gamer provides the played sides commanders AI. The 
actual mechanics and sequence of play are derived from boardgame 
rules. All of this has been attempted before but never as a whole 
nor with the historical rigour that Peter Turcan displays. 

                    War and Peace

         Waterloo was the climatic battle of the Napoleonic era, a 
period of war and some peace that ran from 1799 to 1815, bringing 
together for the first and last time the two geniuses of the 
battlefield - Emperor Napoleon and the Duke of Wellington. In the 
previous four days the French army had fought two battles and 
thus succeeded in driving the Allied and Prussian armies apart. 
Now on the 18th June time was the essence for Napoleon to 
defeat Wellington before an AI Blucher at the head of the 
Prussian Army intervened from the east. 

                    Hougomont or bust  

      The game starts at 11 am as the previous night had seen a 
deluge of rain that made for a muddy field of battle that made 
the siting of the critical artillery prolonged. The battle itself 
takes place in an area about 3 square miles with a shallow valley 
separating the armies. There are 3 garrisoned outposts in front 
of the Allied army, Hougomont - superbly detailed in the game, La 
Haie Saint with its sand-pit and La Haie. They are the key to the 
Allied defence. The majority of the Allied army lies either on 
the ridge or behind it out of artillery line of fire. Arrayed 
against this are Reille's corp to the west and D'Erlon's to the 
east each being supported by a cavalry corps whilst in the centre 
rear is Lobau's corp and the Guard. There is no leeway in 
reserves if you make a fatal error in your orders to the corps as 
to when and where they attack. As once an attack goes in you 
learn that it takes hours for a corps to pull back and reform. 
And without formed reserves your going nowhere fast. You can tell 
how well formed the corps divisions are as you can see them 
either in neatly turned out lines and columns or scattered about 
with some regiments heading rapidly for the rear.

                    Point and panic

      By using the hand pointer ( changed from the telescope 
cursor in Borodino ) and clicking on a unit their status appears 
in the text window. This is effective up to the horizon, the only 
way to check further is to move the HQ which you can do once ever 
15 minute game turn. Just don't do what I did in the first game 
and move the HQ into the path of a routing unit. All of a 
sudden Napoleon found that the HQ was disorganized and wasn't 
able to issue any orders for 2 turns or move the HQ. I sat there 
like a lemon forced to look south whilst the battle raged on to 
the north and broken regiments fled past the HQ. By which time 
the first of Bluchers corps had started to arrive on the eastern 
flank. 
                    La Garde recule!

      Waterloo is an easier game to get into than Borodino, its 
size and scope make for a quicker more comprehensible game. I 
could image actually playing this by mail - one option the game 
gives. The corps commanders AI is quite believable, indeed you 
curse Reille as he sends Jerome's division off on its own to 
attack Hougomont. The victory points  now increment thus 
aiding you in noting how well or not your doing. Yet the graphics 
are so realistic you can see by looking around locally just how 
well its going. The manual is an improvement on Borodino's tho' I 
couldn't find any note on the unit colours - I like to know if my 
heavy cavalry are about to crash into British guards or Brunswick 
militia.  One final plea would be for an order retrieval module 
so you can keep track of your sent orders. The game system 
is excellent as it stands and can only improve as its developed 
further - it has great potential. 


Design: Dr. Peter Turcan.
Publisher: PSS/Mirrorsoft.
Price: 24.99.

--SitComm-May-1990--------------------------------------------------------------

Product: Quartet
Cost: 49.95 (UKP)
Publisher: Microdeal
Reviewed by STeVeN

      Quartet  allows  you  to create 4  channel  music  using  sampled 
      instruments on an Atari ST,  something previously only attainable 
      either by having an Amiga.  For your money, you get a massive box 
      containing  3 single sided disks and a 67 page poor quality  ring 
      bound  manual and a lot of empty space.   Not the best  presented 
      program I've ever seen.

      The  Quartet  package actually consists of  three  programs,  the 
      music  editor,  a voice editor and a sample processor.   It  also 
      comes with a selection of samples for you to use, some demo songs 
      and some modules to let you use the music in your own programs.

      The  sample processor lets you take sound samples that have  been 
      produced  from any sound sampler and manipulate them into a  form 
      readable by Quartet.  This includes converting the sample between 
      Time and Frequency domains and shifting the frequency so that  it 
      plays  the correct note (instruments should be normalised  to  an 
      A).   You may also apply low or high pass filters, loop the sound 
      for  a  sustained instrument and various other  effects  such  as 
      anharmonic  suppression  and  ramping (to avoid  clicks  when  it 
      loops).   My  only complaints with this are that  the  conversion 
      between  time  and  frequency  can take  quite  a  time  (several 
      seconds) and you can only listen to the whole sample and not  the 
      part in the zoom buffer, making it difficult to edit out sections 
      from  a larger sample.   However the software supplied with  most 
      samplers will let you do this so it is not really a  problem.   I 
      have successfully processed many samples with this program  taken 
      from the Amiga.

      The  voice  editor simply allows you to make up a  voice  set  by 
      loading  in instruments created with the sample  processor.   You 
      may listen to the samples,  set the playback frequency, insert or 
      delete samples.

      The  music  editor is the main program that you use most  of  the 
      time.  It has a GEM style user interface with pull down menus and 
      icons.  The main part of the screen is taken up with a treble and 
      bass  cleff.   You simply click on the staves to add  or  replace 
      notes.   Below  the  staves are icons representing  note  lengths 
      ranging  from semi-quaver to dotted semi-breve.   Below this  are 
      some more icons for selecting things like tempo and which channel 
      you  are  editting.   From  the pull down menus  you  can  select 
      instruments,  load and save,  and set the time signature.   Other 
      functions such as slides and repeats are done using  key-presses.  
      You may also input data from the MIDI port.   I havn't tried this 
      yet so can not comment on it.   There are also facilities to  cut 
      and paste a block of data.

