Editorial

The Show. ~~~~~~~~~ Well, it is 9.5.95. I have been home for two days after the show. Just managed to get sat down to give an account of what happened. Minimal preparations this year, any one with us last year will remember that I spent many long hours preparing for the show. What was the hardest part for me was up-shipping all of the 8BS hardware, fitting it into the VW camper, and hoiking it out at the other end with an amazing feat of co-ordination, getting it unloaded at the hall in Harrogate whilst finding somewhere to leave the camper without losing all the gear. I was totally exhausted at the end of last years show. I only managed to do all this last year with the help of a dedicated bunch of 8BS members, but without the help of my wife, I could not have managed. This year I had planned it differently. Gill could not come to help as the youngest, Peter, is now at school. We could not leave him with my parents as he would probably be the end of them. Firstly, there were enough volunteers bringing their own gear for me not to have to bring any of mine. I had a load of handouts and a few odds and ends. Paul Harvey had printed us out a new poster with the phONE number updated. Two boxes of discs and that was it. Loading up the camper was easy. Three small boxes. A kipping bag, a few tins (and bottles) change of clothes and away. On the dot of 0800 on the 6th I was pottering off to Harrogate. Arrived at the campsite at about 1030 where Derek (3PM) was waiting. Booked in, threw the tent up, ate some butties and wandered off down to the International Center where the show was. We were marshalled around to the front entrance, the 8BS stand was just inside the fire exit there. Inside was devastation again, same as last year. We carried the equipment in and Lorna Jenne arrived. Derek was sorting out his gear and Lorna was helping me stick the poster together ready for plastering onto the wall. Chris wotzit arrived from the Wakefield Acorn User Group and waved the show plan at me to point out that we were setting up in the wrong place. Yup, I hadn't believed that the very first area was that which had been allocated to 8BS, it was stacked high with metal girders to be used in the construction of the main entrance. Not a major disaster, no posters stuck up and only a couple of odds and ends taken out of boxes. As it turns out, sorry folks, that was the only mishap this time. We had two large tables set at a 45 degree angle this time, just room for 3 computers to be set up comfortably. We were getting organised when Jonathan Harston turned up carrying a couple of large bags. Out of the bags he produced a slightly unusual looking Master Compact. It had a 3.5" disc drive in the right hand side. The case was separated so that there was a half inch gap all around it so that the disc drive fitted inside. From the back of the drive came a lead which was plugged into another 3.5" drive and a 5.25" drive. A network of wires then sprouted out all over the place connecting to switches, power supplies and other people's computers. Only Jonathan knew what was going on. All that was missing was a monitor. Fortunately Derek had brought two of everything, just in case. So Jonathan used Derek's spare monitor. It was at this point that things might have got out of hand. We thought that it might be nice to have a plinth stretching accross from Derek's set up so that when Mick Needham showed up on Saturday, he could put his stuff on it with plenty of room for other things. Large pieces of wood and metal girders started appearing from all over as 8BS members were going out and "improvising" bits from other peoples stands. In the event, we decided against the plan (to the sound of collapsing displays elsewhere). Just in case, we kept a stock of nice large bits of melamine behind one of the desks. Things were going nice and smoothly, the posters were up, and the equipment was proudly arranged on the tables. Jonathan started backing up his pool for 8BS to have, he had already given me some of his pool, but it had become slightly disorganised in the catalogue. The only answer was to start again (see later, changes to the TBI pool). Time was getting on a bit now, Lorna came over and excitedly mentioned that Archimedes Public Domain Library (APDL) was flogging off loads of second hand stuff cheap for charity. The 8BS stand was suddenly vacated as we shot across to have a look. Piles of gear were laid all over. In the scramble Jonathan managed to pick up 3 large carrier bags of wonderful odds and ends, including what looked like a new Electron with the plus one he wanted. I found a few things, all at very reasonable prices. All through the show we popped back to this stand for a rummage and spent another couple of pounds. More on this later. I think it was about 1930 when we decided to clear off to the camp site. Lorna and Jonathan went to their respective B+Bs. Derek and I went back and I subjected him to a tinned veggie tea. Couple of bottles of beer and kip. I awoke at 0515, this because I awake early when camping and that is the time I get up for work too. Spent an hour or so starting to proof read