January 1992 BYTE LAB PRODUCT REPORT: DATABASE MANAGERS Page 226 7 Tools to Turbocharge Your Database Page 204 A McGRAW HILL PUBLICATION 84 BYTE Award Winners, « Plus International Picks Best Products Windows Accelerators Compared: Graphics Boards from Actix, ATI, Artist Graphics, Orchid, STB, and BCC USER'S COLUMN Jerry Pournelle on Windows 3.1 STATE OF THE ART Developing Applications Across Platforms PLUS 5 Statistics Packages The 8-oz. Psion Series 3 Palmtop ClarisWorks Microsoft Bookshelf for Windows 3.0 Tektronix Phaser III Color Printer !■!' II!] 1 .60 IN CANADA %■ I best one yet ?•;-+*: + 1 t A j^i^^^p^jp^TOiifa^ifcB-.aB;, f-jfflj ^ \ f ^ ft* = = ^^B/Ji = UN aAaaeh n □ m $ 0,0 % \M Q H ill Ofall the reasons to move to Windows, * here'sthe ! Fv. 1 J_ J_ &ia ■■■I ■ii c f Lotus. I Qfc PCI S mi rEH Iff? f^T? nyr y-s ys; £$ -_ 1 H£ v v ^ ^l^J^B til |:H:;:|Si 1:5:;: £= £= eH ?= fiR \ \ O /UUN $ 0,0% GDI .li il(2 m % it n Introducing Loti Well, we've done all this. And a whole lot more. Which, no doubt, is why 1-2-3 for Windows was awarded Byte Magazine's Best New Windows Application at Comdex/Spring '91. For starters, the most exciting part of 1-2-3 for Windows is its Smartlcons,™ an innovative " one-click" approach for automating common spreadsheet tasks and fine tuning your working Rarifje Copy Move File Print Cr^i Data System Quit. Global Insert Delete C«lumn Erase Titlg; torvJow Status Page Hide Push the slash key and you 'U have instant access to the familiar 1-2-3 menu which will appear in a window on your screen. environment ibr even greater productivity. You'll also find these Smartlcons in all our Windows products, including Ami Pro™ 2.1, our award- winning word processor. It's everything a Windows spreadsheet was meant to be. After listening carefully to what our cus- tomers were looking for in a Windows™ spread- sheet, we developed Lotus* l-2-3" J for Windows with three goals in mind. First, make it a full-fledged Windows application. Second, introduce innovations that deliver a perfect balance of power and simplicity. And third, make it fully compatible with all of the earlier versions of 1-2-3 that millions of 1-2-3 users are familiar with. You '11 feel right at home with our true Windows interface, kind you can easily integrate your spreadsheet data with other Windows applications. Our palette of customizable Smartlcons can be sized and placed anywhere on your screen. Our interactive graph gallery means you can preview and select by emmple a wide range of chart and graph types. The program includes Adobe i\jpe Manager (ATM) ® the leading scalable font manager, for outstanding spreadsheet publishing and presentation options. *Snggest.ed retail price. Oiler expires December :i I, 1091. © Copyright 1991 Lotus Developmenl .Corporation. All rights reserved. Lotus, 1-2-3, and DalaLens are registered trademarks an a wholly owned subsidiary of Loins Development Corporation. Microsoft is a registered Irademark and Windows and Toolbar are trademarks of Microsoft Corporation. Adobe Type S g±L s * l * % h -. * ?s t\ c I \ \ O ^ K >£~- Hl' ■III ft ~ % a "y 1 Smartlcons is a trademark of Lotus Development Corporation. Classic is a registered trademark licensed to Lotus Development Corporation. Ami Pro is a trademark of Samna Corporation, anager and ATM are registered trademarks of Adohe Systems. Incorporated. * * Please have your credit card and product package ready when you call. In Canada, call 1-800-668-1509. Revenues ^dve nt i t&i*** Comec mar Joteh D Retu rd Si ^dve ni +2 Romance I li (5) 0,0 1986 $983 $2,367 $c coo $3,895 1 2,868 $ □ hent 85.0% 93.5% 1 1 0.8% VWiU ^0 mn n*: Now'.NewZBOS LOTUS SOFTWARE! Now, for a limited time only, when you buy any ZEOS Windows system you will also receive Lotus 7-2-3 for Windows plus Lotus' new word processor for Windows, Ami Pro 2.0! These are not some scaled down versions or trial disks. You will receive the complete and fully docu- mented editions of both Lotus 7-2-3 for Windows and Ami Pro 2.0! America's best hard- ware plus America's best software. You simply can't go wrong! Call us now at 800-423-5891. Upgradables! ZEOS. AMERICA'S #1 LINE OF UPGRADABLE SYSTEMS. ZEOS '386 & '486 UPGRADABLES! Now, ZEOS gives you complete high performance upgradable systems -with our amazing '386-25s starting at only $1395 and our '486-33s starting at only $1795! And that's not all. Every ZEOS Windows® system, such as those featured at the right, comes complete with Lotus 1-2-3® for Win- dows and Lotus' new word processor for Windows, Ami Pro 2.0! These are the full blown, fully documented editions of the very latest Lotus business software. And they are included with your new ZEOS Windows systems at no additional charge! You get the very latest innovations in hardware, the hot new ZEOS upgradable systems plus the very latest in high pow- For verticaisystems add only $150. ered sof tware, Lotus 1-2-3 for Windows and Ami Pro 2. 0. And you get them both at one low package price! MORE FEATURES FROM ZEOS! When you purchase your ZEOS upgradable systems you have the ability to change processors any time you wish. Starting right with the 386-25 and moving up through the fastest '486 chips available! Pick your power now and in the future! We take care of your future in other ways as well. Like providing you with 300 watt power supplies as standard. And 8 expansion slots and our unique seven bay desktop case, still smaller than many five bay cases. Plus two whisper quiet cooling fans for even more reliability. And, every ZEOS system is UV listed for your safety. High performance, upgradable systems complete with Lotus 1-2-3 for Windows and Ami Pro 2.0. What more could there be? From ZEOS, lots more! 386-25 $2495 386-33 $2595 486SX-20 $2695 486-3 3 $2 895 24 HOUR TOLL FREE SUPPORT. Like 24 Hour Support! At ZEOS, we believe support should be more than a part time proposition. Thafs why we're here to help you Toll Free 24 Hours a Day, 365 days a year! You're also going to appreciate your other ZEOS advantages as well. Because not only do you receive ZEOS 'round-the-clock Support, you're also get- ting our 30 Day Absolute Satisfaction Money Back Guarantee, One Full Year Limited Warranty and our Express Parts Replacement policy. You're going to be very satisfied. We don't just say it. We guarantee it! YOU SIMPLY CAN'T GO WRONG! Your new high performance ZEOS upgradables come from a family of systems which have received Eight PC Magazine Editors Choice Awards. And don't foiget, for a limited time only, when you purchase any new ZEOS Windows system youll also receive Lotus 1-2-3 for Windows plus Ami Pro 2.0. So why not give us us a call right now, 800-423-5891! Purchase orders from Fortune 1000 companies. Governments and institutions subject to approval. Leasing programs available. All prices and specifications subject tochange without notice. Please call to confirm pricing, specification and warranty details. The followW are trademarte of their respecti ve cor- porations: ZEOS and Z-Card of ZEOS International Ltd. © ZEOS International Ltd., 530 5th Aven ue, N.W., St. Paul, MN 55112 USA. ZEOS is a publicly traded company, NASDAQ symbol: ZEOS. Lotus is a registered trademark of Lotus Development Corporation. Ami Pro is a trademark of Sarnna Corporation, a wholly-owned subsidiary of I/)tus Development Corporation. Circle 188 on Inquiry Card. ZEOS PRESENTS UPGRADABLES FEATURING 4MB MEMORY, 130MB DRIVE AND MORE! 128K Cache Available! The Processor and Speed of your choice plus future upgradability! 4 full Megabytes of Ultra High Speed 53ns DRAM. Our fast 130MB IDE hard drive with built in cache. Both Teac H floppies, the 1.2MB and 1.44MB! Your Diamond VGA Plus card with 1MB DRAM. ZEOS 14 High Res 1024x768 VGA Color Monitor with Tilt & Swivel Base. Shadow RAM and EMS support. ZEOS/RS 101 key Space- Saver keyboard. Two Serial, one Parallel & one Game Port built right onto the motherboard. 7-16, 1-8 bit expansion slots, 80387 math co- processor support for '386 systems. ZEOS SpaceSaver case with twin cooling fans for added reliability and product life. Seven drive bays and our custom 300 Watt power supply for your future expansion! Lotus 1-2-3 for Windows, plus Ami Pro 2.0, plus Microsoft Windows and DOS 5.0, plus a genuine Microsoft mouse! Includes ZEOS 24 Hour a Day Toll Free Technical Support and Customer Satisfaction package. PACKAGES Options Galore: Including additional mem- ory, an incredible selection rd drives and virtually any other add-on you could want. Ask about other spe- cial money saving packages as well. ORDER NOW TOLL FREE 800-423-5891 FAX Orders: 612-633-1325 Hearing Impaired (TDD) Orders: 800-228-5389 Outside US and Canada: 612-633-6131 MasterCard, VISA, Discover, Am Exp, Z-CARD and COD. Open 24 Hours a Day, 365 Days a Year! J BVTE January 1992 Volume 1 7, Number 1 COVER STORY The 1991 BYTE Awards PAGE 120 NEWS FEATURES 27 MICROBYTES Chips to the left, chips to the right: Microprocessors and chip sets are delivering more power and functionality in smaller form factors. 40 FIRST IMPRESSIONS Psion's Powerful Pocketable A full-fledged hand-held computer. 42 Microsoft Bookshelf for Windows, a multimedia version of the venerable reference tool Tandon's PacII, a truly modular system with a twist Dolch P.A.C. 486-50E, cutting-edge processing power comes at a price ClarisWorks, a seamless applications environment for the Mac GT486/40, Falco's small but powerful graphics PC Magnavox CDD461RS, a CD-ROM drive matched to the way we really work 62 WHAT'S NEW The StarJet printer goes with you anywhere; Microcom's modem ignores line noise; Soft-ICE/W debugs from Windows; and more. 120 The 1991 BYTE Awards BYTE editors and contributors select the best products of 1991. 1 49 Classic Languages, Part 5: SNOBOL The fifth installment in our Classic Languages series. STATE OF THE ART 158 DEVELOPING APPLICATIONS ACROSS PLATFORMS Overview: A Moving Target Cross-platform development presents unique challenges in this era of proliferating platforms and fragmenting standards. 177 Tributaries and Deltas Tracking software change in multiplatform environments. 191 Let the System Do the Porting A new generation of operating systems will help developers write applications for multiple platforms. 201 Resource Guide: Cross-Platform Application Development Tools 4 BYTE- JANUARY 1992 COVER PHOTOGRAPHY: MEL LINDSTR0M©19 REVIEWS OPINIONS 204 SOLUTIONS FOCUS Database Building Blocks Database libraries with the horsepower to build powerful multiuser applications. 226 BYTE Lab Product Report: DOS Data at Work In our first BYTE Lab Product Report, we sample the DOS database market. 250 Tweaking Windows: New Adapters Boost Speed and Clarity Six new graphics adapters promise to make Windows more efficient. 259 Ample Waves of Data: Five Tools to Help You Stay Afloat Five data-analysis programs promise understanding in a sea of information. 273 Claris Enters the Spreadsheet Wars A strong contender for the Macintosh spreadsheet crown elbows in on Excel' s and Wingz's turf. 279 DOS Extenders: Raising the Ceiling A look at four toolkits for building protected-mode DOS programs. 285 The Phaser III Fires Dazzling Colors Tektronix 's dazzling new color printer. 288 REVIEWER'S NOTEBOOK Supercharged SuperCalc, jaggies relief, and a tool to improve Windows. HANDS ON 293 SOME ASSEMBLY 327 REQUIRED Finally, a Real Keyboard A LapLink cable and your desktop's printer port can take the place of a laptop keyboard. 305 UNDER THE HOOD 333 Processor Pipelines The R4000, RISC System/6000, and 486 pipelines are compared. 319 SOFTWARE CORNER Memory Mapping, Edit II, and an Alarm Clock Memory control blocks, creating 343 Mac text files, and a Unix utility. 321 MACINATIONS Programming Under System 7.0 by Don Crabb 348 Finding the best language systems to use under System 7.0. THE UNIX /bin ACEsWild by David Fiedler The low-end workstation world takes on new significance from ACE and Solaris. NETWORKS Coming Soon: Faster LANs by Barry Nance Packet burst and 100-Mbps Token Ring technologies could change the face of networking in 1992. BEYOND DOS OLE for Windows 3.1 by Martin Heller A developer's view of Windows 3.1. ASK BYTE Big RAM disks, COM ports, TSRs, and a patriotic virus. USER'S COLUMN Configuration Tribulations by Jerry Pournelle Jerry tries to upgrade to Windows 3.1. BUSINESS CONNECTION Murphy's Law and Interoperability by Wayne Rash Jr. Getting your Macs, PCs, and Unix machines connected is simple. Getting them to work together isn't. ROUNDTABLE What Do Benchmarks Really Tell You? Most benchmark results should not be taken at face value. 404 PRINT QUEUE Dead Chickens A-Wavin' The New Hacker's Dictionary exhilarates; Technobabble indicts. 406 STOP BIT Standards Everywhere A pithy look at whom and how standards serve. 10 EDITORIAL The Envelope, Please . . . 18 LETTERS More on safety, Soviets, andC. READER SERVICE 402 399 400 Editorial Index by Company Alphabetical Index to Advertisers Index to Advertisers by Product Category Inquiry Reply Cards: 397 PROGRAM LISTINGS From BIX: Call (800) 227-2983 From Demolink: See ad on page 403 On disk: See page 322 INSIDE BYTE BYTE (ISSN 0360-5280/92) is published monthly with an additional issue in October by McGr aw-Hi!l, Inc. U.S. subscriber rate $29.95 per year. In CanadaandMexico, $34 95 per year. Single copies $3.50 in theU.S., $4.50 in Canada. Executive, Editorial, Circulation, and Advertising Offices: One Phoenix Mill Lane. Peterborough, NH 03458. Second-classpostage paid at Peterborough, NH, and additional mailing offices. Postage paid at Winnipeg. Manitoba. Registration number 9321. Printed in the United States of America. Postmaster: Send address changes, USPS Form 3579. and fulfillment questions to BYTE Subscriptions. P.O. Box 551. Hightstown. NJ 08520. REGIONAL SECTION begins after page 86 CORNER COVER PHOTOGRAPHY: RICHARD LAYBOURN © 1992 JANUARY 1992 -BYTE 5 BYTE Topic Index and Author Guide This index helps you find articles that contain information on each of the listed topics. (The topic list changes each month.) Combined with the table of contents (page 4) and the Editorial Index by Company (page 402), you can identify articles by type, subject, title, author, or product discussed. BENCHMARKS 115 CELLULAR NOTEBOOK 62 42,87 INTEGRATED SOFTWARE 42 INTEROPERABILITY 105, 158, 177 40 305 293 27 COLOR PRINTERS 285 COMMUNICATIONS 62 CROSS-PLATFORM 191 DATA ACQUISITION 62 1 DATA ANALYSIS 259 ■ DATABASES/DBMSE s 62, 204, 226 1 DEVELOPMENT 1 204 DOS EXTENDERS 62 MACINTOSH 42, 158, 273, 288, 321 87 MEMORY MANAGEMENT 87 MICROSOFT 42 40 PROGRAMMING 62, 177 305 149 SPREADSHEETS 273, 288 STANDARDS lL*^" 42 MULTITASKING 406 THERMALTRANSFER 285 TRANSPORTABLE 62 NETWORKS 42 333 OPTICALSTORAGE 158, 327 279 62 87 Allen, Dennis 115 Allstetter, Billy 27 Andrews, D. L. 27, 42, 62 Apiki, Steve 115 Appleby, Doris 149 Barron, Janet J. 162 Blaszczak, Mike 279 Calem, Robert E. 42 Crabb, Don 321 Cronk, Randall D. 177 Diehl, Stan 115, 226 Eglowstein, Howard 42, 293 Fiedler, David 327 Gibson, Christopher R. 273 Grehan, Rick 204, 226 Heller, Martin 27, 343 Joch, Alan 250 Kenner, Hugh 404 Linderholm, Owen 27 Loeb, Larry 27 Malloy, Rich 10 Marshall, Trevor 27, 1 15 Miastkowski, Stan 42 Mitchell, Rob 115 Nadeau, Michael 115, 120 Nance, Barry 319, 333 Osher, Herbert M. 172 Pountain, Dick 40 Pournelle, Jerry 87, 115 Rash, Wayne Jr. 105 Raymond, Eric S. 406 Reinhardt, Andy 27, 115 Ryan, Bob 158 Sheldon, Ken 115 Smith, Ben 115,204,319 Swartz, Carol J. 62 Thompson, Tom 285, 319 Udell, Jon 168, 204 Ullman Ellen 27, 191 Wayner, Peter 259, 305 62 27, 158, 343 27, 62, 87, 158, 250, 288 WORKSTATIONS 42 27, 42, 62 42 6 BYTE- JANUARY 1992 Panasonic announces J another breakthrough innon-interaced 1,024x768 graphics. I Value. jMT . you thought you'd have to compromise on your next High Resolution monitor, think again. With its new 14" PanaSync™ C1395, Panasonic® brings all the compelling clarity and richness of non-interlaced graphics within reach. TUrn it on, and you'll see your most graphics-intensive applications in a whole new light. Compared to interlaced monitors, images will be sharper, edges cleaner, details finer. With noticeably less flicker. Because now you're getting the whole picture, not just every other line. And the C1395 is as easy on your eyes as it is on your wallet. Like all Panasonic monitors, the C1395 has excellent ergonomics. Controls are front- mounted, and a tilt-swivel stand is included. So, whether your desktop is MS-DOS, a MAC II* or one of the other leading workstations, before you spend several hundred dollars more on a new monitor, spend a few minutes at your authorized Panasonic dealer. He'll show you that value has never looked so good. For further information on the PanaSync C1395 Multi-Frequency Monitor, telephone 1-800-742-8086. Monitors, Computers, Peripherals, Printers, Copiers, typewriters & Facsimiles *MAC II is a registered trademark of Apple Computer, Inc. An optional cable is required for Macintosh, the C81M2. Panasonic, Office Automation/^\A Engineered for the office. Designed for people. M4-BY Circle 1 20 on Inquiry Card. The first wo that works like G3 Microsoft Won File Edit View Insert Format Tools d ; g£ y £'%iis i -r ■ +=r SI T/ze Toolbar lets you do everyday things with the click of a button. Microsoft Word - MEMO.DOC »| EHe £dlt VJew Insert Formaj Tgols Table window Help ["dMbI [JWW\ ffl [W^lfel [MTmThiT^W [jg] \WW\ fflspl |Normal || Tj |Tm« Rmn Dear Maria, jffl [Tr]|j] [iTTTTl fgTlRlTWj [JTTTTrn 53 Enclosed is the information you requested about EuroClirab. This year's excursion will include climbs in France, Switzerland, and Italy, Our specialty is adventurous travel by foot. I; : You may join the tour at any time (cost is broken down by country), however, we iecr mend thai to get the most out of the experience, you sign up for the entire excursion ta '■'. uiis packet and contact us soon! K Djfc.'a k fe Italy August 1-14 August 15- September September 4-23 September 24 Total Cost imm 3600 $13600 Use the mouse to move selected objects] to a new location The mouse makes everyday tasks as easy as click, click, click. Rearranging a document couldn't be any easier. With new Word 2.0 you can drag and drop text wherever you ivant. [SB EH BE III 4x4 Table All it takes is one click on the Toolbar and presto, instant tables. Click this Toolbar button and get instant bullets. second nature. MEMO.DOC Table Window Help 1 lim^idi; ^ *&■;•■ V :=m m I Click here for automatic envelopes. I Click here to print your ivork. ! C/zc£ /zere /o ttztf£e c/wrfs. C/;c& fore /o check spelling. Click here to zoom in. Introducing new Word for Windows 2.0. When it comes to word processing, really nothing could be more natural than using the all-new Microsoft* Word for Windows." %u see, Word 2.0 makes those everyday word process- ing tasks remarkably easy Which means you can now concen- trate on what you're actually doing. Rather than how you're actually going to do it. This is possible for a number of reasons. Like our unique Toolbar " feature. It lets you do those things you do most often with one simple click of a button. Of course, looks count for some- thing, too. With Word you can bring in a table of numbers from Microsoft Excel. Or with the new built-in drawing, charting and shading features, along with the ability to move anything on-screen with a drag and drop, you'll find yourself adding some very very cool effects. But best of all, making the move is easy-so easy there is virtually no down- time. Just type in a WordPerfect keystroke and Word demonstrates the equivalent command right in your document. Plus, your existing WordPerfect files (and other file formats) are perfectly usable in Word. "feu can get all of this and a lot more when you upgrade to Word for Windows for only $129.* So pick up the phone and callus at (800) 323-3577 Department W3. You'll quickly see that nothing could be more natural. Microsoft * Offer good for current licensees of Wordi !,ih\ WordStar, MS Word for DOS and DisplavW; ■ ks for delivery upon receipt oforde) ipi Microsoft. Offer expires 3/31/92. Limit one per customer. Reseller prices may vary. Call for system requirements. Offer good only in the 50 United States. © 1991 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. Printed in the USA. In the United States, call (800) 323-3577. Dept W3. For information only: In Canada, call (800) 563-9048; outside the United States and Canada, call (206) 936-8661. Microsoft «? a registered trademark atid Toolbar and Windows are trademarks of Microsoft Corporation. WordPerfect is a registered trademark of the WordPerfect Corporation. EDITORIAL RICH MALLOY The Envelope, Please . . . BYTE's Best of Comdex Awards honor products that are announced at the show It's that time of year again. Many people are rushing around doing last-minute Christmas shopping. Some are making preparations for their New Year's cele- brations. And a few lucky ones are heading of f for a short vacation. But for us it is a time to look back on the amazing products and technologies we have seen in the past year and hand out our annual BYTE Awards. In the past 12 months, we have mentioned roughly 2000 computer products in these pages — by our calcula- tions, more than any other computer magazine around. All the products seemed good, or we wouldn't have spent time on them. Most were very im- pressive indeed. And some were so impressive that they are worthy of special consideration. One of the most satisfying aspects of working at BYTE is having the chance to see these products. But even more satisfying is having the chance to disseminate the results of our findings to our readers. With our awards, we are able to give added prominence to those products that clearly deserve it. This process of giving out awards is a heady responsibility, but a gratifying one as well. Actually, ourawardseason — like the Christmas holi- day season — started several weeks ago. At the recent Comdex, we officially kicked off the season by once again giving out awards for the best new products at the show. These Best of Comdex Awards are also known as the Shelly Awards, in honor of the man who created Comdex, Sheldon G. Adelson. The Shelly Awards focus on the future, on brand-new products that may not be shipping for some time to come. They are our way of previewing the big new products of next year. We look for products or technologies that are innovative, that have had a strong impact on Comdex attendees, and that should have a strong impact on busi- ness computer use worldwide. As you can imagine, there was no shortage of products to examine. Sniffing out the best new products at a show that has 2000 exhibitors is no easy feat. We flew in a team of 25 editors, divided up the show floor, and set them loose. The editors spent a great amount of time on this, braving traf- fic jams, huge taxi lines, and Las Vegas fast food. But the results were worth it. We gave out awards in eight categories. Some were no surprise to anyone at the show; all you had to do was look for the largest crowds. The Apple Mac PowerBook 170 notebook was selected as Best Portable. We gave Microsoft two awards: The new Word for Windows 2.0 was named as Best Application, and the much improved LAN Manager 2. 1 won as Best Connectivity Product. The Intel/ IBM ActionMedia II technology, which is the latest generation of DVI video for CD-ROMs, was cited as Best Multimedia Product. But the best thing about giving out awards is the chance to honor deserving products that might not have the ben- efit of a huge promotional budget. We awarded DR DOS 6.0 from Digital Research the prize for Best Utility Soft- ware. The Best Peripheral award was snared by JVC for its innovative Personal ROMMaker, the first moderate- ly priced device for producing CD-ROMs. Texas Mi- crosystems won the Best Desktop award for its FTSA PC, a fault-tolerant PC that will surely influence other sys- tem manufacturers. The British company Psion won top honors in the Best International Product category for its Psion Series 3 palmtop system. In fact, at the awards ceremony, Psion officials almost sold three of its inno- vative palmtop systems to the other prize winners. The most dramatic award was the Best of Show, but there was not much question about who should receive this. We gave this award to I ntel and IBM for the Action- Media II technology, which will probably have an impact on every system manufacturer in one way or another. The Best of 1991 While Comdex gave us a chance to look at what might be the best products of next year, the closing days of 1991 re- mind us that we cannot avoid mentioning the best prod- ucts of this past year. For these products, we have our BYTE Awards of Excellence, Distinction, and Merit, which are the subject of the cover story in this issue. If picking the best products at a show like Comdex was difficult, picking the best products of an entire year is several times more so. Fellow Executive Editor Michael Nadeau probably deserves an award of his own for help- ing us sort through the hundreds of products we have examined in the past year. To the products that have won awards, we raise a year- end toast of congratulations. But we also toast all the products that have come our way and that have made 199 1 so interesting and enjoyable. And now, for the winners of 1991, the envelope, please.... — Rich Malloy Executive Editor (BIX name "rmalloy") 10 BYTE « JANUARY 1992 BORLAND C++ & APPLICATION FRAMEWORKS FREE BORLAND O & APPLICATION FRAMEWORKS BORLAND THE INDUSTRY-STANDARD C- - WITH OBJECTWINDOWS" AND TURBO VISION" ...If you program for a living New! Borland® C++ & Application Frameworks 3.0 is the choice of pro- fessional C and C++ programmers for Windows and DOS application develop- ment. With unmatched optimizations, powerful tools, unsurpassed Windows development environment and object- oriented application frameworks, Borland C++ & Application Frameworks 3.0 has no equal. Quite simply, if you program for a living, this is everything you need. OOP, to simplify your life Borland C++ & Application Frameworks 3.0 simplifies programming by giving you ready-made user interface objects that plug directly into your application. Automatically inherit windows, menus, scroll bars, mouse support and more. Add an editor in just one line. With Object-Oriented Programming (OOP), you get amazing code reusability, exten- sibility and easier maintenance because applications are built on a base of tested, reliable code. New features give you incredible programming options! Just look at some of the enhanced features in Borland C++ 3.0: • ANSI C and C++ 2.1 and templates • Global optimizer includes: • Global register allocation • Local and global common sub-expressions • Induction variables • Loop and jump optimization • Register parameter passing • And ten other state-of-the-art optimizations • Increased C++ compile speed • Windows and DOS Integrated Development Environments • Visual Object Browser" to view class relationships at a glance • DPMI support for compiler and IDE environments gives you huge capacity • Easy Win™ library makes it easy to con- vert your DOS programs to Windows • Resource Workshop for creating Windows user interfaces visually • Extensive Microsoft® C compatibility • WinSight™ message tracking utility • Turbo Debugger® for DOS and Windows • Turbo Profiler™ for DOS and Windows • Object-oriented Turbo Assembler® And with new Borland C++ & Application Frameworks 3.0 you get all of this, plus: • ObjectWindows™ — the application framework for Windows • Turbo Vision 1 " — the application framework for DOS • Source code for runtime library and application frameworks Optimized for professionals Borland C++ 3.0 ($495 ,X) *) or Borland C++ & Application Frameworks 3.0 ($749°°*) are optimized for your life-style. But don't wait. Because when it comes to professional programming, there's no better way to earn a living than with Borland C++. See your dealer today or call now 1-800-331-0877, Dept. 5002 BORLAND The Leader in Object-Oriented Programming 'Suggested retail pnce Ml prices are in U.S. dollars. Dealer prices may vaiy. Copyright© 1991 Borland International. Inc. All rights reserved. All Borland products are trademarks ol Borland International, Inc. Bl 1451 Circle 27 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 28). Whyyournext should be a By now, you're probably aware that an Apple® Macintosh 8 personal computer was designed from the very first chip to work the same, intuitive way that you do. What you may not know, however, is that a Macintosh was also designed to work with other personal computers. Including the MS-DOS PCs you already own. In fact, Macintosh is the only family of personal computers to offer built-in networking and file sharing as standard equipment. You can use a Macintosh to access almost any main- frame, minicomputer or workstation. Including IBM, DEC, Hewlett-Packard, Prime, Cray and Sun. You can also access resources such as network file servers and mainframe sessions simultaneously And then cut, paste and move files between them. (Try doing that on an ordinary DOS computer) You can even easily connect a Macintosh with any C3 B' *KK i> : K * r *' *r # $ 4' ■»/' 'All you need is SofiPC, a software-based MS-DOS emulator from Insignia Solutions Inc. Or one of two cant from Orange Micro, the Mac286 or Orange386. ©1991 Apple Computer, Inc. Affile, the Apple logo, Macintosh and "Thepower trademark of Hewlett -Packard Company. Piime is a registered trademark of Prime Computer, Inc. Cray is a registered trademark of Cray ResearcJ), Inc. Sun is a trademark of Sun Microsystems, Inc. NetWare is a registered DOS computer Macintosn. industry-standard Tbken-Ring or Ethernet network. And share files and printers over Novell NetWare, Banyan VINES, IBM LAN Server or Microsoft LAN Manager networks. Best of all, only Macintosh offers a single, consistent, intuitive way of accessing and working with information, no matter what computer it's located on. And, of course, Macintosh also has the power to run MS-DOS software* and lets you exchange information with a PC on a standard 3 [ A" floppy disk. Today's family of affordable Macintosh computers offers you more choices and more flexibility than any other personal computer. So your people can work in whatever way works best for them, while you preserve your investment in the networks and PCs you already own. For the name of the authorized Apple reseller near you, call 800-538-9696, ext. 330. You'll find that Macintosh has the power you can really connect with. The power to be your best? //////////i/iniimuwww V '/ * rfr±U::*"lrJMmtiWliUW** = - \-J to be your best" are registered trademark of Apple Co?nf)uter, Inc. IBM is a registered trademark of International Business Machines Corporation. DEC is a trademark of Digital Equipment Corporation. Hewlett-Packard is a registered trademark of Novell, Inc. MS-DOS and Microsoft are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation. VINES is a registered trademark of Banyan Systems Inc. This ad was created using Macintosh personal computers. EVTE PUBLISHER Ronald W. Ev HOW TO CONTACT THE EDITORS EXECUTIVE EDITORS New York: Rich Malloy Peterborough: Michael Nadeau MANAGING EDITOR Anne Fischer Lent ASSISTANT MANAGING EDITOR Lauren A. Stickler NEWS New York: News Editor: Andrew Reinhardt Peterborough: Sr. Ed., New Products: Stan Miastkowski News Editors, What'sNew: Martha Hicks, Carol Swartz, Amanda Waterfield Microbytes: D. L. Andrews San Francisco/ West Coast: Bureau Chief: Kenneth M. Sheldon Sr. News Editor: Owen Linderholm Editorial Assistant: Barbara J. 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Greene Billing Services Coordinators: Tammy Burgess, Donna Healy Editorial Assistant: Brian Warnock TECHNOLOGY Programmer/ Analyst: John Spadafora Systems Consultant: Gary Kendall BIX, the "BYTE Information Exchange," is a worldwide, low-cost, on-line information service featuring industry news, downloadable software, powerful electronic mall, previews of upcoming BYTE articles, the full text of published issues of BYTE, and source and/or executable code for BYTE benchmarks and noncommercial software mentioned in feature articles. BIX also offers unmatched "conferences" on virtually every computer-related topic imaginable, where you can share information with thousands of other computer pros. To subscribe via modem, set your communications software to full duplex, 7 bits, even parity, 1 stop bit, and then call 800-225-4129; in MA, call (617) 861-9767. International, call NU1 31 06901 57800. Then hit the Enter/Return key and enter "BIX" when asked to log in; then enter "BIX. 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BYTE is avail- able in microform from University Microfilms International, 300 North Zeeb Rd., Dept. PR, Ann Arbor, Ml 48106, or 18 Bedford Row, Dept. PR, London WC1R 4EJ, U.K. Wili'M Copyright © 1992 by McGraw-Hill, fiiyZ Inc. All rights reserved. BYTE and ■■nil BVTt are registered trademarks of McGraw-Hill, Inc. Trademark registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office. & Member Audit Bureau of Circulation OFFICERS OF MCGRAW-HILL, INC.: Founder: James H. McGraw (1 860-1948). Chairman. President and Chief Executive Officer: Joseph L. Dionne, Executive Vice President, General Counsel and Secretary: Robert N. Landes, Executive Vice President: Walter D. Serwatka, Senior Vice President, Treasury Operations: Frank D. Penglase, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer: Robert J. Bahash, Executive Vice President, Administration: Thomas J. Sullivan, Senior Vice President, Corporate Affairs, and Executive Assistant to the Chairman: Mary A. Cooper, Senior Vice President, Editorial: Ralph R. Schulz. 14 BYTE* JANUARY 1992 Automated Test Analytical Chemistry You can automate your system with 30-year old technology, or. . Process Control " 1— Audio and Vibration Chromatography # c— o j j p^p .jjjjj L1LJ_IJ_I JJJJJ KwavC*>w&SSfT. ■ 1 BRING IT TO LIFE WTTH LABVIEW 8 2 While PC users wrestle with cryptic text-based programming languages, Macintosh users are gelling the job done with LabVIEW 2, the most celebrated application software for data acquisition and instrument control. It recently won the MacUser £a Magazine Editors' Choice Award. Five years ago, LabVIEW introduced the combination of front panel interfaces and graphical programming. Today, engineers and scientists around the world use LabVIEW 2 and the Macintosh for a broad spectrum of applications. Unlike other graphical packages, LabVIEW 2 does not sacrifice power and flexibility for ease of use. With LabVIEW 2, you create front panel user interfaces and import pictures to customize your panels. Then you quickly build block diagram programs and add your own blocks to expand upon our libraries. Yet your virtual instruments run as quickly as compiled C programs. Call us to find out how you can bring your system to life with LabVIEW 2. For a free LabVIEW 2 Demo disk, call (512) 794-0100 or 1800)433-3488 (U.S. and Canada] f ff NATIONAL Ml INSTRUMENTS The Software is the Instrument ® 6504 Bridge Point Parkway Austin, TX 78730-5039 Circle 107 on Inquiry Card. International Branch Offices: Australia 1031 879 9422, Denmark |45| 76 73 22, France |1) 48 65 33 70, Germany (089) 714 5093, Italy |02) 4830 1 892, Japan 03] 3788 1921, Netherlands (01720) 45761, Norway [03] 846 866, Spain |908] 604 304, Switzerland 1056} 45 58 80, U.K. [0635] 523 545. Product nomes listed are trademarks of their respective manufacturers. Company names listed ore trademarks or trade names of their respective companies. ©Copyright 1991 Notional Instruments Corporation. All rights rese ved. Everything you need to know about the difference between a Compaq PC with Intelligent Modularity and a merely upgradable PC These days, a lot of personal computers have upgradable processors and memory. But the new COMPAQ DESKPRO/M PCs have Intelligent ^rtjjJJ^^ Modularity, which goes far beyond ordinary upgradability, This unique design makes these PCs a smart investment for today and tomorrow. Smart for today— designed for today's needs and today's budgets, Intelligent Modularity puts all vital subsystems on separate boards so you can choose just the performance and features you need, Since the parts are interchangeable, the whole office can standardize on one platform. And since the parts Suggested Resale Price starts at just over $3,000 for this family of four remarkable PCs. Processor Board. Advanced VGA Board. Nobody else gives you all the advantages you get with the COMPAQ DESKPRO/M PCs. COMPAQ DESKPRO/M FAMILY ALR BUSINESS VEISA AST PREMIUM 11 DELL POWERLINE DE IBM PS/2 MODEL90 1. Five-board modular design Yes No No No No 2. Upgradable video wilhoui using an expansion slot Yes Yes No No No 3. Separate I/O board for potential enhancements and ease of seivice Yes No No No No 4. 1 4 levels of security including cable-lock provision Yes No No No No 5. System configuration and ID number available in memory and accessible remotely Yes No No No Yes 6. Power supply adequate for all expansion needs 240w 150w I45w 220w 194w are easy to access, they're easy and inexpensive to service. Replacement parts cost less, too. Keeping track of what's inside each PC is easy with our built-in Asset Management provision. Each COMPAQ DESKPRO/M PC can tell you its serial number, how it's configured and what it has installed. Even remotely, over the network. A big time- and money- j saver for MIS managers. Smart for tomorrow— built to adapt to changing technology and changing needs. With Intelligent Modularity, upgrad- ing and expanding only takes about five minutes. And, thanks tO Unique 1 . High-Speed Memory Board Compaq engineering, you get optimum performance no matter how you configure your system. The 32-bit EISA expansion bus gets the most out of high-performance processors, expansion boards and peripherals. Superior thermals keep things cool, no matter how many options you add. And the 240-watt power supply can take anything you plug in. Call your Authorized COMPAQ Computer Dealer and ask to see the wonders of the COMPAQ DESKPRO/M PCs firsthand. Call 1-800-231-0900, Operator 185, In Canada, call 1-800-263-5868, Operator 185. 4jlSABus o.UOBomd " Board. Intelligent Modularity— Five separate subsystems let you upgrade or replace only what you need. Trademarks and trade names shown are those of the respective companies designated. COMPAQ, DESKPRO, Registered U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. © 199! Compiiq Computer Corporation. A)) rights reserved. Everything the boss needs to know. 1. It's smart. 2. It's easy. 3. It's affordable. camPAa It simply works better. LETTERS Monitor Dangers? While useful in most respects, David A. Harvey's "Health and Safety First" (October 1991) exhibited some muddled thinking about extremely low fre- quency (ELF) and very low frequency (VLF) emissions from computer monitors. He first says that "it wasn't until recently that hard data began rolling in on the sub- ject." Two paragraphs later, he states that "there is a frustrating absence of hard data." Indeed, it is precisely the absence of hard data about alleged VDT dangers, along with the lack of any theoretical model of how ELF/ VLF fields could be harmful, that has led most sci- entists to conclude that the dangers are small to nonex- istent. This has left the VDT debate largely in the hands of fast-buck artists who make a fortune by scaring the daylights out of people. Most studies have found no verifiable hazards in the magnetic fields or in non-ionizing radiation emitted by properly functioning computer monitors. A few studies, however, have found statistical evidence that ELF and VLF emissions might pose some small risks. With over 30 million people in the U.S. getting daily exposure to ELF/VLF-emitting computer monitors, any significant danger would be reflected in an epidemic of VDT-related illnesses. An epidemic has not material- ized, which suggests that— at least in the short run— VDT risks are small. The ELF/ VLF radiation issue does need to be studied further. However, BYTE would serve its readers better by presenting a well-researched discussion of the problem. Scott D. Palmer Indianapolis, IN Please see "Of Monitors and Emissions " (September 1990) for an in-depth discussion of this issue. — Eds. CD-ROM Niche I am writing in response to "CD-ROM Drives: How Good Is the Third Generation?" by David A. Harvey (September 1991). Hitachi is pleased with the excellent review of its CDR-1750S drive. However, we would like to address Harvey's recommendations against the CDR- 1700S based on its performance when playing back ani- mated sequences and its use of a non-SCSI drive adapter to Hitachi's PC or Micro Channel bus interface cards. WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU. Please double-space your letter on one side of the page and include your name and address. Letters two pages in length or under have a better chance of being published in their entirety. Address correspondence to Letters Edi- tor, BYTE, One Phoenix Mill Lane, Peterborough, NH 03458. You can also send letters via BlXmail c/o "editors. " Your letter will be read, but because of the large volume of mail we receive, we cannot guarantee publication. We also reserve the right to edit letters. It takes about four months from the time we receive a letter until we publish it. Health and Safety First Most CD-ROM applications are text- based, with limited use of still graphics and audio. Few CD-ROM applications for DOS computers use animation throughout the application, and even the National Geographic Mammals disc has limited animation sequences. Uneven motion during animation with the CDR- 1700S is designed to meet hardware and software compatibility requirements of our installed base, which demands up- wardly compatible hardware. Hitachi of- fers both drive types to meet customer demands. The CDR-1700S performance on applications is competitive with other non-SCSI-bus drives and to the drives in your review. We hold BYTE in the highest regard and acknowledge the influence it has on the personal computer market. We hope that potential CD-ROM drive customers will not overemphasize animation when text is of primary importance. Eric Kamayatsu Multimedia Systems Hitachi Home Electronics (America), Inc. Compton, CA New Soviet Threat? The threat of a Russian nuclear attack may now be lessened, but some unexpected things may await the U.S. on another battlefront: the computer software mar- ket. Soon we may see real competition between Russians and Americans in software development. Soviet programming potential is like boiling intellect developing inside a rubber balloon. As development ad- vances, the balloon's size increases and pressure rises until the cover bursts (such a moment is not far away). Surely, Russians have a lotto learn from Americans about software creation. But there's no question that Sovi- et programmers are demonstrating originality in their work. The main areas where Soviets could establish com- petitive positions are scientific and system software. I do hope the world software market will be the only battlefield for American and Soviet programmers and that we'll become friends during this new battle now that we've stopped wasting our intellects on the senseless weapons race. Alexander Beresne U.S.S.R. More on COBOL I enjoyed Doris Appleby's article on COBOL ("Classic Languages, Part 2," October 1991), but I must take issue with one comment she makes about recursion: "COBOL does not support recursion, nor is it likely to in the future." Although it's true that the CODASYL standard does not support recursion, Micro Focus lifted this restriction in the most recent release of COBOL/2. This was done to add features to the language for event-driven program- ming, specifically in the Windows and Presentation 18 BYTE- JANUARY 1992 Microsoft announces the best upgrade for WordPerfect users. Special Upgrade Offer $129 Wbnd Processing Program If you're ready to join the millions of people moving from DOS* to the Microsoft* Windows^ en- vironment, upgrade to Microsoft Word for Windows, the best-selling word processor for Windows. While others are releasing their first-generation Windows programs, we've been refining ours. New Word for Windows version 2.0 features our new Toolbar that lets you create automatic bullets, enve- lopes, charts and more. All with a simple click. And our exclusive new "drag and drop" feature lets you instantly move text and graphics around the page. Plus,moving from WordPerfect to Word is incred- ibly easy. Use your existing files** in Word without losing any work. With the Help for WordPerfect" feature you can type the WordPerfect command you know and Word automatically demonstrates the equivalent command right in your document. So why not follow our lead? Upgrade now for $129^ Call (800) 323-3577, Ext W86 to order Word for Windows version 2.0 directly from Microsoft or for the name of an authorized Microsoft reseller near you. #i^i *As used herein, "DOS" refers to MS-»OS or PC-DOS operating systems. **File conversions available for WordPerfect versions 5.1. 5.0, 4. 2, and '1.1. r P|us freight and applicable sales tax. Offer good for current licensees of Word Perfect, Multimate, WordStar, MS Word for DOS and Display Write: Allow 2-4 weeks for delivery upon receipt by Microsoft. Offer expires March 31, 1992. Limit one per customer. Reseller prices mav vary. Call for system requirements. Offer goodonly in the50 United States.© 1991 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. Printed in the U.S.A. In the United States, call (800) 323-3577, Ext. W86. For information only, in Canada, call (800) 56:i-9048. Outside the U.S.and Canada.call (206)936-8661. Microsoft and MS-DOS are registered trademarksand Windows is a trademark of Microsoft Corporation. Word Perfect is a registered trademark of WordPerfect Corporation. The IEF™ can help you devei unprecedented quality, prod "The IEF is a superior tool for implement- ing Information Engineering because it integrates the entire process from planning through code generation. We're deploying the IEF throughout the corporation." David V. Evans Vice President Director, Information Systems J.C. Penney 'The strengths of the IEF are clear-cut. One obvious quality advantage is that application changes are made to diagrams, not code. This ensures ongoing integrity —the specification always matches the executing system." Paul R. Hessinger Chief Technology Officer Computer Task Group "We are using the IEF to develop a new generation of manufacturing systems replacing over 300 existing systems. We estimate that IEF will increase our produc- tivity by between 2-to-1 and 3-to-1 for new systems development.." Wal Budzynski Head of Operations, Systems/Computing Rolls-Royce "Our On-line Banking system has been in production for more than 12 months— 500,000 transactions a day— without a single code failure. And we had very few enhancements to do. Our users got what they needed the first time out." Mark Quinlan Senior Programmer/Analyst Huntington National Bank "I've seen other CASE tools fail, so I raised the bar high when we evaluated the IEF. It passed with flying colors. I could not be happier with my decision to adopt the IEF company-wide." John F. Mott President AMR Travel Services "The IEF offers dramatic improvements in productivity, yet it's easy to learn. One example: We trained 23 developers, including 1 8 new hires, and then completed a large order processing system— 300 transactions— all in only 20 months." Venkat (Vinnie) Tiruviluamala Director, CPC/CPPC Information Systems SONY Corporation "To meet the dramatically reduced time- to-market requirements for our products, we need high-quality systems that can be changed fast. That's why we've chosen the IEF as the CASE solution for our entire organization." John Pajak Executive Vice President Mass Mutual Life Insurance "Our users were extremely pleased when we finished our first project— a 60-trans- action system— in one-half the budgeted time. We had tried interfaced CASE tools without success. IEF integration makes the difference." Giorgio Sorani Division Head -MIS Lubrizol "Our first IEF system was completed faster, and with fewer errors, than any system I've ever seen. If I had to go back to the old ways, I'd find another job...outside the DP world. It means that much to me." Mogens Sorensen Chief Consultant Nykredit (Denmark) )p information systems with ictivity and maintainability* The success of Texas Instruments CASE product is proven — in the field. Major companies have used TI's CASE product, the Information Engineering Facility™ (IEF M ), for everything from rebuilding aging high-maintenance-cost systems to development of new enterprise- wide strategic systems. Study shows zero code defects. The quality of IEF-developed systems is remarkable. In recent CASE research by The Gartner Group, application developers were asked to report the number of abends they had experienced. (An ' 'abend' ' is a system failure or ' 'lock-up' ' caused by code defects.) IEF developers reported zero defects— not one abend had occurred in IEF -generated code. Maintenance productivity gains of up to 10-to-l. In this same study, developers were asked to compare IEF maintenance productivity with their former methods. Of those responding, more than 80 percent had experienced gains of from 2-to-I to 10-to-l. (See chart.) Specifications always match the executing application. With the IEF, application changes are made to diagrams, not code. So, for the life of your system, specifications will always match the executing application. The Gartner Group research showed that all IEF users who reported making application changes made all changes at the diagram level. IEF Maintenance Productivity Compared to Traditional Techniques. 100- ■ 60- ° 40- 20- OJJ (Source: Gartner Group, Inc., 8/90) 2-t0-1 to 10-t0-1 Gains Less Same More Productivity Productivity Productivity Developers were asked to compare IEF maintenance to former metliods. Of tl\ose responding, more ti\an 80% reported productivity gains of from 2*toA to lO'toA. Mainframe applications can be developed and tested on a PC. With our new OS/2 toolset, you can develop mainframe applica- tions, from analysis through automatic code generation, on your PC. Then, using the IEF's TP monitor simulator and the diagram-level testing feature, you can also test these mainframe applications without ever leaving the PC. More environmental independence coming soon — develop on PC, generate for DEC/VMS, TANDEM, UNIX. The IEF has generated applica- tions for IBM mainframe environ- ments (MVS/DB2 under TSO, IMS/DC, and CICS) since early 1988. Soon you'll be able to develop systems in OS/2 and then automatically generate for other platforms. DEC/VMS, TANDEM and UNIX are scheduled for availability in 1991. More will follow. We are committed to increased environmental indepen- dence in support of the Open Systems concept. We are committed to standards. IEF tools and IEF-generated code will comply with standards as they emerge. We will adhere to CUA standards and to the prin- ciples of IBM's AD/Cycle and DEC's COHESION-and we will support Open Systems environ- ments centering around UNIX. In any environment, the COBOL, C and SQL we generate adhere closely to ANSI standards. Our presence on standards committees helps us keep abreast of ANSI and ISO developments affecting the CASE world. Full-service support. Of course, our technical support, consultancy, training courses, satellite seminars, and other infor- mational assistance will continue apace. We also offer re-engineering and template services. This full- service support will remain an integral part of the IEF product. For more information call 800-527-3500 or 214-575-4404. Or write Texas Instruments, 6550 Chase Oaks Blvd., Piano, Texas 75023. Texas ^^ Instruments © 1991 Tl Information Engineering FaciMy and IEF are trademarks of Texas Instruments. Other product names listed are the trademarks of the companies indicated. 66106 LETTERS Manager environments . Programmers find COBOL cumbersome and overly verbose, but it has the advantage of being easier to man- age by virtue of readability . This, along with the sheer volume of code currently in production and development in the CASE industry, will guarantee its longevity well into the next century. Jeffrey Harker Northridge, CA Shorthand Warning In "The Hungarian Revolution" (August 1991) Charles Simonyi and Martin Heller describe yet an- other shorthand system. As with all such systems, the writer has a distinct short-term advantage. Shorthand may be useful for working documents, such as source code, currently being manipulated by a programmer. However, when read later, even by the author, it's all so much gobbledygook— not even close to Hungarian. Building systems that can be understood and main- tained by others requires coding that is intelligible to people. Let the machines adapt to our norm, not vice versa. Compilers can detect type usage errors and inform the error prone. I'm well aware that systems builders swear that they will document those obfuscated lines of code, but mostly they don't— at least not very well. Source code can be represented as the reality to which the documentation becomes a map. Where they are incon- gruous, your point is lost. Writing source code in shorthand is acceptable. It is not acceptable to keep it in that form when future uses are taken into account. We in the computer world have long resorted to various shorthand strategies because of ma- chine limitations. Now that the machines are approach- ing an understanding of our natural language, let's not lose it. Translate to some commonly recognizable sub- set of the national tongue, please. Roger L. Boese Seoul, Korea C Notes From time to time, Jerry Pournelle blames C for the troubles in projects. I don't think the language itself is entirely to blame: It seems that C's reputation for be- ing messy attracts messy programmers. I just taught a guy the first things about C . He knew BASIC and Pas- cal, but he thought that they were much too difficult to use: all those PEEKs and POKEs you had to do. But then he heard about C being well suited for writing messy, bit-twiddling stuff, and he just loved the thought of it. The point is, he would write just as messy code in Turbo Pascal. Up to now I've done most of my program- ming in C, and I have a pretty good idea why some peo- ple dismiss BASIC as a language for real programming. I just have to look at my C programs: They're well de- signed, well structured, well commented, and readable. When I glance at one of my old BASIC programs, I see good old spaghetti-style code. Anders Munch Copenhagen, Denmark I agree t ha: you can write good programs or bad pro- grams in any language. Some, though, encourage good habits, and some do not. —Jerry Pournelle Having enjoyed Jerry Pournelle 's column for many years, I'm sorry that this letter was inspired because my feelings were hurt by something he wrote. I'm refer- ring to his remark that "C is the last attempt of the high priesthood to control the computing business. It's like the scribes and the Pharisees who did not want the masses to learn how to read and write. " Although I am a linguist by profession, I've liked to program ever since I first learned FORTRAN in 1969. Of the languages I know well (FORTRAN, Pascal, Pro- log, and C), as well as the languages I know a bit about (Lisp, COBOL, BASIC, and Modula-2), C is the one I like best. And I think that this is probably a major factor in the popularity of C— programmers like it. One can speculate about why this is so. For me, first of all, C is not cloying. I also find that it is convenient in countless ways: its handy abbreviatory operators, its flatness, and the fact that C code is much easier to read than code in true block-structured languages (an impor- tant factor if you are working with someone else's code). As I'm sure you know, virtually any program written in Pascal receives a 20 percent boost in efficiency when ported to C. A major reason why this is so is that it is easy to use pointers for array manipulations in C and memory is more efficiently accessed and used. In any event, what hurt me was Jerry's comparison of programmers to some high priesthood. In the first place, programmers are not very high on any company's lad- der. I doubt that anyone decides to go into programming because the position of programmer allows one to yield a lot of power. I also doubt that money is any kind of in- centive—programmers' salaries are not very high. Fi- nally, I have never met a programmer who was not de- lighted to explain the details of his or her craft to the uninitiated. I'm sure that most programmers would agree that programming is healthy for the mind and that, at least in small amounts, it would probably benefit everyone in our society to know how to program. Isn't that the oppo- site of the attitude of the ancient scribes? Chet Creider University of Western Ontario London, Ontario, Canada I know that C programmers like C. Alas, few C program- mers like real programs that any other C programmer wrote; hence, in recorded history there are probably only about four cases in which a large C program done by one programmer has been maintained by another C pro- grammer without extensive rewriting and revision. Meanwhile, it 's still the case in the world I live in that whenever I hear of a program that has a known but unfix- able bug, the chances are very large that it was written in C. I'm sure C is wonderful, and I've always said it might well be the language of choice for full-time professionals (although it wouldn 7 be mine), but my goal is to get every PC owner to do some programming— and that isn V going to happen if they have to learn C first. —Jerry Pournelle ■ 22 BYTE- JANUARY 1992 We slash interface development time across DOS, UNIX, XENIX, VMS... (and we can prove it!) C-Programmers: See for yourself how Vermont Views™ can help you create powerful user interfaces— whatever your environment! If you want to create sophisticated user interfaces — and save tremendous time and effort doing it — Vermont Views is exactly what you need. Vermont Views isn't just a com- mon interface package. It's a deep, flexible, menu- driven screen designer supported by a C library of over 550 functions. It lets you create the ultimate user interfaces for complex database applications — in a fraction of the time it would take to code them yourself! With Vermont Views, you create screens interactively. Designing is fast, and creative. And changes — both tiny adjustments and huge reworks — are incredibly easy. Pull-down menus, window-based data-entry forms with tickertape or memo fields, scrollable form regions, choice lists, context-sensitive help... All these interface objects (and more) are immediately accessible. And with Vermont Views, even terminal-based applications can have the elegant features usually found only on micros. ©Copyright 1991 Vermont Creative Software Fast prototypes, faster applications. With most systems, you have to throw away your prototypes when coding begins. But with Vermont Views, prototypes become the actual applications! Menus, data-entry forms, and all screen features are usable in the final applications without change. So not only do you avoid creating code from scratch once, you don't have to do it twice! It's the universal solution. Vermont Views operates completely independent of hard- ware, operating system, and database. Any interface you create can be ported easily among DOS, UNIX, OS/2, XENIX, and VMS. You can use Vermont Views with any database that has a C-language interface (including Oracle, Informix, db_Vista, and C-Tree). You can run it on PCs, DEC, NCR, HP, AT&T, and other systems. You don't have to pay runtime fees or royalties. And full library source is available, too. What's more, your DOS applications can have full mouse control, and work in Pinnacle Meadows Richford, VT 05476 USA Phone: (802) 848-7731 FAX: (802) 848-3502 graphics as well as text modes! Don't take our word for it — put Vermont Views to the test. Call or fax now for your personal, free demonstration kit. It includes a DOS demo diskette and complete instructions for trying Vermont Views on your terminal, via modem. Or order Vermont Views with our 60-day, money-back guarantee. Either way, you'll see immediately that Vermont Views is a cut above the rest. Call for your FREE demo kit! 800-848-1248 (Please Mention "Offer 245") Circle 1 75 on Inquiry Card. IBM presents the that brings If you're a glutton for productivity, chances are you're considering open systems solutions for your business. But much of the menu is so unfamiliar or limited, its enough to make you lose your appetite. The IBM RISC System/6000™ family of POWER- stations and POWERservers is for you. It's as open an open system as you'll find anywhere, to help you take a big bite out of communication barriers. With the RISC System/6000, you offer your suppliers and customers broad connectivity and management for IBM and non-IBM networks. And you satisfy your hunger for the latest leading- edge technology, without network or equipment upset. Naturally, the RISC System/6000 family supports all major industry standards. And it also runs a smorgasbord of over 3,500 key applications. But that's only the appetizer. The family provides the widest range of binary compatible systems, so you're free to put the right level of machine performance and price at every location. The RISC System/6000 also serves up remarkable performance, capacity and value. The POWERserver 550 runs at speeds you'd expect from a supercom- puter, but runs up a tab starting at only $58,000. And 'Prices subject to change. Dealers' prices may vary. IBM and AIX are registered trademarks and RISC System/6000 is a trademark of International Business Machines Corporation. UNIX is a registered trademark of UNIX Systems Laboratories. HAGARTHE HORRIBLE Character(s) © 1991 King Features Syndicate, Inc.© 1991 IBM Corp. first open system more to the table. I'LL. HAVE WHAT P* other models' prices start below $14,000* AlXf the piece de resistance. To make UNIX® even easier to swallow, there's AIX, IBM's UNIX operating system. AIX makes it a piece of cake to develop company- wide networked solutions. And it gives companies robust operating software for enterprise -critical applications. Service with a smile. The RISC System/6000 comes with something you won't find anywhere else — the unpar- ext. 824. alleled support of IBM. -^ -- --^ ^ 1 service 24 hours a day, t or the rower Meeker. 365 days a year. But then, at IBM, customer service and support aren't just fillers. They're your just desserts. To find out more about the IBM RISC System/6000, contact your IBM marketing rep- resentative or Business Partner. For literature, call 1 800 IBM-6676, RISC Svstem/ '6000 mil! mill ■phi lllllllll|]|IW!IDII!IHI!llllllll!lll>«l!»l!illlll!lll!!ll Circle 72 on Inquiry Card. ives your letter wear the Okidata OK! Today, a small business has to be all busi- ness to succeed - right down to the printer that keeps the paperwork moving. That sin- gle printer has to pretend it's three or four dif- ferent printers - cranking out professional- looking business correspondence, lengthy proposals, invoices, multi-part forms, payroll checks, envelopes, and shipping labels with- out skipping a beat. It's a challenge Okidata dot matrix print- ers were born to handle. Any one of our 24- pin 390 Series printers can take a whole of- fice's printing demands in stride - they all offer the flexibility of top, bottom, or rear paper feed; high-speed draft or laser-like let- ter-quality printing; varied type font selection; a paper-saving top-of-form tear-off feature; and paper-park for easy switching between continuous pin-feed forms and single sheets or envelopes. And to make sure your Okidata printer will keep printing, year after year, we build in dependability from the baseplate up - print- head wires made of the world's hardest metal, a closed-loop positioning system to insure proper alignment even after years of wear and tear, and a case made from the same tough plastic as a pro football helmet. Finally, we add a feature as important as any item on our spec sheets: the Okidata OK! It's nothing less than our personal pledge to you that every Okidata printer we sell will provide not only acceptable, but outstanding performance; not just adequate, but excep- tional value. In order for your small business to look good, your printer has to wear many hats. That's why it should also wear the Okidata OK! For more information, call 1(800)OKI-DATA. OKIDATA OK! We don't just design it to work We design it to work wonders; QkiJjtjjnJMiL'fiiliikMicKLxT-M.LiiHinkiiljrjOKlisaT.M, nt'Okl I'l'iirklmluMMJ'., I.| | ). "WV il^ii'i jmm iiL^n;n ii tti MW'^IS^' nn - . t* - J Z2 l * < -'J l - .- .,;>■ J^g iL J. \ ■! '"lb- .'■[■-■JVT • mm •* f\i o ■ ■ j <4 4*» ■ ■ ■'■#' ■ i * /p i ; 1. "5 *.. > *.., "i 4 - M CJ * , ■ ■ SP9042 DM74AS245N if SP9042 7 v g DM74AS24.5N ^ ^ ^ SP9036 DM74ALS244AN Ask for genuine Intel or who knows whatyc ^4& ■ F ^T iP If you need a math ^P|fP| H coprocessor to speed your ■EHP^^^^ power applications, ask ■ yourself this question: Which would you rather have sitting next to your Intel microprocessor — an Intel Math Coprocessor ©1991 Intel Corporation. i2S7, i3H6, i387. i-i87and the SX logo arc tratleimrksof Intel Corporation. or something you may know nothing about? Because if you don't specify Intel, that's basically what you're getting — a big question mark. With Intel, however, there's simply no question. You're getting quality. That's because Intel has the longest tmck record with math coprocessors. In fact, we've manufactured !U:; Math Coprocessors, j'll have to count on. and sold millions more than all the others combined. And we've tested every one of them with the most exhaustive battery of tests in the industiy. All to assure you absolute reliability. So ask for Intel Math Coprocessors. Or there's no calculating what you'll end up with. For a free information packet, including our new low prices, call (800)538-3373. The Computer Inside: Circle 78 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS : 79). NEWS MICROBYTES Bacteria Could Lead to Drives with the Equivalent of 5000 Platters Researchers seeking the storage medi- um of the future have found a promis- ing source in nature. Bacteria living in salt marshes produce a molecule that could serve as a three-dimensional storage medi- um capable of holding a gigabyte of data per cubic centimeter. The protein bacteriorhodopsin (bR), found on the surface membrane of halobacterium halobium, absorbs light in a process similar to photosynthesis. bR ex- ists in two interchangeable 2-D states: one that absorbs blue light at 410 nm and one that absorbs green light at 570 nm. You can use the two bR states to store infor- mation in a binary code. Researchers have worked with bR films since 1984. Dr. Thomas Birge, director of the Center for Molecular Electronics at Syracuse University, says that he has pro- duced 1-inch-square polymer cubes, laced with uniformly oriented bR. "We now have access to a third dimension," said Birge. "It's as if you had a disk drive with 5000 platters on it." But since each layer is only 3 to 6 microns thick, the 3-D drive occupies almost the same space as a stan- dard drive. Birge begins with all the bR in the form that absorbs 570-nm light. To encode the information, he aims two infrared (1140- nm) lasers at a tiny region (3 cubic mi- crons containing 10,000 proteins) of the cube. Each laser produces photons with half the energy of a 570-nm beam. Where the two beams meet, their combined pho- tons convert the bR to its alternate form. "To read it, we essentially write," said Birge. "Then we monitor the effect." As the bR changes forms, it emits a distinctive electrical signal. The bR cube is enclosed in glass, two sides of which are coated with a conducting film of indium-tin-oxide. Birge fires 10-ns laser pulses capable of altering the bR from its green-absorbing state to its blue-absorbing state. The green- absorbing bR will change and emit an elec- trical impulse; a blue-absorbing bR will not. A second laser pulse returns the green- absorbing form to its original state. The ability to read the bR with electrical sensors makes the cubes less expensive than media that are read with optical ones, said Birge. The bR is harvested from bac- teria grown in culture. "If our technology develops the way we hope it will, the price you now pay for 100 to 200 MB will buy multigigabyte drives," said Birge. The bR drives are not particularly fast, however. Birge found that he could not maintain accuracy when he moved the laser beams between different regions of the cube. He has to move the cube instead, resulting in a 1-ms access time. Finding a fast and accurate way to move the cubes is one obstacle to commercial production. So is scaling up the cube pro- duction. More problematic, said Birge, will be consistently detecting the electrical impulses emitted by the bR. The signal- to-noise ratio is now running between 5 and 10 dB, too low for commercially reli- able signal detection. Applications could also be limited by the fact that bR breaks down at temperatures above 83°C. —Billy Allstetter Apple: TrueType Is Alive and Well Sometimes a company does something in the marketplace that users can in- terpret in exactly the opposite way the company intended. Such seems to be the case with Apple. When Apple announced plans last summer to build Adobe's Type 1 font technology into a future release of the Mac operating system, some observers wondered if this meant that TrueType would become superfluous except to those select few running beta versions of Win- dows 3.1. According to Brian Lawley, product manager for type and text at Apple, the company's commitment to TrueType re- mains as strong as ever. "TrueType will be the design center for [Apple's] next generation of type and imaging capabili- ties." He said that the installed base of TrueType is now "well over a million" and noted that the LaserWriter I If and Ilg printers come with a built-in rasterizer. The whole point of the Apple/ Adobe an- nouncement was to tell you that eventu- ally "Type 1 fonts will display and print without [your] having to buy ATM and use that separately." A recent coupon offer, where you could get ATM and four type- faces from Adobe for a $7.50 shipping fee, is an interim solution, Lawley said. He said that Apple's Type 1 TrueType strate- gy is that you "should be free to choose either format and know that it will work " — Larry Loeb and D. L. Andrews NANOBYTES Information Builders, Inc., and Apple have signed an agreement that will let IBI's Enterprise Data Access/SQL client/server software provide Macs with a solution for ac- cessing nonrelational data from a broad array of databases. □ Nantucket, provider of the Clipper 5.0 business application develop- ment system for the PC, now offers a Cyrillic translation that is pro- duced in the Soviet Union. D Guy Kawasaki, author of Selling the Dream, had this to say when asked if Apple's embrace of Ado- be spelled the death of True- Type: "Do I think True- Type's dead? Well, was it ever born? Two years ago everybody said, 'Adobe's doomed.' Well, here i t i s two years later, and the world has reversed. So I guess the lesson is, if you wait long enough by the side of the river, all of your enemies will come float- ing by." He made the comments at a meeting sponsored by Milwaukee's North Shore Computers. □ Following layoffs of 1400 employ- ees, a $70 million third-quarter loss, and the departure of several key ex- ecutives, including former CEO Rod Canion, Compaq says that it will offer a line of low-cost PCs that may have processors from other chip manufacturers besides Intel. New CEO Eckhard Pfeiffer says that product design and develop- ment procedures have been changed to shorten development cycles and lower costs. □ User Land Software has posted on major electronic networks the Fron- tier Software Development Kit. The SDK has sample code, libraries, documentation, and sample pro- grams to help Mac developers take advantage of Interapplication Com- munication protocols. □ 32 BYTE -JANUARY 1992 • • •• •• < ft ••? *•. ? - •? ;; ?: v. „•> v> &♦... ?; v.- ;; . # * ••• »•*««*••■•••••••••••••••• ••••••••■••••••••••••••••• Convention Center •• •• •••• •• 1 • •. f .•••iyt-M • • • • • •••• •• •• < — • • •* ♦• *• *• •••••• «**••• : o :'-' :■•: in; PSfi&QOQWQQF Brffl»gigy#:#:d A CLEAN SW Eg© ^£7 386 Systems GATEWAY 2000 386/33C 486 Systems GATEWAY 2000 486/33C ■: |L H *rak ^ It's really no surprise Gateway 2000 systems ^re singled out as Best Buys since Gateway lis more computers through the direct channel an any other PC manufacturer. This in itself is stament to the value Gateway 2000 offers, ne look and you'll be convinced, too. Gateway's the one with the best prices on lality, fully-loaded, high-performance systems. ate way's the one with the award- winning rvice organization that'll take good care of )ur system. Gateway's the one that's going to be here for you. And Gateway's the only one with a great PC that comes in a cow-spotted box suitable for use as a GATEWAY'S TH* °* rec room end table. Call a Gateway 2000 sales representative today for all the details on the Best Buy system we'll build just for you. ™i™irc You ve got a friend m the business. 8 0-523-2000 THE 16 MHZ 286 £ T 16 MHZ 386SX 80286 Processor ^^< Intel® 80386SX Processor Intel 80386SX Processor,,,--^ 2MB RAM '' /0f=tt^Sr' 2MB RAM I 32K Cache RAM /^^Pv 4MB RAM - ^M IWm LI?Ri's** ^^OWWI products in 27 hardware and software categories. The vote on desktop PCs was a decisive victory Gateway 2000 was awarded Best Buy honors for for the Midwestern firm customers call the "cow 286, 386SX, 386 and 486 systems. "What's most meaningful about these company. According to Computer Shopper, the Best awards," said Gateway 2000 President Ted Waitt, Buy Awards have come to symbolize the best in "is they are given by the readers of Computer service, quality, performance, support and Shopper, people who are buying and using PCs product selection. This combination gives you in the real world." the best value on the market. Our thanks to Gateway's own Semi-Gold Dancers played by employees from departments throughout the company. . NEWS MICROBYTES The Palmtop 386 Is Getting Closer C&T plans to add new functions and power to the PC/Chip, pushing further the level of system integration. This June, the F8680 will add support for VGA dis- plays, augmenting current CGA-compati- ble display controllers. There will likely be a 386-compatible PC/Chip in 18 months. C&T is also exploring how the PC/Chip can offer programmable hardware gates, enabling OEMs to build PC/Chip-based devices that could be integrated into con- sumer electronics systems. With a pro- grammable hardware gate, for example, an OEM could add support for an RCA jack. For the consumer, this would mean a hand-held PC that could plug into a home entertainment center. C&T also has ambitious plans for pen support. According to C&T, it is working with Microsoft, GeoWorks, and Comput- er Intelligence on integrating pens into the PC/Chip environment, with Microsoft "at the top of the list." C&T will support the 32-bit interface of Go Corp.'s PenPoint system when a 386SX-compatible PC/ Chip is ready. At that time, the company may divide its offerings into two branches: the low-end PC/Chip and high-end 386- based solutions. —Ellen Ullman IBM and Intel Fight Back with Chip Accord: First Products to Ship in Two Years B >oth IBM and Intel have taken their ) share of lumps recently: IBM has been late to market with new PCs that turn out to be ho-hum when they finally arrive, and Intel is beset by both 386 chip doners and RISC-chip competitors. Now, it seems, IBM and Intel have real- ized that they are each other's best ally. The two companies have signed a 10-year technology agreement under which they will work together to enhance 80x86 ar- chitecture chips. Under the terms of the agreement, IBM will gain the right to man- ufacture 486 chips for internal use, as it has the 386. More important, IBM will be able to enhance current and future 80x86 designs and use the improved versions it- self for four months before any other com- panies can have them. For IBM, which has lately had trouble differentiating its PCs from the sea of clones, this could provide a leg up in the market — in price, perfor- mance, or some other attribute. Intel and IBM estimate that jointly de- veloped products will be broadly avail- able to the industry in about two years. The plan of attack calls for Intel to pro- vide processor design and the 486 archi- tecture, while IBM will add its semicon- ductor and systems design expertise. Both companies will provide design tools. For Intel, the agreement is a strong response to challenges from 386 doners like AMD and Chips & Technologies. By tapping into IBM's silicon expertise, Intel may be able to deliver advanced processor designs faster than the doners can keep up. — Andy Reinhardt and D. L. Andrews Next Moves in the Real World It was a busy fall for Next and Steve Jobs, president and CEO of Next. Following a speech at the Unix Expo, Jobs admitted in a question-and-answer session that he hopes to take the company public in the next 12 to 18 months. One week after Jobs told reporters that he expected to sell $60 million worth of equipment in the last quarter of 1991 and that Next is profitable, the company announced that it would lay off about 30 people, or around 5 percent of the company's work force. While the lay- offs were certainly not a minor event to those affected, Next's staff trimming was minute compared to the hundreds of peo- ple laid off at companies like Compaq, The Santa Cruz Operation, Grid Systems, and Ashton-Tate. In any case, a Next spokesperson said that the company con- tinues to make a profit, "but in these times, you can't carry any extra weight." The fact that Jobs was there at all was something of a surprise. Once upon a time, Next seemed to be trying to distance itself from the Unix community. Now, Jobs ac- knowledges and even accepts the idea that Next is a Unix company that must com- pete in the market against the likes of Sun, IBM, DEC, and Hewlett-Packard. In one example of Next's new openness, Jobs demonstrated a program that lets X Win- dow System-based applications run in a Next window. ■ — Andy Reinhardt and D. L. Andrews NANOBYTES More than just an operating-system upgrade, Apple sees the new A/UX 3.0 as the basis for the high-end sys- tems that it will be releasing in the future, including those compatible with the PowerOpen platform the company is developing with IBM. The ability to run current Mac ap- plications is crucial, an Apple spokesperson said. Programs run- ning on the new version look just like regular Mac applications. A/UX 3.0 will also support TrueType fonts, the Data Access Manager, the new Finder, and Publish/Subscribe features. Balloon Help is also sup- ported. □ Next is acceding to customer re- quests for stan- dards compliance. As president and CEO Steve Jobs flashed a slide covered with an alphabet soup of Unix acronyms, he joked, "I bet you never thought you'd hear Steve Jobs talking about standards." □ Apple has filed an appeal with the Court of International Trade in Washington, D.C., asking the court to reverse the imposition of a 62.63 percent tariff on imported screens. Apple argues that there cannot have been injury when there is no viable U.S. display industry to injure. □ Philippe Kahn, chairman, presi- dent, and CEO of Borland Inter- national, says that by 1995, most software companies will be program- ming in C++. But the language suf- fers from a standard garbage col- lector. Object systems, he says, tend to fill up quickly. □ AI Stromberg, president and CEO of Verbex Voice Systems (Edison, NJ), a maker of speech recognition systems, on why the market for speech recognition hasn't taken off yet: "You can't convince people they need a better mousetrap if they don't know they have mice." ■ JANUARY 1992 • BYTE 37 What's the business world coming to? Now all users, Macintosh and PC, can get their hands on some color without giving up £preat black and white. Hewlett-Packard makes it all possible with the DeskWriter C printer for Macintosh and now the HP DeskJet 500C for DOS and Win- dows applications. Impressive black and white. And thousands of colors. For only $1,095* The best features of HPfc DeskJet 500 black and white printer haven't changed. You'll still get the crisp, clean, laser-sharp output. The 300 dot-per-inch resolution. And you'll still have all the built-in, scalable fonts and graphic capabilities that can make such a difference in your documents and presentations. Take all that, add a nearly endless choice of attention-getting colors, and your users have one very valuable partner. One that's a pleasure to work with. You just plug, play, and print. On plain paper or trans- parency. With the DeskJet 500C and DeskWriter C, Hewlett-Packard introduces a colorful new generation to its family of inkjet printers. A family that stands for affordable quality. Quality that's backed by a three-year warranty. 'Suggested U.S. list price, tin Canada, call 1-800-387-3867, Ext. 2757. "Offer valid through -January 31, 1992. No purchase necessary; void where prohibited. © 1991 Hewlett-ftckard Company PE12129 Affordable color. The HP DeskWriter C printer for the Mac. And the HP DeskJet 500C for PCs. Only $1,095 each. So when others ask you whatfc new, tell them to get ready for a splash of color. For more interesting graphs and charts. For impressive cover pages and for compelling overhead presentations. All for $1,095. If you'd like to see some sample output from the DeskJet 500C or DestfVriterC,call 1-800-752-0900, Ext. 2757.t Or visit your nearest authorized HP dealer and sign up for a chance to win a Caribbean cruise for two.** Color has finally arrived. HP Peripherals When it's important to you. rag EWLETT PACKARD Circle 70 on Inquiry Card. NEWS FIRST IMPRESSIONS Psion's Powerful Pocketable DICK POUNTAIN Most people's first reaction when I show them the Psion Series 3 is quite simply, "I want one now!" This is not merely a technological gimmick. Psion has succeeded splendidly in designing a pocket isn't a disadvantage computer with sufficient memory, battery life, and processing power to be genuinely useful. It's also easy to use. The Series 3 is not DOS compatible, but its excellent multitasking operating system is far more suitable than DOS is for a pocket ma- chine. The Series 3 exudes quality at first sight. The plastic case has an attractive matte gray finish and pleasing contours. At 6!^ by 3 l A by 1 inch, it is smaller than an average-size wal- let. Its weight, a bit over half a pound (including batteries), makes it quite pocketable. Although the clamshell-style case has no latch, it is held shut by spring tension. The toggle effect of a clever hinge causes the battery compartment at the rear of the case to swing downward and act as a rest that tilts the Series 3 to a comfortable reading angle. The 8-row by 40-column LCD screen occupies the upper half of the case and A proprietary non-DOS operating system when you have a raft of applications in the palm of your hand The Psion Series 3 crams all the parts and pieces of a full-fledged computer into a palmtop package. 40 BYTE -JANUARY 1992 rests at a shallow, fixed angle to the key- board. Psion uses Hitachi's double retar- dation film LCD technology to get high contrast in all but the poorest of lighting. Battery life is about 1 20 hours using two AA alkaline batteries; a lithium battery is included as backup. Not for Touch-Typists The tiny keyboard has a PC-style QWERTY layout, complete with twin Shift keys, a space bar, Control and Alt keys, and an inverted T cursor keypad (but no numeric keypad). The small square keys use elastomer switches and thus have short travel and almost no tactile feedback (an audio click is provided instead). The keys require quite firm pressure. Even the tini- est of fingers cannot touch-type on this keyboard. Holding the Series 3 in both hands and typing with two thumbs is more effective and very fast after a little practice. Both ends of the case have a hinged flap that conceals sockets for Psion's pro- prietary flash memory cards, which be- have like solid-state drives called A and B. The machine I used came with a 256- KB flash memory card. You can buy flash memory cards of up to 2 MB or static RAM cards of up to 1 MB. The file system is fully DOS compatible, even though the Series 3 doesn't run DOS programs. The Series 3 is driven by a 4-MHz NEC V30 (80C86-compatible) processor, put- ting it in the IBM XT class in terms of power. The operating system and applica- tions are held in 384 KB of ROM, and you can choose from models with 128 KB or 256 KB of main memory. This memory is employed far more efficiently than it would be under DOS. On the 256-KB test machine, I can run all seven built-in ap- plications concurrently and have a 100- KB RAM drive left for data. A Nonintimidating GUI The Series 3 operating system works be- hind a simple GUI that I can only describe as brilliant. You can switch instantly be- tween the built-in multitasking applica- tions by pressing icons printed on a touch- pad below the screen. The leftmost icon (System) puts you into a program manag- er with screen-based icons. Beneath each icon is a list of the files associated with that application, which you can pick with the cursor bar. Pressing the Tab key brings up an XTree-like file manager, complete with wild-card filters and file tagging. The operating system uses DOS hierarchical NEWS FIRST IMPRESSIONS directories and filename extensions, but it hides these from the casual user by auto- matically associating each application's files with a particular extension. Inside each application, you press the dedicated Menu key to access Windows- style pull-down menus. Most menu op- tions have key shortcuts using the Psion key. Psion has exhibited enormous inge- nuity in making this interface intuitive and orthogonal. You can cut, paste, and copy among all the applications via a clipboard, or you can bring marked text from any- where without losing the clipboard con- tents. You can also evaluate an arithmetic expression anywhere (e.g., in the word processor or database) by selecting it and pressing Psion- V. Full-Featured Miniature Applications The applications also reveal extraordinary attention to detail. The Series 3 word pro- cessor is powerful, with on-screen bold and italic, multiple printer fonts, and even Microsoft Word-compatible style sheets. There is a built-in outlining feature that works via styles; you can define an out- line level for each style and then hide all text below a given level. Pressing the Word button toggles hiding on and off, and so collapses and expands the outline. When wisely used, this feature compensates for the small screen size; I use it more as a way of navigating through long texts than as a structuring tool. The Series 3 can drive a number of popular printers, including Epson, HP LaserJet, and Canon BJ-lOe, directly via the optional parallel cable. The Data application is a free-form text database that holds up to 4 KB per record, and you can optionally add field names, which can be toggled on and off down the left margin; the software is cleverly de- signed so that empty fields will not be dis- played. Placing a telephone symbol at the beginning of any line will allow the Se- ries 3 dialer to extract phone numbers from that line (DTMF tone dialing is performed via a small speaker under the Series 3's case, which you hold over a telephone mouthpiece). The phone dialer is cleverly integrated with the World application so that it can prefix the proper international code for an overseas call but omit it for domestic ones; you set "Home City" in World to tell the Series 3 which country you are currently in. The World application is the best of its kind I've seen. Everybody knows how to I enjoyed the surreal experience of downloading my BIX mail into something not much bigger than a bar of soap. display a world clock, but Psion has in- cluded a database of practically every country name (pre-U.S.S.R. breakup), and the major towns within countries too (over 70 in the U.S.). What's more, you can add your own towns, with map references, time-zone offset, and phone code. As you browse or search for a town, the cursor shows its position on the world map, to- gether with the local time, phone code, times of sunrise and sunset, and distance from your current home city. Travelers will buy the Series 3 for this feature alone. The Agenda application includes the functions of calendar, two-week planner, appointments diary, alarm, and to-do list. The one-month calendar and two-week time planner appear on the same screen, through which you navigate using the cur- sor keys. Pressing Enter switches to a day diary screen with slots for 14 items. You can repeat appointments (by date or day of week), and you can archive old ap- pointments instead of just deleting them as most time planners do. There is a sepa- rate screen for day notes, and a to-do list that rolls over tasks from day to day until you remove them. Communicating with the World You can communicate with desktop ma- chines and modems via a tiny connector on the left side of the Series 3, using a special cable with a "lump" halfway down it that actually contains the RS-232 circuitry and some ROM programs. When plugged in, this lump appears as drive C to the oper- ating system. When you run Psion's MCLink program on your desktop PC, the PC's drives (named REM::A:, REM::C:, and so on) become directly accessible from the Series 3 as a full network-style remote file system. Drive C also contains a com- munications program with a full script lan- guage based on OPL and prewritten scripts for BIX, CIX, MCI Mail, and more. I en- joyed the surreal experience of down- loading my BIX mail into something not much bigger than a bar of soap. The Psion Series 3 is the first pocket computer that I've found genuinely use- ful, and I shan't leave the house without mine. One criticism is that Psion's flash memory cards are not PCMCIA compati- ble; however, I don't believe this will prove fatal. Most users will find that a flash memory card is more like a perma- nent expansion than a removable medium and will not be purchasing any in quantity. I find that the 256 KB of internal memory and a single 256-KB flash memory card handle all my business easily, using my desktop PC to back up and archive. The Series 3 won't replace a notebook PC for power spreadsheet users, but it might re- place the rest of the contents of their brief- cases. ■ Dick Fountain is a BYTE consulting editor based in London. You can contact him on BIX as "dickp." THE FACTS Psion Series 3 with 128 KB, $425; with 256 KB, $495 Options: Serial cable for PC and Mac file transfers, $99 Internal RAM: 128 KB, $150; 512 KB, $420; 1 MB, $625 Flash EPROM: 128 KB, $105; 256 KB, $150; 512 KB, $255; 1 MB, $420; 2 MB, $775 Psion, Inc. 118 Echo Lake Rd. P.O. Box 790 Watertown, CT 06795 (800) 548-4535 (203)274-7521 fax: (203) 274-7976 Circle 1 209 on Inquiry Card. JANUARY 1992 -BYTE 41 NEWS FIRST IMPRESSIONS Bookshelf Goes Multimedia Cnnlitnlr, »V*. wg-yii or vis i*n. EHn :• dlaphragi v?r1Jtl* r .