      The editor although adequate for editting small sections of music 
      has many shortcomings.  The worst being that you can only see one 
      channel  at  a time,  selecting voice changes is  a  bit  fiddly.  
      Editting  is awkward since if you accidently click on top  of  an 
      existing  note  it is replaced with one of the  current  selected 
      length  and  you  bar lines are all  out  of  place.   Moving  to 
      different sections is also difficult since there is no ability to 
      include  section  marks and whenever you change channel  you  are 
      moved back to the start.   However there is a menu option to move 
      to  a  specific bar line.   It would have been better to  have  a 
      track structure similar to programs like Soundtracker,  where you 
      could edit small sections and then paste them together to make  a 
      complete song.   The only way I've found to create long pieces of 
      music  is to edit a section at a time and then tediously use  the 
      paste buffer to add it to the end of the overall piece.

      Sound  output  maybe either through the ST's monitor  or  through 
      the replay or replay professional cartridges (also available from 
      MicroDeal).   You may select the playback frequency between 4 and 
      16 KHz.  You get better quality with the higher frequencies.  The 
      disadvantage being that a lot of processor time is used  up.   To       
      use  quartet songs in your own programs there is  program  module 
      included  which  you  simply load in  using  the  Gemdos  Pexec() 
      command  and  then tell it the addresses of your song  and  voice 
      set.   Examples are provided in C,  Basic and assembly  language.  
      There  are  two versions provided,  one is a safe  version  which 
      preserves  all of the 68000's registers,  whilst the  other  only 
      lets  you use a few registers in your program,  but lets you  use 
      higher playback frequencies and uses up less processor time.

      Overall, Quartet is a very good program, but let down a little by 
      its editting.   However there are no other progams for sale  that 
      will do what Quartet does and I hope the author will continue  to 
      support  it by adding new features.   It should also not  be  too 
      long before there are some Public Domain utilities for Quartet to 
      allow  conversion between other music formats.   In fact  I  have 
      already  written a program to convert from IFF SMUS (as  used  by       
      Sonix on the Amiga) to Quartet.

      There  are  several quartet songs available for  download  on  my 
      bulletin board (My Little Phoney, 0865-773277)

--SitComm-May-1990--------------------------------------------------------------

 The Unofficial Smiley Dictionary
 -------------------------------- 
 :-)   Your basic smiley. This smiley is used to inflect a sarcastic or
       joking statement since we can't hear voice inflection over Unix.
 
 ;-)   Winky smiley. User just made a flirtatious and/or sarcastic remark.
       More of a "don't hit me for what I just said" smiley.
 :-(   Frowning smiley. User did not like that last statement or is upset
       or depressed about something.
 
 :-I   Indifferent smiley. Better than a Frowning smiley but not quite as 
       good as a happy smiley
 :->   User just made a really biting sarcastic remark. Worse than a :-).

 :->   User just made a really devilish remark.

 ;->   Winky and devil combined. A very lewd remark was just made.
 
 Those are the basic ones...Here are some somewhat less common ones:
 
 (-:   User is left handed
 %-)   User has been staring at a green screen for 15 hours straight
 :*)   User is drunk
 [:]   User is a robot
 8-)   User is wearing sunglasses
 B:-)  Sunglasses on head
 ::-)  User wears normal glasses
 B-)   User wears horn-rimmed glasses
 8:-)  User is a little girl
 :-)-8 User is a Big girl
 :-{)  User has a mustache
 :-{}  User wears lipstick
 {:-)  User wears a toupee
 }:-(  Toupee in an updraft
 :-[   User is a Vampire
 :-E   Bucktoothed vampire
 :-F   Bucktoothed vampire with one tooth missing
 :-7   User just made a wry statement
 :-*   User just ate something sour
 :-)ss  User drools
 :-ss)  User has a cold
 :'-(  User is crying
 :'-)  User is so happy, s/he is crying
 :-@   User is screaming
 :-#   User wears braces
 :^)   User has a broken nose
 :v)   User has a broken nose, but it's the other way
 :_)   User's nose is sliding off of his face
 :<)   User is from an Ivy League School
 :-&   User is tongue tied.
 =:-)  User is a hosehead
 -:-)  User is a punk rocker
 -:-(  (real punk rockers don't smile)
 :=)   User has two noses
 +-:-) User is the Pope or holds some other religious office
 `:-)  User shaved one of his eyebrows off this morning
 ,:-)  Same thing...other side
 |-I   User is asleep
 |-O   User is yawning/snoring
 :-Q   User is a smoker
 :-?   User smokes a pipe
 O-)   Megaton Man On Patrol!  (or else, user is a scuba diver)
 O :-) User is an angel (at heart, at least)
 :-P   Nyahhhh!
 :-S   User just made an incoherent statement
 :-D   User is laughing (at you!)
 :-X   User's lips are sealed
 :-C   User is really bummed
 <|-)  User is Chinese
 <|-(  User is Chinese and doesn't like these kind of jokes
 :-/   User is skeptical
 C=:-) User is a chef
 @=    User is pro-nuclear war
 *<:-) User is wearing a Santa Claus Hat
 :-o   Uh oh!
 (8-o  It's Mr. Bill!
 *:o)  And Bozo the Clown!
 3:]   Pet smiley
 3:[   Mean Pet smiley
 d8=   Your pet beaver is wearing goggles and a hard hat.
 E-:-) User is a Ham radio operator
 :-9   User is licking his/her lips
 %-6   User is braindead
 [:-)  User is wearing a walkman
 (:I   User is an egghead
 <:-I  User is a dunce
 K:P   User is a little kid with a propeller beenie
 @:-)  User is wearing a turban
 :-0   No Yelling!  (Quiet Lab)
 :-:   Mutant Smiley
       The invisible smiley
 .-)   User only has one eye
 ,-)   Ditto...but he's winking
 X-(   User just died
 8 :-) User is a wizard
 C=}>;*{))  Mega-
Smiley... A drunk, devilish chef with a toupee in an updra
                           with a moustache, and a double chin
 
 Note: A lot of these can be typed without noses to make midget smileys.
 