the JGH HADFS manual for Jonathan. Breakfast and off to the show. Arriving at 0800 for the doors opening to exhibitors. Mick Needham turned up with his BBC and scanner, no disasters with the car this time. We were well hidden this year, we were at the front end of the hall hidden from view by the cloak room. This kept us nice and quiet so that we could get on with the 8BS club meeting. Enough passers by found us and bought just enough copies of TBI-00 and 8BS-42 to cover costs. On Saturday then, we had: Me, Lorna Jenne, Derrick Pritchard-Jones, Jonathan Harston, Duncan Webster, Daniel Shimmin (plus little bro and dad) Sid Parker, Brian Raw (sorry I didn't realise it was you!), Mick Needham, Robin Moffat and Albert Schofield turned up. We had Derricks Master, Micks BBC and Jonathan's Compact. The tables were full. This was a bit worrying as we were due to have 4 setups on the Sunday. Would there be room? Saturday evening was party nite. A few presentations and lots of free grub. Derrick, Jonathan and myself then went on a pub hunt. No mean feat. There are no pubs in the center of Harrogate. We wandered about all over and could not find any. Off to Derricks car and a search further afield, we eventually found one and managed to wash away some of the dust that had accumulated over the day. Paul Clucas's well stained beer mat was acquired during the course of the evening. This beer mat is the 8BS prize for the person most willing to take on the heavy mantle of ensuring that every 8BS issue is perfect in every way. The mat in fact had very little, if any, beer spilled onto it to be honest, but the thought was there, so is the photographic evidence. I have since discovered that in fact there are some excellent pubs around Harrogate but we missed them all in the panic to find one. Back to the camp site for a second night in my trusty camper with Derrick on his deflatable mattress in one of the 8BS tents (he had to get up every hour to pump it up I think). Sunday arrived all too quickly and I packed up the camp site ready for off. We left for the center in Derricks car again. Arriving just after 0800. Today. Stephan Richardson was coming with his Master, Brian Raw with his BBC. Along with Derricks Master and Jonathan's Compact, we had a good job squeezing everything onto the 2 tables. It all looked very good. Stephan arrived and put his Master down next to Jonathan's Compact. Jonathan immediately popped a lead into the back of it and joined it to a Wakefield Acorn User Group Archi. He started frantically beating away at the keyboard. Today at the show were: Me, Stephan Richardson, Lorna Jenne, Jonathan Harston, Stan Doran, Derrick Pritchard Jones and Brian Raw. The day shot by. We had a thoroughly enjoyable time mucking about with computers and occasionally having a conversation with a member of the public. I cleared out APDL's second hand stand of BBC stuff as he did not want to load it up again, hence the huge influx of items into the 8BS advert. Four new members at the show. Welcome! Especially to Michael Davies of Eire who bought so much stuff at the show he could hardly carry it. He said his goodbyes to us and disappeared off around the corner. As we all walked out of the building a while later, there was Michael. Huge bulgeing bag of computer wares resting on a wall. He was looking totally exhausted. I wonder if he ever got home? Watch out for A2L! Show expenses: £86.98 Taken at the show: £78 Brought back paid for by cash taken at the show, 10 new disc boxes (thanks Stephan Richardson), 3 very large boxes of BBC bits, see the advert. I don't know about everyone else, maybe they will message us to let us know, but I had a marvellous time. Really enjoyed it. It was nothing like the same hard work this time for me. Many thanks to all the members that came, especially to those of you that brought hardware to exhibit and saved me loads of work. A mention here to Mick Bennet who could not make it. It's a shame you couldn't, maybe next time? Paul Clucas's Beer mat will probably now be nailed to his mantlepiece, but the photographic evidence is available for anyone that wants a set of the show snaps. Mainly featuring the story of a widely travelled mat. Pictured in various settings with various different drinks threatening it. However, I did photograph most of the members that turned up. TBI-84 contains some digitised snaps of the event. See you there next time! ****************************************************************************** First Steps With a Winchester. