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KEN
ABOUT .......... FAX, 8x50, NEWS AND HISTORY
by Ken Ross: 
petlibrary@bigfoot.com
Web Site: http://members.tripod.com/~petlibrary
FLAME OUT
For those amongst you who have dropped in on the newsgroup comp.sys.cbm over the past few months may have noticed the firm CS&E popping up from time to time. Well it seems no more as they're pulling out of the C64 market to concentrate on the PC and Amiga side of things.
Speaking as a Mac man - the PC world deserves all the same attention he gave the C64 world ....;->
(Editor: I understand that CS&E, an alias for David Connelly, has been causing 64 enthusiasts, including advertisers on this site, some consternation with his unusual business methods.)
FIRING UP
I was shifting stuff from my 8050 drive over to the 4040 when a problem arose. The 8050 had suddenly decided that it was going to be temperamental when daisy chained to the 4040. Taking the 4040 out of circuit and running tests on both of them proved that for some reason the 8050 just didn't want to work with it ??
I pulled the spare 8250 out of store and switched it over. The 8250 is the double sided version of the 8050 and it'll quite happily deal with 8050 single sided disks. When they're first put in and accessed the 8250 will give a "can't find error". When this happens just repeat the process a second time and it'll be alright until you put another disk in when the procedure has to be repeated .
To change an 8250 into an 8050 there is a little program that was amongst the first articles I wrote for the printed journal (and even then I took it from a much earlier article by our very own Joe Griffin!).
10 open 15,8,15
20 print#15,"m-w"chr$(172)chr$(16)chr$(1)chr$(1)
30 print#15,"m-w"chr$(195)chr$(16)chr$(1)chr$(0)
40 print#15,"u9"
50 close15This will have no effect on an 8050. On the 8250 it'll only be needed once - any further use of it will have no effect as it's now an 8050. Being a 'soft' change when things are switched off it's back to being an 8250 again.
(The temperamental 8050 is stowed out of the way, 'just in case', as it still works okay without being near a 4040 ;-> )
In the next issue 'How to use the user port with a Centronics printer' - as soon as I find where I've put my notes ;-)
HOT LINKS
A handy URL that I've come across in my wanderings is:
http://www.mth.uea.ac.uk/VL/Overview.html
This belongs to a 'virtual library' for researching subjects, the computing link has a few 'virtual computing museums'.
The last fax item in this series mentioned sending fax via email and our BG wanted a means of receiving them the same way. If you visit the website
and find the free fax page you can sign up for a fax gateway system .
The fax is sent to a personal fax gateway number and it's converted into (in my case ) a GIF file. It is then sent to my email box as an attachment.
Tested with a fax via the tpc.int gateway.
This is part of the startup info given when receiving the personal fax number.
'We now require that you test your fax account by sending a fax to it. If a fax is not received within the next seven days your account will automatically be removed.
'If you need to make any changes to your email address, you can do it anytime at the FaxMe web site.
'An additional confirmation will be sent to you by email.
'If you have any problems viewing or printing faxes you receive, there is lots of help available in Help Me Out!.
'We hope you enjoy using FaxMe.
'Copyright © 1999 - FaxMe is operated by Nildram Ltd - Terms & Conditions of use apply'
(Editor: Well FaxMe, that's a good service!)
CUTTING EDGE TECHNOLOGY
Another addition to the family is a 56K modem that I sort of inherited. There was a bit of a problem demonstrated to me by the fact that the power plug needed fiddling with to get a good connection. At first I thought of just replacing it as I've got a few PSUs handy. In examining things I observed that the PSU lacked a makers name etc. and the plug fitted snugly into the socket when the PCB was out of its case.
Cue Chuck Jones, light bulb, < ping! >, the PSU was bought in from cheapest source and power plugs come in 2 lengths. So, out with Stanley knife and the shoulder was cut back to give a longer plug - hey presto perfect connections - LEDs to ready. (... warp factor 8 on the Internet? -Ed.)
ALL THE NEWS
I'm using a program called Macsoup, (shareware but OK), for reading the news groups. It downloads a (user) set amount of news items to be read off line. To subscribe to a newsgroup it can either import a file from 'newswatcher' or any other program that uses a 'newssrc' file. Alternatively manually create one from the pull down menus. It can also reply to items in the newsgroups or send a private email or both.
I've played around with a few other newsreaders and this is the best of the ones tested. Most demanded to download the entire newsgroup list and a few others just wouldn't work at all!
WEST COUNTRY NEWS ( BELATED )
The Plymouth Mac User Group held their Plymouth Show on Saturday November 13, 1999 in the Noah's Ark pub in Plymouth.
The Open Day was free and they had hardware and software displays by local Mac friendly companies.
The website is worth a look.
http://www.pmug.connectfree.co.uk - Home of the Plymouth Mac User Group
BILL GATES & PAXO
Well the video was set to record Bill Gates and he was going to be grilled by Paxman. (Not another cookery program - Ed). On playback a tale unfolded of struggle unconcerned with mere mortals with a plot unleashed on the world.
Oops! - I'd videod Hercules on C5 by mistake but I don't think there was much difference.
I'm writing this as the judgement has gone against M$, cue of much rejoicing in the newsgroups that I'm subscribed to. The more cynical amongst us may remember that there's one law for the rich and another for the poor and there is a long way to go .....
My Mac is now a M$ free zone as I've got Netscape running and replacing IE.
HISTORY AS WE KNOW IT ....
I came across an item in which someone made a remark about "Deltic" being the first diesel loco. Wrong, it was far from being the first - it was the first that had a PR exercise built around it . Back in the period between the end of WW2 and the nationalisation of the railways lurked LMS 10000 & LMS 10001, (also built by English Electric like the Deltic) and the Southern Railway also had its diesel loco. I can't recall much about it apart from not being very good looking! While the GWR lot dream of Castles and Kings steaming past beaches let them reflect on the number of diesel railcars in the inventory, along with the fact that I had a picture of an 0-4-0 shunter with the GWR #1 painted proudly on it .
'What has this got to do with Commodore computers?', I hear you shout.
In our local library there is a public access machine with CD-ROMs on-line. Idly playing on it I started looking up computers in its search facility. Winston Smith would've recognised the results. Commodore made the C64 as a games machine, then Windows sprang forth into existence was the basic premise of all that I could find out. This is from a machine that local college students are encouraged to use, including a teachers training college.