■:u_-inrj. Thi *>•*** I J n;-' • ■• ■ ■ aring ISJWS* T^ P« ."V ill*' 1 ;. p ii :-!..■ visible ■} Hie wMtt* •. ; (liv tye, in tii sown is co i the Available since 1987, Mi- crosoft's CD-ROM-based Bookshelf has become an in- valuable reference tool for writ- ers and students. Its dictionary, thesaurus, and other sources have been reason enough for thousands of people to invest in a CD-ROM drive. Microsoft Bookshelf for Windows is the next generation, adding the splash of multimedia sound, graphics, and animation — as- suming you have a multimedia- ready PC. Bookshelf for Windows con- tains both plain-vanilla DOS and Windows versions of the program, so you don't need multimedia facilities in order to use it. Both versions contain The American Her- itage Dictionary, Bartlett 's Familiar Quo- tations, The Concise Columbia Dictionary of Quotations, The Concise Columbia En- cyclopedia, Roget's II: The New The- saurus, and The World Almanac and Book of Facts. The Windows version, which takes advantage of Microsoft's new Mul- timedia Extensions for the graphical en- vironment, also contains an electronic ver- sion of The Hammond Atlas of the World. And that's the first hint of this rendition's greater powers. The DOS version of Bookshelf has no atlas because it can't do graphics: It's a text-only product. The atlas included with Bookshelf for Windows has, among other features, topographic maps of any region of the globe you choose, shown in 256-color VGA resolution. Other animations can be found in the encyclopedia; some are ac- companied by sound lectures that explain and augment the video. The mouse can be used to jump to any part of the animation as well as to control the speed at which it plays back, and all the animations in the encyclopedia can also be accessed direct- ly from a list of animations at the top of the "book." I particularly enjoyed one listed as Solar System, which shows the planets revolving around the sun, as well as the movements of comets and meteoroids. A voice-over lecture describes the action. Sound is also a feature of the dictionary. It will pro- nounce the word for you if you click on a megaphone icon in the upper left corner of the definition screen. Information searches are also possible the Coitu Fili: frill nmikiiiiirl: Hunk-slidf !ji:l|i | lml.:H I Hock I lltstory | liiMich } << | )> \ Hi>»Ki | Am i'yc Unikiiii; ill ;mi tiltji-rt 8=== *h\ ' lirHimi | ! llnUons ] i <>•: i. it !ij ■lM)itily is U* '.'••infA. z tn r y.n z< tfi? wfnriow oi the eye. The ■:<■■. .:.' H» layei bene->Ui M>«d -A ■1*11.;* piyrtiwit wi bk»»1 vessel* Meaj tit ww »( the >sr. .A Wie 'M*ty t»>dy, lh* mi.if«:lft; ■. t v/hf>:l\ :h?n Calem THE FACTS Microsoft Bookshelf for Windows $149; upgrade from DOS version, $49.95 Microsoft Corp. 1 Microsoft Way Redmond, WA 98052 (800) 426-9400 (206) 882-8080 fax:(206)883-8101 Circle 1 2 1 on Inquiry Card. 42 BYTE • JANUARY 1992 Unprecedented 32-Bit Programming Power in a Singl : WATCOM C&5/386 WATCOM C8.5/386 Optimizing Compiler and Tools includes: S| Royalty-free 32 -bit DOS Extender Si True 32-bit Windows GUI Application Kit Si Fast, Tight, Reliable 32 -bit Code Optimizer S] Licensed Microsoft Windows SDK Components S] Interactive Source-Level Debugger Si Execution Profiler Microsoft WJNDOVS. ITS CLABB C.VnonB.S WATCOM C7.0 1989 COMPUTER LANGUAG E LANGUAG E Heights 100% ANSI and SAA compatible: C8.5/386 passes all Plum Hall Validation Suite tests. Comprehensive tool set includes a debugger, linker, profiler and much more. Microsoft extensions simplify porting of 16-bit source. DOS extenders supported include Phar Lap, Rational and Ergo. Extensive third party support includes products to help with windowing, communications, C++ development and graphics. AutoCAD ADS development and debugging support DOS Extender Features C8.5/386 includes DOS/4G W, a 32-bit DOS extender developed by Rational Systems and based on the industry- leading technology of DOS/16M, Key features include: • Royalty-free runtime license • Virtual memory support up to 32Mb • 25K real mode memory footprint • DPMI support (DOS, Windows DOS Box, etc.) • VCPI and XMS (himem.sys) compatible 32-bit Windows Kit Develop and debug true 32-bit GUI applications and 32-bit DLL's. Using 32-bit addressing, GUI applications can exploit the flat memory model to overcome inherent Windows memory constraints. Straightforward memory allocation makes Windows application development easier. Key components include: • Supervisor for executing 32-bit applications and DLL's under Windows • Debugger for 32-bit applications and DLL's under Windows • Licensed Microsoft SDK components • Access to Windows API from 32-bit code through special libraries • 387 math co-processor emulation • 32-bit C library for Windows WATCOM C8.5/386 • 100% ANSI C Optimizing Compiler Tools set components: • Protected-mode version of Compiler • Royalty-free DOS Extender with VMM support • Licensed Components of the Microsoft Windows SDK • Interactive Source-Level Debugger • Linker • Protected-mode version of Linker • Profiler • Object Code Librarian • Object Code Disassembler • MAKE Facility • Patch Facility • Object Module Convert Utility • Windows Supervisor • Bind Facility for Windows Applications • 386 Run-time library object code • Special 32-bit libraries for Windows API • 386 Graphics Library for Extended DOS applications • 386 Run- time libraries for Windows Also available: WATCOM FORTRAN 77/386 Includes 100% ANSI FORTRAN optimizing compiler and all tool set components listed above for C8.5/386. Platforms Host environments: DOS, Extended DOS, Windows DOS box, OS/2 1.1 or later Target environments: Extended DOS, Windows, Windows DOS box, AutoCAD ADS, embedded systems Novell's Network CforNLM's includes C8.5/386 Price: $995 1-800-265-4555 WATi 415 Phillip Street, Waterloo, Ontario, Can3da N2L 3X2 Tel. (519) 886-3700 Fax (519) 747-4971 WA1COM C and Lightning Device are trademarks of WATCOM Systems Inc. DOS/4G and DOS/16M are trademarks of Rational Systems Inc. Other trademarks are the properties of their respective owners. • Copyright 1991 WATCOM Predicts Inc. If s Also More Power Introducing The 40MHz Am386™ Microprocessor— The Speediest 386 On The Planet It looks like a mild mannered 386. In fact, can transform any ordinary 33MHz system it is: A genuine, plug-in replacement for the into an invincible, 25% faster, 40MHz Am386 i386. Except it's faster. Burns less power. Costs no more. And it's avail- able now The Am386DX-40 microprocessor POFP packaging system. So you can easily offer the world's fastest 386 performance. It's not only super-fast, it's also super-efficient, thanks to its truly static 901 Thompson Place. RO. Box 3453. Sunnyvale. CA 94088. -■„. -v;> i |;;h"l^' 1 nptipiu Mum* fill timid Mont' lt» 1 1 OUT Mooe Backward Moue in Hulk ) r . r ■•■ ■ ; i irj xiiru r i !B ft?LlJ ■■■■ODD Imp i Rotate nii» Horizontal nip Uertlcal Irf nut) UllflfOtJp lock IIQIIIIII ■■:!■■■■■■ IIQIIIIII znaiiiir" - i ■ i c»* .u:" ■ ZEE because (as a writer) I normally don't think in graphical terms. It's obvious that get- ting you to think graphically is a key aim of ClarisWorks. Even if you're not graph- ics-oriented, ClarisWorks will subtly ease you into it. It's not touted as a presenta- tion graphics package, but that's another thing that it shines at. I used ClarisWorks to quickly whip together a presentation and print it to overhead transparencies on my laser printer. The flat-file database uses FileMaker's "book" metaphor, which I've found to be incredibly intuitive. And the communica- tions package has all the features I'd ever need for communicating via modem. ClarisWorks comes with a number of helpful manuals, but I found that I seldom needed to pick them up. That's because a Hyperhelp system keeps all the help you'll ever need on-line and easily accessible from anywhere in the package. There's also an on-line tutorial that's designed for first-time Mac users. One manual that I did find particularly useful was a small book intriguingly titled Possibilities. It's full of ideas for using ClarisWorks for day- to-day work. One of the features I like best about Clar- isWorks is a selection of over 20 XTND translators. These let you open, insert, save, and edit files from a wide range of the most popular applications across different platforms. Because ClarisWorks is so use- ful, I found myself importing documents from PC-based applications, working on them, and exporting them back to our in- house network. This package isn't designed to be all things to all people, but it's perfect for a wide variety of users, from small- to medi- um-size businesses to students. It's also perfect for users of the i newest Mac portables, since it lets you carry all the most-used applications in a minimum amount of disk space. New Mac users will also find Clar- isWorks a perfect place to get started. You can be doing pro- ductive work with your Mac minutes after opening the box. And for those who are destined to become true power users and eventually might need the advanced features in other Claris packages, ClarisWorks is a perfect training ground. Of course, ClarisWorks isn't the only integrated program available for the Mac, but I have to conclude that it's far and away the best. Claris is serious about harvesting the universe of Mac users who are currently with competitors. If you use Microsoft Works, Symantec GreatWorks, or Rag- Time, you can upgrade to ClarisWorks for $99. (The same holds true for AppleWorks users.) I'd estimate that all but the most feature- hungry Mac users will be able to get 99 percent of their work done using Claris- Works. The package works on all Macs from the Plus on up and is System 7.0 compatible. I tested the prerelease version on a Mac SE/30 and found it to be very fast. I have both a PC and a Mac on my desk, and I must admit that my Mac was for- merly used for a small portion of my work- day. But since I installed ClarisWorks, that's changed. If you want to get some work done without hassling with multiple packages under various GUIs, ClarisWorks is the best excuse I've seen yet to go out and buy a Mac. — Stan Miastkowski THE FACTS ClarisWorks $299 Claris Corp. 5201 Patrick Henry Dr. P.O. Box 58168 Santa Clara, CA 95052 (800) 544-8554 (408)987-7000 fax: (408) 987-7440 Circle 1213 on Inquiry Card. 52 BYTE -JANUARY 1992 - 1 ._^ f ffMHHHMMI ! WBf&/& SSOMLjj . ,L, HH^H^BH ij KPb r _ . _ _ _ '_ ,^«S 1 ^' ec — f * fcr *— -— . J - '_.-_.-— r=_ —~ ' — ■— *- *- • : ^ 1 1 \-- j: 1 i* 1 . i 1 J . j ■ . jl j! ! i : i lUtti Lij - j. \ i 850 CPS & TOUGH AS NAILS! OM/ ViX That's right - 850 characters-per-second! TOUGH AS NAILS. Whytakeachance?Thousandsof owners use the 850XL printer from 2 to 1 8 hours per day. It just keeps on printing, day-in, day-out! And, over 50% of all 850XL printers sold are purchased by existing owners. That alone tells the story for this American- made printer. FREE 30-DAY TRIAL. We offer a free, 30-day trial to any qualified buyer. No strings attached. What other manufac- turer believes this strongly in their product? Call Us Today! (800)468-8788 Now Under $2,000! GSA Pricing: 800-633-9433 GSA Contract #GS00K-91-AGS-5268 OUTPUT TECHNOLOGY CORPORATION Should y ou need service, there arc over 4 00 scivice locations nationwide toserveyou. 2310 N. Fancher Road. Spokane, WA 99212-1381 Circle 1 1 7 on Inquiry Card. NEWS FIRST IMPRESSIONS Falco Blurs a Different Line with the GT486/40 Falco Data Products says that its GT486/40 further blurs the line between desktop computers and graphics work- stations, but I disagree. After spending a few days with this mighty mite (13 pounds) of a system, I'll lean the other way and say that it blurs a differ- ent line, the one between desk- top computers and notebook PCs. The GT486/40 is about half as tall (2% inches) as a can of Jolt. Until you realize that a metal case under the plastic exterior is providing extra sup- port, you wonder why the monitor does not crash right through the unit's housing. Don'tbe misled by this unit's size, however: It's small, but it offers performance that's more than suitable for CAD, desk- top publishing, and graphics applications. It's not actually a 40-MHz 486 processor inside the machine, of course — there is no such thing. But Falco 's integrated design and consideration for aerodynamics let the 486 chip run faster than the rated 33 MHz. The GT486/40 has two thermostatically controlled fans that keep the unit running at a low temperature. Each component within the case acts as an active element in the cooling design, providing an air cross- flow system that moderates the heat of the CPU as well as that of expansion cards, memory chips, and disk drives. The cool- ing system and integrated design provide an upgrade path to a true 50-MHz 486 pro- cessor when it becomes available. Warning: Do not run the machine for an extended period of time without the cover, because this will throw the cooling sys- tem out of whack and can cause the system to overheat. Closing the cover forces air through the system. As I was testing the Falco, I did remove the case to run the BYTE benchmarks, and I noticed that components of the machine soon became very warm. A Falco representative said this was not a good thing to do. The base model sells for $2909. It fea- tures a Super VGA Video Electronics Standards Association graphics card sup- porting up to 1024- by 768-pixel nonin- terlaced resolution, 32,000 colors, 1 MB of RAM, and a 3^-inch 105-MB SCSI hard drive. The unit that I tested was the $6042 top-of-the-line model. It includes 32 MB of RAM, a 3^-inch 426-MB SCSI hard drive, an 85 14/ A graphics card with integrated VGA and support for 1024- by 768-pixel noninterlaced resolution, 1 MB of video RAM, and a 15-inch Super VGA color monitor. The 2.88-MB floppy drive, compatible with 1.44-MB and 720-KB formats, lets you store large graphics files. The high- capacity floppy drive lets users of CAD and other applications copy large digital images or design files to a floppy disk. An external SCSI-2 port supports up to six peripherals, letting you add storage op- tions such as CD-ROM, optical disc, and streaming tape units. Because of the GT486/40's low profile, you get only three 16-bit expansion slots, one of which is oc- cupied by the graphics card. All the GT486/40 models have an addi- tional 256-KB write-back static RAM cache as a standard feature. In the write- back cache scheme, data in the cache is not written to memory until it needs to be removed from the cache or until another part of the system requests it. The write- back scheme is faster than other imple- mentations (e.g., write-through). On the low-level BYTE benchmarks, the GT486/40's performance placed it at about the midpoint between a test 50-MHz 486 unit that we had in the BYTE Lab and a Mylex-made 486/33 with a fast but non- cached SCSI drive. For example, on the CPU lest index, the GT 486/40's performance rated almost four times faster than a Compaq 386/20 machine (I performed the benchmarks with the sys- tem's cover in place so that the machine could deliver maxi- mum performance). To give you an idea of how fast that makes it, the GT486/40 opened a 50-page document created in PageMaker 4.0 for Windows in less than 4 seconds. Perfor- mance like that will be a bless- ing to anyone who has waited as his or her hard drive trundled seemingly into the night on a graphics file. The GT486/40 didn't quite make Windows run in real time, but it gave it a swift kick in the pants. I hesitate to say how small and portable the GT486/40 is, because it's a graphics work- station with a small footprint and isn't de- signed to compete in the portable market. But it wouldn't surprise me if GT486/40 owners decided to shell out a few hundred extra dollars for another monitor and car- ried the system back and forth between their home and workplace. I took it home with me one night, and if it weren't for the monitor, I wouldn't have thought twice about it. The Falco's small footprint oc- cupied about as much space on my home desk as a laptop but with a much better monitor. If your home desk is as cluttered as mine, with the GT486/40, you're in luck. The GT486/40's diminutive size made me wonder if the firm is working on a docking-station version. With the GT486/40, it seems that Falco is more than halfway there already. — D.L.Andrews THE FACTS GT486/40 $2909 to $6042 Falco Data Products, Inc. 440 Potrero Ave. Sunnyvale, CA 94086 (800) 835-8765 408)745-7123 fax: (408) 745-7860 Circle 1214 on Inquiry Card. 54 BYTE • JANUARY 1992 mmm EDITORS' CHOICE "My Dolch 486" is awesome. . ." "Hey, I now own the perfect portable that lets me get my work done anywhere. Not just a few files . . . everything I had on my desktop!" "Powerful? You bet! After I downloaded all my desktop stuff, on its 420 MB HD y I still had plenty of room left and it screamed through everything at 14.5 MIPS!" "My Dolch P.A.C. is setting new 'rules.' It's portable, fast and I still can add 4 full-size internal expansion cards. Wow!" "You have to see the brilliant display — I mean really see it. TFTis the latest color technology, that's fully VGA compatible." Hey! Don't take my word for it. Experts like PC Magazine judged my Dolch P.A.C. to'. . . outclass all other portables' and picked Dolch three years in a row as Editors' Choice!" BW 1989 EDITORS 1 CHOICE 1990 "Get a Dolch today, choose a 286™, 386SX™, 386DX™ or a 486™ like mine. . . clearly the best PC you can buy today, and it happens to have a handle. Get a lot more work done — where and when you want." Why Wait?. . .Call today. 1-800-544-IPAC In Canada call Laptech 1-800-561-4527 Dolch. ROAD-POWER FOR THE BEST OF US Dolch Computer Systems 372 Turquoise Street, Milpitas, CA 95035 Tel: 408-957-6575, Fax: 408-263-6305 In the United Kingdom: Dolch Computers Systems, LTD. 0908-690880 In Germany: Dolch GmbH 49-8801-2386 Circle 57 On Inquiry Card. ™2S6, 386DX, and 486 are registered trademarks of Intel Corporation THE MOST POWER ■A- : , S~ : ^ M^m m mm4& ^§p^ v- ' '- • -*« *Nmur4* © 1991 Toshiba America Information Systems, Inc. The Intel Inside logo is a trademark of Intel Corporation. FUL 486SX. GOING. *"U 1€®@SX TOSHIBA You can use our credit card- sized memory modules to expandstandard2MB MM tolOMBfor added speedand multi-tasking capabilities. Behold the newToshibaT4400SX notebook— the first 486SX computer to offer all the power and performance of a desktop computer while freeing you from the tyranny of the nearest electrical outlet For starters, theT4400SX offers a 25 MHz 486SX microprocessor with 8K internal cache, upgradable to a full 486DX. Plus an 80 MB hard drive and stan- dard2MBRAM, expandable to 10 MB. TheT4400SX is the only notebook computer that offers a high-speed Gas Plasma screen, which means no mouse blur. And its 100:1 contrast ratio delivers seven times the contrast of a typical LCD display. Or if you prefer, you can choose our 9.5"diagonal LCD display, the most state-of-the-art LCD available, with uncompromising clarity from the black and white ultra thin screen. Bothoffera640x480VGAhigh- resolution display as well as the graphic versatility of 16 gray scales for the gas plasma screen and 64 gray scales for the LCD screen. For familiarity and ease And for added expandability and connectivity, there are built-in parallel, serial, video, keypad/board, mouse and bus expansion ports. There's even Sales by I If you choose the 9.5"diagonalLCD display, you get the versatility of 64 gray scales as well as high-resolution 640x480 VGA on theblack and white ultra thin screen. a dedicated modem slot for an optional internal cellular-ready, 9600 bps fax or standard modem. All that in an ultra-strong 117" Wx 8.3" Dx 2.2" H carbon fiber-reinforced case weighing only 725 lbs that fits into half a briefcase. If you'd like to know more about the T4400SX notebook computer, or any l ■ Sw On those occasions whenyoure actu- ally at your desk, youcanplugyour T4400SXinto our optional Desk- Station IV with all standard desktop hard- ware connec- tions and ex- pandability. . y -\ of use, theT4400SX has a full- function keyboard with standard size keys and key spacing. The Nickel Cadmium bat- tery provides more than three hours of computing power. Our AutoResume feature allows you to shut down and start up precisely where you left off. of our full line of Toshiba portables, call us at 1-800-457-7777 We 11 send you information that can lead to only one conclusion about desktop computers: Going. Going. Gone. In Touch with Tomorrow TOSHIBA Circle 1 70 on Inquiry Card. NEWS FIRST IMPRESSIONS A Dual-Personality CD-ROM Player As the variety of available software increases and prices decrease, CD- ROMs are finally becoming viable (read "useful") software tools. Thankfully, prices of both internal and external CD-ROM drives are also falling. This is a fortuitous combination indeed. There's a dirty little secret about CD- ROM drives. Useful they may be, but just about nobody I know uses them for data full-time. In fact, according to Philips, "re- search indicates a CD-ROM drive is used in its computer peripheral capacity only about 10 percent of the time." What about the other 90 percent of the time? They're used for playing music. Most CD-ROM players are designed (not surprisingly) for handling data; playing music CDs is often a pain. With the Mag- navox CDD461RS, Philips has designed a CD player that you can use for a comput- er instead of a computer peripheral that can also play CDs. The Magnavox drive looks more like a CD player than a computer peripheral. But a peripheral it is, with a SCSI port in the back hooked to an add-in card designed for any 8-bit PC expansion slot. There's a headphone jack and volume control on the front panel, and there are stereo line- output jacks on the back for hooking the CDD461RS to a stereo system (which, of course, you would never find in a serious office). Unlike CD-ROM players, which gener- ally have no controls other than an on/off switch and perhaps an eject button, the Magnavox drive has a complete set of the type of controls you'd see on a music CD player, including a track-number display. About the only thing that it lacks is a time display. OK, enough with the music capabilities. The CDD461RS is a first-rate CD-ROM player. Its size, heft, and rugged construc- tion mean it will endure full days of hard work. Installation was a breeze. The add-in board has a single jumper for setting the memory address. The factory setting (340 hexadecimal) works in all but the most loaded systems. Then it's a simple matter of connecting the cable between the board and the drive. On the software side, the Magnavox drive comes with an easy-to- use installation program that installs a device driver for the player and the latest flavor of Microsoft's CD-ROM extensions to MS-DOS. The prerelease unit that I tested came with a variety of CD-ROMs, including the New Grolier Electronic Encyclopedia, Mi- crosoft Bookshelf, and the PC Globe Elec- tronic Atlas. It also includes the PC-SIG Library — a gold mine of hundreds of pub- lic domain and shareware programs. It's a great introduction to the wealth of ma- terial available on CD-ROM. A Philips spokesperson says more CD-ROMs will be shipped with the final version of the player at no extra cost. The CDD461RS doesn't use the car- tridge-like CD-ROM carriers that are prevalent with most players these days. Instead, you press a button and a tray slides out. You simply place the CD-ROM on the tray and slide it back into the player. I much prefer this system to the CD-ROM cartridge approach, especially because ex- tra cartridges are expensive and difficult to find. Most cartridge users end up using a single cartridge and continually changing the CD-ROM, which is a genuine pain. On the technical side, the average seek time of the CDD461RS is about 700 mil- liseconds. That's pretty much par for the course for today's generation of players. But a more important measure is the drive's average transfer rate, which is a bit over 150 KBps. That figure means that the Magnavox drive is fast enough for in- tensive multimedia applications, where data (e.g., animation) needs to get to the processor in a fast and continuous stream. In fact, it's the CDD461RS's multimedia capabilities that make it intriguing, and an excellent investment for the future. As the MPC (Multimedia Personal Comput- er) standard becomes widespread, as it's sure to be, you'll see more and more CDs that mix computer data along with music. As I was completing this First Impression, I received a copy of Microsoft's "Multi- media Beethoven." It's a tantalizing glimpse of the future of mixed-media CDs. In the course of doing this First Impres- sion, I tested the CDD461RS extensively with both audio disks and CD-ROMs. It performs admirably for both jobs. One ad- vantage of the high-tolerance laser-posi- tioning electronics needed for reading CD- ROM drives is that they also do a bang-up job of reading even the most finicky mu- sic CDs. And in another bow to the music- player orientation, there's even a handy "shuffle" button that plays cuts on a music CD in random order. Philips is one of the companies that's been instrumental in making CD-ROM drives popular, making both internal and external drives available for several years. That's not surprising, because it was large- ly responsible for developing both the CD- ROM and audio standards. I have to hand it to Philips for acknowledging that CD- ROM players are used both for business and pleasure, and for building a player that bridges the best of both worlds. My only complaint: Philips could have come up with a better name. CDD461RS doesn't exactly roll off the tongue. ■ — Stan Miastkowski THE FACTS Magnavox CDD461RS $549 System requirements: IBM PC, AT, PS/2, or compatible with a free 8-bit ISA expansion slot. Philips Consumer Electronics Co. 1 Philips Dr. P.O. Box 14810 Knoxville,TN 37914 (800) 722-6224 (615)475-8869 Circle 1 21 5 on Inquiry Card. 58 BYTE -JANUARY 1992 PhMjuCiJiMAMM PothjcJlS ' The POWER USER'S Best Software Source! BLACK & WHITE Dr. Switch-ASE Facelt 153 90 BORLAND Borland C++ 299 & Application Frameworks CALL ObjectVision 2.0 95 Paradox 3.5 525 Special Edition 79 Quattro Pro 3.0 329 Sidekick 2.0. 79 Turbo C++ 69 w/Turbo Vision 139 Turbo Debugger & Tools 105 Turbo Pascal 6.0 105 Turbo Pascal Pro 6.0 209 Turbo Pascal for Windows 169 World of C++ Video 169 CASEWORKS CASE:W 435 CASE:W Corporate Edition 929 CASE:PM for C or C++ 1895 CASE-.PM for COBOL 2395 LAHEY COMPUTER Lahey EM/32 w/ OS/386 1089 Graphoria for Lahey EM/32 315 Lahey F77L 535 Graphoria for Lahey F77L 225 Lahey Personal Fortran 77 89 w/ Toolkit 115 MEDIA CYBERNETICS Dr. HALO IV Compet. Upgrade 49 Dr. HALO IV Imaging Pak 105 HALO Desktop Imager 105 HALOF/X 219 HALOImageFile FormatLib 189 HALO Professional 279 MICROSOFT MS BASIC Prof. Devel. Sys. 349 MS C Prof. Devel. Sys. 299 MS COBOL 629 MS Excel for Windows 349 MS FORTRAN 299 MS Macro Assembler 99 MSOfficeforWindows 499 MS OS/2 DIGITALK Present. Mgr. Softset 105 Smalltalk/V 99 MS Pascal 199 Smalltalk/V286 169 MS QuickBASIC 69 Smalltalk/V PM 395 MS Visual Basic 139 Smalltalk/V Windows 395 DISK SOFTWARE MORTICE KERN SYSTEMS MKSAWK 89 TGL2D/3D 239 MKSLEX&YACC 197 TGL Professional 389 MKS MAKE 119 TGUUtilities 159 MKS Programming Platforrr i 539 FAIRCOM MKS RCS 149 c-tree Plus 459 MKS Software Mgmt. Team 239 Faircom SQL Server 399 MKS Toolkit 199 Faircom Toolbox 899 MKS Trilogy 99 r-tree 239 MKSVI 125 GENUS PERISCOPE MICROPROGRAMMir JG Periscope Oebuggers CALL GX Effects 179 PHAR LAP GX Graphics GX Text 1/9 125 PharLap 386 Debug 169 PCX Prog. Toolkit Proteus 5.0 199 225 PharLap386 DOS Extender PharLap 386 VMM PharLap286 ODS Extender 435 259 435 GIMPEL SOFTWARE C Shroud 599 SEQUITER SOFTWARE C-terp ??9 Code Base 4.2 225 C-terp 386 269 Code Base ++ 225 PC-Lint 105 SILVERWARE PC-Lint 386 179 SilverClipSPCS 259 GREENLEAF SOFTWA RE SilverComm'C'ASYNCUb. 215 GreenleafComm++ 289 SilverPaint Library 109 GreenleafComm Library 287 SilverPak 299 GreenleafOataWindows 315 SilverWare "C" Interface Lit ). /9 Greenleaf Financial Math I. ib.315 SOFTWARE Greenleaf Financial Math Lib. ++ 155 BLACKSMITHS Greenleaf Functions 179 C-CALL 54 Greenleaf SuperFunctions 239 C-CMT 54 GreenleafViewComm 319 C-OOC 169 Greenleaf ViewComm++ 289 C-LIST 4/ GUI COMPUTER C-METRIC 47 C-REF 47 3-in-l C/C++ CALL OynamicObject C/C++ CALL SOLUTION SYSTEMS ObjectTable C/C++ CALL BRIEF CALL INTERSOLV BRIEF &dBRIEF CALL CHARGE HS PolyMake 149 C-Worthy 399 PVCS Pofessional 419 w/ Source 579 Sage Professional Editor 249 Sourcerer's Apprentice 399 SOUTH MOUNTAIN SOFTWARE BreakOut II 189 C Utility Library 199 Essential B-Tree 159 Essential Communications 259 Essential Graphics Chart 179 Essential Graphics GUI 105 Essential Graphics Kernel 149 STERLING CASTLE BestChoice3 79 Logic Gem 109 SUN COUNTRY SOFTWARE SHOWCAT Image Catalog 179 SHOWCASE Image Database 535 SUNSCAN Digital Scanware 269 SUNSHOW Advanced Image Toolkit 219 "C" Language Imag Lib. 219 Database Professional 89 Image Converter 225 SYMANTEC Just Write 179 Norton Antivirus 99 Norton Backup 99 Norton Commander 99 Norton Editor 85 Norton Utilities 6.0 129 On Target 279 Q&A 349 Time Line 5.0 475 Zortech C++ Oev. Edition 599 Zortech C++ S&E Edition 849 SYSTEMS & SOFTWARE 386 Dev Performance Pak 1299 C6toPRDM 129 Link&Locate++ Ext. Ed. 329 Link&Locate 386 629 SoftProbe 86/TX 269 SoftProbe 386/SIM 469 SoftProbe 386/IX 799 TCtoPROM 129 WATCOM WATCOM C8.5 369 WATCOM C8.5/386 579 WATCOM FORTRAN 77 8.5 449 WATCOM FORTRAN 77/386 579 WATFOR-77 3.1 335 WHITEWATER GROUP Actor 4.0 199 Actor Professional 4.0 399 ObjectGraphics 159 WINTRIEVE 339 WRT 169 Call FAXcetera™ (908)389-8173 for instant additional information on the best selling products highlighted in the green shaded areas. ESSENTIAL GRAPHICS KERNEL AND CHART Essential Graphics Chart and Kernel provide a complete set of graphics development tools for C. Kernel contains over 250 functions for video drivers, fonts, PCX, dot matrix printers, HP laser jets, paintjets and plotters. Chart provides a complete set of functions for 2-D and 3-D bar, above/below, line scatter and pie graphs. Supports Microsoft C/Quick C, Borland C/C++ and DOS extenders from Phar Lap and Rational Systems. Source code is available. No royalties. Kernel List: $199 Ours: $149 w/source List: $398 Ours: $299 Chart List: $199 Ours: $179 w/source List: $998 Ours: $749 FAXa-fera* 2089-0016- Kern a I FAXcetera # 2089-0017 -Chart OBJECTVISION 2.0 OBJECTION I ObjectVision is the easiest way to create OSJE( Windows Applications. You simply draw your interface, add logic, and connect to your data - ALL WITHOUT KNOWING ANYTHING ABOUT PROGRAMMING. ObjectVision is a powerful tool that combines popular features from spread- sheets, databases, forms products and front-ends into an easy-to-use WYSIWYG application tool for all Windows users and developers List: $149.95 Ours: $95 FAXretera# 1861-0018 BORLAND C++ 3.0 With full support of ANSI C and C++ 2.1, a powerful global optimizer, templates, and enhanced perfor- mance, Borland C++ is the best and most productive systems available for creating high-quality code in either the Windows or DOS environments. Create Windows applications easily from within Windows with the Windows IDE that includes a graphical class browser with speed bars for quick access to common functions. The WinScope utility tracks Windows messages to make debugging easier, and Resource Workshop allows you to visually draw Windows resources. Also includes Turbo Debugger, Turbo Profiler, and the object-oriented Turbo Assembler. List: $495 Ours: $299 FAX cetera* 1861-0016 TURN THE PAGE... WE HAVE THOUSANDS MORE PRODUCTS TO CHOOSE FROM! All products are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies. Prices subject to change without notice. Q+E Database Library Q+E Database Library is a set of Dynamic Link Libraries providing a common call level interface for developer tools such as Visual Basic, ToolBook, Actor, Smalltalk, C, C++, etc. and most macro language products to access data from Oracle, SQL Server, Sybase, EE Database Manager, DB2, Netware SQL dBase, Paradox, Excel, and Text files. List: $399 Ours: $279 FAXatentf 2625-0002 Distinct TCP/IP for Windows TCP/IP, RPC/XDR and NFS services for Microsoft Windows through small fast dynamic link libraries (DLLs). Includes APIs for Berkeley Sockets, Remote Procedure Call (RPC), Network Windows (NFS client,) TELNET and FTP. Coexists on the same board with either Lan Manager (NDIS) or Novell (packets). Includes data declarations for Microsoft C, Visual Basic, Borland C++ and Turbo Pascal. Supports virtually all Ethernet and Token Ring cards, including 3Com, Western Digital and others. Royalty FREE low cost internal use and commercial licensing available. List: $495 Ours: $445 FAXi*fera# 2994-0002 386MAX® & BlueMAX Qualitas' new memory manage feature SmartMemory™, Automatic Reordering, a integrated graphical inte disk cache, and system a to give you more memory better performance than i other memory manager. 386M 6 also features ROMsearch™; VGAswap™. BlueMAX 6 features BIOS Compression technology form I 386MAX List: $99 Ours: $69 BlueMAX List: $125 Ours: $89 FAXc-ciirm # 1888-0005 & 1888-0006 Windows MAKER Professional The fastest way to create Windows applications in C. Generates the Windows .EXE with fully commented source and production files. No royalties. Point and click to define user interface. Preview your design to instantly test look and feel. Make changes on the fly without compiling. Custom code is preserved during code generation. Supports C++. True Visual Programming in C. Highly recommended. List: $995 Ours: $795 FAXccfcra #2602-0003 386/486 Development Intel 386/486 Code Builder 489 Lahey EM/32 w/OS 386 1089 PharLap 386 Dos Extender 435 PharLap386VMM 259 WATCOM C8.5/386 Prof. 579 WATCOM Fortran 77/386 Professional 8.5 579 Zortech C++ Devel. 3.0 CALL Assembly/Disassembly Advantage Disassembler 279 DIS DOC Professional 209 MS Macro Assembler 6.0 99 Sourcerw/BIOSPre-Proc. 139 Spontaneous Assembly 169 Turbo Debugger & Tools 105 Basic Compilers MS Basic Prof. Dev. Sys. 349 MS Quick BASIC 69 Visual Basic 139 ZBasic PC 89 Basic Libraries & Utilities DB/Lib Professional 142 Dialogic 85 GraphPak Professional 129 ProBas 159 ProBas HyperHelp Toolkit 109 ProBas Telecom Toolkit 70 ProBas Toolkit 3.0 109 Pro Math 109 ProScreen 89 P.D.Q. 115 QuickPak Professional 179 QuickScreen 129 QuickWindows Advanced 119 C/C++ Compilers Borland C++ 299 & Application Frameworks 469 & Appl Frame w/ Obj Mgr 549 InstantC 419 Microsoft C 6.0 299 w/ PC Lint 409 w/Wind Dev Toolkit 449 MS QuickC 69 MS QuickC for Windows 125 MS QuickC w/QuickASM 139 Turbo C++ 69 w/furbo Vision 139 WATCOM C8.5 Professional 369 Zortech C++ 3.0: Developer's Edition 3.0 599 Science &Eng. 3.0 849 CASE TOOLS Analysis Manager 3.0 175 EasyCASE Plus 3.0 449 EasyCASE Professional 3.0 589 Personal CASE 179 C-Code Generators C Source w/ Source 499 PRO-C 695 C Communications BreakOut II 189 CAsynch Manager 139 Essential Comm 259 Greenleaf CommLib 287 GreenleafViewComm 319 SerialTest 259 SilverComm C Asynch 215 View 232 149 C File Management Btrieve 359 C Data Manager 259 Code Base 4.2 225 c-tree Plus 459 Essential Btree 159 Faircom SQL Server 399 Toolbox, Prof. Edition 899 Toolbox, Special Edition 569 C General Libraries C TOOLS PLUS 109 C Utility Library 199 Greenleaf Functions 179 Greenleaf SuperFunc. 239 Turbo C Tools 109 C Memory Management V EMM 169 HEAP Expander 109 Hold Everything 149 C Screens C Worthy 399 Greenleaf Data Windows 315 HI-SCREEN XL 299 Panel Plus II 395 Vermont Views 415 Vitamin C 289 VC Screen 125 Programmer's Paradise FOR SERVICE, SELECTION, AND SAVINGS! C- Additional Products Bar Code Library 319 Clear Plus for C 169 Code Check 479 C-Doc 169 MKSLEX&YACC 197 Objective C 225 Oxygen CALL PC Lint 105 PCYACC Professional 459 TimeSlicer 279 C-Translators BAS-C 329 Commercial 789 286Version 1025 FOR-C 589 w/ Source 849 C++ Libraries/Utilities 3 -in- 1 for C++ 179 BrieforC++ CALL C++Views 419 Codebase ++ 225 DynamicObject for C++ 179 Greenleaf Comm C++ 289 M++ 265 M++, addt'l products CALL Object Manager 269 ObjectTa b I e f o r C++- 229 Rogue Wave Math.h++ 179 Rogue Wave Tools.h++ 179 TIER 175 Win++ 225 Zinc Library 179 for DOS & Windows 269 COBOL Micro Focus COBOL/2 w/ TOOLSET 1199 Personal COBOL 129 MS COBOL 629 Realia COBOL 799 Database Development Clarion Personal 72 Clarion Professional 525 Clear Plus for dBase 169 Clipper 521 DClip 192 dBASEIIU 475 dBase IV Devel. Edition 845 dBFastPlus 267 dGE 249 Dr. Switch-ASE 160 Flipper 249 FoxBASE 249 FoxPro 489 FoxPro Distribution Kit CALL FUNCKy Library 225 Paradox 3.5 525 Q+E Server 219 Q+E Database Library 279 Quicksilver 419 R&RCode Generator 129 R&R Report Writer 219 SilverComm 215 Silver Pak 299 Superbase4 CALL Ul II Touch & Go 315 Ul Programmer II 475 Debuggers Multiscope Debugger (DOS I 99 Periscope Debuggers CALL Documentation All Clear 229 Interactive Easyflow 125 Source Print 74 Tree Diagrammer 74 DOS Extenders Ergo OS/286 Dev.Kit CALL PharLap 286 DOS Extender 439 Editors Brief CALL ED IX 155 KEDIT 125 MKSVI 125 Multi Edit 89 Multi Edit Professional 139 Norton Editor 85 Professional Editor 249 SPF/PC 199 Vedit Plus 115 Wylbur 179 THOUSANDS MORE PRODUCTS AVAILABLE! IF YOU DON'T SEE WHATYOUWANTCALLUS!!!! Embedded Systems C6 TO PROM 129 Link & Locate ++ Ext. 329 Paradigm LOCATE CALL Expert Systems Best Choice 3 79 Database Toolkit 2.0 115 KnowledgePro 339 Logic Gem 105 800-445-7899 GUARANTEED BEST PRICES FORTRAN Version Control/Make Lahey F77L 535 MKSMAKE 119 Lahey Personal FORTRAN 89 MKS RCS 215 MS FORTRAN 299 PolyMake 149 WATCOM FORTRAN 77 Professional PVCS 479 Professional 8.5 449 Sourcerer's Apprentice TLIB 399 CALL FOR OUR NEV / 109 WINTER CATALOG TOD AY! Windows Development Graphic Libraries Baby Driver 229 3-in-l for C 129 BLACKHAWK dGT 259 Actor 199 Essential Graphics GUI 219 Actor Professional 399 Essential Graphics Kernal 149 CASE:W 435 Graf/Drive Plus Developers 269 CASE:W Corporate 839 GrafPrint 219 CODEPAD for Windows 95 GSS Graph. Dev. Toolkit 675 dBFAST/Windows 269 GX Effects 2.0 179 DbxSHIELD 359 GX Graphics 179 DialogCoder 435 GXText 2.0 125 Distinct TCP/IP for Window s 445 Halo Professional 279 Drover Toolbox/Wind. 239 Menuet 259 DynamicObjectforC 143 PCX Programmer's Toolkit 199 InstallSHIELD 369 w/ Source 479 KnowledgePro Windows 399 SUNSHOW Products CALL LogSHIELD 369 TGL 2D, 3D CALL MemSHIELD 369 Victor Image Library 179 MEWEL 259 MS Windows Devel. Tlkit 349 Hardware/Peripherals Multiscope for Windows 289 Pioneer Modem 159 ObjectManager Voyager Modem 379 ObjectTableforC 179 UFO Modem 399 ObjectVision 95 Linkers/Profilers ProtoView 625 Blinker 225 RFFlow 115 Charge 89 Smalltalk/Windows 395 P\mk86 P\us 335 Spinnaker Plus 349 .RTLink/Plus 355 ToolBook 329 Whitewater Res. Tlkt CALL OS/2 WindowsMAKER Prof. 795 CASE:PMforCorC++ 1895 MS OS/2 Present. Mgr.Tkt. 349 Utilities SHIELD Series CALL 386MAX 69 Smalltalk/V PM 395 AboveDISC 64 Pascal AboveMEM 75 Asynch Library 135 ASM Flow Professional 179 Object Professional 149 Blue MAX 89 Power Tools + 109 Central Point Backup 65 Topaz 89 Dynamic Memory Ctl. 72 Topaz Multiuser 135 EZ-lnstall 219 TSR's Made Easy 45 HIJAAK 139 Turbo Magic 169 Hold Everything 159 Turbo Pascal6.0 105 Info Spotter 69 Turbo Pascalfor Windows 169 1NSTAUT 135 Turbo Pascal Professional 209 Label Master 399 Turbo Plus 5.5 155 MKS TOOLKIT 199 Turbo Professional 99 Move'em 79 Turbo Vision Toolkit 109 Norton Anti- Virus 99 Norton Commander 99 Prototyping Norton Utilities 6.0 129 Dan Bricklin's Demo II 215 Opt-Tech Sort/Merge 119 Proteus 5.0 249 ParanetTurbo 72 Show Partner F/X 355 PC Tools Deluxe 7.0 115 Utilities continued Precursor 89 SpinRite II 69 Squish Plus 75 SUNSHOW Image Libry. CALL Switch-It 79 Tree86 69 UpShot 149 Zeno 239 Windows Applications Communications Crosstalk for Windows 129 Dynacomm Asynch 189 Faxit for Windows 129 WIN Connect 82 WinFax 65 Environment Windows 3.0 99 w/ MS Mouse Bus 159 MS DOS 5.0 Upgrade 65 Database & Forms dBFAST/Windows 269 Form Base CALL Object Vision for Windows 99 SQLWindows 1199 Superbase 4 Windows CALL Graphics/Publishing Adobe Illustrator/Wind. 299 Adobe Streamline/Wind. 269 Corel Draw 2.0 389 Micrografx Charisma 345 Micrografx Designer 485 MS PowerPoint 349 PageMaker 499 PC Paintbrush/Windows 53 Publisher's Type Foundry 385 Ventura Publisher 585 GUARANTEED BEST PRICES* Products listed here are backed by the following guarantee: Should you see one of these products listed at a lower price in another ad in this magazine. CALL US! We'll match the price, and still offer our same quality service and support! Terms of off er: ' Offergood thiough Janua»y 31.1932 ' Applicablelo piicingon current versions of software listed. • Januarvissue prices only. ' Offerdoes not applytowards obviouserrors in competitors'ads. * Subject to same terms and conditions 1-800-445-7899 Corporate: 800-422-6507 (CORSOFT Division) International: 908-389-9228 Customer Service: 908-389-9229 Canada: 800-445-7899 Fax: 908-389-9227 MEWEL MEWEL is a text-mode window library which gives an application the SAA/CUA look and feel. The API is compatible with the Microsoft Windows for easy porting between Windows and DOS, OS/2, UNIX and VAX VMS. Can also run in graphics mode. Available for C and various C++ class libraries, including Borland's OWL List: $295 Ours: $259 w/source List: $595 fkXcctera# 1990-0001 Ours: $539 WATCOM C8.5/386 Professional for Extended Dos and Windows Develop and Debug 32-bit applications for extended DOS and Windows with the most complete 32-bit C development package } J available. C8.5/386 Professional is packed full of tools you need to unleash 32-bit power on your applications at a low package price. Includes the royalty-free DOS/4GW DOS extender by Rational Systems, components from Microsoft Windows SDK, award-winning compiler, protected mode linker, interactive debugger, execution profiler, run-time compatibility with WATCOM FORTRAN 77/386 V8.5 plus numerous development tools. Supports other industry standard 32-bit DOS extenders. Create ADS Applications for AutoCAD or for embedded systems development. List: $995 Ours: $579 FAX«tera# 1683-0001 FAX«fcm# 1683-0001 ATTENTI ATE CUSTOMERS corsoit Call (800)422-6507 • Select from over 5,000 titles — and we special order too! • Get quick delivery at great prices on Microsoft, Borland, Lotus... etc. We buy software directly from all the major publishers, and keep plenty of stock on hand. And we're now an authorized IBM software dealer! • Ask about volume purchase agreements, contracts, and personally assigned inside & outside sales representatives. CORSOFT is a Division of Voyager Software Corp A Division of Voyager Software Corp 11 63 ShrewsburyAve., Shrewsbury, NJ 07702 FAXmcni: 908-389-8173 POLICIES Phone Orders Mon-Fri 8:30 AM-7PM EST, Sat 9:30-2:30 EST. We accept MC, Visa, AMEX. Domestic shipments, please add $5 per item for shipping/handling by UPS ground. For domestic COD shipments, please add $3. Rush service available. Mail orFAX/ International /POs Phone number required with order. FAXa/mi (908) 389-8173 Call fromyourFAXtelephone and followthe instructions to receive more information on the products featured abovef Corporate Accounts Call CORSOFT, our corporate sales division. Ask about volume purchase agreements. Returns Subject to S25 processing charge. * All prices subjectto change without notice. Circle 92 on Inquiry Card. NEWS A Sandwich to Go This sandwich-style 386SX notebook in- cludes a 360-dpi bubble- jet portable printer. The system opens like a typical clam- shell case, with the keyboard in front of the display; an- other section opens behind the display and holds the printer. Preconnected cables eliminate the need to hook up components. With a 20-MHz CPU and 4 MB of RAM (expandable to 6 MB), the unit has a 20- MB hard drive that you can upgrade to 40 or 60 MB. Other features include a backlit 640- by 480-pixel VGA display, a coprocessor socket, an internal modem slot, a 3 V^ -inch floppy drive, two serial ports, one paral- lel port, and a port for an external monitor. Price: $3250. Contact: BEC Computer Corp., 22 Yearling Court, Rockville,MD 20850, (301) 294-2152. Circle 1271 on Inquiry Card. Jupiter Brings Power to Your Computing The Jupiter Class Evolu- tion ( JCE) systems in Epic Microsystems' En- hanced Machine Series (EMS) computers support up to 128 MB of on-boardRAM and up to 512 KB of cache. The systems use a passive 32- bit EISA motherboard that accepts a processor card in a WHAT'S NEW • SYSTEMS BEC Computer's sandwich-style 386SX notebook computer. proprietary slot, leaving seven 32-bit slots open. The basic JCE 386/40 desktop has 8 MB of RAM, 3 x h- and 5 ^-inch floppy drives, a 160-MB IDE hard drive, an EMS IDE control- ler with 1 MB of cache, a 1-MB VGA card, one paral- lel and two serial ports, and a 14-inch VGA color moni- tor. The JCE 386/40 work- station has 16 MB of RAM, a 3 V^-inch floppy drive, a 3 fc-inch 500-MB SCSI hard drive, an EMS SCSI controller with 4 MB of cache, a 1-MB/768-KB video RAM 60-MHz Graphics Xcellerator, one serial and two parallel ports, and a 1 4-inch VGA color monitor. DOS 5.0, Qualitas 386Max, Windows 3.0, and a Microsoft Mouse are stan- dard with both models. Price: Desktop model starts at $6219; workstation starts at $8949. Contact: Epic Microsys- tems, Inc., 3RTi- gertail Cir., Derry, NH 03038, (603) 432-6079; fax (603)437-6893. Circle 1272 on Inquiry Card. Scalable Multiprocessor System The first of Micronics' Mpro scalable multipro- cessor computer systems, the SMP-2000 and SMP- 4000 are designed for use with SCO Unix MPX and Banyan Vines SMP. The 486-based system also works with DOS, Windows, Net- Ware, Unix, and OS/2. The SMP-2000 runs at 33 or 50 MHz and is upgrad- able to two CPUs^each with 256 KB of write-back cache— via a second plug-in CPU board. Its 8 MB of on- board RAM is expandable to 128 MB. The system uses 64-bit buses, includes six 32-bit EISA expansion slots and two CPU/memory slots, and supports bus-mas- tering hardware. It includes four half-height bays, a 3 x h- inch floppy drive, a VGA video card, and one parallel and two serial ports. The initial version of the SMP-4000 system has up to four 33-MHz 486 CPUs. In addition to features of the SMP-2000, it supports up to 256 MB of system RAM and has eight EISA expan- sion and six CPU/memory card slots. The unit comes in a tower case with nine half-height bays and a V/i- inch floppy drive. Price: Starts at under $10,000 for each system. Contact: Micronics Com- puters, Inc., 232 East Warren Ave., Fremont, CA 94539, (510) 651-2300; fax (510) 651-5612. Circle 1 273 on Inquiry Card. Cellular, Mobile, and Modular The Grid Cellular Note- book System combines a 386SX-based Grid 1750 notebook computer with PowerTek's model CMI 990 cellular data transmis- sion package. The two units incorporate everything nec- essary for cellular mobile computing, forming a pack- age that weighs 1 1 pounds, including batteries. The system's modular design lets you go on the road with the 6-pound Grid 1750, and then, when you're back in your car or motel room, you can link up the PowerTec CMI to transmit or receive data. The system uses a 9600-bps Microcom Micro-Modem, a Fujitsu transceiver, an intelligent adapter, and a PowerTec cel- lular interface. It has 1 MB of RAM, a 3 V^-inch floppy drive, a 60-MB hard drive, a VGA backlit LCD, an auto- sensing power adapter, and DOS 5.01. Price: $5871. Contact: Grid Systems Corp., 47211 Lake view Blvd., Fremont, CA 94537, (510) 656-4700. Circle 1 274 on Inquiry Card. The Jupiter Class Evolution system. 62 BYTE* JANUARY 1992 NEWS WHAT'S NEW • PERIPHERALS Multipurpose Portable Printer With 24 KB of memory and an optional nickel- cadmium battery pack, the 4-pound StarJet SJ-48 multi- purpose ink- jet printer prints up to 40 pages without a recharge. Its 64-nozzle print head maintains a 45-dB sound level while it prints with laser quality on a variety of paper. The SJ-48 has four resi- dent bit-mapped fonts, two 1.2-MB floppy disks of utilities and fonts for desktop publishing, and a driver for Windows 3.0. Able to print graphics at 360 dpi, the SJ- 48 prints more than 6 x /i text pages per minute at 20 cpi. The printer also has a quar- ter-size mode that lets it print up to 273 characters per line in 20-cpi mode. Price: $499; optional bat- tery pack, $50. Contact: Star Micronics America, Inc., 420 Lexing- ton Ave., Suite 2702, New York, NY 10170, (212) 986- 6770; fax (212) 286-9063. Circle 1275 on Inquiry Card. Speedy Optical Data Storage Sumo's SS630 rewrit- able optical data storage subsystem stores 600 MB of formatted data per removable data cartridge and offers unlimited data storage. The system operates at average seek times of 28 ms and aver- age access times as low as 37 ms. It supports data trans- fer rates as high as 1 MBps. The SS630 stores data on a 5 !4-inch ISO-compatible removable cartridge using magneto-optic recording techniques. Equipped with a SCSI-2 connection, it is '"^■^■^"'■'' You get printing flexibility with the StarJet SJ-48. easily integrated with IBM, DEC, Sun Microsystems, and Macintosh platforms. The unit includes all soft- ware drivers and has auto- matic on-line formatting. Price: $4295. Contact: Sumo Systems, 1580 Old Oakland Rd., S-C103, San Jose, CA 95131, (408) 453-5744; fax (408)453-5821. Circle 1 276 on Inquiry Card. TouchMonitors in Two Styles The GoldStar 1430Plus TouchMonitor, a fully integrated plug-and-play 14-inch VGA touchscreen, is available with your choice of a serial or PC-Bus control- ler. You also have a choice of an IntelliTouch or Accu- Touch screen. The pure glass Intelli- Touch touchscreen uses Sur- face Acoustic Wave tech- nology in its completely transparent panel; the waves in the glass are ab- sorbed by a finger or other soft pointing object. The panel, which senses touch location as well as touch pressure, can be mounted on CRT or flat-panel displays. The AccuTouch screen incorporates resistive tech- nology, which uses a trans- parent polyester coversheet over a glass panel. The layers are separated by tiny transparent dots, each less than 1/1000 inch thick. The facing surfaces of the layers have a clear conductive coat- ing; a light touch registers the touch location by pushing the layers together. Price: GoldStar AccuTouch 1430Plus TouchMonitor with PC-Bus card controller, $1 160; GoldStar IntelliTouch TouchMonitor with PC-Bus card controller, $1280. Contact: Elographics, Inc., 105 Randolph Rd., Oak Ridge, TN 37830, (615) 482-4100; fax (615) 482- 4943. Circle 1 277 on Inquiry Card. CD-ROM Drive Takes to the Road The portable TXM- 330 IP CD-ROM drive, based on Toshiba's XM- 3300 Series drive, has a 325- ms average access time and a sealed drive enclosure that excludes contaminants. The TXM-330 IP weighs 3.8 pounds and has an op- tional battery pack that pro- vides up to 4 hours of opera- tion. The drive features a low-battery detector and indi- cator and includes an AC power adapter. An optional parallel-to-SCSI cable con- nects the drive to laptop and notebook computers. Price: $999. Contact: Toshiba America Information Systems, Inc., Disk Products Division, 9740 Irvine Blvd., Irvine, CA 92718, (714)583-3000. Circle 1 278 on Inquiry Card. The GoldStar 1430Plus TouchMonitor. JANUARY 1992 -BYTE 63 NEWS WHAT'S NEW • ADD-INS SCSI-2 Drives for the Quadra 900 A family of Hewlett- Packard SCSI-2 internal drives for Apple's Mac Quadra 900 are available in 5 l A- and 3^-inch sizes. The drives are targeted for use with CAD/CAM, graphics, and other high- capacity storage environ- ments. The Vh -inch drive offers 422 MB of formatted capac- ity with an average seek time of 12.6 ms and an asyn- chronous burst transfer rate of 1.5MBps. The 5*4 -inch drives have formatted ca- pacities of 1 .355 and 1 .070 gigabytes and 677 MBps. Their seek time is 13.5 ms, and they have an asynchro- nous burst transfer rate of up to 1 .5 MBps. All drives in- clude HP's Formatter soft- ware with full driver sup- port, cables, and trays. Price: $2695 to $5095. Contact: Hewlett-Packard Co. Inquiries, 19310 Prune- ridge Ave. , Cupertino, CA 95014, (800) 752-0900. Circle 1279 on Inquiry Card. XGA Board for PCs The FlashXGA Acceler- ated Graphics Adapter for PCs combines a high- performance CRT controller with a bus-mastering graph- ics coprocessor to create a display adapter similar to the XGA (Extended Graphics Array) for the PS/2. The adapter comes with 1 MB of video RAM. FlashXGA supports most PC display resolutions up to 1024 by 768 pixels non- interlaced with 256 simulta- neous colors. It has a re- fresh rate programmable to The HP SCSI-2 drives provide mass storage for the Mac Quadra 900. 72 Hz and supports the IBM XGA 16-bit color for- mat for direct display of 65,536 simultaneous colors, as well as the 15 -bit Targa format for 32,768 simulta- neous colors at up to 800- by 600-pixel resolution. Price: $649. Contact: Video Dynamics, Inc., 1550 Bryant St., San Francisco, CA 94103, (800) 243-3527 or (415) 863-3023. Circle 1 280 on Inquiry Card. TV in a Window TV-VideoWindows, a single-slot, full-length board for displaying broad- cast or cable TV within Win- dows, integrates Super VideoWindows and Super Tuner functionality. Pack- aged with all necessary cables and connectors, the board includes VEditor. Price: $1195. Contact: New Media Graphics Corp., 780 Boston Rd.,Billerica, MA 01821, (508) 663-0666; fax (508) 663-6678. Circle 1281 on Inquiry Card. Diagnostic Test Card Fits in a Pocket The PocketPost diagnos- tic test card for ISA and EISA computers plugs into any available expansion slot and quickly shows why your computer won't boot. Landmark's PC Certify diagnostic test software, bun- dled with the card, helps to isolate problems on systems that boot but aren't running smoothly. PC Certify re- quires 128 KB of memory and can run in remote mode. PocketPost conducts three major diagnostic tests. For the first, a digital dis- play shows power-on self test codes issued by the BIOS when you switch on the com- puter's power. For the sec- ond test, a built-in voltmeter with five LEDs shows when the proper power level is on and within 90 percent of rated value. In the third test, an LED and jumpers show whether nine vital bus sig- nals are toggling properly. Price: $249. Contact: Data Depot, 1710 Drew St. , Clearwater, FL 34615, (800) 275-1913 or (813) 446-3402; fax (813) 443-4377. Circle 1282 on Inquiry Card. Piggyback Card Surrounds You with Sound The Surround Sound Module from Ad Lib is a piggyback card that snaps onto the Ad Lib Gold card to give you sound enhance- ments ranging from stereo depth simulation to artifi- cial reverb and echo. The module is compatible with all applications written with Ad Lib sound support, automatically enhancing the application you're using when you choose an effect from Ad Lib's selection. Price: $89.95. Contact: Ad Lib, Inc., 220 Grande-Allee East, Suite 850, Quebec, Canada G1R 2J1, (800) 463-2686 or (418) 529-9676; fax (418) 529- 1159. Circle 1283 on Inquiry Card. Accelerate Graphics in Windows 3.0 The FlickerFree Win- dows VGA 8800 graphics board with Safescan accel- erates Windows 3.0 graphics software. With a refresh rate of 70 Hz, the board's Safescan feature eliminates the black border at the edge of your screen, letting you overscan and have 100 per- cent use of your screen. Other features include reso- lutions of up to 1280 by 968 pixels, 256 colors, 1 MB of memory, and a GUI accel- erator. Genoa says the board's processing speeds are up to 30 times faster than Super VGA standards. Price: $495. Contact: Genoa Systems Corp., 75 East Trimble Rd., San Jose, CA 95 13 1,(408) 432-9090; fax (408) 434- 0997. Circle 1 284 on Inquiry Card. 64 BYTE* JANUARY 1992 The new multi-mode VEDIT PLUS is the only text editor you will ever need! The most powerful text editor for program development and text processing • Drop-down menus, mouse support • Columnar blocks, regular expressions, undo • Also VEDIT for $69, VEDIT Jr. for $29 mil) fUgt ■define BflKHAl -ia| (del I ne ttDDEF 1 Idefiu m UK I rtftih -3 Idoflne m MENU -i Silufiiit- EXIT UK S AUD CUT -1 I Jeff hc IWKfcU Idaho* UflLtfl l j\m PKWH.T J , : Cancel ft[t-n:HL-l|i The new VEDIT PLUS is today's finest programmer's editor. Small (80K) and lightning fast, it is written entirely in assembly language. VEDIT PLUS is the only programmer's editor that can edit any text or binary file you will ever encounter. Incredibly, VEDIT is over 20 times faster than other editors on just a 3 megabyte file. When editing multi-megabyte files, only VEDIT has the speed to get the job done. Benchmarks in 3 Meg File Save and continue Load, modify, save, exit Block-column copy (40x200) Delete one column in file 60,000 search & replace Brief 3:52 min 49 sec 30 sec 1:50 hour 1 :44 hour Sage 1 :47 min 1 :38 min 2 sec 1 :03 hour 1:32 hour The extensive compiler support runs popular compilers and also your favorite linkers, debuggers and Make from within VEDIT. It even integrates tools from different vendors. When shelling to DOS, VEDIT swaps itself and TSRs out of memory, giving you as much as 620K of available memory for compiling the biggest programs. Only VEDIT gives you the advantages of a powerful editor with the convenience of an integrated environment. VEDIT PLUS has every advanced feature you might expect. Simultaneously edit numerous files, split the screen i nto windows, search/replace with regular expressions. Automatic indent, block indent, parentheses matching and block operations by character, line, file or column speed program development. Word wrap, paragraph formatting, justification, centering and many printing options are ideal for text processing. VEDIT PLUS has the most powerful macro programming lan- guage of any editor. It eliminates repetitive editing tasks and lets you create your own editing functions. It includes testing, branch- ing, looping, user prompts, keyboard input, string and numeric variables, complete control over windows plus access to hard- ware interrupts, memory and I/O ports. Source level debugging helps you develop new macros quickly and easily. The fastest text editor for mainframe, CD ROM and other huge files Edit up to 2 Gigabyte text, binary, mainframe files Edit in ASCII, EBCDIC or Hexadecimal Emulate Wordstar, Word Perfect, Brief, vi, others nJSlTIUMiBtJHtt^'fi'Jt- |« 22 2B 71 W ZB C6 BB DA 3C SI 53 « 3E ZB 6F 72 2B 3C Bl 52 58 3E 28 CI 9f B8 M CB 2B CI M 65 73 69 72 65 61 28 B8 28 C2 ZB 6T 72 ZB 3C 45 t 'f'iifHH n 5 il « 59 88 82 SB 19 « 47 28 2D 2D 2B 63 Wl 6£7i3A28BBB25Z4556Z8C8II5B853 6176 69 6E 67 38 ZB ZB B8 DE Ef 73 ZB 74 6T 6F Efl 88 51 69 6D 65 38 ZB BB 51 6F ZB 72 65 74 75 72 6E 28 74 6T 28 88 26 74 79 78 65 ZB 22 45 58 49 54 I" to r KuSH> o r if r* H ECTED Repeat Co at: «EU L r s* pus screen slums huu WD IT i'LUS can sitwlUuiumislij edit different file; m UUferent Bodes, Tin.* uurd processing File in tliis window is being e&itiny uiih jard urap dud just ifi cat ion en* hied. The bin.inj file dtuve is being edited in lib byte record node in tuo uindaus - one dispidijs tiie file in hexideciwl, the Titter in ASCII. Tiles can be edited ditd displayed in any desired Bade. Until now, few PC text editors could even begin to handle huge mainframe, CD ROM, postscript, plotter output and other multi- megabyte files. The new VEDIT PLUS, with its unique virtual memory management, handles them all effortlessly. Edit in ASCII, EBCDIC or Hexadecimal modes, or split the screen for any combination of modes. File modes support DOS text, UNIX text, binary and many fixed length record formats. Pius DOS QNX XENIX UNIX FlexOS An intuitive user interface with drop down menus, hot keys, mouse support, optional scroll bars, context sensitive help, point and shoot file selection, 1000 level undo and unlimited keystroke macros make VEDIT PLUS easy to use, easy to learn. And it can emulate the keystrokes of almost any editor you already know. Everything in VEDIT PLUS is configurable. The keyboard layout, the screen colors, the way control characters, long lines and window borders are displayed, and much more, is all configured with easy to use menus. Confidently order your copy of VEDIT PLUS today; it comes with a 30 day money-back guarantee. VEDIT has been the choice of 100,000 programmers, writers and engineers since 1980. VEDIT PLUS - DOS single user license: $185; DOS network 5 user license: $295; UNIX/XENIX, QNX, FlexOS/IBM 4680 single CPU license: $285. Site license pricing is available. 24-Hour Bulletin Board A fully functional demo version of VEDIT PLUS and a shareware version of VEDIT Jr. are available on our BBS at 1 -31 3-996-1 304. Toll Free: 1-800-45- VEDIT (1-800-458-3348) Telephone: (313) 996-1300, Fax: (313) 996-1308 Mail: P.O. Box 1586, Ann Arbor, Ml 48106 VEDIT is a registered trademark of Greenview Data, Inc. Brief is a trademark of Solution Systems. Sage Professional Editor is a trademark of Intersolv. Greenview Data Circle 37 on Inquiry Card. Perhaps the most ama PC is that it can At NEC, we put as much emphasis on affordability as we do on upgradability. Add a Pinwriter* P3200 and a MultiSync 3FGx to your Image Series PC and you can do high- level computing without pay- ing a high price. Anyone who thinks you can't do anything with a quarter these days obviously hasn't seen NEC's new PowerMate 9 Image™ Series SX/16i and SX/20vi PC's. With their tool- less design, all it takes to open them is the quick turn of a quarter. Then you can customize your computer yourself as your needs change. For instance, you can increase your system or video memory by just plugging in chips. And storage devices easily snap into place, too. We've even made it easier to upgrade your system in the future. Simply send us your old Image motherboard and we'll credit CsC Computers and Communications jistofMj irjdeimrits kx) iiTugeSyrv:, m«g« S*«et «nd FG *ra id Capomiion PFS Window w ,' 1. -■-.= ■ 5 r &jt|*«J» COTP zing thing about our $1,199* be upgraded with a quarter. its value towards a new onef* And we don't just give you a faster CPU either. We can give you more memory, cache and video, as well. But that's not all. There's also space for additional drives. So you have room for new technologies like CD-ROM. And like the rest of our Image Series PC's, the SX/16i and SX/20vi come with plugs and j acks that make them multimedia ready. There's ImageSync™ tech- nology for flicker-free graphics when used with our new MultiSync* FG™ monitors. FLASH ROM for upgrading or enhanc- ing your BIOS via diskette. And pre-loaded MS-DOS" 5.0, Windows' and PFS: Window Works? 4 For more information, call 1-800-NEC-INFO, or NEC FastFacts at 1-800-366-0476, #IMAGE (46243). After all, a computer isn't worth a dime unless you can upgrade it with a quarter. Because 1 L is the way you want to go. NEC P o 1991 t€C lochnaowa. he -Uvulactum* MjQQeflftd ratul prcs tor lr» PbwwMmin SX/tt. MSBP tor SWOw a U34900 "Sea van Octkn tor co Circle 109 on Inquiry Card. NEWS WHAT'S NEW • CONNECTIVITY Communicate Fast with MNP-10ACE The QX/4232bis, a V.32bis modem, uses MNP 10 with Adverse Channel Enhancements (ACE) for communication between computers on dial- up and leased lines. Ac- cording to Microcom, MNP 10 data transmission en- ables error-free interactive data transfer over noisy telephone lines. MNP 10, which provides the reliability to maintain the high speed of V.32bis transmissions, automatically decreases the QX/4232bis transmission rate to establish a stable connection when interference increases. As link quality returns to nor- mal, the modem automati- cally returns to optimal speed. Price: $999; bundled with Carbon Copy Plus or Relay Gold, $1099. Contact: Microcom, Inc., 500 River Ridge Dr. , Nor- wood, MA 02062, (617) 551-1000; fax (617) 551- 1007. Circle 1 285 on Inquiry Card. Smooth Operator Uses Windows Smooth Operator 3.0 adds a GUI enhance- ment to its previous release, making it compatible with Windows 3.0. With new user-friendly help screens and the capability to run on most LANs, Smooth Opera- tor 3.0 offers the flexibility to develop application envi- ronments and technologies through an open modular ap- proach. FaxRetrieval, an optional fax-on-demand module, is available. Price: Starts at $22.95; Microcom 's QX/4232bis modem uses MNP level 10. FaxRetrieval, $17.50. Contact: Compass Tech- nology, Inc., Live Oak Of f ice Center, 2201 Cantu Court, Suite 116, Sarasota, FL 34232, (813) 371-8000; fax (813) 377-5600. Circle 1 286 on Inquiry Card. Printer Flexibility on Your LAN A flexible network- printer interface for Hewlett-Packard LaserJet Series II, IID, III, and HID printers, EtherFlex allows direct printer connection anywhere on a LAN. It pro- vides Apple EtherTalk and NetWare support on a sin- gle card that installs in the optional I/O slot of the La- serJet. You choose the proto- col you want by setting a switch, which you reconfig- ure when you want to use the other protocol. The inclu- sion of BNC and lOBase-T Ethernet connectors gives you LAN connection flexibility. Price: $695. Contact: Extended Sys- tems, 6123 North Meeker Ave., Boise, ID 83704, (800) 235-7576 or (208) 322- 7575; fax (208) 377-1906. Circle 1287 on Inquiry Card. DOS and Windows in a Fax Server Version 2.0 of the Lan- Fax Redirector peer-to- peer fax server combines compatibility with DOS and Windows in one package. With a new user interface for fax management, LanFax Redirector now has DDE and DDL support for Windows applications, HP PCL-5 sup- port for DOS applications, binary file transfer, and multiline support. Ugraded server technol- ogy supports up to eight fax cards per server, HP PCL-5 to Group 3 conversion at the server, EMS support, and dynamic log-in. In addition to operating systems previ- ously supported, 2.0 sup- ports OS/2 LanServer, LANtastic, lONet, and DEC- net 4.0. A new fax modem supported is LaserJet Fax. Price: Starts at $995. Contact: Alcorn Corp., 1616 North Shoreline Blvd., Mountain View, CA 94043, (415) 694-7000; fax (41 5) 694-7070. Circle 1 288 on Inquiry Card. Share a Modem on the LAN With CO/Session ACS , any network user can access any modem to send or receive communications. Working in the background on the PC to which the mo- dem is connected, CO/Ses- sion ACS is compatible with LAN communications soft- ware that supports an Inter- rupt 14 interface. CO/Session ACS's low network memory require- ments mean that PCs with modems attached to them for sharing require only 9 KB of memory; PCs needing ac- cess to a modem attached to another PC require only 6 KB of memory. No special hardware or communications cards are required. Price: Two-modem ver- sion, $295; four-modem ver- sion, $590. Contact: Triton Technol- ogies, Inc., 200 Middlesex Tnpk.,Iselin,NJ 08830, (908) 855-9440; fax (908) 855-9608. Circle 1 289 on Inquiry Card. Caching Controllers for Multitasking The hyperStore easy- Cache and easyCache Pro caching disk controllers let you configure a PC-based workstation or network server with up to 12.6 giga- bytes of mass storage. Each controller is based on a 1 6-bit Z280 microprocesor to create a self-contained paral- lel computer, freeing the PC's CPU for other tasks. Price: easyCache, $585 to $635; easyCache Pro, $725 to $775. Contact: Perceptive Solu- .tions, Inc., 2700 Flora St., Dallas, TX 75201, (214) 954-1774; fax (214) 953- 1774. Circle 1 290 on Inquiry Card. 68 BYTE- JANUARY 1992 n IT jiTi 1 i^cji Buy now and get a $100 rebate! Purchase dBASE IV 1 .1 from any reseller and receive a US$100 rebate direct from Borland. Fill out required information on the coupon. All information must be completed. Name , Company Address Title Dept./Mail Stop City □ DOS User State Product Serial # Zip/Postal Code Telephone ' ' # of PCs at This Location U Windows User □ OS/2 User For Corporate Customers Only: Number of Copies Purchased x $100 = $ Rebate Customer Signature Social Security # Attach proof of purchase (dated original sales receipt or, for corporate customers, a copy of purchase order and billing invoice) to the coupon and mail to: $100 Off dBASE IV P.O. Box 9110 Farmington Hills, MI 48333-9110 Offer valid for purchases made between November 1, 1991 and January 3 1 , 1992. All redemptions must be postmarked by February 29, 1992. Borland reserves rhe right to ask for additional verification ofpurchase. Original dealer invoice musr include dealer's name and address. Offer good in U.S. and anada only. Checks payable in U.S. dollars. Please allow 4-6 weeks for redemption. One redemption per copy purchased, Offer may not be used in conjunction with educational sales, upgrades, competitive upgrades, LAN Packs, Multi-Packs, Volume Packs or any other Borland or Ashton-Tate promotion. Distributots and resellers are not eligible to participate. Subject to all local, state ana federal regulations. Void where prohibited. No responsibility is assumed for lost, late, misdirected or destroyed mail. All Borland products are trademarks or registered trademarks of Borland International, Inc. Copyright © 1991 Borland. BOR 2997B Three great reasons to buy dBASE now: • 1. Borland's commitment to dBASE • 2. Borland's commitment to technology y 3. Borland's commitment to customers Now that it's from Borland, you can buy dBASE® with total confidence. Simply stated, Borland is fully committed to delivering dBASE IV more power, more flexibility and better support to the whole dBASE community, Borland advances the dBASE standard. Because Borland is the leader in object- oriented technology, today's dBASE buyer will get more features and new dBASE releases in less time - such as SQL server links, event handling, object-oriented extensions to the dBASE language and compilers that generate fast, tight code. In addition, dBASE users will be able to effortlessly integrate data from the desktop to the mainframe with our InterBase server. Borland support means greater customer satisfaction. Now that dBASE is from Borland, dBASE customers are assured of world class support. In fact, J.D. Power and Associates ranks Borland "Best Application Software in Customer Satis- faction, in small to medium-size and large businesses." ID POWER J A N' I) ASSOCIATES' Borland "Best application software in customer satisfaction in Small to Medium-sized and Large Businesses" Borland leads the way. Borland is committed to advancing the dBASE standard on multiple platforms -DOS, Windows, VAX VMS, Sun, UNIX and Macintosh. A special offer when you buy dBASE now. Buy dBASE from any dealer between November 1, 1991 and January 31, 1992, and get a $100 manufacturers rebate. (See the coupon accompanying this ad for details.) Borland, your database partner in the 90's. When it comes to technological innovation and customer satisfaction, See your dealer today or call 1-800-568-9092 now for rebate information. B O R I A N D Software Craftsmanship ©1991 Borland International, Inc. All rights reserved. Borland, dBASE and the names of other Borland products are registered trademarks or trademarks of Borland International. Someof the product names used herein have been used as identification only and may be trademarks of their respective? companies. 1991 JD. Power and Associates* Computer End User Satisfaction Study: Phase I: Office Based Small to Medium Sized Businesses. Response from Business End Users at 1 ,784 business sites. Small to medium sized businesses were based on office sites with between 1 and 499 employees. 1991 J.D. Power and Associates Computer End User Satisfaction Study: Phase 111: Office Based Larye Businesses. Responses from Business End Users at 1,094 business sites. Large businesses were based on office sites with 500 or more employees. J.D. Power and Associates is a service mark of J.D. Power and Associates. BI 1447 Circle 25 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 26). Introducing Photography New FotoMaiC The portable affordable camera for your computer. Its positively amazing. Now you don't your images in just seconds. You don't even have to wait around to get your photos need a digitizing board. Then preview and developed. Or pay for film. Or prints. New select the images you want to save. FotoMan takes great shots, displays super FotoMans Windows™ based image edit- sharp digitized pictures on your PC in a ing software— FotoTouch™— displays images flash, and comes with all so its of in 256 shades of gray, and makes editing and creative image editing tools. retouching fast and fun: crop backgrounds, change sizes, adjust contrast and Take it anywhere. Powered by built-in rechargeable batteries, pocket-sized FotoMan can shoot 32 pictures in a session. It also comes with a filter for great shots in the great outdoors. And FotoMan's single button operation, automatic flash, and infinite field of focus make it a snap to use— anywhere. A darkroom in your PC After your photo session, sim- ply plug FotoMan into the serial port of your desktop or portable IBM PC (or compatible) and transfer lOGiTECH [42?- brightness, even create special ^^^B^^/gUAJ effects . You can use your perfected J Lisss ^^^^^ , pictures in any application. And a file compression feature i saves them in a minimum of storage space. ^*»fc^I""~ FotoMan comes with everything you'll need, plus something you probably won't: lifetime service and support. And at $799 FotoMan costs hundreds less than any other digital camera. We're positive youll be impressed. For more infor- mation call toll free: 800-231-7717 ext. 345. Circle 90 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 91 ). Tools That Power The Desktop. ' trademarks arc the property of their registered owner: m Without All The Negatives. NEWS WHAT'S NEW • PROGRAMMING SOFTWARE Soft-ICE/W Lets You Debug from Within Windows Soft-ICE, the 386 de- bugger that performs in- secticidal tasks usually as- sociated with in-circuit emulators, has made the transition from real-mode to protected-mode application debugging. The first debug- ger for Windows 3.1, Soft- ICE/W lets you debug Win- dows programs at the system or application level, Nu-Mega says. You can use Soft-ICE/W to debug virtual device drivers, DOS virtual ma- chines, device drivers, and applications from within Windows. The program fea- tures memory-range and memory-location breakpoints and a back-trace function. Nu-Mega also offers CV1 , which lets you run and display Microsoft's Code- View within a window without having to leave the Windows environment. Price: Soft-ICE/W, $386; CV/1,$129. Contact: Nu-Mega Tech- nologies, Inc., P.O. Box 7780, Nashua, NH 03060, (603) 889-2386; fax (603) 889-1135. Circle 1291 on Inquiry Card. Clarion Goes Full Speed Ahead Clarion has licensed the TopSpeed optimizing code generator from Jensen & Partners for use in the Pro- fessional Developer 3.0 database applications devel- opment tool. The internal computing speed of a Profes- sional Developer 3.0 pro- gram is as much as 200 times faster than the same pro- gram created with FoxPro EAX=BBBB0B81 EBX=8D0O15BE ECX=0BB81809 EDX=QB0D1EFS ESI=8B0B08DF E l=BB8816F EBP=8B8B15BC E P=8BB81S86 EIP=B08B8C9S odlszapc CS=05F5 B3=89FB =89FD ES=80B8 FS=fl8fl8 6S=8808 0) 889FD:08BBB1AE = ?? lipenBackgnd 1) liB9F5:B88B8! UPICB*B&8: 0028:8BB7BB0F 964 = 55 3 DrauFatHand BET B328:838?BBiB CALL [SetJHJxecJfodel 8928:8B87BBI& JHP [Beg in_Use_Locl{ed_PH„Stack 1 BB28:80B7BB1C CALL [Begin Use Locked PH Stack] 8B2B:8B87BB22 JMP [Set U86 Exec Hodel 8928:8007BB2B INT w File Edit Formula Format Data Opt Normal ♦ * «► SS!S H B I Quick, pick a function. That's how the Toolbar works: easy access to everyday features. For instance, to get a quick column total, simply hit the Autosum"" button, and there you go. Just a point and a click do the trick: charting, fortnat changes, macros, you name it. Create an instant report: hit the outlining arrow to collapse or expand your worksheet, showing as much or as little detail as you need to. Then create a chart in one step, display it right on the worksheet, and voila— what you see on-screen is what you get at the printer. dsheet to make theequatioa Excel s Macro Window Help □ O iL fftl Microsoft Excel, the leading Windows spreadsheet. There's one very important factor that most spreadsheets don't know how to handle: you. But Microsoft 8 Excel 3.0 for Windows"" has changed all that With plenty of easy-to-use fea- tures like the Toolbar; you may start to think of Microsoft Excel 3.0 as an extension of your thought process in- stead of a spreadsheet. Which makes it easy for you to do some powerful things, such as con- solidating up to 255 worksheets at a time, regardless of format or structure. Or take Solver. It lets you start with a desired result and work back- wards to find the variable you need. It's also easy to share results with other Windows applications, like Microsoft Word for Windows. (Just what you'd expect from the people who pio- neered the first Windows spreadsheet.) And Microsoft Excel reads and writes Lotus 9 files. And converts 1-2-3* macros. And offers online help to guide you through your transition from Lotus to the friendliest spreadsheet ever seen on the personal computer. Finally consider that, even if you are using Lotus 1-2-3, you can upgrade to Microsoft Excel 3.0 for only $129: Just see your local reseller or give us a call at (800) 323-3577 Dept.W15. Microsoft Excel and you. It all adds up. Microsoft 'Plus freight and applicable sales tax. Offer good for current owners of Lotus 1-2-3, SuperCalcf Quattro* Pro and VP Planner. Please allow 2-4 weeks for delivery upon receipt of order by Microsoft. Offerexpir s 12/31/91. Limit one per customer. Reseller prices may vary. Call for syst m retirements. Offer good only in the 50 United Stat s. © 1991 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved, hinted in the U.S.A. In the United States, call (800) 323-3577, Dept.W 15. For information only: In Canada, call (800) 563-9048; outside the United States and Canada, call (206) 936-8661. Microsoft and the Microsoft logo are registered trademarks and Autosum, Toolbar and Windows are trademarks of Microsoft Corporation, Lotu and 1-2-3 are registered trademarks of Lotu Lkvdcrpmerd Corporation. NEWS WHAT'S NEW • SCIENCE / ENGINEERING SOFTWARE Solve Geometry Problems by Sketching Anew Windows-based geometry solver called Apollonius lets you de- scribe and solve geometry problems by drawing them. Once you sketch out a prob- lem in Apollonius, you can make the problem exact by specifying known distances and angles. The program will then solve the geometry problem by giving unknown distances, angles, and areas. It also provides a scale drawing of the geometry. Two-way DXF links let the program communicate with popular CAD programs. Price: $98. Contact: Saltire Software, P.O. Box 1565, Beaverton, OR 97075, (503)642-1874; fax (503) 642-5705. Circle 1 300 on Inquiry Card. Viewdac Adds GPIB, RS-232 Support Viewdac, the data acqui- sition, analysis, and graphics program for 386- and 486-based PCs, can now Apollonius for Windows 3. can solve geometry problems without requiring you to remember formulas. The program offers a sketch-based drawing package and a variational geometry solver. communicate with general- purpose interface bus (GPIB) and RS-232 instruments. Viewdac 2.0 also adds an ex- ternal language interface, Lotus 1-2-3 I/O, and graph- ics output to Hewlett-Pack- ard Graphics Language and PostScript plotters and printers. The GPIB IEEE 488 standard interface offers a way to connect peripherals to the PC through a 24-pin parallel connector. Version 2.0 lets you automate a range of monitoring, test, and ex- perimental applications without programming. Viewdac 2.0 can control up to 56 GPIB instruments at once. The new external lan- guage interface, which lets you import custom analysis routines into the system, sup- ports C and assembly language. Price: $2495. Contact: Keithley Asyst Software Technologies, Inc., 100 Corporate Woods, Rochester, NY 14623, (800) 348-0033 or (716) 272- 0070; fax (716) 272-0073. Circle 1 301 on Inquiry Card. Viewdac 2.0, a data acquisition, analysis, and graphics program for 386- and 486-based PCs, integrates its features in a multitasking, window-based system. Serial Line Analysis for the PC Anew version of Data- Scope, which trans- forms your PC into a pas- sive or active RS-232 data- and signal-line monitor and protocol analyzer, lets you run up to four concurrent active displays in any window arrangement. Paladin says that version 2.0 can outper- form expensive dedicated hardware line monitors while eliminating the guesswork in working with serial line transmissions and can col- lect up to 8 MB of data with microsecond time-stamp resolution. Price: $249. Contact: Paladin Software, Inc., 3945 Kenosha Ave., San Diego, CA 921 17, (619) 490-0368; fax (619) 490-0177. Circle 1 302 on Inquiry Card. Mac Data Analysis for Oscilloscopes SuperScope/488, a data acquisition and analysis program for digital-storage oscilloscopes and black-box digitizers, offers a trans- parent interface between your instrument and the Mac. Using dialog boxes and a front panel that resembles that of an oscilloscope, you can configure the program to transfer data and measure- ments to the computer for display or processing. To transfer data from the oscilloscope to the program, you open a channel from within the program. All ac- quisitions are sent to the program without requiring programming on your part. SuperScope/488 supports instruments from companies such as Tektronix, Hewlett- Packard, IOtech, Nicolet, and LeCroy. In addition to supporting IEEE 488 instru- ments, the program sup- ports the MacADIOS line of digitizing hardware. Price: $990; 488 Instru- mentation Library, $290. Contact: GW Instruments, Inc., 35 Medford St., Somer- ville, MA 02143, (617) 625-4096; fax (617) 625- 1322. Circle 1 303 on Inquiry Card. 82 BYTE' JANUARY 1992 This is your dot matrix, printing. This is our new quiet 2624, printing. This is the one you've been waiting for. Panasonic® presents the first of a new generation of quiet dot matrix printers. The KX-P2624 wide- carriage. It doesn't scream, it whispers. Through multi-part forms, those 'industrial strength' spreadsheets, and your customer correspondence. And does them all with ease, speed and the superb reliability we've built a reputation on. It has all the features you've come to expect from the leader in dot matrix printing. And then some. One super letter- quality and seven letter- quality fonts. Multiple paper paths. An LCD display A top speed of 300 cps in draft mode, 100 cps in letter quality. A two-year limited warranty on parts and labor. * And serene quiet. For more information call us toll-free: 1-800-742-8086. Or, better yet, see your Panasonic dealer. You'll like what you don't hear. PQ8-BY * See your dealer for details. Circle 1 1 9 on Inquiry Card. Printers, Computers, Peripherals, Copiers, Typewriters & Facsimiles Panasonic, Office Automation^^ftt Our innovations never stop. The new MultiSync 4FG, 5FG, and 6FG monitors feature our AccuColor™ Control System. An amazing advance in computer monitors that lets you match on-screen colors to printer output, other monitors, and color reference systems such as Pantone* CsC Computers and Communications Are you missing the big picture? Do the . - little things just disappear? The new genera- ti ■ 1h I pi tion of MultiSync* monitors were designed plj. to solve these problems with a larger, more readable display for windowing environ- ments. Introducing the 15" 4FG 1M and the 17" 5FG™ monitors. Larger screens combined with our FullScan™ capabil- ity provide edge-to-edge images in a much bigger display area. A high-contrast surface delivers exceptionally crisp text and graphics. The new MultiSync 4FG and 5FG monitors. Images so big and sharp, you'll see more details in more detail. Advanced screen technology gives you a flatter screen both horizontally and vertically, so images appear flat with less distortion at the edges. Higher refresh rates enable flicker-free images. Plus, on-board memory and digital controls store preset graphics modes and automatically size and center screen images. You can also adjust image size, position, on-screen color, and pin cushion. Both monitors are compatible with MS-DOS based systems and the Mac II family and Quadra?