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Stephan Richardson had acquired a hard disc drive for me on his travels. This was handed over to me at the show. I packed my prize new acquisition carefully into the camper and pottered off home with it. On arrival at 8BS HQ I plugged it straight into the Master and switched on. It would not work, I realised that it must be something to do with the lead by the way the computer was acting. Eventually, I discovered that the lead at the computer end was in the wrong way up. There were none of the usual protrusions on the plug to show which way up it was meant to be, so I plugged it in with the ribbon cable coming out what appeared to be the right way. Of course, this was an incorrect assumption. Next I had to format the disc. For this purpose I had a choice of programs. I, in fact tried two or three of them to see what they were like as (hopefully) this would be the only time that I would be using a format program. Not having any sort of manual, I was fumbling about in the dark. The best program that I found was the PRES formatter. This program actually told me what was going on as it was performing. Apparently what happens is that the program first of all looks for a disc defects file as all hard discs have errors and this file maps the errors out so that they can be avoided for saves. The disc is then formatted avoiding the errors in the error file. Any new errors found during the formatting are then recorded in the errors file. The disc is continually re-formatted until no errors are reported. the disc is then ready for use. All that is on it is a directory called Format containing the format program and the errors file. Next I had to decide on the size of the DOS partition that I wanted on the disc as now was the only time that I would be able to change the size of a partition. It is possible to have several different disc formats on a hard disc. Each different format must be in a separate partition that is made using software. I loaded DOS+ and ran the program HDISK which allows you to create a DOS partition of various sizes. I chose the smallest of 4 megabytes as all I wanted to keep on hard disc was DOS+ itself and a few other odds and ends. Then I installed DOS itself using the program HDINSTAL. All of this sounds very simple, but in reality the whole process took me the best part of a full day as I was fumbling about in the dark. Next I created a few directories and loaded all the software that I thought would be useful to have. I use ADU which has a *MENU option that is quite a reasonable front end for an ADFS disc. I have found this very useful up to now. The Winchester when booted first says hello to me and then runs the menu. After putting most of the software onto the disc I thought I would like to be there, I had a series of brain storms which lead to the inevitable first (probably of many) disaster/s. I backed up the hard disc. It went on to 9 floppies. Simple enough to do, *BACKUP 0 5 ( the hard disc is 0, the old drive 0 is then 4 and the old drive 1 is then 5). I then wondered to myself if I did *BACKUP 5 0 whether the floppy in drive 5 would neatly copy onto the hard disc in 0. It did of course but totally overwrote the catalogue of the hard disc, not destroying the data I suppose, but making it jolly difficult for me to recover the software! So I popped in the first backup disc and typed *BACKUP 5 0. The computer came back with broken directory. I tried repeatedly, I tried to *MOUNT 5 but all to no avail. Later of course I realised that all I had to do was to *MOUNT 0 and then backup, but at the time I did not think of this. So thinking that the backup was useless, I proceded to re-format my hard disc which I had neatly converted from a 30 megabyte to a 650K disc in only a minute or so. Fortunately, it did not take too long to re-install everything. It went much more quickly the second time. Well, that is it so far. I can highly recommend a Winchester, it speeds up the ADFS access time very nicely Since the initial setup, I have now written an ADFS and a DFS disc imager. The images can now be moved about easily as one program, usually from the hard disc to the RAM disc made by CPFS. They then plop down onto the target disc with amazing speed. This is only of any use to myself when backing up an 8BS issue. It should reduce backup time now from what used to be a full day to less than two hours. I may put the imagers onto the ADFS version of this issue if I remember, but they are only really of any use to people with a Master 512 with 1 meg upgrade plus a hard disc drive, as the ADFS image (if the disc is full) takes up 5 bytes more than the capacity of an ADFS L disc. ****************************************************************************** Thanks to the member that donated a Modem to 8BS. I now can access a lot of bulletin boards containing large amounts of interesting text. More next time as space in this editorial is a bit tight this time. Changes to the TBI pool: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Thanks to the eagle eyed Paul Clucas for discovering a file on 8BS-13 that I had meant to delete. A set of Repton screens that could be described as offensive. R.Joke removed. If you have a copy of 8BS 13, please delete this file if you are easily offended. The whole JGH (J.G.Harston PD) section introduced in the last issue has been re-numbered, so please do not order any JGH software from old catalogues. Although I do still have copies of the old entries if you are too confused by the changes. Basically, I have given the sotware exactly the same numbers as they appear in the JGH catalogue. They are all available in HADFS (several entries to a disc, ADFS, (one or two HADFS discs to a disc) or DFS (one catalogue