 :)  Midget smiley
 :]  Gleep...a friendly midget smiley who will gladly be your friend
 =)  Variation on a theme...
 :} - What should we call these? (what?)
 :) - Happy
 :> - what?
 :@ - what?
 :D - Laughter
 :I - Hmmm...
 :( - Sad
 :[ - Real Downer
 :< - what?
 :{ - what?
 :O - Yelling
 :C - what?
 :Q - what?
 :,( - Crying
 [] - Hugs and
 :* - Kisses
 |I - Asleep
 |^o -Snoring
 
   :-`.smiley spitting out its chewing tobacco
   :-1.smiley bland face
   :-!.."
   :-@.smiley face screaming
   :-#|.smiley face with bushy mustache
   :-$.smiley face with it's mouth wired shut
   :-%.smiley banker
   :-6.smiley after eating something sour
   :^).smiley with pointy nose (righty)
   :-7.smiley after a wry statement
   8-).smiley swimmer
   :-*.smiley after eating something bitter
   :-&.smiley which is tongue-tied
   :-0.smiley orator
      .smiley invisible man
   (:-(.unsmiley frowning
   (:-).smiley big-face
   ):-).."
   ):-( unsmiley big-face
   )8-) scuba smiley big-face
   =:-).smiley punk-rocker
   =:-( (real punk rockers don't smile)
   +:-).smiley priest
   :-q.smiley trying to touch its tongue to its nose
   :-e.disappointed smiley
   :-t.cross smiley
   :-i.semi-smiley
   :-o.smiley singing national anthem
   :-p.smiley sticking its tongue out (at you!)
   :-[.un-smiley blockhead
   :-].smiley blockhead
   :-{.smiley variation on a theme
   :-}.ditto
   {:-).smiley with its hair parted in the middle
   }:-).above in an updraft
   :-a.lefty smiley touching tongue to nose
   :-s.smiley after a BIZARRE comment
   :-d.lefty smiley razzing you
   g-).smiley with ponce-nez glasses
   :-j.left smiling smiley
   :-k.beats me, looks like something, tho.
   :-l.y. a. s.
   :-:.mutant smiley
   :-\.undecided smiley
   :-|."have an ordinary day" smiley
   ;-).winking smiley
   :-<.real sad smiley
   :->.y.a.s.
   :-z.y.a.c.s.
   :-x."my lips are sealed" smiley
   :-c.bummed out smiley
   :-v.talking head smiley
   :v).left-pointing nose smiley
   :-b.left-pointing tongue smiley
   :-/.lefty undecided smiley
   :-?.smiley smoking a pipe
   .-].one-eyed smiley
   ,-}.wry and winking
   0-).smiley cyclops (scuba diver?)
   :-=).older smiley with mustache
   :u).smiley with funny-looking left nose
   :n).smiley with funny-looking right nose
   :<.midget unsmiley
   :>.midget smiley
   }:^#}) mega-smiley: updrafted bushy-
          mustached pointy nosed smiley with
          a double-chin
 
 :-).ha ha...    ssss:-(.net.flame
 |-).hee hee...    O |-).net.religion
 |-D.ho ho
 :->.hey hey...    8 :-I.net.unix-wizards
 :-(.boo hoo...      X-(.net.suicide
 :-I.hmm...        E-:-I.net.ham-radio
 :-O.uh oh...       >:-I.net.startrek
 :-P.nyah nyah..    3:o[.net.pets
 |-P.yuk
 
 :-}.beard
 :-{.mustache
 :-#.braces
 :-X.bow tie
 :-Q.smoker
 <:I.dunce
 (:I.egghead
 @:I.turban
 
 8-).glasses
 B-).horn-rims
 8:-).glasses on forehead
 :-8(.condescending stare
 ;-).wink
 :-<.mad
 
 Drama :-(.Comedy :-).Surprise :-o.Suspense 8-|
 
 Male.:- Female.>- Birth.|-O
 Death.8-#
 Infinity.8
 
 Have fun with these!


--SitComm-May-1990--------------------------------------------------------------

                       ... And that's just my opinion 

      STeVeN's comment on the state of the computer games industry.

      No  one  can help but notice that despite  the  proliferation  of 
      games  available  for  the Atari ST,  there  are  very  few  high 
      quality addictive playable games amongst them.   Most of them are 
      either  poor quality arcade conversions,  film licences  or  some 
      other pointless tie-in or endorsement.   Most games are also very 
      expensive being between 20 and 30, with some costing even more.

      The high cost is generally put down to low sales caused by piracy 
      and  the  longer  development times that 16  bit  software  needs 
      compared to 8 bit.  I'm sure everybody reading this has their own 
      theories  and  complaints  about the so  called  "money  grabbing 
      publishers".

      As  a  veteran games creator myself (I'm not keen  on  the  terms 
      programmer  or coder,  because creating games is a lot more  than 
      just  coding),  I  may be a little more aware of the  facts  than 
      those  outside  the industry.   Licensed games outsell  most  new 
      original  games several times over,  despite lacking entirely  in 
      gameplay and even getting bad reviews in the magazines.  Thus the 
      only people who who can really be blamed for the situation is the 
      consumer who goes out and buys them!

      Any publisher with a business sense is going to continue creating 
      what sells rather than what is good,  so the only way to  improve 
      the  quality of games is to only buy the good  original  playable 
      games and leave the awful arcade conversions and film licences on 
      the  shelves.   Do not be tempted by the misleading  adverts  and 
      back-of-the-box screenshots (they are probably loading screens or 
      faked up screens).   Read and take note of magazine reviews  (not 
      previews).

      Also piracy does account for a loss of revenue and the people who 
      lose  out  here most are the developers and  the  consumer.   The 
      retailers,  distributers and publishers just increase the  retail 
      price  to  cover this.

      Many  people  seem  to think that because  thay  can  not  afford 
      software then they are entitled to copy it for nothing.   This is 
      completely  wrong  and is the same as saying that you  should  be 
      able to steal anything you think is too expensive.

      Many people seem to still be under the impression that games  are 
      still  developed  by  teenage  millionaire  wizz  kids  in  their 
      bedrooms at weekends,  but the reality is that games are  written 
      by a professional team of developers over a period of many months 
      on  below  average  salaries.

      Many  people think that computer game technology has not  changed 
      since Space Invaders and that all there is to producing games  is 
      to bang in a couple of numbers into your machine and stick it in 
      a pretty box.   The reality is that a similar amount of  creative 
      effort  goes into a computer game in terms  of  concepts,  ideas, 
      graphics,  music and algorithms than into other media types  such 
      as  Books,  Films and Music,  yet you don't go and photocopy  the 
      latest novel!

      Few  developers  can afford to spend years on  original  programs 
      when they will sell far fewer copies than a simple 3 month arcade 
      conversion  or film tie-in and publishers are only interested  in 
      what they can sell.

      - STeVeN.... And thats just my opinion! 

