Hull-o! Well, issue 51 arrives and we are still going strong. Why might this be? I have given this a bit of thought. Let's throw this up in the air and see which way up it lands. The main reason is that I am still inundated with loads of wonderful submissions from other similar like minded BBC owners. These people have their machines for various reasons. Some have picked them up at car boot sales or found them in skips outside schools and colleges and are looking to see if there is any software for them. Some refuse to waste a "good machine" by letting it sink into oblivion. Some have got used to using it and cannot see why they should "upgrade". Some have "upgraded" and still hang on to the BBC because of clubs like 8BS. Some have "upgraded" but still prefer their BBC as they are more easy to use. Some use their BBC to run bits of hardware and don't see why they should upgrade to a PC to do the same job for £1000 extra (the best reason I can think of). Me? I dunno. OH NO, not again, more errors. AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAArgh. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Yes, the old finger slips struck again in early versions of 8BS 50. A couple of minor ones that most of you will have blipped over without bothering. Some of the more pedantic amongst you will have written in to me to point the errors out. I must explain to you here how this happens. Paul Clucas spots all of the errors in the issue, however the version that Paul checks is the version that is ready on deadline day. After this date, I still keep adding odds and ends to the issue, these additions arrive at your house unfiltered. Hence the errors. So it is not Paul's fault! Jonathan's Bash ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ We had a bit of a do at Jonathan Harston's place in July. We had a very good time. There are two ADFS discs of scanned photographs available to those of you who want them. Send discs and return p+p. The first person to request the discs in DFS format will inspire me to copy them across to FOUR DFS discs. We had a great time, using the opportunity to discuss the future of 8BS. EBTEL (8BS Telephone Network) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Andrew Nelson has loaned 8BS an SJ fileserver. To follow is a 450 meg hard drive. This will enable me to place the whole 8BS pool onto the hard disc. The idea is that I shall eventually make the fileserver available to YOU over the telephone. Jonathan Harston is writing 8BS communications software that will make connecting to 8BS as simple as booting up the 8BS magazine. Software will be written so that you can: 1. Write messages off line to send them over the phone for use either in the magazine or to be left for someone else to pick up via their telephone. 2. Receive any messages waiting for you 3. Browse the 8BS pool 4. Download specific files from the 8BS pool 5. Upload files to me 6. Chat with me This is how it will work: You get a modem and the 8BS EBTEL utility disc. The disc contains everything that you need to get you going. SHIFT+BREAK before going on line, and from the menu, select what you want to do whilst on line. Go on line and carry out the selected tasks. Examine the results off line. The time on line will be kept to a minimum, theoretically, the EBTEL software will do everything quickly without you having to intervene. This should keep your costs quite low. A system of "call back" may be used. Basically this means that those of you who would pay more to ring 8BS than 8BS can call you for can be in credit with 8BS and get 8BS to call you, thus saving you money. At first, only a few key members of 8BS will have access to the system as we debug and refine it. More on the system later, but start looking for a modem. If you are not sure about what to go for, go for the fastest, avoid those that require specific software to run them. If in doubt, don't get it and contact me. The idea is to keep the 8BS "look" and to have a similar setup to the 8BS magazine but on-line. A whole host of ideas have been discussed, any suggestions from the membership would be welcomed (the sooner the better!). Changes to the TBI Pool Since Last Time. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 8BS-49 Correction to ElecMenu. See the Comments on Programs article. TBI-101 Steven Flintham's Compression Utilities. Updated and a ROM added. Janny Looyenga has sent me the usual bundle of discs for the 512 section, this section has got to 15 inches in my drawer! 512-62 Two 360K DOS discs. C Tutor with example programs. 512-63 Two 360K DOS discs. Pascal Tutor with example programs. 512-64 PC-DBMS. Relational database system. Thanks. ~~~~~~~ Thanks to Fred Nevin for sending the lottery numbers for my Ultimate Lottery Program to bring me up to date. Moi. ~~~ I am an Ambulance Paramedic as most of you already know. Recently, I have been seconded into headquarters to do various jobs involving, guess what? Yes, computers. I am presently working normal working hours (9 to 5 with weekends and bank holidays off). I have just been given the job of setting up a new department in the Humberside Ambulance Trust, Clinical Audit. I shall be doing this until April 1997. This is going to take up a fair bit of my time and energy, so please bear with me. See you next time.