entry to a side: The Harston PD Section. JGH-00 HADFS Info Disc 1D 7 Files 38 K If you are wondering what HADFS is all about, then this is the disc for you. Contains text files explaining what HADFS is, how it may be fitted and when it is fitted, what is available. If you supply the disc and return postage, this disc is free. The disc contains various indexes, giving a full catalogue of software in the Harston PD library. HADFS is an ADFS type filing system suitable for DFS users with Sideways RAM or 1 free 16K ROM slot. The System consists of a ROM image which is loaded into sideways RAM. If you do not have sideways RAM, I can blow an EPROM for you for the usual charge. You may then insert the EPROM into a free ROM slot. JGH-0A ABZ Teletext HADFS Harston Catalogue Number 001 JGH-0B HADFS Startup HADFS Harston Catalogue Number 002 JGH-0C Various HADFS Harston Catalogue Numbers 003 004 005 Utilities 1. Pictures 1. Archivers. JGH-0D Various HADFS Harston Numbers 006 007 008 Roms 1. Music 1. JGH-0E Small C HADFS Harston Catalogue Number 009 JGH-0F Various. HADFS Harston Catalogue Numbers 010 011 012 View Programs. Pictures 2. File Index. JGH-0G Various. HADFS Harston Catalogue Numbers 013 014 015 Music 2. Menu Programs. DOS Utilities. JGH-0H Various. HADFS Harston Catalogue Numbers 016 017 018 Fonts. Informant. Utilities 2. JGH-0I Various. HADFS Harston Numbers 019 020 021 022 023 Music Editor. Ikon Editor. Painter. Automata. ADFS versions of the JGH PD collection are available. Each ADFS disc contains either one or two of the above HADFS entries: JGH-0A Containing 1 JGH-0B Containing 2 JGH-C-D Containing 3 4 5 6 and 7 JGH-0E Containing 9 JGH-F-G Containing 10 11 12 13 14 15 JGH-H-I Containing 16 17 18 20 21 22 23 DFS versions of the following JGH PD discs are available. They are all 1D unless otherwise stated: JGH-01 JGH-03 JGH-04 JGH-05 JGH-06 JGH-07 JGH-09 2D JGH-10 JGH-11 JGH-13 JGH-14 JGH-15 JGH-16 JGH-17 2D JGH-18 JGH-20 JGH-21 JGH-22 JGH-23 IMPORTANT! When ordering JGH discs, please ensure that you clearly state the format that you require (HADFS, ADFS or DFS). That was reproduced faithfully from the 8BS catalogue. See 8BS issue 42 or JGH 00 for full details of the catalogue. There is a lot of excellent software available, more on the way according to Jonathan. ARC-10 The Archimedes PD Library (APDL) catalogue disc. In ADFS 800K format. At last! I hear you all say. Several people have suggested discs on themes, well: TBI-82-1 8BS Games 1. 2D Disc one of the new 8BS "Theme" collection. This one is full of games from the earlier issues of 8BS magazine discs. TBI-82-2 Games 2. 2D The rest of the games from 8BS issues up to issue 42 so far. TBI-82-3 Poems and stories. 1D. Collected from 8BS issues TBI-82-4 National lottery. 1D Six programs from recent issues. TBI-83 BOFH Amusing text. 1D. Warning, contains bad language. TBI-84-1 Acorn User Show Pics. 2D. Digitised by Mick Needham from photos taken at the Acorn User Show. TBI-84-2 Acorn User Show Pics. 3DA. Digitised by Stephan Richardson from photos taken at the Acorn User Show. BBC 147. Hints and tips. DFS version. For a long time the DFS version had been a pain to me, there was no menu on it. Therefore I had to save the menu I had written for the ADFS version onto a different disc for people that ordered it. This would have to include a lengthy explanation of why there wasn't a menu, where it was and how to use it. I have joined 2 of the files on BBC 147 (DFS) together leaving room for a menu! Anyone wanting an update is welcome. 512-18 Eamon Trezore. Text Adventure. 360K DOS 512-19 Supernova. Text Adventure. 360K DOS 512-20 Mystic Pascal. 360K DOS TDU-16 Micronet Demo. 1D This disc was submitted by L1M. She found it on side 2 of TDU-03. Although TDU discs were supposed to be single sided, this appeared on side 2 of TDU-3 and is an advert for Micronet. Comprising a collection of screens such as you would find on a Viewdata bulletin board. Any more ideas for "Theme" discs? Please submit your ideas to me. Send a list of the software that you would like compiling from back issues of 8BS. You should use the catalogue to help you. List each program and which issue it came from. Please do not suggest a theme with no further help for me! I would be prepared to supply back issues free of copying charge to anyone willing to compile such discs for 8BS. So if you have an idea, contact me now! ************************************************************************** Consumables. ~~~~~~~~~~~~ I have just analysed the questionnaires and have noticed that a high proportion of you have said that you would buy disc boxes and blank discs from 8BS. Please note that I have a large ish stock of both. Contact me. Put the kettle on and read the 8BS advert available from the main menu! Membership. ~~~~~~~~~~~ I took a big gamble and poked the trusty Z88 into my rucksack one weekend. It managed to arrive at my workplace in working condition. Over a period of 10 hours I managed to find a few minutes here and there to mess about with the data in it and do something that I have been trying to do for absolutely ages. That is to work out the true membership