--SitComm-May-1990--------------------------------------------------------------

      SiTComm Magazine would like to point out that the views of the
      writer of this article do not necessarily reflect the views of
      the magazine.


      Hacking By Marcion

      "...To cut and clear (a way, path, etc) as through undergrowth".

      So runs the Collins Dictionary definition for  the  word  'hack'.
      Those who are familiar, either to a lesser or greater extent with
      this ever-increasing activity -  made possible by computer, modem
      and telephone,  may  well  feel  this  adequately  describes  the
      activity or purpose of hacking.

      Why 'hack' ? Firstly many do it for  the  challenge  of  invading
      unknown territory which  is  prohibited  to  them.  Despite  this
      violation,  they enjoy the protection of  simply  being  able  to
      'drop carrier' if things go awry. Secondly, it can have financial
      benefits, ie. using the account of a Multi-National to make calls
      abroad that would usually be impossible for  the  average  modem-
      user.  Whilst some might deem this as theft, the fact remains the
      account-holder can firstly afford it, and secondly can only  have
      it in the first place by commercial exploitation; therefore  when
      this occurs, the hacker is simply retrieving what does not belong
      to the account holder in the first place.   This may be seen as a
      rather imperfect way of achieving this, but no one would  suggest
      we live in a perfect world in the first place.

      However, the most popular reason for this activity appears  to be
      for perusing information that  is  otherwise  unavailable to  the
      "general public". As time goes on, it is becoming more obvious to
      even the most 'security conscious' person that the United Kingdom
      is fast becoming a country of secrets, restricted information and
      "access denied". An article appeared in the Observer not long ago
      pointing out that in the last five years  Britain  had  become  a
      country that was more secretive than many Eastern Bloc countries;
      some therefore see hacking as a means to undo  the  very suspect,
      if not dishonest, lengths that various agencies and bodies go  to
      in compiling confidential (and often incorrect) information about
      people and then carefully ensuring no one can access this  unless
      they have some spurious government power to do so, or more often,
      have the money to buy it. The newspapers abound with accounts  of
      the misery caused to so many in trying to obtain information held
      by various authorities about themselves.

      There have in fact been several incidents where hackers have left
      warning messages to say they  have  penetrated  the  system,  but
      these have been ignored, eg. one person hacked inside a  Building
      Society system, then happily travelled around its  databases  and
      then, very charitably, left messages at  various  points  telling
      the Society he had successfully penetrated  the  system.  A  week
      later he called back  only to find the messages had not been read
      and nothing had been changed. It seems that with the epidemic  of
      secrecy attacking this country at present,  complacency  comes  a
      close second. Hacking must be seen in the light of current trends
      and attitudes and behavioural patterns. It is a reaction, and   a
      wholly legitimate, reaction against  depersonalisation  and   the
      loss of freedom and personal initiative. A refusal to "comply and
      submit" without protest.

      There are very few  very  occasions  when  hacking  has  actually
      effected physical damage. Invariably those who hack  simply  wish
      to see if they can beat the system, almost as if in an  Adventure
      game.  They  may  also  want  to  travel  though  the  vaults  of
      information hidden away from prying eyes, which in reality should
      be available to the very people about whom they relate.

      The Member of  Parliament,  Emma  Nicholson,  has  recently  made
      stenuous efforts to curtail and criminalise hacking although  the
      subject has only  attracted  extraordinary  sensationalism    and
      inaccurate reporting by the ever news-hungry news  media.  It  is
      interesting to note  that  Ms  Nicholson,  so  dedicated  to  the
      prohibition of hacking is also a keen  supporter  of  the  Embryo
      legislation. Yes, the one that  will  allows  our  fellow  infant
      humans to be experimented upon and then  flushed  down the labor-
      atory sink together with the  garbage. Admittedly, some might not
      see the connection, nor the parallel,   but I find  it  more than
      interesting that the same person who is so keen to stop one  type
      of  freedom  also supports the destruction of another. In reality
      the whole question revolves around the rights  of the individual.
      This is closely allied with the changes at present  occurring  in
      this country where more restrictions are continually and consist-
      -ently laid down to squash people to stereotypical forms. In sum,
      the weak just go 'under' and the remainder become unthinking  in-
      sensitive 'cardboard' people who cannot see or think further than
      their bank balance. People who choose not to conform, or even God
      forbid, challenge the system - and hacking is one example of such
      "anti-social" behaviour - simply must be criminalised.  All  such
      people, whether labelled 'dangerous deviants',   revolutionaries.
      non-conformists, are all fighting a system that  is   obsessively
      intent on reducing people to non-thinking unimaginative robots.

      This is no endeavour to 'politicise' the matter but rather arises
      from a study of behaviour in 1990. Those who hack must have their
      wrists slapped as they are not obeying 'the rules'and their  very
      activity shows they have not succumbed to State brain-washing  to
      obey the rules.  Returning to the quotation supplied at the  very
      beginning; hackers are part of a group who are "cutting  a   way"
      through an undergrowth of distortion, deception, secrecy, restri-
      -cted power, disproprtionate power and wealth,  and greed. To put
      it crudely, hacking is sticking up 2 fingers at the power barons,
      and only a fool would say that is a bad thing to do.

      As this "democratic country" (!!!) of ours sees yet more and more
      laws restricting various activities of the individual, albeit  it
      causes no harm to anyone, it is up to those who  are  enlightened
      enough to see the way things are  going, to  'stand  up  and  be
      counted' and combat this. The State's anti-hacking  hysteria   is
      just another means of  suppressing  individuality, expression and
      freedom, only and simply to protect excessive profits  and  those
      who seek to control our lives. A curse on both their houses.

                                                               Marcion.

--SitComm-May-1990--------------------------------------------------------------

                        Making the most of your modem

      Part 1 - What type of modem to buy?

      Since  most people who are reading this must have already  worked 
      out how to log onto a board,  download files and un-archive them, 
      I will assume a basic level of intelligence!

      Firstly,  it  is  in your best interest to purchase  the  fastest 
      modem you can afford.  Although you may have been brought up in a 
      society  where  you generally try to find the cheapest  model  of 
      anything  this  does not work with modems  because  your  running 
      costs  (i.e.  phone bills) soon make your initial modem  purchase 
      pretty insignificant in comparison.  At the moment, most bulletin 
      boards  will support up to 2400 baud and there are an  increasing 
      number that support HST or V32.   Almost everybody will save  the 
      cost  of a faster modem in the reduced phone bills after  only  a 
      few quarters.

