USE CURSOR KEYS TO SCROLL TEXT. USE CURSOR KEYS TO SCROLL TEXT. 8 BIT SOFTWARE Reactions Reactions ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, To: 999 (all members) From: K6X (Cluke) Subject: Geriatric Ova Evacuation? Beeb-PC Communications. Further to Simon Godfrey's article in 8BS-41. He mentions his use of telephone cable to make his connection cables, which I feel might be a bit misleading. Those of us who are quite happy to hoik the lid off our 128s at the least excuse will already know the following, but for anyone thinking of burning themselves with a soldering iron for the first time, a few points I think worth mentioning. DO NOT USE TELEPHONE CABLE! Proper telephone cable as used by BT etc. has single solid wires. These are perhaps easier for the novice to solder, but will probably give rise to problems later as they are meant to be used as static connections, and are liable to break if they are moved around too often. As electricity flows on the surface of a conductor, and as each coloured wire has only one strand of copper in it, the path down which the electricity ( ie the data ) can flow is restricted. A far better option is to use multi-strand cable, where each coloured wire consists of several smaller strands. 7/0.2 ( ie 7 strands of wire, each having a cross- sectional area of 0.2mm ) would be the type to use, and from Simon's description is probably what he did in fact have. This multi-strand cable has the added advantage that it can also be bought in a screened version ( ie a braided wire mesh beneath the outer sheathing surrounding the bundle of wires ) which if properly connected ( ie to Earth or Ground at each end ) will reduce unwanted signals ( eg Radio 1 ) appearing on your datalink, and should allow higher baud rates to be reliably achieved. I hope that I HAVEN'T been teaching your Granny to suck eggs, and good luck with the project if you decide to attempt it. ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, From: K5W (CHRIS LEWIS) Subject: HOW A PSU WORKS - NOT! I had a good chuckle over Mick York's article on switch mode power supplies. Then I was faced with trying to repair one for real. I have temporarily given up and parted with my only spare. Could anyone out there write a serious article? My symptoms are correct voltages when the PSU is disconnected but only 1.7v measured with a DVM when plugged into the motherboard. Are there any stock faults? ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, From: L1M (Janny Looyenga) Subject: ARCHIVE Just what I was looking for: a good working archive to pack a whole disc in just one file! It is very user-friendly (you don't have to write down the names of the files you want to pack, thanks to the *CAT) and even archives different directories, => BUT ... it is not yet waterproof ! When archiving a disc of 31 files which uses a lot of space, you get 2 problems: the archive does not compress, in contrary some space is added and at the end of archiving you get an error message 'can't extend' and the program stops, however without closing the file. So checking the file you get the error message 'file open'. That's it. And indeed what Chris mentioned: You can't yet wipe files from an archive:would be nice when you add this and a bit of compression please! My compliments to Chris Richardson: THIS WILL BECOME VERY OFTEN USED SOFTWARE!!! EDITOR.... Thanks for the comments Janny. The first problem is caused by the fact that part of the archive is used to remember all the load and run addresses of the software in the archive. Therefore the archive is bound to be larger than the sum of the originals. I wrote this program to enable a large number of SMALL programs to be put into one file (in fact 992 files per DFS side is possible theoretically, anybody want to try it out?). Perfect for an 8BS issue where there are a large number of small utilities on occasions. I had a dilemma in programming the archiver. There is a nasty bug in the Master DFS that messes up a file if you type CLOSE_0. Ideally in an error trap, CLOSE_0 is the best way of ensuring that all files are shut correctly. CLOSE_F% if F% is not a file handle would cause an error which would then cause the program to lock up in the ONERROR routine. A catch 22 situation. I decided that the best way was to forget closing the file in the ONERROR routine and hope nobody noticed! Oh well, there you go. It would be possible to do it using a GOTO but I refuse! COME ON SOMEBODY! Free software to the person that can resolve the problem in a couple of lines without major changes to the program. For instance, setting a flag so that the program knows when a file is open or closed is a good solution, but it requires an overhaul of the program. ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, From: K2H (RON BOYCE) Subject: CONVOY ARTICLES The three CONVOY articles were most interesting. I was the Petty Officer Telegraphist aboard HMS Peacock which escorted convoys JW59 and RA59A to and from Murmansk in August/September 1944. An excellent account of these convoys appears on Page 127 Chapter 10 of "The Arctic Convoys" by Vice Admiral B B Scholfield, but it does not list the names of ships in the convoys. Has any 8BS member got more detailed information? If so, I would be very greatful for it. I am in touch with some ex Peacock crew and a reunion is held annually at Leamington Spa. ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, To: 999 (all members) From: K2H (RON BOYCE) Subject: The REACTOR The 'Countdown'-type anagram game was interesting and well presented. Maybe it could be improved by the addition of a 'Countdown'-type ticking clock which speeds up as the time limit comes up? ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, From: 0E7 (Fred Nevin) Subject: Labeller A very useful program for printing one-off or small quantities of labels It is easy to use and it works. ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, From: L1M (Janny Looyenga) Subject: CONFIGURE-IT From Issue 42. ADFSextra When I read the instructions I thought this might be a handy program, but it is not yet. It is full of BUGS. Not very user-friendly because with every mistake - yours or the writer's - the computer resets. When trying to answer the first question about what you want to start with Loud/Soft an error already occurs and the computer resets. Checking what happened shows that a Bad Command is given at line 390: *Configure Soft must be: *Configure Quiet. When having improved this one you can continue - no need to press RETURN. The Language question was not given any instruction about, as you don't know what to do your computer resets. LANGUAGE? means which Language you want to start with: for instance 12 (C) = BASIC 14 (E) = VIEW. Press RETURN here. MODE? 0-7 Whatever you are trying to answer you don't see anything, and when you are inclined to press RETURN (which was needed after the former questions but not now), YES: your computer resets again! The last question gives a Bad Command at Line 630 and now *CONFIGURE Shift is not known. So by pressing the 'S' your computer resets again! but no need to press RETURN. You can start the Configure-it program from within its own Menu, but not read the Instructions, because these are renamed. The menu searches after !Readme and the file is called ConInf here. The warning in the instructions are very true: Don't experience unless you know what you are doing! The Configure-it Menu itself LOOKS GOOD, but the total needs improvements! ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, BLAM! PRESS BREAK PRESS BREAK