* The 4FG supports a range of video standards from VGA to 1024 x 768 (70 Hz) non-interlaced. The 5FG supports video standards from VGA to 1280 x 1024 (74 Hz) non-interlaced and many workstation modes. The all-new 4FG and 5FG. So big, bright, and sharp it's easy to see their advantages. PCComputing MultiSync 5FG Monitor o, Ine 1991 NEC TachnologlBi Because ^r is the way you want to go. NEC MultiSync 4FG Monitor Call 1-800-NEC-INFO. (In Canada: 1-800-343-4418.) For immediate info via fax, call NEC FastFacts, 1-800-366-0476. Request 1531 for 4FG and 1741 for 5FG. Circle 1 1 on Inquiry Card. NEWS WHAT'S NEW • CAD AND GRAPHICS SOFTWARE What-lf Analysis for Claris CAD Intended for use as a com- panion application to Claris CAD for the Mac, Vision Software's design- Power lets you focus on the overall structure of your de- signs and experiment with different aspects of your work. designPower features relational layering, object linking, and parametric or what-if design tools. Geo- metric Resolver technology ensures that your design con- forms to your predeter- mined specifications. designPower includes a library of parametric sym- bols of doors and windows for use in architectural de- sign settings. The program also features MacDraw II and DXF capabilities for inte- gration with other Mac CAD and graphics programs. Price: $399. Contact: Vision Software, 3160 De La Cruz Blvd., Suite 104, Santa Clara, CA 95054, (800) 800-8476; fax (408) 748-9584. Circle 1 304 on Inquiry Card. Create Gigantic Posters Version2.1ofS. H. Pierce's poster produc- tion program, PosterWorks, lets you create posters in sizes of up to 10,000 square feet. Using the Mac and any PostScript output device, you can use PosterWorks 2. 1 to design tiled posters, dis- plays, and billboards. The program lets you adjust im- ported color type, line-art objects, and scanned images. It also supports Sys- tem 7.0, 32-bit addressing, and enhancements for Apple- Talk devices. PosterWorks 2 . 1 lets you import scanned images from Mac and DOS TIFF files and from Scitex CT files. West 32nd Ave. , Vancou- ver, B.C., Canada V6L 2C1, (800) 663-8045 or (604) 266-5380; fax (604) 266- 5348. Circle 1 306 on Inquiry Card. By moving or rotating designPower' s relational layers, you can see how this robotic arm will move. The program features im- proved color and image con- trol tools, including im- ported illustration- correction, type-correction, and image-saturation-control capabilities. If you opt to have a pro- fessional large-format service bureau produce your hard copy, you'll appreciate PosterWorks' BureauFile export option. BureauFile contains the poster layout, imported elements, settings, and font listings in an edit- able format. S. H. Pierce also offers a professional version of Post- erWorks, designed for use by reprographic service bu- reaus in producing output on large-format devices. The Bureau Edition has all the features of PosterWorks 2 . 1 and takes advantage of the Mac's FPU for faster pro- cessing. Price: PosterWorks 2.1, $295; Bureau Edition, $2995. Contact: S. H. Pierce & Co., Suite 323, Building 600, 1 Kendall Sq. , Cambridge, MA 02139, (617)395-8350; fax (617) 395-1281. Circle 1 305 o n Inquiry Card. Customize Your CAD Linetypes The professional-look- ing results of linetype annotation are now avail- able for users of all CAD pro- grams that can read and write DXF files. Originally available only for Auto- CAD, Universal C-Line lets you assign meaning to dif- ferent types of lines and routes in engineering, map- ping, and many other applications. Universal C-Line is available in three versions- Lite, Standard, and Profes- sional—and supplies up to 130 linetypes, depending on which version you use. Price: Lite version, $295; Standard version, $495; Pro- fessional version, $695. Contact: M. Slinn Engi- neering Services, Inc., 3158 v Major Visual Impact, Minor Wallet Damage Aimed at the nonartistic user who needs an easy tool for producing polished presentation materials, Mi- crografx's Windows Draw provides a heavily featured illustration program at a relatively low price. Windows Draw provides Bezier curve editing, outline fonts, and effects such as text on a curve and blending. Drawing tools include free- hand, line, and curve, and you can use rotate and re- shape functions to alter your view of your work. Windows Draw includes ClipArt Manager, which lets you search the program's 2600 clip-art images by sym- bol name or by filename. If all that clip art doesn't meet your needs, you can import images using Windows Draw's 30 import and ex- port filters. You can import 24-bit scanned color TIFF and PCX images for display, manipulation, or printing. Price: $149.95. Contact: Micrografx, Inc., 1303 Arapaho, Richardson, TX 75081; (800) 733-3729 or (2 14) 234- 1769; fax (2 14) 234-2410. Circle 1 307 on Inquiry Card. In this Universal C-Line map, the light blue line represents a stream, pink shows elevation, dark blue shows gas lines, green represents the tree line, and yellow marks a dirt road. 86 BYTE* JANUARY 1992 WE HAVE A FEW WORDS FOR PEOPLE EXPECT TO PAY PEANUTS FOR IT. DELL COMPUTER CORPORATION You wanted it, you got it. Introducing the Dell®486P/20. A computer that gives you an i486™ SX processor at the price of an i386™ DX machine. An incredible perf onnance boost of up to 40% at virtually no additional cost. Generating enough processing power to exploit the full potential of future versions of Microsoft® Windows™ and OS/2? Making whatever software you run, run that much faster. Giving you quicker recalcs, database compiles and screen refreshes. In short, getting rid of excess wait. And if that isn't impressive enough, the Dell 486P/20 comes with an upgradeable processor that can go from a 20 MHz i486SX chip all the way up to a high-end 33 MHz i486DX system, and even beyond. Which, considering that we're talking about a computer under $2,000, is nothing short of revolutionary. A title power user's desktop. For its low price, the Dell 486P/20 has a lot of technical innovations you wouldn't expect to find on even higher end machines. Things like programmable Flash EPROMs, for example, that make conventional methods of upgrading system BIOS seem almost obsolete. You won't have to take this computer apart and lose your patience trying to pry out a reluctant chip. Just slip in a diskette— that's all. Expanding memory is equally con- venient. One of the few PCs to support 16 MB SIMMs, the 486P/20 carries 4 memory expansion sockets, on its main board. So as your needs grow, you can keep adding RAM in 1, 4, or 16 MB increments up to a total of 64 MB. That's plenty of room to run your networking software, Microsoft Windows and just about any high-performance graphics application. And talking about graphics, a small expansion of video memory to 1 MB (512K is standard) will put over 32,000 cokm at your disposal, letting you create images that approach photographic quality. The 486P/20 also makes those images a lot easier on your eyes. It supports up to 1024 x 768 non-interlaced video at a fast 70 Hz refresh rate for a flicker-free display. Unlike the kind you get on some competitive machines that are limited to 60 Hz non-interlaced. An i486SX pwcessor with the future built in. Because the Dell 486P/20 upgrades via a processor chip instead of traditional processor cards, upgrading takes the form of a single, economical step: Just remove one chip and replace it with a higher performance version. On the other hand, if you never need to upgrade at all, you don't end up having paid a price penalty to get the system in the first place. Either way, you win. Apart from the processor, the 486P/20 is also designed to allow easy upgrading of hard disks, memory and video capability. So when your needs change, the rest of your computer can, too. DELL MtHJii 9H CORPORATION 800-545-1580 TO ORDER,CALLPLEASE REFERENCE #11E56 HOURS: 7AM-9PM CT MON-FRI 8AM-4PM CT SAT 10AM-3PM CTSUN IN CANADA 800-668-3021. IN MEXICO 95-800-010-0664. LEASE* :$75/MOf* THE DELL486P/2020 MHz i486SX SYSTEM.* SYSTEM INCLUDES 50MB HARD DRIVE, VGA COLOR MONITOR, AND 2MB RAM. HE MORE YOU SAVE. r e've just mentioned, here's an amazing fact: feature for feature, you can get an our savings increase with the sophistication of the Dell System* you buy. So go ahead, read on. how the more our i486 systems cost, the less they actually cost. MORE SPEED From desktop publishing to spreadsheet applications, there's one feature that's always welcome, and that's speed. With quick recalcs and lightning fast screen refreshes, you'll get your work done faster with the Dell 486P/33. The 33MHz i486DX processor generates up to 80% more performance than 33MHz i386DX systems. If that leaves you craving for more, you can upgrade to a faster i486 processor when available. This 486P/33 configuration features a 100 MB hard drive with a phenomenal 15 ms average access time. An 8 KB cache in the processor boosts performance. And dual floppy drives allow you to read any diskette, regardless of MS-COS format. A 1024 x 768 non-interlaced big 15" color monitor with overscan gives you 30% more viewable area than the standard 14" you get with any competitively priced system. For even more versatility on desktop publishing or graphic-intensive applications, just expand video RAM to 1 MB and you'll get a 32,000 color, near-photograph quality display. The system comes with 4MB RAM on 32-bit SIMMs with gold-plated connectors, MS-COS 5.0, Microsoft Windows 3 . and a M icrosof t Mouse. $2,999 LEASE: $11 2/MOf* THE DELL 486P/33 33 MHz i486DX SYSTEM. • SYSTEM INCLUDES100MB HARD DRIVE, ULTRASCAN 15CMONITOR, 5.25-1.2 MB AND 3.5"1.44 MB FLOPPY DRIVES AND 4 MB RAM. SAVE $948* MORE GRAPHICS The Dell 486D/33 has every high-end feature you'd expect in an outstanding graphics workstation. Except a high-end price tag. There's a superf ast 33 MHz i486DX processor, with 8 KB internal cache. For even greater performance, all you'll need to do is replace a processor chip. So you can upgrade inexpensively as soon as new chips hit the market. Should your workload, heaven forbid, triple by then, you'll still find the 200 MB hard disk more than adequate. And as your requirements become increasingly more sophisticated, you can keep adding to the 486D/33's 8 MB RAM. With a maximum of 64 MB, there's plenty of room to grow. Talking about room, we have a large 15" flat square monitor with 30% more viewable area than a standard 14" monitor, which makes those large spreadsheets and high resolution documents much easier to read. The Dell 486D/33 comes with factory- loaded MS-DOS 5.0, Microsoft Windows 3.0 and a Microsoft Mouse. m ilrf in: ;$i4ej THE DELL 486D/33 33 MHz i486DX SYSTEM.* SYSTEM INCLUDES 200 MB HARD DRIVE, ULTRASCAN (1024 x 768) 15C MONITOR. 5.25-1.2 MB and 3.5"1.44 MB FLOPPY DRIVES AND B MB RAM. SAVE $1,348* smorks ond TechFox is o service mark of Dell Computer Corporation. Leasing arranged by Leasing Group, Inc. In Canada and Mexico, configurations ond prices may vary. lYContains on intel' - microprocessor, fntel is a registered trademark and i386, i486 jws is a trademark of Microsoft Corporation. 1991 J.D. fbwer and Associoles* Computer End User Satisfaction Study: Phase t: Office Based Small to Medium Sized Businesses. Responses from Business End Users at 1,784 business sites. SmoM to Medium Sized Businesses y interest in the rTKjrVsordrramesdotners.ASetvkepro^o^bv third pa Dell Computer Corporation. Ail rights reserved. Gold-plated SIMMs increase system reliability by eliminating connection- related errors. There are plenty of companies anxious to sell i486 systems at a low price. All they really need is a supply of parts ( the cheaper, the better ) and a garage to assemble them in. Once the "production line" gets going, they place CT jIflWfa a few ads in the paper. After MBMJfflBl that, of course, it's anyone's The 486P/20 is guess as t0 w hich will last one of the few computers to longer: the computer or the feature 16 MB SIMMs. "company" it came from. At Dell, on the other hand, we offer lower prices by cutting down on traditional retailer mark-ups, not quality. In fact, we're almost fanatical about the quality of every machine that leaves our state-of-the-art factory. That attitude is reflected in the way we design, test, manufacture and ship our i486 systems. how our i486 systems stand up to air delivery, we use a Black Box. Or, in technical parlance, a portable accelerom- eter/therrnometer. This little device is fitted into a test computer which we then send out through regular delivery channels, much as if you had ordered it yourself. When we bring it back, the "Black Box" tells us exactly what the computer went through, in terms of shock, vibration and temperature. This innovative test is part of a series that's been so Our Black Box test makes sure your Dell computer never amies this way. -O ■. ^*i 0> CY /9o successful in helping us improve our packaging, we've won an international award for package design. To make our computers more reliable , we cook them. After our computers are fully assembled and con- figured, randomly selected units are "burned-in" and tested at 104°E In perhaps the most grueling temperature test we've evercome up with, pilot Dell systems must survive a storage chamber where temperatures vary rapidly between -40°Cand +60°C. ■ THE MORE YOU GET, If your requirements call for a more powerful or specialized system than the om even better deal with our higher-end i486 systems. From $248 all the way up to a whopping $1,34 And if you still have any doubts, call us.We'll be happy to expla MORE VALUE The Dell 486P/20 is a 20 MHz i486SX general purpose workstation you can upgrade to 33 MHz and beyond. For a configuration that costs so little, you sure get a lot. Like programmable Flash EPROMs for easy BIOS upgradeability. And an 80 MB hard disk drive with 15 ms access time. And an 8 KB cache built into the processor for increased throughput. And 4 MB of RAM on 32-bit SIMMs with gold-plated connectors for greater reliability. And 2 floppy drives. Surprised? Keep reading. You'll also get a 1024 x 768 14" color monitor with long persistence phosphors. And the power to display 32,000 colors simultaneously, if you expand video memory to 1 MB. And factory-installed MS-DOS®5.0 and Microsoft Windows 3.0. And a Microsoft Mouse. And, considering it's from Dell, a whole lot of peace of mind. That, by itself, is worth a fortune. THE DELL 486P/20 20 MHz i486SX SYSTEM.* SYSTEM INCLUDES 80 MB HARD DRIVE, SUPERVGA (1024 x 768) COLOR MONITOR, 5.25"1.2 MB AND 3.5"1.44 MB FLOPPY DRIVES AND 4 MB RAM. SAVE$248 V MORE PRODUCTIVITY The Dell 486D/25 is a sophisticated productivity workstation that was designed with your future in mind. To upgrade from a 25 MHz i486SX processor to a faster processor when available, all you'll need to do is replace a processor chip. Not a card. And starting with 4 MB, you can keep adding RAM up to a maximum of 64 MB. This new system is priced on par with 33 MHz i386DX machines, yet performs up to 40% faster. And its sheer processing power is amply backed by a 100 MB hard drive with a 32 KB cache for increased throughput. A dual floppy drive completes the excellent storage arrangement. A 1024 x 768 14" color monitor with a 70 Hz refresh rate gives you a flicker-free display. With 32,000 colors, if you make a small expansion of video RAM. Should anything go wrong, the built-in Smart Vu" diagnostic display can find the problem, even if the monitor goes down. The 486D/25 comes with six expansion slots and five drive bays foradded flexibility. You'll also get factory-loaded MS-DOS 5.0, Microsoft Windows 3.0 and a Microsoft Mouse. THE DELL486D/25 25 MHz i486SX SYSTEM. 6 SYSTEM INCLUDES 100MB HARD DRIVE, ULTRASCAN'" 14C MONITOR, 5.251.2 MB AND 3.5"1.44 MB FLOPPY DRIVES AND 4 MB RAM. SAVE$748 V VSavings colculoted (com Dell retail pricing as of Dec, 9, 1991. No other discounts apply. Promotional prices expire 2/29/92. All prices ond specilicotians ore subject to change without notice, Detl and Dell System are registered trademarks, UltraScan and SmanVu are and the Intel Inside Logo ore trademarks of Intel Corporation. FORTUNE 500 is a registered trademark ol the Time Inc. Magazine Company OS'2 is o registered trademark licensed to Microsoft Corporation. MS-DOS and Microsoft ore registered trademarks and W were based on office sites with between I and 499 employees. Best Personal Computer in Office Bosed End User Satisfaction in Smoll to Medium Sized Businesses. J. D. Powerand Associotes is a registered service mark of J.D. Power and Associates. Defl disclaims propi JUST BECAUSE YOU PAY LESS DOESN'T MEAN YOU GET LESS. And if you chink that's rough, consider our shock test. Sample i486 computers are strapped to a guillotine - like apparatus which repeatedly drops them to the ground. This tells us" what we can do to improve their shock tolerance level Our power supply units undergo an equally rigorous quality control process. In a test that simulates several years of actual usage, randomly selected photogn test units are switched on and off 1,206 times; only then can they be approved. While our testing may seem a little extreme, it's based on a rather simple fact: if our machines don't fail with us, they haven't much chance of failing with you, either. Our computers have a heart of gold. At Dell, we take quality consciousness so seriously, we fit our i486 systems with SIMMs that have gold-plated connectors. If you're wondering what such expensive components are doing in relatively inexpensive computers, the answer is simple: they cost us a bit more, but by eliminating connection-related errors, they're worth their weight in gold. It's exactly this kind of commitment to quality control that's enabled us to meet CSA, UL, TUV-GS, FCC and VDE standards, earning worldwide regulatory approvals. There are thousands of ways to use a Dell i486 system. Dell i486 systems are tested for compatibility with major peripherals, software applications, network topologies and network operating systems, including Banyan and Novell, in several hundred permutations per system. They're even tested f or AS-400 connectivity. So you can use our machines in virtually any environment. 50% fewer opportunities for things to go wrong. After the traditional computer manufacturer builds a system, A small expansion of video memory giies you over 32, 000 colors for a near aphic quality display. it goes to the dealer, who then does his own configuring. That's 2 stages of manufacturing, which means twice as many opportunities for things to go wrong. A Dell i486 system, on the other hand, is manufactured only once. We custom- configure memory boards, Random Dell computers are "burnt in at 104 degrees Fahrenheit. network cards and advanced video, testing the system as a unit. We even load select software packages you buy from us, at no cost to you. That includes MS-DOS 5.0, Microsoft Windows 3.0, and many popular applications programs. With 20 diskettes and 2 hours to load and configure just one system, imagine the time you'll save and the potential hassles you'll avoid. Which gives you yet another reason to buy a Dell i486 system: When you open the box, you're ready to go. DELL COMPUTER CORPORATION 800-545-1580 TOORDER.CALL PLEASE REFERENCE #11E56 HOURS: 7AM-9PM CT MON-FRI 8 AM-4PM CT SAT 10AM-3PM CT SUN IN CANADA 800-668-3021. IN MEXICO 95-800-010-0664. As a potential buyer, you'll receive lots of attention from most computer companies. Until they receive your check that is. For all practical purposes, once the sale is closed, so is the company. At Dell, on the other hand, half our story begins after you receive your computer. Despite our low prices, we've built a reputation for the highest level of support in the industry. To begin with, a Dell expert works with you to figure out which computer, with which options, works best for you. We help you arrange financing from a wide variety of credit, lease and lease-to-buy plans. Then we test, pack and ship your personalized personal computer to you via two-day air standard. In the unlikely event that you have a problem with your computer, it won't last long. Our technical support staff solves 90% of reported problems over the phone. Usually in six minutes or less. You can also get tech- nical help 24 hours a day via our innovative lechFax 5 " line. Just dial up and detailed system information REVENUE 200 100 6,2 MILLION will be auto- matically faxed back to you from the Dell Technical Library. We even have a special section on CompuServe's PC vendor forum. So you can view other users' problems, and, more importantly, our solutions. But what makes oul bulletin board special is that we constantly monitor what goes on there. Which means we can keep track of any small problems, and stop them before they become big ones. But what if you have a problem that just carit be solved over the telephone? 1988 1991 FISCAL YEAR Dell has built a $546 million dollar business by building a lehiionship vuith every customer. On-site service is an ambiguous term. To some enterprising vendors, it conveniently means that the replacement parts, and not the service technician, will arrive on-site. Which isn't as crazy as you may imagine; there are any number of do-it-yourself computer whiz kids in this business. If you don't count yourself among their i Last year, Dell won customer satisfaction polls in the US., UK., Germany and France. ranks, you'll prefer Dell's way of supporting our machines. If needed, a trained technician can be at your home or office with a solution in hand, usually by the next business day. A What's more, every time you call Dell Tech Support an entry is made in our cus- tomer database. So over time, we'll know your computer as well as you do. Maybe even better. And you get all this support ithout getting . Because the price of your system includes on-site service coverage for a year, and phone support forever. Buy a computer and get the company. By standing finrily behind every machine we've ever sold, we've built up a $546 million company in just seven years, one customer at a time. Un the way, we've acquired quite a following. For example, the editors at PC Week have described the Dell service and support package as "overkill." J.D. Power and Associates® ranked Dell "Best PC in Customer Satisfaction in Small to Medium Sized Businesses." We've won PC Week's Customer Satisfaction Poll an unprecedented -^ eight times. And in the last 12 months alone, we've collected 53 product awards, including PC Magazine's Editor's Choice, InfdWorlds Buyer's Insurance and PC World's Best Buy and World Class Awards. And it's not just the smaller users that are satisfied, either: Dell computers are now used by over two-thirds of the FORTUNE 500? Every Dell Computer comes with a trained computer staff who knows your computer as well as you do. Maybe better. same story. We've more than doubled our overseas sales in the last 3 years in a row, and won in customer satisfaction surveys in the UK, Germany and France. Still can't decide? Take 30 days to make up your mind. Within that time, if you aren't completely satisfied, just return your Dell system and we'll refund your money, no questions asked. We're proud to add, though, that this unconditional guarantee has been used so sparingly, only 1.2% of the over half a million computers we've sold so far have ever come back. What does keep coming back, in ever increasing numbers, are our customers. Over 70% of the people who buy a Dell computer buy another. That's perhaps the strongest statement of satisfaction any manufacturer could ever hope to receive. §o before you buy a'ri M86 system, asfe U1WEEK sfl A Overseas, it's been pretty much the asp Our 53 pnxluct awards in 1991 alone make Dell one of the most awarded PC companies in the world. around; there are plenty of Dell users out there. And if there's anything you need, call us. But you'd better hurry. Great computers may last a long time but great deals don't. DELL IflUlMaiq CORPORATION 800-545-1580 TO ORDER, CALL PLEASE REFERENCE #11E56 HOURS: 7AM-9PM CT MON-FRI 8AM-4PM CT SAT 10 AM-3PM CrSUN IN CANADA 800-668-3021. IN MEXICO 95-800-010-0664. r i FAX SHEET SEND US THE FAX AND WE'LL SEND YOU THE FIGURES. Fill this out, fax it to us and we'll send back a price quote, spec sheet and any other information you may need on our line of i486 systems. PROCESSOR MEMORY □ SuperVGA Color, 14',' □ i486SX, 20 MHz □ 4MB 1024 x 768, 28mm dot pitch □ i486SX, 25 MHz □ 8MB □ UltraScan HC, 14',' 1024 x 768, . 28mm □ i486, 33 MHz □ 16MB dot pitch non-interlaced, 70Hz □ i486, 50 MHz □ UltraScan 15C, 15;' 1024 x 768, . 28mm HARD DRIVES dot pitch non-interlaced, 70Hz ARCHITECTURE □ 50 MB □ GPD-16C, 16',' 1280 x 1024, .31mm dot pitch □ EISA □ 80 MB □ GPD-19C, 19',' 1280 x 1024, .31mm dot pitch □ ISA □ 100 MB OPERATING SYSTEMS □ 200 MB □ MS-DOS 3.3 CHASSIS □ 320 MB □ MS-DOS 4.01 □ Small Footprint □ 650 MB □ MS-DOS 5.0 □ Mid-Size □ Other □ MS-OS/2 1.21 □ Floor-Standing MONITORS □ Dell UNIX® System V □ VGA Color, 14: 640 x 480, OTHER (i.e.: tape drive, network card, DISKETTE DRIVES .39mm dot pitch mouse or modem) □ 3.5" □ VGA Color Plus, 147 640x480, .31mm dot □ 5.25" pitch Namp Trie Company. Address City (If Applicable) .State .Zip_ Fax Number. Please have a Dell representative call me at ( ) DELL COMPUTER CORPORATION 800-727-8320 FORMORE INFORMATION, PLEASE FAX US. #11E56 NEWS WHAT'S NEW • UTILITIES MenuWorks Keeps Private Data Private I enuWorks Total Se- I curity provides PC se- curity via a wide variety of tools. The program offers se- curity through start-up con- trol, access control, auditing and tracking, and data en- cryption. Access control is provided through user log- on, locking of selected drives and directories, controlling access to individual files, and locking DOS commands. MenuWorks Total Secu- rity provides Data Encryp- tion Standard-compliant encryption through the cre- ation of multiple virtual drives on any one storage de- vice. The administrator designates the virtual drive or drives that are to be encrypted. Price: $149.95. Contact: PC Dynamics, Inc.,31332ViaColinas, Suite 102, Westlake Vil- lage, CA 91362, (800) 888- 1741 or (818) 889-1741; fax (818) 889-1014. Circle 1 002 on Inquiry Card. Ifenu Harts Total Security 2.08 (C) PC Dunanics, Inc. in Utilities Tutorials Ex linteiwice || : - Power-Launch withhDC The latest offering by hDC is a Windows util- ity that combines the func- tionality of a system menu launcher, a virtual screen driver, a command sched- uler, and a task manager. Power Launcher lets you launch, individually or in combination, any applica- tion, document, script, or macro with a single click of the mouse. You can expand the desktop's virtual screen to as much as 64 times the current size. Price: $99.95. Contact: hDC Computer Corp., 6742 185th Ave. NE, " factor rile MS heck B OTflure File : slugger 6 Disk flupue 7 Is& Cokj 6 Isplay Pile 9 Find iring B ; oHwt Dlsket 1 cabel Dlekett OnckBisk 'Mm • Define or Edit Custon Helji for User flu Hi-Linn Editor for Extra Comnaiids Fi - Help J Press F6 to Select from File or Birec™ Lists || DOSUTIL MenuWorks' password-protection control is one of the utility's many security tools. Redmond, WA 98052, (206) 885-5550; fax (206) 881-9770. Circle 1 000 on Inquiry Card. Get the Most from Your Memory Stuff It SpaceMaker in- corporates two compres- sion functions in a single software package. The Alad- din product features on-the- f ly and automatic back- ground compression capa- bilities. To compress a file or folder, you need only attach a preset keyword to the docu- ment' s name. Once you've attached the keyword, SpaceMaker works transpar- ently. SpaceMaker's Idle-Time Compression feature auto- matically compresses data while your Mac is idle. You can specify particular disks, files, or folders that should not be compressed by Idle-Time, or you can turn off the feature altogether. SpaceMaker compresses most files to half their origi- nal size, and it can com- press some files, such as graphics and database in- formation, by as much as 98 percent. According to Alad- din, the software works with all Mac applications, and it can compress data at speeds comparable to those of hardware-based compression boards. You can also create Stuff It Deluxe and self -ex- tracting archives. The pro- gram includes Aladdin's Stuff It Engine. Price: $59.95. Contact: Aladdin Systems, Inc., 165 Westridge Dr. , Watsonville, CA 95076, (408) 761-6200; fax (408) 761-6206. Circle 1003 on Inquiry Card. SuperStor removes data redundancy and can automatically compress your files to a third of their original size when you write them to disk. AddStor's new package performs on- the-f ly data compression transparently. Because it is a software- only product, SuperStor does not require an expansion slot or additional hardware. According to AddStor, the program's compression capa- bilities equal or exceed those of plug-in boards. SuperStor is compatible with any hard drive, Plus Card, Bernoulli Box, or floppy drive running DOS or Windows. Price: $139. Contact: AddStor, Inc., 3905 Bohannon Dr., Menlo Park, CA 94025, (800) 732-3133 or (415) 688-0470; fax (415) 688-0466. Circle 1 004 on Inquiry Card. Keep an Eye on Your Power onitoring your com- puter's power source is a job more easily done with a little help. Systems En- hancement offers two prod- ucts that provide power moni- toring across a host of operating environments. PowerMon (for OS/2 LAN Manager, 3 + Open OS/2 LAN Manager, and OS/LAN Server) and Smart- Mon (for SCO Unix, SCO Xenix, System V release 4, DEC VMS, SunOS, and Interactive Unix) alert you to changes in your system's power supply and let you set up a procedure for the mon- itoring system to follow in the event of a power disruption. PowerMon comprises software and cables that monitor your uninterrupt- ible power supply (UPS) by constantly checking for power failure. On discover- ing a failure, PowerMon follows your predetermined directions, which can in- clude a system shutdown. SmartMon lets you dis- play or print information per- taining to the status of your UPS's batteries and utilities. Price: PowerMon, $149; SmartMon, $199 and up (de- pending on operating system). Contact: Systems Enhance- ment Corp., 761 Spirit of St. Louis Blvd., Chesterfield, MO 63005, (314)532-2855; fax (3 14) 537-2791. Circle 1001 on Inquiry Card. JANUARY 1992 -BYTE 86PC-1 NEWS WHAT'S NEW • WORD PROCESSING Wang Integrates Non-GUI Applications Wang's new Up Word 2.0 document-process- ing program for Windows 3.0 integrates with Windows and non-Windows applica- tions and offers workgroup computing and image man- agement. The program's compound document man- agement capability lets you keep documents and related external images together when copying, renaming, moving, or deleting files. Wang says that UpWord 2.0's ability to link with non- Windows applications, such as Lotus 1-2-3 and dBase, lets you enjoy Windows document processing without having to shift all your ap- plications to a GUI. UpWord's workgroup functions support redlining and revision tracking. Price: $495. Contact: Wang Laborato- ries, Inc., 1 Industrial Ave., Lowell, MA 01 85 1,(508) 459-5000. Circle 1005 on Inquiry Card. Two DTP Programs for Windows 3.0 Express Publisher for Windows is for the busi- ness user who wants to create professional-looking ads, newsletters, brochures, flyers, and other design- intensive documents. The program offers templates called Express Designs that include layouts and styles. Express Publisher for Windows provides thumbnail previews, which are live thumbnail graphical repre- sentations of document tem- plates, clip art, fonts, spac- ing, and alignment options that you can edit. With Ex- press Publisher for Win- l.f|iWoiil |)| 4)1 l'!.V/lf,i pc l-iiil View liiiina! Iri-irrl hints fjiVtliitijr. Um:\ i Main ifixi [i] |a |a |aj]a» |a ]a |a Width ?,m\ Helghj i.!l«.>l Uer.r.p/w 'j V »kk \ m t y A \iU\\, |t xirnmj refjjStykf III UpWord 2.0 lets you crop, scale, or size images as needed. Within the cropping editor, you can invoke a graphics editor, such as CorelDraw for Windows 3. 0, for further image enhancement. dows, you can rotate text, text frames, and other page elements. The program comes with Adobe Type Manager, 13 font outlines, and 20 predesigned tem- plates. A built-in spelling checker is also included. Price: $249.95. Contact: Power Up Soft- ware Corp., 2929 Campus Dr., San Mateo, CA 94403, (415) 345-5900; fax (415) 349-1356. Circle 1006 on Inquiry Card. cations. Price: $149. Contact: Serif, Inc., P.O. Box 803, Nashua, NH 03061, (603) 889-8650; fax (603)889-1127. Circle 1007 on Inquiry Card. Windows users looking for an inexpensive desktop publishing program can buy PagePlus for Win- dows for less than $150. The program offers text and image rotation, typographic control, and an electronic pasteboard for creating publications. PagePlus for Windows lets you control text point sizes from 4 to 250 points in J/Io-ponit increments, Serif says. The program offers expand, condense, slant, kern, letter-space, outline, and pattern features. It im- ports text and graphics from a variety of appli- Page Layout for the Amiga PageSetter III, an en- hanced version of Gold Disk's entry-level page lay- out program, provides text and graphics creation as well as a layout system for the Amiga. Along with a word processor and spelling checker, the program offers a color paint program and clip art. New output capabilities include PostScript compati- bility and color printing of bit maps and art. PageSetter III runs on any Amiga, and it is compatible with Work- bench 2.0. Price: $129.95. Contact: Gold Disk, 5155 Spectrum Way, Unit 5, Mis- sissauga, Ontario, Canada L4W5A1, (416) 602-4000; fax (416) 602-4001. Circle 1010 on Inquiry Card. Create Font Special Effects akeUp, a program for Windows 3 . x that lets you create special ef- fects with type, combines text manipulation and graphics for creating logos, illustrations, banners, and mastheads. MakeUp sup- ports PostScript Type 1 , TrueType, and Bitstream Speedo type, and it doesn't require a separate font-scal- ing utility. MakeUp ships with five typefaces. You can rotate, stretch, flip, and otherwise manipulate text with Make- Up. You can even pour text into customized shapes, Bit- stream reports. The pro- gram supports color. Price: $149. Contact: Bitstream, Inc., 215 First St., Cambridge, MA 02142, (617)497- 6222. Circle 1008 on Inquiry Card. Power Up Software's TextAppeal for Win- dows lets you create more visually interesting docu- ments with custom head- lines, logos, bursts, and other text effects. It com- bines type manipulation, drawing tools, and the abil- ity to import and export graphical images. With TextAppeal, you can curve, rotate, shadow, and stretch type to create an image for your document. You can combine text with lines, curves, and boxes created with the program's drawing tools and clip art to produce custom logos, bursts, and headlines. Price: $129.95. Contact: Power Up Soft- ware Corp., 2929 Campus Dr. , San Mateo, CA 94403, (415) 345-5900; fax (415) 349-1356. Circle 1 009 on Inquiry Card. 86PC-2 BYTE- JANUARY 1992 n Windows 5 Times Faster! PC Labs Benchmark 1.0 Results: S3 and ET 4000 vti 386-20SX w cache een Configuration 1 024 x 768 256 Color* 3 VIDEO BOARD JSENG LABS ET 4000 BOARD ~B?S| HTiv PRODUCT MATRIX Value Systems Performance Power Systems ^M lnte!386SX20MHz $1,550 $2,195 $2,845 lrrtet38625MHz $1,650 $2,295 $2,945 I Intel386 33 MHz $1,895 $2,540 $3,190 I Intel486 25 MHz ISA $2,350 $2,995 $3,645 I Intel486 25 MHz EISA* N/A $4,795 $3,445 Intel486 33 MHz ISA $2,495 $3,140 $3,790 lnteM8633 MHz EISA* N/A $5,095 $5,745 Motherboard with cache 1.2or1.44foppy One parallel and two serial ports Enhanced 101 key - I keyboard 2 MB RAM 4 MB RAM 8MB RAM 52MB 17MS drive 119MB 15MSdnve 210 MB 15 MSdrive 16bit SVGAcard TangentS.3grapNcs Tangent S3 graphics wtth512KRAM card w/ 1MB RAM card*/ 1MB RAM 14" SVGA color 14* SVGA Mooter 14" SVGA M color monitof 1024x768 ironta 1024x766 monitor 1024 x 768 MS-DOS5.0 MS-DOS5.0 MS Windows 3.0 MS- Windows 3.0 Mouse ;.' Mouse Includes EISA disk caching controller and SCSI drive. Revolutionary new Windows accelerator! Another breakthrough from Tangent! The new S-3 graphics accelerator, available on our 386 and 486 systems! The S-3 sets new standards of Windows performance — ninning/zve times faster than systems using ordinary boards, based on PC Labs Windows Benchmarks (v. 1. The S-3 even has hardware cursor control to eliminate cursor lag, and make you more productive. Get 32,000 photoreal colors! And our fastest drives ever! Tangent's new systems are available with the Sierra Hi-Color RAMDAC, for photorealistic images using up to 32,000 on-screen colors. You can also take advantage of non-interlaced, VESA-compliant flicker-free displays, and high speed drives that are even faster than our previous award- winning models. You win with Tangent. The new S-3 is just one more reason Tangent leads the way in PC engineering. No wonder we've won four PC Magazine Editor's Choice awards in the last 18 months! From award-winning workstations to the industry's fastest network servers, our systems deliver unbeatable performance and value. You get the latest technology innovations — at prices our competitors can't touch. Each system has a one-year parts and labor warranty. Plus on-site service through TRwwand toll-free technical support! , Limited Offer: Free Windows and Mouse! Experience this new level of exhilarating Windows performance! Buy any Tangent Performance System or Power System before January 3 1 , 1992, and we'll give you a copy of Microsoft Windows 3.0 and a mouse— fr eel Call (800) 223-6677 right now! FAX: (415) 342-9380 TANGENT COMPLETER You Always Win *&&* With Tangent 197 Airport Blvd., Burlingame, CA 94010 (415) 342-9388 ©1991 Tangent Computer Corp. All Rights Reserved GSA Number. G500K91AG5212. Corporate Purchase Orders and European Orders Welcome! Windows/Mouse otter expires January 31,1 992. The Intel Inside logo, Intel386 and Intel486 are trademarks of Intel Corp. Other product names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies. All prices subject to change without notice. Circle 577 on Inquiry Card. NEWS WHAT'S NEW • OTHER Convert Fonts into TrueType The FontMonger type- manipulation program for PCs lets you convert your existing type library into TrueType format for use with Windows 3.1. FontMonger converts font files in any direction among the major font for- mats. It can also automati- cally convert selected char- acters or entire fonts into Adobe Illustrator and En- capsulated PostScript file formats (for both Windows and Mac graphics applica- tions) and the Windows metafile format. Like the Mac version of Font- Monger, the Windows ver- sion offers a blend of type- modification capabilities. FontMonger enables you to generate inferior and superior characters for mathematical and scientific formulas, pricing, and frac- tions directly from your keyboard. Using FontMonger, you can combine type with graph- ics and merge it back into a font for immediate access and quick placement of fre- quently used graphics and logos. Price: $99.95. Contact: Ares Software Corp., 561 Pilgrim Dr., Suite D, Foster City, CA 94404, (415) 578-9090; fax (415) 378-8999. Circle 1013 on Inquiry Card. Using FontMonger 's Alter Character window, you can assign specialized characters to specific keys on your keyboard. Paging Doctor PC The next time you're feeling ill, try asking your PC for medical ad- vice. Schueler's Home Medi- cal Advisor (HMA) is a ref- erence system that provides information on self-care, preventative medicine, and symptom analysis. Designed by a team of emergency-room physicians, the program uses an inter- rogative format to diagnose your problem. HMA's topic files cover symptoms, dis- eases, injuries, poisons, drugs, medical tests, and specialist referrals. HMA includes hundreds of images to help you distin- guish between similar con- ditions. The program is not U.S. and Soviet polar-orbiting satellites provide the weather feeds to Sat View. intended to be a substitute for the doctor. Once you've consulted HMA, you'll know what to expect when you seek treatment, and you'll be better able to choose specialists. Price: $99.95. Contact: Pixel Perfect, Inc., 10460 South Tropical Trail, Merritt Island, FL 32952, (407) 777-5353; fax (407)777-0323. Circle 101 1 on Inquiry Card. Weather Images from Space N | ow you can receive real-time U.S. and So- viet satellite images on your Macintosh. SatView gathers data from satellites that or- bit the earth every 100 min- utes, and it displays cloud cover and ocean surface tem- peratures worldwide. Sat- View offers image-process- ing and -analysis software and a NuBus card with an on- board processor for image digitization and storage. Price: $3950. Contact: Marisys, Inc., 2905 South Federal Hwy., Suite C-10, Delray Beach, FL 33483, (407)272-3490; fax (407) 272-3485. Circle 1015 on Inquiry Card. Speed Up Your Graphics Windows Display WinSpeed for Win- dows 3.0, an alterna- tive to speed-up cards, will boost the speed at which graphical images are dis- played on your screen by two to five times. The program supports about 85 percent of the Super VGA cards on the market. Price: $79. Contact: Panacea, Inc., Post Office Sq., Suite 4, 24 Orchard View Dr. , Lon- donderry, NH 03053, (603) 437-5022; fax (603) 434- 2461. Circle 1 01 4 on Inquiry Card. New Authorware Supports Multimedia With Authorware Pro- fessional for Win- dows, you can develop in- teractive applications that support CD audio, MIDI, animation, and Windows sound. Authorware says that the Windows 3.0 version is a complement to the Mac version, providing almost 100 percent conversion of application structure and content. The program comes with an object-authoring interface for nontechnical users. You can build sophisticated appli- cations without scripting, the company reports. As you create your application, Authorware guides you through development with a graphical map. Price: $8000. Contact: Authorware, Inc., 275 Shoreline Dr., Suite 535, Redwood City, CA 94065, (415) 595-3 101; fax (415) 595-3077. Circle 1012 on Inquiry Card. 86PC-4 BYTE- JANUARY 1992 JET-BLACK The JF/T86. Nothing can beat it for speed, quality, and looks. And $3,785 is surprisingly down to earth for a sky high-performance 486 computer. Discover the speed of a JET. Contact us at 1-800-486-1 000. Includes: 33MHz 80486 with 5 1 2K cache, AMI Bios ■ 8MB of 60ns RAM (con upgrade to 64MB) Full tower cose with digital display and second fan ■ 400 Watt power supply ■ TEAC 1 .2MB and 1 .44MB diskette drives ■ 2 1 3MB IDE hard drive with 64K coche, 15 millisecond ■ Diamond Speed Star Plus with Hi-Color chip (32,000 colors) ■ Non-interlaced monitor with 72Hz refresh ■ 101 key tactile keyboard ■ 1 parallel, 2 serial, 1 game port ■ DOS 5.0 with manuals ■ Windows 3.0 ■ Block mouse and pad ■ Other configurations available ^Computer, 2090 E. University, #101 Tempe, AZ 85281, Telephone (602) 967-21 30, Fox (602) 967-3610 Circle 578 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 579). NEWS WHAT'S NEW • WINDOWS PROGRAMMING Expert Systems Through Diagraming An upgrade of the Adept expert-system develop- ment tool lets you model business and technical proce- dures and turn them into in- teractive software applica- tions that guide an end user through complex tasks. Adept 2.0, which runs under Windows 3.0, lets you create a graphical depiction of expert procedures— much as you would create a flow- chart—to develop a clear pic- ture of the choices and the alternatives. Adept 2.0 doesn't force you to create an expert system using if- then statements. Other new features in- clude graphical debugging and Dynamic Data Ex- change. The program uses a visual programming meth- od and lets you insert changes into your system at any point. Price: $695. Contact: Symbologic Corp., 15379 Northeast 90th St., Redmond, WA 98052, (206) 881-3938; fax (206) 881-7198. Circle 1 1 6 on Inquiry Card. By creating a graphical depiction of the procedures that experts use, Adept 2. turns real-life decisions into interactive software programs. Testing for Unix, OS/2, and Windows As GUI applications be- come more complex, es- pecially LAN-based and groupware programs, it's getting harder to find, track, and fix software bugs. Software Quality Automa- tion's SQ A: Robot lets you ex- ecute a standard test and play back the results during system testing. SQ A: Robot can record p] -■■' SGARobot ^m Ht;c»r;u:k lldit j.csl Casus 1 relerenccr Options jkip jPlaybacfc Completed SQA:Robot's record/playback functions let you conduct performance and regression tests on GUI modules. The version for Windows 3. is shown here. all functions of the GUI envi- ronment, including mouse and keyboard activities and window moving, resizing, and scrolling. Advanced script logic and test-execu- tion/validation techniques are also included. SQA says the program is integrated with Visual Basic, which lets you interact with nonpro- prietary scripting languages in modifying test scripts. SQA: Robot works with SQA: Manager, SQA's soft- ware test management pro- gram. SQA: Manager consists of three tools: the test man- ager, the problem tracker, and the analyzer. SQA: Manager works under DOS, Windows 3.0, OS/2 Presentation Man- ager, and the X Window Sys- tem under Unix. SQA.Ro- bot works under Windows and OS/2. Price: SQA: Robot for Win- dows, $695; SQA: Robot for Presentation Manager, $995; SQA: Manager, $3500 and up. Contact: Software Quality Automation, 1 Parker St. , Lawrence, MA 01843, (800) 228-9922 or (508) 689- 0182; fax (508) 689-4195. Circle 1 1 9 o n Inquiry Card. Field Validation for Windows Applications For use with any Win- dows dialogue editor (e.g., the dialogue editors of the Software Development Kit or WindowsMaker Pro- fessional), Magic Fields of- fers a collection of objects that perform data-field validation. The collection includes objects that perform numeric, text, date, and other data-field validation. Without programming, you can also define fields such as employee number and in- voice number. Price: U.S. version, $295; international version, $369. Contact: Blue Sky Soft- ware Corp., 7486 La Jolla Blvd.,Suite3,LaJolla, CA 92037, (619) 459-6365; fax (619)459-6366. Circle 1 1 8 on Inquiry Card. Learn Windows Programming Fast An interactive system from IntelligenceWare teaches you Windows 3.0 programming techniques with hypertext, graphical tutorials, and source code an- notations and explanations. Source code explanations in WindowsTeach are pro- vided with hypertext clarifi- cations in a multiwindow environment. WindowsTeach' s con- cepts component explains the structure of Windows, and the programs component of- fers 2 1 structured pro- grams, each illustrating a feature of Windows. Price: $123. Contact: IntelligenceWare, Inc., 5933 West Century Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90045, (213) 216-6177; fax (213)417-8897. Circle 1 01 7 on Inquiry Card. 86PC-6 BYTE' JANUARY 1992 MetaWare INCORPORATED Multi-Language, /Wa/^/^/afform • Compiler Products for \ Professional Software BeVelopers 21 61 Delaware Avenue KSarita Cruz, CA^95Gm5706> (408) 429 : &82+mx : 0^ MelaWare, the MetaWare [030,, Professional Pascal, ana 1 High C, are registered .trademarks, antf DOS Helper is. a 'fradera ark,. of MetaVVarq-lncp rpb rated; ' ■' '.'; ■ ' ■•■'■- .-■,.- ,"■ ■.'.,'•■ -'-:'■■• ■ / ',, .:■ ( ';'., ^ GopyrighFI 99f' Me;taWare : Incorporated ' ."/. \ ■'.*'•-'" '/ ■ 4 '. ..-.'.' '''".'•...">■■' • -'-'.' ■ Circle 573 on Inquiry Card; NEWS WHAT'S NEW • UNIX Software Engineering forX Rational Rose, a graphi- cal object-oriented anal- ysis and design tool, offers a client /server software tool for language-independent analysis and design on the IBM RISC System/6000 and Sparcstation com- patibles. You can access Rose from any X Window System- compliant display running Motif or Open Windows. Rose supports languages such as C++, Ada, Small- talk, and C. It also supports the Booch programming method. Rose offers class browsers and reusable librar- ies. The semantic informa- tion stored in Rose's reposi- tory is accessible through a set of open interfaces, letting you integrate the program with third-party tools and frameworks. An object-oriented data- base and a desktop publish- ing system come with Rose. Price: $3995 per license. Contact: Rational, 3320 Scott Blvd., Santa Clara, CA 95054, (408) 496-3692; fax (408) 496-3638. Circle 1 022 on Inquiry Card. Unix Desktop Without Clutter The new version of the Wish (for Window Icon- ic Shell) program develop- ment and delivery desktop for Unix, Motif, and Net- work File System distributed computing minimizes the use of screen space and pro- vides file and application management. Non Standard Logics says Wish elimi- nates the proliferation of win- dows that you often find in graphical desktops. Wish2 includes Wx2, the com- Rational Rose shows the highest-level view of a problem- reporting system in the class-diagram editor at lower left. The upper left window contains a class-diagram editor that shows a decomposition of one of the class categories— that of user applications. At right, the class specification editor lets you examine the behavior of each class, and the object diagram editor lets you examine key mechanisms and how they work in the system. Also shown at right is the hypertext help system. Rose integrates with applications from Frame and Saber. pany's graphical program- ming editor for Motif. Wish2's main window has a current-directory panel and a tool-tray panel for docking frequently used tools, files, and applica- tions. Wish2's command window uses the AutoRe- call feature to supply you with lengthy path names automatically. You can type rm and click on an icon. Once you click on the file icon, a long command se- quence, such as rm / usr / export / sony / ns / demo / nevf ile, can appear on the command line. On-line help is available. Wish2 re- quires OSF/Motif 1 . 1 . Price: Starts at $695 (de- pending on platform and quantity). Contact: Non Standard Logics, Inc., 4141 State St., Suite B-l 1 , Santa Barbara, CA 931 10, (805)964-9599; fax (805) 964-4367. Circle 1 020 on Inquiry Card. An X Debugger for Real-Time Unix A debugging tool for real-time Unix and Po- six that operates in the X Window System interface or the ASCII terminal mode, LDB offers source- and ker- nel-level debugging of multiple threads and pro- cesses. LDB's features in- clude signals debugging; support for break, watch, and trace points; stepping; and stack examination. LDB can also debug a pro- gram on a remote system via an Ethernet link. The initial release of LDB supports LynxOS. Ver- sions are planned for stan- dard variations of Unix. Price: $895. Contact: Lynx Real-Time Systems, Inc., 16780 Lark Ave., Los Gatos, CA 95030, (408) 354-7770; fax (408) 354-7085. Circle 1 023 on Inquiry Card. IDB Object Database for Mac and Unix The IDB Object Data- base is now available on the Mac, Next worksta- tions, and Hewlett-Packard machines running HP/UX, joining versions for Win- dows, Sun, and HP/Do- main operating systems. Version 1 . 1 supports controlled sharing of infor- mation across heteroge- neous networks with any mix of supported platforms, ac- cording to Persistent Data Systems. The program can also store and manipulate complex information. Price: $2500 for PCs or Macs; $3500 for Next; $6000 for HP/ Apollo, HP/UX, or Sun workstations. Contact: Persistent Data Systems, Inc., 75 West Chap- el Ridge Rd., Pittsburgh, PA 15238, (412)963-1843. Circle 1 024 on Inquiry Card. Objectworks \ C++ Supports Teamwork Objectworks\C++, ParcPlace Systems' programming environment for C ++ , now supports team programming and inte- grates with popular Unix development tools such as make. It runs on the Sun-3 and Sparcstation platforms. Version 2.4 of the envi- ronment is now suited for teams of programmers working on medium to large C ++ projects, the com- pany says. Price: $3000. Contact: ParcPlace Sys- tems, 1550 Plymouth St., Mountain View, CA 94043, (415) 691-6700; fax (415) 691-6715. Circle 1 021 on Inquiry Card. 86PC-8 BYTE* JANUARY 1992 486/33 Features 80486 33MHZ 32 bit INTEL CPU 4MB RAM-Expandable to 32MB AMI BIOS with Extended CMOS Setup 256K Static RAM Cache 8 Expansion Slots (ISA 16 bit) 14" SuperVGA Color Monitor, 1024^768, 28mm dot 1MB VGA Card, resolves 1024x768 at 256 colors 1.2 and 1.44 MB Floppy Disk Drives 120MB IDE Hard Drive, 19ms Desktop Style Case (Tower Option Available) 220 W Switching Power Supply Serial, Parallel, and Game Ports MS-DOS 5.0, Serial Mouse included Full 1 Year Limited Warranty-Parts and Labor All LSI Professional Systems Are FCC Certified. 386/25 Super VGA 286 and 386 SX 42MB Hard Drive, 1MB RAM, SuperVGA 42MB Hard Drive. 1MB RAM, Mono Monitor 80386 25MHZ 32 bit CPU IMBRAM-Exp.to4MB(286) or 8MB(SX) 1 MB RAM-Expandable to 16MB 1 2" Monochrome TTL Monitor, 720x348 res. 14" SuperVGA Color Monitor MonoGraphic Card, Hercules Compatible 512K Super VGA Card 1.2MB Floppy Disk Drive 1 .2MB Floppy Disk Drive (;idd S65 for 2nd Floppy) 42MB IDE Hard Drive, 28ms 42MB IDE Hard Drive, 28ms Desktop Style Case, 220W Switching PS Desktop Style Case Serial, Parallel, and Game Ports 220W Switching Power Supply Full 1 Year Limited Warranty-Parts and Labor Serial, Parallel, and Game Ports 386SX/20 286/12 Full 1 Year Limited Warranty-Parts and Labor $ 845. 00 $ 645. 00 $i one uu • 386SX/16 14 " Su P erVGA ' 512K VRAM add $35 ° *i^yo d*mmg-\wm f\f\ BOMB Hard Drive, 19ms addS100 ^ iM^ 120MB Hard Drive, 19ms add $200 • 9J fJ • Memory Upgrade {per MB) add S65 MS-DOS 5.0 (with System Purchase Only) $65 Logitech Mouseman, Serial $69 Logitech Mouseman, Bus $79 Logitech Trackman, Serial $89 Logitech Grayscale Scanman $315 TEAC 1.2 Floppy $65 TEAC 1 .44 Floppy w/ bracket $69 Microscience 8040, 42MB IDE HD, 23ms $235 Conner 30104, 120MB IDE HD, 19ms $415 1 20MB Tape Backup $275 CM7 SuperVGA, 14" (Interlaced at 1024, .28 dot) $345 CM8 SuperVGA, 14" (Non-interlaced 1024, .28 dot) $475 AM9 SuperVGA, 14" (Sony Tube, Non-lntl., .25 dot) $575 EISA System, 32 bit Bus add $1 000 (EISA has 7 32-bit slots, 1 16-bit slot) Sony 1304 (non interlaced) add $450 200MB IDE (19ms) add $300 336MB ESDI (1 6ms) add $1 1 50 760MB ESDI (1 4ms) add S1 950 760MB SCSI (14ms) add $2250 ESDI/EISA 32-bit Controller add S795 SHOPPlilx S AO VioQRY— If you're finding yourself stuck in the confusing forest of computer dealers, you won't find many that can claim: I) A Large National Customer Base, 2) Major Corporate Clients, 3) Retail/ Mail Order and Wholesale business, 4) An Established Tradition of Customer Support. Bui WE C AN ! Since 1 984, we conlinue our commitment to providing the highest quality components and service at the best price. Stay on the cutting edge with Lucky Star International! 386/33 Power System 120MB Hard Drive, 4MB RAM, SuperVGA 80386 33MHZ 32 bit CPU 4MB RAM-Expandable to 32MB 64K Cache-Expandable to 128K 14" SuperVGA Color Monitor, 1024x768 512K Super VGA Card, 1024x768 at 16 colors 1.2 and 1.44 MB Floppy Disk Drives 120MB IDE Hard Drive, 19ms Desktop Style Case 220W Switching Power Supply Serial, Parallel, and Game Ports MS-DOS 5.0, Serial Mouse included Full 1 Year Limited Warranty-Parts/Labor 00 Limited Time At This LOW LOW PRICE!!! $1695. Non-interlaced SVGA, ,25mm dot (Sony tube) add $350 16" Non-interlaced SVGA, ,28mm dot add $850 20" Non-interlaced SVGA CALL Above Video Upgrades include 1MB VGA Card Quality Service and Support Since 1984 Locations Nationwide now open m Atlanta, gai Retail Hours Mon-Sat 9am-6pm Eastern/Central/Pacific Time Sunday Noon-5pm Addison, TX Tukwila, WA Locations ONLY Mail Order Hours 9am-6pm Central Time 1 -OUU-966-5o25 SOUTHWEST REGION 1 70 1 Greenville Ave. #602 2 1 32 N. Collins R ichardson, TX 7508 1 Arlington, TX 760 1 I NORTHWEST REGION 10773 SW Bvtn.-Hills. Hwy 14220 NE 20th #D Bcavcrton, OR 97005 Bcllcvuc, WA 98007 CKY STAR INTERNATIONA! ^ VISA (2 1 4)690-6 110 (81 7)265- 1 883 (503)67 1 -096 1 (206)643-2673 GREATER ATLANTA 5939 Jimmy Carter Blvd. Norcross,GA30071 (404)416-9605 4151 Bcltlinc Rd. #120 Addison, TX 75244 l2H0Westheimcr Houston, TX 77077 17338 Southccntcr Pkwy. Tukwila,WA98188 (2 14)702-8588 (7 1 3)497-7887 (206)575-9060 Circle 571 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 572). Computer-Aided Designinj flft jPt Engineering ' IAII & Workstations Ann UIIU Business Graphics '92 C O N F E R E N C E & EX PO S I T I O N , The hottest computer graphics technologies for engineering and business, together in one complete show! March 9-12, 1992 • Anaheim Convention Center •Anaheim, California Hi:: For more information, call 1 -800-22 5-NCGA, ext. 310 and give the operator code MCF2. ^MSlT Sponsored by the National Computer Graphics Association NCCA, 2722 Merrilee Dr., Ste. 200, Fairfax, VA 22031-4499, 703-698-9600 Circle 574 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS; 575). Built To Evolve 3^1 SO* w 18 r p£**" PUBLICLY TRADING OTC SYMBOL: SOMX Upgradable Non-upgradable 386SX CPU SUMEX AST ALR Dell PCBrand 25MHz 16MHz 20MHz 20MHz 25MHz Memory 2MB 2MB 2MB 2MB 2MB 1.2MB FD Included Included Included Included Included 1.44MB FD Included Not incl. Not incl. included Included Hard Disk 40MB 40MB 40MB 40MB 40MB Serial Port 2 2 1 2 2 Parallel Port 1 1 1 1 1 Mouse Port 1 1 Not incl. 1 1 Mouse Included Not incl. Notinci. Included Included VGA Card 1MB Not incl. 512KB 1MB 1MB VGA Monitor 1024x768 Not incl. 800x600 1024x768 1 024x768 * MS DOS 5.0 Included Not incl. Not incl. Included Included ^ Windows Included Notinci. Not incl. Included Included Price $1,595 $2,895 $2,393 $2,516 $1 ,825 It has recently become apparent that upgradable, modular computer systems are an excellent approach to preserving a buyer's investment. Upgrad- able computers have been priced sub- stantially higher than conventional, non-upgradable ones; UNTIL NOW. MODULAR, UPGRADABLE SYSTEMS 386DX/33 $2,395 486SX/20 $2,595 486DX/25 $3,195 386DX/40 $2,595 4MB RAM, 64KB Cache, 120MB HD, SVGA 486SX/25 $2,795 4MB RAM, 64KB Cache: 120MB HD, SVGA 486DX/33 $3,395 4MB RAM, 64KB Cache, 200MB HD, SVGA Add $200 for 256KB Cache systems. All prices are introductory offers. 30-DAY MONEY BACK* • 1-YEAR WARRANTY • MADE IN USA SUMEX Corporation is introducing a new, low-cost upgradable computersystem line called DATAstation™. It is upgradable from 386SX to 386DX to 486SX to 486DX by changing a single Proces- sor Module. This upgrade procedure is very simple. It does not require any jumper or switch settings. The system will automati- cally reconfigure. The system memory will also automatically rescale to match the CPU Module (16-bit or 32-bit) so that no "bottle-neck" is created to hinder the CPU performance. SUMEX Corporation, incorporated in 1985, is engaged in the development, manufacture and marketing of "upgradable, modu- lar computers". Following the current introduction, there will be a high-power, 32-bit EISA-MCA based modular computer product line and many others involving leading-edge, patent pending "modularity" technologies. SUMEX is a company that dares to innovate. SUMEX Corporation is also poised to grow. The leading-edge technologies, competitive pricing, and commitment to total cus- tomer satisfaction are some of the solid building blocks for SUMEX Corporation's growth.. Give us a call today and find out how you can better preserve your computer investment. S SUMEX <^ CORPORATION Toll Free (800) 257-8639 800-25SUMEX Hours: 9 AM-6 PM M-F, PST Tel: (714) 563-7456 Fax: (714) 563-1804 431 N. Brookhurst Street, Unit 130, Anaheim, CA 92801 Prices & specifications subject lo change without notice. Call for details of terms & conditions. All trademarks belong lo their respective companies. *Rcl'unds do not include shipping & handling charges. Return Authorization Number is required before returning products. Circle 581 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 582). NEWS WHAT'S NEW • PROGRAMMING Data Acquisition for Visual Basic DriverLinx for Visual Basic offers a series of real-time data acquisition engines for third-party, high- speed analog and digital I/O boards. DriverLinx, which takes the form of a custom control that is added to the Visual Basic toolbar, enables you to drop a data ac- quisition engine into your application. Users can choose from more than 100 func- tions for creating both fore- ground and background tasks. Price: $400. Contact: Scientific Soft- ware Tools, Inc., 30 East Swedesford Rd. , Malvern, PA 19355, (215) 889-1354; fax (215) 889-1630. Circle 1031 on Inquiry Card. DriverLinx for Visual Basic comes with complete source code for this two-channel function synthesizer to show you how to develop real-time applications. Nonlinear Modeling in C++ Autodif is a C++ array language extension with automatic differentiation for use in nonlinear modeling and statistics. Derivatives are calculated with the same accuracy achieved by ana- lytical formulas and with minimal overhead. Price: $99; $149 after April 1. Contact: Otter Research, Ltd., P.O. Box 265, Station A, Nanaimo, BC, Canada V9R 5K9, (604) 756-0956. Circle 1033 on Inquiry Card. Network Routines for BASIC Patterned after Novell's C Interface, QuickNet consists of more than 250 assembler routines that let you write applications in BASIC that access Novell networks. QuickNet works with QuickBasic and version 4.0 and higher of Microsoft's BASIC Compilers. Price: $199. Contact: Mirage, 8086 South Yale, Suite 1, Tulsa, OK 74136, (918)251-8086. Circle 1032 on Inquiry Card. - Aiva f * irihing|Prptection! I Network support and Windows compatibility. Now for OS/2! Dr. Solomon's Anti-Virus Toolkit, the first anti-virus package to win both the Byte Magazine Award of Merit and PC Magazine's Editor's Choice, introduces another first - virus protection for the OS/2 environment. Dr. Solomon also leads the pack in quick detection - we're three times faster than the competition! EE5EMB Dr. Solomon has the jump on viruses. Do you? jpntrack ANTI- MS TOOLKIT 1-800-752-1333 International: 612-937-1107 ■ Fax: 612-937-5815 6321 Bury Drive, Eden Prairie, MN 55346 86PC-12 BYTE* JANUARY 1992 A 80486-33Mhz Industrial Portable Personel Computer At Only $ 3,495 ! o Color SVGA CRT Portable Computer o 486-33, 386-33 and 386-25 Processors o 3 Full Length 16-bit ISA Expansion Slots o FCC Class B Certified o Satisfaction Money Back Guaranteed PORTABLEdesktop PD433 We called our portable PC the "PORTABLEdesktop" be- cause it is a desktop computer in disguise. Unbeatable Performance The PORTABLEdesktop models come in a 486-33, 386-33 and 386-25 processor speed. The model PD433 with a 486- 33 microprocessor containing a built-in 8 KB cache, MMU and FPU. The MaxiCache and IROS are two schemes exclusively to the PD433. The MaxiCache is a full page direct-mapped write back cache with either 64 KB or 256 KB external cache memory and will achieve over 97% cache hit rate while the IROS in- corporates circuitry to recharge the DRAM in such a way that the CPU can work without interruption. The marriage of these two architectural breakthroughs results in a blasting speed of over 15 MIPS on the Power Meter scale ! Standard Configuration All systems come with 4MB of RAM expandable to 32MB; a 120MB IDE or SCSI hard disk drive; two 5.25" drive slots for a 1.44MB and a 1.2MB floppy disk drive; VGA card with 512K RAM; built-in 10" color SVGA monitor; two serials and one parallel port; three full length slots; MS-DOS 5.0 installed and carrying bag. Portable PC Experience Bi-Link has over 8 years experience in portable and trans- portable PC from supplying to the VAR or directly to the corporate USA. Ordering Information Ordering is easy. Just call our toll free number listed below and a sales engineer will be able to help you with your requirements. All custom built systems will be tested and ready to ship within 5 working days upon order confirma- tion. Ask for other options. 1-800-888-5369 PORTABLEdesktop PORTABLEworkstation B 11606 E. Washington Blvd., Whittier, California 90606 Tel: (310)692-5345 Fax: (310)692-9623 Tech: (310)695-5166 All trademarks mentioned are registered, trademarked or serv/icemarked by their respected manufacturer . Circle 569 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 570). NEWS WHAT'S NEW • WORD PROCESSING Document Management for Unix Available for the first time for Unix, the Xe- rox Document Search and Retrieval (DSR) document management software, Do- cuTran automated translation software, and DocuTeam workgroup software run on SPARC systems with the Xerox Global View net- worked environment. DSR combines text man- agement and retrieval to store, retrieve, and view documents. DocuTran trans- lates text from English into French, German, Spanish, Italian, and Portuguese. It also translates German and French into English. Price: DSR starts at $7000 for five licenses; DocuTeam I !-•> •■■ i _j^L=H.i^lML - ■■■! ■ ■■}■< - '» «™ , /:.:;:•' «)'.*„.■«/.«. j 1 •Vnn ■SI u\ -,. .,.,.1 19 ----I 3 -| ■ai •■■■• .3 |V,-M EBDQ L^llSl seih: I] Lib— * jm^M n p™ □ E10B HE10O By pointing and clicking with a mouse while running Xerox 's Document Search and Retrieval software , you can locate electronic documents on networks. starts at $20,000 for 10 desktops. DocuTran: host station, $9995; worksta- tions, $2000 each. Global- View, $1985 per work- station. Contact: Xerox Corp., P.O. Box 1600, Stamford, CT 06904, (203) 329-8700. Circle 1034 on Inquiry Card. r A More Nearly Perfect Mouse Driver The developer of the MousePerf ect mouse driver that tricked Word- Perfect into thinking it was "mousif ied" has updated the program for WordPerfect 5.1. MNP (More Nearly Perfect) provides pop-up menus, point-and-shoot macro lists, and hot-key macros. The program inte- grates seamlessly with Word- Perfect's mouse cursor, has faster macro support, and consumes just 9 KB of memory. Price: $35. Contact: Niche Software, 2154 Briarlake Trace, Atlan- ta, GA 30345, (404) 634- 9377. Circle 1 035 on Inquiry Card. Time is slipping away — It's time now to plan your marketing strategy. AIS offers an innovative, cost effective 4-Part marketing program for your OS/2 products that: ■ Maximizes Exposure ■ Minimizes Expense Dr. AIS says. your 05/2 produtt!" I OS/2 2.0 will be here sooner than you think. Act now and call AIS. 800- -5818 Advanced Integrated Systems 1 030 Sandretto Drive-Suite H Prescott, AZ 86301 ADVANCED INTEGRATED SYSTEMS Circle 583 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 584). Scientific/Engineering Software For Microsoft C, Borland/Turbo C, and Turbo Pascal Science, Engineering and Graphics Tools The Science/Engineering/Graphics Tools (Revision 7.0) are a collection of general purpose routines which solve the most common data analysis and graphics prob- lems encountered in science and engineering applications. All of the routines are supplied on disk in the source code of the target language and can be used royalty free when compiled into an application program. Versions of the Science, Engineering and Graphics tools are available for Turbo Pascal 5.x, 6.x, Turbo C 2.x, Borland C++ and Microsoft C 5.x, 6.0 & Quick C 2.x. FEATURES Uses the graphics routines supplied with the respective compiler. Science/Engineering charting routines - Linear, semi-log, and log graphs. Hardcopy support -Screen dumps, PostScript and HPGL 3-D plotting -translation, scaling, rotation, and function plotting routines. Statistics, Multiple Regression, Curve Fitting, Simultaneous Equations, FFTs, Eigenvalue, Integration, Differential Equation, Root Solving, Special Functions, RS-232 Support. Royalty Free ■ Use these routines in your programs without royalty fees. Each version is $100 - Please specify compiler when ordering. Price includes libraries, demo programs and a 200 page manual. Real-Time Graphics and Measurement/Control Tools Fast Real-time Graphics - Real-time graphics routines for scrolling graphs, sweep graphs, process control bargraphs, annun- ciator panels, three types of meters and general graphics text displays. Real-time mouse routines are also included. The routines are optimized around the graphics primitives that come with the respective compiler. Versions of the Real-Time Graphics and Measurement/Control Tools are available for Turbo Pascal 5.x, 6.x, Turbo C 2.x, Borland C++ and Microsoft C 5.x, 6.0 & Quick C 2.x. BRAND NEW Powerful Measurment and Control - PID Control (position and velocity algorithms), Thermocouple linearization for the 1 5 standard TC types (B, BP, BN, E , J , JP, JN, R, K, KP, KN, S, T, TP, TN), Thermocouple curvefitting for any temperature range. Royalty Free - Use these routines in your programs without royalty fees. Each version is $200 - Please specify compiler when ordering. Price includes libraries, demo programs and a 300 page manual. Huge Virtual Array and Numerical Analysis Toolbox The Quinn-Curtis huge virtual array tools give programmers working with very large numeric arrays the ability to break the 640K DOS limitation and utilize all system memory available. Optimized for speed, the Quinn-Curtis virtual array mechanism will automatically utilize low memory (lower than 1 MB) first, then Extended memory (greater than 1 MB) and finally hard disk memory. The sizes of virtual arrays are limited only by the size of the hard disk. The package also contains a selection of numerical analysis tools where very large arrays are critical for advanced work. Building on the virtual array core routines, these tools include extensive matrix math support, solutions of large systems of linear equations, curve fitting, multiple and stepwise regression, Fourier analysis (FFTs), eigenvalues, eigenvectors, and general statistics. Borland/Turbo C & Microsoft C and Turbo Pascal programmers, working under DOS on PCs will now be able Programming language limitations compared to Quinn-Curtis Virtual Array Tools Large Model C Borland/Microsoft Huge Model C Borland/Microsoft Quinn-Curtis Virtual Array Tools 0.1M 1M 10M Maximum Array Size to program advanced scientific and engi- neering applications which, until now, could only be handled using a super minicomputer or mainframe. Versions of the Huge Virtual Array and Numerical Analysis Toolbox are available for Turbo Pascal 5.x, 6.x, Turbo C 2.x, Borland C++ and Microsoft C 5.x, 6.0 & Quick C 2.x. Royalty Free - Use these routines in your programs without royalty fees. Each version is $300 - Please specify compiler when ordering. Price includes libraries, demo programs and a 300 page manual. Quinn-Curtis, 35 Highland Circle, Needham, MA 02194 USA Tel. 617/449-6155 FAX 617/449-6109 Circle 576 on Inquiry Card. You Deserve A Derby. . . Power, Price and Performance. All with unparalleled service! SX/25C-80PRO 2MB RAM, 32K Cache 80MB Hard Drive, 17m: with 64K Cache 1.2MB 5 1/4" Drive 1,44MB 3 1/2" Drive CTX- 1024, Super VGA Color Monitor 2 Serial, Parallel, Game Ports New MS-DOS 5.0 & Windows 3.0 Z-nix Mouse, 400 ppi LandMark=30. 1 Mhz/Sl=26.8/Mips=4,25 $1,595 Now! MS-DOS 5.1 SX/25C-130 PRO 80386SX-25 2MB RAM, 32K Cache 130 MB Hard Drive, 17ms with 64K Cache 1.2MB 5 1/4" Drive 1.44MB 3 1/2" Drive 2the Max VGA, 1 MB CTX- 1024, Super VGA Color Monitor 2 Serial, Parallel, Game Por New MS-DOS 5.0 & Windows 3.0 Z-nix Mouse, 400 ppi Landmark=30. 1 Mhz/SI=26.8/Mips=4.25 $1695 386/25-130 PRO 80386DX-25, 32-bit 4MB RAM BOMB Hard Drive, 17ms with 64K Cache 1.2MB 5 1/4" Drive 1.44MB 3 1/2" Drive 2the Max VGA, 1 MB CTX- 1024, Super VGA Color Monitor 2 Serial, Parallel, Game Ports New MS-DOS 5.0 & Windows 3.0 Z-nix Mouse, 400 ppi Landmark=28.6MhzySl=26.4/Mips=4.03 $1895 386/40C-200 PRO 80386DX-40. 32-bit 4MB RAM. 64K Cache 210MB Hard Drive, < 15ms with 64K Cache 1. 2MB 5 1/4" Drive 1.44MB 3 1/2" Drive 2the Max VGA, 1 MB CTX- 1024, Super VGA Color Monitor Performance: By using only high performance components such as Intel, Chinon, Toshiba, Teac, Quantum, Microscience, Maxtor, Focus, and CTX, Derby systems can outperform any comparable system. To ensure the Highest Quality & Reliability possible all systems go through our 7-step, 72 hour burn-in, test. Power: If Power is what you want then Derby is what you need. We use the latest technology in every system, IDE, Cache RAM, and 2the Max VGA (1 Meg Video, 1024x768 resolution with 256 colors, 24-bit Color Option - 3 68 sim I aneous c lors). All systems include Windows 3.0, which has been pre-loaded and fine-tuned for optimum performance. The NEW MS-DOS 5.0 features, advanced memory management, improved graphical shell, full-screen editor and MS-QBasic. NOW! All systems come standard in our space saving ergonomic Mid-Tower case. Price: While supplying all the Power and Performance you demand, Derby also gives you an affordable price. Conclusion: In the areas of Power, Performance, and Price, no one compares to Derby. With the best service and quality in the industry, why go anywhere else? So, CALL NOW and talk with your own Personal Consultant! perbyTecl, I In 386/25-80 PRO 80386DX-25, 32-bit 4MB RAM 80 MB Hard Drive, 17n with 64K Cache 1.2MB 5 1/4" Drive 1.44MB 3 1/2" Drive 2the Max VGA, 1 MB New MS-DOS 5.0 & Windows 3.0 Z-nix Mouse, 400 ppi Landmark=28.6Mhz/SI=26,4/Mips=4.03 $1795 386/40C-130PRO New MS-DOS 5.0 & Windows 3.0 Z-nix Mouse, 400 ppi . Landmark=65.7Mhz/Sl=48.2/Mips=8.27 $2,195 DERBY DELIVERS One Year Warranty 72 Hour Burn-In Testing Life Time Toll Free Technical Support All Systems Built In the USA 30 Day Money Back Guarantee (Less any shipping charges) Shipping & Handling $45.00 Same Day Shipping All Software pre-loaded & fine-tuned No Surcharge on Credit Cards New sales hours: 9am - 8pm CST M-F 10am-2p mCST S-S ■ 80386DX-4G, 32-bit ■ 4MB RAM. 64K Cache ■ 130MB Hard Drive, 17ms with 64K cache 1.2MB 5 1/4" Drive 1,44MB 3 1/2" Drive 2the Max VGA, 1 MB CTX- 1024, Super VGA Color Monitor New MS-DOS 5.0 & Windows 3.0 Z-nix Mouse, 400 ppi J Landmark=65.7Mhz/SI=48.2/Mips=8.27 $1995 486SX/20-130 PRO 80486SX-20, 32-bit 4MB RAM, 8K Internal Cache 130MB Hard Drive, o, KEAterm, KEAlink, ZSTEM and PowerSlation are trademarks of KEA Systems Ltd. All other brand and product names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders. Copyright© KEA SYSTEMS LTD. 1991. All rights reserved. or spreadsheet boxes, on your screen. Moreover, the Graphics Ultra is easy enough to install. It comes with a mouse port and its own three-button mouse. Of course, having a mouse bus on the video board saves a slot (or a COM port). There's lots of software for using the Graphics Ultra with AutoCAD, Ventura Publisher, and so forth. You get Bitstream scalable fonts. Mostly, you get displays that look as if you have a laser printer right there on your screen. If I had to do much desktop publishing with a PCompatible system, I'd run out and get the Graphics Ultra. The time saved in proof copies would be significant. This board isn't a memory hog, and it has per- formed wonderfully for every task we've asked of it. I really like it. Desqview I run Windows on a Cheetah 486. That's the machine that Larry Niven uses when he comes to work here: it has an older Zenith keyboard, which Larry prefers to my nice new Northgate OmniKey keyboards. It also has the 19-inch Hitachi screen (which Larry can see without his glasses), an ATI superfast video board, and the Perceptive Solutions superfast hard drive controller. I run Windows on that machine largely because I like to be able to get at Norton Commander without exiting the word pro- cessor. Niven and I use "sneakernet" to transfer text files: when he works on a chapter, he saves that onto the hard disk. When it's time for me to see it, the files are transferred to a floppy disk, which I put into my machine, automatically mak- ing a backup copy. If Larry has made changes to several chapters (each chapter is a file in our sys- tem), there are several files to be trans- ferred to a floppy disk, and that is ac- complished by using Norton Commander. Thus, what I want available on Larry's machine is a task-switching system that will get me from Q&A Write (configured with Word Finder and the Definitions Plus version of The American Heritage Dictio- nary as TSR programs that are available in background) to Norton Commander. On my own system, I do that with Desqview; but the problem with Desqview is that the hot key is the Alt key, and Lar- ry Niven is perfectly capable of striking that key inadvertently. When he does, Desqview pops up, and it confuses him. We both hate when that happens; and since Windows was doing the job quite nicely, and Niven is exceedingly unlikely to hit Control-Escape, I used Windows for his machine. That also means that 1 can play Rail- road Tycoon and switch back to either 90 BYTE • JANUARY 1992 Circle 84 on Inquiry Card Do You Make These Six Common Mistakes On Your Taxes? Six common mistakes can cause you big headaches on your taxes. An oversight here, an omission there. From unnecessary tax payments to full blown IRS audits -- you can end up paying too much ... or worse. But now, using TurboTax and your per- sonal computer, you can avoid these simple but costly mistakes: IThe Arithmetic Error Today, even the simplest forms con- tain complex calculations. And with all the late-night scrambling, an innocent mistake could cost you plenty. 2 The Transcription Error With all those numbers being juggled from schedule to schedule, it's no wonder the figures are so often transcribed incorrectly or entered on the wrong line. 3 The Omitted Form Even "ordinary" returns require any- where from six to a dozen forms to complete. It's easy to miss one ... or end up rushingallovertowntofindtheoneyouneed. 4 The Misinterpreted Instruction Atbest, IRS instructions can be tough to understand. At worst they can be mind-boggling. What you need are clear directions in plain English. 5 The Overlooked Deduction You'd have to be a professional tax preparer to know all the deductions you're entitled to. If you miss just one, it could cost you hundreds of dollars. 6 The Exceeded Guideline The fastest way to trigger an IRS audit is to exceed the "normal" range on one of your deductions. You need to know whatthe IRS looks for on a line-by-line basis. When you do your taxes with TurboTax, mistakes like these are virtually impossible. And filing your taxes couldn't be easier. Macintosh' America's *1 Tax Software TurboTax is America's #1 best-selling tax software - over six million returns were filed with TurboTax lastyear! With TurboTax on your PC (or MaclnTax on your Macintosh), you can completely and accurately prepare your income taxes in just a few hours. Here's how easy it is! A. Gather your records and receipts. B. Enter your data into TurboTax just once. C. Print out, sign and drop in the mail. TurboTax does the rest. Even if your records and receipts aren't in any particular order, TurboTax guides you through step-by-step questions and shows how to enter every item. And like a good tax advisor, TurboTax helps you iden- tify every deduction you can claim. Then TurboTax makes all the calculations, checks for accuracy and consistency, and transfers ev- S^S ery number to the proper lines on the proper forms. And, TurboTax prints every form you need in IRS-approved format right on your own printer - ready to sign and mail (or file electronically, if you prefer, for a faster refund). PC Magazine says TurboTax "makes doing your taxes almost fun." Try it for yourself. Free. We know that if you try it, you'll never go back to doing your taxes the old-fashioned way. So we'll send you TurboTax on an unconditional free trial basis: If you don 't like it, you don 't pay for it! Free Bonus! 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USSR'S COLUMN Q&A, Norton Commander, or to a data- base (when I play Railroad Tycoon, I tend to be serious). However, my own machine, a Cheetah 386, still has Desqview. I'm used to it; and, indeed, Desqview really is more flex- ible than Windows, and once you have some experience with it, it's easier to use. Among other things, you can close a Desq- view application much more easily than you can get rid of a Windows application; and you can quit Desqview regardless of whether other applications are running. I suppose over time Windows will re- place Desqview. It does have some ad- vantages; but for the moment, I am content to use Desqview — except that once more I have a weird problem to relate. My Cheetah 386 runs DOS 3.3, and thus my hard drive is partitioned into logical drives C through L. This isn't a real hard- ship except that sometimes I forget where a file has gone. I have two large TSR drivers set up with my Cheetah 386: a Hitachi CD-ROM and LANtastic. With LANtastic, I can access the Pioneer Minichanger CD-ROM drive and the Pioneer read/write optical drive that doubles as a WORM; and, of course, I f you do change to Windows, get Norton Desktop. I can send stuff to the network server for backup on the Palindrome tape drive, as I described last month. All these assets are available in all Desqview windows, and my windows can be 544 KB in size, which isn't really enough, but it will serve. However, I keep thinking I ought to have larger windows and that I can get them by switching to DOS 5.0. But when- ever I do that, I have much smaller Desqview windows. This doesn't make much sense; but I have twice changed to DOS 5.0, and each time I have fished out the DOS 5.0 uninstall disk and gone back to the old system. More when I learn more, because I really do like DOS 5.0. Sigh. Norton Desktop for Windows If you do change to Windows, get Norton Desktop. It makes Windows a lot more fun, as well as easier to work with. There's even an icon editor to let you customize things, and a fast-open panel that's quite nifty for getting things started in a hurry. It does take up a lot of disk space — about 5 MB. I think it's worth it, but then I have a lot of disk space. One caution: if you update your version of Windows, you may lose all the work you did with Norton Desktop in making things pretty. In theory, you can save things; but in practice, I was not able to do that. If you do reinstall with the notion of getting some of the saved stuff back, for- get it. I saved mine in D\C2\NDW, and the Norton installation program went over there and found it and insisted on work- ing with that no matter how much I told it not to. The designer of that installation program is another prime candidate for mayhem. Except for the installation program, though, I really like Norton Desktop for Windows, and I think you will, too. Rec- ommended. XTree Easy, the file and disk management choice for laptop users and those new to computing. SSSS] VimSaf e catches viruses before they KQ have a chance to attack your PC. And I VimSafe/LAN protects the PC's on your network. ViruSae GOLD UP A All the experts agree, the value of Gold is up. Over a million computer users have invested in XTree for improved produc- tivity because it's the industry's most logical and easy-to-use high performance, file and disk management software. And JCTreeGold 2.5 is the one file and disk management utility that builds on the strengths of every MS-DOS package, including DOS 5.0. To list just a few highlights in our XTree Gold 2.5 portfolio; there's unsurpassed power and speed to enhance your PC performance and productivity, including a wealth of viewers - over 50 for spreadsheets, database, word processing AllSaf e, the comprehensive security product that includes virus protectior access control and security reporting 92 BYTE • JANUARY 1992 USER'S COLUMN More Goodies Although you don't need them for Win- dows, a few other products make it a great deal more fun. Icon Paks I and II provide all kinds of nifty little icons — balloons, birds, government buildings, trains, tanks, flags, programmer symbols, you name it. After Dark, the famous Flying Toasters screen blanker, will put fish, lightning, and other stuff, including messages, on your screen when you're not using it. One reason to adopt Windows is that it helps make PComp.itible computers fun again. Maybe not quite as much fun as a Mac, but it's getting there. One warning: once you start customizing your icons, it's hard to know where to stop. And Yet More One problem with Windows is that the standard fonts are, if not really yucky, at least not very sparkling. The Graphics Ul- tra board comes with some better fonts, but there aren' t enough of them. There's an easy fix for this: More Fonts gives you scalable typefaces, about as many as you'll ever want, with more com- ing. They look nice, especially with the Graphics Ultra board. There's a wide va- riety, from formal to fun, with patterns, outlines, shadows, reverses, and all the other stuff you'd expect. They're easy to install, and they work fast and efficient- ly. If that's not enough, there's also Dis- play Faces, 26 more typefaces ranging from Geneva to cursive script to Zbats, which are Dingbats for the PC. What more could you want? Recommended. It's Me, Blast You! I like MathCAD. It's easier to use than most other math programs, and MathCAD makes it a lot easier to create documents that have numbers in them. If you're look- ing for a present for a computer-using high school or college student — regardless of major — I have no hesitation in recom- mending this program. I would have killed for it when I was in school. MathCAD lets you simply muck about with numbers and equations, doing com- plicated things and getting the right an- swer. In other words, it lets you get a feel for how mathematics works to describe the world. That's terribly important for any educated person, whether he or she is going to teach English, go into account- ing, become a physicist, or just wants to understand the world better. The new ver- sion of MathCAD for Windows integrates into the Windows environment nicely, and on a 386 or a 486 with a math chip, it runs so fast you hardly notice the delays. I'm fond of MathCAD, but this seems to be a month for complaints. When I in- stalled the program, it insisted that I give it my name. All right, that's becoming a common way of trying to control software piracy, and I don't disapprove. Then it wanted a company name. I'm not a company. I'm just me. Sure, there's a legal entity known as J. E. Pour- nelle & Associates, but I don't need that splattered over every program I have. So I put in my name and left the company name blank; it wouldn't install. I tried spaces. Same story. I finally typed in BLAST YOU ! ! , and that worked fine; so now my copy of MathCAD for Windows identi- fies itself as being used by Jerry Pournelle, BLAST YOU!! Oh, well. MathCAD isn't the only program with silly installation rules. Highly recommended. Math Blaster Plus We have a whole slew of new education- al software. I generally let Roberta pick hale rest Of market unchanged. and all the popular graphics file formats like TIFF, PCX, GIF, AutoCAD XTreeGotd file archiving lelsyou compress files intoiheindusirysiandardZip format to fDWG and free up disk spocejnaking slorose simpler. DXF), Postscript (EPS), Microsoft Windows Paint and more. Then there's the integrated file compression with Zip archives that'll save all kinds of space on your hard disk. You can even create self- extracting Zip files! And with your investment in Gold you Now XTreeGold lets you view graphics file formats in ail the original colors and free of aijy screen distortion, plus you're given size, dimension and color spec information, too. get an enhanced Application Menu with AutoBuild that installs, displays and runs more than 1,000 programs. Plus the Compare/ Search function that lets you easily find old or duplicate files. As well as the Undelete command that will recover accidentally deleted files. Whew! The list goes on and on. Plus you'll find all the 24 karat features that have made JCTreeGold the international standard for file and disk management, like pull-down menus, fast, single- keystroke commands, integrated mouse support, text editor, context-sensitive help XTreeNet simplifies file and network management for Novell® Netware administrators. xtree for UNIX® systems, the first easy-to-use file and disk management system for the multi-user UNIX environment. and extensive, easy-to-follow documen- tation. So put away your wagon; ask your software broker about XTreeGold 2.5 -the investment with built-in productivity to get you moving and shaking faster. For the name of the )CTree broker nearest you, call (800)843-6888 Ext. 550. Buying "GOLD" pays interest! Registered XTreeGold investors can upgrade anytime to XTreeGold 2.5 for as little as $19.95. Anyone can sell short other file managers and receive XTree Gold 2.5 for $49.95. Call (800)282-5003 Ext. 975. XTREE COMPANY 4330 Santa Fe Road, San Luis Obispo, CA 93401 Circle 185 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 186). JANUARY 1992 • B Y T E 93 STACKER SOFTWARE DOUBLES YOUR DISK recomputing MVP 19 9 1 -WINNER- PC Magazine Award tor Technical Excellence Slac Electronics Used to be, when your hard disk got full you had to empty your wallet and buy a bigger one. Or, you could buy yourself some time by deleting a bunch of your files. At Stac'we didn't think this was much of a choice. So we invented Stacker.