WEST OF SCOTLAND

ATARI 

USER GROUP
(Affiliated to The Association of Atari User groups)


Issue number ONE, February 1996
(ascii text version)


Our  aim is to provide support for, and to foster communication 
between, Atari Computer owners in the West of Scotland, to provide 
timely information about Atari news, products, vendors, and service, 
and to find solitary Atari computer owners and encourage them to join 
the group.




Sandy Thomson                         Alasdair Goold
41 Mayfield Crescent                 "RoisBheinn", Overton Crescent
Howwood                               Johnstone
PA9 1BL                               PA5 8JB

Tel: 01505 703813                     Tel: 01505 328254
e-mail:sandy_t@cix.compulink.co.uk    e-mail:agoold@cix.compulink.co.uk


EDITORIAL

Welcome to the first ever issue of the Newsletter of "The WeST of 
Scotland Atari User Group". The obvious question is why start a new 
user group when everyone is saying "THE ATARI PLATFORM IS DYING". My 
answer is that every computer platform will inevitably die sooner or 
later. So just like the IBM compatible PC, the Apple MAC or any other 
platform, yes it is dying, but, IT'S NOT DEAD YET, not by a long way.

"The WeST of Scotland Atari User Group" has been set up to bring us 
all together, so that we can share our knowledge, experience and 
enthusiasm for the Atari platform. If it is going to be a success it 
will require everyone to take as active a part as possible. So if you 
regularly use a piece of software, have any upgrade fitted to your 
machine, or have any other Atari related matter you would like to 
share then please send it to me on a floppy disk (ascii, 1st Word 
Plus, Papyrus, .RTF or .STW format) for inclusion in a future 
newsletter. Don't assume that because you know something everyone else 
will too. Everybody has something to contribute !!!

Over the last couple of years there has been a major change in the 
Atari scene. No longer are there dozens of games released each year, 
we're left with only a handful of Commercial and shareware games. 
However as far as good, serious software, both shareware and 
commercial, things have never been better.

So if you haven't already done so, open your mind and have a good look 
at what the Atari still has to offer the home user, you might be 
surprised !

On the Atari magazine scene with the closure of ST User and ST Review 
things looked grim for a while, but Atari World has appeared and is 
getting better with every issue. The writers, who are mostly on-line 
with CiX are committed to the Atari platform and use the hardware and 
software they write about on a daily basis. I would urge every member 
of the user group to support AW by either placing a regular order at 
your newsagents for it, or by subscribing. You can subscribe on a 
quarterly basis.

In this and in future issues there are a letters or Forum, and a For 
Sale/Wanted section, so if you have anything you want to say about the 
Atari World, any questions you want to ask, technical or otherwise, 
any computing tips or anything you want to sell or buy (computer 
related obviously) let me know.

Also do you know of any other Atari users ? They are all welcome at 
the User Group. One of the aims of the Group is to seek out solitary 
Atari users and encourage them to join our group.

So, if you have any ideas for the type of thing you would like to see 
happening in either the User Group or in the newsletter please let me 
know and if anybody wants to submit an article on any piece of 
software, hardware or anything else you use with your Atari, or that 
you use your Atari for please do so. (If you don't, I might have to 
start allocating you things to write). Also anybody who wanted to 
write a regular column on any Atari related subject would be very 
welcome.

REMEMBER ! It is your Atari User Group, use it or lose it.

Alasdair Goold





INAUGURAL MEETING

The Inaugural meeting of "The WeST of Scotland Atari User Group" will 
commence at 7:30pm on Tuesday 20 February 1996, within the upstairs 
Lounge of The Railway Inn, Main Street, Howwood. Access will be 
available from 7pm. It is anticipated the meeting will be concluded by 
10:30pm.

The Railway Inn is easy to find if you have your own transport. You'll 
need to find your way onto the A737 between Johnstone and Lochwinnoch. 
This is the new bypass that was completed a couple of years ago.

Between Johnstone and Lochwinnoch you will find an exit marked 
Howwood. Come off the A737 there and follow the road into the village 
of Howwood. The Railway Inn is on your right hand side just after you 
enter the village. You'll find us upstairs in the lounge.

