Keith's Gleanings

While there were some "simulations and modelling" in this issue, there was also plenty of technical content for the Amiga. Karl J.H. Hildon's editorial referred to the Amiga 500 ("curiously similar to the Atari 1040 ST") and "2500", although one letter-writer complained how the computer no longer allowed the "so automatic" directory-printing command "open4,4:cmd4:(caT" or listing-printing command "list):print#4:close4" and supposed the "2000" and "500" amounted to a page "taken out of IBM's manual of deserting the loyal customers," and another letter, in supposing multitasking ran into "a lot of us have trouble enough concentrating on one task at a time" and "most tools that are easy to learn are less satisfactory for the experienced user," limiting the Amiga to "technofreaks and artists. Business empires on this market are not built." One article on RLE images mentioned how their rigid sizes had been tailored to "the original Radio Shack Color Computer" and included some samples from CompuServe, including an "FBI Ten Most Wanted" image, a missing child report, and one piece of art that was not just "in an anime style" but pretty much lolicon...

SpeedScript returned in this issue to the Gazette from Compute! itself, with some extra utilities available as separate type-in programs. Increased storage for the Commodore 64 and 128 was examined, ranging from RAM disk cartridges to hard disks.

As the MIDI ports on the Atari ST came to seem ever more significant, this issue's musical focus included "the inside story of how Atari won the war against IBM, Apple and Commodore." The "Ian's Quest" column looked at the ST version of "Balance of Power," making a small point of how easy it might be to suppose Chris Crawford ("that old Atari 8-bit whiz kid") had a particular view of the world from the way the game played out. One article discussed Electronics Arts acquiring Batteries Included. The back cover ad was for "MIDI Maze," which allowed sixteen STs to be networked together to hunt "happy face opponents."

Aware in advance in a general way of “a Christmas episode” of The Twilight Zone, I found some amusement in getting to “The Night of the Meek” during July...

The musical content in this issue included a program to imitate the sound of a Japanese shakuhachi bamboo pipe, inspired by the soundtrack from The Karate Kid, and a review of the Roland TR-707 rhythm composer. The "hard disk primer" led off with the warning that they were "psychologically addictive" and included a later warning that they shouldn't be switched on multiple times in one day, given how much torque was needed to bring them up to operating speed. A news item mentioned Electronic Arts intended to purchase "rights to the brand" of the Atari software firm Batteries Included, which had been "plagued in its final days by piracy."

At its latest anniversary, Antic handed out awards again. It was also able to report on Atari's latest products, a repackaged ST with more memory capacity and an MS-DOS machine; Jack Tramiel proclaimed "In 1987, we are declaring war on the computer business in the United States." One type-in program strove to squeeze "Rogue" into the 8-bit Atari computers; a grander (commercial) version of Rogue for the ST was also reviewed inside.

While a working TRS-80 Model 100 is the one “1980s computer” in my possession I can switch on without clearing what limited table space I have to cable together hardware, at times I’m just as likely to resort to its “Virtual T” emulator as to pull the computer out of its old slip case (which is itself stamped “made in Japan”)...

The Apple IIgs shipped with twice as much memory as the IIe and IIc, but 256 K was judged inadequate to run the software beginning to show up that made use of its unique capabilities. This issue looked at assorted expansion cards that would increase its memory to a megabyte and beyond. Fred Davis's editorial and the news section acknowledged the appearance of the Macintosh II and Macintosh SE, supposing that their expansion capabilities drew from the example of the Apple II.

Getting data into your computer by scanning bar codes, which had been an idea for a while (if around long enough to also result in disillusionment) provided the cover story for this issue. The first impressions of WordStar 4.0 hoped it would also be available for CP/M; users of that operating system got pointers on how to patch their programs. While the article on "the electronic shopping mall" supposed the brick-and-mortar original "the cultural phenomenon of the 1980s," it was quite ready to see potential in the online version.

Cover aside, the contents of this issue were eclectic. Bill Barden's article on "creating business forms" approached the "heresy" of wishing MS-DOS machines were a little more like the Macintosh in representing on their screens what output from their printers. An article on "predicting solar outages" explained how satellite dish users would have their TV reception degrade or even disappear twice a year when the sun wound up in line with the geostationary communications satellite their dish was pointed at. "Programmer roulette" was a program for the Model 100 that posed the potential risk of killing a perhaps-misbehaving file, although you could default to a dummy file if you didn't want to risk anything. A "MicroScopes" news section reported on IBM introducing Personal System/2 computers, OS-9 showing up at last for the Color Computer 3, an improved Portable Disk Drive from Tandy, and Microsoft changing its logo, where we learned some employees now regretted the disappearance of a distinctive "O" in the middle of the old logo they called the "Blibbit."

The Consumer Electronics Show coverage in this issue talked about Commodore bringing a PC clone over to the United States and quietly introducing the Amiga 500 and 2000; Richard Mansfield's editorial, though, declared "the Commodore 64 has become the Volkswagen of the computer market, the most widely accepted personal computer ever" with people beginning to predict it would keep selling "into the 1990s." In his regular column, Fred D'Ignazio explained how his seven-year-old son hadn't taken to computers when they'd been pushed on him, but a bit of benign parental indifference had worked better, leading to his son taking up computer games and educational programs.

This issue unfortunately isn't available on the Internet Archive, although it is to be found elsewhere. Along with its telecommunications articles, it included a lengthy letter from someone insisting that, just as the Atari 800 had been vastly superior to the Apple II despite the smug incomprehension of Apple users, the Atari ST was immensely superior to the Macintosh, especially now that the "Magic Sac" would let Atari's computer run (some) Macintosh software faster and with a more ample screen to spread out on. The Magic Sac was also reviewed, with a comment that its documentation read as if it had been "designed by a lawyer," pitching the ST cartridge as a "Macintosh upgrade" and going to lengths explaining how to extract the ROM chips from a Mac rather than just finding a dealer who'd sell them (although the price had been going up with increased demand from Sac users). One article offered positive descriptions of Sierra's "Quest" adventures, noting how Ken Williams had recently announced Sierra wouldn't be bothering with "the considerable C64 audience" any more. Sierra just happened to include an ad near the back of the magazine, pointing out how Space Quest had graphics and The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy didn't.

The camera Rod Serling showed off in the preview for “A Most Unusual Camera” at least looked distinctive to me for being so plain, although I knew “box cameras” had existed once upon a time...

Dialing into a BBS (or even a big commercial service) received another introduction in this issue. Arthur Leyenberger's "The End User" column described some unusual products before reminding everyone just what month it was.

A spreadsheet template to calculate your taxes returned in this issue. The theme continued to a type-in game where you were trying to protect your savings in "an unusual Swiss bank" from "a crack team of IRS field auditors". One company promised "more muscle" for 8-bit Atari computers than came standard with the ST.

The "getting online" focus of this issue mentioned 2400-bps modems as the "high-speed" option (for $350 to $600), and that "about a year and a half ago" "modems had achieved only 10% market penetration", although "major marketing efforts" had pushed that up to "20% of all U.S. households with personal computers". The "sound magic" feature in the corner of the cover mentioned that you could "build a crude sound-input device for about $15," starting with a Radio Shack intercom and a few other parts. Fred Davis's editorial got around to addressing the disappearance of Macintosh coverage, explaining that Ziff-Davis had just purchased MacUser "after months of secret negotiations." A MacUser ad showed up inside this issue.