™ In the process, we created an instant bestseller. Which isn't surprising, considering that Stacker instantly gives you twice the disk capacity you ha J before. No^ aren't you glad you didn't rush out and buy a new hard disk? How? By compressing all the files on your disk- applications, utilities, documents, spreadsheets, data, everything-using our patented Stacker LZS data compression technology Don't know a thing about data compression? Don't worry You don't have to. In fact, you don't have to think about Stacker at all. Stacker works behind the scenes, expanding your data when you need it and compressing it again as it goes back to disk. Automatically It doesn't even matter what kind of software you use. Because Stacker is 100% compatible .with everything from business and graphics programs to undelete utilities and low- level formatters. Not to mention the latest versions of DOS 8 and Windows! If you think doubling your disk capacity will slow you down, think again. You see, Stacker is fast. So fast, in fact, that it actually improves the performance of many of your applications. Stacker is also 100% safe-something no other data compression product on the market can say Which explains why every leading utility software publisher and tape drive manufacturer uses our technology in their own products. Speaking of software publishing and hardware manufacturing, we do both. Which means we give you a choice. If your PC can't spare a slot, or if your PC is a portable, a laptop or a notebook, the software on the opposite page is just what you need. But if you're one of those who insist on smaller driver size and the highest possible speed and compression ratio, you'll want to install one of our three hardware versions. Installation, by the way, is a snap. Just plug the board into any slot-no jumpers or switches to set. The software practically installs In addition to the software-only co-processor-with-software versions: Stacker XT/8, Stacker AT/16 and Stacker MC/16, eachfealuring the unique Stacker LZS chip. As data is stored on your disk, Stacker instantly compresses it. Then, when your PC neads the data, Stacker instantly expands it. You don't have to do a thing. iteplf Ttpvpn m * s ? m ) Stacker is now available in three optimizes your disk for you. To find just how much Stacker can do for your disk, your data and your wallet, call 1-800-522-7822 Ext. 298. Or ask your dealer for a demonstration. And see how well we Stac up. STAC The Data Compression Company Circle 1 56 on Inquiry Card. USER'S COLUMN through that pile to see what she'll rec- ommend. One she likes is Math Blaster Plus for the Mac; this evaluation is based on her notes. The start-up program is a snap. Enter your name at the prompt, and Blasternaut and his robot Spot invite you to join them in outer space, where ships race across the sky. The program is built around four ad- venture games. The graphics are neat, even on the tiny Mac SE screen. The 750 math facts cover most elemen- tary school arithmetic facts, from addition through percentages. The program is far from perfect. The error loops aren't as well thought out as we'd like, and sometimes it will tell you that you got a perfect score when you didn't. You'll always reach the Hall of Fame no matter how lousy you do. However, Math Blaster Plus does make flash-card drill more palatable. There's an editor, so a teacher or parent can customize the drills to concentrate on areas where more work is needed. Probably nothing is going to make math drill really fun, but this gets closer than most methods. If you have a Mac and a child in the relevant grades, this will likely do some good. Disney World For best results with Disney software, first buy the Disney Sound Source. This is a little speaker that plugs into your PCom- patible's printer port (you can do this while your printer is still active; install Sound Source and forget it). It didn't come with any software, so its only use seems to be to run Disney software, but that's quite enough reason to have one. One Disney program is Mickey's ABC's: A Day at the Fair. 1 1 comes in liv- ing color with music and speech. Roberta says: "The ABC program is recommended for preschool kids ages 2 to 5. Installation takes only three steps. Beware of the copy- protection scheme. The adult installing the software needs to match up a black draw- ing of Mickey in a particular pose on brown paper with a cartoon cell on the screen. The black drawing is almost im- possible to see on the very deep brown pa- per. Don't give up on this, because the part designed for the kids is worth it." In fact, she says a lot more, all enthusi- astic. The program is self-prompting: if you do nothing, a female voice gives you directions. Then Mickey talks to you, leads you around the house, and generally does things in response to your typing in let- ters. This is about as painless a way to learn the alphabet as you'll find. Roberta continues: "Pressing a letter can initiate different actions depending on Mickey's location. Press the uppercase or lowercase F, and Mickey slides down a firepole in his bedroom floor (every boy's dream) and he's off to the fair. He meets different animals at the fair and competes with Donald Duck. Donald or Mickey wins the contest depending on the sequence, and Goofy shoots the starting gun, which presents the word bang, like in a vaudeville scene. After the contest, Goofy presents the prize ribbon." And so forth. The cartoons are Disney quality, the voices are true to the characters, and the various actions you get from pressing dif- ferent letters are fun to watch. All told, it's another painless way to get kids to do alphabet drills. Roberta, who has taught about 15,000 people to read, sums it up this way: "This software is a step in the right direction and would probably have enough variety to keep most children's interest at that age. No software designed for this age group will last very long. Learning that letters have sounds is the first step in learning to read. This software can help you explore 96 BYTE • JANUARY 1992 Circle 64 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 65). iRl J3A01MS DVdS I MVO 03 iraan <«PP jioddns ipaj ou sbij suiojqoid ijiliqipduioo sbij •^ V T^ i pjieoq ysia poj joduii paBoq pmoasiQ MP CD §■■■■■■ go .3 < ffo AMI EISA The Only Game In Tbwn For EISA, there is only one player to consider— AMI. Whether it's motherboards, BIOS, utilities, or SCSI host adapters, AMI is the single source for advanced EISA technology. ADVANCED EISA & MODU- LAR CPU MOTHERBOARDS With AMI leading the way in EISA motherboard designs, you will benefit from bulletproof performance and proven reliability. ■ EZ-Flex— A new modular CPU design offering easy upgrades to future technology. ■ Enterprise II— A proven EISA per- former, popular for critical applications. (510)652-5464 (800)688-1520 The Literacy Connection $100 fax:(510)652-5040 (818)841-3326 The Literacy Connection Circle 1 163 on Inquiry Card. fax:(716)873-0906 3960 Laurel Canyon Blvd., Suite 372 Circle 1 153 on Inquiry Card. Studio City, CA 9 1604 Norton Desktop for Windows $149 Circle 1 158 on Inquiry Card. Symantec Corp. Graphics Ultra 10201 Torre Ave. with 512 KB $599 The Lost Admiral $59.95 Cupertino, C A 95014 (800)441-7234 with 1 MB $799 Quantum Quality Productions, Inc. ATI Technologies, Inc. 1046 River Ave. (408) 253-9600 3761 Victoria Park Ave. Flemington, NJ 08822 fax: (408) 252-4694 Scarborough, Ontario (908) 788-2799 Circle 1 164 on Inquiry Card. Canada M1W3S2 Circle 1 159 on Inquiry Card. (416)756-0718 386Max 6.0 $99.95 fax:(416)756-0720 Magazine Rack CD-ROM. .$89.95 Qualitas, Inc. Circle 1 154 on Inquiry Card. Bureau of Electronic Publishing, Inc. 7101 Wisconsin Ave., Suite 1386 141 NewRd. Bethesda,MD 20814 Parsippany, NJ 07054 (800)733-1377 (800) 828-4766 (301)907-6700 (201)808-2700 fax:(301)718-6060 fax: (201) 808-2676 Circle 1 165 on Inquiry Card. Circle 1 160 on Inquiry Card. the sound/symbol connection requisite to learning to read. Highly recommended." The Literacy Connection You're probably tired of my mentioning it, but Roberta's reading program, known as The Literacy Connection, continues to get results in field tests. She's got it in half a dozen schools now. Teaching reading is tricky, because a lot of kids — between 25 percent and 33 percent — are "natural read- ers" who pretty well learn without in- struction. Another 25 percent or so will learn quickly and easily. The rest have problems, and the worse the problem, the more important it is to be systematic about reading instruction. Unfortunately, given today's classroom problems, being sys- tematic is precisely what many teachers cannot do. Roberta's program proceeds systemati- cally. It has 70 lessons. Most children don't need them all. Somewhere around lesson 35, they take off on their own — which is, after all, what you want to happen. We've never heard of anyone who got through all 70 lessons and was still unable to read. But then when Roberta was the teacher of last resort in the L.A. Juvenile Justice sys- tem, she got plenty of "hopeless cases" and never failed to teach any of them, either. Winding Down The big problem with CD-ROMs is that the access/retrieval software isn't up to 98 BYTE • JANUARY 1992 TO Wfr „ so you can us j^ me n t s thougnt t tne revolution one *$$$& hgdg^ in le ss 25 MHz and a i s anoa the batte y^ yQU Plus botn let you d continue v n eares?ZenithDataSystem hAmenca '^J^*A-' ZENITH data systems Groupe Bull '386 and the Intel Inside Logo are trademarks of Intel Corporation. MastersPort and Premier System Management are trademarks of Zenith Data Systems Corporation. MS-DOS and Microsoft Windows are trademarks of Microsoft Corporation. 'Under normal rest/resume conditions. Battery life varies with application, CPU clock speed, memory configuration, peripheral options attached, hard disk access, and display settings. Copyright © 1991 Zenith Data Systems Corporation Circle 1 87 on Inquiry Card. Circle 178 on Inquiry Card. USER'S COLUMN VSRSNAP, the handy screen snapshot utility for capturing screens, windows or parts of a screen in the OS/2 PM environment VSRSNAP version 1.03 for OS/2 PM ThePM capture program Features: • The whole desktop or any area of the screen can be captured • The current pointer shape is always captured • Many different file formats are supported • Full support of the OS/2 PM clipboard • Online help • Changeable time lapse between choosing and grabbing, giving you time to pull down a menu, select text etc., before capturing • Runs under OS/2 PM version 1 .2 or higher Supported file formats: • All OS/2 PM bitmap formats • All Microsoft Windows 3.0 bitmap formats • OS/2 PM metafile format • TIFF 24 bits • ZPIXMAP (X_Windows) Prices: Single user license $195.= Site license $3,900.: To order VSRSNAP write or fax to: VSR Holland P.O. Box 2584, 3500 GN Utrecht The Netherlands Fax: +31 30 31 04 26 (Phone: +31 30 32 49 44) QuickTrace The Scan & Paint Autotrace Program I >||||i I i||||i 'Mil I * i||||||||||!< Now you can scan, create, edit, print and even vectorize images — all with one program. You can work easily and quickly with large black-and-white images upto 4Mbytes such as logos, maps, clip arts and drawings. QuickTrace for Windows supports ScanJet and Scan Man scanners with full painting functions, and handles Tl FF, PCX and Windows bitmap image Files, automatically converts into CGM, EPSF, DXF, Micrografx PIC/DRW and Adobe Al vector Files. QjmM Developed by w*£i Information & Control Lab. Co. Nakajima Bldg., 5F, 11-22, Shinjuku 5-chome, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo 1 60, Japan Phone:3-5379-7470 / Fax:3-5379-7471 for Windows $295 DOS Versions {supports Autotrace function only) forDTPdBSSaSS 8 ^-) $245 Convert into EPSF, CGM. Micrografx PIC, DRW for AutoCAD DXF $295 for Lotus Freelance Plus $245 PLEASE CONTACT: 212-605-2339 OR SEE EGGHEAD NEAREST YOU IN U.S. CONTACT REFLEX IN U.K.: 0734-314611 jrm. Mitsubishi international Corporation Technology Affairs Dept. 520 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10022 Phone:212-605-2339 / Fax:212-605-1847 for Windows 3-0 •Quicktrace can input images scanned by Niscan, Logitec ScanMan and etc. »OEM inquiry welcome the technology. However, I recently re- ceived a disk from Aries Systems that demonstrates their Knowledge Finder software; this one is for a very large med- ical-reference text database. Knowledge Finder is neat stuff, and if you're contem- plating making a CD-ROM, you will want to look into it. The CD-ROM of the month is Maga- zine Rack, which is published by Infor- mation Access (355 Lakeside Dr., Foster City, CA 94404, (800) 227-8431 or (510) 378-5000) and is available from the Bureau of Electronic Publishing. It includes about 100,000 articles from 300 different pub- lications, indexed to make things fairly easy to find. While I'm at it, Meckler ( 1 1 Ferry Lane W, Westport, CT 06880, (203) 226-6967) has a book that if you need it, you need it bad: CD-ROM Research Collections, An Evaluative Guide by Pat Ensor (1991, ISBN 0-88736-779-8). This lists nearly every known CD-ROM database — and there are a lot of them — along with ad- dresses, prices (if known), equipment re- quirements, and some comments on use- fulness. It covers everything from chemicals to sports to psychiatry collec- tions. The book of the month is Lois Mac- Master Bujold's The Warrior's Appren- tice, action adventure science fiction of the old school. The woman can write. The game of the month is The Lost Ad- miral. It has some flaws and probably is the silliest role-playing game I have ever seen, but as a game it grows on you. The game mechanics are simple enough to learn, even from the wretched documentation. This is a game, not a simulation, but most of the principles of naval war can be ap- plied. Of course, if you want modern naval realism, get Harpoon. It has some new sce- narios. All told, a good month, and I learned something: you can install Windows with no trouble at all, provided that your Very Significant Other doesn't mind standing on one foot like a flamingo. ... ■ Jerry Pournelle holds a doctorate in psy- chology and is a science fiction writer who also earns a comfortable living writing about computers present and future. Jerry welcomes readers comments and opin- ions. Send a self-addressed, stamped en- velope to Jerry Pournelle, do BYTE, One Phoenix Mill Lane, Peterborough, NH 03458. Please put your address on the let- ter as well as on the envelope. Due to the high volume of letters, Jerry cannot guar- antee a personal reply. You can also con- tact him on BIX as "jerry p." 100 BYTE -JANUARY 1992 Circle 74 on Inquiry Card The^NotebookOfTheYear'' AndTwo Powerfii Sequels. \ ANAffSTS I CHCKE ffiSTBUY BRITISH EDITION snaftp NOTEBOOK OFTHE1EAR pop* Premium^ 1 Exec ,M 386SX/20 Model 43V New Lower Pricini $2395 20 MHz, 386SX Processing 2 MB RAM, 40 MB Hard Drive VGA Monochrome Display With 32 Grav Shades >ii^«#^ : Premium Exec 386SX/2 Color Model 63V/4 $4995 25 MHz, 386SX Processing 4 MB RAM, 60 MB Hard Drive VGA Color Display New Low $2995 25 MHz, 386SX Processing 4 MB RAM, 60 MB Hard Drive VGA Monochrome Display With 32 Grav Shades Only one year after its introduction, the Premium Exec 386SX/20 has become one of the most popular notebook computers today, with sales of more than 70,000 units and climbing. And among industry experts, the Premium Exec 386SX/20 is winning such coveted awards as "Notebook of the Year," "Analyst's Choice," "Best Buy" and the "VIP Award." So, you can be assured AST delivers the best combination of price, performance, quality and customer support on the market today. And if you need a color display, or 25 MHz processing power, here are two more winners to meet your specific portable computing needs: Premium Exec 386SX/25 For Split-Second Processing — When every minute counts, ask for this speed demon. It delivers super-fast 25 MHz speed to conquer any number of appli- cations with ease. And at a cost comparable to other manufacturers' 20 MHz systems, AST's Premium Exec 386SX/25 gives you a 25% increase in performance. Now that's value. Premium Exec 386SX/25C For Fabulous Color At A Fabulous Price — Here's your chance to take advantage of a top-notch 256-color note- Backed By AST's Award-Winning Service And Toll-Free Support For More Information On AST Products Call 1-800-876-4AST book with 25 MHz processing for only $4995. Its bright, fast VGA display offers a resolution of 640 x 480, perfect for Windows-based software. Made In America To Stringent Quality Stan- dards — Designed and manufactured right here in the U.S., our Premium Exec notebooks offer state-of-the-art features and performance. Backed By Award-Winning AST Service and Support — We're never out of touch. Whether you need to reach us by computer, telephone, mail, or even by FAX, you can count on AST for a full range of service and support programs. This includes ExeCare™ an optional program which guarantees your Premium Exec will be replaced within 24 hours. Ask For The "Notebook Of The Year" — For the best all-around notebook computer, look to the experts. Their choice is unanimous — the Premium Exec. For more information, or the name of the dealer nearest you, call AST today at 1-800-876-4AST. COMPUTER The Power Of Choice e MSRR dealer prices may van' Awards: Notebook Of The Year, PC La/Him December 1991; Vll> Portable Ofjur, November 1991; Analyst's Choice, PC Week, April 1991; Best Buy, PC Murium' (Hriiish luliiion), April 1991. AST markets products worldwide; outside ol the United States and Canada call AST Inter natkma! n:i (714) 727-9292 or l ; AX to (714) 727-8585. AST, AST logo and Premium registered, Exec, F.xeCare trademarks AST Research, Inc. Copyright © 1991 AST Research, Inc. All rights reserved. Circle 19 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 20). When It Comes lb Offers The Com System Boards MNE486 High-Performance EISA486 System Board ► 486 25/33MHz (Upgradable to 50/66MHz) ► 128KB of external write-back cache ► IDE, floppy, S/P, PS2 mouse ports ► Mylex BIOS, surface mount design ► 50MHz available 1,1992 SCSI Host Adapters DNE960 EISA SCSI-2 Host Adapter ► SCSI-2 (fast and wide), 20MB/s peak throughput ► EISA bus-master transfer rates up to 33MB/s ► Support for all popular SCSI devices ► Disconnect/reconnect, scatter/gather, synchronous drive support, disk mirroring and duplexing ► DOS, OS/2, UNIX, NetWare support DCE376 EISACaching SCSI Host Adapter ► Intel 80376, up to 8MB cache, bus-master transfer rate up to 25MB/s ► Disconnect/reconnect, scatter/gather, mirroring, duplexing, tape backup ► DOS, OS/2, UNIX, SCO UNIX, NetWare, Windows 3.0 Graphics Controllers GXE020A/B High-Resolution EISA Graphics Controllers ► TI 34020 32/40MHz graphics processor ► 1600 x 1200 or 1280 x 1024 resolution, 8 bit, 256 colors ► TIGA 2.05, Windows 3.0, AutoCAD, X-Window support GLE9II Fast EISA Graphics Accelerator ► S3 graphics accelerator ► 1280 x 960 x 16 or 1 024 x 768 x 256 resolution ► Windows 3.0, GEM 3.1, AutoCAD, X-Window, AutoShade Ethernet LAN Adapters Multi-Channel EISA Ethernet LAN Adapter ► Four lOBase-T Ethernet ports ► Four Intel 82596 32-bit Network Interface Controllers (NIC) ► 256KB dual-ported SRAM (64KB per NIC) ► Up to 16 individual 10Mbps Ethernet lOBase-T ports per host ► Supports Novell NetWare 3.11, UNIX TCP/IP and NDIS LNE390A EISA Ethernet LAN Adapter ► DP8390 Network Interface Controller ► EISA shared-memoryup to 16MB/s ► Novell certified ► NetWarev2.15, 2.2, 3.0, 3.1 and 3.11, UNIX, OS/2 LAN Manager EISA, Only Mylex plete Solution. Multiprocessing System Available Ql, 1992 ► 64-bit 26ZMB/s fully symmetric multiprocessing bus ► Four 486/50 CPUs with up to 512KB of write-back cache ►All EISA peripherals available from Mylex, Mylex BIOS ► UNIX VA, Novell Netware 286/386, SCO MPX, MS-DOS, Windows 3.0, LAN Manager support Multiprocessor Interrupt Controller ECC Memory Controller EISA Bus Interface Backplane CPU Board Disk Array Subsystem (Multi-Channel) Available Ql, 1992 ► The most advanced and unique disk array subsystem- includes disk array enclosure, controller, host adapter and software ► Five fast and wide SCSI-2 channels on a single-host adapter card- each channel supports up to 20MB/speak throughput ► EISA SCSI host adapter uses Intel i960CA 32-bit RISC processor ► Up to 64MB of write-back cache provided ► Striping with built-in support for various RAID levels ► Fault tolerance features including automatic drive failure detection, hot replacement and transparent rebuild DAC960 Circle 306 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 307). For more information on these or any Mylex products, please contact us atl-800-77-MYLEX or 1-510-796-6100. Or, fax the domestic sales department at 1-510-745-8016 and international sales at 1-510-745-7521 . All trademarks are the properly of their respective holders. ©1991, Mylex Corporation. Specifications subject to change without notice. nrvwx Rely On The MINUTEMAN UPS For LAN Protection Spikes. Surges. Overvoltage. Undervoltage. Brownouts. These things happen. And they can do irreparable damage to your equipment and data — unless you're protected with MINUTEMAN Uninterruptible Power Supplies. MINUTEMAN protects all your equipment and data. All the time. In fact, in the event of power failure, it will safely and automatically shut down an unattended network. No matter what your needs are, MINUTEMAN can pro- tect and interface with everything from a stand alone workstation to the largest of the IBM AS/400s. We also provide 220-volt international models and Automatic Voltage Regulators. So call the experts for LAN protection and receive a free power protection package. 1-800-238-7272 MINUTEMAN detects power failure, alerts network and continues to provide computer grade power until shut down command is issued. See us at CeBIT '92 Hall 17 USA Pavilion STANDBY UPS MODELS 300 VA to 2300 VA Sinewave output Small, lightweight design ON-LINE UPS MODELS 500 VA to 10,000 VA True double conversion Static by-pass standard Sinewave output Lower pricing than ever UNATTENDED SHUT DOWN MINUTEMAN UPSs are network ready for unattended, orderly shut down of every available operating system. FOR L.A.N. NOVILL L/tIS TESTED and APPROVED MINUT Novell approved UPS monitor boards UNINTERRUPTIBLE POWER SUPPLIES © Para Systems, Inc. 1 455 LeMay Drive, Carrollton, Texas 75007 Phone: 2 1 4-446-7363 FAX: 2 1 4-446-90 1 Circle 121 on Inquiry Card. BUSINESS CONNECTION Murphy's Law and Interoperability WAYNE RASH J R M any people in the computer industry have a deep and abiding interest in Murphy's Law. They firmly believe that when you examine something up close, much of it doesn't work. . These people are pessimists, of course. Un- fortunately, they're frequently right. For those of us who have had to deal with moving complex information between platforms, it's clear that the person who first wrote "interoperable systems won't" knew what he was talking about. For years, interoper- ability was an unrealized dream, and so-called compati- ble hardware and software packages frequently weren't. Times have changed. It's now possible to find imple- mentations of popular PC programs for a variety of com- puter systems. You can use the same spreadsheet pack- age on your Mac, your DOS PC, and your Unix system. You can process your prose on the same word process- ing program, whether you're using a PC, a Mac, or even a VAX. No longer do you have to worry about finding ways to convert files. After all, you're using the same package on different systems. Or are you? Defining "Compatible" One of the best ways to ensure software compatibility between systems would seem to be to use the same ap- plications software across platforms. Using WordPer- fect on your DOS, OS/2, Mac, and Unix personal com- puters and on your DEC, Data General, and IBM host systems should guarantee common access to any word processing file from any machine. That's true, but us- ing the same software on all platforms doesn't necessar- ily ensure total interoperability. The problem is that there are several levels of compatibility. The ability to transfer files between two word pro- cessing packages means only that you don't need to re- type the document text. You probably won't be able to preserve any special characters, formatting commands, or other attributes, although in some cases a word processor from one vendor, for example, will recognize some or all file attributes of another. Applications that run on several platforms may support all file attributes across all systems. Often, however, the different versions are out of sync. That means that fea- tures available to PC users may not yet be available to Mac or Unix clients, or vice versa. Still other packages have incompatible file formats, and nothing you can do short of custom programming will allow you to exchange data between them. You might find yourself in this situation if you try to exchange Sharing files among the many systems and applications in today's office inevitably leads to confusion data between a financial package running on an IBM mainframe and a DOS word processor. Work-Flow Changes The reason that there's something of a gap between the way applications treat foreign files and the way users want them treated has a lot to do with apparent differences between the way users work in groups and the way ap- plications developers write ap- plications. When people work in teams— project teams, de- partments, hierarchies, or whatever — they normally share responsibility for the ultimate work product. They may, for example, parcel out sections of a report-writing project and then assemble the sections for final editing. Other companies delegate the initial work on a project to a junior member, who then passes it to others who edit, add material, or oth- erwise change it. Once the initial writing for a product is complete, it passes to final production, where it gets a final scrub for format- ting changes, minor correc- tions, and layout before taking its final form. So the document, spreadsheet, or other work file passes through many hands be- fore it shows up in finished form. Until recently, most of- fice workers performed these functions on paper, and a sec- retary did most of the work. Now, with the popularity of heterogeneous LANs, elec- tronic versions of a document pass among many users who are often on different sys- tems and running different application programs. The file changes its form many times as it passes through this process. Often, something gets lost in the shuffle. Common Denominators LANs make exchanging files very easy. That's why it is so important for applications to handle conversions ILLUSTRATION : MICHAEL MACLAUGHLIN ©1992 JANUARY 1992 - B Y T E 105 Circle 29 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 30). ICy yjS7^jflp jfjK / lH^W BUSINESS CONNECTION = Multimedia CIA World Tour n = MPC Title! With info straight from the CIA -- = = Plus Maps from Hammond, Inc. and flags & = = National Anthem segments New version! $99 = 1 Monarch Notes on CD-ROM § = Over 200 Notes oh One CD-ROM Disc = = The Entire Collection (manyowoiprmo Only $99 e= == Itie definitive muttimedia source for understanding the = = world s greatest literature. PC & Mac == j§ Greatest Books Ever Written § = The Ultimate Electronic Book PC & Mac $295 = W Countries of The World g = Full text of over 100 Study Books, Maps, = = National Anthems, Flags & more! PC & Mac $495 = 1 U.S. History on CD-ROM I = WINNER 1991 OPA BEST EDUCATIONAL PRODUCT = sss Text & Images PC/Mac *S50 rebate-final cost $349 = 1 Pioneer CD-ROM 6 Pak 3 = 6 PC/MAC DISCS BUNDLED FOR ONLY $395! = ^^ • U S. Htstoiy • Counlries/World • Shakespeare • Holmes • Birds • Sottwore Potpourri ^= = Six Pack & Minichanger (Save over $1000) $ 1 489 = SONY Laser Library m Enhanced BUNDLES! CALLj With Monarch Notes! H M High I Performance SONY CD-ROM Drive Kits = Fast, MPC compatible drive kits in-stock = SONY CDU-535 kit (internal) call =3 SONY CDU-541 kit (internal) MPC ready call = SONY CDU-7201 kit (desktop) call = SONY CDU-721 1 kit (desktop) MPC ready call = SONY Disc Caddies (5 or more) SlOeach =: Also: Pioneer Minichanger, CDT, NEC, Hitachi, = WORM & Erasable drives, in-stock - Call H Multimedia CD-ROM Titles = = Microsoft Bookshelf best selling CD-ROM disc Best Price = S3 Mixed Up Mother Goose 'fun* educational disc S59 5= = Beethoven's Multimedia MPC classic disc $79 = = Grolier's Encyclopedia 21 volumes, VGA pictures Call = = Mammals-Nat. Geographic/IBM pictures & text Call = = Compton's Multi-Media Encyclopedia 795 = s Libraries / Science / Business ^ = Between Heaven & Hell II even stranger $99 ss S5 Magazine Rack 100 s of current magazines 78 = = Voyage to the Planets astounding Voyager trip 1 19 == = Coates Art Review colorful, classic art 129 = = TIME Magazine Compact Almanac 5,ooo articles Call == ^= Family Doctor home medical guide 98 ^= = Variety Video Directory Home video reference 189 = = Zip++ Every US address 195 S=5 = McGraw-Hill Ref. Set 1 00,000 terms; 7.300 articles 495 = ^= Speed Dial entire U.S. Yellow Pages on one disc Sale =s =5 Oxford Textbook of Medicine general reference 595 == ^s PC-Sig Library new edition, newest version Call S: = Oxford English Dictionary over 250,000 headwords! 889 = = Phonedisc USA Telephone Directory -East or West 989 = ^s, * MORE! Over 300 different titles available * =- = LOWEST PRICES! Free tech support = ^= Bureau On-line CD-ROM Library. FREE access to =: ^ 12 different CD-ROM Discs. CALL HI ^ = GSA#GS00K91AGS5280 ^ = HOURS M-F 8:30am - 6:30pm EST = Bureau of *%S£g M ^Electronic Publishing, Inc.^ = Dept. 8. 141 New Rood, Porsippany, NJ 07054 = mmmmm CALL 800-828-4766ORDERS 201 -808-2700 information transparently. Unfortunately, the process usually isn't transparent. Often, complete conversions aren't possible, and you may have to settle for conversions to and from ASCII as the least common denominator. Most applications can convert files to and from ASCII. You might, for example, convert a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet to ASCII in order to import it into a WordStar document. You retain the numbers but lose special characters, formatting, and formu- las. Even ASCII doesn't always work as an intermediary, because some programs still don't support it. In that case, you'll need a conversion utility to serve as an interme- diary. It's unfortunate that a file must pass through all those permutations just so you can get a plain text copy. Fortunately, there is life beyond ASCII. For example, Lotus 1-2-3 can read dBase files, and Excel can read Lotus 1 -2-3 files. The program importing the file converts it directly into the native file format. This works better than converting to ASCII, but you still usually lose some attributes. There are exceptions: Excel, for example, can interpret formulas and other attributes from Lotus 1 -2-3 and a few other spread- sheet file formats. Some developers design their packages to work with other programs. When I wrote my recent book WordPerfect Office 3.0: The Basics (John Wiley & Sons, 1991), I sent WordPerfect 5.1 files to the publisher, who used PageMaker for the page layout. The typesetting equipment accepted the text from PageMaker but re- jected the embedded WordPerfect graph- ics-format illustrations. I had to use Inset Systems' HiJaak to convert these images to TIFF. In such a vast wilderness of file formats, you'd think that the best salvation would be to use the same software on all the com- puters at your business. If you're using WordPerfect on your IBM clones, for ex- ample, perhaps you should use WordPer- fect on your Macs and your VAX as well. Then you'd be able to move documents around with no problems of any kind what- ever. Right? Not quite. The Big Iron Differences between platforms become more noticeable when you move into the world of minicomputers and mainframes. Companies like Lotus and WordPerfect also make software for larger computers outside of the personal computer market. WordPerfect got its start writing word pro- cessing software for Data General mini- computers. Regardless of their background, though, differences between software ver- sions remain. You can create a WordPerfect file on your personal computer that you can't use with the version of WordPerfect that's running on your VAX down the hall. Why? Because the versions for the mini- computer and mainframe worlds tend to lag behind the personal computer versions. WordPerfect 5.1 for the PC was out months before VAX customers using ver- sion 5.0 received their upgrade. The spread between WordPerfect versions for some versions of Unix is even wider, so choos- ing WordPerfect for a corporate standard may still require file conversion. Some companies respond by ignoring the problem, but most companies can't do that. Others plan to convert everyone to one system. Unfortunately, many compa- nies have such a large investment in the central computer and its attendant termi- nals that conversion to personal computers proceeds slowly. It's not at all unusual to find workgroups in which some users have computers while others are still using dumb terminals. For these groups to work ITEMS DISCUSSED HiJaak Inset Systems 71 Commerce Dr. Brookf ield, CT 06804 (203) 740-2400 Circle 1239 on Inquiry Card. Lotus 1-2-3 (Unix, DOS, Windows, IBM System/370) Lotus Development Corp. 55 Cambridge Pkwy. Cambridge, MA 02142 (617)577-8500 Circle 1240 on Inquiry Card. Microsoft Word (Windows, DOS, Macintosh, Unix) Microsoft Excel (Windows, Macintosh) Microsoft Corp. 1 Microsoft Way Redmond, WA 98052 (206) 882-8080 Circle 1241 on Inquiry Card. WordPerfect (Windows, DOS, Macintosh, Unix, VMS, IBM System/370, Data General) WordPerfect Corp. 1 555 North Technology Way Orem, UT 84057 (801)225-5000 Circle 1242 on Inquiry Card. CAD/CAM Software 3,000 bucks for a CAD program? Are you kidding? DesignCAD 2D is only $349, and it has more and better features than the other CAD programs that cost $3,000! And, if you're ready for a three dimensional CAD program, there is the state-of-the-art DesignCAD 3D . . . for only $499! \ DesignCAD is the software used in the design of Andre Agassi's tennis rackets, the Patriot missile, and scores J of other high tech, low tech, and no tech products. So what's all the racket about? It's because we believe that it's silly to spend more on a CAD system ' i than you would on a word processor. Agree? Well, the ball's in your court. Your product designed with DesignCAD? Let us know, and maybe we'll put it in one of our ads. lk-M m mm eeH m -'JM 5 T . lH 1 1 1 >■ 1 1 1 « J ■■■ — * ■ — >H ■^ i ■ nn i i i i i i r j ■■ i — « i — i i ^m i i MAGAZINE MAGAZINE EDITORS' I editors* 1 CHOICE | | CHOICE | Circle 1 8 on Inquiry Card. For a free demo disk and 16 page color brochure, contact: J American Small Business Computers, Inc. One American Way« Pryor, Oklahoma 74361 (918)825-4844* FAX (918) 825-6359 - European Headquarters: 102 Rue La Fontaine* 75016 Paris, France Phone 331 4520 6540* FAX 331 4520 6539 *m £ m/e for Ma ****** WMId U jHK* /Mussels • Bucharest • Istanbul • ^^||pL-Eragu^ ,..•, Sao Paulo • Tokyo • Other offices in: anbul • London "okyo • Warsaw Circle 87 on Inquiry Card People are talking about us. F77L-EM/32 & Lahey Ergo OS/386 Port mainframe programs as large as 96MB to 386/486's with this 32-bit DOS-Extender compiler. The Winner of PC Magazine's 1988 Technical Excellence Award just got better. New Vfersion 4.0 includes: Programming Tools, Popular Fortran 90 features, Virtual Memory Support, DESQview Support, New Documentation and Free Unlimited Runtime Licenses. F77L-EM/32 $995 OS/386 $395 F77L The fastest real-mode compiler available. F77L can take advantage of your 386 PC by generating 32-bit instructions. New Version 5.0 includes: Fortran 90 features, Weitek Lahey Personal Fortran 77 Version 3.0: Full ANSI 77, Editor, Debugger, Linker, Library Manager, Microsoft and Borland C interfaces. A great learning tool at an unbeatable price. $99 support, and Video Graphics. $595 £#•*$ When people talk about FORTRAN the name mentioned most often is Contact us to discuss our products and your needs, (800) 548-4778 Lahey Computer Systems, Inc. P.O. Box 6091, Incline Village, NV 89450 Tel: (702) 831-2500 FAX: (702) 831-8123 FORTRAN IS OUR FORTE BUSINESS CONNECTION together, they must share information bi- directionally. What should be a simple task, such as sending a page of text from one user to another, may require a file con- version, a file transfer, or even an upload to the host system, followed by a file con- version. For the process to be useful, it needs to work effectively. Often it doesn't. What's the bottom line? There's no way to be certain that you can use the same software on multiple platforms transpar- ently unless you can find someone who has done it already. About the only thing you can assume is that there will be glitch- es, but hopefully minor ones, from time to time. Coping with the Confusion Clearly, you'll find no magic solution if you're dealing with users and workgroups that must work together yet have evolved with their own unique systems and appli- cations. But that should be no surprise by now. What you can do is manage the situ- ation by recognizing these limitations and restructuring your work flow and the re- sources you use to avoid them. You have three basic choices. Your approach de- pends on your business situation, your corporate culture, and your current in- vestment in hardware. Solution 1 : You can simplify your situ- ation by restricting everyone's choice of computers and software and by replacing those systems that don't fit. If everyone has DOS PCs running WordPerfect, Lo- tus 1-2-3, and PageMaker, you won't have any problems. This solution avoids com- patibility and file-conversion problems and minimizes training and upgrade pro- cedures. It's a bit rigid, though, and can get quite expensive if you have to replace much of your computer equipment. It might also make some operations in the work-flow process less efficient: Mac users in the production department won't enjoy learning to use a PC Nevertheless, a com- pany that depends heavily on moving doc- uments from one user to another may find compatibility to be more important than flexibility. Solution 2: Let each user retain his ot her chosen system but choose software for each platform that's interoperable with your other applications. This more relaxed approach is more suitable to the way many businesses work. You might seJect Mi- crosoft Word as your word processor and Excel as your spreadsheet if your work- groups' consist of Macs and PCs running Windows 3.1, for example. This works well only if the applications you need are available on all your systems. Be prepared, however, for unforeseen difficulties. You'll maintain workgroup efficiency, but you 108 BYTE -JANUARY 1992 Circle 148 on Inquiry Card , When there's only one LaserJet® to go around... It's a lesson you learned long ago — how to share with others. But unfortunately, no one ever informed you of the ways to share a LaserJet® printer. .vou learn how to share. So now you've got several people in an office all vying for the rights to a single printer. What do you do? Learn to share with Pacific Connect™. This printer sharing device for the HP LaserJet Series II, IID, III, and HID is perfect for environments with several PCs and/ or Macintoshes. Why spend money on multiple LaserJet or PostScript® printers when you can share one LaserJet with up to five PC and Macintosh users? Pacific Connect slips conveniently into the optional I/O slot on a LaserJet printer. So it's easy to install and easy to use. No other LaserJet printer sharing device comes com- plete with all the cables, adapters and Macin- tosh support needed. Of course, PostScript operation requires Pacific Data Products' award- winning PostScript language emulation cartridge, Pacif icPage™ and the additional printer memory needed for printing PostScript files. As if each user were printing to his own printer, Pacific Connect eliminates the need for mechanical switch boxes or net- working software. And print jobs are placed in the user-upgradeable buffer memory of 256k or 1 .25 MB, and printed in the order that they are received. For product information contact Pacific Data Products at 9125 Rehco Road, San Diego, CA 92121, USA, (619) 597-4609 FAX (619) 552-0889. citic Connect and PacificPage ore trademarks of Pacific Data Products, Inc. I IP and LaserJet are registered trademarks of 1 levvlelt- ckard Co. PostScript is a registered trademark of Adobe Svstems Incorporated. Macintosh is a registered trademark of Apple ■mputer Inc. EUROPEAN HEADQUARTERS: Switzerland Tel (41) 22-112650, Fax(41) 22-410682. Wl Pacific Data Products, Inc. PACIFIC DATA PRODUCTS BUSINESS CONNECTION may still lose some flexibility as files pass between groups. Solution 3: Go for total flexibility. Al- low users on each platform to use the best possible application for their task, and live with the limitations. You'll have to accept the fact that moving information between platforms might be a cumbersome pro- cess, and you'll have to be willing to live without some file attributes that simply aren't recognized by other applications further down in the work-flow process. You might, for example, end up with software that can read the data format of another application, or you might select conversion software — such as HiJaak — that will perform such conversions for you. If you don't move many files, don't trans- fer much data between groups, or don't need a lot of nontransferable file attributes, this approach makes sense. What's Ahead There was once a time when data com- patibility wasn't a problem. People trans- ferred their documents on paper. If they had to move information in electronic form, they did so by modem or by passing along a floppy disk. Now, word processing documents, spreadsheets, and graphics files are immediately accessible to every- one on a network. Work flow is now an electronic process, and file compatibility is a big issue. WordPerfect and other vendors are rushing versions of their packages for Mac, DOS, Windows, and Unix users to market. They're not, however, rushing to support other vendors' file formats or to develop a better intermediate file format. Why isn't there a better least common de- nominator for file interchange than ASCII? The reasons lie partly in the difficulty of determining such a standard, partly in selfish marketing concerns, and partly in a lingering vendor ignorance of how com- puter networks have changed the work- flow process. Why encourage a customer to buy anything but your product? Ulti- mately, products that attempt to lock in users in this way will find themselves locked out of tomorrow's LANs. The more egregious file compatibility problems should be solved soon. There's no good reason for Mac, Unix, and Win- dows versions of the same word process- ing program to have problems exchang- ing data. And users shouldn't have to go through an arcane conversion process in order to read common file formats such as ASCII. Today's software manufacturers are much better at allowing users to move their information between platforms, but they have a long way to go before file exchange between applications becomes transpar- ent. Until the industry gets there, you'll have to balance the desires of your em- ployees against the efficiency of moving information around and against the flexi- bility you need to match computing re- sources to needs. ■ Wayne Rash Jr. is a contributing editor for BYTE and a principal and technical director of the Network Integration Group of American Management Systems, Inc. (Arlington, VA). He is coauthor of two books for business network users; The Ex- ecutive Guide to Local Area Networks and The Novell Connection. You can contact him on BIX as "waynerash," or in the to.wayne conference. Your questions and comments are wel- come. Write to: Editor, BYTE, One Phoenix Mill Lane, Peterborough, NH 03458. You Build the Bitmaps. We Build the Show. Eile Edit Show Joels PROPERTY.IMO p [CQVPIA2A.TGA |Wlpe [Medium jfaJT |5" Located on the <:< I Ifffi it of King and College St l>taulli J HBQQIIDCl— EM Labal COVPIAZXTGA jUg If you need to show true-color images for your technical seminars or client presentations, ImageQ™ for Windows gives you the power to get the show on the road. Whether it's a simple slide show or a fully interactive presentation, use the programmability, speed and quality of ImageQ to display your 24-bit TARGA, BMP or TIFF files. Use ImageQ to communicate your visuals with the clarity they deserve. ImageQ offers you: High speed display of images from disk ■ Visual slide sorting ■ Portable presentations ■ 'On-the-fly' conversion of true-color images to super VGA ■ Powerful control scripting language ■ Transitions between images with control over direction and style ■ Support for PCX, GIF, TIF, BMP, TGA, VST, VII and others ■ Cut and paste of text and images from other Windows applications ■ Automatic creation of presenter notes and viewer handouts ImageQ $349 ImageQ Demo $19.95 Contact: 1-800-363-3400 IMAGE Image North Technologies Inc. ■ 1 80 King St. S. } Suite 360 ■ Waterloo, Ontario, Canada- N2J 1 P8 ■ Dealer inquiries welcome 110 BYTE- JANUARY 1992 Circle 21 1 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 212). More Computing Know How Get the most from your computer- our books show you how. Windows System Programming The bible for Windows programmers. Includes the tools you need to program professional applications for oper- ation under Windows. Contains sample applications with exhaustive documentation and background information with programming examples in C. Topics include using GDI, bitmaps and the color palette manager; using DDE (Dynamic Data Exchange) between applications; Windows memory management; the DDL (Dynamic Link Libraries) concept and much more. 740 pages with companion diskette. #B116 ISBN 1-55755-1 16-2 $39. £$&*»£ ,95* Turbo Pascal System Programming Gives you "know how" to program faster, easier, tighter and better. Find out how to use Turbo for system programming tasks; writing TSRs; per- forming multi-tasking; using SAA windowing and implementing expanded and extended memory. Learn how Turbo generates machine code, handles the mouse, scqiis the keyboard, uses UNITS and OOPS, performs fast screen display and more. 750 pages with companion diskette of more than 800K of source code. #B124 ISBN 1-55755-124-3 $44.95* PC System Programming An encyclopedia of PC technical and programming knowledge. Features parallel working examples written in Pascal, C, Assembly and BASIC. Explains how to use extended and expanded memory, hard disks, PC ports, mouse drivers, graphics and sound. Also explains memory layout, DOS operations, fundamentals of BIOS and TSR programs. Includes complete appendices. 920pages and 2 companion disks with over 1 MB ofprogn ISBN 1-55755-036-0 #B036 $59.95* Available at most B. Dalton Booksellers, Waldensoftware. and Software Etc. and other bookstores nationwide. In the UK contact Computer Bookshops 021-706-1 188 • In Australia contact Pactronics 02-748-4700 Abacus! Dept. B1, 5370 52nd Street SE Grand Rapids, Ml 49512 Orders: 1-800-451-4319 • Phone: (616) 698-0330 • Fax: (616) 698-0325 In US and Canada add $5.00 Postage and Handling. 'Foreign orders outside North America add $13.00 surface rate or $20.00 air mail per book. We accept Visa, Master Card or American Express. Call or write for your free catalog of PC Books. Circle 8 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 9). DR DOS 6.0 COMPLETE DR DOS 6.0 Complete is an everyday user's guide to running Digital Research's brand new DR DOS 6.0 operating system. An encyclo- pedia of practical info makes this the most authoritative DR DOS 6,0 reference book available. Shows you how to use DR DOS 6.0's new features including: SuperStor disk compression, MemMAX memory saving, FileLink data transfer and more. Both beginning and advanced users will find that the; techniques presented will make them more productive with DR DOS 6.0. Includes 3.5" companion disk. #B144. ISBN 1-55755-144-8. $34.95* Turbo Pascal for Windows Provides an in-depth look at programming using this popular development system. Includes an extensive introduction to the integrated developmental environment and a practical overview of the fundamentals and special features of Pascal programming under Windows including Object Windows. Also includes techniques for using Units - a vital topic for understanding object- oriented programming. Includes 3.5" companion diskette. #B141 ISBN 1-55755-141-3 $39.95* In US & Canada Order Toll Free 1-800-451-4319 ext. 21 ' For fast delivery Order Toll Free 1-800-451-4319 ext. 21, or FAX (616) 698-0325 ' □ Yes, please rush the following items □ Yes, please rush your free PC catalog Apply to my: □ Visa □ MasterCard Q Am.Express / □ I have enclosed a check/ M.O. PC System Programming $59.95 DR DOS 6.0 COMPLETE 34.95 Turbo Pascal for Windows 39,95 Windows System Programming 39.95 Turbo Pascal System Prog. 44.95 In US and Canada add $5.00 Postage and Handling. *Foreign orders outside North America add $13.00 surface rate or $20.00 air mail per book. Card#: . Expires: Name:_ Company . Address:_ City:_ State; _Zip:_ Phone#: L. . Depl. B1 J NATURAL A Wider Vista of Reliable Electronic p * Fans, Enclosures, and Components ws* Please relar to Mall K*r 1 when ordering Jameco 8088, 80286 and 80386 Computer Kits Weller Soldering Stations Terms: Prices arc subject to change without notice. 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J AMECO ^^ ELECTRONIC COIflPOHEWTS COMPUTER PRODUCTS 1355 Shoreway Road, Belmont, CA 94002 1-800-831-4242 (415) 592-8097 FAX: 1-800-237-6948 Circle 83 on Inquiry Card. ® All trademarks arc registered trademarks of their respective companies. © 1/92 Jameco Electronic Components/Computer Products See the Difference. **&& ■'*-■■-■-.: ■-',:, '.;'..:■, •-/" "■■' .■<■;;;.■.; "Using each adapter at VGA, 800^600 and l,024-by-768 pixel resolutions, all test images were dis- played crisply. 9? -■ PC Week u The intelligence built into this monitor eliminates all of the arm stretching and wheel turning so often associated with video mode changes." • PC Magazine NANAOa^scAM- MiCROPHOCESSOR CONTROLLED MULTIPLE SCAN ■aOfcHl-WkHl "The image is the brightest we 've ever seen, even in the brightly -sunlit new CADalyst office. " — CADalyst "Nanao thoughtfully : places the seven most- used controls on the front of the monitor, S unobtrusively tucked below the faceplate. 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NANAO and FLEXSCAN are registered trademarks o f Nanao U.S.A. Corporation. ROUNDTABLE What Do Benchmarks Really Tell You? BYTE columnists, staff, and contributors debate the issues Roundtable is a forum in which BYTE edi- tors, columnists, and contributors debate key issues that affect how you purchase and use hardware and software. The "conversations" take place on BIX, where you can participate in the round. table conference. KEN SHELDON: Benchmarks: You can't live with 'em, andyoucan't live without 'em. Or can you? BYTE spends much time and effort making sure that its benchmarks are fair, are sensible, and produce mean- ingful results. It takes a lot of work and isn't a lot of fun; anyone who dares release a suite of benchmarks is al- mostbegging the world to take potshots at their efforts. Some companies optimize their products specifically so that they'll get good ratings on benchmarks. And with the rapid rate of technological advance, today's bench- marks are outdated tomorrow. In view of that, does bench- marking make sense? DENNIS ALLEN: Let me start by clarifying what bench- marks and benchmark tests are. A benchmark is noth- ing more than a standard used for comparison. A bench- mark test, on the other hand, is a test or a suite of tests that provides measurable results that you can compare back to the original benchmark. For example, the BYTE low- level benchmarks tell you precisely how fast a system performs discrete functions that exercise the CPU, mem- ory, video, and hard drive subsystems. BYTE's DOS ap- plication benchmark suite consists of a variety of popu- lar application programs that exercise the system as a whole. By comparing the test results from, say, a note- book PC to the test results of BYTE's IBM AT bench- mark system, you can gauge its relative performance. How important is that? Assuming that performance is a critical issue for the work you do on your computer, those benchmark test results are invaluable. They pro- vide an insight to the type of performance you can expect on a given system. Other considerations depend mostly on the applications you run. But benchmark tests provide a meaningful starting place for evaluating systems. BEN SMITH: Benchmarks invaluable? Piffle! The only true evaluation of performance is to actually run the ap- plications that you intend to use in the environment in which you intend to use them with the data that you will be handling. The value of a benchmark is determined by how closely the benchmarking method approximates your actual needs. STAN DIEHL : Benchmarks give you objective data to cite when talking about performance. I put more stock in the product rating of a review- er who runs a specific suite of tests than that of a reviewer who merely runs a few appli- cations and concludes that "the system seemed kind of pokey under Windows." A good benchmark will consistently ex- pose poor performers and re- ward the good ones. We recently tested a 486 sys- tem that consistently returned abnormally poor benchmark re- sults. The vendor finally ad- mitted that it was using a 16- bit data path between the CPU and memory. It helped to have hard, tangible numbers to back up our assertion that the ma- chine ran like a dog. SMITH: I'm not saying that benchmarks are without value; just that they can be mislead- ing if you don't know what they represent. Indexes force the confusion onto the reader. And even knowing this, I will often refer to an index as an in- dicator of a system's perfor- mance. Why? Because it is con- venient; not because it is informative. DENNIS ALLEN Senior Editor and Director, BYTE Lab STEVE APIKI Technical Editor, BYTE Lab STAN DIEHL Testing Editor/Engineer, BYTE Lab TREVOR MARSHALL Consulting Editor ROB MITCHELL Senior Editor, Columns MICHAEL NADEAU Executive Editor JERRY POURNELLE Senior Contributing Editor ANDY REINHARDT News Editor KEN SHELDON West Coast Bureau Chief BEN SMITH Technical Editor TREVOR MARSHALL: No single performance in- dex is useful, but I use benchmarking daily to judge per- formance improvements in the systems I'm designing. Say an engineer comes to me and says, "I have this neat idea for improving our RAM interface." My reaction is to try and identify how much better it is than the current technique. The only way to do this is to use benchmarks. JANUARY 1992 • BYTE 115 ROUNDTABLE Having an adequate repertoire of tests and knowing which tests are likely to detect the changes you've made is the art of a good systems designer. ROB MITCHELL: BYTE's low level and DOS application benchmark indexes show the reader the tip of the iceberg. The graphical presentation of index numbers gives only a general impression of how a machine has performed. The BYTE Lab goes over the raw benchmark numbers to pick up any unusual events, such as par- ticularly slow doubleword moves, that need mention. In some cases, above-av- erage performance on one set of tests will compensate for below-par performance in another category. That means that two computers with similar CPU indexes, for example, might not truly perform similar- ly. We always try to point these things out in a review. MICHAEL NADEAU: The benchmark tests do no more than indicate whether a machine is fast enough for a given task. The problem lies in how benchmarks are represented, and both purveyors of bench- marks and system vendors share the blame. Benchmark graphs provide nice visuals, but magazines should explain how to in- terpret them; that doesn't always happen. Vendors promote good benchmark scores heavily, sometimes to the exclu- sion of other selling points. This creates the impression in some buyers' minds that benchmarks are the most important pur- chasing factor. JERRY POURNELLE: The problem with benchmarks is that it is often possible to work around them. If you know enough about the benchmark, you can design to it; and that has been done, since getting a high score on benchmarks has, in the past, been worth considerable prestige and, thus, money in this competitive business. Years ago, I devised what I called "a benchmark of sorts" that consisted of gen- erating some matrices, their floating-point multiplication, and then the floating-point summation of the elements of the answer. I generated the matrices by taking recip- rocals of numbers, thus making for con- siderable division. That, at least, had both integer and floating-point loops and nu- merical calculations, meaning that it would be hard to design to that test and not pro- duce a useful machine. It wasn't perfect, but it seemed better at the time than most benchmarks I knew then. Not long ago, I heard a tale of horror about how, if you know what you are do- ing, you can make a crippled machine score as well on one famous magazine's benchmark set as another machine that's not crippled will perform. Even today, benchmarks can indicate only one data point in comparing systems. MARSHALL: The ultimate benchmark is real life, but whose life? A scientist would be a fool to look at benchmark tests constructed to show spreadsheet perfor- mance. He or she needs data on arithmetic speed and accuracy. No one set of bench- marks can cover all cases. This is the failing with SPEC, but there are many other benchmark suites out there that give potential purchasers some idea of what they're getting. Knowing which to use is still an art form. Graphics benchmarks are even worse, but heaven knows we need them. How do you benchmark the performance of the X Window System, for instance? And what about the Windows accelerators that ev- erybody is talking about? How much faster are they in real life? You could just say, "Well, the accelerator from company X looks a lot faster when running the Turbo Pascal editor," or you could construct benchmarks to give a quantitative assess- ment. I prefer the latter approach. NADEAU: SPEC is not perfect, but it is effective for providing a quick-and-dirty performance ranking of workstations. MARSHALL: SPEC is good for work- station comparisons but was designed only for Unix systems. You also have to assign at least two programmer-months to com- pile and run them all, and you need to as- sign your in-house compiler group to the continuing task of optimizing your com- pilers for a better SPECmark. (Remember when a recent software upgrade gave IBM a huge boost in its RISC System/6000 SPECmark?) Both these investments are beyond what smaller computer manufac- turers can afford. ANDY REINHARDT: The RISC Sys tem/6000's performance boost didn't rep- resent an increase in CPU power, but if a company can achieve a performance in- crease by introducing a new FORTRAN compiler (whose benefits would also ac- crue to any other program recompiled with it), that represents a fair and legitimate ex- pression of system performance. The im- portance of a good optimizing compiler in RISC systems — especially ones with the parallelism of the RISC System/6000— is paramount. It's not a sleight of hand. MARSHALL: I am a skeptic. I know that the fastest compilers are designed specif- ically to recognize the code constructs that Dhrystones and Whetstones benchmarks use. Those changes may not affect the code that you or I write. REINHARDT: I would like to see a price/performance rating in which the cu- mulative score on the BYTE high-level benchmark tests is divided into the price of the review system, as configured for the test. The end result would be to show which systems provide not just the best performance but also the most for your money. This raises all kinds of problems, though — among them the issues of "sug- gested list price" versus "street price" and configuration differences. STEVE APIKI: The primary problem with this approach is that many systems we receive include goodies that aren't per- formance related. Say we get a 486 with a CD-ROM drive, a Super VGA monitor, and 1 6 MB of system RAM. What price do we use for the price/performance ratio? We can eliminate the CD-ROM drive right off. But additional memory translates to increased performance under Unix, and the full complement of 16 MB allows for memory interleaving, where the standard 1-MB version does not. Does the Super VGA monitor mean you test applications using Super VGA drivers? If not, I could argue that your application benchmarks are unrealistic, because most users will run the machine in Super VGA mode. Price/performance would be nice to report, but coming up with a fair sys- tem for doing so is an intractable problem. MITCHELL: BYTE does ask for exactly the same configuration for all machines in a head-to-head comparison. But if the configuration it requests is different from how the vendor typically sells the system, BYTE may bend the rules a bit. In this case, a price/performance ratio would be meaningless. What makes BYTE different is that it doesn't publish price/performance num- bers. Computer systems are much too com- plicated to reduce to a single ratio. Which index number would be used for the per- formance denominator? Which price and configuration would be used as the nu- merator? Benchmark numbers make for good graphics, but the real story lies in the telling. Why did a machine do extremely well in the low-level video tests yet not excel in the application tests? Why did a machine with a SCSI caching hard drive controller not perform better than others with standard IDE hard drives? A good reviewer puts the numbers in perspective for the reader. ■ 116 BYTE -JANUARY 1992 SOFTWARE DEVELOPERS Rainbow Technologies Protects Software Better. In More Places. For More Developers. And For More Good Reasons. For the most solutions, best support and worldwide availability in PC, MAC and LAN software protection, there's no reason to look further than Rainbow Technologies. 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Call Today For Details . . . 1-800-852-8569 s Copyright © 1991 Rainbow Technologies, Inc. All product names are trademarks of the respective holders. Rainbow Technologies stock is traded on NASDAQ-RNBO \g? RAINBOW TECHNOLOGIES 9292 Jeronimo Road, Irvine, CA 92718 'TEL: (714) 454-2100 (800) 852-8569 • FAX: (7 14) 454-8557 • Apple Link: D3058 RainbowTechnologies, Ltd., Shirley_Lodge, 470 London Rd., Slough Berkshire SL3 8QY. U.K. TEL: (44) 0753-541512 • FAX: (44) 0753-543610 Circle 141 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 142). Hie ZEOS 386 SX Now 20MHz Only 1995! 16 Notebook. MHz Only 1795! 'THE HOTTEST DEAL ON THE NOTEBOOK MARKET "-PC MAGAZINE "King of the Hill... Sensational... The best price-performer . . . Astonishing value ...The number one contender. . ." The praise goes on and on. Winner of PC Magazine's Editor's Choice Award and PC World's Best Buy Award, the experts love the ZEOS Notebook. And you'll love it too. Because as PC Magazine said, the ZEOS Notebook is simply "the hottest deal on the notebook market." INCREDIBLE DESKTOP FEATURES IN A NOTEBOOK. Pick your power. Choose our '386SX-16MHz version or go for the incredible new ZEOS '386SX-20MHz ver- sion. Combine that with our high speed hard disk, built in 1.44MB floppy drive, VGA and more — you've got the greatest notebook going at any price! Look closely at the details. Like our crisp 10" VGA display. The ultimate in sparkling clarity featuring advanced fluorescent back- lighting for vivid VGA graphics. And then the drives. Two drives are better than one! First, you're getting our whisper quiet high speed, high capacity hard disk. Then we've built in an industry standard 1.44 Megabyte, 3.5 inch floppy as well. And we don't stop there. DETAILS MAKE THE DIFFERENCE! For instance, the battery system of your new notebook is the most advanced on the market. You can quick charge, or trickle charge, any time your system is plugged in. Or, you can use the optional charging stand if you wish. Either way, you're sure to appreciate our light weight snap-in, snap-out battery packs. They're so light and easy to use, you can easily take an extra one with you on those really Purchase Orders from Fortune 1000 companies, Governments and institutions subject to approval. Leasing Programs a re available. All prices and specifications are subject to change without notice. Please call to confirm pricing, specifications and warranty details. The following are trademarks of their respective companies: ZEOS (ZEOS International, Ltd.), MNP (Microcom Systems, Inc.); © 1991, ZEOS International, Ltd., 530 5th Avenue, N.W., St. Paul, MN 55112 USA. ZEOS is a publicly traded company {NASDAQ symbol: ZEOS). Circle 1 89 on Inquiry Card. long trips. Plus, you can get even more life out of a single charge by using our program- mable power management system. Hour upon hour of Notebook computing power! CONNECTIVITY TOO! Your new ZEOS notebook is a great connectivity tool! Using our optional built-in 2400 baud MNP® Class 5 modem, con- nectivity buffs will find themselves logging on at every turn. And speaking of connec- tivity, we've kept the I/O easy to use too. Because unlike many of the others, your new ZEOS notebook has the same industry standard port connectors you'll find on your larger desktop system. Serial and Parallel ports; even an external VGA connector. Completely compatible! ZEOS 24 HOUR A DAY SUPPORT. Don't forget your new ZEOS notebook is backed by the best Technical and Sales support in the industry, 24 Hours a Day. We're always here to help, any time of the day or night. And we don't stop there either. Your new notebook is also backed by our 30 Day Absolute Satisfaction Money Back Guarantee and One Full Year Limited War- ranty. You're going to be very satisfied. We don't just say it. We guarantee it. ORDER YOUR OWN ZEOS NOTEBOOK NOW! You can order your own ZEOS Notebook right now. Simply pick up the phone and give us a call now at 800-423-5891. Larger hard drives, carrying cases and more are also available! At last, a full featured notebook that lets you compute anywhere. You're going to love it! ORDER NOW TOLL FREE: 800-423-5891 NOW. YOUR COMPLETE '386SX-16 NOTEBOOK! VGA, 20MB HARD DRIVE, 1.44MB FLOPPY AND MORE. LIGHT AND LOADED! INCREDIBLE. ONLY $1795! 20MHz ONLY 51995/ 386SX-16 or '386SX-20. 1MB DRAM, expandable to 3 or SMB. 1 20MB High Speed HDD. i Built in High Density 3.5 1.44MB floppy drive. ' High resolution VGA dis- play. Fluorescent back I it 640x480, 32 grey scales. Bright and clear! ' Removable quick charge NiCad battery. Two hour plus battery life typical, more using Programmable Power Management! i Quick charge or trickle charge using included AC power adapter. Extra battery packs and external charging stand available. 82 key keyboard. True 101 key emulation. Industry standard Serial and Parallel Ports. VGA port for external VGA color display. Great for demos! Total system weight 7 lbs. with battery. 30 Day Absolute Satisfaction Money Back Guarantee and ZEOS Customer Satisfaction Package. ' One Full Year Limited Warranty. 24 Hour a Day Toll Free Technical Support, 365 Days a Year. ORDER NOW TOLL FREE 800-423-5891 FAX Orders: 612-633-1325 Minnesota: 612-633-4591 Hearing Impaired (TDD) Orders: 800-228-5389 Outside US and Canada: 612-633-6131 MasterCard, VISA, Discover, Am Exp, Z-Card and COD. Open 24 Hours a Day, 365 Days a Year! COVER STORY FEATURE THE 1991 BYTE Awards The best products of the last year get the recognition they deserve The 1991 BYTE Awards provide a snapshot of the most important events that occurred in the computer industry last year. Each of the 84 winners represents an achievement in its category that pushed the industry forward. Apple, for instance, answered the challenge posed by Microsoft's Windows 3.0, last year's top vote-getter, with its System 7.0, this year's number-one winner. Meanwhile, Microsoft was busy producing products to support Windows. Three of those packages, Visual Basic, Word for Windows 2.0, and Excel 3.0, are among the award winners for 199 1 . Apple, in turn, built on System 7.0 with QuickTime 1 .0. Many products in the portable category won awards, including two notebooks from Toshiba, Psion's 8-ounce hand-held system, Citizen's PN48 portable printer, and Ze- nith's Mastersport 386SL. The most important winners in this area are not end-user products, however. Chips & Technologies and AMD introduced CPUs that should provide a shot in the arm for portable system developers. Criteria To be eligible for the 1991 BYTE Awards, a product must be new within the last year, and we must be reasonably sure that it will be commercially available by the time you read this. We chose products or technologies based on their impact; specifically, we looked for innovation, superior performance, and price breakthroughs. BYTE editors and contributors nominate products or technologies for awards. Each editor or contributor then votes for his or her 10 most important products of 1991. Products with the highest number of votes receive Awards of Excellence, and mid- range vote-getters receive Awards of Distinction. Those products receiving the fewest votes are given Awards of Merit. No awards are given to nominees that do not receive any votes. A World View BYTE has many licensees around the world. These publishers reprint BYTE articles in their native languages. This year, we invited all BYTE licensees to participate in the 1991 Awards. We received lists of winners from three: Nikkei BYTE from Japan, RAM from Greece, and Binary from Spain. The editors of these magazines chose winners based on their importance to the regional computing community. Many of their selections match those of the BYTE staff's. This represents the increased globalization of the computer industry. Products today are more likely to be launched on a worldwide scale than in only one particular region. We hope you find the selections of Nikkei BYTE, RAM, and Binary as fascinat- ing as we did. —Michael Nadeau 120 BYTE* JANUARY 1992 PHOTOGRAPHY: MEL LINDSTROM © 1992 JANUARY 1992 -BYTE 121 BYTE AWARDS System 7.0, Apple Computer The delayed release of Ap- ple's System 7.0 was worth the wait: It offers an easier-to- use interface that includes a built-in file-search capability and icons that represent file aliases to often-used appli- cations, files, or remote vol- umes. Internally, System 7.0 provides enhanced commu- nications functions, 32-Bit QuickDraw, virtual memory, TM i lie hiu Utem i.itu-i Special , Hboui Hus Macintosh... , fll I'K'U' L * i I niitjat i'tirifls „ [lis fc I op , : FtKOp ,: ItrllUCll't lllltll I .tl< 111 CHHoldttig i iin \; gMeclUrlte II i: MotklUrite "- BesSdH 2.1 }-• Scrapboofc j§ Sn.ip.liil i- \i|sU'l!i Finns eI" lunbHklu -Ml r, ttitiKliPh't tiiif- P. -,.QLJ= f i ; .. ! fG I (K . .; ^ ~ • . ■•■ i — m m 5 i -i Ethernet and token-ring driv- ers, and the ability to share hard disks or folders with oth- er networked users. Its Inter- application Communication and Open Scripting Architec- ture provide mechanisms for dynamically sharing infor- mation and automating repeti- tive tasks. Another bravura performance by Apple's soft- ware engineers. IcotiWoiks Vlewci Pile I .lit Options Help Selected lcon:^liaC^laKB*5t:i^a|ia^|| iu,ii',AH.>n:n ml ■fin PCMCIA 2.0 A PCMCIA 2.0 is the specifica- tion that could launch tiny IC cards into wide use as inter- changeable storage devices for personal computers, palmtops, and hundreds of other noncomputer applica- tions. The specification now 122 BYTE* JANUARY 1992 defines how IC cards can execute programs directly, rather than your having to load software into main mem- ory, and spells out how you can use PCMCIA slots for general I/O devices like modems or printer ports. Visual Basic, Microsoft With Visual Basic, Windows programming becomes almost easy. Visual Basic combines a structured version of BASIC with a user interface for designing the graphical elements of an ap- plication. You can create windows; drop in text boxes; and posi- tion command buttons, radio buttons, and other graphics-con- trol elements. You can then double-click on the control element (e.g., a menu or a check box) and write the BASIC code that defines the function of each element. Visual Basic combines your BASIC code with the Windows interface code. You can compile the code to create an executable Windows program. You never have to know the nitty-gritty of Windows; you just need some experience with BASIC programming. FoxPro 2.0, Fox Software V FoxPro is the acknowledged speed leader among dBase- compatible database pro- grams and deserves the 1991 "most improved" award for its remarkable version 2.0. A new retrieval technology called Rushmore crunches through million-record data- bases with stunning speed. Other major enhancements include compressed com- pound indexes, a Structured Query Language subsystem, a WYSIWYG screen builder, a project manager, an interface to Watcom C, and an ex- tended-DOS version. ARTICLES. ISSUEKEY, ARTICLES. II TIE, ARTICLES. DEfT, WHERE ARTICLES. AUTHOR == AUTHORS. LASIHAHE; AMD ( ARTICLES. ISSUEKE* = "April"; AND ARTICLES.KPf = "flews"): IMTO TABLE C :\JGN\APRIL .W Fi lr juil.irnix Uit:u Hi- 1 p 113 fulrlcrls). T.isMIhX hilrrf.i I IC.1N i -i— uizi.ni I -J — IIOKIiHI COWTR ku-xt n.ou i - 1 ORGCH n LOJ r; - ivu.rji : flv., il.il.lr: 236BK tiwr Tasks S"nirii.i:i.r.fiH *| ! 3 NORTON ! -1 123 | 5 D1SKQPT ? CIU Tu|{ Him"" 1 Delete | .juscrt j _?_! I Gaunt; f 1 1 " D " D D DR DOS 6.0, Digital Research A It has taken a while, but Digital Research's DR DOS 6.0 seri- ously threatens to dethrone MS-DOS as king of the text-based operating systems. It features a better memory manager, a task switcher, and proven utilities for disk caching and file compres- sion. Free lifetime support is another plus. DR DOS also comes with several networking tools, which suggests that new owner Novell might have even more interesting things in mind for this DOS challenger. Microsoft Excel - RECYCLE.XLS Fil e Edit Forn iuJa Form at Data Options Macro Window Help jg | =SUM(C7C9) ■a O Recycling Systems, nc I Material Jon Feb March Ql Q2 Green 23 1 250 216 697 89.4 Clear 342 439 217 998 131 8 Glass 57.3 68.9 43.3 1695 221.2 Metal 110.7[ 1()99| 105.4 326.0 358.1 Newsprint 569 532 510 161.1 149.6 Magazine 321 331 282 93.4 87.0 [Paper 89.0 1163 79.2 254.5 236.G Total 257.0 265.1 2279 GatorBox CS, Cayman Systems t> Cayman Systems' GatorBox CS is simply the easiest way to tie together networks of Mac and Unix systems. For net- work administrators grap- pling with the thorny issues of interoperability, the Gator- Box is a refreshingly elegant solution in a realm that usu- ally requires working with partial solutions from a num- ber of vendors that never quite dovetail . The GatorBox CS is a plug-and-play LocalTalk/ Ethernet gateway that sup- ports AppleTalk Phase 1 and 2, TCP/IP, and DECnet Level 1 protocols. Optional Gator- Share software takes the link one step further by offering Network File System hosts (disguised as AppleShare vol- umes) to Macs on the con- nected LAN. BYTE AWARDS EXCELLENCE QuickTime l.O, Apple Computer * File Edit Record Compression Play Iwf^m Blastoff wmmmi Duration 00 IC ! " > «i !► ■ 1 "I -»'T 1 0.0 1 j •:«Ti.i)0 [ I * 1 o 02.27 ?.n t-rTT. i .;:-•' I: Apple's system software has al- ways been out- standing, and now QuickTime 1.0 sets the stage for a marked advance in the use of multi- media technology in practical appli- cations. With its new movie file for- mat, QuickTime allows a standard way for applica- tions to dynami- cally exchange data from one computing plat- form to another. r Excel 3.0, Microsoft You really can improve an application years after it first ar- rives. Microsoft's Excel 3.0 represents a quantum leap over its predecessor, adding new icons, an auto-sum feature, best-fit column sizing, and a new outlining capability that lets you shrink your view of the spreadsheet. Most important, Excel 3.0 embraces direct manipulation, making it by far the most graph- ical spreadsheet available. JANUARY 1992 •BYTE 123 BYTE AWARDS V LaserJet IIISI, Hewlett-Packard As it has in other segments of the printer market, Hewlett- Packard is leading the way in network laser printers with the LaserJet IllSi. Fast and reasonably priced, this 106- pound beast is heavy duty all the way, yet its output quality is excellent. If your current workgroup laser printer is creating long lines and short tempers, the IllSi could be a godsend. §5j \ . ■ V. {»-5U~~- • • .y. fcr . i si | b'_~'-' •" iS ' ; | ■ :% 1 H ► a M 1 ''"'■IB Mjl \ 1 1 NetWare 3.11, Novell Used with NetWare for the Macintosh, NetWare NFS, and NetWare FTAM, the 386 version of NetWare now sup- ports Mac, Unix, and PC client types (e.g., DOS and OS/2). NetWare 3.11's "name spaces" feature main- tains machine-specific name information for each client type, preserving data and re- source-fork information on the Mac and extended attri- butes on OS/2 clients. Net- Ware 3.11 is an expensive— but fast and reliable— LAN operating system for users who need to integrate multi- ple client types. PC/Chip, Chips & Technologies > PenPoint, Go Corp. A PenPoint is the first operating system for pen-based com- puters designed from the very beginning for a new and revo- lutionary input method. At every stage, Go Corp. consid- ered how the operating system and the machines and applica- tions using it would interact with users and their pens. As a result, PenPoint-based sys- tems feel truly natural when operated with a pen— there are no awkward or uncom- fortable compromises. Pen- Point is also a truly object- oriented operating system that has not had to accept any of the limitations imposed by having to work with existing software. The PC/Chip is the first true single-chip PC It finally allows manufacturers of sys- tems to build a computer using only one chip plus some memory. That alone would be an achievement, but Chips & Technologies has added to this with its architectural innova- tion of Superstate— a way to ex- tend the PC architecture and add all kinds of new capabilities without affecting or compromising its compatibility with the original. Sketch, Alias Research The Mac-based Sketch is one of the fastest and coolest three-dimensional CAD/sol- ids modelers we have ever seen. With such features as its Curve-o-Matic tools, you can produce complex 3-D wire- frame models using 2-D tech- niques. It is coming soon in a Windows version, too. 124 BYTE* JANUARY 1992 ilijlli BUT NOT OUT OF TOUCi "\ m\i\i 1 m Rill MoMe Computing. Ws the hot new.buzz^ v- v ward for people vvbdse bu^in^^s ta( ri-iwii ., computer free -to use alter 49 seconds. 1^-; ',.© 1991 Seiko ;:'. Instruments, BYTE AWARDS DISTINCTION CDR-IOOO, Tandy Another example of Tandy's aggressive push to make mul- timedia common in the com- puter community. At $399, it's hundreds of dollars less expensive than its competitors and has the high-speed data transfer needed to handle Mi- crosoft 's multimedia exten- sions to Windows. IBM 3.5 " Rewritable Optical Drive, IBM The storage wave of the fu- ture. IBM has managed to combine, in one device, sup- port for both rewritable (mag- neto-optical) and optical read- only 3V2-inch discs, opening lip new possibilities for soft- ware and data distribution, as well as local and network data storage. Borland C++ 3.0, Borland International The combination of C++ 2.0, the Integrated Development Environment, the Object Windows Library (the C++ application framework for Windows), and Turbo Vision (the C++ application frame- work for character-mode DOS GUIs) makes for a stu- pendous offering. CorelDraw 2.0, CD-ROM edition, Corel Systems Despite fierce competition in the Windows illustration package market, CorelDraw 2.0 consistently comes out ahead: It manages to combine professional-level power with usability by mere mortals. The CD-ROM edition has over 4000 clip-art images and symbols, along with all the drawing, type manipulation, special effects, and tracing features of the standard edi- tion. Address Writer, CoStar The logical extension to label printers. It makes the pesky job of printing envelopes al- most a pleasure. Full Page Pivot, Radius Radius brings its unique por- trait and landscape monitor technology— the only way to do serious word processing and desktop publishing work— from the Mac to the PC platform. GT486/40, Falco If you push a 486 to 40 MHz, couple it with 32 MB of RAM, a 426-MB hard drive, a 1024- by 768-pixel graphics system, and put it all in a box that's the size of a large book, you have an ultimate graphics system that will easily com- pete with high-ticket Unix workstations— for $6000. HP 95LX, A Hewlett-Packard Yes, the keyboard is not good and the screen is small, but this is an incredible pocket- size computer. It is also the only system of any size with built-in Lotus 1-2-3 and in- frared connectivity. HP Apollo 9000/Serles 700, Hewlett-Packard > Defying the trend toward building Unix workstations and servers around standard processor platforms, Hewlett- Packard came out with a new generation of its homegrown Precision Architecture RISC chips and blew the lid off the competition. The HP Series 700 family of systems offers the best price/performance on the market, and it puts HP squarely back in the worksta- tion race. Iris Indigo, A Silicon Graphics Petite yet powerful, the Iris Indigo brings three-dimen- sional graphics computing to an affordable level. Silicon Graphics has sacrificed little in the process. The Iris Indigo has a 33-MHz Mips R3000A CPU and a proprietary back- plane and bus that allow a 133-MBps transfer rate. LapLInk Pro 4.0, Traveling Software Traveling Software's venera- ble file transfer utility steps into the 1990s with a new in- terface and even faster speed, keeping the package comfort- ably ahead of its competitors. MS-DOS 5.0, Microsoft It is not just the extra 40 KB of workspace that makes MS- DOS 5.0 a significant prod- uct; it's also the integration of the Smartdrive disk cache, the ability to handle large disk volumes fast, and the Unde- lete feature. Unlike Windows, this package was largely bug free. NuVlsta + , Truevision This NuBus video board for the Mac does everything— composite/RGB/S-video in, composite/RGB/S-video out, multiple programmable reso- lutions (both interlaced and noninterlaced), and the abil- ity to be programmed for dig- ital effects. It also includes a built-in chromakey. 286| DOS-Extender, PharLap The Phar Lap 286 1 DOS-Ex- tender now supports Borland C++ and Microsoft FOR- TRAN as well as Microsoft C. That'll make it a cinch for programmers writing hordes of DOS applications to have those applications run in pro- tected mode and, thanks to the DOS Protected Mode In- terface, to multitask under , Windows enhanced mode. Power LAN 2. 10 r Performance Technology The fastest peer-to-peer LAN available today. Rapport, Clarity A Unix document processor, spreadsheet, E-mail utility, drawing program, and audio editor. Rapport does a num- ber of things and links them together nicely. Nanao T560I, Nanao USA Nanao' s 17-inch T560i sets a new standard for desktop dis- plays. Once you've seen Win- dows at 1280 by 1024 pixels (with 70-Hz refresh), you'll never go back. 128 BYTE- JANUARY 1992 Imagine getting twice the Bernoulli for two-thirds the price. The new Bernoulli 90MB. Welcome to the next generation of BERNOULLI MEANS SECURITY FOR YOUR DATA' removable storage, the new Bernoulli® 90 from Iomega® At 90 megabytes per removable disk, we've more than doubled our capacity. Yet the new Bernoulli 90 is actually less expensive than the Bernoulli 44. A lot less. And with a new, 19-msec* effective access time, a lot faster, too. The best part is, it's all Bernoulli. Rugged, reliable, endless storage. Just what storage-intensive users — like Windows users — demand. More value. If you need more storage, you'll welcome the Bernoulli 90, since it's now comparable in price to a hard disk upgrade. So why not buy a hard disk? Consider what you don't get with a hard disk. You don't get infinite storage in 90-megabyte increments — hard disks fill up. You don't get 180MB of easy backup. You don't get the physical security of removable data disks, or head- crash-resistant technology. You don't get compatibility with all major operating systems, and workstations. And you don't get Central Point's Backup software. gj|| /03&£d^ In short, you don't get I I Hy. "^ > • a Bernoulli . IS ^^sr More recognition. Leading publications have given us welcome recognition, Circle 81 on Inquiry wt££8 EVTE **** but with a 98 percent satisfaction rate, our biggest supporters are Bernoulli users. Our users enjoy worldwide support and a 24- hour * drive replacement service. To further protect their investment, we've designed the Bernoulli 90 to read 44MB disks. And we're instituting an upgrade program to help get every Bernoulli user into the 90s. Call 1-800-777-40841 Questions? We don't blame you. There's a lot more you should know about — like our free, 90MB disk offer, drive configurations, Bernoulli Technology® and speci- fic pricing. So we've prepared a brochure that's yours with a phone call. Find out what a welcome change Bernoulli can be. Before the 90s leave you behind. Card (RESELLERS: 82). L-M=GA Makers of Bernoulli © 1991. Iomega, "the Iomega logo, Bernoulli and Bernoulli Technology are registered trademarks, and Bernoulli Means Security For Your Data is a trademark of Iomega Corp. All other products are registered trademarks of their respective companies. 'Less than 13 msec with included caching software. ♦•U.S. only. tPhone number for U.S. and Canada. Internationally, call 322-720-99-16. For customer service questions, call 1-800-456-5522. BYTE AWARDS MERIT Lotus 1-2-3 for Windows, Lotus Development This is a key product that Windows users have been waiting for. 4th Dimension 2.1, Actus The most powerful rela- tional database development system available for any microcomputer. 