Public transport is a problem. If anyone wants to attend, and can only 
use public transport, get in touch and we'll see what can be 
organised.

The lounge will be closed to the general public for the duration of 
the meeting and although the bar will be closed, refreshments will be 
available from the Public Bar downstairs.

There will  be a short presentation of the concept behind "The WeST of 
Scotland Atari User Group" and then the floor will be thrown open for 
a discussion on the direction we would all like to see the Group 
going. I think it is important to get as much input from others as 
possible, so come prepared with your thoughts.


The first order of business will be to elect a committee. Personally 
while we would prefer "The WeST of Scotland Atari User Group" not to 
become too formal, having a committee and appointing a treasurer seems 
a prudent idea.

At the moment it appears as if  we will be getting the premises for 
nothing. The licensee is happy with the idea that a few Coca-Cola's 
will be being bought each night. Therefore the only expense that we 
can foresee at the moment is a relatively small amount per person to 
cover the cost of the stationery involved in setting up the User 
Group, and publishing the newsletter. To try to keep expense to an 
absolute minimum we would ask that everyone who attends brings with 
them a medium or large SAE for the next copy of the next newsletter.

We will also be looking at ways to raise the finance for the 
stationery etc to reduce members costs as much as possible.

FORMAT OF MEETINGS

Our initial intention, which is  open to discussion, is that each 
meeting will be split into 3 phases.

i) Formal meeting: to discuss any relevant business and to allow 
suggestions to be made. Hopefully this would only take up a few 
minutes of each night

ii) Demo: A short demo by a member or a guest of either some piece of 
hardware or software. Many of us have only ever seen some Atari 
products in the magazines. This is your chance to see them live.

iii) Random Access session: A general free for all to allow the 
members to meet, talk and try out software on the machines present.    
                                            AG

1996 MEETINGS

All meetings will take place within the upstairs lounge of The Railway 
Inn, Main Street, Howwood. The doors will be open from 7pm . The 
formal opening of each meeting will take place at 7:30pm. The proposed 
dates for the meetings to be held in 1996 are as follows.
	
	1996	
	
	20 FEBRUARY - 1ST MEETING			
	19 MARCH 				
	16 APRIL				
	14 MAY				
	11 JUNE				
	9 JULY				
	6 AUGUST			
	3 SEPTEMBER			
	1 OCTOBER				
	29 OCTOBER				
	26 NOVEMBER				
	24 DECEMBER -NO MEETING
		
           1997			
	
	21 JANUARY - AGM ? 

All dates are provisional at the moment and will depend on both the 
response to the groups as a whole, and the suitability of the Railway 
Inn.                              AG



ATARI NEWS

ST Format stops new subscriptions.

With issue #78 of ST Format, subscribers got a note to say that all 
new subscriptions to the magazine had been stopped. Existing 
subscribers could re-subscribe for either 6 or 12 months, but Future 
Publishing will no longer accept new subscribers. This is not good 
news for ST Format.                            AG

The UK Association of Atari User Groups.

You may have noted on the front page of this newsletter and on our 
headed paper that we are affiliated to The UK Association of Atari 
User Groups. To explain what exactly this is I have included a press 
release from Harry Sideras. For those of you that have read Atari 
World, you might recognise Harry's name. He writes AW's Clubbin' page 
as well as the occasional other article. AG


The UK Association of Atari User Groups re-launched
=============================
Recently Ken Ward announced the end of his involvement with the 
UKAAUG. This followed 15 years of sterling and much appreciated work 
on behalf of Atari 8-bit, ST and Falcon owners and User Groups.

Following that decision I contacted Ken and obtained his consent to 
take over the AAUG and re-launch it within the UK as from January 1st 
1996.

The primary purpose of the UK Association of Atari User Groups is to 
maintain a directory of User Groups and their contact details in order 
to enable individuals to join an existing network of support. Advice 
and encouragement is also available on creating new groups in areas 
where it doesn't currently exist.

The UK AAUG will continue to operate on a non-profit making basis, so 
all postal contact requiring a response must be accompanied by an SAE 
and disk.

The directory will also contain information on groups that support 
Atari software, Atari publications (both printed and on disk), PD 
Libraries and Atari Bulletin Boards, FTP and WEB sites.