      If  you  call bulletin boards at 300 baud then STOP  IT!   It  is 
      costing you a fortune.   There are very few modems that won't  at 
      least  support  V23 (1200/75).   Some of the cheaper  modems  may 
      require  you  to use a special program to allow the  use  of  the 
      split baud rates.   On the ST a program called V23EMU will  allow 
      you  to use unbuffered V23 modems.   Almost every ST based  board 
      will have this in its download areas and if you have difficulties 
      setting  it  up  then most sysops will be glad to  sort  out  the 
      problem.  There is nothing sadder than watching someone logged on 
      at 300 baud.

      V23  (1200/75)  callers are amongst the most  disliked  group  of 
      callers  to  your average sysop because they are quite  happy  to 
      download  for hours on end,  but because they can only upload  at 
      300  or 75 baud they rarely (if ever) do.   Another problem  with 
      V23  is  that cheap imported modems or the  newer  faster  modems 
      often do not support this speed,  so Sysops are left in a dilemma 
      about  whether to go put a fast modem on their board at the  risk 
      of losing a lot of callers.  So by using V23 who are holding back 
      the  use of more advanced technology.   If you are a  V23  caller 
      then do yourself a favour and buy a 2400 baud modem.   There  are 
      several  reasonably  priced  modems from the  likes  of  Hi-Tech, 
      Frontier and Amstrad,  or you could get a 2nd hand  one.   You'll 
      wonder how you ever managed with 1200 baud once you upgrade.


      Part 2 - Connecting to a Bulletin Board

      I  don't intend to go into the mechanics of actually  logging  on 
      since  as I said before anybody reading this already knows  that!  
      What I will do is to try and point out some "obvious" facts  that 
      may have eluded you before.

      You will need a terminal emulation program to use your modem.  On 
      the  Atari ST there is a good choice,  many of them being  Public 
      Domain  or  Shareware.   Some of the most  popular  ones  include 
      Uniterm  (my  favourite),   Vanterm  and  Flash.   Most  terminal 
      programs  will  include  facilities to auto-log on  to  a  board, 
      capture text into a file for later perusal and of course to  send 
      and receive files.   I will go into file transfer in more  detail 
      later on,  but for now the most used protocols are XModem, YModem 
      and  Zmodem.   You  should  find some of  these  built  into  the 
      program.

      Make  sure you have set your RS232 settings  up  correctly.   The 
      main  settings  will include baud rate (This is  the  speed  used 
      between  the computer and modem and not necessarily the  same  as 
      your  connect  speed,   particularly  if  your  modem  is   speed 
      buffered).   Other settings are length, Parity and Stop bits, for 
      most bulletin boards setting this to 8 bits, no parity and 1 stop 
      bit  (8N1) is the best.   If you set it to 7  bits,  Even  Parity 
      (7E1), which for some reason a lot of people seem to do, then you 
      will not be able to download or upload binary files,  though  you 
      will  be  able to use the message bases.   Other  settings  could 
      include local echo which should be OFF since most bulletin boards 
      echo  back  your characters.   Feel free to experiment  with  the 
      other settings.

      If you call several bulletin boards please try to use a different 
      password on each board.   You may think this is silly,  but there 
      have been cases where people have somehow got hold of a  password 
      file  from one board and then used those same passwords on  other 
      boards where those users may have higher privileges to cause  all 
      sorts of damage.

      When  leaving messages use the normal typing technique  of  mixed 
      lower and upper case.   If you type in upper case then firstly it 
      is  more  difficult to read and secondly it is  a  convention  to 
      indicate  that  you  are SHOUTING IN A VERY  LOUD  AND  OFFENSIVE 
      MANNER!   If you are one of these people then please try to  find 
      out where your caps lock key is!

      Be  aware of your phone costs,  you should have a little  booklet 
      from  British  Telecom describing how to calculate  phone  calls.  
      The  difference between cheap,  standard and peak rate  calls  is 
      considerable so you should always call in cheap rate times  (i.e. 
      6pm till 8am weekdays and all day Weekends).   Also be aware that 
      if  calling  foreign  countries  the  cheap  rate  times  may  be 
      different.   Try to keep account of how much you use your  modem, 
      then  you will not be too surprised when you get the bill at  the 
      end  of the quarter.   For example a normal trunk call  (B  rate) 
      costs you about 4 pounds per hour, so if you are on-line for half 
      an hour a day then that will cost you 180 pounds per quarter.  If 
      there  is a big demo that will take you 60 minutes  to  download, 
      then consider how much it is costing and perhaps wouldn't it have 
      been cheaper to buy it from a PD library instead?

      Evening time is the most busy period for bulletin boards  because 
      due  to the society we live in,  it is the time when most  people 
      have  spare  time  and also telephone  bills  are  cheaper  then.  
      Because of this most sysops do not like people downloading  large 
      files during this time period.  Downloading is better done either 
      early morning or at weekends.

      If you are calling a bulletin board to leave a message,  then try 
      to  prepare it off-line with a text editor and then upload it  to 
      the board in one chunk.  Composing messages while sitting on-line 
      can be very time consuming, not to mention being awkward with the 
      on-line  editors.   If you do upload a message prepared  off-line 
      then  make sure your message is saved out in ASCII  format.   For 
      example if you use 1st Word disable WP mode before saving.   Some 
      boards  have  the facility to upload a message using  a  transfer 
      protocol  like Xmodem or Zmodem.   If this is available then  use 
      that.   If not then you will have to do an Ascii upload  straight 
      into  the text editor.   This is fraught with problems and  often 
      you will lose the start of lines.  If your terminal program  will 
      allow  you,  then  set the end of line delay to about  a  second.  
      Some  boards  will  have the facility  to  archive  and  download 
      messages.   If  this is available then you should use it  because 
      then you can log on, file all the new messages and log off.  Then 
      you can read the messages in your own time without paying British 
      telecom  loads-a-money.   Then if you wish to reply  prepare  the 
      messages and call back to upload them.   This could  considerably 
      reduce your on-line time!

      Phew...  This is getting to be a lot longer than I was  expecting 
      and I havn't even started on File transferring or File archiving.  
      So I guess this will have to wait till the next issue.