386Max6.0, Qualitas Neither MS-DOS 5.0 nor Windows 3.0 can yet match the memory management capabilities of this utility. ATI 8514-Uitra, ATI An inexpensive, fast, high- resolution graphics adapter that helps deliver the prom- ise of Windows 3.0. Adobe Illustrator 3-0, Adobe Systems The premier professional graphics package for the Mac gets even better. Now there is a Next version, too. Altalr, Motorola Altair uses microwave radio in the gigahertz region, giv- ing it bandwidth high enough to support Ethernet at full (10-Mbps) speed. Chaos: The Software, Autodesk A cutting-edge application that lets you explore the new science of chaos. Claris Works, Claris Integrated software for the rest of us— powerful, inex- pensive, and easy to use. Distributed Computing Environment, Open Software Foundation DCE is a solution to the seemingly intractable prob- lem of getting all your dif- ferent types of computers to work together. Dr. Solomon's Virus Toolkit, Ontrack Computer Systems Good medicine for when your personal computer catches the flu. EktaPius 7016 Printer, Eastman Kodak A hybrid printer and copier that demonstrates innovative engineering by Kodak. Harvard Graphics for Windows, Software Publishing This package offers the best compromise between ease of use and presentation power. MacDraw Pro, Claris A Mac-based drawing package upgraded to handle 32-bit color. Mac Topas and Topas VGA, AT&T Graphics Software Lab Two affordable, feature- packed three-dimensional rendering and animation programs for the Mac and the PC. Mastersport 386SL, Zenith Data Systems The first 386SL notebook, and still one of the best SL designs. Apple Mode32, Connectix Apple Mode32 patches Mac II, IIx, and SE/30 ROMs to make them 32-bit clean. Apple now distributes it for free. Momenta Pen System, Momenta The first notebook PC to provide practical pen-assisted applications. Nlsus 3.06, Paragon Concepts This slick Mac word pro- cessor continues to get better and better. ObJectVlslon, Borland International ObjectVision allows visual programming of forms and includes a Paradox-compat- ible database manager. On-Target, Symantec The first project manage- ment package that lets you get serious planning work done without needing a master's degree in the subject. Outbound Notebook System Model 2000, Outbound Systems The first Mac-compatible notebook PC gets better. Paclf IcPage XL, Pacific Data For $999, this hardware and software package turns your Hewlett-Packard La- serJet into a blisteringly fast PostScript printer. PageMaker 4.0, Aldus Aldus got rid of many of PageMaker's limitations in this new release. It can now handle larger documents and multiple documents. QuickC for Windows 1.0 , Microsoft The decision to include a simple applications generator will probably push this tool to the number-one spot among Windows developers in a hurry. Realizer, Within Technologies BASIC for Windows pro- grammers, amateur and pro- fessional alike. Safari NSX/20, AT&T Safari Systems A snazzy notebook PC with well-integrated communica- tions capabilities. HP ScanJet lie, Hewlett-Packard Hewlett-Packard brings full-page and full-color 24- bit scanning to both the PC and the Mac at a low price. Shortcut, Aladdin Systems Performs file searches on a Mac using multiple criteria, even from archived files. T4400, Toshiba Only slightly taller than the T2200SX, the T4400 is a 486SX system with long battery life. The World of C++, Borland International Borland's irrepressible David Intersimone takes much of the pain out of learning essential object- oriented programming concepts. Thunder/24, SuperMac Technology This is a 68040-compatible accelerated display board for the Mac. Timbuktu 4.0 and Timbuktu/Remote 3.0, Farallon Computing These packages allow you to view and control remote Mac screens. Ashlar Vellum for Silicon Graphics, Ashlar An excellent CAD program that shines on a serious work- station like the Silicon Graphics Iris Indigo. Win Printer 400, LaserMaster The first laser printer de- signed to work specifically with Windows. It is host- based, using your PC's CPU for processing power. Z-Mall2.0, Siren Software A Unix GUI-based mail program that sets new stan- dards in simplicity, programmability, features, and performance. 130 BYTE- JANUARY 1992 CSS/3 ™ Complete Statistical System with over 1 ,000 presenta- tion-quality graphs fully integrated with all procedures and on-screen graph customization ■ The largest selection of statistics in a single system; in-depth, comprehensive implementations of: Exploratory techniques; multi-way tables with banners; nonparametrics; dis- tribution jitting; multiple regression; general nonlinear estima- tion; logitlprobit analysis; general ANCOVA/MANCOVA; stepwise discriminatit analysis; log-linear analysis; factor atialysis; cluster analysis; multidimensional scaling; canonical correlation; item analysis/reliability; survival analysis; time series modeling; fore- casting; lags analysis; quality control; process analysis; experi- mental design (with Taguchi); and much more ■ Manuals with comprehensive introductions to each procedure and examples ■ Integrated Stats Advisor expert system ■ Extensive data management facilities (powerful spreadsheet with formulas; relational merge; data verification; flexible programming language) ■ Optimized (plain English menus/mouse) user interface: even complex analyses require just few self-explanatory selections (CSS can be run without manual; Quick Start booklet explains ail basic conventions) ■ Macros, batch/ commands also supported ■ All output displayed in Scrollsheets™ (dynamic tables with pop-up windows and instant graphs) ■ Extremely large analysis designs (e.g., correlation matrices up to 32,000x32,000) ■ Unlimited size of files; extended precision; unmatched speed (Assembler, C) ■ Exchanges data (and graphics) with many applications (incl. Excel®, Lotus 3®, dBASE IV®, SPSS®) ■ Highest resolution output on practically all printers (incl. HP, Postscript), plotters, recorders, typesetters ■ IBM compatibles, 640k or more * Price: $595. Qllick CSS™ Subset of CSS/3: all basic statistical modules (incl. data management) and the full, presentation-quality graphics capabilities of CSS/3 ■ Price: $295. CSSlGRAPHICS™ A comprehensive graphics/chart- ing system with data management ■ All graphics capabilities of CSS/3 and, in addition, extended on-screen drawing, 19 scalable fonts, special effects, icons, maps, multi-graphics management ■ Hundreds of types of graphs * Interactive rotation and interactive cross-sections of 3D graphs ■ Extensive selection of tools for graphical exploration of data; fitting; smoothing; spectral planes; overlaying; layered com- pressions; marked subsets" Unique multivariate (e.g., 4D) graphs" Facilities to custom-design new graphs and add them permanently to menu ■ Import/export of graphs and data, 15 formats ■ Optimized (menu/mouse) user interface; even complex graphs require few keystrokes: ali graphs on this page can be produced from raw data in less than 20 minutes ■ Macros, batch/commands also supported ■ Unlimited size of files ■ Highest resolution output on all hardware (see CSS/3) ■ IBM compatibles, 640k or more ■ CSS:GRAPHICS is included in CS&STATISTICA (available separately for $495). Megafile Manager™ Comprehensive analytic data base management system ■ Unlimited size of files (up to 32,000 fields or 8 MB per record) ■ Megafile Manager is included in CSS/3 and CSSSWISTICA (separately: $295). CSSl STATISTIC A™ A hilly integrated system that combines all the capabilities of CSS/3 and CSS:GRAPHICS into a single extremely comprehensive data analysis system ■ Price: $795. Domestic sh/h $7 per product; 14-day money back guarantee. Circle 157 for DOS. Circle 158 for MAC. StatSoft TM 2325 E. 1 3thSt. • TUlsa, OK 74104 • (9 1 8) 583-41 49 Fax: (918) 583-4376 STATISTIC A/M3C ™ A CSS-compatible, comprehensive data analysis and graphics system designed for the Macintosh ■ Large selection of statistical methods fully integrated with presentation-quality graphics (incl. FDA, multiplots, a wide selection of interactively rotatable 3D graphs; MacDraw-style tools) ■ Unlimited size of files ■ Exchanges data with Excel and other applications ■ Price: $495. Qllick CSS/MaC™ A subset of STATISTICA/Macj all basic statistical modules and the full, presentation-quality graphics capabilities of STATISTIC VMac ■ Price: $295. ; i,.. ( «, M .»i «... »J SCbfcpM Cultnffl ipiw — —~jm rr s, "»< s 7.CM 4,5-11 t,m -.477 •ix* «*■ ' Overseas Offices: StatSoft of Europe (Hamburg, FRG), ph: 040/4200347, fax: 040/4911310; StatSoft UK (London, UK), ph: 0462/482822, fax: 0462/482855; StatSoft Pacific (Melbourne, Australia), ph: 613-866-1766, fax: 613-866-3318; StatSoft Canada-CCO (Ontario), ph: 416-849-0737, fax: 416-849-0918. Available from: CORPORATE SOFTWARE and other Authorized Representatives Worldwide: Holland: Lemax BV 02065-98701; France: VERSION US (1) 40590913; Sweden: AkademiData 018-240035; Spain: ADDLINK, SRL; ph: 34-3-459-0722. CSS, CSS3, CSS:GRAPHICS. Megalile Manager. Quick CSS. STATISTICA, SlatSoft. dBase IV. Excel, Lotus. MacDraw, Macintosh. Postscript are trademarks ol their respective companies: SPSS is a registered trademark of SPSS, Inc. BYTE AWARDS NIKKEI BYTE EXCELLENCE The Fujitsu FM R-Card fits in a briefcase and offers the fea- tures of a desktop machine. It weighs only 2.2 pounds, mea- sures 11.6 by 8.3 by 1.04 inches, and has a full-size, keyboard. It runs for 8 hours on two AA-size alkaline bat- teries—the result of major new technologies, like drop- ping the operating voltage to 3 volts and halting the supply of power to circuits not in use. It costs 238,000 yen. DD-DR1, Sony v The Sony DD-DR1 is an elec- tronic book— a CD-ROM drive handling 8-cm discs. It is linked through an RS-232 interface for read processing. This makes it possible to in- sert CD-ROM data into PC files. The system also has a 256- by 200-mm dot-pitch monochrome graphics display and an ADPCM (adaptive dif- ferential pulse-coded modu- lation) audio playback func- tion (a subset of the CD-ROM XA standard). DISTINCTION PTC-300, Sony > The Sony PTC-300 is the third model in Sony's palmtop line of pen comput- ers. While the previ- ous models were de- signed to fit in an attache case, the PTC-300 fits in your pocket, measuring only 105 by 165 by 28 mm and weigh- ing 355 grams. It costs 65,000 yen, or about US$400, and will run for about 9 hours on two A A cells. In spite of its size, the PTC- 300 is a full-fledged com- puter with an 8-MHz 68000 CPU, 2.5 MB of ROM, and 288 KB of RAM. BYTE AWARDS DOS J4.0/ V (Japanese version), IBM Japan DOS J4.0/ V is an epoch-mak- ing new technology that al- lows the display of Japanese language on IBM AT-compa- tible machines equipped with a VGA display. No special- ized hardware, such as a Japa- nese language character gen- erator, is required. This means that if you use DOS J4.0/V, you can purchase in- expensive IBM compatibles from overseas. It spells an ac- celeration of the reduction of PC prices in Japan. RAM EXCELLENCE MS-DOS 5.0, Microsoft The new full-featured edition of the world's most popular operating system is a major upgrade that conforms well to the elevated needs of today's applications software. Sev- eral application programs can use extra breathing space; MS-DOS 5.0 provides that. With MS-DOS 5.0, the aver- age user has a flexible and powerful set of commands and tools available right at the DOS prompt. Excel 3.0, Microsoft; Lotus 1-2-3 for Windows, Lotus Development The new generation of graphi- cal spreadsheets for Windows offers a whole new class of capabilities combined with a much higher level of ease of use than previous genera- tions. Even novice users can now comprehend the basics of spreadsheets and start using them in a few hours. By using Windows' Dynamic Data Ex- change, you can integrate Lotus 1-2-3 for Windows and Excel with other applications in a modern and powerful desktop environment that im- proves productivity consider- ably. System 7.0, Apple Computer The long-awaited System 7.0 delivers countless new fea- tures to the Mac. It is very sta- ble and has few compatibility problems. It requires as little as 2 MB of RAM and runs without problems even on a Mac Plus. 132 BYTE* JANUARY 1992 ish all you want, but your standard 300-dpi 1 business printer just isn't designed to be a high-performance Windows™ printer. That's why LaserMaster™ created our new WinPrinter™ line— the first business printers specifically designed for optimal Windows printing. Our new WinPrinters give you: /FAST WINDOWS PRINTING Our new WinPrinters give you the fastest Windows printing in the industry. Even your complex pages print in seconds, not minutes. S400 OR 800 dpi QUALITY Today's graphically rich business documents need more than 300-dpi resolution. Our new WinPrinters provide 400- or 800-dpi output for sharper text and crisper graphics to make all your documents more effective. / UPGRADABLE TECHNOLOGY The WinPrinter's power comes from intelligent software instead of an expensive controller. This technology taps into the existing processing power of your '386 or '486 for increased printing performance without reducing your system performance. This design also gives you three ways to upgrade your WinPrinter: (1) when you upgrade your CPU, you'll automatically upgrade your WinPrinter, (2) as Windows improves (Version 3.1), so will the performance of your WinPrinter, and Circle 88 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 89). (3) you can add future WinPrinter advances with a simple software upgrade. / THREE PRINTERS IN ONE Our new WinPrinters are really three printers in one. You can get fast, high-resolution print- ing from PostScript,® a direct Windows GDI driver, or PCL print modes. / EXPANDED FONT CAPABILITY All WinPrinters come with 50 premium Post- Script Type 1 typefaces so you can give your message the perfect typographic look. And our advanced font-management technology means never having to download fonts again. / AFFORDABLE WINDOWS PRINTING Whatever your need, LaserMaster has a WinPrinter for you. Our WinPrinter 400 provides fast, 400-dpi output at just $1,995. Our WinPrinter 800 provides fast, 800-dpi output at just $2,795. And our $995 WinJet™ 800 gives you the option of using your HP LaserJet II or III as a fast, full-featured, BOO dpi WinPrinter. LASERMASTER can make your business printer dreams come true. Call us today to see how our WinPrinters can turn your Windows printing wishes into reality. fL M f LaserMaster ™ I'm turbores printer division Affordablllty Compatibility CALL TODAY: 800-365-4646 OR 612-944-9330 DEPT. 02B ©1991 LaserMaster Corporation. LoserMoster is a trademark and the LAA Logo and TurboRes are registered trademarks of LaserMaster Corporation. PostScript is a registered trademark of Adobe Systems, Inc. All other product or brand names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders. MORE: SPEED, FONTS & RESOLUTION! BYTE AWARDS RAM HP LaserJet Hip, Hewlett-Packard By providing its classic 4- page-per-minute "p" box with PCL-5 and resolution en- hancement capabilities, Hew- lett-Packard has once again redefined the basic, low-cost laser printer. HP LaserJet IIISI, Hewlett-Packard The new top-of-the line Hew- lett-Packard laser printer of- fers a 16-page-per-minute printing engine, PCL-5 with resolution enhancement, and elevated processing power, giving network users a much- needed tool. PowerBook 170, Apple Computer The most powerful of Apple's new notebook trio, the Power- Book 170 packs all the char- acteristics you can imagine in a very compact and light case. Its price is high, but it offers advanced technology, a 25- MHz 68030 processor, and the best black-and-white screen you can buy for a por- table computer: Apple's back- lit AMLCD. Quadra 700, Apple Computer Even though Quadra is not Apple's flagship, it offers the best price/performance ratio for those who really need power. Almost two times faster than the Ilf x, it is the ideal machine for demanding applications such as CAD and desktop publishing. Visual Basic, Microsoft Microsoft's Visual Basic has brought Windows program- ming to thousands of BASIC users. It offers programmers all the necessary tools for de- signing a Windows applica- tion. With Visual Basic, it is easy to create the user inter- face, one of the most complex and time-consuming tasks of the GUI environment. Turbo Pascal for Windows, Borland International Borland has done it once again. In fact, it has kept its promise with a highly ex- tended version that remains compatible with the last Turbo 6.0. Turbo Pascal for Windows offers a completely integrated environment. The programmer has a powerful language with object exten- sions that ease the job and in- voke creativity. DeFacto, Computer Logic DeFacto from Computer Logic is a business software package targeted to medium- and big- scale companies. DeFacto deals with the whole process of a business: It takes incom- ing orders, controls customer support, keeps information on cash flow, has a fully fea- tured inventory control, and produces the invoices in an easily adaptable format. Photoshop 2.0, Adobe The original version of Ado- be's Photoshop received worldwide acclaim and also won a 1990 BYTE Award of Excellence. Now, Adobe out- performs itself with the sec- ond release of Photoshop, which gives artists incredible power. Direct CMYK (cyan, magenta, yellow, black) edit- ing is supported, and you can import Illustrator 3.0 files. Photoshop 2.0 can easily match the power of dedicated prepress systems like Hell or Scitex. 3D Studio, Autodesk The name Autodesk is usually associated with hallmark products in the CAD cate- gory, with AutoCAD being the s most famous example. The same seems to be hap- pening in the area of anima- tion. 3D Studio seems to be the first mainstream PC- based application that allows the production of profession- al-looking applications. DISTINCTION Sharp TFT, Sharp Electronics Sharp has amazed everyone with this TFT color LCD screen for the PC-8500 porta- ble computer. The price is high, but so is the temptation. CorelDraw 2.0, Corel Systems CorelDraw 2.0 offers out- standing capabilities to the graphic artist and the novice alike. Besides its excellent handling of type, it offers a large number of clip-art im- ages and symbols. XG A Video Adapter, IBM IBM's new video adapter of- fers improved resolution, a wider choice of colors, and some local processing. IBM has also popularized the stan- dard by permitting its free use by manufacturers. AutoCAD release 1 1, Autodesk The latest release of the best- known design program has an environment that facilitates the development of the al- ready-numerous add-on pro- grams that are in the market. SCO Unix MPX, The Santa Cruz Operation The MPX extension of Unix from SCO takes full advan- tage of the new double-pro- cessor structure of today 's top machines. It can allocate the jobs to be executed to either processors, thus better utiliz- ing the system. OLE Specification, Microsoft The Object Linking and Em- bedding specification, al- though not fully implemented at the moment, is a great step forward. No application is an island anymore, and this specification allows applica- tions to interact seamlessly. QuickTime 1.0, Apple Computer Apple is setting new stan- dards for multimedia with this excellent piece of soft- ware. On a Mac, QuickTime 1 .0 ensures that all movies are played at the same speed. Canvas 3.0, Deneba Deneba's popular drawing program is now even more powerful. Fully supporting System 7.0, with a huge li- brary of add-ins, Canvas 3.0 is an excellent tool for every- one—novice or professional . Tekton, LH Software This design program provides three-dimensional tools that help an architect easily design and edit natural objects, such as a wall, roof, or staircase. WordPerfect 5.1, Greek edition WordPerfect WordPerfect 5.1 is the first major player in the word pro- cessing market to appear with full support of the Greek language. PC Tools 6.0, Central Point Software; Norton Utilities 5.0, Symantec PC Tools and the Norton Util- ities are a pair of packages that can save valuable data that has been struck by com- puter gremlins. Both pro- grams are a must for every computer user. ScanMaster 1850S, Microtek Microtek's 35mm slide scan- ner is a real breakthrough in price and performance. With a street price close to that of a color scanner, the ScanMas- ter can be the slide scanner for everyone. SuperBase 4, Precision Software SuperBase 4 offers a power- ful and integrated platform for developing applications under Windows 3.0. Am386, Advanced Micro Devices Besides being the fastest 386 processor, the Am386 has also established a price/per- formance ratio that is better than ever before. 134 BYTE* JANUARY 1992 w HMA DOS5.0 XMS BUFFERS UMB 386MAX 486SX DRIVERS 386SX NETWORKS TSRs BLUEMAX C&T286 DOSS. D0$SwithMAX6. I here's no doubt about it. DOS 5 is the sleekest, most convenient, most powerful DOS upgrade in history. And it's a great place to start if you really want to get the ultimate in PC performance without even lifting a finger, New MAX 6 -the driving force in automatic memory management. Top performance requires as much conventional memory as possible. So applications can run faster. And so you can load Windows, TSRs, even a network, and have memory to spare. Of course, DOS 5 helps with its smaller program size. And it does let you load programs high- if you want to do it by hand. But for optimal memory manage- ment that's totally automatic, you need new MAX version 6-386MAX® for PC compatibles, and BlueMAX™ the only memory manager designed to recover up to 250% more high DOS memory on IBM PS/2s. They're the dramatically advanced versions of the fastest growing brand of memory managers in the world. Now with better memory recovery, superior optimization, and amazing ease of use. Intelligent, thoughtful, and totally reliable. Just type maximize, and MAX takes over with its automatic memory man- agement tools. Like new 386MAX ROMsearch™ that recovers massive holes of unused system BIOS memory. New 386MAX VGAswap™ that creates more contiguous memory on all VGA/EGA systems. Like SmartMemory™ that takes care of memory allocation for you, so you'll never again have to think about what kind of memory your computer needs. And new Maximize Reordering that helps fit more programs into high DOS by automatically arranging pro- grams for optimal loading, every time. And using MAX 6 is a cinch thanks to the new graphical interface, complete with pull- down menus, mouse support, and context-sensitive help. There's even a new improved version of ASQ™ the intelligent system analyzer and tutorial, right on board. The ultimate in power and luxury is more affordable than ever. New386MAX6for286* 386, and 486 PC compatibles is now just $99.95. And new BlueMAX 6 for 386 and 486 IBM PS/2s is only $124.95. Frankly, whether you use DOS 5 or not, only MAX 6 will have you on your way to maximum PC performance with an absolute minimum of effort. See your dealer or call toll-free today. 1-800-676-0386 Call to upgrade for just $29.95 plus $5 S&H** mm- IA The Intelligent Memory Managers 'FFERS UMB 386MAX 486SX DRIVERS 386SX NETWORKS TSRs BLUEMAX C&T286 en ©1991,1992 Qualitas. Qualitas, 7101 Wisconsin Avenue, Suite 1386, Bethesda, MD 20814. All company and product names are trademarks or registered trademarks oftlieir respective owners. System Requirements: Any 386 or 486 PC or PS/2, min. 256K of extended memory, f\ r^ica *^ S ^'° or n *# ner > and nard disk drive - *386MAX supports 286 systems ivithSliadoivRAM. Feature IJUALITAS availability and memory recovery may vary. ** Offer valid in North America only. Circle 1 35 on Inquiry Card. BYTE AWARDS RAM Open, Singular Open from Singular is a com- mercial program generator that uses the "open" concept. It consists of basic rules and entities for each business package, and a fully flexible, adaptable, and customizable environment for the user and programmer. Although it runs under DOS, the user in- terface is very well designed. High Refresh Specification, VESA The vertical refresh rate of 72 Hz proposed by the Video Electronics Standards Asso- ciation deserves praise for its comfortable way of interfac- ing humans with computer monitors. Whatever combina- tion of resolution and colors you use, there's no flickering on the sides of the screen. MERIT Touchbase Worldport Fax/Modem 2496, USRobotics FrameMaker 3.0, Frame Technologies PN48 Professional System, Citizen America LaserWriter llg, Apple Computer Trackball, Microsoft Radius Rocket Accelerator Card, Radius Personal R:Base, Microrim Now Utilities 3.0, Now Software BYTE AWARDS BINARY BYTE AWARDS EXCELLENCE Visual Basic, Microsoft Norton Desktop for Windows, Symantec MS-DOS 5.0, Microsoft System 7.0, Apple Computer IBM PS/2 Model P75, IBM LSX-5000, Olivetti DR DOS 6.0, Digital Research Excel 3.0, Microsoft Sony 128-MB rewrit- able optical disks, Sony NetWare Lite, Novell Desqvlew/X, Quarterdeck Teac 2.88-MB floppy drives, Teac America WordPerfect for Windows, WordPerfect QuickTime 1.0, Apple Computer DISTINCTION NEC MultiSync 3FG, 4FG, NEC NCR System 3125, NCR Canon Ion, Canon; Photoman, Logitech Phaser II PXI, Tektronix Zortech C++ 3.0, Symantec PC Tools 7.0, Central Point Software PowerBook, Apple Computer HP LaserJet NISI, Hewlett-Packard Idea I + D, WinLogo FasMath, Cyrix Dell 325NC, Dell; NB-SL/25c, Epson PenPoint, Go Corp. 3D Studio, Autodesk NetWare 3.11, Novell PC/Chip F8680, Chips & Technologies Am386DXL-40, Advanced Micro Devices HP 95LX, Hewlett-Packard HP DeskJet 500 Color, Hewlett-Packard CorelDraw 2.0, CD-ROM edition, Corel Systems MERIT Mathematlca for Windows, Wolfram Research Ventura Publisher 4.0 for Windows, Ventura Software Hercules Graphics Station Gold, Hercules Computer Technology NetWare 2.2, Novell Borland C++ 2.0, Borland International IBM XGA Display Adapter/ A, IBM Mastersport 386SL, Zenith Data Systems QuickC for Windows, Microsoft Ultra 144, Hayes Dell 450DE, Dell Iris Indigo, Silicon Graphics Quattro Pro 3.0, Borland International Ami Pro 2.0, Lotus Development Lotus 1-2-3 for Windows, Lotus Development SCSI-2 standard T2200SX, Toshiba HP Apollo Series 9000 Model 42, Hewlett-Packard SoundBlaster Pro, Brown-Wagh Publishing HP ScanJet lie, Hewlett-Packard Lotus Notes 2.0, Lotus Development CodeBase 4.2, Sequiter Multi Access Series 3000, Advanced Logic Research FoxPro 2.0, Fox Software GeoWorks Ensemble, GeoWorks TrackMan Portable, Logitech; BallPoint, Microsoft VRAM II, Video Seven PhotoStyler, Aldus HP LaserJet Hip, Hewlett-Packard Readers may send comments or queries to Nikkei BYTE, RAM, or Binary do BYTE, One Phoenix Mill Lane, Pe- terborough, NH 03458. 136 BYTE- JANUARY 1992 *8§ WW « *'i *'" 4 J*L^*'V 0,; -.''**r*' K-. asK^w uy The Only Full Turn It Into A Page Color Display, Spreadsheet Display And .. For Free. NOW FOR $1249 you can own the only color por- trait display for the PC. Introducing the Radius Full Page Pivot, the display that shows you an en- tire page at one time. Pivot displays 65% more information than standard 12" or 13" monitors, so you can see a letter or full page layout from top to bottom. Image quality is superb - anywhere from | VGA resolution all the way ^>^k tip tol024 ; x 768. You can also \M *Vv rotate Pivot into landscape mode ^^j^^ to view a complete spreadsheet. JeTL Pivot combines with the advanced Radius SVGA MultiView Interface for real-time pivoting. When given a gentle turn, Pivot automatically reorga- nizes your application, so you can quickly and gracefully go from one orientation to the other. In addition, Pivot with MultiView provides 100% VGA and SVGA compatibility, offers high resolu- tion full-page drivers for Windows 3.0, WordPerfect, Lotus 1-2-3, AutoCAD and others, displays up to 32,768 colors and meets the Swedish standards for low ELF/VLF magnetic emissions. We might also mention that MultiView— the fastest SVGA card you can buy today-works with a vari- ety of multi-frequency displays, sells for $449 and comes ife^ with a seven-year war- ranty, m ^T •If the combination of Full ^Zjf Page Pivot and SVGA MultiView : ^ sounds like the perfect ^BHI display system for all your applications, it's proba- bly because it is. Pivot and MultiView are available from Radius, the leading manufacturer of high res- olution grapliics systems for personal computers. To find your nearby Radius reseller or to receive a Full Page Pivot video tape, call 1-800-227-2795. Circle 1 39 on Inquiry Card. radlis of Radius Inc. All other products are trademarks or registered trademarks: of tlierr respective owners. 1408-434-1010. So-Cfti image courtesy of Don Uaariu' Excel Town. BYTE AWARDS The Fourth Annual BYTE Award Winners Arius, Inc. Ashlar, Inc. Citizen America Corp. Ergo Computing, Inc. 4th Dimension 2. 1 Ashlar Vellum for Silicon Graphics PN48 Professional System Moby Brick 10351 BubbRd. 1290 Oakmead Pkwy., Suite 218 2450 Broadway, Suite 600 1 Intercontinental Way Cupertino, CA 95014 Sunnyvale, CA 94086 Santa Monica, CA 90404 Peabody, MA 01960 (408)252-4444 (408) 746-1800 (213)453-0614 (800) 633-1925 (408)252-0831 fax: (408) 746-0749 fax:(213)453-2814 (508)535-7510 Circle 985 on Inquiry Card. Circle 993 on Inquiry Card. Circle 1 064 on Inquiry Card. fax:(508)535-7512 Circle 1 072 on Inquiry Card. Adobe Systems, Inc. ATI Technologies, Inc. Claris Corp. Adobe Illustrator 3. ATI8514-Ultra Claris Works Falco Data Products, Inc. 1585 Charleston Rd. 3761 Victoria Park Ave. MacDraw Pro GT486/40 P.O. Box 7900 Scarborough, Ontario, 5201 Patrick Henry Dr. 440 Protero Ave. Mountain View, CA 94039 Canada M I W3S2 Santa Clara, CA 95052 Sunnyvale, CA 94086 (800) 833-6687 (416)756-0718 (408) 987-7000 (800) 325-2648 (415)961-4400 fax:(416)756-0720 Circle 1065 on Inquiry Card. (408)745-7123 fax:(415)961-3769 Circle 994 on Inquiry Card. fax: (408) 745-7860 Circle 986 on Inquiry Card. Clarity Software, Inc. Circle 1073 on Inquiry Card. AT&T Graphics Software Lab Rapport Advanced Micro Devices Mac Topas and Topas VGA 2700 Garcia Ave. Farallon Computing, Inc. Am386 3520 Commerce Crossing, Suite 300 Mountain View, CA 94043 Timbuktu 4. and P.O. Box 3453 Indianapolis, IN 46240 (415)691-0320 Tim buktul Remote 3 . Sunnyvale, CA 94088 (317) 844-4364 fax: (415) 964-4383 2000 Powell St., Suite 600 (800) 222-9323 fax: (317) 575-0649 Circle 1066 on Inquiry Card. Emeryville, CA 94608 (408) 732-2400 Circle 995 on Inquiry Card. (510)596-9100 Circle 987 on Inquiry Card. Connectix fax: (510) 596-9023 AT&T Safari Systems Apple Mode32 Circle 1 074 on Inquiry Card. Aladdin Systems, Inc. Safari NSX/20 2655 Campus Dr. Shortcut 14K World Fair Dr. San Mateo, CA 94403 Fox Software 165 Westridge Dr. Somerset, NJ 08873 (415) 571-5100 FoxPro 2.0 Watsonville, CA 95076 (908) 302-5800 fax:(415)571-5195 134 West South Boundary (408)761-6200 fax:(908)469-4578 Circle 1067 on Inquiry Card. Perrysburg, OH 43551 fax:(408)761-6206 Circle 996 on Inquiry Card. (419)874-0162 Circle 988 on Inquiry Card. Corel Systems fax: (419) 874-8678 Autodesk, Inc. CorelDraw 2.0, CD-ROM edition Circle 1 075 on Inquiry Card. Aldus Corp. Chaos: The Software 1600 Carling Ave., Suite 190 PageMaker 4.0 2320 Marinship Way Ottawa, Ontario, Go Corp. 41 1 First Ave. S Sausalito, CA 94965 Canada K1Z8R7 PenPoint Seattle, W A 98104 (415)332-2344 (613) 728-8200 950 Tower Lane, Suite 1400 (206) 622-5500 fax:(415)331-8093 fax: (613) 728-9790 Foster City, CA 94404 fax: (206) 343-4240 Circle 997 on Inquiry Card. Circle 1068 on Inquiry Card. (415) 345-7400 Circle 989 on Inquiry Card. fax: (415) 345-9833 Borland International, Inc. CoStar Corp. Circle 1 076 on Inquiry Card. Alias Research, Inc., Borland C++ 3.0 AddressWriter Style Division ObjectVision 22 Bridge St. Grolier Electronic Publishing Sketch The World of C++ Greenwich, CT 06830 Grolier Electronic Encyclopedia 1 10 Richmond St. E 1800 Green Hills Rd. (203) 661-9700 Sherman Tpke. Toronto, Ontario, P.O. Box 660001 fax: (203) 661-1540 Danbury, CT 06816 Canada M5C 1P1 Scotts Valley, CA 95067 Circle 1069 on Inquiry Card. (800) 356-5590 (800) 267-8697 (408) 438-8400 (203) 797-3500 (416)362-9181 fax: (408) 439-9344 Digital Research, Inc. fax:(203)797-3197 fax: (416) 362-0630 Circle 998 on Inquiry Card. DRDOS6.0 Circle 1 077 on Inquiry Card. Circle 990 on Inquiry Card. Box DRI Cayman Systems, Inc. 70 Garden Court Gupta Technologies, Inc. Amaze, Inc. GatorBox CS Monterey, CA 93942 Quest for Windows The Far Side Computer Calendar 26 Lansdowne St. (800)395-2480 1040 Marsh Rd. 11810 115th Ave. NE Cambridge, MA 02139 (408) 649-3896 Menlo Park, CA 94025 Kirkland,WA 98034 (800)473-4776 fax: (408) 64.6-6248 (415)321-9500 (206) 820-7007 (617) 494-1999 Circle 1 070 on Inquiry Card. fax:(415)321-5471 fax:(206)823-0568 fax:(617)494-9270 Circle 1078 on Inquiry Card. Circle 991 on Inquiry Card. Circle 999 on Inquiry Card. Eastman Kodak Co. EktaPlus 7016 Printer Hewlett-Packard Co. Apple Computer, Inc. Chips & Technologies Personal Printer Products HP Apollo 9000/Series 700 LaserWriter Iff and II g PC/Chip 901 Elm Grove Rd., HP LaserJet lllSi Mac Quadra 900 3050 Zanker Rd. First Floor, Building 14 HP ScanJet lie PowerBook 170 San Jose, CA 95134 Rochester, NY 14650 19310PruneridgeAve. QuickTime 1.0 (408)434-0600 (800)344-0006 Cupertino, CA 95014 System 7.0 fax: (408) 934-1552 fax: (716) 726-3108 (800)752-0900 20525 Mariani Ave. Circle 1062 on Inquiry Card. Circle 1071 on Inquiry Card. Circle 1 079 on Inquiry Card. Cupertino, CA 95014 (408)996-1010 Circle 992 on Inquiry Card. 138 BYTE' JANUARY 1992 486/860 Speed. . . Microway Quality. Microway has engineered four distinctive black tower systems. The 486-B 2 T is designed for high-end users. It comes standard with American 486 motherboards and power supplies, yet has a reasonable starting price of $2,195. A broad range of options can be installed including high speed and capacity hard disks, intelligent serial con- trollers, tape back-up units, high end graphics adapters and our Number Smasher-860. These systems are ideal for configuring Novell or UNIX file servers, multiuser systems, and workstations for graphics, CAD and scien- tific uses. The 486-B 2 T comes with dual fans, Across the Board™ Cooling and American industrial grade power supplies. All systems are thoroughly tested, burned in and include the best technical support in the industry, which weVe provided since 1982. ie key to attaining workstation performance is Microway 's 40MHz Number Smasher-860. It features a four-way interleaved 644>it memory system that runs at 160 megabytes/sec. The Number Smasher's i860 has been clocked at 80 megaflops doing matrix multiplies, 67 megaflops doing FFTs and 11.8 Double Precision Unpack Megaflops on large arrays— ten times the speed of a 486 and twice the speed of a Cray 1F! One happy user recently reported that his "Baby Cray" was happily humming away saving him thousands of dollars per month in 3090 rentals. The Number Smasher comes with the finest i860 compilers on the market, your choice of Microway's NDP™ FORTRAN, C|C++ or Pascal. Call or write today for more information on Microway's new black tower systems. Microway ® ; ® Technology You Can Count On Corporate Headquarters, Box 79, Kingston, MA 02364 USA • TEL 508-746-7341 • FAX 508-746-4678 • UK/Europe 081-541-5466 France 01 43 2 69593 • Germany 069-75-2023 • Holland 40 836455 • Italy 02-74.90,749 • Japan 0474 23 1322 • Norway 6-892020 BYTE AWARDS The Fourth Annual Byte Award Winners (continued) Hewlett-Packard Co. Nanao USA Corp. Performance Technology, Inc. Sun Microsystems, Inc. HP95LX Nanao T560i PowerLAN2.10 Sparcstation IPX 1000 Northeast Circle Blvd. 23535 Telo Ave. 800 Lincoln Center 2550 Garcia Ave. Corvalis, OR 97330 Torrance, CA 90505 7800 IH 10 W Mountain View, CA 94043 (800) 443-1254 (800) 800-5202 San Antonio, TX 78230 (415)960-1300 fax: (503) 750-4689 (213) 325-5202 (800) 327-8526 fax:(415)969-9131 Circle 1080 on Inquiry Card. fax: (213) 530-1679 (512) 349-2000 Circle 1 261 on Inquiry Card. Circle 1087 on Inquiry Card. fax: (512) 366-0123 IBM Circle 1 096 on Inquiry Card. SuperMac Technology IBM 3.5" Rewritable Optical Drive NCR Corp. Thunder/24 U.S. Marketing and Services NCR 3125 Phar Lap Software, Inc. 485 Protero Ave. 1 133 Westchester Ave. Workstation Products Division 286\DOS-Extender Sunnyvale, CA 94086 White Plains, NY 10604 1601 South Main St. 60 Aberdeen Ave. (408) 245-2202 (800) 426-2468 Dayton, OH 45479 Cambridge, MA 02138 fax: (408) 735-7250 Circle 1063 on Inquiry Card. (800) 225-5627 (617)661-1510 Circle 1262 on Inquiry Card. (513)445-6160 fax: (617) 876-2972 Intel Corp. fax:(513)445-2008 Circle 1 097 on Inquiry Card. Symantec Corp. Net Satisfaxtion 1. Circle 1088 on Inquiry Card. Norton Desktop for Windows 5200 Northeast Elam Young Pkwy. Psion, Inc. On-Target Hillsboro, OR 97124 Novell, Inc. Psion Series 3 10201 Torre Ave. (503) 696-7086 NetWare 3. 11 57 River St. Cupertino, CA 95014 Circle 1081 on Inquiry Card. 122 East 1700 South Wellesley, MA 02181 (800)441-7234 Provo, UT 84606 (617) 237-8538 (408)253-9600 LaserMaster Corp. (800) 346-7177 fax: (617) 431-2155 fax:(408)253-4092 WinPrinter 400 (801)429-5900 Circle 1098 on Inquiry Card. Circle 1263 on Inquiry Card. 6900 Shady Oak Rd. fax:(801)429-5155 Eden Prairie, MN 55344 Circle 1089 on Inquiry Card. Qualitas, Inc. Tandy Corp. (800) 365-4646 386Max6.0 CDR-1000 (503)629-7000 Ontrack Computer Systems, Inc. 7101 Wisconsin Ave., Suite 386 700 1 Tandy Center fax: (612) 944-0522 Dr. Solomon 's Virus Toolkit Bethesda, MD 20814 Fort Worth, TX 76102 Circle 1082 on Inquiry Card. 6321 Bury Dr. (301)907-7400 (817) 390-3300 Eden Prairie, MN 55346 fax:(301)718-6060 fax:(817)878-6508 Lotus Development Corp. (800)752-1333 Circle 1 099 on Inquiry Card. Circle 1 264 on Inquiry Card. Ami Pro 2.0 (612)937-1107 Lotus 1-2-3 for Windows fax: (612) 937-0196 Radius, Inc. Toshiba America Information 55 Cambridge Pkwy. Circle 1 090 on Inquiry Card. Full Page Pivot Systems, Inc. Cambridge, MA 02142 1710 Fortune Dr. T2200SX (617) 577-8500 Open Software Foundation San Jose, CA 95131 T44O0 fax:(617)693-1197 Distributed Computing Environment (800) 227-2795 Computer Systems Division Circle 1083 on Inquiry Card. 1 1 Cambridge Center (408)434-1010 9740 Irvine Blvd. Cambridge, MA 02142 fax:(408)434-0770 Irvine, CA 92718 Microsoft Corp. (617)621-8700 Circle 1 1 00 on Inquiry Card. (800) 334-3445 Excel 3.0 Circle 1091 on Inquiry Card. (714) 583-3000 MS-DOS 5.0 Silicon Graphics, Inc. fax: (714) 587-6034 QuickC for Windows 1.0 Outbound Systems, Inc. Iris Indigo Circle 1 265 on Inquiry Card. Visual Basic Outbound Notebook System 201 1 North Shoreline Blvd. Word for Windows 2.0 Model 2000 Mountain View, CA 94043 Traveling Software, Inc. 1 Microsoft Way 4840 Pearl East Cir. (415)960-1980 LapUnk Pro 4.0 Redmond, WA 98052 Boulder, CO 80301 fax:(415)961-0595 18702 North Creek Pkwy. (800) 426-9400 (800) 444*4607 Circle 1257 on Inquiry Card. Bothell.WA 98011 (206) 882-8080 (303) 786-9200 (800) 343-8080 fax:(206)883-8101 fax:(303)786-8611 Siren Software Corp. (206)483-8088 Circle 1084 on Inquiry Card. Circle 1092 on Inquiry Card. Z-Mail2.0 fax: (206) 487-1284 750 Menlo Ave., Suite 200 Circle 1 266 on Inquiry Card. Momenta Corp. Pacific Data Products Menlo Park, CA 94025 Momenta Pen System PacificPage XL (415) 322-0600 Truevision 295 North Bernardo Ave. 9125 Rehco Rd. fax:(415)322-4023 NuVista+ Mountain View, CA 94043 San Diego, CA 92121 Circle 1258 on Inquiry Card. 7340 Shadeland Station (415)969-3876 (619) 552-0880 Indianapolis, IN 46256 fax:(415)969-3877 fax: (619) 552-0889 Software Publishing Corp. (317)841-0332 Circle 1085 on Inquiry Card. Circle 1 093 on Inquiry Card. Harvard Graphics for Windows fax: (317) 576-7700 3165KiferRd. Circle 1 267 on Inquiry Card. Motorola, Inc. Palindrome Corp. Santa Clara, CA 95051 Altair The Network Archivist 2. (408)986-8000 Within Technologies Altair Product Operations 850 East Diehl Rd. fax:(408)980-0729 Realizer 3215 Wilke Rd. Naperville, IL 60563 Circle 1259 on Inquiry Card. Laurel Corporate Center, Suite 201 S Arlington Heights, IL 60004 (708) 505-3300 8000 Midlantic Dr. (800) 233-0877 fax:(708)505-7917 Stac Electronics Mount Laurel, NJ 08054 (708)632-4723 Circle 1 094 on Inquiry Card. Stacker 2.0 (609) 273-8881 fax:(708)632-7811 5993 Avenida Encinas fax:(609)231-8991 Circle 1 086 o n Inquiry Card. Paragon Concepts, Inc. Carlsbad, CA 92008 Circle 1268 on Inquiry Card. Nisus 3.06 (619)431-7474 990 Highland Dr., Suite 3 12 fax:(619)431-0880 Zenith Data Systems Solana Beach, CA 92075 Circle 1260 on Inquiry Card. Master sport 386SL (800) 922-2993 2150 East Lake Cook Rd. (619)481-1477 Buffalo Grove, IL 60089 fax: (619) 481-6154 (800) 553-0331 Circle 1 095 on Inquiry Card. (708) 808-4300 Circle 1269 on Inquiry Card. 140 BYTE- JANUARY 1992 Why Is Northgate Going Public With Confidential Information? To Illustrate The Northgate Take a behind-the-scenes look at Northgate quality. It's no secret that Northgate makes some of today's finest computer systems. A room full of awards from major industry publications is proof of that. But the tour you're about to take will show you how Northgate achieved its worldwide reputation for quality. The reason we're "going public" with this information is simple People who already own a Northgate system know from experience that we make no compromises on quality Now we want the rest of the world to know about the qualities that made Northgate a leading direct marketer of high-quality systems. Complete line of systems. • Latest technology The Northgate systems you buy today won't become obsolete tomorrow. 1 Complete product line. From lightweight notebooks to giant network file servers, Northgate makes a complete range of computers to handle every business application. Our newest products include low-priced 386SXV 386 and 486™ systems. ■ Award-winning performance. Our most recent triumphs include InfdWorld and BYTE magazines' "Desktop Computer of the Year" awards. Seven PC Magazine Editors' Choice awards, eight Computer Shopper Best Buy and three other InfdWorld recogni- tions are added proof of Northgate quality. 1 Customized, ready-to-run systems. Northgate custom configures every system to meet your specific requirements. We'll even rack mount or hard case your systems. 1 Finest components. We test and use compo- nents from only the best manufacturers to ensure peak performance and reliability. • Flawless software compatibility. Our systems are fully compatible with MS-DOSf OS/2? Novell® and other operating systems. • Product testing and burn-in ensures your system will work perfectly from day one. • All systems are FCC Class B Certified for home and office use. Network solutions. • Northgate LAN specialists are uniquely qualified to con- figure and install high quality products that provide a solid foundation for networking. • Novell Certified Gold Dealer We certify and test all products to work perfectly with Novell as well as OS/2, SCO/UNIX® and Banyan® Vines. And our staff of Certified NetWare® Engineers will help keep your LAN operating at peak efficiency. Novell Gold Authorized Circle 1 1 3 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 1 1 4). ustomer service and support nsures your complete satisfaction. 24-hour toll-free technical support 365 days a year, for as long as you own your system. Free year of on-site service provided by NCR? Your complete satisfaction is our commitment. If necessary, we'll even send a skilled technician to your home or office. Free overnight shipment of replacement Darts to minimize computer downtime. 30-day money-back guarantee safeguards /our purchase decision. Fullparts and labor warranties — 1 year on systems, 5 years on keyboards. Customized service and support plans for :orporate customers. Whatever you need in he way of service, Northgate delivers. We i fer a variety of customized service options ncluding disaster recovery planning. Affordable quality is yours with Northgate. • Low Factory-Direct Prices. • GSA/Government and VAR discounts. • Leasing plans with low monthly install- ments and flexible terms up to five years. • 100% financing with Northgate's Big 'N' Card. We can usually set up your account the same day you call. • Other convenient payment options include MasterCard, VISA, American Express and Discover cards, wire transfers, personal and corporate checks, Corporate Purchase Orders and C.O.D. Our promise: no compromises. As you're about to see, our reputation for quality is built on a solid foundation of superior design, engineering, manufacturing, and service. Turn the page to begin your tour of Northgate. CALL TOLL-FREE 800-345-8709 A/OffTHGATE COMPUTE/? SyS7EMSJA/C. "Smart Tools For Business""' 7075 Flying Cloud Drive. Eden Prairie, MN 55344 Circle 1 1 3 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 114). Quality Through Engineering Manufacturing high-performance, quality systems takes more than just a top-notch Research and Development team. It requires a strategic alliance with the industry's premier component vendors. To meet our rigid stand- ards, Northgate engineers work in tandem with our suppliers to design a full range of components. Then, they test hundreds of configurations to find the optimum combination of performance and reliability. Northgate 386SX ™/16 or 20 • Intel® 80386SX/16 or 20 MHz Processor • 1MB RAM (Expands to 16MB) '52MB IDE Hard Drive with 17 ms Seek Time • Five-Bay Case; Three 5.25" and Two 3.5" Bays » Six 16-Bit Expansion Card Slots • Choice of 1.2MB 5.25" or 1.44MB 3.5' Floppy Drive • Exclusive OnmiKcf* Keyboard •VGA 800x600 Card and Color Monitor • MS-DOS 3.3, 4.01 or 5 • FCC Class B Certified Northgate 386DX/25 or 33 ■ Five-Bay Case; Three 5.25" and Two 3.5" Bays » Exclusive OmniKcy Keyboard •VGA 800x600 Card and Color Monitor • Microsoft® Windows™ 3.0 and Mouse Northgate 386DX/40 $1599°7$i699 OO • Intel 80386DX/25or33 MHz Processor • 2MB RAM (Expands to 32MB) • 52MB IDE Hard Drive with 17 ms Seek Time •64K Cache •Choice of 1.2MB 5.25" or 1.44MB 3.5" Floppy Drive • Six 16-Bit and Two 8-Bit Expansion Card Slots $2099 7$2199 00 •MS-DOS 3.3, 4.01 or 5 • FCC Class B Certified • AMD386DX/40MH: Processor • 4MB RAM (Expands to 32MB) • 52MB IDE Hard Drive with 17 ms Seek Time •64K Cache •Choice of 1.2MB 5.25" or 1.44MB 3.5" Floppy Drive •Six 16-Bit and Two8-Bit ExpansionCardSlots $2399 00 • Five-Bay Case; Three 5.25* and Two 3.5" Bays • Exclusive OmniKcy Keyboard •VGA 800x600 Card and ColorMonitor • Microsoft Windows 3.0 and Mouse •MS-DOS 3.3, 4.01 or 5 • FCC Class B Certified Circle 1 1 3 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 114). &asm' A/386 Through Compatibility Once our components meet our highest expectations, a different set of engineers takes the helm. System configurations are set up on our own LAN test bed and undergo a grueling month-long battery of tests. We check hundreds of business software packages to ensure our systems run applications under MS-DOS® OS/2® Novell® SCO/UNIX® Banyan® and other operating systems. Through this process, Northgate has earned an industiy-wide reputation for flawless compatibility. Be assured that when you purchase Northgate systems, you're getting compatibility you can rely on. CALL TOLL-FREE 800-345-8709 NOffTHGArE COMPi/TEff 111 j h ii * * "* " z, ii m it tt r <* ; - n ■ . :gS5SSS5£S5S8»— .-- 1. : ■ ■• ) H? SS£ • Northgate Slim Line Scalable Processing (SP) Upgradable Systems Northgate Slimline SP™ 386/25 or 33 Northgate Slimline SP486SX/20 • Intel 80386DX/25 or 33 MHz Processor on Power Module • Fast, Affordable Upgrades - Simply Replace Power Module •■1MB RAM (Expands to 32MB) • 52MB IDE Hard Drive with 17 ms Seek Time • 64K Cache Memory • Continuous Edge Graphics Chip $2799 00 /$3099 00 • 1.2MB 5.25" and 1.44MB 3.5" floppy Drives 1 Exclusive OmniKcv Keyboard • VGA 1024x768 Color Monitor • Microsoft Windows 3.0 and Mouse •MS-DOS 3.3, 4.01 or 5 • FCC Class B Certified • Intel 80486SX720 MHz Processor on Power Module • Fast, Affordable Upgrades - Simply Replace Power Module •4MB RAM (Expands to 32MB) • 52MB IDE Hard Drive with 17 ms Seek Time • 64K Cache Memory • Continuous Edge Graphics Chip $314 9 oo • 1.2MB 5.25" and 1.44MB 3.5" Floppy Drives ' Exclusive OmniKcv Keyboard ■ VGA 1024x768 Color Monitor ' Microsoft Windows 3.0 and Mouse •MS-DOS 3.3, 4.01 or 5 ' FCC Class B Certified Northgate Slimline SP486DX/33 • Intel 80486DX/33 MHz Processor on Power Module • 4MB RAM (Expands to 32MB) • 52MB IDE Hard Drive with 17 ms Seek Time • 64K Cache Memory • Continuous Edge Graphics Chip $3329 00 ■ 1.2MB 5.25" and 1.44MB 3.5" Floppy Drives » Exclusive OmniKcv Keyboard ■VGA 1024x768 Color Monitor ■ Microsoft Windows 3.0 and Mouse •MS-DOS 3.3,4.01 or 5 ' FCC Class B Certified Circle 1 1 3 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 114). Quality Through Manufacturing Northgate has studied manufacturing methods and has selected a process that gives the greatest quality and productivity. Our technicians are skilled in all phases of man- ufacturing. Working in teams of four, they bring the elements of quality together with craftsmanship that knows no equal. A detailed system of checks and balances ensures strict adherence to our ri quality control standards. When all is complete, comprehensive burn-in and final testing begin. Northgate Elegance SP M 386/25 or 33 Northgate Elegance SP 486SX/20 Northgate Degance SP486DX/33 • Intel 80386DX/25 or 33 MHz Processor on Power Module • Fast, Affordable Upgrades— Simply Replace Power Module •4MB RAM (Expands to 32MB) • 106MB IDEHardDrivewith 17 ms Seek Time • 64K Cache Memory • Desktop Case $32997$3399 00 • 1.2MB 5.25" and 1.44MB 3.5" Floppy Drives • Exclusive Omni Key Keyboard •VGA 1024x 768 Card and Color Monitor • Microsoft Windows 3.0 and Mouse •MS-DOS 3.3, 4.01 or 5 • FCC Class B Certified • Intel 80486SX/20 MHz Processor on Power Module • Fast, Affordable Upgrades— Simply Replace Power Module •4MB RAM (Expands to 32MB) • 106MB IDEHardDrivewith 17 ms Seek Time • 64K Cache Memory • Desktop Case $3699 00 • 1.2MB 5.25" and 1.44MB 3.5" Floppy Drives • Exclusive OmniKcy Keyboard •VGA 1024x 768 Card and Color Monitor • Microsoft Windows 3.0 and Mouse •MS-DOS 3.3, 4.01 or 5 • FCC Class B Certified • Intel 80486DX/33 MHz Processor on Power Module • 4MB RAM (Expands to 64MB) • 106MB IDE Hard Drive with 17 ms Seek Time • 64K Cache Memory • Vertical Power Case $399900 • 1.2MB 5.25" and 1.44MB 3.5" Floppy Drives • Exclusive OmniKcy Keyboard •VGA1024x768Cardand Color Monitor • Microsoft Windows 3.0 and Mouse •MS-DOS 33, 4.01 or 5 • FCC Class B Certified Circle 1 1 3 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 114). Quality Through Service Northgate backs every system with a n award- winning package of service and support. Including a 30-Day Money-Back Guarantee, full parts and labor warranties (one year on systems, five years on keyboards) and free overnight shipment of replacement parts. You also get toll-free technical support 24 hours a day, seven days a week. We track every detail concerning your system, including configuration, | * || M |n previous questions and ™* correspondence. This gives our staff immediate access to your system's history the moment you call. Should you require on-site help, we'll dispatch a trained NCR® technician to your door. This service is free for one year. CALL TOLL-FREE 800-345-8709 WmHGATE COMPUTES? SySTFAfS t /NC 'orthgate "Specialty" Systems ,5a -f»i- v Northgate Elegance 486/25 or 33 EISA » Vertical Power Case • Exclusive OmniKey Keyboard •VGA 1024x768 Card and Color Monitor • Intel 80486DX/25 or 33 MHz Processor •4MB RAM (Expands to 32MB) • 200MB IDE Hard Drive with 15 ms Seek Time • 128K Cache •EISA Bus • 1.2MB 5.25" and 1.44MB 3.5" floppy Drives $45997$5599 00 ■ Microsoft Windows 3.0 and Mouse ■MS-DOS 31 4.01 or 5 • FCC Class B Certified Northgate Slimt/re" 386SX/20 • AC Adapter • Intel 80386SX720 MHz Processor • 1MB RAM (Expands to 5MB) •40MB Hard Drive • 1.44MB 3.5" Floppy Drive • 84-Key Keyboard Emulating 101 • 8.5* LCD Screen Supports 32 Shades of Gray; VGA 640x480 • 11.7" x 8.25" x 1.9"; 6.1 Lbs. $2399 00 • Stacker'" Software (Provides up to 80MB of Storage) • Magic Cursor™ for Windows or No-Squint II™ for DOS ■MS-DOS 4.01 or 5 ■ FCC Class B Certified Northgate OmniArray™ • RAID-3 Parallel Drive Array with 1.1GB to 4GB Data Storage • Four Data Drives with 512 K Total Cache; One Redundant Drive with 128K Cache • Fast SCSI Engineering Delivers lOMB/Second Performance •ISA/EISA SCSI Adapter for NetWare® File Servers Call For Pricing » Novell Certified for NetWare 386 3.11 • Failed Drive Supports Keeps Unit Operational with Single Drive Failure; Rebuilds Data on Replacement Drive ■ SCSI Cable and Terminator • Vertical Power Case Circle 1 1 3 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 114). Quality Custom Configurations Northgate custom configures every system to meet your most demanding needs. We offer a comprehensive range of top quality com- ponents, giving us the capability of tailoring a system over 3,000,000 ways. To find out which is best for you, call one of our Systems Consultants toll free. Hard Drives Options include IDE hard drives with capacities of 52MB, 100MB,200MB or 340MB. Also available are ESDI and SCSI hard drives with capacities as high as 1.2GB. Call for other drive size options. Memory Expansion Northgate systems have a variety of memory expansion capabilities. Our Systems Consultants can help you decide how much memory you need for both current and future applications. Monitors Northgate offers 12" VGA monochrome, 14" monochrome (amber), 14" VGA monochrome, 14" VGA color, 16" VGA color and 19" VGA color monitors. Resolutions include 640 x 480, 800 x 600, 1024 x 768, and 1280 x 1024. NEC 15", 17" and 21" flat-screen, low- radiation monitors also available. Math Coprocessors Speed up processor-intensive business applica- tions with an Intel or Weitek®math coprocessor A Northgate Systems Consultant can help you select the right one for your system. Tape Backups To protect your valuable data, Northgate offers an array of high-speed tape backup devices. Choose internal or external designs in the following capacities: 40/1 20MB, 80/304MB, 80MB, 150MB, 300MB and 1.3GB. Communications Northgate has the right equipment to link your system to other computers or fax machines. Products include internal and external MNP-5 modems in 2400 and 9600 baud speeds. Also available is Northgate Faxlt for Windows, a revolutionary fax card designed to work from within your Microsoft Windows applications. Printers The best thing to have beside your computer is a printer from Northgate. Printer options include low-cost 9-pin and 24-pin dot matrix printers as well as laser printers and PostScript-compatible laser printers for the very best print quality. Floppy Drives Floppy drive options include 5.25" models in 360K and 1.2MB designs and 3.5" models with capacities of 720K and 1.44MB. CD-ROM & Other Hardware We can also configure your Northgate system with many other hardware options, including CD-ROM drives, high end video cards, and I/O cards. Call and ask a Northgate Systems Consultant for the latest options and prices. [AD EDITORS' CHOICE HroductJ "^ OF THE V - YEAR Jw CALL TOLL-FREE 24 HOURS EVERYDAY 800o45-870y Major corporations, volume purchasers and government agencies call National Business Accounts.- 800-545-6059 Fax your order! 800-323-7182 Notice to the Hearing Impaired: Northgate has TDD capability. Dial 800-535-0602. NORTHGATE COMPUTER SySTEMSMC "Smart Tools For Business"™ 7075 Flying Cloud Drive. Eden Prairie, Minnesota 55344 Northgate OmniKey Keyboards - Quality Designs No System Should Be Without! LOG :: - iLULfc fflmmm WtJ< OmniKey/iOMX • 12F-KeysOnTop • Alps Click/Tactile Key Switches • Independent Inverted T Cursor Control And Numeric Keypads •RateSelect From 3-120 CPS $89 00 • Period/Comma Lock Key Locks out < > Even When Shifted • Interchangeable CTRL, ALT, CAPS LOCK Keys • Unmatched IBM® Compatibility ' FCC Class B Certified OmniKey/102 • 12F-Keys0nLeft • Alps Click/Tactile Key Switches • Independent Inverted T Cursor Control And Numeric Keypads •Rate Select From 3-120 CPS $ 89oo ' Period/Comma Lock Key Locks out < > Even When Shifted 1 Interchangeable CTRL, ALT, CAPS LOCK Keys • Unmatched IBM Compatibility 1 FCC Class B Certified OmniKey/UURA • 12 F-Keys On Left And Top • Alps Click/Tactile Key Switches • Independent Inverted T Cursor Control And Numeric Keypads • Rate Select From 3-120 CPS $129 00 • Period/Comma Lock Key Locks out < > Even When Shifted ' Interchangeable CTRL, ALL CAPS LOCK Keys • Unmatched IBM Compatibility ' FCC Class B Certified ■JHWEEK LABS SHOOT-OUT AD/Cycle r ?V WINDOWS AM) OSS PROTOTYPE TO DELIVERY. In Windows and OS/2, you need prototypes. You have to get a sense for what an application is going to look like, and feel like, before you can write it. And you can't afford to throw the prototype away when you're done. With Smalltalk/VJyou don't. Start with the prototype. There s no development system you can buy that lets you get a working model working faster than Smalltalk/V. Then, incrementally, grow the prototype into a finished application. Try out new ideas. Get input from your users. Make more changes. Be creative. Smalltalk/V gives you the freedom to experiment without risk. It's made for trial. And error. You make changes, and test them, one at a time. Safely. You get immediate feedback when you make a change. And you can't make changes that break the system. Its that safe. And when you're done, whether you're writing applications for Windows or OS/2, you'll have a standalone application that runs on both. Smalltalk/V code is portable between the Windows and the OS/2 versions. And the resulting application carries no runtime charges. All for just $499.95. So take a look at Smalltalk/V today. Call your local software dealer, or call Digitalk at (800) 922-8255 for more information. It's time to make that prototyping time productive. Smalltalk/V Smalltalk/ V is a registered trademark of Digitalk, Inc. Other product names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders. Digitalk, Inc., 9841 Airport Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90045 (800) 922-8255; (213) 645-1082; Fax (213) 645-1306 DIGITALK LOOK WHO'S TALKING HEWLETT PACKARD HP has developed a network trouble- shooting tool called the Network Advisor. The Network Advisor offers a comprehen- sive set of tools including an expert system, statistics, and protocol decodes to speed problem isolation. The NA user interface is built on a windowing system which allows multiple applications to be executed simultaneously. NCR NCR has an integrated test program develop- ment environment for digital, analog and mixed mode printed circuit board testing. MIDLAND BANK Midland Bank built a Windowed Technical Trading Environment for currency, futures and stock traders using Smalltalk/ V. Circle 52 on Inquiry Card. KEY FEATURES I World s leading, award-winning object- oriented programming system I Complete prototype-to-delivery system I Zero-cost runtime I Simplified application delivery for creating standalone executable (.EXE) applications I Code portability between Smalltalk/V Windows and Smalltalk/V PM I Wrappers for all Windows and OS/2 controls I Support for new CUA '91 controls for OS/2, including drag and drop, booktab, container, value set, slider and more I Transparent support for Dynamic Data Exchange (DDE) and Dynamic Link Library (DLL) calls I Fully integrated programming environ- ment, including interactive debugger, source code browsers (all source code included), world's most extensive Win- dows and OS/2 class libraries, tutorial (printed and on disk), extensive samples I Extensive developer support, including technical support, training, electronic developer forums, free user newsletter I Broad base of third-party support, including add-on Smalltalk/V products, consulting services, books, user groups feu L LJ ffllflfflfflllfflSfflDtDlilj r □□□P IDDamtlDDCIDIfflt .1 This Smalltalk/V Windows application captured the PC Week Shootout award— and it was completed in 6 hours. Smalltalk/ V PM applications are used to develop state-of-the-art CUA-compliant applications— and they're portable to Smalltalk/V Windows. 158 BYTE- JANUARY 1992 ILLUSTRATION: JIM LUDTKE © 1992 STATE OF THE ART A MOVING TARGET Windows, Macintosh, assorted Unix flavors, and GUIs-how do you deal with all the platforms that make up today's computing environment? BOB RYAN Developing computer applications used to be a breeze— relatively speaking. Back when computing was synonymous with IBM 360/370 mainframes, MIS organizations and commercial developers didn't have to worry about supporting multiple platforms for their software— most computing environments were homo- geneous and proprietary. Today, the situation has changed radically. Organizations typically employ a smorgasbord of computers— micros, minis, and mainframes— from many different companies running lots of different operating systems. This situation makes developing and supporting mission-critical applica- tions a daunting task. Cross-platform development has be- come a way of life for MIS departments and commercial de- velopers alike. Too often, however, it is a way fraught with setbacks and peril. This article and the two that follow it examine many of the aspects of cross-platform development in the 1990s. No longer is it enough to have a standard compiler for each plat- form. As complex GUIs and distributed processing take the place of character-based PCs and dumb terminals, the prob- lems of supporting a heterogeneous environment grow expo- nentially. The challenge is to develop a cross-platform strat- egy and acquire a standard set of tools that can deal with multiple platforms and let you adapt to rapid changes in technology. As the Intel/IBM/Microsoft monolith fragments and more and more applications migrate from the "big iron" to the desktop and LAN server, confusion will reign both in the marketplace and inside organizations of all sizes. The ability to make sense of the results will differentiate the win- ners from the losers. Issues and Answers Cross-platform development encompasses so many different ideas that it is impossible to define simply. In its purest sense, it means writing programs that perform the same functions on different hardware and operating-system plat- forms. As networks become more pervasive and organiza- tions become more thoroughly connected, the need for dif- ferent applications to share common data or even common computing resources will grow in importance. Cross-plat- form development will become an integral part of any coop- erative or distributed-processing environment. One major issue in development across various types of systems is how to develop applications that will run identi- cally—or nearly so— on sev- eral different platforms. Many large commercial de- velopers have multiplatform marketing strategies: They support as many different popular platforms (e.g., DOS, Windows, Macintosh, and Unix) as their resources permit. Consequently, their cross-platform development tools and tactics have be- come strategic assets. The ability to deliver applica- tions for many different platforms in a timely man- ner gives a company a major competitive advantage: Its applications have lower de- velopment costs, and they are quicker to market. For example, Lotus De- velopment (Cambridge, MA) has stated that it in- tends to make its flagship product, Lotus 1-2-3, avail- able on all major computing platforms. At first, Lotus went with a straight porting strategy to achieve this goal, JANUARY 1992 -BYTE 159 A Moving Target BY BOB RYAN 158 Tributaries and Deltas BY RANDALL D.CRONK 177 Let the System Do the Porting BY ELLEN ULLMAN 191 Resource Guide: Cross-Platform Application Development Tools 201 Circle 33 on Inquiry Card A MOVING TARGET IEEE-48 You can control any IEEE-488 (HP-IB, GP-IB, 488.2) device witn our cards, cables and software the PC/AT/386, EISA, Micro Channel Macintosh II. You get fast hardware and software support for all the popular languages, plus a software library of time saving utilities. Instrument control has never been easier. FREE Informative Catalog 800-234-4CEC Applications help 61 7-273-1 81 8 Capital Equipment Corp. Burlington, MA. 01803 » Ctwntl It « trademark of IBM with software engineers translating code developed originally for the DOS envi- ronment to run on other platforms. It wasn't too long before the company real- ized that straight ports were not the way to achieve a reasonable time to market. Lotus decided that it had to build cross- platform capabilities into its code. According to Eileen Rudden, director of spreadsheet marketing for Lotus, the company uses one code base for Lotus BVIE ACTION SUMMARY In today's multiplatform world, you can no longer write for one platform and ig- nore the rest. We all want the freedom to put our favorite type of system on our desk. With that freedom, cross- platform development is a necessary complication of the modern computing world. 1-2-3, with a high percentage of the code shared among different versions of the program (the exact percentages are a trade secret). Lotus is building a develop- ment environment that consists of a set of high-level application programming in- terfaces (APIs) that access a platform- specific layer above the core application. Platform-specific functions provide the glue between Lotus 1-2-3 and the differ- ent platforms. All custom development takes place at this layer. As Rudden puts it, "The application it- self is not ported. Our energy goes into the platform-specific layer. The reason we can do it this way is that we've engi- neered our application to recognize that certain services are handled differently on different platforms." So, Lotus takes a proactive approach to cross-platform development. It starts with an application that is "cross-platform-aware" so that it can devote its energies to refining the platform-specific parts. Of course, even the best cross-plat- form development system can't save you if you misread the market. Lotus is cur- rently playing catch-up in the booming Windows software market— not because of any major weakness in its cross-plat- form efforts, but because it made an early commitment to OS/2 and Presenta- tion Manager (PM). Only after seeing that the business world was choosing Windows over OS/2 by a wide margin did Lotus give priority to its Windows devel- opment efforts. Wolfram Research (Champaign, IL), publisher of Mathematica, is another company that pursues an aggressive mul- tiplatform strategy. Wolfram supports dozens of different platforms by cleanly separating interface code from the com- putational engine. The result is a system that makes it possible to automatically update and maintain versions of a pro- gram for many different platforms (see the text box "Concurrent Multiplatform Development" on page 162 for more de- tails). Local Concerns Cross-platform development is not the exclusive domain of big-time commer- cial developers. In-house developers also must suppport many different desktop standards. The days when MIS depart- ments dared— or cared— to dictate one hardware standard and one operating- system standard for every desktop in a medium or large organization are rapidly disappearing. The computing infrastruc- ture in most companies consists of a het- erogeneous mix of desktop platforms and networks. With end users clamoring for greater access to data repositories from their desktops, many MIS departments confront the task of supporting a variety of platforms in their in-house develop- ment efforts. When developing across platforms, you have to decide how closely you wish to support the native environment of each one. This is a concern mainly for in- house developers; commercial develop- ers who don't fully support the interface standards and capabilities of different platforms usually find a limited demand for their products. On the other hand, in-house develop- ers have a choice: They can adhere to the standards of each platform, or they can try to make their applications appear the same on every platform. The approach you take depends entirely on the goals of your organization and the needs of its end users. If, for example, it is the goal of your company to supply the same interface to corporate data from every desktop to save on training and software-support costs, you'll want to create a common in- terface across platforms. But if seamless integration of in-house and commercial applications on each platform is the stated goal, you'll have to tailor in-house development to the needs of the different supported platforms. The decision may come down to the 160 BYTE- JANUARY 1992 Circle 34 on Inquiry Card A MOVING TARGET relative importance of commercial and in-house applications in your computing environment. If most of the work in your organization is performed with commer- cial tools, you'll probably want a "go native" cross-platform strategy. If most people are running homegrown applica- tions, the one-size-fits-all strategy may be the way to go. Two Looks for Smalltalk The strategies employed by the two prin- cipal publishers of Smalltalk illustrate these two distinct approaches to cross- platform development. ParcPlace Sys- tems (Mountain View, CA) takes the ap- proach that an application should always look exactly the same, regardless of the platform on which it is run. Digitalk (Los Angeles, CA) approaches the prob- lem differently. It believes that an appli- cation should reflect the standard inter- face and use all the special facilities of each specific platform. Assuming that you use either ParcPlace's or Digitalk's version of Smalltalk to develop your ap- plications, you will, by default, adopt that publisher's philosophy. If you choose ParcPlace's Smalltalk, your porting work will be essentially complete once you have written your ap- plication on one machine. Your Small- talk code will look and operate the same on any machine that has ParcPlace's Smalltalk. The price you pay for this convenience is the difficulty you encoun- ter in taking advantage of the special at- tributes of the host platforms. For exam- ple, it is not a trivial task to take complete advantage of Windows dynamic link li- braries (DLLs) with ParcPlace's Small- talk. Having your application always take on the ParcPlace look has advantages and disadvantages, depending on your rea- sons for developing on multiple plat- forms. If you are porting a commercial application from Windows to the Macin- tosh, you want your application to follow the Macintosh style guidelines: You want your Macintosh version to look and act like all other Macintosh applications. After all, the common look and feel among Macintosh applications is a major reason for the machine's success. But if your application is developed with Parc- Place's Smalltalk, your program will look like a ParcPlace program running inside a Macintosh window— kind of a kludge. On the other side of the argument, once people have learned to run a Parc- Place application on one system, they are totally familiar with it no matter what system they happen to be using. This cuts Introducing OSIRAM32™ for the Micro Channel 1 V Provides from 2 to 8 Mbytes of fast memory. *> Works in 16 or 32 bit mode to meet your needs. Provides extended and expanded memory. Fast software for LIM 4.0 included. Automatic configuration for DOS, OS/2 and UNIX. Easy to install. Risk free guarantee. Two year warranty. Add a disk cache and RAM disk using OS/RAM32 to get maximum performance from your computer. Guaranteed compatibility with all of your programs. "Best price performance", says PC Week . Call today 617-273-1818 or 1-800-234-4CEC cec Capital Equipment Corp. Burlington, MA. 01803 PS/2 and Micro Channel are trademarks of IBM down on retraining. The ParcPlace phi- losophy is attractive if your application is for in-house use, especially if your "house" uses many different kinds of systems. You can train users for all sys- tems in the same course. If, however, you choose Digitalk's version of Smalltalk, porting an applica- tion can require a major effort. After you have written the code that is common to all computer platforms, you then have to write separate code that takes advan- tage of each of the distinct operating sys- tems and user interfaces of the individual platforms. On the bright side, Digitalk's class de- signs reach deep into each host's GUI and operating system with common meth- ods and classes, but you still have to write some of the expected behavior methods for each environment. On the dark side, Digitalk itself has become vic- tim to one of the pitfalls of cross-plat- form development: It has not produced concurrent revisions for all the platforms that it supports. The Impact of GUIs One reason that cross-platform develop- ment has grown more complex in the past few years is the growing demand for ap- plications to sport a graphical interface. GUI applications are inherently more difficult to develop— and hence to port— than are text-based applications. Master- ing a single GUI is difficult enough for an individual or an organization; master- ing multiple GUIs is even more difficult. As a consequence, a number of com- panies provide toolkits to aid in develop- ing cross-GUI applications. These tool- kits are analogous to the cross-platform compilers and assemblers that were the only cross-development tools you needed when the computer world was younger— and the choices fewer. The best known of these toolkits is the Extensible Virtual Toolkit (XVT Soft- ware, Boulder, CO). Consisting of C li- braries for Windows, Motif, PM, Macin- tosh, and character-based interfaces, XVT lets you write an application once and compile it on the different target plat- forms. In effect, you write to the XVT API rather than to the individual target APIs. Tools like XVT have a common short- coming: the least common denominator. Creating a portable library that accesses the functions of many different GUI plat- forms means that you can include only those elements that all the platforms share. The platform-specific functions and features (e.g., the DLLs of Windows or Publish/Subscribe on a Macintosh) must be added after the common applica- tion is built. For in-house development, the least common denominator approach JANUARY 1992 -BYTE 161 A MOVING TARGET Concurrent Multiplatform Development Janet J. Barron According to an old saying, you can't be all things to all people. Evidently, when Wolfram Re- search first developed Mathe- matica in 1986, it chose to ignore this homily. When they started their firm, Wolfram's leaders decided not to get locked into using only two or three plat- forms internally or having their applica- tion available outside of the company for only a few of the most popular ma- chines. Wolfram was already sensitive to the trends in the market that showed rapid acceleration in the pace of technology in desktop systems. Historically, every six months there is a new generation of ma- chines with a new level of performance. The firm wanted to make sure its soft- ware would continue to be consistently compatible with the technology as it changed. Market Requirements Looking at its primary potential cus- tomers—scientists, educators, and engi- neers—Wolfram noted that people in these disciplines are not bound to one machine. They might use one machine in their office, another at home, and a combination of systems in the labora- tory. It made sense to provide them with the flexibility to develop a Mathematica application on one machine and to be able to run it on another. Prem Chawla, chief operating officer of Wolf ram, says that before it came out with Mathematica, Wolfram not only studied the domestic scene but also per- formed an in-depth study of the interna- tional market. It found that, in the U.S. , one platform dominates the market for a while, and then it is replaced by an- other. In contrast, in the international market, people in specific countries de- velop a consistent loyalty to certain plat- forms; temporal considerations have lit- tle impact on their choice of systems. Wolfram decided to make sure Mathe- matica was useful in both the domestic and the international markets. When you look at Mathematica' s architecture, you see two major parts, a kernel and a front end, Chawla ex- plains. "The front end is very specifi- cally machine-bound; the kernel is very portable. The way we made it very por- table was to use dual coding— reason- ably modular techniques. At the same time, we coded the kernel in C so we could take it from machine to machine. "Both the kernel and the front end are very discrete pieces, and they don't have to run on the same machine. The front end can take advantage of a specific GUI environment, such as the graphical interface of the Macintosh or Windows. If there isn't a GUI environment avail- able on a platform, we provide an X Window System-based interface that is consistent across the board." The cost of porting to many machines is quite high, Chawla explains. "Basi- cally, we do primary development of the code on Sun and Next machines. In 1986, when we started this project, we set up a network of all the various plat- forms. Every night, after our develop- ers have added new functionality and features, the changes are compiled on the Sun. Immediately, new versions of the software are built on all the different platforms. Every day, we can literally have a new version of the product that was created automatically the night be- fore." According to Chawla, this approach to cross-platform applications develop- ment provides major benefits to the cus- tomer. "If you want to use Mathemat- ica," he says, "you don't have to worry about the hardware— you'll be hardware independent. With new hardware, you can get up to speed fairly fast, and you can keep up with the technology. You don't have to be stuck with old tech- nology." With Mathematica, the kernel that runs on one machine is the same kernel that runs on another. Every machine has the same functionality. Files that are supported by Mathematica are all text-based, so you don't have to do any file conversion from one platform to another. "Another reason our front end plays a very important role," says Chawla, "is that one of our front-end design criteria was that you should be able to take what is created on one platform— say a Mac- intosh—load it on a Windows platform, and run it without any change. "Suppose you are writing a technical report in Mathematica on a Macintosh may be OK, but for commercial develop- ment, it usually isn't. Beyond cross-platform toolkits lies the realm of cross-platform operating sys- tems. In the past year, a slew of initia- tives, consortia, and joint ventures have cropped up that promise to provide cross- platform interoperability between indus- try-standard Intel-based PCs and one or more of the latest RISC platforms (see " Let the System Do the Porting" on page 191). Pink (the Apple-IBM joint ven- ture), the Advanced Computing Environ- ment (with Mips, Microsoft, DEC, Com- paq, et al.), and Solaris from Sun Microsystems all promise cross-platform interoperability, but who is going to pro- vide interoperability among them? Pulling Together Beyond running the same application on different platforms, cross-platform de- velopment has also invaded the domains of cooperative and distributed process- ing. Before computing environments be- came heterogeneous, computing over a network was a challenge; today, it can be a nightmare. Even here, however, a new generation of tools is making it easier to share data and computing cycles. In its simplest definition, cooperative processing describes the sharing of data by many computers over a network. 162 BYTE* JANUARY 1992 Circle 1 59 on Inquiry Card A MOVING TARGET and you want to distribute that report in electronic form to your colleagues who have IBM PCs running Windows. They can take that format as it comes out and run it, because they will get exactly the same graphics, equations, scientific text, and compound documents— all the things you have created on the Macin- tosh." Build and Test Rory Murtagh, Wolfram's director of engineering, addresses some other is- sues associated with in-house and exter- nal cross-platform development efforts. "In-house," says Murtagh, "we run on about 30 platforms, most of them Unix, a few DOS. A couple of platforms that we dial out to are Convex and Alli- ance, and we contact them by Internet 2. In-house, all our machines are connect- ed by Ethernet. For DOS machines, we use PCNetwork File Server, which shares Unix file systems with PCs. On the Mac, we do equivalent things on the Hierarchical File System. "Our core product consists of about 300,000 lines of source code— that comes out to one large binary [file] and several small binaries. We have a public domain software-control system called Revision Control System. RCS keeps a history of added changes to the source code files so we can progress and re- gress. "In the Unix environment, the RCS builds a new binary nightly. More than 20 machines concurrently update their own copies of the source codes; they synchronize a local copy of the source codes with a master copy and build a new version of the product. Then, our software engineers can test it on any platform with the latest copy. By build- ing it as frequently as possible, it will show machine-specific problems right away, because it will fail to compile." An early method Wolfram employed was to build on the same file system using a network. When this procedure was performed several times simulta- neously using a shared file system, how- ever, the network bogged down. A year and a half ago, the firm changed to its current method, which is working fine. "Some other software houses— such as Lotus, Microsoft, and Oracle— do this number of platforms, but most vendors do only a few," says Murtagh. Regarding upgrading Wolfram's sys- tem, Murtagh explains that if the firm had unlimited funds, it would use soft- ware network technology (e.g., Fiber Distributed Data Interface), but that technology is still very expensive. "We are dealing with concurrent de- velopment. Several developers can work on the same code at the same time using Concurrent Version System, which runs on top of RCS. We are just beginning to use it, but it's a definite improvement. " Earlier, Wolfram had one canonical source code, and several developers would work on it. Theoretically, one de- veloper could preempt the others. Now, each developer gets a copy of all the source codes (one person works on a particular algorithm) and has to wait until that copy is in a consistent state and is ready for testing. Then those changes are committed to a central re- pository. "If more than one person is working on the same part of the code, the system will warn them and help merge the two [sets of] changes. This process is much better than it was when we were con- stantly overwriting each other's work or when we had to lock our files. You want to make point changes to many source code files, particularly in porting. Lo- gistically, that was kind of a problem." Janet J. Barron is a technical editor for BYTE. You can reach her on BIX as "neural. " When every computer in your depart- ment or enterprise shared the same ar- chitecture and operating system— and was connected by a single-protocol net- work—cooperation between applications that accessed the same body of data was not too difficult. Today, sharing data over a network is more of a challenge, al- though the rewards can be well worth the effort. Cooperative processing in practical terms means common access to a rela- tional database that resides on one or many servers. These servers can be oth- er workstations, a LAN server, a large minicomputer, or a mainframe. Today, the most popular way to access a rela- tional database is via Structured Query Language. SQL is a nonprocedural language used to create and access relational databases. It is supported by all major database BACK BY POPULAR DEMAND! • Install and partition hard drives in minutes • Maximize speed, capacity and efficiency with advanced utilities • Comprehensive diagnostics not found in DOS NEW V6.0 FEATURES! • DOS 5.0-compatible • Supports 8-, 16- and 32-bit controllers • Works with memory managers $99.95* SRP $29.95* Upgrade •Plus lax. postage and handling To order, call 800-967-4246 Ext. 2 OVER 700,000 INSTALLED STORAGE ! DIMENSIONS The Industry Leader In Storage Solutions JANUARY 1992 • BYTE 163 A MOVING TARGET The Vertical View Most of us take a horizontal view of cross-platform development. We worry about getting the same software up and running on both a Sun workstation and a Win- dows-based desktop PC. Such concerns can seem positively provincial when you consider the cross-platform dilem- ma facing MIS organizations. Their concerns are more universal in scope: how to create and maintain software systems that span the gaps among mam- moth mainframes, slick personal com- puters, and workstations. John Tibbetts sees these concerns firsthand. He is a principal of Kinexis, a San Francisco-based consulting firm that works with companies to develop cooperative-processing systems that span personal computers, LANs, and mainframes. He has a valuable perspec- tive on the issues you face when inte- grating personal computers and main- frames—one that is not often heard in the community of personal computer users. "My impression of the world right now is that we've seen the first phase of computing development, where over a couple of decades mainframe activity spread and we knew how to use only these big, centralized machines. Phase two, of course, was the personal com- puter and LAN revolution, which really represented a different culture— a 'pow- er to the user' culture. That is where a lot of people still are today, certainly in the downsizing arena. "I work with what happens next, with what happens when those two environ- ments hit. This is more than a technical collision; it's a cultural collision. How do you put all these pieces together into unified applications that can tie into transaction-intensive terabyte databases on the one hand but still give power to the user on the other? How do you think about the roles of each platform as you proceed from enterprise server to LAN server to client?" Enterprises and Clients Unlike many observers, Tibbetts does not think that LAN-based client-server architectures, taken alone, are a com- plete solution to the problems of provid- ing both community-level processing and corporate computing, although he does see client-server computing as a component of corporate computing. While the economics are obviously at- tractive, Tibbetts also sees the downside to moving all processing to desktops. "You need to deal with environments that contain machines whose job it is to represent the concerns of the enter- prise and its accompanying security and integrity constraints. You also want to incorporate the power-to-the-user move- ment. Personal computers and worksta- tions have allowed individuals to exer- cise more initiative and creativity in solving their own problems. You have to be able to put that together into a mean- ingful environment without open war- fare breaking out. In a lot of organi- zations right now, open warfare has broken out between [the Information Systems (IS) department] and desktop users. "I have a client— one of the world's largest chemical companies— that has an old mainframe environment that isn't very responsive to its needs. The com- pany's order volume is projected to in- crease by a factor of 10 over the next de- cade, and the current teleprocessing system on the mainframe is at capacity. The IS organization has responded by fielding a huge project to rebuild the system. It is in the second year of a seven-year study, preliminary to doing the design work that will replace the system. "In the meantime, there is this really dynamic guy, probably five years away from retirement right now, who learned how to program Lotus a few years ago, an event that completely changed his life. He happens to be in charge of inter- national operations at this company, and he's now brought up three countries doing order entry using Lotus 1-2-3. In my judgment, that is a completely inap- propriate tool, although he solved the problem using guerilla tactics, using these very-easy-to-manipulate personal computer tools along with bulletin- board software to send the data. "This is very typical of what you see. There are two camps at war: The per- sonal computer people see the LAN as everything in computing, and they see mainframes—if they survive at all- serving as disk-farm handlers. Main- frame people look at the same platforms and see the mainframe as everything, and they look at the personal computer as a way to put pretty new front ends on [the mainframe]— but don't let personal computers get near the data. The idea is to build a negotiated settlement between the two environments." Tibbetts sees the need for organiza- tions to determine what is the best role for all types of platforms in an organiza- tion. In his view, desktop computers and mainframes have very different but complementary roles. "At one extreme, you have highly trusted back-end community processors whose job it is to hold the enterprise data, something everyone recognizes as important. I think that it is also the job of the back end to be a repository for enterprise function as well. This is less recognized right now. For example, when considering distributed data- bases, a lot of people view the back-end machines as exclusively database en- gines. I disagree with that view. In a co- operative environment, they ought to be viewed as transaction engines. They hold not only enterprise data, but also those transactions whose job it is to en- sure that data's integrity. The back end does not just hold the credit table; it owns the credit-check procedure. ' Freedom to the Desktop Tibbetts adds, "At the other extreme, the client level, we have a whole culture of powerful tools and proficient users. The focus of the front end is not integri- ty, reliability, and security. Just the op- posite: Everything about personal com- puters is about accessibility— even the way they are screwed together. Their beauty is that they make computing re- sources accessible. That's what makes them great. "I believe that in most corporate com- puting environments, you want to keep those machines free. You maintain the ability to run programs of your choice, continued 164 BYTE- JANUARY 1992 A MOVING TARGET The Vertical View (continued) to boot up your own machine, and per- haps to have a medium such as a disk for moving data and programs on and off the machine. "To the extent that they are free, those machines should be considered untrusted— not untrustworthy, but un- trusted by virtue of their openness and accessibility. One of the flaws in the cli- ent-server model is the notion that the application moves down to where the client is. The problem is that the appli- cation is every bit as valuable an enter- prise asset as is the data. It's not only valuable to keep information about how much somebody has spent; it's just as valuable— just as important as an enter- prise asset— to deal with the ownership of the rule that runs a credit check. To that extent, you don't want to be putting enterprise assets onto machines that you can stick screwdrivers into, just as you wouldn't put a cash box out in the mid- dle of a bank lobby. "I believe it's the role of clients to be untrusted but free. Their job is to pro- vide very high powered, object-oriented user-interface environments that send messages toward the enterprise— the mainframe or the LAN server. I label these messages PUOWs, for proposed units of work. Their role is not to partic- ipate in transactions, but to simply sug- gest to the enterprise that a transaction [should] occur. "Once you make this leap, you see that you can still let the client machine be very free. You don't have to worry about viruses and things like that, be- cause the only communication, the only hook between the client and the next level up, is a message stream that is making suggestions. "I believe that the personal computer should be viewed architecturally as the agent of the user, not the agent of the en- terprise, which is to say its job is to am- plify the capabilities of the user, wheth- er the user is smart or dumb, honest or malicious." Where you draw the line between freedom and trust varies from organiza- tion to organization. In most instances, Tibbetts sees the trust line falling in be- tween mainframes and micros: at the LAN server. "That implies a couple of things. First, the LAN server should be locked up— at least that server that is the gate- way to the enterprise. Obviously, you do not want to lock up a print server. Ar- chitecturally, you can do a lot of nice things if you make the LAN server trusted. For instance, you can download some of the enterprise transactional rules and have them close and quick to the clients. "There are environments, however, where you can't trust the LAN. I've re- cently been looking at an environment in a government agency that has about 2000 LANs connected to a mainframe. They don't think they can administer 2000 trusted LANs. So, in that case, they've moved the trust boundary up to the mainframe. "When we do these designs, the trust line is not static. If you move it further down toward the client, you start re- stricting freedom but creating more trust. You have to tune it to the type of application and the type of human struc- ture you're modeling with the informa- tion system." The Role of Objects Recognizing the nature of the different platforms in a cooperative-processing environment clarifies many design is- sues. In the end, however, you have to implement your design. Tibbetts sees object orientation as the paradigm that will make enterprise-wide cooperative processing an attainable goal for any organization. "The place where object orientation is so great that it has an unfair advantage over any other alternative is at the user interface. Object-oriented user inter- faces are incredibly powerful. I recom- mend that organizations be very aggres- sive and use tools— Smalltalk or [some powerful object-oriented GUI build- er]— that can support multiple window- ing environments. It gives you enor- mous productivity. The closer you get to the user interface, the more aggressive you should be with objects. However, at some point in the system— usually about the LAN server area— you're going to discover that an object-oriented infra- structure does not exist for the type of community processing needed at this level." In Tibbetts 's view, the lack of a for- mal object-oriented infrastructure at the back end doesn't mean you should jettison the object paradigm. "Although the formal infrastructure isn't there, object orientation is still a useful paradigm as you move away from the user interface. In fact, the easiest place to see this is at the back end of the system, where the database lives. How- ever, I think the relational data model will be with us for a long time, because it provides unbiased views of the data. I also believe an object-oriented shell around a relational database makes a lot of sense. Many people who take an ob- ject-oriented approach to the front end are also taking a 'wrappering' approach to the relational database. "You can create object wrappers that render a particular view of the database as a particular hierarchy and use your transaction manager to put rules and be- havior around it, making a simulated object, or a set of simulated objects, that wraps the relational database. I think that's a very effective approach, and it's one that preserves a lot of the existing transactional and relational machin- ery—but still gives you object views of the application-building process." Tibbetts isn't shy about his views on object orientation. As he sees it, object orientation represents the best way to create cooperative systems that span multiple platforms and meet the needs of both the enterprise and the end users. He is anything but shy about predicting the future. "Presently, you have terrific object- oriented capabilities on the front end. On the back end, you want to keep it re- lational and representational. And in the middle, you have a mixed bag. As we move along in the decade, the object- oriented paradigms will eventually ex- tend throughout. As we go more and more into distributed and parallel sys- tems toward the end of the decade, we are absolutely going to require the ob- ject-oriented paradigm throughout." 