To this end I would ask that all organisations that need to be listed 
in these directories, that haven't already been contacted directly on 
this subject, confirm their current contact details as soon as 
possible to ensure that they are included within my provisional lists.

Harry Sideras

UK Association of Atari User Groups
49 Haywood Road
Tile Cross
Birmingham
B33 0LJ
(Remember the SAE and disk)

Internet: sidcelery@cix.compulink.co.uk
hsideras@mettav.demon.co.uk
NeST:     Harry Sideras on 90:102/143
TurboNet                   100:1011/143
AtariNet                   51:502/100.16
FIDO                       2:254/108.16



COMMS

Several of the founder members of the WeST of Scotland Atari User 
Group are keen users of comms. several of us are on CiX which featured 
in Atari World, issue #9. The intention with this section is to bring 
you news from the world of communications.
 
FORUM

Obviously, this being the first issue there are no letters or items in 
The Forum section. I would hope that htis could develop into an area 
where questions could be asked, then other members could write in with 
their own answers which will be included in a future issue. Hints and 
tips for any Atari related subject can also be featured here.

FEATURES

This section will contain features on Atari related items as written 
by members of the group. This can be on a piece of software you use, 
or  a purpose that you put your computer to. There are no rules here, 
as long as you can tie it to your Atari somehow. As a starter there 
are a couple of items. The first on Grahpics cards by Sandy Thomson, 
and the second by Brian Stanton on getting Timeworks, as supplied 
witgh AW a few months ago to run with other useful bits of software. 
If you have any comments on these or future articles, send them in and 
we'll put them in the FORUM section.


GRAPHICS  CARDS:

Although  they have been available for some time for the MST and TT 
range of Ataris, it is only  recently  that one has become available 
for the STe & STFM range.
   
Priced at around 300, you either have to be a VERY enthusiastic 
Atarian, or have a definite purpose in mind to even consider this as a 
serious option.

First question is Why?  As a professional photographer, I wanted to 
use Multi-session CD Rom to store and re-touch my photographs so, when 
I enquired about this, I was advised to fit a graphics card to my 
MegaSTe4.

System Solutions could do a graphics card/multiboard package for 
around 300.

So what would I get for my money ?

PROs 

24 bit card gives "TRUE COLOUR", IDE Hard drive Compatible, Up tp 
8meg Ram space

CONS         

Multisync or VGA/ SVGA monitor required, Having to recase an ST into a 
desktopper or similar, Cost

At this point, my interest began to cool VERY rapidly. An outlay of 
400 or more to me, meant either opting out of the Atari platform 
entirely OR buying a Falcon OR forgetting the whole idea altogether. I 
opted for the middle idea and  bought  a Falcon. HOWEVER......
   
IF you own a basic system and
IF you intend to upgrade the memory and
IF you intend to buy  a Hard Drive and 
IF you don't yet have a monitor,
This could be for YOU!

Anybody  out there got a card  going CHEAP ????   ST

TIMEWORKS V2.04:

TITLE: Timeworks 2.04 & the Falcon -

I have at last got TW up and running - hopefully what follows may be 
of interest. Thanks to Neal O`Nions at Compo for much needed advice at 
various stages.

(After several false starts, I ended up working with fresh 
installations of Speedo 4.2 & 5 on a spare partition and a bare 
desktop. XBoot and a text editor - Everest for me - are almost 
essential).

1.      Install Timeworks 2.01 from the 
Readers Disks, selecting ST High as the 
screen resolution (printer to taste!). Do 
not run either FONTWID.APP or 
PUBLISH.APP.

2.      Install v 2.04 as per READ.ME text 
file supplied, with ASSIGN.SYS being 
edited to remove all the fonts except 
Dingbats screen and printer bitmap fonts. 
Don't run Fontwid etc at this stage.

3.      Change from ST High Res. with 
"Set Video" option on the Desktop. 
Personally went to Falcon SVGA 16 
colour (640*480*16) mode which is my 
default. From now on, this can be used, 
and ASSIGN.SYS does *not* have to be 
altered to take account of this.