--SitComm-May-1990--------------------------------------------------------------

      There are many sources of Public Domain software,  mostly it 
      is  spread  through  the use of  Bulletin  Boards,  specific 
      Public  Domain  disc  libraries and  swapping  software  with 
      friends.  There  are advantages and disadvantages to choosing 
      one particular method or another. 

      Bulletin Boards

      The  software  on  Bulletin Boards tends to  vary  from  the 
      excellent  to  very poor.  If you are lucky enough  to  have 
      access  to usenet then you are in a position to obtain  some 
      of  the latest software before it gets to the public  domain 
      libraries  as many authors also have access to usenet  - such 
      as  the excellent comms package Uniterm and the Double Click 
      series  of software.  Unfortunately it seems that the use  of 
      usenet  has  to  be paid for,  and if your only  reason  for 
      subscribing  is  to get public domain  software  and  totally 
      ignore  the varied and interesting messages then you are best 
      to  avoid  it.  However saying this "Tharr"  Bulletin  Board 
      (0234  261804  -  V21 to 22bis  -  24Hours)  does offer free 
      access  to  usenet.  If you do call this  BB,  and  download 
      software - please enter a few messages as well.
      There are other BBs that offer good downloads as  well,  but 
      as a general rule, leave plenty of messages. Most SysOps get 
      annoyed if all their effort in putting a BB up goes to waste 
      in users who just wish to download software.
      However if the thought of a large phone bill deters you, and 
      believe me large phone bills are very common - especially if 
      all you download much software at slow speeds,  then you may 
      need to turn to Disc Libraries.

      Public Domain Libraries

      Public   Domain  Libraries  differ  greatly  in  their  disc 
      collection,  service and prices.  I think that,  to show  my 
      point,  it may help if I compare a couple contributors to the 
      Public Domain Library scene.

      SoftVille:  SoftVille  take their service very seriously and 
      don't  offer  a home run service.  Their disk collection  is 
      large and covers a range of different types of software.  
      The Catalogue is well held together,  bound and a nice touch 
      i  thought was the pages at the back which showed print outs 
      of clip art - you can see exactly what you will buy.
      Their  prices are quite expensive - roughly   2.50  per disk, 
      Single Sided and   4.00 disk double sided.  Members of  their 
      club  get  reductions.  However,  I think that the price  is 
      justified in that you receive a complete service, they offer 
      a  lot  more  than just  Public  Domain  software  - Labels, 
      Printer  paper,  blank disks,  commercial software and  even 
      hardware.                    

      When  I  asked them why they thought that they  were  better 
      than  other Public Domain Libraries,  the reply - we receive 
      more  disks than other libraries,  400 orders each and  every 
      day.  Well,  they certainly have a following - but does this 
      mean that they are better?

      16/32:  16/32  is  a home run public  domain  library,  the 
      owner, Nick Harlow, is well known on several bulletin boards 
      and  offers a good service.  They make it to every  computer 
      show  that  is possible,  always willing to  help  out  with 
      something that you may be having problems with.
      The  catalogue  isn't  that well presented a  few  photocopied 
      sheets.  Although  this is understandable when you  look  at 
      their  price list.  The cheapest price is 50p for  every disk 
      (this  is if you supply the disk and are a member -   1.00 if 
      you don't supply the disk),    1.50 for a disk if you are not 
      a member. Very cheap i think you'll agree. 
      They specialise in Demo's from a look at their list,  a  very 
      good  collection.  Which not only covers product demos,  but 
      amazing demos from crackers and demo makers,  some which are 
      excellent but surprisingly rare. You will also find plenty of 
      utilities and comms stuff.
      Whilst  it may not look as flashy as SoftVille,  if you  are 
      prepared  to  have a good scrummage around I think  that  you 
      will find plenty of interesting disks. 
      Comparing these two libraries I came to the conclusion that 
      in  all they differ for different  people.  SoftVille  deals 
      with those who like a complete service - beginners,  but are 
      prepared to pay for it.  16/32 on the other hand tends to be 
      for  those  who know their public domain and like find  that 
      rare  piece,   possibly  before  other  libraries,  and  are 
      prepared to do quite a bit of the work themselves. 
      I think you'll find that a lot of libraries are similar  in 
      this,  and you would be well advised to keep up to date with 
      all of them, then I think you'll find one which suits you.
             
      Friends

      Well not everyone is blessed with plenty of mates with ST's. 
      One  way to gain them is to use BBs,  enter messages and you 
      will find a whole load of people out there who are  prepared 
      to swap software with you.
      Although,  it  is worth pointing out that in general  SysOps 
      and  Library owners check for viruses,  friends tend not  to 
      bother,  and  the more you swap software the greater  chance 
      you have of getting a virus on a disk.

      Matthew Miles

      Details: 

      SoftVille  -  Tel.  0705 266509.  Unit  5,  Stratfield Park, 
      Elettra Ave, Waterlooville, Hants. PO7 7XN. England.

      16/32 - Tel.  0634 710788.  35 Northcote Road, Strood, Kent. 
      ME2 2DH. 

--SitComm-May-1990--------------------------------------------------------------

                                     SysOp ?

                            Article By Matthew Miles

        Would you like to setup a Bulletin Board ? I think that many 
        people who are involved with comms think that they would like to 
        set a Bulletin Board up. How many actually succeed?

        The first thing that you need to decide is the Bulletin Board 
        Software that you are going use. The Atari ST has some common 
        pieces of BBs software - FoReM, MichTron BBS Ver.3, QBBS-ST and 
        some people now seem to be taking to STadel. Your choice really 
        depends on what you want your BBs to do. Have a look around some 
        other boards that run these pieces of software and make your mind 
        up. A piece of warning, STadel is not friendly to the first time 
        user, you have to "enter" commands. For instance .r n will Read 
        New messages. Although it is more powerfull perhaps than the 
        others. QBBS-ST is quite a new piece of software, coming from the 
        PC, where it has gained much acclaim. It's most redeaming point 
        is that it allows the SysOp to completetly design the look and 
        lay out of his BBs, in a way that none of the others do. MichTron 
        does have it's own C Style language, but yet all of the boards 
        end up almost exactly the same. 
        Both QBBS and STadel are Shareware, this will allow you to set a 
        board up, and if you don't like it move onto another piece of 
        software without having paid anything.