166 BYTE- JANUARY 1992 66llie EECpc 433 mixes top PC performance with networking and blazingly fast video performance. •• PC Magazine October 15, 1991 Pretty hot stuff, huh? And that's not all PC Magazine felt fit to print about our DECpc™ 433 Workstation. Just get a load of this: "The DECpc 433 adds value to the existing standard without sacrificing compatibility. What's more, this machine shows strength in an area where DEC knows a thing or two: the graphics workstation market." And how about this: "At $5,999?.. [this] machine is a PC designer's dream." Of course, far be it from us to censor one of the best PC sources in the business. Especially when it comes to this quote (our favorite): "If graphics speed is important to you, give the DECpc 433 a long hard look." Naturally, we encourage you to take them up on this suggestion. For more information on the DECpc 433, or any PC in Digital's line, call 1-800-DIGnAL, ext. 417. Or talk to your local Digital Authorized Distributor. DIGITAL. THE OPEN ADVANTAGE, © Digital Equipment Corporation, 1992.The DIGITAL Logo and DECpc arc trademarks of Digital Equipment Corporation. 486 and Intel Inside are trademarks of Intel Corp. * U.S. Pricing A MOVING TARGET r The Thinl Wave Jon Udell New processor architectures and operating systems burst out of the starting gate each year. Time was, software developers who bet on a horse that zigged when the mar- ket zagged were ruined. That can still happen today, but, increasingly, devel- opers are finding ways to hedge their bets. The widespread adoption of ANSI C helped enormously. Finally, you could count on the ability to abstract programs away from the details of Intel, Moto- rola, SPARC, VAX, and other architec- tures. Then the next challenge arose. Each platform evolved its own GUI— or sev- eral of them. ANSI C alone could not help you move programs from one GUI to the next. Homegrown and commercial toolkits that spanned the differences between GUIs sprang up. As a result, developers now successfully field versions of their applications for two or more GUIs. Some favor C or C + + libraries and prototyping tools, and others rely on pure object-oriented programming en- vironments. But nearly everyone sees the need to abstract away from the raw minutiae of GUI programming. What's next? The coming challenge will be to create distributed applications that cross operating-system and net- work boundaries. Few applications exemplify this third wave, although businesses now com- monly deploy a mixture of computing resources. PCs, Macs, and workstations stand side by side and may even share common network cabling. Thanks to an emerging class of interoperability prod- ucts (see "The Perfect Pitch," Decem- ber 1991 BYTE), these different cul- tures can sometimes even emulate on another's file- and printer-sharing ser- vices. Programs that support the same file formats across different platforms (e.g., Wingz, PageMaker, and dBase) benefit accordingly. More sophisticated and less wide- spread are client-server applications that depend on networked interprocess communication. Even though database vendors (e.g., Oracle) offer tools that shield developers from a certain plat- form's operating system, GUI, and net- work transports, the leverage they con- fer extends only to applications in the database realm. Integrators looking for ways to deliv- er networked software on multiple plat- forms really need a general-purpose so- lution. Just as ANSI C adapts to 68000, 80x86, and SPARC architectures, and GUI toolkits can work with the Mac, Windows, and Motif, what's needed is a communications layer that handles IPX, NetBIOS, TCP/IP, AppleTalk, LU6.2, and other protocols. Pipe Dream? PeerLogic claims that its Pipes platform fills the bill. The Pipes kernel supports a range of operating-system and net- work-transport pairs. Up to now, the list has included DOS-IPX, DOS-Net- BIOS, NetWare-IPX, NetWare-TCP/IP, OS/2-NetBIOS, SunOS-TCP/IP, and AIX-TCP/IP. An MVS-LU6.2 version is all but complete, and AppleTalk now waits in the wings. Written in C, the Pipes kernel aug- ments each host's native interprocess- communication services with a message- oriented peer-networking subsystem. The Pipes application programming in- terface (API)— just a dozen well-chosen verbs— is, as you'd expect, common to all supported Pipes platforms. Pipes irons out the differences among transport protocols and abstracts away from the details of network program- ming. That means you can build a dis- tributed application for a NetWare LAN without any references to IPX (a neat trick) and then port it immediately to a TCP/IP or NetBIOS LAN with equal disdain for the nuts and bolts of these other transports. What's more, the same distributed application can run in a mixed environ- ment in which DOS-IPX and Unix- TCP/IP nodes work as peers. Commu- nicating nodes need not share a common transport protocol— and that's a major boon. Most DOS-to-Unix network sce- narios, for example, rely on protocol multiplexing at each DOS node to ac- commodate NetWare and Unix at the same time. This side-by-side approach not only burdens DOS with extra proto- col processing, but, more significantly, it does little to facilitate communication among the parallel networks. DOS stations can have peer-to-peer or client-server relationships with Unix nodes, but only on the terms dictated by Unix— either TCP/IP sockets or remote procedure calls. Contrast this with the Pipes approach, in which a DOS node running IPX can reach a Unix node run- ning TCP/IP through a context bridge. The bridge, which can be any node in a Pipes network, runs dual protocols, so the rest of the nodes don't have to. engines in one form or another. So, it can act as a glue between front-end applica- tions and back-end databases. The most talked-about cooperative- processing scheme today is the client- server architecture. With this architec- ture, a number of different applications running on several different platforms can all access a common data repository by sending SQL queries over a network to the database engine. The engine pro- cesses the query and returns any resul- tant data back to the application. By sep- arating the front-end applications from the database engine, the client-server scheme allows you to use any application to access the database— even a spread- sheet or a word processor— as long as the application can generate standard SQL queries. Because it's a standard across all types of computer platforms (e.g., desktop ma- chines, minicomputers, and mainframes alike), SQL has the potential to provide access to large corporate databases from PC-based applications. It is also one of the driving forces behind the downsizing movement, where core corporate appli- cations that formerly ran exclusively on mainframes migrate to PC LAN envi- 168 BYTE* JANUARY 1992 EIYES! Enter my one-year (12 issues) subscription to BYTE for only $24.95. Til save 40% off the single copy price. Plus, I'll also receive BYTE's Annual Special Issue FREE with my paid subscription. If at any time I'm not satisfied with BYTE, I may cancel for a full refund on all unmailed copies. □ Payment enclosed □ Bill me NAME COMPANY ADDRESS CITY_ _STATE . _ZIP. Please allow 6-8 weeks for delivery. Basic subscription rate is $29.95. (Mexico, $29.95 payable in U.S. funds.) IB2I01I BUSINESS REPLY MAIL FIRST CLASS MAIL PERMIT NO. 42 HIGHTSTOWN. NJ POSTAGE WILL BE PAID BY ADDRESSEE: BVTE Subscription Department P.O. Box 558 Hightstown, N.J. 08520-9409 NO POSTAGE NECESSARY IF MAILED IN THE UNITED STATES ,mImImI,I,„I,III,„I,I,„I„III,„I,I„„II,I A MOVING TARGET A particularly strategic place to lo- cate a Pipes kernel would be in a Net- Ware 3.11 server. Although Novell now offers a robust TCP/IP (with NetWare NFS), a NetWare 3.11 server isn't a context bridge in the Pipes sense. DOS clients must still run TCP/IP in order to communicate with the Unix side of a mixed Unix/NetWare LAN. That is why Novell released LAN Workplace for DOS— the company's own protocol multiplexer and DOS TCP/IP stack— at the same time as Net- Ware 3.11. With a Pipes NetWare load- able module in place, however, the DOS TCP/IP stack could become superflu- ous. A DOS-IPX node can converse with a Unix-TCP/IP node through the context bridge; each speaks its native dialect and is unaware that its partner is foreign. The virtual network that is the set of connected Pipes nodes offers other ben- efits as well— notably, fault tolerance. You can have several context bridges ac- tive in a network. If one fails, message traffic automatically seeks an alternate route. Routing information is distrib- uted everywhere, and at each of the levels of the deeply hierarchical logical network there is a privileged manager node that runs the show. The Programmer's View To the developer, the Pipes API looks alarmingly thin. There are verbs to reg- ister an application with the kernel, ad- vertise a service (or "resource"), find resources advertised elsewhere, estab- lish sessions, send messages— and that's just about it. PeerLogic points out that, simplicity notwithstanding, writing ap- plications for a symmetrical network of peers requires a major conceptual shift analogous to the entry to GUI program- ming. It took us a while to get used to the idea of applications as collections of overlapping windows. It'll be a while longer before we learn to think of them as sets of communicating processes. While conceptually small, the Pipes kernel consumes a fair bit of RAM. The current version of the DOS kernel uses 200 KB of extended memory and an- other 40 KB of conventional memory. That will be partly offset if Pipes saves you from loading one or more foreign transports. Still, it is a lot for DOS to digest, particularly because Pipes' asynchro- nous messaging thrives best when sup- ported by real— preferably threaded- multitasking. Even though it supports DOS and Windows, PeerLogic wisely recommends Unix and OS/2 to develop- ers who are serious about building mis- sion-critical distributed applications. The AppleTalk version of Pipes has been delayed— for an interesting reason. American Express asked PeerLogic to port Pipes to IBM's MVS operating sys- tem and LU6.2 transport protocol. Perhaps this shouldn't be surprising at all. Without a doubt, the most preva- lent sort of cross-platform application today uses the personal computer as a mainframe terminal. While preserving its investment in this venerable but lop- sided architecture, American Express hopes to usher in an era of more equal distribution of computational work, re- lying on Pipes' superior portability as a hedge against the volatility of the per- sonal computer market. In the meantime, despite endless talk about client-server computing, today's heterogeneous LANs often fail to add up to more than the sum of their parts. That will change when developers can routinely target their applications for the diverse networks that now wreath our desktops. Technologies like Pipes will play a key role in the transforma- tion. Jon Udell is a BYTE senior technical edi- tor at large. He can be reached on BIX as "judell." ronments. If the client-server architecture sounds too good to be true, that's because it is. Marvelous in theory, it is less easily im- plemented in practice. For one thing, not all database engines speak the same dia- lect of SQL— and some databases only process queries from front ends devel- oped by the same company. In addition, you {must overcome the problem of uni- ou rr versal network connectivity before your organization can implement universal database access. Finally, there are basic security problems that must be dealt with when you try to integrate networks of PCs with a corporate data repository (see the text box "The Vertical View" on page 164). Despite the obstacles, the client-server architecture is catching on— although more slowly than its boosters envisioned. Products such as Microsoft Excel and Lotus 1-2-3 are being built with the abil- ity to generate SQL queries, and many companies are providing back-end re- lational databases that run PC-based LANs. One of the more aggressive com- panies in the client-server field is Gupta Technologies (Menlo Park, CA). Gupta markets query tools, applications build- ers, connectivity solutions, and database engines. By offering a series of gateway products, Gupta gives you all the tools you need to access an IBM DB2 database from a Windows desktop. Sharing the Load SQL connectivity solutions from Gupta, Oracle, and other companies make it possible to share a common database en- gine, but they are not capable of the more general task of sharing processing among all the computers on a network. In other words, it takes something other than SQL to create network-aware applica- tions. Sharing machine cycles, whether in a peer-to-peer environment or a client- server arrangement, can greatly increase the power and efficiency of a computing environment. An application can take ad- vantage of the computing power of an en- tire network and access subroutines that reside on any machine. Computational servers that specialize in floating-point math or vector processing could provide services to any number of other com- puters. Once you step over the line into shared computational resources, you enter the domain of distributed pro- cessing. One of the better-known tools for pro- ducing distributed applications is the remote procedure call. RPCs are con- ceptually simple. All programs make procedure calls; in the vast majority of cases, these procedures are contained within the calling program or are at least located on the same machine. RPCs are procedures located on different ma- chines. They still take parameters and return results; they simply execute on some other machine that is on the net- work. For RPCs to work, you need a com- mon format for the calling application and the called procedure, and a naming service that lets the application find the proper remote procedure. Less sophisti- cated RPCs use early binding, where you have to explicitly state the location of the remote procedure when you compile the application. More sophisticated systems use late binding, where a naming service matches calling applications and called JANUARY 1992 -BYTE 171 A MOVING TARGET Object Request Brokers Herbert M. Osher During the last few years, the computer industry has reverber- ated with news of the coming revolution in object-oriented software. The commotion has reached a crescendo over the last few months as the Object Management Group (OMG) has attempted to create a new platform standard called an Object Request Bro- ker (ORB). What's all the fuss about, anyway? First, you should understand what the OMG is and why its members are inter- ested in creating object-oriented stan- dards. Today, the OMG consists of 150 companies, mostly hardware and soft- ware vendors, as well as a small number of end users. The OMG's major objec- tive is to work with computer industry vendors and end users to create object- oriented standards and avoid a multi- plicity of incompatible systems. One of the OMG's first forays into the standards arena was its call for sub- missions for an ORB. From the original 10 submissions, two became finalists. HyperDesk and DEC submitted one proposal, and Hewlett-Packard and Sun submitted the other. The ORB has attracted so much atten- tion because it promises to revolutionize software and the way it is created, inte- grated, and deployed. This technology will deliver the benefits of object-ori- ented development as well as those of client-server computing. Its marriage of network-based systems and object ori- entation will let developers create appli- cations that are truly independent of the system and the network architecture— in effect, software without walls. Objects and Their Uses Put simply, an object is the specific in- stance of a generalized software tem- plate. This template is a flexible and open-ended mechanism that describes certain data and the procedures that work on that data. The template layout (see the figure) is called a class. It is only when the fields in that template are filled in with specific information that you create an instantiation of the class CLASS STRUCTURE Object name — *- Riiriuuie l ■■ ■■ "^ • Aitriuuie w *■ PROG.O Method 1 *■ • SHELLSCR Method /7 * (An integer value) (A spreadsheet filename pointer) (A C program binary file) (An interpreted shell script file) Objects of class FOO contain a number of attributes and methods. The attributes correspond to the data, and the methods are the code that acts on the data. You access and manipulate an object 's data by invoking the methods. template: the object. Therefore, a class is a description of the set of specific im- plementations or instances called ob- jects. A class template consists of a set of attributes and a set of methods. Attri- butes can be simple data items (e.g., integers or character strings) or more complex data (e.g., files, bit maps, or digitized voice— in these cases, the at- tributes are pointers to the complex data items). The methods can range from compiled subroutines written in conven- tional languages, such as C, to code written in interpretive languages, such as BASIC, REXX, or even shell scripts. Objects permit you to take a component approach to building large software sys- tems. Using relatively simple and reus- able objects makes it considerably eas- ier to produce and maintain complex applications. Distributed Object Management The ORB represents the core of a new area of object-oriented technology called Distributed Object Management. Basically, the ORB acts like a network operating system that sits on top of any conventional operating system, such as Unix, OS/2, or DOS. It implements one basic command: EXECUTE. The for- mat of this command looks like this: EXECUTE [object_name, method, parameter!., parameter2 . . . parameter^]. It's the job of the ORB to locate the named template (i.e., the object), start the specified operation (i.e., the meth- od), and pass it the parameters. Because objects can exist anywhere on a net- work, you need a name service or a unique identifier— a handle— to locate them. If this handle is known, the object can be directly accessed. In addition to this basic invocation function, the ORB must provide other capabilities associated with object-ori- ented systems. These capabilities are what make software development in an object-oriented environment as produc- tive, maintainable, and extensible as the evangelists have proclaimed. Although these concepts have fancy computer sci- ence names (e.g., subclassing, inheri- tance, and polymorphism), they are simple to understand when put in the context of the software-class templates described above. Subclassing allows you to create new 1 72 BYTE* JANUARY 1992 A MOVING TARGET classes from existing ones. You can re- vise the behavior of any of the existing (inherited) methods and add new meth- ods and attributes of your own (special- ization). By doing this, you've created a new version of the class that is similar, but not identical, to the original. Sub- classing lets you take advantage of an existing template— perhaps one devel- oped for an application unrelated to your own— and modify it to suit your needs. It provides the reusability bene- fits of object orientation and promotes cost-effective software systems that are easier to develop, maintain, and en- hance. A slight variation on subclassing is the substitution of a different method (with the same name) for one in the original template. Because methods are invoked by name, this lets you leave an application unchanged yet still benefit from the modified behavior— be it a bug fix, an enhancement, or whatever. This process is referred to as overloading. For instance, say you have a text- based template called "document" that contains a "print" method. If you cop- ied the template for use in a graphics- based class (graphics document), you could replace the original print method with one (still called print) that knows how to output bit maps. You would in- voke this new template just as you did the old one, but the behavior would change. This capability, called poly- morphism, lets you maintain a consis- tent interface and hide differences in implementation. Any object-based sys- tem needs to support these capabilities. The ORB supports these capabilities by including some primitive, or root, templates (also called base classes) as part of the basic ORB. Built into these base classes are methods that provide the functionality of subclassing, inheri- tance, and polymorphism. The presence of base classes lets you use the EXECUTE command, which provides the basic object-oriented func- tions by letting you invoke a subclass or substitute method. In fact, adding more of these intrinsic operations to the base classes enhances the system's capabili- ties and makes them available through the same simple interface mechanism. What's more, you can now define your own functionality by adding and chang- ing methods. Because these methods can be inherited by newly defined class- es, you can create and specialize more functionality as the system evolves. So, the ORB is essentially a control module with a simple interface for ma- nipulating objects and a small number of operations defined by a set of base classes and their built-in methods. This is the starting point for building more complex and extensible software. One interesting point is that even these built- in objects are predefined classes (tem- plates), manipulated by the same basic interface. Because these classes can be changed or replaced, even the system's basic capabilities can be modified and extended. This raises a couple of inter- esting points. First, you need a bootstrap process that loads the initial set of classes. This capability is provided by the Genclass compiler. Second, because basic func- tionality can be redefined, you must es- tablish a standard for these basic func- tions and classes. This is exactly the role that the OMG is expected to play. In this arena, the base classes and their object life-cycle methods are known as a type repository. To provide true interoper- ability and compatibility between dif- ferent implementations of an ORB, a standard for these classes and methods is essential. Software Without Walls With an ORB, you have a method of ac- cessing objects located anywhere on a network using a name service. This per- mits you to build complex client-server applications using objects located on network servers that you access by in- voking their methods through the ORB. Building applications in this manner lets you move pieces around easily, change services without affecting the clients, create prototypes quickly, and general- ly attain great flexibility in building network applications. In addition, HyperDesk envisions an ORB with the following attributes: • A developer of the class template should be able to modify or add new code without bringing the system down or affecting applications that are al- ready running. This is known as dyna- mism. • A developer should be able to provide several methods (with the same name). The system would determine the proper method at run time based on user pref- erences, such as the machine the user is running, the language that is being used, or other cultural or system prefer- ences. • The user (or client application) should be able to ask the object to describe it- self (i.e., its methods, parameter re- quirements, and attributes) so that, by exploration, you can discover new capa- bilities and services that can be used at run time. This is also a capability of dynamism. • All this software should be portable across different hardware, operating sys- tems, and networks. The functionality provided by Distrib- uted Object Management and the ORB reduces cost and creates more maintain- able software for client-server and LAN applications, and it enables true appli- cations interoperability across diverse computing environments. Additionally, the dynamic application-integration as- pects of the software provide the devel- oper and the user with greater efficien- cy and productivity. Through the standards leadership of the OMG, the capability to develop ap- plications that are truly independent of system and network architecture is now a reality. Herbert M. Osher is president of Hyper- Desk Corp. (Westborough, MA), which develops distributed-computing soft- ware based on object management tech- nology. You can reach him on BIX c/o "editors. " JANUARY 1992 -BYTE 173 A MOVING TARGET ■ procedures at run time. RPC toolkits are available from many sources. Netwise (Boulder, CO) offers interoperable RPC implementations for dozens of different platforms. The Dis- tributed Computing Environment from the Open Systems Foundation (Cam- bridge, MA) is built on RPCs. With its sophisticated naming, time, and remote file services, DCE lets you create globe- spanning distributed applications. Although they are extremely power- ful, RPCs don't deal with the lower-level protocol issues that you must face to create network-aware applications. One innovative solution to building applica- tions over multiple-protocol networks is Pipes. It gives you everything that you need to create LAN-spanning applica- tions (see the text box "The Third Wave" on page 168). Networks of Objects Software development is hard and getting even harder. Throw in multiplatf orm net- worked environments, and it becomes al- most impossible. In increasing numbers, developers are turning to object-oriented technologies to help them create and maintain usable software. The point of object orientation is to shield developers from the incredible complexity of software systems. Using objects whose functions are well under- stood—but whose internal workings may be a mystery— developers can create and maintain sophisticated systems much more easily than they can with standard procedural code. This way, you need only understand what an object does, not how it does it. Objects are showing up in many places in cross-platform environments. For ex- ample, the ParcPlace and Digitalk im- plementations of Smalltalk discussed earlier are object-oriented environments. In fact, one company even offers an ob- ject-oriented interface builder for Parc- Place' s Smalltalk that further abstracts the problems of building a GUI for your Smalltalk applications. The Tigre Pro- gramming Environment from Tigre Ob- ject Systems (Santa Cruz, CA) enables you to create Smalltalk GUIs for many different platforms with a minimum of coding. Given the advantages of object orienta- tion and of distributed computing, you shouldn't be surprised that people are trying to put the two together. The Ob- ject Management Group (Framingham, MA), a consortium devoted to setting practical standards for object technol- ogy, has recently announced its choice for an Object Request Broker, which will let applications access objects anywhere on a network just as an RPC lets a pro- gram access a procedure anywhere on a network. The ORB is the first step to- ward the definition of a truly transparent cross-development environment (see the text box "Object Request Brokers" on page 172). Are objects the be-all and end-all of cross-platform development? Given the enormous complications of cross-plat- form development and the powerful ab- straction capability of objects, the an- swer is undoubtedly yes. The question now becomes whether it is cost-effective to move hundreds of billions of dollars' worth of software into the object-ori- ented realm. That answer is just as obvi- ous— not yet. ■ Bob Ryan is a BYTE technical editor. You can reach him on BIX as "b.ryan. 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You can compress a single file or entire directory structures with a single command. Compressed files can be quickly returned to their normal size with PKcinzip. Software developers can reduce the number of diskettes needed to distribute their product by using PKzip . Call for Distribution License information. i The included PKzip utility lets you store compressed files as a single self- extracting .EXE files that automatically uncompresses when run. Only $47.00 9025 N. Deerwood Dr. Brown Deer, Wl 53223 (414)354-8699 Fax (414) 354-8559 174 BYTE* JANUARY 1992 Circle 1 29 on Inquiry Card. If your LCD projection panel doesn't perform as well as you do, you're the one that ends up looking foolish. That's why we gave the MagnaByte® 6001 true color satura- tion and outstanding image clarity. And we made it so easy to set up and use, virtually anyone can give a professional, glitch-free presentation. Anywhere. With the lightweight MagnaByte 6001, whatever appears on the computer screen is projected in thousands of crisp, rich colors through an overhead projector. And you can still use your mouse or key commands to manipulate graphics, call up different screens or type in new text All in brilliant 640 x 480 resolution. Seeing is believing. Ask your AV dealer for a comparative demon- stration. For the Telex dealer nearest you, call 1-800-828-6107. Because if you can't show it as well as you know it, your presentation isn't the only thing that will suffer. The MagnaByte® 6001 Compatibility: IBM and IBM-compatibles with VGA output Macintosh II and LC. ©1991 Telex Communications, Inc. Circle 1 67 on Inquiry Card. *^I ^T# THE CONCE ^3)9HCI!ItTlf& CASE PRODUCT. ■Y®; ; ' System Architect has the power to handle your most complex applications. And it's so easy to use, even beginners will be produc- tive in ho time. 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Other product names used herein are for identification purposes only and may be trademarks of their respective companies. Price shown valid only for USA & Canada. Price and specifica- tion s subject to cha nge without notice at the sole discretion of the company. Product delivery subject to availability. Please call for the name of the nearest international distributor. Circle 130 on Inquiry Card. STATE OF THE ART TRIBUTARIES AND DELTAS Tracking software change in multiplatform environments RANDALL D. CRONK Despite the best efforts of the computer industry's many stan- dard-setters (official and unof- ficial), the world is still a dan- gerous place in which to write software. It is bad enough that there are still Hew- lett-Packard, IBM, DEC, Sun Microsys- tems, Silicon Graphics, Mips, and about a hundred or so other variations of Unix to contend with— there remain all the proprietary platforms, too. Several rep- resent huge markets, and woe to the ven- dor who introduces exciting new features for the Macintosh now and asks its Unix and DOS customers to wait a year. The challenges of cross-platform de- velopment, however, do not affect just vendors, nor are they limited strictly to compatibility issues. By far, the biggest problem is code management. Anyone who has ever written more than one ver- sion of the same program knows the frus- tration of trying to make sure that bug fixes and updates are applied appropri- ately to all versions. Changes to the X Window System version of a Unix pro- gram may work in the DECwindows ver- sion of a VMS program, but not in the command-line version. The addition of TCP/IP to an E-mail application may af- fect different software modules for dif- ferent users, depending on whether they have Chipcom, Proteon, or some other hardware. For large development efforts, manag- ing code for applications that run on dif- ferent platforms can become very com- plex indeed. The definition of a platform can include not just the operating system and CPU hardware but also such things as database managers, communications servers, and math coprocessors. And ILLUSTRATION: JIM LUDTKE © 1992 * % i iiL ! 1 1 Ji » tit. . . * |'/V // *♦ * *••§ jfoj/ " ^s8 ^ # ** *„* * IL»/v **'•%.*• few- -%?^ EPS Ih^^I i: A*MS***£*. jm i* <<4 ' frtil, ^M * JANUARY 1992 -BYTE 177 TRIBUTARIES AND DELTAS SEQUENTIAL-CHANGE MODEL I *m I *m \ , , V2.1 ► V2.2 *- V2.3 Figure 1: The boxes indicate versions of the file. Each version is the immediate successor of the previous version. One or more logical changes are made between versions, and every version in the tree has a linear sequential history. these are only the technology factors. There are also nontechnology factors. These can include accounting rules, de- mographic preferences, legal require- ments, and distribution-channel restric- tions. Nontechnology factors often have a lot of influence on what features are implemented on what platforms. For ex- ample, a company might want to allow third parties to develop local variations of its DOS product in non-U. S. markets while developing all its Macintosh ver- sions itself. There can be as many different ver- sions of a program as there are ways to define users. You don't need to have too many versions before the potential for overwhelming complexity becomes clear. Every time a change is made, the follow- ing questions must be answered: • What versions are affected by the change? • How will the change be migrated to those versions? • What other code in each of those versions is affected by this change? BVTE ACTION SUMMARY Software revisions can turn your multiplatform comput- ing environment into a frus- trating tangle of conflicting code versions. The way to avoid the problems caused by revisions is to adopt the right approaches to manag- ing software in these environ- ments. • What else is affected (e.g. , documentation)? • How are selected versions created from the software inventory? The last two questions raise issues t>jnt go beyond making certain that the di- rect changes are successfully implanted in the right release. External dependen- cies (e.g., documentation) are also part of a software release. For example, if only the DOS version of a product feature is changed (say, to reflect the existence of a brand-new coprocessor chip), all the appropriate references must, obviously, be identified and changed in the docu- mentation. Finally, there is the issue of version creation itself. This can be more compli- cated than it might first appear. For ex- ample, who's to say that the latest ver- sions will always reflect the most recent changes? At some point, the developer may want to undo some prior changes for some of the platforms supported (e.g., because a function becomes available in hardware that was previously implement- ed in software). It is also possible that the vendor will want to institute a "reusable code" poli- cy. The company may adapt code from a previous version as a base for a new plat- form migration. That might happen if the most recent version supports one win- dowing system and a new target platform calls for another that is completely dif- ferent. Rather than use the existing win- dowing system as a development base, the developer may opt to start with the original command-line version of the product. Finally, the developer might want to create a completely new version of the software from the existing source code inventory. Rather than select an existing version and add changes, the de- veloper might want to simply select code out of the inventory and build a version from that. Wanted: A Good Code Manager The general practice of keeping track of multiple software versions is known as software-configuration management. A number of automated SCM tools exist, and each one addresses some or all of the cross-platform development issues. All SCM tools share certain features. For example, they all view software develop- ment as an incremental process in which any version equals a base version and the changes. All SCM tools also exploit the idea that less storage should be required to hold one release and the changes than to hold entire copies of all releases. Sav- ing storage space during product devel- opment, however, is not usually a major concern in multiplatform development efforts. There are major differences among the various SCM tools. These differences broadly affect the tools' ability to cope with cross-platform development. The key differences center around the following issues: • whether the tool is file- or object-oriented • whether the tool represents changes physically or logically • whether the tool applies changes sequentially or selectively For all but the most simple design ef- forts, a system that captures change as an object rather than as a file of source code is better. Source files lack the ability to represent all the things that need to be managed in a complex cross-platform de- velopment effort. They can only include the physical code itself and the various name tags (e.g., the name of the file and the name of the version to which the file belongs). Some of the things that cannot be easily represented include platform dependencies, code dependencies,- and documentation dependencies. A better candidate for a change "con- tainer" than a file would be an abstract data type called a change set. Such an ob- ject can be defined to incorporate all the features that are meaningful to the cross- platform development process. A big advantage of using change sets is the ability to represent software changes as logical change rather than just physi- cal change. A logical change is what the change accomplishes (e.g., converting output to PostScript format). A physical change is the physical evidence that re- sults from the implementation of the logi- cal change (e.g., changes to source files, executables, and documentation). SCM tools based on files are only suited to deal with physical changes, and primar- 178 BYTE* JANUARY 1992 Circle 59 on Inquiry Card. TRIBUTARIES AND DELTAS SELECTABLE-CHANGE MODEL Change selection Figure 2: The circles indicate changes. A version specifies a collection of selected changes. The diagram shows the change selections for V2.2 shown in figure 1 as though a single logical change were made between the versions. ily one kind of physical change at that: changes to the source code. A change ob- ject can just as easily capture changes to executable code, graphical data, imaging data, or documentation. Change sets can also have features called attribute tags, which allow them to be manipulated on the basis of abstract criteria. As an example, the developer could ask the SCM system to list all change sets that support a specific func- tion on a particular platform and that in- clude references to specific subroutines. Fundamentally, the benefit of express- ing change logically rather than physical- ly is that it conforms to how people think. People are more likely to under- stand a change called "Convert output to PostScript format" than a change worded "version 3.2 of File 123, version 5.1 of File ABC, and version 3.7 of File XYZ." The third criterion that differentiates SCM tools is the way they select software to be included in a version. There are two basic types of version-selection models: the sequential model (see figure 1) and the selectable-change model (see figure 2). In the sequential model, the SCM tool is, in essence, an archiving mecha- nism for recording the sequence of file versions as they are generated. The fun- damental unit in the sequential model is the file version; changes are just bridges from one version to the next. In the selectable-change model, the changes are the fundamental unit. A ver- sion is, in effect, a collection of changes. Systems that use the selectable-change model are always implemented in a way that permits individual changes to be in- cluded or excluded independently of each other. The Sequential Model SCM tools that are based on the sequen- tial model are not really management systems; they are archival tools (i.e., they select previously named versions). A previously named version is one that was created by making changes to an old- er named version. SCM lets you pull to- gether established versions from an in- ventory of source code files, not create new versions from the source code. There are a number of variants of the sequential model. They share the follow- ing fundamental assumptions: • The fundamental unit of specification is the version. • Changes are represented as the differences between an old version and its successor. • Each version (except the original base) has an immediate ancestral version. • The only versions recorded in the system are those that are read into it; these are the only ones that can be retrieved from the system. The simplest model is the linear se- quential model. In this model, the sys- tem records a sequence of versions, each being the successor of the one immedi- ately preceding it. Prior versions can be retrieved on demand, but only the latest version can be updated. The linear se- quential model is fundamental; in most development efforts, it represents the normal sequence of events. Files are usu- ally altered in a cumulative sequence of changes. SCM systems must be able to handle linear sequences of versions in a convenient manner. The fundamental Computer Images 800 Toil-Free Credit Card Signup. Then use same 800 #to Download. 1-80O-GO-MODEM Or use direct dial 64 Line BBS at (503) 697-5100 8/N1 SuperVGA 1024x768x256 ASTRONOMY • NA TURE • SCENIC • GRASP • ANIMA TOR • 3D STUDIO MOVIES • SOUND • GAMES • TARGA* UTILITIES 'IMAGE CONVERTERS Event Horizons Commercial BBS, thousands of images and movies. Quality Color Super VGA/VGA/ EGA. 1200/2400 bps $10/hr., 9600 bps $40/hr., 800# $6/hr. extra. Also Professional Image Scanning from prints or slides to disk. No Modem? Order our Mail Image Library with samples $9. World-wide shipment. Info voice line 503-697-7700. All credit cards accepted. Same day shipment. MS-DOS systems only. Event Horizons 311 Ave. B, Ste. 209 Lake Oswego, OR 97034 Voice 503-697-7700, BBS 800-466-6336, or BBS 503-697-51 00 JANUARY 1992 •BYTE 179 TRIBUTARIES AND DELTAS SCM-MODEL IMPLEMENTATION STRATEGIES A comparison between the "manual " model of control-divergent sources and the two structured models for SCM. Manual Sequential change Selectable change Elements managed Files Files Change-set objects Information available to developer Filenames Filenames File-version names Sequence of deltas that make up a file version Filenames Software-release names Changes that make up a release Files affected by a change Software changes Documentation Hardware platforms Releases Operating systems Relationships and dependencies among software routines Software development steps Select an existing file version Select existing versions of all needed Select an existing release of the whole system Create a new release by selecting desired change sets Product examples None sees RCS CMS Aide-de-Camp problem with the linear sequential model is that it does not provide a good method of dealing with parallel versions. The branched sequential model is a natural generalization of the linear se- quential model. From a given version, you can create branch versions, each with its own linear sequence of versions. The versions recorded in a branched se- quential system form a tree of versions. All versions in the tree are retrievable, but only the version at the terminal nodes can be updated. Linear sequential and branched sequential models often use a simple version-numbering system for specifying versions. This is natural, be- cause it corresponds to the sequences that are recorded. DEC's Code Management System is an example of a system that uses the branched sequential model for specifying names. The basic problem with the branched sequential model is that branches, once established, diverge and are never reunit- ed. This is not satisfactory. There are two major reasons for creating branches. The first is to create a parallel path of de- velopment that will later be merged into the main path. This is known as version merging. An example of this is when one development group works on a new re- lease of a product while another group maintains the current release. At some point, the old bug fixes must be merged with new functionality. The second reason for branching is to maintain parallel versions that have some specific difference (e.g., software that runs under two different operating sys- tems). A bug fix often must be moved across all software releases of a product. This is known as change migration. In both cases, there must be communication between branches, which the branched sequential model does not inherently provide. There should be, for example, some way to know which changes made in one branch should be applied to an- other branch. The Selectable-Change Model The selectable-change model leads to true management tools rather than sim- ple version-retrieval systems. The devel- oper has the option of selecting new com- binations of prior changes to produce previously unnamed versions. Given the additional capabilities of data-type ab- straction provided by an object-oriented change definition, the selectable-change model enables true cross-platform soft- ware management. Developers can mix and match their source code to corre- spond to virtually any combination of hardware, software, documentation, mar- keting, or other criteria. In this model, changes are created by comparing an old version of the file to an altered version. Each change receives a name. The changes are stored in such a way that each change set can be applied independently of the others. A version is specified by a list of changes to be ap- plied. In principle, if there are N changes in the system, any of 2 N possible combi- nations of included and excluded changes may be a version. Versions can be de- fined at any time, but a version name is not automatically created for each change added. The changes are treated as inde- pendent, selectable units of change that are not tied to a particular version. The major assumptions of the selecta- ble-change model include the following: • The fundamental unit of specification is the change. • Versions are specified as collections of changes. This can be done implicitly or explicitly. • In principle, a change need not represent the difference between two versions. • Any combination of changes can be used to specify a version, even though the version so specified did not previously exist. These assumptions are not always ex- plicitly implemented in a particular sys- tem; however, they are implicit in the model. The only system with a full im- plementation of the selectable-change model is Aide-de-Camp from Software Maintenance and Development Systems. So-called update systems (e.g., IBM Up- date, CDC Update, and Historian Plus from Opcode) ordinarily lack a good method for referencing and representing versions. The modern implementation of the Source Code Control System (SCCS), generally packaged with Unix, is an in- teresting hybrid system; operationally, it behaves like a sequential-change model system, although its underlying technol- ogy uses the selectable-change model. Model Implementations The table describes the implementation strategies for tools employing the se- quential-change and selectable-change models, along with specific product ex- amples. For purposes of comparison, the 180 BYTE* JANUARY 1992 SiYES! BVTE Enter my one-year (12 issues) subscription to BYTE for only $24.95. I'll save 40% off the single copy price. Plus, I'll also receive BYTE's Annual Special Issue FREE with my paid subscription. If at any time I'm not satisfied with BYTE, I may cancel for a full refund on all unmailed copies. □ Payment enclosed □ Bill me NAME COMPANY . ADDRESS_ CITY . -STATE . _ZIP. IW2I137 Please allow 6-8 weeks for delivery. Basic subscription rate is $29.95. 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TRIBUTARIES AND DELTAS GENERATION OF X CHANGE OBJECTS FROM MIT DISTRIBUTION XV2 Distribution - X V1 Base Sun.MIT.2 Sun.MIT.1 SCO.MIT.2 SCO.MIT.1 DEC.MIT.2 DEC.MIT.1 Figure 3: A change, set results from the difference between an existing version of the X files for each platform and the updated files provided in the MIT distribution version for that platform. manual model is also listed. This is the familiar scenario where the developer maintains various software versions as files in a directory. When selecting a version, the developer searches through the directory and picks out the proper files to be included in the release. Be- cause it is the manual model that all SCM tools were invented to improve on and re- place, no SCM products are listed in the manual category. Only the selectable-change model has been implemented as an object-oriented system. This makes sense: Files impose a sequential way of looking at data, and objects do not. The next feature on the table is information available to the de- veloper. This relates directly to whether change is represented in logical (i.e., abstract) or physical terms. If the data structures being managed are files, the system is limited to the kinds of informa- tion available in files (i.e., the names and contents of files). If the data structures are objects, a change can be associated with whatever information is meaningful to the developer. Next, the table lists what the developer does to build a release. Only in the ob- ject-oriented, selectable-change model does the developer have the option of de- fining a release as something other than a previously named version. Finally, the table lists product examples. How versions are built is a function of how versions and changes are represent- ed. The manual approach represents a re- lease as a number of complete program files that the developer selects, links, and builds as a version. There is no way to manage platform-dependent change, because there is no way to isolate these changes within files. Moreover, unless the developer uses a well-disciplined and robust naming convention, it may be dif- ficult to know which files go with which platforms or versions of platforms. Sequential-change models represent change as files: as complete source files and files of differences to source files. Only by creating an external naming ta- ble can developers equate these differ- ences with meaningful units of change (e.g., new functions or platform migra- tions). Defining change in terms of files also encourages the developer to represent multiple program versions within the same file. For example, Mips', The San- ta Cruz Operation's (SCO), and Ultrix versions of a product would probably be contained in the same file on an SCCS system. To express the appropriate code on the appropriate platform, the develop- er will probably insert conditional state- ments in the code. The purpose of these conditional state- ments is to check to see on which plat- form the program will run and to "turn on" the parts of the program relevant to that platform. In essence, the developer implements a code management scheme in the source code. This approach also results in the developer always seeing all existing code variants every time a file is viewed, irrespective of the one version currently of interest. The object-oriented approach also uses the idea of deltas, except that in this case the deltas are not the objects that are be- ing manipulated by the developer. Del- tas, or collections of source code changes to a given file, are defined as features of a change set. Unlike deltas, change sets can include features other than source code (e.g., the author and date of the change, relevant documentation, soft- ware relationships and dependencies, and hardware relationships). These fea- tures can be used to collect and apply changes that are relevant only to specific platforms or other operating conditions. In contrast to deltas, change sets are not necessarily defined as the difference between two successive versions. Several change sets, or a single change set, can represent all changes that result in a new version. Several changes can also be tied together by a common attribute (e.g., a work-order number) and treated as a sin- gle object. This gives the developer the flexibility to handle change with varying degrees of granularity. In some instances, the developer may find it convenient to implement all the changes that define a new version with a single identifier. At other times, the de- veloper may find it necessary to examine or manipulate a particular part of the overall change (e.g., the new password- retry restriction). Not only can change objects that implement part or all of a named version be defined, but change objects that implement entirely new ver- sions can also be defined, including ver- sions that merge changes from several development paths. This means that once a feature has been implemented on one platform, it can be selected or deselected for other platforms as well. An Object Lesson A good application for an object-oriented SCM system would be if a company had to make updates to its many X-based products every time another X distribu- tion arrived from MIT. Every two or three months, MIT sends out a distribu- tion disk containing a complete directory for each X platform MIT supports. The directory includes a list of bugs fixed or changes made since the last distribution, but with no reference to files changed. A software company receiving the distribu- tion must integrate the changes into its own software releases for the various platforms it supports. In an object-oriented SCM environ- ment, the company would do this by comparing source files, identifying del- tas, and defining change sets containing 182 BYTE- JANUARY 1992 *KST HOLIDAY BUNDLE 't^UON! Nissan 300ZX Twin Turbo Z-NIX Ijj COMPANY, INC. Tel: (71 4) 629-8050 For a ilrrited time when you 'test drive' the Cordless dealer you can enter (or a chance to win o new Nlsson 300ZX Twin Turbo worth $40,000. See your computer deoler tor delolts Circle 190 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 191). Circle 77 on Inquiry Card. Rack & Desk PC/AT Chassis Integrand's new Chassis/System is not another IBM mechanical and electrical clone. An entirely fresh packaging design approach has been taken using modular construction. At present, over 40 optional stock modules allow you to customize our standard chassis to nearly any requirement. Integrand offers high quality, advanced design hardware along with applications and technical support all at prices competi- tive with imports. Why settle for less? 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Although figure 3 shows the difference for each platform as a single change set, in practice there would prob- ably be many change sets, depending on the number of logical changes contained in the distribution for each platform. Each change set is also assigned appro- priate attributes (e.g., version number, platform, and feature name). The sum of all the change sets for all platforms could also be represented as a single change object. This collection of change sets, representing the new X fea- tures, can then be migrated to the com- pany's various platforms. As shown in figure 4, a new version of the software company's products (i.e., ones with the new X features) results from the application of the change sets to the existing version of each of the com- pany 's products. For some platforms, no doubt, not only would the new change set have to be selected for a particular plat- form, but some prior changes, such as those from a previous X distribution, would also have to be deselected. Because the new code on the X distri- bution disk comes from outside the path of the company's own sequence of devel- opment, it cannot manage these changes using a sequentially oriented SCM sys- tem. The only alternatives are to hand- stitch (and later perhaps unstitch) the X code into its product— or else use objects to turn these changes on and off. , ° continued APPLICATION OF X CHANGE SETS TO EXISTING PLATFORM-SPECIFIC PRODUCTS Sun change SCO change SCOV1 (with old windows) / Change deselection Change selection Figure 4: A new version of the products built using X features results from the application of the change sets to the existing version of each of the products. CREATING PLATFORM-SPECIFIC PORTS USING CHANGE SETS Figure 5: A simplified model of a product port of generic files to Sun, SCO, and DEC platforms. Would you get on board any SYSTEM THAT only takes you 80% OF THE WAY? © "® '■■©■ *i The worst time to discover that you can't complete a critical application is when you're in the middle of it. Yet it happens. Why? Because professional developers have never had a comprehensive, high-level system designed to build even the most complex applications. Never, that is, until Progress. The Progress Application Development Envi- ronment is built by developers, for developers. It provides everything you need for the fast, easy creation and execution of strategic applications- from prototype right through to delivery. How? 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TRIBUTARIES AND DELTAS COMBINATION OF SINGLE- AND MULTIPLE-PLATFORM DEVELOPMENT WITH CHANGE SETS Figure 6: Simultaneously developing software in two directions means that changes are made to successive versions of a product] on each platform, and changes made to a product on one platform are migrated to products on other platforms. The benefits of an object-oriented ap- proach become even clearer in the X-up- date example when one remembers that the X-related changes are not the only kinds of changes likely to be happening to the product at any one time. Among the other types of changes that are also occurring simultaneously are ports to other platforms, as well as general prod- uct-feature innovations. Figure 5 shows a simplified model of a product port of generic files to Sun, SCO, and DEC platforms. For purposes of il- lustration, the changes needed to turn the generic base into a platform-specific re- lease are represented as just a few change objects for each specific platform. Again, there might very well be many change sets associated with each logical change required for a platform migra- tion; however, all change sets could be linked to one object— and the number of change objects involved does not alter the basic methodology. For this company, changes have been organized into change objects so that a port is implemented by selecting the change set associated with the desired platform and deselecting any other port's platform-specific changes that may have been present in the code. 186 BYTE- JANUARY 1992 Figure 6 illustrates the process of de- veloping software in two directions at once. Changes are made to successive versions of a product on each platform, and changes made to a product on one platform are migrated to products on other platforms. Again, to keep the pic- ture simple, only a few change objects and a few releases are shown. Whether porting the product to other platforms, developing successive versions on the same platform, or importing external code, as with the previously mentioned case with X, changes are managed in a consistent and coherent way. Where soft- ware originates— or is used— does not re- strict the management process. The ability to move changes between development paths does introduce one complication not encountered in sequen- tial-change SCM systems— conflict. A conflict might be created when a change on one development path removes a sub- routine and a change on another path in- cludes the subroutine. If the two changes are merged into the same path, someone must review the changes to see that the conflict is resolved. Conflict can occur any time two devel- opment paths change the same file. For e o s example, if file. list. mit is the listjof files changed between MIT VI and MIT V2, and file.list.local is the listfof files changed between local version yl and local version V2, then the inters' tion of these lists consists of files to checked for conflict. Even though system has been invented that resol logical conflicts automatically, an ject-oriented system is ideal for idi tif ying situations where such logical con- flicts can exist. That is because it can sort changes by attribute (e.g., all he changes made to a release that referei ce the same subroutine or hardware device) . Complexity issues such as conflict ; re more likely to occur in the multiplatfo m environment, where most software writ- ers work today. These are the kinds of issues that computer technology, espe- cially object-oriented technology, is par- ticularly well suited to address. It is iron- ic that software developers have waited so long before applying these techniques to their own work. ■ Randall D. Cronk is a Boston-based free- lance writer on computer technology and the industry. You can reach him on BIX c/o "editors. " a se .** ** ** • •• + • •• *• **• • I •• * *** * • * + • * i Whether you're working to keep the space shuttle in orbit or analyzing complex census data, SPSS has the right statistical software for you. The same company that helps NASA get off the ground safely through problem-trend analysis, can help make your systems go with in-depth, easy-to-use software. Software that gives you the power to access, manage, analyze and present data. Software supported by the documentation and training that's set the industry standard for ove r i . 25 years. Take off with SPSS, suppliers of statistical solutions \- lle^^^ "* I to over 2 million users worldwide. Call 1(800) 543-5835 or FAX (312)329-3668. The sky's no longer the limit. 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THIRD NTERNATIONAL COMPUTER FORUM (ICF) COME TO MOSCOW! □ The ICF brings together people that influence and determine the major trends of information technologies in the USSR and world-wide □ The ICF lets western companies obtain top-quality, first-hand information about the real and potential computer and software markets in the USSR □ The ICF provides Soviet computer professionals with better access to products and technologies from the rest of the world Scheduled Speakers: • Philippe Kahn (Borland) • Jerry Kaplan (Go) • Greg Herrick (Zeos) • Dick Williams (Digital Research) • Esther Dyson (EDventure Holdings) • Stewart Alsop (Info World) • Ken Wasch (Software Publishers Association) • Fred Langa • and others. Topics: • Status of the USSR computer market; business opportunities • Future of PC market • Workstations market • Macintosh • UNIX applications • LAN policy • LAN practice • Windows and OS/2 market • Pen-based technologies • etc. If you're a part of the emerging Soviet and east European computer industry, or if you want to learn more about doing business with that rapidly-growing market, you need to attend the Third Annual International Computer Forum! SAVE MONEY BY PRE-REGISTERING The registration fee covers access to keynotes, sessions, presentations, exhibitions, cultural programs, 3 lunches and 3 receptions. Register before March 31, 1992 and receive the special discount rate of Just US$760. After March 31, 1992 the normal fee of US$840 applies. RESERVE YOUR EXHIBITION SPACE Price Includes exhibition space Itself, labor for building the booth, power supply (220 volt, 50Hz), and furniture (tables, chairs, etc.). The fee Is US$3400 for each 9 sq.m. ($2800 for the members of ICC). FOR MORE INFORMATION Contact the ICC at: Mall: 101813 USSR, Moscow, Proyezd Serova, 4. Fax/phone: 7-095-921-09-02. MCI ID: 439-1034. Internet: levon@staff.lcc.msk.su. San Francisco-Moscow Teleport: ICC. JUNE 15-18, 1992 WORLD TRADE CENTER, MOSCOW, USSR The Cream. The Crop. % wwmM Object-Oriented Confusion m*ir^rr > "i!7 y *""- , °^' r *"^"~^"" s ^^Tf "^ *■*"'**■ h ■ *■*** •**»■*■«» ■wim * .. ggsgflg ** «*■*£■ — «5I«- «■>». ■i 11 »HiinMHr^«»«n'.|ig»i— 1. .^i^S' 1 M * MM '"l ' JI/S. -.f'>.l>|l «" 5 ■ «t OOf * ■mmu^nwnMidni-Ki a^wgsjgaajSaaSa^ m »v«t /* KttUt There are plenty of places to get information in this industry. Too many. But if you want the best quality information, there's only one that rises to the top: BYTE WEEK BYTEWEEK is a weekly newsletter from the same professionals who produce BYTE Magazine. Each week, the most important news and information from the previous week is presented in a readable and concise manner. BYTEWEEK offers you what no other publication can: timely news on the rapidly- evolving computer industry as it happens with the interpretation and evaluation that only BYTE's experienced editorial staff can provide. Clip Coupon Here -X- Subscribe now and take advantage of a special subscription rate of $395 ($495 outside the U.S. and Canada). Your subscription to BYTE WEEK also includes a free subscription to BIX, BYTE's exclusive on-line conferencing system. Don't miss this opportunity! Foi fastest seivice, call toll-free 1-800-258-5485 (in N.H., call 603-924-9281) and charge to a major credit card or we'll bill you. BVTE tm One Phoenix Mill Lane, Peterborough, NH 03458. WYWEEK offers a money-back guarantee if you are not completely satisfied. (J YES! Sign me up as a subscriber to the Cream of the Crop, BYTEWEEK at the special subscription rate of $395 a year for 50 issues ($495 a year outside the US. and Canada). Name □ MasterCard Title Company Mail Address _ City/State/Zip _ Business Phone □ Check enclosed Card# Exp □ VISA □ Bill me Signature WUlWMMK m One Phoenix Mill Lane Peterborough, NH 03458 You must have heard how SOUND BLASTER took the PC market by storm... Now the HURRICANE. "It's the next-generation sound card and it is loaded! The operative word is "twice." It has twice the sound channels (22) of the original Sound Blaster with twice the quality of sound in stereo, as well as stereo DACs for digitized speech and sound effects." Computer Gaming World August 1991 VViJilll |St8reo/MusicA/oice/Speech/MIDI/CD-ROM Interface/Game Port] The Multimedia Sound Standard I ! »i •4ft *X^ <> i . M i r 1 ' - i i , ' >, i > !> 'i ' ) > • ' *i «i trademark of Bruce Ariwkk might be "incompatibilities" between the hardware platforms, even within op- erating systems. Reviewing the ACE portability road map, it was soon clear that developers wishing to write applications for all ACE-compliant hardware would need four compilers and two architecturally incompatible versions of source code. They would need source code for Win- dows NT and for SCO Desktop, as well as compilers for Windows NT on Intel, Windows NT on Mips, SCO Desktop on Intel, and SCO Desktop on Mips. This is portability? Is ACE a joker? To be fair to ACE, the portability benefits of the initiative should be looked at one operating system at a time. A cer- tain amount of cynicism is unavoidable when you look only at the hoopla of the overall announcement involving multiple processors, software vendors, and hard- ware manufacturers. But, putting aside the political compli- cations, you can see that ACE is offering developers competition in the very area that will benefit them: cross-platform operating systems. Two very different operating systems, SCO and Windows, are competing for precedence across the CISC/RISC divide. This competition can only be good for developers. What follows is a roundup of the new cross-platform operating systems due in the first part of the 1990s, starting with the two ACE offerings . SCO Open Desktop SCO's version of Unix for the Intel 386/ 486 platform quickly became a popular system environment. As an example of the burgeoning success of SCO Unix, a recent survey of the members of Uni- Forum, a Unix users organization, re- ported remarkable growth in the use of the SCO system. Between 1990 and 1991, use of SCO Unix went from somewhere in the "other" category to second in overall use among UniForum members, ahead of SunOS and second only to Unix System V . SCO no doubt hopes to find the same response to its version of Unix for the Mips R4000 platform. SCO Open Desk- top for Mips will allow developers who have switched to SCO Unix to follow their operating system to the RISC plat- form. Open Desktop for Mips will offer source code compatibility with Open Desktop for Intel-based applications and with applications written for SCO/Unix System V/386. In addition, SCO Desk- top offers binary compatibility with DEC Ultrix systems. SCO describes the Open Desktop as consisting of three components: operat- ing-system services, networking ser- vices, and the GUI . According to reports JANUARY 1992 -BYTE 195 Circle 54 on Inquiry Card. FfealTime, - ... - V."W New, affordable video frame grabber for IBM computers. ComputerEyes/RT includes everything you need to capture high-resolution 8- or 24-bit color (or 8-bit gray scale) images from any standard composite or S-video source in real time. VGA and Super-VGA compatible. All popular file formats are supported. Call today for more information and free demo disk. Otherversionsavailablefor IBM PC and Macintosh from under $250. Digital Vision, Inc. 270 Bridge St., Dedham, MA 02026 (617)329-5400 To order call (800) 346-0090 New 24-Bit Color Video Frame Grabber For Under $600. Digital Vision COMPUTERS YES Clip'nSave lets you have your screen in a flash The simplest and most intuitive screen capture program is now available for Microsoft Windows. Many options available including freehand capture and single-key screen printing. Works in mono, gray, and 16 to 16 million colors. Reads and writes BMP, DIB, TIF, PCX, GIF, and EPS. AlsO available for OS/2 Presentation Manager. ORDER NOW! SATISFACTION GUARANTEED! TH TO ORDER: 1-800-522-4624 or 1-514-489-3007 Dynalink Technologies Inc. P.O.Box 593, Beaconsfield (QC) Canada H9W 5V3 LET THE SYSTEM DO THE PORTING from SCO, the kernel of the Open Desk- top is based on OSF/1 technology. The system incorporates technology from USL's System V/386 release 3.2. The operating system is compatible with multiple standards for the Unix system, including the following: X/Open Porta- bility Guide Issue 3 , Posix 1 003 . 