4.      Install (activate) SpeedoGDOS 
(5.0c preferred, but works with any 
version), with OUTLINE.ACC & 
DRIVERS.ACC also active. Probably 
best just to start with the standard no. of 
fonts supplied for manageability. (Loaded 
all the Speedo fonts I had from HiSoft's 
Designer's/Writer's Font Packs - 72 in all! 
- worked fine but took 8 minutes to 
load...)

5.      Using OUTLINE.ACC, configure 
EXTEND.SYS - set Width tables "ON" 
but do not create width tables. Set caches 
including the bitmap cache. Set point 
sizes to 10, 12, and 14, set all fonts and 
save. Reboot to activate these settings. 
Can edit EXTEND.SYS with the text 
editor but it's a lot easier with the acc.

6.      Now (at last!) run FONTWID.APP. 
This should process the screen widths, 
the printer widths and finally the 
Postscipt (sic!) widths. The prog. will 
hang at this stage. Reboot.

7.      Run PUBLISH.APP.

8.      Once running it's probably best to 
create a new DEFAULT.STY before 
trying anything as "error in j_getfont" 
tends to appear if the prog. looks for a 
font in the original default.sty that isn't 
there. 
In general, care in making sure that the 
correct versions of the printer drivers are 
present, and also of OUTLINE/DRIVER 
ACC's for the Speedo versions, plus 
checking all the paths are correct makes 
life a lot easier. FONTWID has to be run 
after any alteration in fonts or screen 
resolution, but creation of various sets in 
XBoot of standard set-ups cuts down this, 
as the Batch Command facility really 
comes into its own to copy in the various 
pre-created SCREEN.WID & 
PUBLISH.WID files.

Works with NVDI 2.5 & 3 - but more of 
that to follow.

Also to follow is how to get rid of the 
original Dingbats bitmap bullet font. This 
leads to the best combination a Speedo 
"bullet" font, Speedo 5, and NVDI 2.5 
(mainly from the ease of handling font 
changes - NVDI 3 is a pig in that 
respect). Truetype fonts are also on the 
agenda.

Now to remove the original Dingbats 
bitmap font as supplied so as to run 
purely on vector fonts....

Start point - Falcon in 16 colour mode 
SVGA using standard Speedo

4/5 fonts supplied (aided by XBoot & 
Everest).

1.      Assign.sys: delete all the zdbxxxxx 
screen & printer fonts leaving just a list 
of "path =  ", screen.sys's and "21  
appropriate Speedo printer driver.sys". 
(The path I chose is to my NVDI 2 
Gemsys folder to make life easier for 
adding NVDI).

2.      Extend.sys: set BITCACHE = 0 
(leave WIDTHTABLES = 1).


3.      PUBLISH.DEF: edit last line 
BULLET_FONT 129 to 
BULLET_FONT 5003 - now using one 
of the installed Speedo fonts as the bullet 
font that Timeworks requires - Swiss 721 
BX000003.SPD in this case but can use 
most of the others that have a full 
character set AFAIUI (not More 
Wingbats SWC!!) with Speedo 5 adding 
5000 to the font id.

4.      Reboot. Rerun FONTWID - hangs - 
reboot. ...and that's it!

You can add/remove Speedo fonts very 
easily with OUTLINE.ACC/PRG. I use 
XBoot to install sets with various 
standard groups of fonts, using the Batch 
Command option to copy in the various 
associated PUBLISH.WID & 
SCREEN.WID files - so only have to run 
FONTWID at the setup stage. For small 
font  alterations, I use a Timeworks 
Reboot set which has no Assign.sys or 
Extend.sys info file specified so 
rebooting doesn't alter these just changed 
files - but FONTWID has to be run.

Now for NVDI 2.5...
(I prefer 2.5 to 3, as it's much easier to 
change fonts - reputedly the best setup is 
TW 2.04, NVDI 2.5 & Speedo 5 with not 
a bitmap font in sight).

1.      Assign.sys: path points to folder 
with NVDI 2.5 screen drivers and Speedo 
printer driver. No alteration required if 
this GEMSYS folder was used as 
suggested previously.