of 8BS. I keep all the details of the group on this Z88. Accounts, all discs issued. All membership details including who has ordered what discs. I also keep a record of how many of which discs have gone out from the pool. From all of this I can glean all sorts of info. One problem is working out how many members of 8BS actually still want to be members. Some people come back after over a year and ask to be updated for instance. As there is no membership fee and as there are no rules regarding membership, it is hard to know when someone has left the fold. One reasonable guide is if a member has received recent issues. So: There are 247 members on the books. There are 168 that have received at least issue 40 I purposely make no hard and fast rules regarding membership as I am not really bothered about numbers, after all, size doesn't matter despite what the Viz survey claimed. Don't ask about the accounts, but if you really want to know, a printout of this years accounts from the Z88 is available if you send return p+p and ask. Contract Bridge. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Ages ago, one member expressed his keen interest in Contract Bridge and asked me if I knew of any programs for the BBC. I did not. However. I have just come across Black Queen, a contract bridge program. £3.50 in the 8BS ad. Who is it? Apologies. ~~~~~~~~~~ It seems that I have sent out 2 blank discs that should have had software on them and also I have not sent 2 of the latest issues to members that ordered it. A copy of 8BS 11 turned up in a drawer. I have no idea who should have received it. Sorry about that. Here are some feeble excuses: The cat got it (someone used this on me recently). It's a bit runny. It was the wrong sort of electricity. The postman must have irradiated it. It was ok when it left me. Well, its a common fault you know. The computer went down (down what?) I posted it yesterday. I will post it tomorrow. Shut up Peter, sorry, what was that? Here are some explanations: I am using a computer blind believe it or not. The Compact does about 50% of the backing up nowadays. Usually I have three machines on at once, two will be backing up software and one will be calculating something or other. I have not yet got a monitor for the Compact, there isn't room for it. All the new discs that I send out back up ok and therefore go out with virtually no problems (1 in about 300 produces a problem). However, sometimes discs sent to me to have software put on them are not formatted on the second side. Most times I spot this as the backup stops a bit too soon. Occasionally, one escapes with side two blank. The moral here is that you should format and verify both sides of discs you send to me. Please bear this in mind when ordering software from 8BS. I welcome recycling discs, but 2nd hand discs can consume a fair bit of my time when they are not formatted and verified properly. May I take this opportunity to ask that you do not send grubby discs. Now and again an hour of my time is wasted when a blob of spaghetti from a grubby disc escapes from a sleeve and sticks to one of my heads. Spaghetti is used here as an example, it could just as easily be a boiled sweet, banana or piece of tobacco. The other problem that has arisen recently is when members place an order for software from the pool and ask for the next issue when it comes out. I copy their order and send it off. In the heat of the moment, I forget to get a disc out for the latest issue or address an envelope ready. As a consequence, the issue doesn't turn up and the member is left sat next to their letterbox in a pointless wait. The moral here is that, if, by the issue date you have not received your issue, please ring me! I don't mind, there is nothing worse than a member without an issue. What? Cheat. ~~~~~~ A cheat for Tarzan: *LOAD Total 1200 ?&6085=&60:REM IMMORTALITY ?&5AB4=&60:REM NO ARROWS ?&5BA1=&60:REM TRIBESMEN DON'T HURT YOU ?&5BE5=&60:CHEETAHS DON'T MOVE, DON'T HURT YOU *SAVE Total 1200+4F00 900 Me. ~~~ Finally, I have to mention this again for new members. I am an Ambulance Paramedic. I work 12 hour shifts giving 24 hour cover to Holderness (the area that I live in). I had to move on to these shifts against my own wishes (sorry about the whinge). Here are a few guidelines about contacting me: By Royal Mail. Anytime of course. But occasionally there will be a 2 or 3 day delay in my reply due to me being more like a demented zombie than a human being whilst at work. You will NOT get any sense out of me at these times. Under these circumstances, I have decided that it is best to leave my mail alone when not on a day off. I often pick it up, poke at it and fondle it. So far I have remained just sane enough not to actually attempt to do anything with it unless I am day off. By telephone. Never after 2000 hours (8pm) as I very often go to bed around then. You will probably be wasting your pennies. Do not worry about ringing during the day, as, if I am asleep you cannot wake me up (ear plugs and blindfold)! Well, thats it for this fun packed issue, keep the messages, articles and software coming in! See you next time.