1 ; Posix 1003.2; Posix 1003.4 (draft); FIPS 151- 1, OSF Application Environment Speci- fication; System V Interface Definition Issue 2; and System V Interface Defini- tion Issue 3. The networking component, like the core operating system, will support multiple standards. The SCO system will support TCP/IP, Sun's Open Network Computing (ONC), Microsoft's LAN I indowsNT is a 32-bit operating system that uses a flat-memory model. Manager for Unix Systems Client Sup- port, Simple Network Management Pro- tocol Agent support for network admin- istration, and, as specifications are finalized, Open Software Foundation's Distributed Computing Environment. The SCO Open Desktop graphical in- terface uses the OSF/Motif window man- ager and is based on the X Window Sys- tem 11 release 4 standard. When you start up the system, you see a desktop showing icons of available programs and services. You can use drop-and-drag op- erations to execute interactions among applications. For example, you can drag text from a word processor to an E-mail program to send a memo. The desktop will also include some form of encapsulation of programs and data, a feature known as object linking. At the first demonstration of the system, given last October at a Mips event in San Francisco, SCO announced that opening a file could start up the application that had created the file (e.g., opening a text file could start the word processor). This encapsulation feature hasn't been demonstrated as of this writing, nor has SCO literature described the mechanism. However, given the competition with 196 BYTE- JANUARY 1 992 Circle 204 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 205). LET THE SYSTEM DO THE PORTING Microsoft, which has made much of Ob- ject Linking and Embedding in its Win- dows product for Intel, program/data en- capsulation is sure to be a must-have feature for SCO. Windows NT Windows NT has its history in the tor- tured relationship between Microsoft and IBM. The two companies jointly be- gan working on a new graphical 32-bit operating system to replace DOS on Intel platforms. That new operating system was supposed to be OS/2 2.0 with Pre- sentation Manager. Then something hap- pened. According to Microsoft, its Win- dows 3.0 sold about 2.75 million copies in its first seven months on the market. Microsoft, finding its fortune in the Windows platform, began parting ways with IBM. After months of rumors and confusion, the two companies announced their separate plans. IBM would work on OS/2 2.0, and Microsoft would take on OS/2 3.0. In a short time, though, Mi- crosoft abandoned all pretense of work- ing on any operating system called OS/2. The company began referring to its new system software as portable Windows, then as Windows New Technology. With the announcements of the ACE initiative and the Mips R4000, the issue was set- tled once and for all: Microsoft's new op- erating system would be Windows New Technology, or NT. Windows NT is a grown-up form of the popular Windows 3.0 environment. The familiar graphical interface is there, but the system is no longer just a pretty task switcher for DOS. Windows NT is a 32-bit operating system with support for preemptive multitasking, multithread- ing, and symmetric multiprocessing. It uses a flat-memory model with a pro- tected paged-memory design. The speci- fications include certified security and support for the 16-bit Unicode character set, which will enable the system to sup- port non-Roman alphabets. But the design of Windows NT had to be more than that of an advanced operat- ing system with a graphical interface. To save its investment in its current user base, Microsoft had to build into NT an upward migration path from the current Windows 3.0 and DOS platforms. The company approached the problem by turning to a microkernel approach, a technology used in the Mach operating system developed at Carnegie Mellon University. A layered system— consisting of a microkernel, privileged processes, protected subsystems, and applications- lets the operating system run on multiple processors and support multiple APIs. Howtolanda747 in an area no bigger thanyourdeS What do you need to bring in a 400-ton, five- story jetliner? Nerves. Skill. And the Microsoft® Flight Simulator® Aircraft & Sce- nery Designer. Add it to our Flight Simulator 4.0, and you're off on the most realistic flight experience this side of a PC. You get a Boeing 747-400, complete with computerized flight display You can also try out a Piper Archer, a Beechcraft Starship or a seaplane. Fly them stock, or push the envelope and modify them to your own specs. See a Microsoft dealer. Because now it's possible to buy excitement. In the jumbo size. Microsoft Windows NT concentrates the core of its system services in a microkernel, or the NT Executive, as Microsoft calls it. This kernel, which consists of 50 KB of compiled code, contains the machine-de- pendent portion of the operating system, including support for thread dispatching and multiprocessor synchronization. The kernel is rewritten for different proces- sors. It serves as the native portion of the system, isolating machine dependencies from other more machine-independent operating-system services. Above the NT Executive layer are the privileged-mode extensions— processes such as device drivers, file systems, and LANs, which have direct access to hard- ware resources and file-system services. For example, Microsoft is implementing LAN Manager, its PC LAN software, as a privileged process. The protected-subsy stems layer is the component that makes NT capable of supporting multiple APIs. Protected sub- systems run as separate "fire- walled" tasks (i.e. , they cannot cause one another to crash), each supporting a different API. Microsoft plans to provide three sub- systems: Windows, OS/2, and Posix. The Windows subsystem will support 32- bit Windows programs, 16-bit Windows programs (via emulation), and DOS pro- grams (also via emulation). The OS/2 subsystem will run OS/2 1 .3 and 2.0 pro- grams. The Posix subsystem will run programs adhering to the Unix standard 1003.1. Because subsystems are imple- mented as separate tasks and NT is a multitasking operating system, the three protected subsystems can run simulta- neously. For the user, this means Win- dows NT can run multiple types of pro- grams (e.g., Windows, DOS, Posix, and OS/2) at the same time. The outermost layer of the NT system is the application. Applications are seen as clients of the protected subsystems. Clients issue requests for system ser- vices, which are passed to the appropri- ate subsystem for handling. In this sense, NT uses a remote-procedure-call model between the client application and the server subsystem. The final shape of Windows NT is not yet clear. The system will run all those applications, but how much interaction will be permitted among them? Will you be able to cut and paste or drop and drag between Posix and Windows programs or between OS/2 and Windows? And what about networking support? NT has provided the structure for networking (in the privileged-mode extensions layer), but company literature describes the ex- tensions as "a very general architecture" that "can be used by vendors of other net- working services." It appears that net- work implementations will provide the JANUARY 1992 -BYTE 197 LET THE SYSTEM DO THE PORTING proverbial third-party opportunities, and may therefore come sometime later than the operating system itself. SunSoft Solaris Sun Microsystems has been nearly syn- onymous with SPARC. The company de- signed the SPARC RISC architecture and led the efforts to manufacture and license the standard. Then, in February 1991, Sun announced it would become the par- ent company for three subsidiaries, each one chartered to succeed on its own. Sun- Soft, the new system-software subsid- iary, must have looked with great longing at the enormous installed base of Intel machines. In September 1991, the com- pany announced Solaris (see the figure), a Unix operating environment that would run on both Intel 80x86 and SPARC plat- forms. Solaris 2.0, due out in the first half of 1992, will be the cross-platform version of the Solaris 1.0 operating system cur- rently available for SPARC. The entire operating environment will be portable, from developer tools to operating system to user interface to desktop accessories. Solaris 2.0 will offer the developer the advantage of a completely symmetrical development environment across CISC and RISC architectures. The source code is carried to the other platform, and, us- ing the same tools as were used on the original platform, the program is recom- piled. Solaris is based on SunOS 5.0, an SVR4 version of Unix. The system has support for multitasking, multithread- ing, and symmetric multitasking. Like most Unix systems, Solaris provides ex- tensive networking support, including ONC and the beginnings of Project DOE (for Distributed Objects Everywhere), a network-transparent object-messaging facility under joint development with Hewlett-Packard. The Solaris user interface will employ a new version of the Open Look X Win- dow manager. You will be able to per- form drop-and-drag and cut-and-paste operations among applications running anywhere on the network. And, unlike other Unix systems, Solaris is prepared to run "foreign" programs: Solaris 2.0 on the Intel platform will provide DOS and Windows emulation, and you will be able to cut and paste between DOS/Win- dows applications and Unix programs. Apple/IBM PowerOpen In 1991, just before the Fourth of July, Apple and IBM stunned the computer in- dustry with the announcement of a tech- nology partnership. Among the several SOLARIS'S LAYERED ARCHITECTURE The layered architecture of Solaris 2.0 from SunSoft. Microsoft also describes its Windows NT system as "layered. " facets of this momentous agreement was a relatively prosaic element: a partner- ship on a new joint version of the Unix operating system, later dubbed the Power- Open system. The PowerOpen system, due in 1993 or 1994, will combine IBM's AIX ver- sion of Unix with Apple's Macintosh user interface. In addition, the system will support the OSF/Motif user inter- face; you will be able to choose between the GUIs. PowerOpen will run existing applica- tions for both the Mac and AIX, giving you access to applications that previously required a distinct architectural choice. The combined Apple/IBM system will be Unix with a friendly face, and it will of- fer access to all those friendly Mac appli- cations. As described by Apple president Michael Spindler, PowerOpen is de- signed to be a "Unix for the many." PowerOpen will run on the new Power- PC RISC processor, a single-chip ver- sion of IBM's RISC System/6000 chip set, which both Apple and IBM will use in their machines. Designed for one pro- cessor, PowerOpen is therefore not tech- nically a cross-platform operating sys- tem, as are the others discussed here. Although PowerOpen will run on only one processor, it will provide the first unified development path that crosses the previously trackless Apple/IBM divide. The system will represent the first joint effort of two companies whose differ- ences have been nearly religious in char- acter. It is in the ecumenical spirit of PowerOpen that I characterize it as a cross-platform system. Apple/IBM Taligent The most ambitious piece of the new partnership between Apple and IBM is their joint venture to build a new object- oriented operating system. This operat- ing-system venture is also the most un- certain part of the agreement. Not due until the mid-1990s, the new operating system is still mostly promise and pro- motion. What is really known about this most ballyhooed of ventures? Apple and IBM will form a new 350-employee company called Taligent. Taligent will build a "platform-independent" object-oriented operating system. The system will be de- signed as a cross-platform operating sys- tem, running multiple types of programs on multiple processors. As it is now de- scribed, Taligent will run Mac, OS/2, and AIX applications on PowerPC RISC, Intel 80x86, and Motorola 680x0 proces- sors. However, little is known about the de- tails of the Taligent system, and even less about how the two companies will solve their technical and business differences. The final shape of Windows NT is not yet clear. It will be difficult, if not impossi- ble, for Apple and IBM, opposites in cor- porate culture, to learn to work together. Industry representatives wonder how Taligent will merge the technical contri- butions of these two competitors. Taligent had its origins in what ap- peared to be just one more unpromising IBM technology partnership. The an- swers to the questions concerning this new effort may lie in the history of the joint venture. In September 1990, IBM announced the formation of Patriot Partners with Metaphor Computer Systems, a Moun- tain View, California, software com- pany. Patriot was to build a cross-plat- form software development environment. At that time, IBM already had two un- successful partnerships under its belt. The company had licensed NextStep but 198 BYTE- JANUARY 1 992 LET THE SYSTEM DO THE PORTING had done nothing with it, and the rela- tionship with Microsoft on PC operating systems had already gone sour. No one expected the alliance with Metaphor to be any different. Yet Patriot Partners went on to become one part of Taligent. Shortly after the an- nouncement of the Apple/IBM alliance, IBM acquired Metaphor, and with it the work done by Patriot. Patriot, renamed Constellation to avoid association with the now-famous Patriot missile system, would become IBM's contribution to the Apple/IBM joint operating-system ven- ture. Apple would contribute its nascent object-oriented operating system, code- named Pink. Looking at the two technical contri- butions to Taligent— Constellation and Pink— you can predict a few things about the new operating system to be offered by Taligent. Although there is no assurance that Taligent will represent a blending of these two technologies, Pink and Con- stellation should provide clues about the directions Apple and IBM consider im- portant. Constellation was designed to be a component-software platform. Using the metaphor of machine tools, the compo- nent-software model sees applications as assemblies of replaceable parts. Just as the pieces of one machine can be taken and reused in another machine, compo- nent software is made up of individually made parts that can potentially be re- combined to build a new application. Developers would write small, highly focused programs— the components. The Constellation platform would provide the mechanisms for assembling the compo- nents, protecting some of the assemblies from being disassembled (for program copyright protection), and letting users and vendors freely recombine some as- semblies to construct new applications out of existing ones. The entire Constellation platform was supposed to be portable. As first de- scribed in March 1991, Constellation would run on OS/2 2.x, AIX, OSF/Unix, PenPoint, the Mac (depending on the ca- pabilities of System 7.0, which had not been released at that time), and 32-bit Windows. The Pink operating system has been shrouded in mystery. All we know for sure is that the system is object-oriented. From remarks concerning the design of portable systems made by Edward Birss, senior vice president for object-based systems at Apple, you can assume that cross-platform design was part of the work done on the system. Pink is said to consist of about 1 million lines of code, Create a scene inyoifflMigiDom. :- — -I Make mountains. Build bridges. Give rise to rivers and run- ways.Whenyouadd Microsoft® Flight Simulator® Aircraft & Sce- nery Designer to Flight Simulator 4.0, the world is literally yours. Because now you can choose from 34 different objects- natural or man-made-and change their size, shape, color and even location to your liking Ask your Microsoft dealer about it. You'll get the biggest kicks in the air. While you're having the KUKSf*§&%^f%'fti' most fun on earth. frlArfvwI/fl itnis of Microsoft Corpor, ■ .89^25S. Ifektronix The best andthebrightest. Circle 1 66 on Inquiry Card. RESOURCE GUIDE Cross-Platform Applica Development Tools Cross-platform application development makes it possible for you to take the outcome of your work on one system and use tion it in a noncomoatible environment. Some companies are in the process of developing "industrial-strength" applications that will include the benefits of both visual programming and object-oriented reusability. Absoft Corp. Exsys, Inc. Interactive Systems Corp. Neuron Data (MacFORTRAN II/Aux) (Exsys Professional 3.0) (Architech Application Series) (Open Interface) 2781 Bond St. 1720 Louisiana Blvd. NE, 2401 Colorado Ave., 156 University Ave. Rochester Hills, MI 48309 Suite 312 Third Floor Palo Alto, C A 94301 (313)853-0050 Albuquerque, NM 871 10 Santa Monica, CA 90404 (415) 321-4488 fox: (313) 853-0108 (505) 256-8356 (800)346-7111 fax:(415)321-3728 Circle 1 166 on Inquiry Card. fax: (505) 256-8359 (213) 453-8649 Circle 1 1 87 on Inquiry Card. Circle 1 1 73 on Inquiry Card. fax: (213) 828-6453 Itawamba Software, Inc. Circle 1 1 80 on Inquiry Card. Oracle Corp. (Multiplatf orm Compatibility Falcon Software, Inc. (SQL*Forms3.0) Package) (cT) Ithaca Software 500 Oracle Pkwy. 150 East Olive Ave., Suite 203 P.O. Box 200 (Hoops 2.22) Redwood Shores, CA 94065 Burbank,CA 91502 Wentworth, NH 03282 1001 Marina Village Pkwy. (415) 506-7000 (818)843-1627 (603) 764-5788 Alameda, CA 94501 fax:(415)506-7200 fax:(818)843-8364 fax:(603)764-9051 (510)523-5900 Circle 1 1 88 on Inquiry Card. Circle 1 167 on Inquiry Card. Circle 1 1 74 on Inquiry Card. fax:(510)523-2880 * Circle 1181 on Inquiry Card. ParcPlace Systems CACI Products Co. Graphic Software Systems, Inc. (Smalltalk) (ModSimll) (Graphics Development Toolkit) Knowledge Systems Corp. 1550 Plymouth St. 3344 North Torrey Pines Court 9590 Southwest Gemini Dr. (KSC ChangeManager 1.0) Mountain View, CA 94043 La Jolla.CA 92037 Beaverton, OR 97005 114 MacKenan Dr., Suite 100 (800) 822-7880 (619)457-9681 (503)641-2200 Cary,NC27511 (415)691-6700 fax: (619)457-1184 fax:(503)643-8642 (919)481-4000 fax:(415)691-6715 technical support: Circle 1 1 75 on Inquiry Card. fax: (919) 460-9044 Circle 1 1 89 on Inquiry Card. (619)455-6300 Circle 1 1 82 on Inquiry Card. Circle 1 168 on Inquiry Card. Gupta Technologies, Inc. Parsytec, Inc. (SQL Windows) Manx Software Systems, Inc. (MultiTool) CYMA 1040 Marsh Rd., Suite 200 (MS-DOS-Macintosh Cross) 245 West Roosevelt Rd., (Cause 2.0) Menlo Park, CA 94025 P.O. Box 55 Building 9, Unit 60&61 1400 East Southern Ave. (415)321-9500 Shrewsbury, NJ 07701 West Chicago, IL 60185 Tempe, AZ 85282 fax:(415)321-5471 (800)221-0440 (708)293-9500 (800) 292-2962 Circle 1 1 76 on Inquiry Card. (908)542-2121 fax: (708) 293-9525 (602)831-2607 fax: (908) 542-8386 Circle 1 1 90 on Inquiry Card. fax: (602) 345-5703 ImageSoft, Inc. Circle 1 1 83 on Inquiry Card. Circle 1 1 69 on Inquiry Card. (CommonView) PeerLogic, Inc. 2 Haven Ave. Meta Software Corp. (Pipes Platform 3.0) Dalcon Computer Systems Port Washington, NY 11050 (Design/OA 2.6) 555 De Haro St. (U-BASIC) (800) 245-8840 150 Cambridge Park Dr. San Francisco, CA 94107 1222 16th Ave. S (516)767-2233 Cambridge, MA 02140 (800) 873-7927 Nashville, TN 37212 fax: (516) 767-9067 (617) 576-6920 (415) 626-4545 (615) 321-9000 Circle 1 1 77 on Inquiry Card. fax: (617) 576-0519 fax:(415)626-4710 fax:(615)321-5944 technical support: Circle 1191 on Inquiry Card. Circle 1 1 70 on Inquiry Card. Information Builders, Inc. (203) 222-9087 (Level5 2) Circle 1 1 84 on Inquiry Card. Pixar Digitalk, Inc. 1250 Broadway (Developer's RenderMan Toolkit 3.2) (Look&Feel Kit) New York, NY 10001 Microsoft Corp. 1001 West Cutting Blvd. 9841 Airport Blvd. (800)969-4636 (Visual Basic) Point Richmond, CA 94804 Los Angeles, CA 90045 (212) 736-4433 1 Microsoft Way (800)937-3179 (800) 922-8255 fax:(212)967-6406 Redmond, WA 98052 (510)236-4000 (213)645-1082 Circle 1 1 78 on Inquiry Card. (800)426-9400 fax:(510)236-0388 fax:(213)645-1306 (206) 882-8080 Circle 1 1 92 on Inquiry Card. Circle 1 1 71 on Inquiry Card. Informix Software, Inc. fax:(206)883-8101 (Inf ormix-4GL 4.0, Circle 1 1 85 on Inquiry Card. The Progeni Corp. Dimension Software Systems, Inc. Informix-ESQL/C) (Micro-GLE) (FreeForm7.1) 4100BohannonDr. Mortice Kern Systems, Inc. 3150 Holcomb Bridge Rd. NW, 1717 Walnut Hill Lane, Suite 104 Menlo Park, CA 94025 (MKS Make) Suite 220 Las Colinas, TX 75038 (800)438-7627 35 King St. N Norcross, GA 30071 (214)580-1045 (415)926-6300 Waterloo, Ontario, (404) 840-7550 fax:(214)580-0794 fax:(415)926-6593 Canada N2J2W9 fax: (404) 840-7907 Circle 11 72 on Inquiry Card. Circle 1 1 79 on Inquiry Card. (800) 265-2797 (519) 884-8861 fax:(519)886-8619 Circle 1 1 93 on Inquiry Card. Circle 1 1 86 on Inquiry Card. continued JANUARY 1992 -BYTE 201 Circle 1 01 on Inquiry Card. GACKPAOC irSAOMVEOFA DIFFERENT COLOR. Add a diskette drive without horsing around inside your com- puter — just plug Backpack into your parallel port! Connect your printer to the Backpack drive. No tools. No hassles. " No interface cards. Backpack works with IBM ft and compatibles including PCs, XTs,ATs,PS/2s, PS/Is, and laptops. It's available in 5.25" and 3.5" and comes complete with everything you need. So don't horse around inside your computer, add an external * ' drive the easy way— plug ■ in a Backpack! Hard Disk models and tape backup available soon. *=£? MicroSolutions Computer Products I , > 132 W. Lincoln Hwy„ DeKalb, IL 60115 815-756-3411 Fax:756-2928 Protects while y< type! Remains in Place while you use your computer. Avoids Costly Repairs. Protects delicate electronics from dust, spills, smoke, ashes, staples. Soft, Flexible, retains normal keyboard fee!. Washable, Durable High-Tech Polymer lasts years. Hundreds of Models. SafeSkin is available for most PCs, laptops, workstations and clone keyboards. Office" Home* Factory ■ Classroom "Laboratory List Price $29.95. Please call or write for free color brochure. Dealer inquiries encouraged. KEYBOARD PROTECTOR Merritt Computer Products, Inc. 5565 Red Bird Center Dr., Suite 1 50 ■ Dallas, Texas 75237 (214)339-0753 -FAX (214) 339-1313 RES0URC1 E GUIDE QCAD Systems, Inc. Tigre Object Systems, Inc. (QParser+) (Tigre Programming 1164 Hyde Ave. Environment 1.6) San Jose, CA 95129 3004 Mission St., Suite D (408) 727-6884 Santa Cruz, CA 95060 fax:(408)727-6105 (408) 427-4900 Circle 1 1 94 on Inquiry Card. fax:(408)457-1015 Circle 1 202 on Inquiry Card. Raima Corp. (db Query 2.20) TPS Publishing, Inc. 3245 146th Place SE, Suite 230 (PSMenu,PSNet,PSLock) Bellevue, WA 98007 25 South Livingston Ave., (800) 327-2462 Suite A (206) 747-5570 Livingston, NJ 07039 fax:(206)747-1991 (800) 777-2663 technical support: (201)740-1750 (206)562-2622 fax:(201)740-9118 Circle 1 1 95 on Inquiry Card. Circle 1 203 on Inquiry Card. Ryan McFarland Corp. Unify Corp. (RM/COBOL-85 6.0) (Accell/SQL for Oracle RDBMS) 891 1 Capital of Texas Hwy. N 3901 Lennane Dr. Austin, TX 78759 Sacramento, C A 95834 (800) 762-6265 (800) 328-0073 (512)343-1010 (916) 928-6400 fax:(512)343-9487 fax: (916) 928-6406 Circle 1 1 96 on Inquiry Card. technical support: (916)928-6433 SBT Corp. Circle 1 204 on Inquiry Card. (SBT Developer's Platform) 1 Harbor Dr. Via International Corp. Sausalito, CA 94965 (Via/DRE) (415)331-9900 8000 Tower Crescent Dr. , fax:(415)331-1951 Suite 290 Circle 1 1 97 on Inquiry Card. McLean, VA 22182 (703)761-4920 The Small Computer Co., Inc. Circle 1 205 on Inquiry Card. (f ilePro Plus 4.0) 41 Saw Mill River Rd. Windstar Corp. Hawthorne, NY 10532 (WindCode) (800) 847-4740 475 Cochrane Dr., Suites 2-3 (914) 769-3160 Markham, Ontario, fax:(914)769-3653 Canada L3R 9R4 technical support: (416)479-6621 (914) 769-2150 fax:(416)479-6086 Circle 1 1 98 on Inquiry Card. Circle 1 206 on Inquiry Card. Software Translations, Inc. The WNDX Corp. (B-Tran/B+) (WNDX GUI Development System) 11 14 Lost* Cree* Blvd., 1550 Eighth St SW, Suite 305 Suite 350 Calgary, Alberta, Austin, TX 78746 Canada T2R1K1 (512) 327-6001 (403) 244-0995 fax: (512) 327-6005 fax:(403)244-1039 Circle 1 1 99 on Inquiry Card. Circle 1207 on Inquiry Card. Sybase, Inc. XVT Software, Inc. (Open Client) (XVT-Design, XVT Extensible 6475 Christie Ave. Virtual Toolkit 2.0) Emeryville, CA 94608 1800 30th St., Suite 204 (800) 879-2273 Boulder, CO 80301 (510) 596-3500 (303) 443-4223 fax:(510)658-9441 fax: (303) 443-0969 technical support: Circle 1 208 on Inquiry Card. (510)596-3555 Circle 1200 on Inquiry Card. TGV, Inc. (XViewforVMS) 603 Mission St. Inclusion in the resource guide should not be taken as a BYTE endorsement or recommenda- Santa Cruz, CA 95060 tion. Likewise, omission from (800) 848-3440 the guide should not be taken (408) 427-4366 negatively. The information here fax:(408)427-4365 was believed to be accurate at Circle 1201 on Inquiry Card. the time of writing, but BYTE cannot be responsible for omissions, errors, or changes that occur after compilation. 202 BYTE- JANUARY 1992 Circle 98 on Inquiry Card. HASP The Professional Software Protection System See us at f^ HANNOVER MESSE GjGeBIT'92 13. - 20, MARCH 19921 Aladdin is a world leader in the field of software protection. During the last six years we have helped thousands of software producers in more than 40 countries to protect their software. TM The HASP system is based on advanced ASIC (Application Specific Integrated Circuit) components and sophisticated encryption algorithms. State-of-the-art engineering ensures fall protection of your software with no hassles for your customers, HASP plugs are designed for the IBM PC & PS-2 families and their compatibles, as well as for Apple-Macintosh computers. Full software support is provided for dozens of languages and compilers under DOS, OS/2, WINDOWS-3, SCO XENIX, SCO UNIX 386, AIX, PHAR-LAP, and AUTOCAD. TM NetHASP , the latest addition to the HASP family of software protection systems, makes it possible to activate a protected program from several stations in a network using only one plug. NetHASP works both on Novell networks and on those based on the NET-BIOS protocol, and it can therefore be used on almost any LAN. To learn more about why so many professionals have chosen HASP, please contact: Q LADD1N K N W L SYSTEM EDGE S LTP, 15 Beit Oved St., Tel-Aviv, Israel P.O.Box:11141 Tel-Aviv 61110, Tel: 972-3-5375795 Fax: 972-3-5375796 Australia Conlab Pty. Ltd., Tel: 3 8985685, Fax: 3 8995759 Belgium Akkermans Intl. bvba, Tel: 3 2338826, Fax: 3 2315438 Czechoslovakia ATLAS Ltd., Tel+Fax: 2 821280 Denmark SC Metric a/s, Tel: 42 804200, Fax: 42 804131 France Logidata Intl., Tel: 50707375, Fax: 50753144 Germany CSS GmbH, Tel: 201 74970, Fax: 201 748644 Greece Unibrain SA, Tel: 1 6465195, Fax: 1 6423648 Holland Akkermans Automatisering BV, Tel: 45 241444, Fax: 45 245515 In North America: ALADDIN SOFTWARE SECURITY 306 Weymouth St., Dix Hills, NY 11746, USA Tel: 800-223 4277, 516-586 2845 Fax: 516-586 1602 Circle 1 3 on Inquiry Card. Italy Partner Data S.r.L, Tel: 2 33101709, Fax: 2 347564 Korea llanil System Inc., Tel: 2 5639161-5, Fax: 2 5538079 New Zealand The Training Solutions Co., Tel: 4 666014, Fax: 4 69719Q Poland Systherm Tel: 06l 45065, Fax: 06l 324134 Portugal Futurmatica Lcla., Tel: 1 4116269, Fax: 1 4116277 Spain PC Hardware, Tel: 3 2493193, Fax: 3 3337497 Switzerland Opag Inf ormatik AG, Tel: 61 7112245, Fax: 6l 7115355 SOLUTIONS FOCUS f Database Libraries DATABASE BUILDING BLOCKS A database library lets you custom-craft your own database applications, but you must be ready to roll up your sleeves RICK GREHAN, BEN SMITH, AND JON UDELL S ometimes prepackaged applications don't cut it. Sometimes you really have to get inside a database to forge that program you are not able to buy off the shelf. Or perhaps your department requires an application that demands the kind of control you can get only from a carefully crafted C program. Maybe it is essential for you to be able to display graphics on-screen side by side with data fetched from a database: Just try doing that in dBase. In-house programming often requires that the programming staff produce on- demand applications with an intricacy not easily achieved with a database applica- tions builder. You also face speed and size considerations. Running a full-blown dBase or FoxPro environment, for example, can place significant memory de- mands on the workstation. Database development libraries let programmers draw on the flexibility and power of standard programming languages such as C, C++, and Pascal. Essentially, you buy a database engine: a collection of routines for creating and manipulating databases that you'd rather not have to write your- self. Some libraries actually include source code, so intrepid programmers can incorporate only those routines they actually need. If your target application only searches a database, why force it to carry around routines for inserting and deleting? In this review, we examine seven software database engines. All provide what we call "low-level" access to database files via function calls you make from a C or C++ program. Additionally, all the packages can operate in multiuser envi- ronments, either on networks or under Unix. The packages that include libraries for DOS and DOS-based networks are Btrieve 5.10 Developer's Kit from Novell, CodeBase 4.2 and CodeBase++ 1.05 from Sequiter, db_Vista 3.20 from Raima, and Paradox Engine 2.0 from Borland. The two entries for Unix are db_Vista in its Unix incarnation and c-tree Plus 6.0 from FairCom. 204 BYTE* JANUARY 1992 PHOTOGRAPHY: RICHARD LAYBOURN © 1992 BVTE ACTION SUMMARY WHAT DATABASE LIBRARIES DO These libraries give programmers low-level access to database files. LIKES For programmers looking to wrap an application around a database, these packages provide the only real alternative to building a database application from scratch. DISLIKES The low-level access that these products provide makes them powerful but difficult to master. RECOMMENDATIONS If you're already using dBase to manage your databases, CodeBase 4.2 or CodeBase++ 1 .05 will let you keep your files while integrating specialized database applications into your workplace. Otherwise, db_Vista 3.20 is a powerful package that you can run under DOS, Unix, NetWare, and most PC-based networks. How Low Is Low? We should be careful here about the term low-level— iVs easy to misinterpret it in the multilevel realm of database pro- gramming. Some Structured Query Lan- guage (SQL) programmers may think that Clipper is a low-level environment, while Clipper programmers may view carefully rolling a database written en- tirely in C as low-level programming. Using a database library like the ones re- viewed here places you somewhere be- tween a Clipper programmer and a poor soul building a database system in C from scratch. As its name implies, a database li- brary provides you with a collection of functions that you can link into a pro- gram. Generally, these functions give your program access to two kinds of files: data files and index files. Data files consist of the information stored in your database. Typically, a data file looks like a series of fixed-length records composed of fields. Certain fields within a record are unique for that record and specify the route by which the record will be ac- cessed. For example, in a database of student records, the social security num- ber of each student is unique. There will be reports to run that require access to student information via the SSN. Such unique fields are referred to as keys, and JANUARY 1992 -BYTE 205 DATABASE LIBRARIES Database Glossary B-tree A data structure that is espe- cially suited for manipulating a large collection of keys on secondary storage devices. The B-tree derives its name from its treelike structure of pointers. field A member of a row that holds a data value associated with an attribute. index A collection of keys, usually stored in a disk file. The keys within an index are embedded in some data struc- ture that facilitates rapid searching, in- serting, and deleting. Such data struc- tures can include hash tables, binary trees, and B-trees. ISAM (indexed sequential-access method) An ISAM system lets you ac- cess records within a file in either in- dexed or sequential fashion. Indexed ac- cess is a form of random access: You specify a value for a field, and the sys- tem fetches one or more records that sat- isfy that specification. Sequential ac- cess means that you can access records in ascending or descending order based on the value of a field. In both cases, it's understood that the target fields are key fields. join A merging of records from two or more tables to create a resulting table. The merge is usually guided by a com- mon field. key A data quantity composed of one or more fields from a record. A key's value is often unique. Keys are kept in an index, and each key usually has an attached data pointer that leads to the associated data record. rollback The act of returning a data- base to some previous state, usually on the failure of a transaction. row Physically, a row is usually a rec- ord in a data file. Logically, a row is one horizontal member of a table: a col- lection of fields. table Usually, a collection of rows all stored in the same logical file. In some cases, a table also includes any indexes associated with the data. transaction A collection of operations on a database whose processing is con- sidered to be atomic. That is, if any op- eration within the transaction fails, all operations fail, and the database is re- turned to the state it was in prior to the execution of the first operation (see rollback). union The process of combining speci- fied rows from two tables into one table. keys are typically kept in a separate file called an index file. Inside an index file, keys are arranged in one of several structures that permit rapid insertion, deletion, and retrieval. Often this data structure is a B-tree, a kind of elaboration on the binary tree. A data-record pointer is associated with each key in the index file. (For more on B-trees, see "Trees 'n Keys," January- March 1989 BYTE.) Many database libraries provide func- tions that distinguish between key fields and other fields. Such functions are nec- essarily aware of the relationship be- tween keys in the index files and data in the data files. You need only call a rou- tine that searches for any record with a particular field matching a particular value. The library routine will search the index for the matching key, fetch the data pointer, and use that to retrieve the associated record from a data file. Programming with a database library requires not only that you map out key fields but also that you be intimately fa- miliar with the internals of your records. In many cases, you are working at the level of C structures. Some packages help you maneuver through the internals of a record with collections of "field- handling" routines that can manipulate various data types. Once you have speci- fied the layout of a record, the field-han- dling routines let you extract from or store into the record such things as strings, dates, numbers, and sometimes specialized data types, such as currency. Elaborate database operations famil- iar to SQL users (e.g., joins and unions; see "Database Glossary" at left for defi- nitions of these and other terms) must be constructed manually if you're using a database library. A database library pro- vides record-at-a-time access; hence, any database-wide activity, such as a join, turns into a loop that must examine each record in the member data files. However, there's a universe of database activities for which record-at-a-time ac- cess is sufficient. Point-of-sale order entry, reservations tracking, and inven- tory searching represent three good examples. To test the database libraries, we de- veloped a simulated inventory system complete with a parts table, a suppliers table, a salesman table, and an orders table. We developed programs to run the same tests on each package (for details about the performance tests, see the text box "Racing the Engines" on page 210). Besides giving us a handle on the per- formance of each package, developing our inventory application enabled us to uncover the important similarities and differences among the libraries. We have given a blow-by-blow features list in the table. More subjective analysis follows. Btrieve 5.10 Developer's Kit Most of the packages we examine here are strictly libraries of code; Novell's Btrieve is the exception. Btrieve is a record manager that can be either a DOS TSR program (for single-user DOS ap- plications) or a combination of a server- based record manager and workstation- based Btrieve requesters. In the single- user configuration (which we tested), the record manager is a TSR that hooks interrupt vector 7B hexadecimal. In a server-based scenario, each workstation runs a Btrieve requester TSR that redi- rects calls to the record manager running on the network server. The server-based record manager is implemented as a Net- Ware loadable module (NLM), which is included with NetWare 386. The Btrieve Developer's Kit helps you build client applications for the Btrieve record managers. For $595 you get the DOS TSR version of the Btrieve man- ager; source code files for building inter- faces to Btrieve for high-level languages such as C, BASIC, and COBOL; and sev- eral utility programs for things like file repairs and crash recovery. Btrieve's design has two advantages. First, the single-user manager and the server-based managers both look the same to client applications. You can write a Btrieve client application using 206 BYTE* JANUARY 1992 YESTERDAY WAS TOMORROW Are you waiting until tomorrow for a system board that was available yesterday? There is a better way. MICRONICS. Time is ticking away... OEMs, Systems Integrators, VARs, and end users, it's the same for all. No Product — No Business! If you're waiting for your system board vendor to supply you with the latest system boards, go ahead and put your feet up on your desk... you might as well do something while your competition is taking your business away! Yesterday, Micronics customers were shipped the latest 80486SX, and 80486 EISA system boards. In fact, we ship thousands of advanced technology system boards a month with less than a 1% failure rate. ® Our reputation for high quality and superior design has made our customers the price/performance industry leaders in fully compatible system products. Along with being EISA/ISA standard compatible, our products are designed to be compatible with Novell, UNIX and other platforms. Micronics' leadership in advanced technology can be seen in our ability to provide new architecture breakthroughs, such as local bus architecture, and 80486 multiprocessors in our product lines. We even have a new program to certify 32-bit EISA peri- pheral cards to run with our EISA system boards! You don't find this kind of support anywhere else. Micronics customers are So can you. Call us at 1-800-659-5901. Micronics EISA Bo MICR®NICS 232 E. Warren Avenue Fremont, California 94539 (510)651-2300 FAX (510) 651-5612 Circle 1 00 on Inquiry Card . DATABASE LIBRARIES DATABASE ENGINE FEATURES ' All packages support at least C programming in the DOS environment, environments , from VMS to Microsoft Windows. (% = yes] O = no.) Many support a variety of languages and Btrieve 5.10 Developer's Kit CodeBase 4.2 Code- Base++ 1.05 c-tree Plus 6.0 db.Vista 3.20 Paradox Engine 2.0 Company Novell Sequiter Sequiter FairCom Raima Borland Price $595 DOS: $295 Unix: $495 $295i $595 Single-user DOS: $895 Multiuser DOS, $1295 SCO Unix: $1895 $495 Languages supported C, Pascal, BASIC, COBOL, others C.C++ C++ C C.C++ C, C++, Pascal 2 Operating environments DOS, Windows, OS/2 DOS, Windows, OS/2, Unix DOS, Windows DOS, Unix, Macintosh DOS, Windows, VMS, Unix System V and BSD 4.2 DOS, Windows Networks supported NetWare . Any PC-based LAN Any PC-based LAN Any PC-based or Mac LAN NetBIOS, Unix Any PC-based LAN Source code O • • • • Variable-length records • •3 •3 • • O Key compression • O O • • Record locking • • • • • • File locking O* • • • • • Undelete o • • O O Transactions • o • • o Data-file encryption • o • Customizable sort orders • • • • • Key length 255 bytes 100 bytes 5 100 bytes 5 4 gigabytes 246 bytes 6 Data length 4090 bytes 7 32KB 32KB 4 gigabytes 32KB 1350 bytes 8 Records per table No limit 9 9 Depends on OS 16 million 10 1 Screen management routines are a $95 option. 2 Supports any language that supports DLLs. 3 Variable-length records supported with memo fields. 4 File locking is automatic within transactions. 5 dBase compatibility; 338 bytes for Clipper compatibility. 6 Record-length dependent. 7 Fixed portion. Btrieve allows up to 56 KB for the variable portion of a record. 8 Keyed tables. Nonkeyed tables can be up to 4000 bytes. 9 Depends on component fields. 10 Depends on record length; maximum table size is 256 MB. the developer's kit, test it using the sin- gle-user record manager, and be reason- ably confident that it will work on a Net- Ware network. Second, it is possible to call Btrieve from virtually any language. Novell's documentation provides you with sample source code for C, Pascal, COBOL, assembly, and even interpreted BASIC. To write a Btrieve program, you have to be willing to get down. You access Btrieve functions by loading up a param- eter table, placing the address of that table in a CPU register, and calling an in- terrupt. The parameter table is a block in memory that carries a set of pointers to the current record buffer, the current key buffer, the position block, and similar information. Fortunately, Novell pro- vides an interface routine that wraps a function call around the interrupt call, so you end up with a standard-looking C function. Btrieve files consist of pages (i.e., fixed-size blocks on the disk). Btrieve will not let fixed-length records cross page boundaries, so any space left on a page after Btrieve has filled it with the records is wasted. You specify the page size when you create a Btrieve file, which lets you minimize wasted space. When you begin designing a Btrieve database, you'll be glad to find an entire chapter in the documentation devoted to calculations of page size. A Btrieve file is a collection of pages. All data and all data-index information reside in the same file. Each page is either a data page or an index page. An index page holds keys, and a data page holds records. Each Btrieve file can con- tain the equivalent of one data file and several index files; Btrieve's file organi- zation is often referred to as "super files." If you examine part b of the fig- ure, you'll see that Btrieve's file size ap- pears larger than that of files created by other packages. This is an effect of com- bining index and data into a single file. (However, the total disk space taken up by each package is roughly the same. ) Btrieve's keys can be multisegmented, which means that a single key can be the concatenation of various portions (fields) of the data record. When you create a key, you specify its component field off- sets, their types, and their lengths. You can also specify whether each segment is sorted in ascending or descending order. For example, you can build a key con- structed of dates in descending order and check numbers in ascending order. This would let you print a report showing most recent checks first. Btrieve supports alternative collating sequences for all 255 ASCII codes. You can completely respecif y how one ASCII code sorts with relation to another, so you can have B sorting before A and Z sorting before B, if you like. We were impressed with Btrieve's fine-tuning options. As we mentioned above, Btrieve constructs indexes that place keys on fixed-size pages. As your program adds more keys to the file, the pages fill up and their contents must be redistributed to new pages. You can specify whether Btrieve is to be intelli- gent about this redistribution process. If you choose intelligent redistribution, Btrieve tries to keep key pages packed as densely as possible. Otherwise, it simply distributes the keys so that pages are at least half full. The former produces in- dexes that are smaller and quicker on read operations but slower on insert op- erations; indexes produced the latter way are larger, but they are quicker on insert operations. Btrieve 5.10's most interesting new feature is its support for extended f unc- 208 BYTE* JANUARY 1992 DATABASE LIBRARIES a) DATABASE ENGINE PERFORMANCE b) CodeBase CodeBase++ Paradox Engine Btrieve Developer's Kit db_Vista (DOS) db_Vista (Unix) c-tree Plus (Unix) < Better Worse ► 1 ] ] Z MB 1 ] ZJ : 1 ■ zz zz h ■■ F f «« Better Worse ► 1 i ! 1 1 1 J 1 50 100 150 200 250 Seconds 300 350 400 100 200 300 KB 400 500 □ Create company I database I Create parts ■ Post I database I orders I Run reorder report Index file size I I Data file size Engines compared for speed and database size: (a) Benchmark results showing the time to create the company information and parts databases, followed by the times to post orders against the parts database and run a reorder report. Shorter bars mean better performance, (b) File sizes (in KB) for the 4000-record orders database. Notice that Btrieve keeps both index and data in a single file. tions. Extended functions permit you to operate on multiple records with a single call; for example, you can insert a set of four records with a single call to the Btrieve insert function. Btrieve has various levels of file recov- ery and data-integrity protection. It sup- ports crash recovery with preimaging. With preimaging activated, a copy of the page about to be changed is written to a preimage file before the file is modified. Btrieve will discard the preimage file's contents only after the operation is com- plete. If the system crashes before the op- eration has finished, Btrieve can use the preimage file to restore the original file to its state prior to the crash. For even tighter safeguards, you can use Btrieve's transactioning system, which handles rollback. Btrieve can group a set of operations into a single atomic transaction. Once you execute a "begin transaction" command, any sub- sequent file that you access is automati- cally locked. This keeps other users from modifying files controlled by your transaction until you have executed an JANUARY 1992 -BYTE 209 DATABASE LIBRARIES Racing the Engines Database developers can appreci- ate the elegance of object-based field access and the utility of a logical approach to file locking, but these factors mean little to users. Next to questions of data integrity, the most important consideration for users is speed. Naturally, the engine you choose will make a big contribution to the speed of the application you develop. We chose an inventory application of intermediate size to get a feel for the kind of perfor- mance you can expect from the products that we reviewed. The database con- sisted of four components: a parts table, a suppliers table, a salesman table, and an orders table. We ran a number of tests against this database. First, we created the suppliers table. The system read an ASCII-format data file and created the table. Each record included an ID number, a company name, an address, and a phone number. Our suppliers table consisted of 1000 entries. Next, we created the parts table. Each record here consisted of an ID number, a description, a supplier, cost each, sale price each, current quan- tity, reorder level, and back-order quan- tity. There were 4000 parts in our table. Once we had created the tables, we ran a daily orders application. The sys- tem generated 4000 orders that were posted against the parts table. Addition- ally, the salesman table was updated to tally each salesman's current sales. If the quantity in inventory dropped below the reorder level, the back-order field was updated accordingly. Finally, we ran a reorder report. The system simply stepped through the parts table and generated a reorder request for each item that had a nonzero back-order amount. The idea was for the tests to mimic what might take place in a real-world in- ventory management system. Orders were posted against the inventory table; salesman records were updated to re- cord year-to-date sales; and reorder re- ports were run so that depleted inven- tory items could be replenished. We performed our DOS tests on a Compaq Deskpro 386/33L running DOS 4.01 with 4 MB of memory and a 120-MB hard drive. For the Unix pack- ages, we used an Everex Step 386/33 with 8 MB of RAM and a 300-MB hard drive. The results are shown in part a of the figure on page 209. As you compare the benchmark figures for DOS pack- ages with those for Unix packages, keep in mind that applications running under Unix enjoy that operating system's built-in disk I/O buffering (which, for an 8-MB system, is substantial). Part b of the figure shows the size of the data and index files each package created for the parts inventory. In all cases, we used neither data- nor index- file compression. It is interesting to note that the aggregate file size for both data and index files was comparable for all packages. "end transaction" command. If a failure occurs or your program issues an "abort transaction" before the transaction com- pletes, then changes made to any files since the "begin transaction" command are discarded. Keep in mind, however, that activating transactioning can signifi- cantly degrade performance. The graphs in the figure are for the DOS version of Btrieve without preimag- ing and without transactions. Btrieve scored at the bottom of our performance tests, although not so far behind the other packages as to be unusable. We should point out that we did not specify index compaction when we started Btrieve. Consequently, insert operations per- formed well , but search operations were probably less than optimal. We also tested the NLM version of Btrieve on a 486-based Dell server with 16 MB of RAM. As expected, those parts of the benchmark that depended heavily on search operations showed a significant performance improvement, running as much as four times faster than the non- NLM version. To test the overhead for transactions, we ran the daily orders portion with transactioning activated whenever we added a new order to the orders database. The difference was significant— times rose from an average of 392 seconds to an average of 1200 seconds. You may find yourself developing ap- plications in various languages that must draw on the same database. In that case— and as long as you don't need to run your application on Unix— we rec- ommend Btrieve. It runs on single-user machines as well as on NetWare net- works, you can interface it to just about every language imaginable, and its integ- rity and crash-recovery features are top- notch. CodeBase 4.2 If you're already using dBase, you might consider development with a library that can understand dBase files. Sequiter's CodeBase 4.2 easily digests dBase-com- patible files, which means that you can rapidly integrate programs written in CodeBase into your existing system. Data and index compatibility is clearly a valuable asset, since a big chunk of the world's PC-resident data is tied up in .DBF files. CodeBase's dBase compatibility also means that all fields— numeric or oth- erwise—are stored as alphanumeric strings. Interestingly, CodeBase boasts special routines that let it parse strings carrying dBase expressions. Usually, you'd use these routines to define the structure of keys within an index file. For example, suppose that you define a dBase-compatible journal-entry file with the fields ENT_DATE and REF.NUM. Assuming that REF_NUM is a string value, you can make the following call: data_ptr= e4eval ( » DT0S ( ENT_DATE) +REF_NUM" ) and the static variable data_ptr will re- ceive a pointer to an internal field hold- ing the result. You can use this result to construct the key with which your pro- gram would search an index that is sorted by date and reference number. Our biggest complaint with CodeBase is its odd naming convention. For exam- ple, d4go() means "read the specified record into the record buffer." We as- sume there is some connection (however tenuous) to the dBase verb GO, but we 210 BYTE- JANUARY 1992 Microsoft Project For Windows. In An Independent Study,* It Took 50% Longer To Complete A Project Than CA-SuperProject. iJ " ell 11 £ to Ik ■Hi 1 1 ti w5 i & fe s? Ij -■* il ■1 iiuti rii Bfl miIm y*j Sis m i i CA-SuperProject. With More Efficient Scheduling Algorithms, It Helps You Bring Projects In On Iime And On Budget. ^ a«i. uu ..... -, im B ,& BflH «„ li W. £ Hi till 11 *!5 a» Jttjal m a& lit io oh nia 111 jjg .run a'a Sa fli ail M Ifjl £ I. ft b is £ h I Si I Identical Project Different Project Manager Can Yon Spot The Difference? CA-SuperPrqject Efficiency. Accuracy. Dependability Required skills for any project manager. But not as common as you'd think. In a recent independent study of the five leading pro- ject managers -all scheduling the same project- the completion dates varied by as 2SX31 much as five months. 77*90* CA-SuperProject® finished first in 214 working days. Microsoft® Project finished last in 323 working days. That's why serious project managers trust CA-SuperProject. It offers more efficient scheduling algorithms, better manage- © 1991 Computer Associates International, Inc., 711 Stewart Avenue, Garden City, NY 11530-4787. All trade names referenced are the trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies. * March 1991 study published by iSof t Decision, Inc., including CA-SuperProject 2.0, Microsoft Project For Windows, Symantec's Timeline 4.0, ABT Project Workbench and Scitor's Project Scheduler-5. Circle 39 on Inquiry Card. ment of resources and gives you comple- tion dates you can bet your career on. It's also incredibly easy to use. You can create __ projects in minutes. And with a few clicks of the mouse, you'll have pre sentation quality Gantt, PERT, Cost/Resource and Work Breakdown charts. So call 1-800-645-3003 today to find out the location of your nearest dealer. Because once you've worked with the most- efficient project manager, the difference will be obvious. qomputer Dissociates Software superior by design. DATABASE LIBRARIES never became fully accustomed to the convention. The CodeBase data-access model as- sumes one active database at a time. To do anything with a database, you must activate it with a call to d4select(). From that point on, all the database functions target that database. You don't have to explicitly tell each function what database you're working on. You also don't need to explicitly tell CodeBase to write a record once you've modified it. If you use the field-manipu- lation functions provided, CodeBase rec- ognizes record modifications and makes updates to disk whenever the record buf- fer is about to be overwritten (or when you close the file). CodeBase supports variable-length records in the form of memo fields. A memo field is actually a pointer into an- other file (i.e., the memo file) that holds the variable-length portion of your data records. BY HAND. OR BY NOON Flow Charting™ 3 Now, even complex flowcharts that once took days to perfect can be presentation perfect— in no time! Quick to master and a snap to use, Patton & Patton's flowcharting software is the standard of both large and small businesses around the world— and is availablethrough all major software dealers. SeeyourdealertodaylOr.fora "live" interactive demo disk, call: 800-525-0082, ext.1113. International: 408-778-6557, ext. 1113. PATTON &PATT0N Software Corporation Excellence in charting the flow of ideas! Works on IBM & 100% compatible PC's, supports CGA/EGA/VGA and over 150 dot matrix and laser printers, with multiple print densities and 10 font sizes. Creates multi-page charts, portrait or landscape, on most standard paper sizes. Mouse or keyboard controlled. IBM is a registered trademark of International Business Machines Corporation. We should note that CodeBase pro- vides routines that go beyond database access. For example, CodeBase includes screen management routines that you can use to build windows, pull-down menus, pop-up menus, and even Lotus 1-2-3- style hierarchical menus. CodeBase can also handle data-entry chores. If you're already using dBase and must preserve your investment, you should check out CodeBase 4.2. It gives good performance, and the input-handling functions provided will take you a long way down the road to developing your final application. Its one great weakness is its lack of any kind of transactioning. Remember, though, that CodeBase 4.2' s $295 price tag for DOS ($495 for Unix) gets you the complete source to the li- brary. CodeBase++ 1.05 Sequiter's CodeBase++ wraps C++ packaging around the core functionality of CodeBase 4.2. Like its procedural cousin, CodeBase++ reads and writes dBase IV data (.DBF) files andmultitag index (.MDX) files and supports stan- dard dBase primitives such as SKIP, GO, RECNO, and ZAP. While retain- ing the essential dBase verbs might seem strange in a product that takes an object- oriented programming approach to data management, it's actually a fine idea. If you've used any of the so-called xBase family of products (e.g., dBase, FoxPro, or Clipper), you will instinctively know how CodeBase++ deals with filters, in- dex files, and locking. Bringing the le- verage of C++ to bear on these familiar mechanisms makes a great deal of sense. In a CodeBase++ program, you nor- mally declare a single instance of the class named CodeBase, which handles errors and stores global settings on be- half of one or more database objects. Next, you declare the database objects. The database classes form a hierarchy. Class Data defines the basic . DBF capa- bility, but you're more likely to use its child, Datalndex, or its grandchild, DataMemo. The idea is that your program need accrue only minimum overhead. If you require index files but will not be needing memo (i.e., variable-length character) fields, use class Datalndex and avoid linking in the extra memo- field functions of class DataMemo. You use the separate database class DataFilter to restrict the set of avail- able records. With the dBase equivalent (SET FILTER), you supply an expres- sion that defines the filtered record set (e.g., SALESMAN == "JONES" .AND. OR- DERS > 100). Similarly, in CodeBase++, 212 BYTE* JANUARY 1992 Circle 122 on Inquiry Card. WHY SOFTWARE COMPANIES ARE CHOOSING HARDLOCK Actual size shown. Hardlock — programmable, algorithmic response and memory option — all in one GLENCO ENGINEERING INC. SERVING THE SOFTWARE INDUSTRY SINCE 1979 270 Lexington Drive Buffalo Grove, Illinois 60089-6930 (708) 808-0300 FAX 808-0313 1-800-562-2543 Developers Say. . . "Since the Hardlock uses an algorithmic response chip, I am assured of the highest level of protection. Also, the optional programmable memory means I can keep custom configurations in Hardlock rather than in a file. I can protect my .EXE or .COM files directly and/or incorporate Glenco's high level language interface routines into my software. And, I feel confident I'll have Glenco's support if I use other programming languages." Accountants Say. . . "Hardlock provides our company with a healthier bottom line. Since our software can't be copied, our revenue has steadily increased. The unique pro- gramming board allows us to program the Hardlock in seconds. This ensures optimum delivery schedules from Glenco and a lower inventory cost for us. Hardlock's field programmable feature means a single Hardlock can protect more than one product." End Users Say. . . "Hardlock allows me to backup my software investment. I just plugged Hardlock into the printer card, connected the printer cable, and forgot about it. Since Hardlock doesn't require a battery, I am assured of reliability and no down time. HARDLOCK™ The Preferred Protection System! 1-800-562-2543 For a distributor in Europe contact, FAST Electronic GmbH 49-89-539800-20 FAX 49-89-539800-40 For International information circle 66, For End-User information circle 67 on Inquiry Card. DATABASE LIBRARIES you can declare instances of class Expr that you use to evaluate arbitrary dBase expressions. Expressions can be useful not only for filtering but also for index creation and interactive querying. More general-purpose classes include Date and LinkList. There's also a set of field classes. These classes naturally derive from the string class Str, because .DBF files rep- resent all kinds of data, including dates, numbers, and Booleans, as characters. Class Field handles character fields. More specialized field classes, such as DField, NField, and MField, derive from Field and handle date, numeric, and memo fields. Class Str overloads comparison oper- ators, such as == or <, and type-casting operators, such as int and double. The field classes inherit these operators, and that makes field objects extremely easy to use. To compare the contents of a char- acter field called SALESMAN to the Out of Sight LAN Performance Check the latest comparison studies. They're saying what we've said all along. That Invisible's Net/30 is flat out the fastest DOS based LAN (PCMaga- zim). And the #1 rated network for all-around, peer-to-peer performance (bifoWorld). Plus Invisible brings the ease- of-use of Windows to network manage- ment. Turning a difficult task into a 214 BYTE* JANUARY 1992 virtual piece of cake. As to support: for technical savvy, availability, and friend- liness, nobody outshines Invisible. Nobody. These things are important. Because they help you get faster, easier access to the information you need. For more information call 415/570-5967 (don't be surprised if an engineer answers). Or FAX 415/570-6017. Or write 1142 Chess Dr., Foster City, CA 94404. Invisible. Out of sight. Km INVISIBLE Circle 80 on Inquiry Card. contents of another character field called LASTNAME, you can simply write if (LASTNAME == SALESMAN). Or, if ORDERS is a numeric field, you can write (long) ORDERS * 100, casting the field's digits to a long integer on the fly. The field classes themselves define— and overload— the assignment operator to ease dealing with differing data types. To assign the value 100 to ORDERS, you can write ORDERS = (double) 100 or ORDERS = "100" or ORDERS = QUANTITY (where QUANTITY is another field ob- ject). CodeBase++ makes fields into first- class data types that you can treat just like C integers and strings. That meant that our CodeBase++ version of the test program could use fields directly, with- out requiring a raft of intermediate vari- ables. Our first cut at the program, how- ever, did use extra variables to help move data from text files into the databases and from the databases back out to the re- port file. Then we rewrote the program to ex- ploit the power of C++. From the input and output stream classes in the Borland C++ class library, we derived new classes that added the ability to read and write CodeBase++ fields. By overload- ing the stream insertion and extraction operators, we eliminated the need to ex- plicitly manage a buffer for field input and output. To perform field input, for example, we could simply write code like this: f > > Cost > > Description > > SalePrice >> CurrentQuantity >> BackOrders; where f is a C++ file stream and Cost, Description, and the rest are Code- Base++ fields. The end result was a program that was shorter, more readable, and more main- tainable than any of the other solutions. Whatever the other merits of Code- Base++— and they are considerable— its C++ orientation makes it a compelling choice. It was quite straightforward, for example, to build a windowed database browser by blending the text scroller de- veloped in one of the Turbo Vision sam- ple programs with CodeBase++ data- base and field objects. Also, because CodeBase++ provides a dynamic link li- brary, we could have done a Windows version of the browser in terms of Bor- land's Object Windows Library. Like dBase, CodeBase++ handles basic record and file locking automati- cally. When you seek to a record or ap- pend a new one, it locks the record; when When You Think 387, Think faster. PART NO. PKG. PIN-OUT 38700SX 68-pin PLCC Pin- Compatible 38700DX 68-pin CPGA Pin- Compatible Introducing The Price Performance Leader In Math Coprocessors. The benefits of our new SuperMath™ coprocessors are very easy to understand: SuperMath Coprocessor ► Faster execution of software packages such as Lotus 1-2-3, Microsoft Excel, and AutoCad 386 ► Plug-in compatible and software compatible with industry standard 387DX and 387SX coprocessors ► Up to 600% better perfor- mance at the instruction level ► Perfect system companion to ndustry compatible 80386 CPUs - including CHIPS' □ SUPERMATH □ INTEL own Super386™ ► CMOS processing and on-chip power management circuitry dramatically reduce power consumption For more information on our SuperMath coprocessors, call (800) 944-MATH. SuperMath Coprocessors. The fastest way to improve your system. POWERMETER WHETSTONE ■■■■■■■ ■■ ■ ■■■■■■■■■■■■ ■ ■ ■■ ■■ ■■ 11 §§ " Opening The Future Of Microprocessing. ©1991 Chips and Technologies, Inc. , 3050 Zanker Road. San Jose, C A 95134. SuperMath and Super386 are registered trademarks o f Chips and Technologies. Lotus, Lotus 1-2-3, Microsoft, Microsoft Excel, AutoCad 386, Intel, 387DX and 387SX are registered trademarks of their respective holders Circle 35 on Inquiry Card. DATABASE LIBRARIES you reindex or zap a database, it locks the database and associated index file. If you're using only one of many tags in an index file, CodeBase++ will lock the entire index file when it updates that tag— which could cause a lot of conten- tion in certain situations. However, there is no equivalent to the dBase SETRETRY command, which specifies how long to wait for a locked file. CodeBase++ defaults to infinite re- try with a 1 -second wait; if you disable waiting, it returns immediately with an error. To get reasonable throughput in the multiuser order-entry test, therefore, we disabled waiting and explicitly polled for locks on the orders file. CodeBase++ supports Turbo C++, Borland C++, and Zortech C++. Com- mendably, Sequiter provides full source code so that, with some fiddling, you should be able to use the class library with any compiler that supports AT&T C++ 2.0. CodeBase++ costs $295 with- R I Model IV for 386SXs OS/2 Driver Support Rent Model IV Windows 3 Driver Support i i Soon! j T Professional Software and Hardware-Assisted Debuggers for 80386 & 80486 Systems Af you need a debugger but have no room left in the lower 64IK of your 386™ or 486™ system, Periscoj)e now has a new SOFAVARK-ONLY solution for you — Periscope/KM. ■ Periscope/KM takes advantage of the extended memory you already have, rather than using any memory in the lower 640K. ■ No runaway program can corrupt Periscope/KM because it's write-protected. ■ You don't have to use a slot since there's no board to install. ■ You can add an optional break-out switch to recover from crashes. ■ Periscope/KM costs only $295, half the cost of Periscope Model i, with most of the same functionality. Periscope/KM requires 386MAX® or BlueMAX™, version 5. 1 1 or later; a 386 or 486 system with about 300K of extended memory; 32K of memory between 640K and one megabyte; DOS 3.0 or later. New Debugging Tools 7 needed a means to debug interrupt handlers where I could realty see what was going on. The hardware trace buffer is great. I was able to debug code in 3 days that I have been trying to debug for months!" ...writes PegSestrich with Prime Computer, on why she chose Periscope Model IV. The xrj Periscppe Company, Inc. 1197PEACHTREEST. PLAZA LEVEL ATLANTA, GA 30361 404-875-8080 FAX 404-872-1973 If you need more than your current software-based debugger gives you, Periscope Model IV, with these advanced NKW features, may be just what you're looking for; ■ Supports 386 and 486 systems running up to 33MHz with its ICK-like capabilities. ■ Real-time hardware trace buffer holds up to 16KCPU events. ■ Knhanced analysis and display of trace buffer makes you more productive. ■ Periscope/KM functionality, built-in at no extra cost, saves you money. Just call toll-free 800/722-7006 for details or to order. Real-time Periscope Model IV, shown with new 33MHz board and 486 pod. out the screen-handling routines that you will find in CodeBase 4.2. If all you need is a database engine, you're set; but if you want to incorporate 4.2's screen handling in your CodeBase++ pro- grams, you can have them for an addi- tional $95. c-tree Plus 6.0 As with CodeBase++, the c-tree Plus li- braries are distributed as source code. We tested c-tree Plus under SCO Unix, but the code is portable enough to make it useful for most Unix implementations. The library we tested sells for $595. FairCom also markets a version for building DOS applications. To get under way, you run a script pro- gram to compile the library modules and utilities. In this way, you can be sure that the library object files are compatible with your development system. You can use c-tree Plus to generate stand-alone programs or to build client applications for FairCom Server, a database server that FairCom markets for Unix systems. There are three distinct levels of data- base programing with c-tree Plus: what we've been calling low-level, ISAM, and SQL. We built our sample application using both low-level and ISAM tech- niques. c-tree Plus is remarkably flexible. You can program with fixed-length or vari- able-length data records. If you are pro- gramming with the low-level functions, you have several options for how the key values are stored in the index file: fixed- length keys (the fastest), leading-charac- ter compression (less file space, particu- larly for keys that are very similar), pad- ding compression (a variable-length key useful when there is variation in key data), and a combination leading/pad- ding compression when file space is more important than speed. At the low level, programming with compound keys (i.e., keys that are com- posed of several key fields) requires ad- ditional code for building and breaking down the compound keys. At the ISAM level, however, you can define com- pound keys from the start, and the ISAM routines know how to handle them. One of the most valuable skills in database design is knowing when to use compound key files, which keys should be com- bined, and which should have their own index files. Programming with the low-level func- tions requires a great deal of planning and care— and lots of lines of code. For each step in a database operation, you must program the relationship between the index files and the data files. Even 216 BYTE- JANUARY 1992 Circle 1 25 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 126). I The World's Tbp-Rated Illustration Software Is Getting Some Impressive Letters* Now Adobe type-handling software and 180 Type 1 fonts are integrated free into Micrografx Designer! What do you get when you cross the world's mostpowerf ul PC illustration software with the ultimate type-handling software? You get lots of attention. That's because there's never been anything like the new Micrografx Designer? We've seamlessly integrated Adobe Type Manager, plus Adobe TypeAlign, plus 180 Type 1 fonts into Designer. That's a value of over $5,000 - free! .pp. Now you can bring professional-looking y \W^ O/C illustration and type to everything *X^ r ^ *>- 'fe-s y° u ^°' From technical drawings to transparencies, layouts to logos. As well as to PageMaker, Word for Windows, Excel and other Windows programs. Besides choosing from a huge selection of fonts in any v Designer is unsurpassed m both illustration and type handling. Now size, you'll be able to add special effects like perspective, shadows and rotation. Do your own kerning and leading. Or use Designer's powerful drawing tools to alter your type at will. Here's what people were saying about Designer even before our Adobe upgrade: "Designer is perhaps the most sophisticated of all the illustration packages." PC Magazine, Editor s Choice (3 consecutive years) "State-of-the-art features, good performance and un- matched ease of learning and use in a sophisticated package" Software Digest, * • • * * (highest rating) So why just get by when you can get noticed with Designer? Call to order today! Registered Designer 3.X users call for your $99.95 upgrade ($149.95 for earlier versions). 60-day money- back guarantee! 1-800-733-2113 MICROGRAFX Micrografx, Inc. 1303 Arapaho, Richardson, TX 7 5 08 \ (214) 234-1769. Micrografx has»r?ices in Los Angles, Paris, London, Munich, Sydney and Copenliagen. Copyright © 1991, Micrografx, Inc. All rights reserved. Micrografx i: registered trademark and Micrografx Designer is a trade murk of Micrografx, Inc . All atlier products are trademarks of their respective owners. •esigner system requirements: 286 (386 recommended) IBM PC or compatible, or PS/2. I MB RAM {2 MB RAM recommended). 20 MB (or larger) hard disk. Windows 3.0. DOS 3.1 (orhigher). Mouse ordigitking pad. Windows-compatible monitor. Circle 99 on Inquiry Card. DATABASE LIBRARIES after ycJii create the files, opening each requires fc file ID, a filename, and an ac- cess mtjtfe. And all this is independent of the strtitfaire that you intend to stash in each tefcbrd. Nonetheless, the 39 functions that constitute the low-level library provide all tMtjJOU need. (There are an addition- al f ivfe functions for variable-length rec- ords.) These data-record-manipulation functions handle basic record functions such &s create, lock, unlock, read, and write; they also let you count and release records. As records are released, they continue to consume space in the file. There is no function available that lets you rebuild the file and thereby return this unused space to the operating system. The c-tree Plus low-level libraries also include an impressive collection of func- tions for working on index files. There are the expected functions for creating and deleting key entries; searching for a Y)uCan Take It With^u. Introducing Simplicity Portable Drives Simplicity portable drives give you the confidence and convenience of taking all your programs and files with you, wherever you go-- home, office or client. Use any PC, anywhere, as easily as your own! Simplicity's rugged construction and small size -- 7.5" X 4.5" X 1.2"-- lets you put it in your pocket and run to a meeting. No juggling floppies and leaving the information you need most back on your desktop. Simplicity drives are easy to use, too. They attach instantly to any IBM PC compatible or laptop parallel printer port. No card is needed. There's no easier way to add extra storage! Simplicity drives also come with an exclusive one-year warranty with 48-hour express replacement, toll-free technical support and a 30-day money back guarantee. INTRODUCTORY SAVINGS! NOW SHIPPING! 40MB $499, 80MB $699, 120MB $899 Optional live-hour battery $79 ORDER NOW! 1-800-275-6525 Simplicity Computing, Inc. 1 26 W. 23rd St., NYC 1 001 1 (212) 229-1 625 Fax: (212) 229-2938 ^Wfa. .> simplicity computing Smart Solutions For People On The Move.™ specific value, the first value, and the last value; and stepping forward and backward through the index file. But there are also functions for searching for key values greater than, greater than or equal to, less than, and less than or equal to a target. There is a nasty twist to all this flexi- bility with keys and indexes, and that is that the data in the key-field space is typeless. It's merely a string of bytes. This means that when you create a key string, you cannot simply terminate the string with a null character; all charac- ters are considered significant up to the length of the key. You must pad the entire string space with nulls (or some other character). Low-level programming gives you some access to FairCom Server. In spite of the necessary reduction in data throughput, accessing the data through the server buys you a lot of comfort. This comfort includes transaction accounting, which allows you to tie multiple database operations to a single transaction. The operations within a transaction are com- mitted to the associated files in a single function call. FairCom Server also adds resources, customizable information stored in file headers that describes the state of each file and provides some file specifics. If you don't need or want to program at the level of the bronze age, you probably will want to start your application using the c-tree Plus ISAM functions instead of the low-level functions (the two are near- ly exclusive). Our test application using ISAM took 30 percent less code than the low-level version. The biggest saving in code and effort comes about because the relationship be- tween indexes and data files is defined outside the source code. The catch is that the file that defines these relationships (i.e., the parameter file) consists of a Byzantine organization of data-file and index-file parameters and descriptors (see listing 1). Fortunately, once you have got past writing the parameter file for your database, you're on easy street. All you need to do to find a record in your data file is to issue a GetRecord from an associated index file. Likewise, adding new records with their associated keys in the index files is a simple single step. You can avoid the parameter file by hard-coding definitions for all the pa- rameters and relationships using IFIL, IIDX, and ISEG, the internal typedef structures for incremental ISAM file operations. These structures contain essentially the same information as the lift BYTE- JANUARY 1992 Circle 206 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 207). With An Object-Oriented 4GL Professional developers agree, Dataplex 3.0 is the ideal application development environment for simple and complex commercial applications. By combining a flexible, lull-featured object-oriented 4GL, WYSIWYG application generator, and a powerful database management system, in a single, integrated package, DataFlex represents a radical improvement in the process ol application development. "Its comprehensive set of built-in productivity tools and utilities make creating large, complex applications much easi- er, much faster, and much more economical than with any other development system available today." Jerry Busick, President, Data Modes, U.S. Software Development Company. "I design the forms in the WYSIWYG screen painter and DataFlex automatically generates and compiles the code. I DATAFLEK3.0 can run the finished application in minutes!" Tony Figueiredo, Systems Analyst, Laurentian General insurance Company of Canada. "Reusable procedu- ral and object-oriented command modules including forms, tables, editors, prompts, pull- down menus, action bars, and scrollable selec- tion lists from the built-in library save substantial development time." Paul Wu, M.I.S. Director, Associated Press. "DataFlex 2.3b was already a powerful and stable product. DataFlex 3.0 has reduced our development time by more than 25%!" Craig Bilodeau, Systems Programmer, Raytheon Company. See how you can eliminate time-consuming drudgery and port to all the most popular supported environments,* by calling us now for more information on DataFlex 3.0. For more information in the U.S., call us at 800/451 -FLEX or contact one of the following International distributors: Switzerland ABACUS RESEARCH AG 41-71-259-325 Scandinavia EUR0S0FTA8 46-300-195-30 Singapore BIZP0INT SYSTEM PTE. LTD. 65-775-5588 Mexico INFO-RED 525-545-6327 Canada CANVE0N SYSTEMS 416-226-2181 Brazil INTERCOMP LTDA. 55-11-872-9266 Germany & BeNeLux United Kingdom DATA ACCESS EUROPE GmBH DATAFLEX SERVICES LTD. 49-6172-75014 44-71-729-4460 Italy LAN SYSTEMS SRL 39-51-437-025 Spain S.E.I. 341-402-2298 * Currently multi-user DOS, and soon to be ported to a variety of other environments including OS/2 and UNIX. © DataFlex is a registered trademark of Data Access Corporation. DATA ACCESS CORPORATION 14000 SW 119 Avenue Miami, Florida 33186 305/238-0012 For information via CompuServe: GD DAC Circle 43 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 44). DATABASE LIBRARIES Listing 1 : The parameter description file for c-tree Plus ISAM programming. The information in this file is scanned whenever the database is opened. The indentation reflects the hierarchy of data structures used internally by ISAM functions to describe the relationship of indexes and data records. Compare this description method to the DDL file used by db_Vista (see listing 2). 12 4 4 4 parts.dat 54 1 1 pt_del pt_last 1 parts. idx 900001001 pt_key 9 2 company.dat 70 1 1 co_del co_last 3 company. idx 900001001 co_key 9 4 orders.dat 31 1 1 or_del or_last 5 orders. idx 900001001 or_key 9 6 salesman.dat 19 1 1 sm_del sm_last 7 salesman. idx 400001001 sm_key 4 1 parameter file but give you the flexibility of working with the database either as a complete entity or as a collection of data and index files. This means that you can trim the number of buf f ers for open files down to the minimum needed for the op- erations at hand. Be warned, however, that working with these structures is al- most as complicated and confusing as groping your way through the parameter file. Unfortunately, the low-level compli- cations of building the key fields for in- dex files also apply to ISAM records. You will want to use the special function TransformKey for building anything more complex than the simplest charac- ter-string keys. There is no performance cost associated with using the ISAM functions. In fact, since the error han- dling is simplified, you may find that your ISAM code is faster than your low- level code. c-tree Plus gives you a library of flexi- ble database functions for developing a wide variety of applications. Perfor- mance is good, and the design is out- standing. db_Vista3.20 If you prefer not to feel the earth of data- base development between your toes and would rather travel by coach, you may prefer the db_Vista libraries and utilities from Raima. What db_Vista may lack in low-level flexibility it makes up for in sophistication. db_Vista is not based on the simple data-file and index-file design that is typical of relational database systems (al- though you can use it that way) . Rather, db_Vista provides access to your data through the simple sequential method, 2" X 4" EMBEDDED PC Microcontroller. Microcomputer. "Megatel Wildcards provide PC functionality in a flexible, small format" Wildcard 88™ • CPU clock to 10 MHz • Replaces full PC motherboard • Co-processor and BIOS socket • DMA, Bus, DRAM, Keyboard controllers Mit/tt/10 • On-board SCSI Host Adapter (supports up to 7 devices) • Floppy Controller (1.44M, 1.2M) • 2 RS-232, I Parallel, I RS-485 multi-protocol serial port All Wildcards are low power single + 5 volt operation. 125 Wendell Ave., Weston, Ont. M9N 3K9 Fax: (416) 245-6505 VidlMem: • 640Kb User memory • Video/Colour LCD controls CGA, Hercules®, IBM® Mono; (runs LCD Panels) For information on our representatives please contact our head office at the number below. (416) 245 3324 Wildcard 88 and Megatel are trademarks of Megatel Computer Corp. Hercules is a trademark of Hercules Corp. IBM is a trademark of IBM Corp. megatel ® 220 BYTE* JANUARY 1992 Circle 97 on Inquiry Card. ^^ • •;-J::i' ; .- : Calculations. End of Problem. New Mathcad 3.0. When number-crunching time comes, docs work grind to a screeching halt? Want a better way to do technical calcula- tions than a spreadsheet or calculator— an obstacle clearer instead of an obstacle creator? You need new Mathcad 3.0, the crunch- thosc-numbcrs, and deliver-results-in-a- sccond calculation software. As in-depth as you want, as routine as you need. Mathcad 3.0 does everything from averages to FFTs, from percentages to matri- ces. Almost every function you'll ever need is built in for rapid, effortless calculations. New Electronic Handbooks make it easy to click-n-paste hundreds of standard for- mulas, useful data, even entire calculations into your documents. And a full range of add-on Applications Packs help you solve J problems specific to your profession. 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Bcstof'88 Bcstof'87 • 2-D and 3-D graphics • Prints high-quality documentation •PC DOS, Macintosh® and Unix® versions also available For a free Mathcad 3. demo disk, or upgrade informa- tion, call 1-800-MATHCAD (or 617-577-1017, Fax 617- 577-8829) . Or sec your software dealer. Available for IBM® compatibles, Macintosh computers, and UNIX workstations. TM and ® signify manufacturer's trademark or registered trademark respectively. 1-800-MATHCAD The answer is Mathcad MathSoft, Inc. 201 Broadway, Cambridge MA 02139 USA Australia: Hear™ (03) 866 1766; Belgium: SCIA 013/55 1775; Denmark: Engberg 4225 1777; Finland: Zcncx 90*692-7677; France: mCcgx (I) 4609 2400; Germany: Softlinc(0 78 02) 4036; Italy: Crunnel02-90091773; Japan: CRC 03-3665-9741; B 94 Netherlands: Klaasing 01620-81600; Norway: Protcch 09-959020;Swiaahnd:R*hann0324101 11; U.K.: AdeptScicntific (0462)480055. Inother locations, contact MathSoft, USA. Circle 94 on Inquiry Card. DATABASE LIBRARIES Listing 2: The DDL file for the db_Vista test database. The syntax is almost the same as that ofC (in contrast to the syntax of the parameter file used by c-tree Plus ISAM). The dbJVista DDL processor utility generates a database dictionary and an include file from the information in the DDL file. database partlist { data file parts_dat = "parts. dOl" contains parts; key file parts_key = "parts. kOl" contains parts . stock_no; data file company_dat = "company. dOl" contains company; key file company _key = "company. kOl" contains company. co_id; data file orders_dat = " orders. dOl" contains orders; key file orders_key = "orders. kOl" contains orders. ref_no; data file salesman_dat = "salesman" contains salesman; key file salesman_key = "salesman. kOl" contains salesman. id; record parts { unique key char stock_no[9]; char description[l6]; char co_id[9]; long cost; long sale; long curr_quan; long backorder; long reorder_level; } record company { unique key char co_id[9]; char co_name[l6]; char co_address[21] ; char co_state[3] ; char co_zip[10]; char co_phone[ll]; } record orders { unique key char ref_no[9]; char stock_no[9]; long quan; long backorder; char status; int salesman_id; } record salesman { unique key int id; char name [13]; long sales; } the familiar indexed method, and the set method. The set method uses the network data- base model, a hybrid of relational and hi- erarchical models, and it allows you to organize your data as a tree of linked lists. The set method will be familiar to most programmers; for example, the model of inheritance in object-oriented programming follows the structure of sets. Unlike the exclusivity of various levels of database library functions in c-tree Plus (i.e., low-level, ISAM, and SQL functions), the three access methods of db_Vista can be mixed within a single database. You can also develop programs that access more than one database at the same time. However, to do so safely re- quires you to become familiar with the db_Vista concept of current database state. At any given moment, the current state points to only one database and one record within that database. Any data- base operations that you specify are ap- plied to that current state. This program- ming model greatly reduces the number of arguments passed to functions but re- quires additional functions to change the state from one record (or database) to another. When you open a db_Vista database, you specify one of three modes in which you want to operate: single-user mode, shared-access mode, or exclusive-access mode. If you are new to db_Vista, we recommend that you prototype a multi- user application using only single-user mode. Once your application opens a database in shared or exclusive mode, it requires an access (lock) server (an ex- ternal program that comes with db_ Vista) to handle database-access re- quests. Since multiuser database opera- tions require interprocess communica- tions with the access server, the data- processing time can be two or even three times greater than that required for sin- gle-user access. For this reason, you should design data-access-intensive ap- plications using exclusive or single-user mode with the database locked (i.e., batch mode). Only interactive operations should use shared file access. To design a database, you define the records and indexes in a data description language file (see listing 2). Before com- piling (or even writing) your application, you run the DDL processor utility, ddlp, to generate a header file that describes all the structures and alias #def ines that pertain to your database description. The ddlp utility ensures that each database file has a unique handle and that the structures are appropriate for the appli- cation. The ddlp utility also generates a database dictionary file that the db_Vista functions use. Most db_Vista functions perform high-level operations and require only two or three parameters. For example, to find a record, the function is d_keyf ind (field_ID, target, db_ID), where f ield_ID and db_ID are aliases defined by the database header file. The step up from single-user access to multiuser access requires only a few more function calls but a significant amount of foresight, because you must be careful that one user doesn't lock an- other user completely out of the data. The access manager can queue requests with an application-specified time-out, but the application must include appro- priate code to handle locking so that other users are not locked out of records and files for unbearably long amounts of time. The value of db_Vista does not stop with the simplicity of its function calls. Its utilities simplify the business of ap- plications development and database maintenance. dbJVista can take you all the way from a simple, single-user data- base to a complex, multiuser database with transaction safeguards. db_Vista performed at the top in almost all our benchmark tests. Combine that with its cross-platform support, and you've got one powerful database package. The price is a little steep: $895 for a single- user DOS version, $1295 for a multiuser DOS version, and $1895 for an SCO Unix version. But those prices get you source code and a royalty-free license, so the power may well prove to be worth the price. Paradox Engine 2.0 Although the Paradox Engine provides database access at a very low level, while using it you always feel that you're work- ing much higher— as though you were performing relational activities rather than simply reading and writing individ- ual records. It's an illusion, of course. Much of the illusion comes from the rela- tional terminology Borland uses in the documentation: A database is a "table"; a record is a "row." The Paradox Engine places very tight controls on how your program accesses fields. When you build a table, you must first define a pair of arrays that you pass to the PXTblCreate() routine. One ar- ray specifies the field names within the table, and the other specifies the field data types. You build each record by writing into fields with calls to type-spe- cific routines, such as PXPutAlphaQ 222 BYTE- JANUARY 1992 Wiethe PC industry continues to talk about performance in terms of CPU and disk speed, we at Quarterdeck think the biggest issue for most users is getting rid of "out of memory" messages. DATABASE LIBRARIES and PXPutDate ( ) , which write character strings and dates. In order to retrieve the contents of fields, you call the corre- sponding PXGetAlpha() and PXGet- Date() routines. Such routines allow the Paradox En- gine to provide data types beyond those of standard C. They also add a level of protection, since it's unlikely that a pro- gramming mistake will overwrite a nu- meric field with a string. However, the result is code that is bulkier than that of a system that simply relies on C structures to map out the record structure (e.g., Btrieve). Sometimes the Paradox Engine ap- proach to data typing can get frustrating. Just extracting the contents of a record into a form that you can display requires a slew of function calls. We also won- dered why the function for packing al- phanumeric values (PXPutAlpha) does not require a length count, while its counterpart for extracting alphanumeric information (PXGetAlpha) does. Appar- ently, PXPutAlpha can derive length in- formation from the field-definition array, while PXGetAlpha cannot. We suppose that the idea is to allow pro- grammers to selectively unpack only a portion of a string, but that selectivity gets you only the leading bytes of the string. A properly placed memcpy( ) can achieve the same thing. The Paradox Engine uses handles ev- erywhere; you access everything through them. You make handles for files, han- dles for records, and even handles for each field within a record. This handle concept gives the Paradox Engine added flexibility. Database pack- ages like CodeBase provide only one record buffer per database. The handle orientation of the Paradox Engine allows multiple record buffers for each data- base. In this way, Paradox permits sev- eral different simultaneous views into a single database. You can use the Paradox Engine in sin- gle-user mode or on a network. The li- brary is compatible with a variety of net- work operating systems. However, you need to decide whether or not an applica- tion will run on a network at compile time, since you have to set constants to tell the engine what type of network you're running on, what your applica- tion's user name will be, and the direc- tory where the PARADOX.NET file will be found. (PARADOX.NET is a file that the Engine uses to control concurrent access.) Initially, we speed-tested the Paradox Engine using its defaults and with write- buffering off. This meant that the en- gine's own internal buffers amounted to only 32 KB and that all writes went im- mediately to disk. The effect was a pain- fully slow orders update. The results given in the figure show how the Paradox Engine performs with the write-buffer- ing on and its own internal cache set to the maximum (256 KB). The ability to turn write-buffering off is an important feature in critical situa- tions where an up-to-date image on the disk is more important than speed. Such situations often occur in networked ap- plications. We tested the $495 Paradox Engine for Borland C. Borland also offers a Turbo Pascal interface that has two Turbo Pas- cal units— one compatible with version 5.5, the other with 6.0. The Paradox Engine's documentation is superb. Borland provides the right number of examples at just the right level of complexity. The reference guide is easy to read and navigate through. Para- dox fared very well in our benchmarks, leading the DOS pack in the post-orders test. Just as CodeBase will attract dBase users, so will, the Paradox Engine attract users with Paradox databases already in place. Check Out These Libraries Although most of the packages are close- ly clustered in their performance times, db_Vista appears to be the overall win- ner in speed. We were impressed with the performance results for CodeBase and CodeBase++ , especially since these packages use standard dBase index and data files. However, your choice for a database library will be determined more by what your application requirements are than by a benchmarking horse race. To put it another way, it doesn't matter how fast a database package can run if it can't run on your chosen operating system. If you want compatibility with existing dBase files, either CodeBase package will serve your needs. We really liked the simplified model of programming database applications in CodeBase C++ . Likewise, if you already have a signifi- cant amount of data stashed in a Paradox database, Paradox Engine is the logical choice for you. For developing databases on NetWare LANs using almost any pro- gramming language, we would recom- mend Btrieve and the Btrieve Develop- er's Kit. Our overall favorite is db_Vista. It scored at or near the top in the perfor- mance tests we ran. It's a powerful sys- tem loaded with all the features you'll ever need. Most important, db_Vista offers portability to a host of operating systems at a time when developing appli- cations for diverse networks is often a critical requirement. ■ Rick Grehan is technical director of the BYTE Lab. He has a B. S. in physics and applied mathematics and an M.S. in mathematics/computer science. His work with database systems extends back to the late 1970s. Ben Smith is a BYTE techni- cal editor ; a former database consultant, and the author of UNIX Step by Step (Howard W. Sams f 1990). Jon Udell is a senior technical editor at large for BYTE. You can reach them on BIX as "r/c/:_g," "bensmith," and "judell," respectively. COMPANY INFORMATION Borland International, Inc. (Paradox Engine 2.0) 1800 Green Hills Rd. P.O. Box 660001 Scotts Valley, CA 95066 (408) 438-8400 fax: (408) 439-9344 Circle 1 308 on Inquiry Card. FairCom Corp. (c-tree Plus 6.0) 4006 West Broadway Columbia, MO 65203 (800)234-8180 (314)445-6833 fax:(314)445-9698 Circle 1 309 on Inquiry Card. Novell, Inc. (Btrieve 5.10 Developer's Kit) 5918 West Courtyard Dr. Austin, TX 78730 (800) 733-9673 (512) 346-8380 Circle 1 3 1 on Inquiry Card. Raima Corp. (db_Vista3.20) 3245 146th Place SE, Suite 230 Bellevue, WA 98007 (800) 327-2462 (206)747-5570 fax:(206)747-1991 Circle 1311 on Inquiry Card. Sequiter Software, Inc. (CodeBase 4.2, CodeBase++ 1.05) 9644 54th Ave., Suite 209 Edmonton, Alberta, Canada T6E 5 VI (403) 437-2410 fax: (403) 436-2999 Circle 1 3 1 2 on Inquiry Card. 224 BYTE- JANUARY 1992 Introducing QEMM 386 v6 Technology, art and magic make the best memory manager better still. Stealth: The Ultimate Weapon. QEMM6 introduces an amazing new concept: Stealth. This new feature, the first of its kind, actually maps ROM into other areas of memory, resulting in a memory gain of up to 211K. Now you can load larger TSRs and device drivers into high-memory (the area above 640K), to give your applications more room. Stealth works on most IBM and IBM compatible computers. New Optimize Makes it Easier. QEMM6 includes a completely new version of Optimize, the program which automatically configures and optimizes your memory. Now, it includes simple on- screen instructions, the ability to play "what-if " games, and a 'View, browse