        Your choice of software will also be governed by the system that 
        you have. All the software above, especially QBBS and FoReM 
        require a hard disk drive. If you cannot afford a hard disk drive 
        and wish to run the BBs from floppies then it is probably 
        worthwhile having a look around BBs and public domain libraries 
        for small pieces of BB software. StarTerm is quite a nice, small,       
        piece of software. It is "styled" in much the same was as FoReM 
        but on a smaller scale.

        After you have your board set up, your main problem will be 
        getting a good userbase. There is no point in setting a BBs up if 
        it sits there all day dormant. A few ways to get a large user 
        base:

        i.  High Speeds .. Users will not be interested in someone with 
        low speeds. These days most users seem to have 2400.
 
        ii. Good Range of downloadable software. You have to decide if 
        this is a good thing, do you want your users downloading all your 
        software without returning an upload or leaving some messages.
 
        iii.Good Range of messages. Don't have one message area just 
        consisting of Atari ST messages, you will get all types of users. 
        NetWorking is a good idea, it will enable you to exchange 
        messages with other BBs, therfore many more messages. Which 
        network you join depend again on your software. FoReM has it's 
        own network as does StarNet (but does anyone use it?), QBBS will 
        enable any network although the common one is FidoNet, this is 
        largely PC orientated. Although the Atari ST is beginning to 
        feature highly now. STadel has it's own network, although it does 
        allow other networks within it. "Tharr" for instance has Usenet 
        access, which accounts largely for it's popularity.
 
        I think that your attitude is important, I see far to many "new" 
        SysOps imposing heavy restrictions on their users. Unless the 
        board is in great demand, which if it is new it won't be, then 
        you will find that the users of the board won't want anything to 
        do with it. 

        The spirit of Comms, within the comms community, it seems to have 
        a very bad impression outside of the community, is one of 
        seriousness but yet also with a lot of fun mixed in. I think the 
        secret to a good BBs is this, have areas where people can leave 
        jokes, chat, have a laugh - but yet also make sure that there are 
        areas where people can down/upload serious software and talk 
        about their ideas.

        I myself started running a BB quite a while back. I started 
        running it on a piece of PD Software called Pandora, on an ST 
        with just over 1Mb of storage. 

        I then moved to StarNet, still on the same system. I only offered 
        v21 and v23. My opening hours were 9pm to 7am.
        I didn't have many callers and the BBs was quite inactive. 
        I then moved my software over to STadel, same system and hours. 
        More people started calling and I started networking with a few 
        other BBs. This started looking up. Although i realised that 
        before long a hard drive would be required, and although i had 
        quite a few callers many were put off due to the non-standard key 
        strokes.

        I then had a chance to move my whole system over to a PC running 
        QBBS. I did so. I now run the board at the same hours, and I
        have a new modem  (which allows 22bis).
        Demand has greating picked up:
        I have had my phone line engaged (due to callers on my board) from 
        9:30pm to 2am. A great achievement I feel.  
        
        Make of this what you will, I've found that the true success of a 
        BBs is the larger the better. A great shame because I have seen 
        so many small, new boards which had shown so much promise close 
        down due to lack of callers. 

        If you do desperately want to set up a BBs then the best advice I 
        can give is stick at it, determination will get you everywhere.

        I can be contacted on the Invicta Conferencing System, V21 to 
        22b, 9pm to 7am, 0622 891308, and soon 24 hours on 0622 890888, if
        you call and a voice answers or nothing answers call the 890888.

        BBs to have a look at:

        Tharr (STadel)            0234 261804  >22bis  24 Hours
        My Little Phoney (FoReM)  0865 773277  >22bis  24 Hours
        Penthouse (FoReM)         01 9303903   >22bis  24 Hours
        JuSaVo (MichTron)         0324 32414   >22bis  24 Hours

--SitComm-May-1990--------------------------------------------------------------

 
                       The Assembly Line Interview
                       ---------------------------

    The Assembly line are  a games development team,  who  have  been 
    responsible for many good original games, including Xenon-II (with 
    the Bitmap Brothers published by Imageworks/Mirrorsoft), Pipemania 
    (published   by  Empire),    Interphase   (Imageworks/Mirrorsoft), 
    E-Motion (US Gold).  Through the use of CIX (Compulink Information 
    eXchange), they agreed to answer a few questions.  The interviewer 
    is STeVeN.
 
    Q) Thank you for agreeing to find time to answer a few  questions
       for  SiTcom.   To start with perhaps you can give us a bit  of
       background behind 'The Assembly Line', for example who are you
       and what did you do before forming TAL?
 
    A) First  of  all,  a disclaimer: this  information  has  already
       appeared  in  lots  of magazines &  is  probably  stupendously
       boring to anyone who's seen it before.  Just so you know....
 
       Martin Day:
 
       Coded Impact and Helter Skelter with John Dale for ASL  before
       moving on to Pipemania (also with John) and Xenon II with  the
       Bitmap  Brothers.   Also  the developer of  SNASM,  the  cross
       development system marketed by Cross Products.
 
       John Dale
 
       Designer rather than programmer; worked with Martin on Impact,
       etc. & later with Adrian on E-Motion.
 
       Adrian Stephens
 
       Has  been  programming for a long time, starting  with  Killer
       Gorilla on the BBC in 1981, moving on to Crazy Painter & Mr Ee
       for  the  same  machine,  Donkey  Kong  &  Ping  Pong   arcade
       conversions  for the Amstrad.  Worked with Andy on  the  sadly
       unfinished   3D  epic,  EPT,  and  produced  Powerplay,   then
       Interphase, then E-Motion on the 16 bit machines.
 
       Andy Beveridge
 
       Worked  on EPT with Adrian, then worked at Real Time Games  in
       Leeds  on Carrier Command before returning to Bristol for  the
       start of the Assembly Line.
 
       See also our resume on CIX.
 
    Q) You  must be one of the most prolific development  houses  of
       recent  times  and  yet you have still managed  to  keep  your
       programs original and of high quality.   Are you dedicated  to
       producing  original programs,  or will you perhaps be  turning
       your attention to arcade conversions and film licences if  the
       opportunity arises?
 