2.      Extend.sys: no change.

3.      Activate NVDI.PRG in Boot 
partition AUTO folder.

4.      Ensure XCONTROL.ACC & 
NVDICONF.CPX are installed and 
active.
5.      Reboot and run FONTWID.APP.   
Reboot.

6.      Run PUBLISH.APP.  This will 
most likely result in an "Invalid Handle" 
error message. Key <1> repeatedly (11 
times!!!) and the Timeworks Info screen 
will eventually appear and loading will 
proceed unhindered.

This is due to faulty VDI calls and 
enabling "TOS Compatibility" in the 
NVDICONF.CPX will cure this, 
although it is not recommended for 
otherprogs - XBoot to the rescue again!

Works beautifully, snappy screen redraws 
- so far seems stable.

Works with Screenblaster - have used 
752*560*16 and a Virtual
Screen of 1505*1120 - impressive!

Note: I've not tried using this with NVDI 
3 as I personally dislike the Speedo font 
addition/removal and I didn't feel it was 
worth the effort.
Still on the backburner is the use of 
TrueType fonts - haven't had time to 
investigate the use of these. However, I'm 
waiting for my NVDI 4 upgrade which 
may prove to have better font 
interchangeability - there may well be 
more to come...                                     BS




SHAREWARE & PUBLIC DOMAIN

Genuine Shareware and Public Domain software will be available for 
copying at meetings. Most of this will have been sourced from PD 
libraries, Bulletin Boards, CiX and PD CD Roms.

I personally would strongly recommend that everyone registers any 
Shareware software that you regularly use. At the moment, Shareware is the 
strongest new source of quality new software. The only way to keep the 
programmers active on the Atari scene is to encourage them by registering. 
The fee is normally very reasonable.																																										AG

SOFTWARE PIRACY

The WeST of Scotland Atari User Group does not condone software piracy 
and will not allow the group meetings be used to copy commercial 
software.

HARDWARE UPGRADES

If you have, or know of someone with a 520 STE we have a supply of 
simms chips to upgrade these to 1 megabyte machines. We will have 
these at the meetings so if you bring the machine with you we will 
supply and fit them there and then for you. For this service we will 
charge 5 per  upgrade. The half meg upgrades are chips that have come 
from machines that have been upgraded already and have therefore been 
obtained free of charge. The funds raised for the club would be used 
toward stationary costs etc.

IMPORTANT Please remember that if any machine is opened to be upgraded 
it is done at the owners own risk, and that it would invalidate any 
warranty still existing.

In addition we expect to be lay our hands on some 1 mb simms shortly 
to allow STE's to be upgraded to either 2 or 4 megabytes. These 1 mb 
simms have still to be obtained and paid for, but I would hope to be 
able to supply and fit them for appx 20 per meg. These are not being 
being sold on behalf of the user group.

FOR SALE & WANTED

STE/FALCON Software for Sale: I'm 
looking for offers for the following 
software, which is all in perfect condition 
:- 
DA Vektor PRO, Cyber Paint, Rainbow, 
Dogfight, Caesar, Bloodwych, Flight of 
the Intruder, Championship Manager 
Italia, Dragons of Flame, Falcon (STE 
version) and both mission disks: Op 
Counterstrike & Op Firefight, BOOKS: 
Atari ST Machine Language, (Abacus 
Software), ST Disk Drives Inside & Out  
(Abacus Software). Tel: Alasdair on 
01505 328254

FOR SALE :  STe 4 meg Upgrade TOS 
1.62 + Cumana ext DD + boxed games 
250o.v.n.o.  also   STFM 4 meg 
Upgrade TOS 1.2 - 2.06 switchable + 
Atari SF 314 ext DD + boxed games  
200o.v.n.o. Tel. Sandy on 01505 
703813

WANTED ;   Microvitec Multisync 1438 
14" monitor or similar, Tel. Sandy on 
01505 703813 


CREDITS

This Newsletter was prepared using Papyrus Gold with N.V.D.I.  and 
printed at 300 dpi on a Hewlett Packard Deskjet 500C. The headings are 
in Swiss 721 12pt text and the body text is in Times New Roman 10 pt.

Contributors:

Alasdair Goold          Sandy Thomson       
Brian Stanton           Harry Sideras

( WSAUG, 1996)