    A) Unlikely.  Too much in a typical current arcade machine to fit
       into  an  ST.  Consoles maybe, when they're  more  widespread.
       Never seen a good film licence yet.
 
    Q) Do  you play games yourself,  and if so what sort of games  do
       you like to play?
 
    A) Sometimes.   In  no  particular  order,  Tetris,  Gunhed   (PC
       Engine),  Wanderer (PD IBM game, not the red &  green  glasses
       one!),  Mr Do (arcade cabinet - Adrian has his own),  Defender
       (arcade cabinet), E-Motion, Super Sprint.
 
    Q) Several  games now have a multi-player option using the  RS232
       or MIDI ports.   Have you or are you going to be doing this in
       any of your games?
 
    A) Haven't done so yet, but we intend to.  Particularly likely in
       respect of 3D stuff where two screens can be used to show  two
       different views of an action sequence.  RS232 more likely than
       MIDI,   because  it  is  more  straightforward  to  link   any
       combination of ST, Amiga & PC rather than just two ST's.
 
    Q) Will  you  be  continuing to produce playable  demos  of  your
       games so that people can try before they buy?
 
    A) Depends largely on views of publisher.  Empire liked them,  US
       Gold  didn't.  We are happy to do so if there is  the  demand.
       Tell  USG!  And we would welcome feedback on any of our  demos
       (or  the  subject  of playable demos in  general)  from  games
       players.   Mail  TAL@CIX or the ST conference  which  we  read
       regularly.   In  fact perhaps we can turn the tables  and  ask
       some  questions ourselves: [if you buy games] why do  you  buy
       them?   On  the  strength of a review? or  the  demo?  or  the
       packaging?  or  the name of the publisher? or  the  developer?
       How much difference does price make to you?
 
    Q) Many  people  think the retail price of 16 bit  games  is  too
       high.   This  is often blamed on piracy or  high  development
       costs.  What is your opinion on this?
 
    A) Don't  know.   If everyone stopped paying  these  prices  then
       they'd  come  down.   Don't think piracy  puts  the  cost  up;
       rather,  it drives developers into other, safer,  markets,  so
       there  is  less software around.  It's a pity in  a  way  that
       nearly  all software is marketed at the same price - if  games
       players  could  be  sure  that a  more  expensive  game  would
       definitely  be  *better* then maybe pricing  would  seem  more
       reasonable.   Many  man years go into the best games;  it's  a
       labour intensive business.
 
    Q) Do you see much future in the Atari ST as a home computer  and
       will you be continuing to produce ST versions of your games?
 
    A) We  will  produce games for it as long as it  is  economically
       feasible.  As long as publishers want to support the format we
       will  do  so, but when the market shrinks (through  piracy  or
       through upgrading) to the point when publishers no longer want
       to  sell for it, then we too will have to move on.   This  has
       already  happened  to  the ST in America -  most  of  the  big
       publishers  don't care about an ST version, only Amiga  &  PC.
       No sign of this happening in Europe yet.
 
    Q) What  do  you  think about the future  of  home  computers  in
       general regarding games?  Do you think the anticipated console
       revolution  is  finally going to hit  Britain  soon?   And  in
       particular what do you think about the Atari Lynx?
 
    A) Newer consoles (PC Engine, Megadrive) would be nice to develop
       for.   Depends  how  many  machines  are  sold.   Gameboy   is
       interesting  & Lynx is *very* nice, but as always it's in  the
       hands of our publishers.
 
    Q) ...  and  what about Compact Disk technology which seems to be
       the in-thing at the moment?
 
    A) See above.  Don't know what the appeal is; what do you do with
       an  extra  500 meg?  Stuff it with extra  digitised  sounds  &
       pictures, sure, & don't worry about data compression any more,
       but how much will that improve the games?  I wouldn't buy  one
       -  I  wouldn't have any use for it, or at least  not  to  play
       games  with.   CD Interactive, maybe, when  the  machines  are
       widely available, but that may only really help certain  types
       of games - RPG, adventure and so on.
 
    Q) I'm sure our readers would be interested to know what they can
       expect  to  see from you in the future  (especially  regarding
       the ST).   Can you tell us anything about what you have in the
       pipeline, or is it all top secret?
 
    A) Many things under development; which ones see the light of day
       depends on how willing publishers are to take a chance on very
       different  games.   We were lucky that Empire  recognised  the
       potential  of Pipe Mania & ditto USG with E-Motion.   We  have
       other  projects which are similarly unclassifiable  which  may
       simply  never  be  taken up by  a  publisher.   Shame  really.
       Definitely  happening,  though, are a  follow-on  to  E-Motion
       (which   uses  similar  ray-traced  graphics  but  in   a   3D
       environment)  and  some solid (polygonal) 3D  material.   Both
       will certainly appear on the ST.

    SiTcom would like to  thank  everyone  at  The Assembly Line  for 
    their valuable time and wish them all the luck in the future.

    - STeVeN.

--SitComm-May-1990--------------------------------------------------------------

How to Contact Us:

Matthew Miles, Bulletin Board : The Invicta Conferencing System
                                0622 891308 (9pm to 7am) V21-22b
                                Soon 24 Hours on 0622 890888
             For the Disk Mag : 10, Oak Farm Gardens, Headcorn
                                Ashford, Kent. TN27 9TU 

Steven Green, Bulletin Board  : My Little Phoney
                                0865 773277 v21-22b
                         CIX  : sgreen
                    Fido Net  : 2:252/25
                        FNET  : 1004

Lucien Oppler,Bulletin Board  : The Whitehall Penthouse 
                                071 930 3903, v21-22b
                         CIX  : luce
                         FNET : 1014

Lau. McDonald,Bulletin Board  : Contact BBs
                                071 646 0746, v21-22, 9pm to 8am           

--SitComm-May-1990--------------------------------------------------------------


                         SiTComm Magazine Wants YOU!

      If  you feel that you can write an article for our magazine  then 
      please  do.  We  are always on the look out for people  to  write 
      articles on anything to do with the Atari ST or Comms.

      Articles should ideally be 65 columns justified to the right,  we 
      prefer  Quality  rather than quantity.  They should  be  straight 
      ASCII files.

      Articles can be uploaded to any of the Bulletin Boards  mentioned 
      in the Contact File, or they can be sent to the address mentioned 
      there as well.


--SitComm-May-1990-----------------------------------------------------The End--