and play" feature. ^ jjggfik Squeeze: Flexible JpP^ Memory at Start-up. What you can expect Automatic Memory Gain Comparison DOSS QEMM5 QEMM6 Often TSRs you wish to load into high-memory require more memory while they are initializing than they do once resident. Squeeze recognizes this, and can temporarily increase a High RAM region during a program's load and initialization. $* Help for Beleaguered Laptop Users. QEMM 6 now fully supports most battery-operated laptops, with detection of "suspend/resume" Manifest Changes Destiny, qemm includes a copy of Manifest free. This amazing memory diagnostic and analysis tool is vital when configuring today's complex PC systems. Much More Speed. QEMM makes your machine faster, because it can place sluggish ROM into high-speed RAM. (QEMM is also a lightning fast memory manager.) Even More Memory. QEMM's VIDRAM feature extends conventional memory by 96k on EGA or VGA systems. VIDRAM disables graphics, but can easily be turned on or off. DOS 3.3 DOS 4.0 DOS 5.0 Model DOS Size Avail Mem Avail HMA DOS Size Avail Mem Avail HMA DOS Size Avail High Avail Mem HMA IBM PS/2 80 581 K 211K 64K 572K 211K 64K 620K 211K OK Compaq 20e 581K 211K 64K 572K 211K 64K 620K 211K OK ALRVEISA 582K 211K 64K 573K 211K 64K 620K 211K OK New Feature Highlights • STEALTH: Maps system ROMs INTO OTHER AREAS OF MEMORY. Potential memory gain: 211K. • NEW OPTIMIZE: Simple menu- ing interface, "what-if" mode, "view, browse and play" modes, AND five new parameters. • SQUEEZE: Temporarily increases a hlgh-ram region during a program's loading. • Support for Suspend-Resume features on laptops. • Ten new parameters for QEMM386.SYS and loadhi.com. • Support for SCAT shadow RAM. More Memory by Default. QEMM's Optimize will now, automatically, find up to 211K of high- memory. No other memory manager is able to accomplish this feat. QEMM Shares Memory, qemm automatically gives programs any kind of memory they need (i.e. EMS or XMS). Other memory managers require manual allocation of memory, which means you have to change your conf ig.sys file and reboot to change memory configurations. QEMM Practices Safe Memory Management. Optimize can now automatically detect areas which may present conflicts during operation. Additionally, PS/2 users can sleep well, since QEMM recognizes a wide variety of adapters that may conflict with certain PS/2™ memory areas. Much More Compatibility. QEMM-386canmn Windows 3.0 in any of its three modes. Chart data is based on the following: Automat c Memory Gain: DOS 5 will automatically gain up to 76K (using the DOS=h gh and devicehigh commands), QEMM v5 will automatically gain up to 172K (using QEMM's Optimize command and DOS=high), whereas QEMM 6 will gain up to 255K using the new Stealth feature, DOS=high and the new Optimize. As with any utility, these features are dependent on type of machine and application. All trademarks or registered trademarks are property of their respective owners. © 1991 Quarterdeck Office Systems Quarterdeck Office Systems, 150 Pico Blvd., Santa Monica, CA 90405 (213) 392-9851 Fax: (213) 399-3802 Circle 137 on Inquiry Card. DATABASES DOS DATA AT WORK The first BYTE Lab Product Report takes a look at 1 databases for DOS i RICK GREHAN AND STANFORD DIEHL f this is indeed the infor- mation age — and all the signs point in that direc- tion — then you had best make managing information your top priority. In the absence of a unified storage-and-re- trieval method, a pile of impor- tant facts and figures usually turns out to be just that: a pile. But when you arrange your information systematically, that same data becomes a powerful tool. Enter database management sys- tems (DBMSes), the filing cabinets for the electronic age. If you dig into the paperwork of virtually any organization worldwide, you probably will come upon stacks of documents whose contents cry out for a digital home in a database: the customer list for the video-rental parlor, the cassette-tape inventory at a busy music store, or even your own company's employee records. Lots of data already has found its way into dBase, Paradox, and other database files, but still more lies locked up in ink. In this special product roundup, the BYTE Lab examines 10 database packages that can help convert reams of printed material into a useful electronic data bank. Our selections include such well-known packages as dBase IV (a former Ashton-Tate product now marketed and supported by Borland International), Borland's Paradox, Micror- im's R.Base, DataEase from DataEase International, Nantucket Soft- ware's Clipper, and FoxPro from Fox Software. Other packages include new or lesser-known products that are no less interesting: WindowBase from Software Products International and Alpha Four from Alpha Soft- ware. We also look at Informix Software's durable Informix-SQL and 226 BYTE- JANUARY 1 992 Precision Software's Windows offer- ing, Superbase 4. All of the products we tested run under MS-DOS or Windows 3.0, but our choices by no means represent an exhaustive survey of database packages for the DOS world. Rather, they provide a cross-sectional sam- pling of packages equipped with similar capabilities (see the features table). We should point out, howev- er, that what you see in the product descriptions isn't necessarily all you can get. In many instances, you can expand the core capabilities of the databases reviewed here by purchas- ing upgrades such as multiuser mod- ules, C-language interfaces, and fourth-generation programming lan- guage add-ons. The Gauntlet The primary focus of our testing was to analyze the ease of use and overall capabilities of each database pack- age: How easily can you get data into the package? Is it difficult to con- struct a data-entry form? How effec- tive a tool is the program's report generator? To help answer those questions, BASES File Cabinets , For The Future we drew up a specification for an inventory system that enables us to put the programs through their paces in a controlled fashion. The specifi- cation required importing start-up data into four tables: an orders table, a parts-inventory table, a supplier's table, and a salesperson table. Next, we built an order-entry screen of the type a mail-order distributor might need for its order-entry clerks. For each package, we also created a reorder report and a batch-mode order-entry program for processing orders and comparing them against a salesperson table and parts table. Because raw performance also was a consideration, we ran two tim- ing benchmarks (see the benchmark graphs on page 240). The first mea- sured how long it took each package to index a 4000-item parts file and import that file into the parts table. Although most packages let you cre- ate an index before or after reading data into a table, to really put the packages to the test we purposely created the parts table index before reading data in. This method often slows down performance, not only during importation but anytime you subsequently access the index. If you create the index after the table is filled with data, the index tends to be more compact, and searches per- formed on that index are significant- ly faster than if you had created the index before importing data. Our batch order-processing bench- mark reads an 800-item order table and posts its orders against a 100-item salesperson table and a 4000-item parts table. This benchmark requires the system to perform searches on the salesperson and parts tables, so we indexed those tables on the proper columns whenever possible. The packages we tested share a rich set of features. All of them, for example, include some form of browser, a querying screen that per- mits you to search a database for particular information. Many of these browsers include an edit mode for modifying information in the database. All of the packages also let you create forms and reports. How- ever, each package's methods for supporting standard features is unique; benchmarking a specific group of operations enabled us to uncover these idiosyncrasies. ACTION SUMMARY I WHAT THEY DO Database packages allow you to store information so that it can be retrieved and manipulated rapidly and in some structured form. I WHAT YOU'LL LIKE With most packages you can quickly import your data and easily browse and edit your database once its built. Most DBMSes include a form designer for constructing custom data entry screens and some form of report- builder for generating custom reports. I WHAT YOU WONT LIKE A complex database often requires programming in the database package's DML (database management language), which can be as complex as any high-level language. I RECOMMENDATIONS The performance and functionality of FoxPro 2.0 can't be beat. We also liked Paradox for its intuitive interface and outstanding documentation. JANUARY 1 992 • B Y T E 227 DATABASES ALPHA FOUR 1.1 Alpha Four is a database package that wraps a spiffy, menu-driven interface around a dBase-compatible engine. The advertisements touting it as a "relational database for nonprogrammers" are right on target; Alpha Four lacks a real database management language (DML), so there's not much for a programmer to do. In fact, Alpha Four's programming capabilities are so limited that it couldn't perform our batch order-processing benchmark. (A future release of Alpha Four, however, reportedly will include a powerful script- ing language that will make the program more versatile.) On the bright side, Alpha Four's import capabilities are among the best of any package we tested. If you select the option to import an ASCII file with fixed- length keywords, Alpha Four guides you comfortably through the process of map- ping data from the source file to the target database. It even displays the first record of the input file, highlighting sections of the record so you can see instantly what portion of the record you are importing into each field. As you would expect, Alpha Four can read dBase III and dBase III Plus files directly. You specify relationships among files using the program's set editor (the pro- grams uses set to mean database). Once in the set editor, you define the primary table (called a parent database) and its link fields, its connections to any child databases. The links may be one-to-one or one-to-many, and parent/child rela- tionships may be nested, but you may not create more than 10 databases in each set. The set editor displays links graphically, so you can see a tree dia- gram of file relationships at a glance. Alpha Four's forms builder is suffi- cient for simple data retrieval and query- ing, but we had trouble using it to do anything complicated. It includes all the basics — multiple file access, verified fields, and calculated fields — but expres- sions within calculated fields can be only 228 BYTE* JANUARY 1 992 254 characters long. This restriction quickly limits your ability to set up a form that uses complex decision-making sequences during field updates. Alpha Four does include some very powerful utilities, though. If you have a search query that you execute frequently, you can save the expression for reuse. If you often use your database to do mail- ings — creating mailing labels and form letters, for instance — then Alpha Four may be just the ticket. It has functions for just such puiposes. Even more useful is Alpha Four's Post Database com- mand, which presumes that you keep a database of transactions that you periodi- cally post to a master database. A trans- action of this type might be a journal- entries database whose contents you post to your general ledger database on a monthly basis. You tell Post Database what the linked field is — the account number, in the previous example — and the command races through the transac- tion database, tallying its contents into the proper rows of the master database. You can select among four tally func- tions: add, subtract, replace, or none (although we can't figure out why any- one would conduct a series of null opera- tions on a database). Alpha Four might be ideal for a small business that uses a database primarily for tracking clients and maintaining an inventory containing several thousand items. The company's claim of providing a package for nonprogrammers is accu- rate; Alpha Four's ability to easily create mailing labels and churn out form letters attests to that. However, we found the package's simple approach too restric- tive overall. CLIPPER 5.01 Clipper takes the opposite tack from Alpha Four: This database development package is decidedly for programmers. Although it lacks some of the nifty code- generation utilities of the other packages, Clipper offers a wealth of tools and capabilities that programmers need. Two of those tools are a report gener- ator (called RL) and a utility (called DBU) for creating and managing database files, but even these programs come with a twist: They are written in Clipper's own programming language and the source code is included. You can use this code as reference or tweak it and add it to your database applications. You'll especially appreciate the database utility when you're building database structures and objects. Although Clipper is built for users who understand programming, an inter- active working environment still is important, particularly when it comes to doing mundane database management tasks. DBU is helpful here, too. The main DBU screen lists options across the top of the screen, along with the function keys assigned to them. The rest of the screen is devoted to a visual representa- tion of the active database view, which consists of a column split into three sec- tions. The first group displays the names of the active database. If you include an argument when invoking the DBU pro- gram, the database or view you specify will appear here. The next section shows the active indexes associated with the active database, and the bottom grouping displays the field names for the active database. The column itself represents a work area. If the column is blank, you simply press the Enter key to see a list of the databases in the current directory. You can select one of them to load into the work area or create a new database by pressing the appropriate function key. This setup lets you quickly and easily load different databases into separate work areas, use or create indexes, and modify the structure of your database. We especially appreciated the ease with which this system let us create different views and set up database relationships. The RL report generator isn't as flex- ible. It does not support a WYSIWYG outline of the report, nor does it let you see a preview of the output as you work. The program simply prompts you for a column name and definition. You then type in the field name you want to appear in the first column, along with the title for the column. You also can define summary fields from the column-defini- tion screen. That's it. You can add only one column at a time. After you set up your columns, you can specify groups and set up parameters for the entire report. But even though its procedures aren't slick, RL does the job with ease. Clipper's real power lies in its coding. continued Raima Database Engine Captures Fortune 500 With Record Speed Accelerated Database Performance Compared to conventional relational databases, retrieval of records can be 10 — 20 — even 50 times faster with db_VISTA III from Raima. Propelling The Biggest Names In Business Companies like General Motors, Hewlett-Packard, IBM, Eastman Kodak, Rockwell and others are using db_VISTA III in their competitive environments. Today's most critical, most demanding applications demand the high performance of db_VISTA III. Powerfully Efficient Leading-Edge Technology Raima's combined technology merges the flexibility of relational databases with the lightning speed and efficient storage of the network model. It's written entirely in C, so you can "fine-tune" the db_VISTA III engine for optimum performance in any application. Put Yourself In Fast Company Give yourself the competitive advantages of db_VISTAIII: • Speed — faster access to data • Portability — supports most environments • Royalty-free — increase your profits • Source Code Available — total programming flexibility • Full Raima support services — including training Whether you're writing a stand-alone DOS application, or one for UNIX accessing thousands of records, db_VISTA III will put your application on the fast track. Race to the phone and call for more information! In the U.S. or Canada, call: 1-800-DB-RAIMA In Washington state or international, call: (206) 747-5570 fO RAIMA lm^ CORPORATION Specifications Relational B-tree indexing. Network data model. Relational SQL query and report writer. Single & multi-user. Automatic recovery. Built-in referential integrity. Supports: VMS, QNX, ULTRDC, UNIX System V, Berkeley 4.2, AIX, SunOS, SCO, MS DOS, MS Windows, and OS/2. Most C Compilers and LANs supported. Raima Corporation 3245 146th Place S.E., Bellevue, WA 98007 USA (206)747-5570 Fax: (206)747-1991 International Distributors: Australia: 61 2 4197177 Belgium; 32 2 734 9818 Finland: 358080405350 France; 33 1 46092784 Germany: 49 7022 34077; 49 0214 91051 Italy: 39 49 829 1285 Japan: 81 33 865 2140 Mexico: 52 83 49 53 00 The Netherlands: 31 215 946814 Norway: 472 38 48 88 Singapore: 65 334 0061 Sweden: 46 13 111 588 Switzerland: 41 64 517475 Taiwan: 886 2 552 3277 United Kingdom: 44 992 500919 Copyright ©1992 Raima Corporation, All rights reserved. Photo: Dale LaFollette Circle 1 40 on Inquiry Card. DATABASES As the benchmarks indicate, the pro- gram's compiler is very fast, but the pack- age also has a number of interesting capa- bilities. One new feature is its support of so-called code blocks, small chunks of executable code that you can store as variables or pass as arguments to other programs. You use an EVAL ( ) function to execute a code block. Another helpful feature is Clipper's use of make files for tracking which files in a program depend on other files to run properly and keeping them up to date. With this system in place, you can invoke the Make utility to perform only those compiling and linking operations needed to keep all the files in sync. Clipper also supports functions to read from and write to binary DOS files. A file pointer follows the read or write sequence, or you can set the pointer your- self with the SEEK ( ) function. Programmers also will appreciate Clipper's debugger, which lets you step through your program code, enter com- mands, and monitor the state of particular variables, field names, or expressions. A status window lists the databases open in all active work areas, as well as the val- ues of all Set commands. The debugger also keeps a history of all routines called as the program code executes. Clipper is not for the database novice, but database programmers will find a lot to like. DATAEASE 4.2 When you work in DataEase, you get the feeling that the program is taking you by the hand, patiently guiding you along step by step. This can make things easier, but at times you may want to break loose. If you've worked with databases before, don't expect DataEase to work like anything you're used to. It follows a unique, structured approach. When you start up DataEase, you are greeted with a log-on screen. You must indicate the name of the database you'll work in right off the bat. If you enter the name of a database that isn't listed, DataEase asks if you want to create a new one. The pro- gram also prompts you for a user name and password. You can press the Enter key if you don't wish to protect the database from prying eyes. At the main menu, your choices are listed next to option numbers. You can use cursor keys to highlight an option or press the number of your choice. DataEase does not support a mouse. Usually, the first thing you do with a new database is create a table (called a form in DataEase). DataEase follows this approach but gives you extra mileage. As you create your form, you are creat- ing an entry screen and a table structure. You start with a blank screen on which you can type text (a heading that reads Company Name:, for instance). When you press F10 to enter information in a field, a field-entry form containing the text you just typed appears. This sequence is typical of how DataEase works: The interface is made, up entirely of menus, function key options, and blanks for you to fill in. The form used to define your fields exposes some of the powerful features DataEase offers; no programming is required. You can define the field type as you would in any database program, but DataEase also lets you specify numeric formats, such as a phone number or social security number, without using functions or formatting code. You then can desig- nate the field as a required field or a unique field by filling in the blanks the program presents. An entry labeled derivation formula lets you enter a formu- la for the field, such as quantity *pr ice; you can use the resulting figure to com- pute the value in the total sales field. After you design your forms, you can link them using another menu option. You simply specify the forms you want to link and fill in the fields to link; DataEase makes sure the connection is retained during all subsequent opera- tions. For instance, you can pull up a pri- mary form that tracks company names and press FIO to access a secondary form listing the parts a particular compa- ny supplies. DataEase keeps track of the relationship between the two tables. DataEase's structure made it especial- ly easy to generate our report. We desig- nated a primary table to use and a form came up with the field names. Next, we pressed the space bar to select the fields we wanted to show up on the report. DataEase also let us enter keywords in the field list so that we could group selected fields or accumulate statistical information such as running totals. This enabled us to call up a related table or, easier still, create a lookup field for pulling the associated information into the report. For the company field, for instance, we entered the keywords group and sum and designated part numbers as the lookup field. This produced a report listing each company name and the part number of the products the parts table indicated that the company supplied. The total replacement cost for all back- ordered parts from each company was listed at the end of each company's parts list, and a grand total was supplied auto- matically at the end of the report. The program is easy to work with, but in the end we felt confined by DataEase's environment. You must use the DataEase editor to build code, and it won't let you save a file that contains bad code or nonexistent variables. We also had prob- lems with the batch-entry code because we started out using lookup fields. DataEase's lookup fields are updated only when you enter data in a form; they do not change when the data referenced by the lookup changes. This limits their usefulness for programming purposes. Restrictions such as this won't help programmers feel comfortable in the DataEase environment, but novice users who need to set up their own applica- tions should do well with the package. DBASE IV 1.1 Gone are the days when dBase set the standards for DOS -based database man- agement. dBase rose to the top mostly on the strength of its powerful programming language. Delays and buggy releases opened the door for packages that included the same programming prowess hidden beneath simpler interfaces. dBase is becoming easier to use: In addition to the dot prompt so familiar to old-time dBase hackers, the program now offers a menu-driven interface called the Control Center. Although the Control Center represents an improve- ment for users intimidated by a single 230 BYTE* JANUARY 1 992 **■* #1T Retri "Powerful and flexible searc capabilities; extremely easy to learn and use." -Patrick Marshall InfoWorld, August 5, 1991 Finds needed information quickly. ZylNDEX simultaneously searches all files, thousands of pages, entire networks, with results in less than 3 seconds! Searching is easy. To find a word, just type it. Instructions are clear and readily available. Versatile. Powerful. ZylNDEX provides the widest range of search techniques: • Boolean Logic • Thesaurus • Comments • Phrase Searches • Numeric Range • Field Searches • Wildcards • Conceptual Searches • Proximity Searches... and more. Prepare your entire drive for searching with just one keystroke. Ideally suited for networks and frequently changing text. ZylNDEX finds every occurrence of your search request. Select any file for viewing. Browse or jump from hit to hit. Copy, paste and print. Available for DOS, Windows and UNIX. Supports WordPerfect, Word and most other word processor formats. Type a search request. i irirt gallons Win Jaw jiil^fliMiF i Ogams window !m M-TiTf| \m- ^|"l"-: n | -i I- •■ r^Hc?n 1 New derr/-; Otit ttllutir caowtunMan »T ierowmsm-iUl | . . ■ WIFtffl ccati no l : '' , l ' ; .'i , . i . : '«,'" 1 '""* »4 |:.f.t-i'i!..-l tar !!j? Ivt , » plsu to mis thff pio ■ r.eivcrV si?it >:l i '. -. 'Ji"j-M'.:pre-Mle sytl'su In Itr* *•!*» 11. ITC-FILE.MSW Oullineuln I'iMNSACUXT Hhlnlyofc TOOPOSAL.WP 05/11 /U3Fli PLANTJMK IMI.IXt i'i«iiiF!-..i>:i Llci 9-J-. I Sir? List of files fou "■Jufioiic at ce[io!Br]"ni)iJi!egollat" ' 'l*J!ic:'t line;! . View file with hits highlighted. ZyUB a Division of Information Dimensions, Inc. 1 00 Lexington Drive Buffalo Grove, Illinois 60089 (708) 459-8000 FAX (708) 459-8054 CalM -800-544-6339 Demo disk available BYTE DEMONS Free Demo Download 617-861-9767* '•:,/' H "■:-,, (, t„ s ■ k ©1991 Circle 1 93 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 1 94). Vk never dreamed for creating the best PC Object-oriented, event-driven operation means that you get the benefits of a Graphic User Interface (GUI) on your DOS PCs, and code thafs reusable from application to application. FoxPro 2.0 is the state-of-the-database-art, an object-oriented, event-driven DBMS that runs in DOS to protect your information systems investments. 4GL Tools (Fourth Generation Language) simplify the creation of Mac-like applications on your DOS PCs, using keyboard shortcuts or a mouse. Event-driven operation allows you to work with any number of resizable, scrollable windows, get to all of your data all of the time. Optional Distribution Kit creates stand-alone .EXE files for distributing your applications. Rushmore query optimization is unique to FoxPro and gets your answers as much as hundreds of times faster than competitive products. ystem He tut araMse ecord rogram indow rowse Uiew customer Mjeiail mm C ] Quotes -H Customer Fox Software [XI Shipped ►Ami Contact Kennaner, Halt C ] Billed Crl Phone 419-874-0162 I Fo| City Perry sbur§ Output to: (•) Printer ( ) Disk C ) Screen Customer James, Xing an Contact Kingsleyi Mary ye rtarchniy Bands, Inc.* For users, the View window makes it easy to work with multiple tables of data, RQBE (Relational Query By Example) simplifies the creation of business queries. USE C:\FOXPROZ\DEMO\DEIAIL.DB SELECT A SET ORDER TO TAG PNO OF C:\F0 Application Program Interface (API) links to external libraries written in C or assembler. Third-parties are currently developing communications, client/server access and other packages. (Optional Library Construction Kit available.) \ FoxPro 2.0 runs your industry- standard dBASE programs today, lets you build on your current systems for your needs tomorrow. Applications you write in FoxPro 2.0 can exchange data with our FoxBASE+/Mac on a LAN today, will run virtually unchanged under our Windows, Mac and UNIX versions currently in development (no release date yet). Response to FoxPro 2.0 has been overwhelmingly favorable. And that's the problem: the response has been overwhelming. We're hearing of callers being on hold for 20 minutes or longer! And this in spite of ramping up our support months in advance of the release. Well, we're adding another 40 phone lines and hiring more people. And if that's not enough, we'll add even more. In the meantime, we'd like to say we'd be apologizing database in the world Results from an extensive suite of query tests independ- ently performed by Micro Endeavors, Inc. and published in the 8/91 issue of Data Based Advisor. RELATIVE SPEED QA 80 60 40 20 J . .... ■ SINGLE-USER ■ MULTI-USER 1 Vm'* A ^HH FRIfTffl ^^^^ffl . V FoxPro 2.0 is far faster than the other PC database management systems and raw compilers like Clipper, both single-user and on a LAN. "Thanks" to the tens of thousands of you Call 1-800-837-FOX2 or 419-874-0162 again. M FckPk I 1€ who put up with the wait, and "Sorry" to jl ^ r^p^ (We believe we've fixed it.) those who didn't. 1 But please try again. We think we've got things under control now. And FoxPro 2.0 really is worth the wait. 2Q. Query benchmark tests performed by Micro Endeavors, Inc. (215) 449-4680. FoxPro and FoxBASE+/Mac are trademarks of Fox Holdings Inc.; other products and services are not. © Fox Holdings Inc. 1991. Circle 62 on Inquiry Card. DATABASES dot on a blank screen, the simple addi- tion of pull-down menus doesn't make this a user-friendly product. First of all, the package doesn't offer mouse support. You must rely on Alt-key combinations, cursor keys, and function keys to get around. The Control Center doesn't help the cause much by requiring confirma- tion whenever you move out of one operation and into another. Even when you've saved the data in the window and you press the Escape key to return to the main menu, the Control Center asks if you really want to do that. Once you get used to the key se- quences, the Control Center offers a few nice features. Among them is the pro- gram's query builder. As with many other packages, you start out with a skeleton of the active database structure. You can add multiple databases to the query from the menu and switch among these databases with function keys. By pointing to field names in the skeleton, you can create links between databases, specify fields to include in the query, organize the database using specific fields and sort methods, and set the conditions for the query. A query also can trigger multiple- record updates; you can save the result as a view or as a new database. We really missed mouse support when building forms and reports. Worse, the interface offers no obvious way to A Taste of SQL Two of the database packages we worked with — Informix and WindowBase — used SQL as their database management lan- guage. Another, R:Base, retains SQL compatibility while adding a few other capabilities. To work effectively in any SQL database, you need to start by placing yourself in a "table" frame of mind. That involves adjusting to the idea that you have to manipulate your database as a whole, rather than as a collection of individual records. At times, this approach offers distinct benefits. For example, when we imported the salesperson information into the SALESPERSON table in Informix, we noticed that we had set the ID field incorrectly. It should have ranged from 1000 to 1099 but instead ranged from to 99. In a database not based on SQL, fixing the problem might have required writing a looping structure to read in each entry, changing the ID number, and writing the change back to the database. In SQL, the solution is as simple as adding 1000 to each ID number. The statement to do this is: UPDATE SALESPERSON SET ID = ID+ 1000. But because SQL implementations are far from standardized, not all structures are as predictable across the board. In Informix-SQL, for example, we used the following sequence to move the contents of a field from the parts table into our orders table: UPDATE ORDERS SET PRICE = ( SELECT PRICE FROM PARTS WHERE ORDER.STOCK_NO = PARTS.STOCK_NO); WindowBase's SQL, however, does not permit an embedded SELECT command within the SET clause of an UPDATE statement. To combine fields from two tables, you must create a third table and link them along a common field. To complete the oper- ation described above, for instance, you would create a temporary orders table and issue an INSERT command with an embedded SELECT com- mand. The SELECT command would include all the fields from the first orders table, along with the price field from the parts table. The WHERE clause would look similar to the one above and would specify the join field (STOCKJJO, in this case): INSERT TEMPORDS SELECT , PRICE FROM ORDERS, PARTS WHERE ORDER.STOCK_NO = PARTS.STOCK_NO relocate text and fields. You won't find cut-and-paste capability (not even in the editor), and you can't simply select a field and move it. After consulting the menu and the documentation, we finally resorted to deleting fields and replacing them. The forms generator did not sup- port multiple database entry forms with- out some tweaking of the code. When we first loaded different databases from the menu and placed the fields on the design screen this looked possible, but when we ran the form, it could not find the field designators. We loaded all the databases used in the form into different work spaces and set up relationships for each of them, but the form still didn't understand any references for fields out- side of the active work space. Fortunate- ly, the fix was simple. We loaded the generated code (saved with a .FMT extension) into an editor and prefaced the external field names with the databases they belonged to. Not a huge undertaking, but the form generator should have been able to do it. Usually, the best way to work with multiple databases is to create a query first. This worked well with the report generator but was less effective with the form generator. We couldn't use the dBase form templates for operations that allow updates (browse and edit, for instance). The view created was set to read only. To create our report, we set up a query and used the result to design the report. That worked and didn't require additional tweaking. We added a group designation and placed the company name in the group header so that the company name was listed first, followed by all the part numbers for that company. We then moved to the end of the high- lighted band below the group and added a summary variable to compute the back-order replacement cost. This gave us a cost summary at the end of every group listing. The report generator auto- matically set up report summaries for all our numeric fields. We deleted those we didn't want to use. Because of the state of the documen- tation we received, however, the process did not go as smoothly as it sounds. While we were reading about update queries, the discussion suddenly switched to forms. Finally, we discov- ered that the manual had jumped from page 8-6 to page 9-19. We started look- ing around for the last part of the chapter on update queries and noticed that chap- ter 1 also ended abruptly, cut off once more by page 9-19. The rest of the pages then fell in order, but we didn't find the last part of chapter 8 until we rustled up 234 BYTE- JANUARY 1 992 GATEBUSTERS! L^si H^ M*tf« >^ X '■"ste iS***i»M.M5Ti ***a**?33m N\V «c stf** s $2,899 $3,499 486-33 ISA* 486-33 EISA** 32-Bit Intel 80486/33 MHz CPU • Burst Mode Support Zero-Walt 64KB (Exp. to 256KB) High Speed Cache* Zero-Wait 128KB High Speed Cache* 4MB Zero-Wait State 32-bit memory on the World's Best Motherboard made by AMI (Expands to 32MBV96MB**) 8 Expansion Slots 16-bit*/7-EISA and 1-32/8 bit* * SONY 1304 HG 14" SVGA Monitor (1024 x 768 Non-interlaced) Orchid ProDesigner II VGA Card with 1MB RAM ' 207MB 15ms Maxtor IDE Hard Drive » Teac 1.2 AND 1.44 Floppy Drives 2 Serial/1 Parallel Ports I/O* • 2 Serial/2 Parallel Ports I/O** PC Power & Cooling 300 Watt Power Supply Vertical Case: 6 Bays/Security Lock/LED (Also shown is our optional deluxe case 450 W PS) Keytronics 101-key Enhanced Keyboard AMI BIOS/CMOS Set-up/Diagnostics/Clock/Calendar • 3-Ring Cloth Binder for Manual and Software 10-year Lithium Battery/ T^JCUB Tool 800 number for Lifetime Technical Support TRW On-Site Service Available to Most Locations Federal Express Replacement of Defective Components FCC B Certification Made in the USA lOUCHE A PCPRDS Company 8205 Sooth Cass Avenue Dunen, Illinois 60559 708/810-1010 Fax 708/810-9490 $1,899 386-33 MHz COMPLETE SYSTEM Upgradable to 486 386 20SX Starting at $799 COLORADO 120MB Tape Back-Dp Option $249 BOCA 2*00 Baud Internal Modem Option $69 THE T0UCHE COMMITMENT TO QUALITY AND VALUE KEEPS GROWING! OUTSTANDING. That is the word PC Magazine used to describe our system! We're very proud of our 486-33 review and we encourage you to read it. One example: Of 30 systems reviewed, TSUCW ranked #1 in the small-record DOS access file test and #2 in the large DOS access file test for speed! To achieve this feat we relied on Maxtor and Ultrastor, two fantastic product partners. Maxtor and Ultrastor are just two companies on a long list of companies we obtain high-quality components from to custom-build high-quality systems. AM I-SONY-Intel-Teac-Orchid-Keytronics- Micropolis-CYRIX-SIEMENS-PC Power & Cooling-BOCA are all names you'll easily recognize. You'll never see us offer components from Fui-Manchui or other tongue-twisting companies you've never heard of before. WYSIWYG is a term used in desktop publishing. What You See Is What You Get is also a standard we use in building our systems. That means you get exactly what you expect when you receive your order from us. No hidden surprises or cut corners that many of our competitors try to sneak by with cheap or low quality components. The use of AMI motherboards guarantees full DOS-UNIX-OS2 compatibility. We custom-build every system and offer special prices on enhancement items to upgrade your system like CD ROM's, digitizers, laser printers, scanners, 20" monitors, and hundreds of other products. Our parent company, PC PROS, was founded in 1982. Before you buy any system, ask all the hard questions and compare. Who makes the motherboard? This is one of the most important questions to ask since this is the heart and soul of any computer. We use more AMI motherboards than anyone in the world. Don't be fooled by claims of an AMI BIOS equaling an AMI motherboard. Insist you receive a system with the best motherboard money can buy. . . an AMI. Whether you're government, FORTUNE, major institution or just need a machine or two for your home or office, we offer the absolute best quality and service anywhere! WHO YA GONNA CALL? 708/810-1010 Circle 1 95 on Inquiry Card. DATABASES 3 another dBase package from the BYTE library. Hopefully, quality control will improve under Borland. The latest release of dBase IV is an improvement over past incarnations. Still, if you like the power and maturity of the dBase language, FoxPro is the bet- ter product. FOXPRO 2.0 If your primary criterion for a database is performance, you need look no further than FoxPro 2.0. But that's not its only selling point. FoxPro has a lot to offer casual users and developers alike. The interface includes pull-down menus — along with a convenient command win- dow — so you can use menus or type commands without either interface get- ting in the way of the other. Mouse sup- port is the best of any character-based package we've worked with. The com- mand window keeps a running history of FoxPro instructions. This makes it easy to repeat commands used throughout a session. You also can select portions of the command history and paste them into your applications. If you trigger opera- tions from the menu options, FoxPro places those instructions in the command history — a great tool for building appli- cations. You can perform an operation using FoxPro's menus, capture instruc- tions from the command history, and paste them into a program file. FoxPro made child's play of our pro- ject. To create the data-entry screen, we opened the databases and set up the nec- essary relationships. FoxPro's View Window assisted these setup chores. The window graphically depicts available work areas; you can select a work area and open a database in it by clicking on a command button. FoxPro provides a list of databases from which to choose. After loading the three databases we needed, we highlighted the orders database and selected the command button to set a relationship between it and the parts database. FoxPro offered a dialog box with a list of key fields. We selected the stock number field to link the two databases. Because we would need to repeat this operation later when writing code for the batch-order test, we called up the command window, copied the commands generated in the operation, and pasted them into a program file. When we designed the input screen, the screen generator saved environment information. We didn't have to worry about opening databases first and setting up the relationships. The screen builder starts off as a blank screen in which you can enter text and place fields. You also can create command buttons, check boxes, "radio" buttons, and pop-up lists. And you can attach pieces of code to any object, including the fields. From the setup screen, you can designate code to run before and after the screen-entry pro- gram. When you generate code for the screen you've designed, you can attach other screens to it, which saves you time once you build a library of generic screens. We simply added a control screen included in the tutorial for navi- gating through records, adding a com- mand button for processing an entry and attaching code to update the parts database and the salesperson database each time an order is entered. The easiest way to create the reorder report was to build a query first. To do this, we opened a new query screen and selected the company database and the parts database for our query. A dialog box, which included three blank boxes, prompted us to enter the linking criteria. Clicking on the box on the right brought up a list of fields in the parts database, while the left box offered fields from the company database. The middle box pro- vided a choice of relational operators (like, less than, and so on). With a few clicks of the mouse, we had created a simple query. Next, we selected the fields we wanted to include, grouped the query by company name, and sent the result to a report. When we ran the query, FoxPro generated a report file, which we could call up from the report builder for reformatting. As in the screen builder, we could drag text and fields around with the mouse or group infor- mation and then move it. To keep track of running totals, we defined a couple of variables and put them in the group foot- er and the page footer. A query is saved as a program file and since a formatted report is part of the query, you can gen- erate the final output directly from the command line by invoking the DO com- mand and using the filename as an argu- ment, or you can include the command sequence in an application. FoxPro was a barn burner on our per- formance tests, thanks mainly to Fox- Pro's proprietary Rushmore technology. Our one complaint about the package is its unwieldy documentation. Finding information quickly was a problem, but a strong on-line help facility got us through the rough spots. FoxPro is sim- ply an outstanding product. INFORMIX-SQL Informix-SQL is a structured-query-lan- guage (SQL) database through and through. The program's look is more Spartan than that of the other systems we examined; you'll find no multicol- ored screens with pop-up menus and windows here. The package's Lotus- style, menu-driven screens automate the more significant database operations, such as creating a table, defining and altering fields, and so on. Informix also includes a report generator and a system for executing form-definition files that you design and write in a kind of pseu- dolanguage. But at its core, Informix is a SQL system. You build a form in Informix, not by moving a cursor about on the screen with a mouse or arrow keys, but by writ- ing sl form-specification file, a kind of screen definition coupled with exe- cutable instructions. This file comprises five parts: a database section, which identifies the database on which the form will operate; a screen section, which defines the layout of the screen; a tables section, which identifies which tables the form will access; an attributes section, which describes each field dis- played by the form; and an optional instructions section, which defines oper- ations to be performed on fields within the form. Simply put, the database and tables sections tell the system what to show, the screen section tells where to show it, the attributes section tells how 236 BYTE* JANUARY 1992 Access 1BM!1 ! u _r" DXpTD II Ii3£] ITDUi ;.l Customer Browse Modify Find Select Bottom lop Go Customer No. 32482 I 9491 Last Name Stickle Stickel 34732 35007 8092 22824 12842 39148 16785 27096 15523 33045 Stice Stevenson Steward Steward sori = Stewart Stewin Steyn Sthankiya Stiansen Stickley First Name Jim | Ron Vern Alan Baline Search On: Cust. No. First Name Help PI 6 B 7 3 Customer Edit Modify Find Select Bottom Top Go Customer No. Last Name 32482 Search Value: Anderson OK Cancel Stickle Jim 639-923-8475 r « Help Design CodeBase Browse/Edit screens using any resource toolkit • Multi User • Portable (DOS, Unix, ...) • Royalty Free DLL • C++ interface included 2SSI?, <«j^&-su ISSI Use CodeBase 4.5 from Visual Basic or T\irbo Pascal for Windows. Use the super-fast, super-small FoxPro 2.0 CDX or the Clipper NTX index files. " Our product was too slow under FoxPro 2.0, so we rewrote it in C using CodeBase. Now it is incredibly fast." Jeff Reed, DCS Computer Services rj The C Library for DataBase Management -i,£> SEQUITER SOFTWARE INC. TEL. 403*437*241 FAX 403*436*2999 Europe 33.20.24.20.14 #209,9644-54 AVE., EDMONTON, AB, CANADA T6E-5V1 © 1991 Sequiter Software Inc. Circle 147 on Inquiry Card. Graphics by Micro/lrls. © 1991 About the ontyl cant contain is \ ±) ED Imagine this. A Window? database that can handle virtually any data type. It's called SuperbaseM from Software Publishing Corporation. With it, the devel opment possibilities are, well, thought provoking. Consider bar coding. The state of the art in inventory control. Start thinking creatively and anything's fair game. A > high-security prison, r for example, uses ^^,»-^ j Superbase 4 tQ handle the toughest inventory control problem anywhere. Keeping track of their prisoners. Or how about video? Through DLL you can store still shots from a full-motion video camera. So you can monitor re- mote locations in real time. Or grab key images L""' from a previously recorded tape. A petrochemical facility, for example, uses Superbase 4 to store camcorder images in a training file for new engineers. Imagine, a free demo disk just by calling 1-800-336-8360, Operator 617. Superbase is a registered trademark andSupcrbasc4 is a trademark of Software Publishing Corporation. Windows is a trademark of Microsoft Corporation.© 1991 Software Publishing Corporation, 3165 Kifer Road, Santa Clara, CA 95051. hdng Superbase 4 Dur imagiiiatm *k - What's more, any photographic or graphic image can be included in any data file. So you can dress up product catalogs. Personnel records. Insurance , claims files. Or anything else you can think of. And through DDE Microsoft you can even pull in more MBSS familiar business acces- sories. Like maps, graphs, charts, and spreadsheets. But don't think for a minute that this versatility comes at the expense of raw power. Superbase 4 is fast. It lets you include an unlimited num- ber of characters in any text field. And supporting SQL, it easily connects with some formidable databases— SQL Server, Oracle, Sybase, dBase, and DB2, among others. In fact, Superbase 4 already manages a direct mail database containing over one million records. It could handle a lot more. r> YOU'LL N£V£ft HAVE TO WORK AGAIN, A stock market ticker. A ticket sales network. You know, big stuff. And our Data Management Language (DML) gives you unsurpassed ease and flexibility in customizing screens. So it's no wonder Superbase 4 is the worldwide market leader in Windows databases. Just imagine what it can do - for you. SUPERBASE* §E SOFTWARE ^PUBLISHING vstmi;;!"*;; DATABASES to show it, and the instructions section tells the system what to do before, dur- ing, and after showing it. There's a catch to Informix's form system, though: You can operate only on fields displayed by the form. This ran us aground when we were building our order-entry form. Each order carried a salesperson ID number, which refer- enced a row in our salesperson table. We naturally wanted the appropriate sales- person's year-to-date sales field updated whenever an order is committed. But we didn't want to let an order-entry clerk see a salesperson's year-to-date sales, so we tried to update that field without dis- playing it. No chance. Another annoying shortcoming is how fast error messages come and go. In most cases, they appear on the last line of the screen, heralded by a beep. If you don't get your eyes down there quickly enough, the message is gone before you've read it. This hap- pened twice while we were trying to create an index for one of our tables. Ultimately, we did get the index built, but to this day we don't know what the error was. Included with Informix-SQL are a number of utility packages. BCHECK verifies the integrity of indexes; if it finds a discrepancy between a data file and one of its indexes, it lets you recreate the index. DBLINK and DBLOAD are handy for ferrying data between Informix and the outside world of Lotus 1-2-3, dBase, or ASCII files. With DBSCHEMA, you can produce the SQL statements needed to create a table or database (if you've already built the table in Informix). The Informix-SQL documentation is well presented, and the software certain- ly is solidly crafted. Informix-SQL runs on a variety of platforms; if you're inter- ested in portability this is a DBMS to consider. In addition, Informix sells numerous add-ons that extend the capa- bilities of Informix-SQL. One such package, ESQL, lets you embed SQL in C programs so that you can write code to more efficiently perform operations that SQL is ill equipped to handle. PARADOX 3.5 One of Paradox's most notable charac- teristics is its speed. Not only did Para- dox perform well in our speed tests, its response time for browsing and editing tables was quick-as-a-blink fast. You do complex querying and editing using the query by example (QBE) tech- nique. It works like this: Paradox pre- sents you with a grid that mimics the layout of the target database. You enter BENCHMARKS < Better BATCH ORDER-PROCESSING Worse ► ■ < Better IMPORTING AND INDEXING Worse ► Alpha Four Clipper : DataEase ■ 290 dBase IV FoxPro Informix-SQL 309 Paradox R:Base Superbase 4 WindowBase 181 53 154 198 22 257 290 178 1000 2000 3000 Seconds *Product proved incapable of running this benchmark. 4000 500 1000 1500 Seconds For the Importing and Indexing benchmark, each program had to create a 4000-record database of parts information from an ASCII file. The Batch Order-Processing benchmark tests the time it took each package to post a batch of 800 orders and update three separate database files. In each case, FoxPro displayed the most impressive performance. 240 BYTE* JANUARY 1992 Open new windows with Tl microLaser™ printers* ■&x% ■ ^ And get powerful fonts and graphics, ease of use and more speed than ever. By now you've heard how fast and easy Microsoft® Windows™ makes it to tap all that PC power you've got on your desk. Well now there's an affordable, easy way to put that power on paper — microLaser from Texas Instruments. Right out of the box, microLaser comes with what you need to print the dazzling pages of text and graphics you've dreamed of. m^ m ]ustplugitinandgo.»J POSTSCRIPr That's because microLaser PS models come with PostScript® software from Adobe® and the memory it takes to use it Plus you get your choice of either 17 or 35 scalable fonts, starting at just $1,399*. New model. More speed. Same price. When it comes to print speed, the new microLaser Plus zips along at 9 ppm. If you need a shared printer solu- tion, turn to the 16 ppm microl-aser XL If all that isn't enough, just look at what else you get with microl-aser. It's the smallest printer in its class. It han- dles more paper and envelopes in more ways. And it supports more than 4,000 software packages, including your Windows applications. So when you add it all up, you'll understand why the power of your ideas needs the power, convenience and econ- omy of microl-aser. Let microLaser open new windows for you. For the name of the nearest dealer, call 1-800-527-3500. ^ Texas Instruments *TI suggested retail price. (Dealer prices may vary.) microLaser is a trademarkof Texas Instruments Incoiporated. Microsoft is a registered trademark and Windows is a trademark of Microsoft Corporation. Adobe, PostScript and the PostScript logo are registered trademarks of Adobe Svcems, Inc. © 1991 TI 71860 Circle 1 69 on Inquiry Card. M DATABASES 7% relational operations and filters within the fields you want Paradox to evaluate. For example, if you want to set all cur- rent sales figures to zero, you would type >0, CHANGETO in the appropriate field slot in the template. When you turn Paradox loose, it uses the information in the template to guide its actions. Paradox supports the most important import and export formats, but we ran into trouble importing information stored in ASCII format. During the portion of our testing involving importation of ASCII data, Paradox demanded that the fields for each record of the import file be arranged in the same order as the fields in the destination table. (In con- trast, Alpha Four allowed us to map input fields to target fields in the database.) With Paradox, you must plan care- fully before jumping into building a form. This is particularly true with forms that access multiple tables. Multi- table form design involves creating a master form for the master table, then inserting into that master form embed- ded forms from other tables. So to create the full master form you should design your embedded forms first — unless you don't mind flipping back and forth among forms as you work. Upfront design will eliminate lots of down-the- road headaches. Paradox's database management lan- guage is PAL, though to present PAL as simply a DML is a misrepresentation. PAL is not what we expected. Being a procedural language, PAL is not a SQL derivative. Nor does its repertoire include typical database manipulation language statements such as SEEK_KEY and READ_RECORD and DELETE_RECQRD. Rather, PAL is a language that automates the Paradox environment. For example, the PAL command for moving to the next record in a file is DOWN, which simulates the effect of pressing the down-arrow key (hence the command's name). What makes PAL programming diffi- cult is that it resembles sending com- mands to a robot that's sitting at a key- board running Paradox. For example, the DOWN command moves to the next record if you are viewing a table. How- ever, if you are in a form (and you can execute forms from within PAL), the DOWN command moves the cursor to the next entry field on the form. A com- mand reacts differently in different states of the Paradox environment, and Paradox has many different states. The key to effective PAL programming, then, is to thoroughly learn Paradox's menus and keyboard and form designer before you try to do any serious work with PAL. The rewards will be well worth the investment in time. If, however, you simply don't want to have anything to do with PAL, you can install the Personal Programmer. Essen- tially an application builder, this program guides you through creating an applica- tion — complete with menus and forms — outputting PAL code as its final product. The people who wrote the documen- tation explaining all of Paradox's ins and outs had better be getting paid well, because they're doing a bang-up job. Borland is fast gaining a reputation for supplying good manuals with its soft- ware, and the documentation that accompanies Paradox only bolsters that reputation. Each manual is a supermar- ket of illustrated examples, each heading on a page is highlighted with a light blue bar, and Borland even put small blue arrows under the page numbers to help you quickly get your bearings as you search for a particular page number. Well done, indeed. The quality of Para- dox's documentation alone earns it a high place among this roundup of database packages. Finally, we should mention the raft of Paradox add-ons that Borland supplies: SQL Link allows you to embed SQL queries in PAL code and talk to SQL servers, the Paradox Engine provides low-level C and Pascal access to Paradox tables (see "Database Building Blocks" on page 204), and Paradox Runtime lets you build applications and distribute them to clients who don't own Paradox. R:BASE 3.1 When you start up R:Base, a command bar appears across the top of the screen. You can use a mouse or Alt key combi- nations to make selections that bring up a series of pull-down menus. But because the package's mouse support is a bit uneven, we often resorted to the keyboard. Worse, R:Base does not COMPANY INFORMATION Alpha Software 1 North Ave. Burlington, MA 01803 (617)229-2924 fax:(617)272-4876 Circle 1136 on Inquiry Card. Fox Software, Inc. 1 34 West South Boundary Perrysburg, OH 43551 (419)874-0162 fax:(419)874-8678 Circle 1139 on Inquiry Card. Nantucket Corp. 12555 West Jefferson Blvd. Los Angeles, CA 90066 (310)390-7923 fax:(310)397-5469 Circle 1142 on Inquiry Card. Borland International, Inc. Database Business Unit 1 800 Green Hills Rd. Scotts Valley, CA 95067 (408) 438-8400 Circle 1137 on Inquiry Card. Informix 4100BohannonDr. Menlo Park, CA 94025 (415)926-6300 fax:(415)322-2805 Circle 1140 on Inquiry Card. Software Products International 9920 Pacific Heights Blvd. San Diego, CA 921 21 (800) 937-4774 (619)450-1921 Circle 1143 on Inquiry Card. DataEase International 7 Cambridge Dr. Trumbull, CT 0661 1 (800)243-5123 (203)365-2317 Circle 1138 on Inquiry Card. Microrim, Inc. 15395 Southeast 30th Place Bellevue, WA 98007 206-649-9500 fax:206-146-9350 Circle 1141 on Inquiry Card. Software Publishing Corp. 8404 Sterling St. Irving, TX 75063 (800) 562-9909 fax:(214)929-1655 Circle 1144 on Inquiry Card. 242 BYTE- JANUARY 1 992 Introducing Borland's Unified Solution for Paradox, dBASE and InterBase The future of dBASE Simply stated, we're com- mitted to revitalizing dBASE 8 : delivering more power, more flexibility and better support to the whole community of dBASE users. We are using our object-oriented develop- ment techniques to accelerate releases and add substantial new features. We're adding new SQL server links, event handling and object-oriented extensions to the dBASE language. Soon, as quickly as 1992, you'll see a new dBASE for Windows and DOS, as well as compilers that generate fast, tight code. All based on Borland's proven technologies, all compatible with the existing dBASE standard. That's the Borland commitment to the dBASE community! The future of Paradox Paradox® is entering the world of objects. We're evolving PAL™ and all the Paradox interactive design tools. Using our leading edge object-oriented technology, you'll be able to visually create sophisticated Windows applications. Instantly. We'll also be introducing revolutionary database- publishing tools as well as powerful new data-modeling capabilities. More than ever, Paradox gives you instant database power on Windows or DOS. InterBase, the database server of the '90s InterBase™ is the first relational database server to satisfy the demands of online complex processing. The kind of real-world applications used in finance, banking and manufacturing. Designed for optimal per- formance in multi-platform networks, InterBase provides features targeted at the needs of highly complex database applica- tions in dynamic, distributed environments. InterBase is the clear technology leader with advances such as true peer-to-peer architec- ture, highly efficient event alerters, "smart" automatic two-phase commit and rollback, Borland's object-oriented architecture will allow Windows versions of Paradox, dBASE Quattro® Pro to work together in enterprise-wide information systems, giving you instant access to more types of data. and "By bringing two database platforms under one strong management and support orga- nization, Borland is providing a unified solution to our current database needs." - Carl Hane, Group Leader Micro Applications Systems MCI International, Inc. "Now we know that dBASE will have a bright future in Borland's hands." - Adam Green Borland, leader in customer satisfaction J.D. Power and Associates just ranked Borland "Best application software in customer satisfaction in Small to Medium-sized Businesses."* Company for company, technology for technology, Borland is your best choice. Borland, your database partner for the '90s There you have it: the best technology and the best support from the one com- pany that guarantees your software investments now and in the future. J.D. POWER AND ASSOCIATES APPLICATION SOFTWARE CUSTOMER SATISFACTION DMDEX SM i UOR) ND^ 2. WORD PERFECT 3. CLARIS 4. ALDUS 5. MICROSOFT 6. LOTUS multi-threaded sewers and instant recovery from hardware failures. For Paradox and dBASE network users, InterBase will work wonders in helping integrate your data from the desktop to the mainframe. All with unprecedented simplicity. Borland, the technology leader Borland is the pioneer of object-oriented technology. We're now at the forefront of . 32-bit computing. What this all means to you: more power, more performance and lower support costs. And that's why IBM and Novell have picked Borland as a strategic partner. IBM NOVELL® BORLAND Software Craftsmanship Choose Paradox, dBASE and InterBase today and join the thousands of corporations worldwide who have discovered the Borland advantage. Special offer to database users Buy either Paradox or dBASE right now, and get your passport to upgrade to the Windows version of the same product for only$139 a5 !t And, to inaugurate the new era of dBASE from Borland we're making this special, limited-time offer. Purchase dBASE from any dealer between October 14, 1991, and January 31, 1992, and get a $100 manufac- turer's rebate. See your dealer today or call 1-800-568-9092 for rebate information! '1991 J.O. Power and Associates' Computer End User Satisfaction Study: Phase I. Office-Based Smalt to Medium-sized Businesses. SM Responsefrom Business End Users at 1,784 business sites. Small to medium-sized businesses were based on office sites with POnp M^lfi I De,ween 1 and 4 " em P |o y ees - 1 " 1 J-D. Power and Associates' Computer End User Satisfaction Study: Phase III: Office-Based Large Businesses. SM Responses from Business End Users at 1,094 business sites. Large businesses were based on office sites with 500 or UUUt:. IVIolO | more em p| y ees j rj p owe r and Associates is a service mark of J.O. Power and Associates. fOealer prices may vary. Upgrade pricing good in U.S. and Canada only. Borland is a registered trademark of Borland International. Inc. Copyright© 1991 Borland International, Inc. All rights reserved. Bl 1433-2C Circle 22 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 23). DATABASES Sfflfe Database Features Company Product Version Alpha Software Alpha Four 1.1 Borland/Ashton-Tate dBase IV 1.1 Borland Paradox 3.5 DataEase International DataEase 4.2 Fox Software FoxPro 2.0 Platform(s) Price Field Types Integer Floating Point Currency Date Time Text Variable Length (memo! Other Impo ASCII D1F DBF SDF SYLK WK1 Other Query Language dBase SQL Proprietary Recommended Capacity DOS $549 • O O Logical DOS, Unix, Mac, VAX/VMS $795 [DOS version] DOS $795 DOS, OS/2 $795 DOS $795 Numeric Import Formats ASCII • • • • D1F • • • • DBF • • • • SDF O • O • SYLK • • O • WK1 • • • • Other PFS, WordPerfect merge FWII, RPD Quatiro Pro, Reflex Custom Paradox o o o • (QBE) O Partial implementation O RAM 640 KB 640 KB 640 KB 570 KB 640KBrec, 1.5MBXMS Disk 2.0 MB 5 MB 3-4 KB 2.5 MB 6 MB Limits Maximum # of Open Tables Maximum # of Indexes per Table Maximum Rows per Table Maximum Fields per Row Maximum Record Size 10 7 2 billion 254 4000 bytes 10 57 1 billion 255 4000 bytes 24 1 per field 256 million 255 4000 bytes, indexed 255 255 255 255 4096 bytes 99 unlimited 1 billion 255 4000 bytes Password Security User O • • Database O Table Access Levels Encryption Multiuser Support File/Table Locking Record Locking o r/w O o o • Tools Form Generator • Report Generator • Database Language o employ scroll bars, so you'll have a hard time navigating with the mouse, espe- cially when you're building a report that is wider than the screen. You'll also wish you could move fields around by click- ing and dragging the mouse while designing forms and reports. The first pull-down menu lists the databases available to you; you simply select the one you want. If you have dBase files, you can open them from this menu — along with indexes — without importing or converting them. After you select a database, another pull-down menu lists the tables associated with the 244 BYTE- JANUARY 1992 DATABASES Informix Microrim Nantucket Software Products SPC Informix-SQL R:Bose Clipper WindowBose Superbase 4 2.10.06 3.10 5.01 1.0 1.3 DOS, OS/2, Unix $795 O o DOS, OS/2 $795 DOS $795 '• O o Windows 3.0 DOS/Windows $695 • Decimal, serial Numeric Logical Boolean, datetime, image External text or graphics, logical • • • • • O • O • • O • • . O • o O • O O O o • O O o • o • O • WKS, XLS, LGS, SOL, SBF o PFS O O • • • O • O 640 KB real/1 MB prot. 640 KB 300 KB 2MB 2MB 3 MB 6 MB 3.5 MB 2MB 1.5 MB unlimited unlimited 80 unlimited 250 15 1 billion 1000 65,534 bytes 8 999 2 billion unlimited unlimited 1 billion unlimited unlimited 32,768 bytes unlimited 400 4096 bytes 255 2 billion bytes unlimited unlimited • • O • O O • O • O O • O o • • O • O n/a • o • o • • • • n/a • • O • n/a • • =yes O O = no n/o = not applicable active database. Selecting a table puts you in browse mode, from which you can view or edit your data. Other options within the table menu let you modify the structure of tables and create new tables. All the elements of a database — reports, forms, and views — are available from the main menu. To build a query, you work from the browse-mode menu. The query screen displays the column names of the select- ed table; you can select the columns you want to include in the query and set con- ditions by specifying them below the column name. Another menu selection lets you include up to five other tables in the query and link them by columns. This provides an easy way to build pow- erful queries, and you can view the results in browse mode or save the result as a separate table or as a view file. You can create an R:Base command file with any ASCII editor. The code you create is compatible with ANSI SQL, so SQL programmers should be productive right away. The applications generator is especially slick, allowing even nonprogrammers to create menu- based applications without a hitch. Experienced programmers can cut their programming time by generating an application automatically and customiz- ing the resulting code. We did run into some trouble building input forms, however. Normally, R:Base lets you refer to inactive tables by prefac- ing the column name with the table name (as in company_table. company _id). Unfortunately, the form builder does not support this type of reference. You can include multiple tables in a form, but only one form may be active at a time, and you can't refer to the columns of an inactive table. Fortunately, other features make this an easy limitation to get around. We set up our form with only one active table and used variables to look up related data in the other tables. When you do this, you may attach a command file to any field so that you can validate entries or process input — to exclude parts that cost more than $40, for instance. The report builder easily handled our sample report. We started with a quick report that automatically displayed selected columns from our parts table on the screen. We then defined lookup vari- ables to pull the name and address of the company supplying each part. By defin- ing the company ID number as a break point, we got R:Base to automatically sort on that number. A variable in the break footer summed the replacement cost of back-ordered parts for each com- pany. We also placed a variable in the report footer to return a grand total for the entire report. R:Base's biggest drawback is its slow performance. It lacks a facility to auto- matically link tables together; instead, you must manually set up a pointer (called a cursor) and then update tables by matching a key field. For this reason, R:Base does not process batch orders very quickly. JANUARY 1 992 • B Y T E 245 « & DATABASES Still, R:Base is a good choice for non- programmers. Its interface is intuitive and easy to learn, and its applications generator really works, churning out use- ful code from simple specifications. SUPERBASE 4 1.3 Built to run under Windows 3.0, Super- base 4 is a database package with some quirky but clever features. The quirk you'll notice first is the list of controls at the bottom of the program's main brows- ing screen. You'll think you're looking at the front panel of a tape deck: There's a rewind button, a fast-forward button, and even a pause button. The tape-deck paradigm fits neatly into database brows- ing. Once you enter a search criteria and skip to the target record, you can hit Fast-forward to step rapidly through the succeeding records. Hit Pause to stop on a record you're interested in, or rewind if you passed it. Because it has dynamic data exchange capabilities built in, Superbase 4 can act as a DDE server or a DDE client. This lets you, for example, link Microsoft Excel and Superbase 4 so that data retrieved from a Superbase 4 data file is inserted into the cells of an Excel spreadsheet. Working with Superbase 4's form designer is almost like using a paint pack- age. When you open a blank form, a tool- box of icons appears across the bottom of the screen. From the toolbox, you select the kinds of objects to place on the form: fields, calculations, boxes, even imported images. The system uses an intelligent hierarchy for displaying objects to govern what happens if you try to place one object on top of the other: Fields are dis- played on the top, then text, then images, and so on. Another nice feature is that the designer lets you embed commands with- in forms. The commands remain invisi- ble, jumping into action only when they detect the right type of input. Superbase 4's programming language, DML, is based on BASIC. Luckily, it's sufficiently structured — it includes IF. . .THEN. . .ELSE and CASE state- ments — and uses labels rather than line numbers. Writing programs in DML is straightforward. Superbase 4 supplies a simple editor (it will sustain life,, but that's about it). You can load and save ASCII files if you prefer to construct your DML programs in another editor. You also can enter single lines (each line may contain as many as 255 characters) of DML commands from a pull-down menu, which lets you use DML to take shortcuts. For example, if you want to clear out a database named Orders, you can open the' command line window and type REMOVE FROM FILE "ORDERS". In addition, you can use Superbase 4's DML to create start-up programs that exe- cute when you fire up Superbase 4. Other helpful features include macros, a built-in communications package you can use to send files from machine to machine, file viewing of external text or graphics files, and a LAN version with extensions to the DML for multiuser programming. In short, an abundance of features like these and good performance put Superbase 4 near the top of its database class. WINDOWBASE 1.0 Like Superbase 4, WindowBase is designed to run under Windows 3.0, but although both are graphically oriented they neither look alike nor run alike. One of WindowBase's many impor- tation selections lets you specify that the field types in the first record are stored in the first record of the import file. Win- dowBase reads the first record and "guesses" at the format of the remainder of the file based on the contents of the first record's fields. You can help it by specifying the field names and their proper types before WindowBase pro- ceeds with the rest of the file. This tech- nique made it easy to import our sample data. That's good, because the rest of the importation process was slow. Just importing into an index-free table took over 17 minutes for the 4000-item parts file. We watched impatiently as a counter displaying the percentage of completion inched its way upward. When the counter reached 100 percent, we were only halfway to being finished. After telling us it was done, Window- Base pounded the disk for at least 8 or 9 minutes before returning cursor control. Speed is definitely not the hallmark of this package. Once we built the parts table, opening it took nearly a minute and a half. Perhaps WindowBase was reading as much as it could into memory so things would run faster. As you would expect, WindowBase's form designer is graphical. Object icons appear across the top of the form-design window; tool icons line up across the bottom. You can import graphic images and embed them into your forms. Designing a form with WindowBase requires some patience and lots of SQL know-how, since SQL is the underpinning for the form designer. Every form has a governing SQL query (typically, a SELECT statement) that specifies the tables covered by the form. Fields in which data is entered or displayed are referred to as cells. The cells within a form may be controlled by the governing SQL statement, or have their own "depen- dent" SQL query (called dependent because it is contingent on a value stored in another cell). The information stored in a cell may be data or the result of a calcu- lation. Furthermore, you can use a calcu- lated cell to update a column within a table. WindowBase provides a function called external () that lets you pull data in from a table outside the form and enter that data into the current table. You also may need a bit of patience with the WindowBase documentation. Once, while we were updating the parts table to clear the back-order amounts, we got an "internal error -120" error mes- sage. We searched the manual for an error appendix but came back empty handed. A call to the company's technical support line revealed that we had uncovered a bug; the solution was to put an exclusive lock on the table. Unfortunately, this required using a command that was not in the manual, either. The technical repre- sentative we spoke with assured us that the next release would include the correc- tion and the new command. Other deficiencies in the manual caused more problems. For instance, we needed to know whether you can find out if a database already has any indexes defined. The manual offered no help, and we concluded that, unless you keep 246 BYTE* JANUARY 1 992 PC DIAGNOSTICS MADE EASY SPEED TEST YOUR PC You've seen the Landmark Speed Rating advertised by many major PC manu- facturers, now you can have your own copy of the Landmark System Speed Tesr. Accurately measure CPU, math, and video speeds to make an informed purchasing decision, determine the best PC for the job or maybe just win some bets in the office on whose PC is reallyi aster! Includes the Landmark AT CMOS RAM Setup program to update your system configuration on-the-fly. CALL for current pricingl *JJ>>n(lil [A' '■«! CSm^t Re SF &F" 1 3h. lt .-rr ( -,i :.. .. 77 ,0, .1 m ' !Tt '™, ,,* *. „. » M ,., w " V . .oc.^o^^mJ'Z ™ ualnl „ v*. !■ witn' THE 5 MINUTE SOLUTION TO FLOPPY DRIVE FAILURE With Aligniryoucan clean, diagnose, and align your flop- py drives in minutes without a scope. Patented technology requires only ascrewdriverto perlorm ANSI-accurate alignments (.3 mil). Alignlt is ideal for corporate users with 2 or more PCs be- cause it includes a "GOLD STANDARD" feature so you can align all your PCs to the same in-house standard, guaran- teeing that all your floppies are perfectly interchangeable between PCs. 80% of all floppy drive failures can be fixed with Alignlt. So don't replace your drive, save time and money instead. Includes dual size floppies, (both high and low density) and no-mess pre-lubricated cleaning diskettes (both sizes) good for 180 uses. Replacements and single drive size ver- sions available. For all PCs and compatibles. CALL for current pricingl PC WONT BOOT? THEN JUST KICKSTART IT! Don't replace your motherboard, use KickStart 2™. When serious hardware problems occur, nothing gets you up and running as fast. KickStart 2 measures power within 2.5% on all four voltages, shows Power-On Self-Test (POST) failure codes, and features on-board ROM-based diagnos- tics allowing you to determine and remedy the problem quickly, easily, and inexpensively! Built-in serial and parallel I/O allows for testing via modem, or simply logging results to a remote terminal, printer or laptop. You can configure your own test routines and store them in KickStart 2's battery backed-up CMOS RAM saving valuable setup time. Includes serial and parallel loopback plugs and Landmark JumpStart™ AT ROM BIOS for testing PCs that don't issue POST codes. KickStart 2 tests your system regardless of O/S (even UNIX). On-board switches, LEDs, and digital displays allow com- plete control over testing in systems lacking video or disk (ideal for motherboard or system burn-in). KickStart 2 is the ultimate SECURITY CARD too! With both supervisor and user levels of password protection, you can prevent unauthorized use of your PC and accidental run- ning of destructive tests. CALL for current pricingl "KickStart 2 system diagnostics board helps users check out virtually every aspect of a PC's hardware system... the board is a worthy investment for com- puter maintenance. " David Claiborne, PC Week HOW TO DEBUG A DEAD PC Need an inexpensive solution ior dead or problematic PCs and motherboards? Try KickStart 1" or JumpStart ROM POST, two quick and easy to use debugging tools. KickStart 1 test card shows power status on all four volt- ages and binary PORT 80 Power-On Self-Test codes. The manual translates error codes for easy failed circuit isola- tion. CALL for current pricingl JumpStart ROM POST is a plug-in chip designed to replace your motherboard BIOS for testing purposes. Tests include CPU registerand logic, 8087 math coprocessor, 8253 tim- er, 8237 DMA controller, 8259 interrupt controller, parity error and memory refresh logic, erroneous maskable/non- maskable interrupt detection, display adapter (MDA, CGA, EGA), keyboard, keyboard controller, floppy controller, drive A: read Base memory at normal & slow refresh rates, and POST checksum. Display of motherboard switch configuration. CALL for current pricingl PROFESSIONAL LEVEL PC TROUBLESHOOTING Landmark Service Diagnostics™ is ideal for professionals requiring the most exhaustive diagnostic test capabilities. Each module is CPU specific, including PC, XT, AT, 386/ 486, and PS/2. Since 1981 major manufacturers like Wang, Xerox, Prime, Sony, DEC, NEC, and NCR have relied on Service Diagnostics to tackle their toughest operating problems. Intended for professional service and repair technicians, Service Diagnostics is also easy to use for the novice. Clear, concise on-line help and intuitive menus make finding system problems a breeze. Tests all CPUs, math chips, all memory, floppy, fixed and non-standard disk drives, standard/non-standard printers, system board, video, com ports and all keyboards. Utilities include low- level reformat, log bad sectors, edit bad sector table; the partition editor allows you to set up multiple partitions; back-up program transfers hard disk image on unformat- ted floppies and allows for restore after reformat. Ideal for UNIX and other operating systems, the self- booting version doesn't require DOS. The manual offers troubleshooting tips to the component level. Also available in a complete Kit including: all CPU specific software, dual size floppy alignment software (see Alignlt), and PC/XT & AT ROM POSTS. PC Magazine Editor's Choice B/90. "Overall, Service Diagnostics: The Kit was the best performer. (You can) locate and identify most of the computer problems you'll ever encounter. If you're running a service department, Service Diagnostics is not an option, it's a necessity." Bill O'Brien, PC Magazine • Service Diagnostics XT/AT KiL.SAVE $$ CALL NOW • • Service Diagnostics PS/2 KiL.SAVE $$ CALL NOW • • XT ROM POST ...SAVE $$ CALL NOW • • AT ROM POST...SAVE $$ CALL NOW • -- Individual pricing available on all kit components, please inquire - KickStart 2 is ideal for permanent installation. It eliminates the need for an I/O card, provides remote and on-site diagnostic capabilities for quick repair time and offers a solid hardware based solution to unauthorized access with impenetrable password protection. SLASH DOWNTIME AND OPERATING PROBLEMS r mark* IUHMWHtMi CoBfigwc Lui.i ' SuTc-lModc ■ s ',::« K^CUlrT.IL'L-ttlTl.-^ J-: .-, ...'■: ril-.ll VII I\1S'S :..... ■ ttSuiu^H ■HI : RiMl-Timc Clock ' : CMOS RAM With PC Probe™ you'll save time and money when your PC starts acting up. In one easy-to-use package you get Diagnostics, Virus Protection (for over 700+ known virus- es), Benchmarks, Performance Enhancement Utilities, and System Information. Combined, this arsenal of tools will keep your system up and running at peak performance and remove the mystery about what's inside. PC Probe diagnostic testing quickly isolates the source of hardware problems, even locating bad RAM chips. It tests system board, RAM, video, keyboard, com ports, floppy drive, hard drive, Ethernet card and more. Run PC Probe tests in batch mode or single pass, remote or on-site. PC Probe allows you to increase your hard drive data transfer rate by determining optimum interleave and changing it, prevent catastrophic datalossby performing data revitalization, reformats hard drive, run external pro- grams, display and edit CMOS RAM on-the-fly, prevent accidental hard drive data destruction with passwords, diagnose problems with device drivers installed. The 200 page on-line manual has built-in table of contents, topic/text search, and troubleshooting tips. PC Probe comes with dual size floppies and 9 & 25 pin serial/parallel port loopback plugs. For PC XT, AT, 386, 486 and compatibles using DOS 2.0 or higher. CALL for current pricingl • Toll-Free Lifetime Tech Support • 90 Day Money-Back Guarantee • Federal Express Shipping CALL (800) 683-6696 Fax (813) 443-6603 •Voice (813) 443-1331 Dealer Inquiries Welcome niANDMARK RESEARCH INTERNATIONAL CORPORATION First in PC Testing... Since 1981 703 Grand Central Street • Clearwater, Florida 34616 Copyright ©1991. PC Probe. Alignlt, KickStart, JumpStart, ROM POST.andServtce Diag- nostics are trademarks of Landmark Research International Corp. All Rights Reserved. Othernamesaretrademarksofthelrassociatedowners. Circle 1 61 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 1 62). DATABASES good notes on your databases, the only way to find out what indexes you have defined is to create an index. If you don't get an error message, you haven't defined any indexes. Can you change a column's data type? Again, no clue... you have to try it. Apparently, you can change its name, but to change its type you have to delete the column and re- create it (which involves an additional update step to put back the data that the delete will destroy) or dip into SQL and issue an ALTER COLUMN command. WindowBase obviously is still rough around the edges and needs a serious performance tune-up. But the package has promising features. It supports DDE and SQL, and the forms designer can create powerful data input screens. We look forward to the next version. So What Did We Think? The results of our performance for this crop of database packages tell some of the story. As the graphs show, both SQL- based programs had trouble with our batch-order test. Because we were simply unable to modify our SQL version of the batch-order test to run under Window- Base SQL, no results are posted for that program. Informix could run the test since it permits a SELECT subquery within the SET clause of an UPDATE statement. FoxPro was the overall performance leader with Clipper and Paradox close behind. Except for the SQL packages, all the products scored very well. In defense of Informix's poor showing, a batch- order processing test doesn't give SQL much of an opportunity to show off its strong points. Those products that could handle items one record at a time natu- rally fared better. Our favorite Windows database pack- age was Superbase 4. We were won over partly by its responsiveness, but mainly by its wealth of features. Paradox also is at the top of our list. Its query-by-exam- ple format is easily mastered. The docu- mentation is the best you'll find, so you're never far from the solution to any problems that arise with the package. Our only caveat for first-time users is to spend plenty of time toning up their Paradox muscles before tackling PAL. In the end, though, the laurel wreath went to FoxPro. The interface boasts a convenient mixture of easy-to-use menus and a convenient command win- dow. FoxPro also delivers an outstand- ing help facility and all the tools for automatic generation of forms, reports, queries, and applications. And its per- formance is phenomenal. ■ Rick Grehan is technical director and Stanford Diehl is a testing editor/engi- neer for the BYTE Lab. Rick has a B.S. in physics and applied mathematics and an M.S. in mathematics/computer sci- ence. His work with database systems extends back to the late 1970s. Stan wrote the BYTE benchmarks for database applications, notebook comput- ers, monitors, and PCL printers. While in the Air Force, he maintained secure communications equipment for com- mand -and -control operations. In indus- try, Stan worked at Raytheon as an engi- neer. Additionally, he developed a database inventory control system for the United Arab Emirates. You can reach Rick and Stan on BIX as "rick-g " and "sdiehl, " respectively. u . . .ISYS replaces ZylNDEX for DOS as the industry standard for unstructured DOS text retrieval programs." 1 pc sources 11/91 ISYS ZylNDEX SEARCH CAPABILITIES 2.0 3 1 for DOS • Full range of capabilities: Boolean logic, Proximity, Wildcard and Phrase searches. YES YES SEOFUSE iferminate-and-stay-resident. (TSR) option; ability to run search without leaving your document YES NO • Activate word processing documents from within the search program. YES NO • Cut and Paste to anywhere in your document. YES NO • All functions from main menu. No need to return to DOS to execute functions. YES NO Text retrieval faster than a speeding bullet... ie. PERFORMANCE middle of something. Without exiting your work, pop up ISYS, get what you ' Consistently faster indexing and retrieval need, then copy and paste it into whatever you're working on! , # Nehvork P ric ' in S based on concurrent W * TFCH SUPPORT Don't take our word for it. PC Week, MayJ 99 1 , rated ISYStops in flexibility . unlimited toll-free technical support. and functionality, aswell as file compatibility and quality of documentation* Consistently faster indexing and retrieval* YES NO Network pricing based on concurrent usage. YES NO YES NO $99 TRADE-IN OFFER: Send us your ZylNDEX disk and receive your ISYS replacement by return mail. $395 value. Free ISYS Demo Disk: 1-800-992-ISYS (l-ROO-992-4797) ' 17th Floor, 3900 West Alameda Avenue, Burbank, CA 91505, (818) 972-1798 Fax (818) 972-1636 es between 25% and 53% faster than ZylNDEX, i * r! „i tt 01 a * m l n *i..i-w c-.A I decei I cdc. *»i k\ ;d by PC Week Labs on identical databases). C,rde 2 ™° n ,nqu,ry Card i RESELLERS - ™ *) . © 1992 The Windows Database E»t L* fl«»y tt*Mtt HHctiu.n.i HawKtnm WindowBase is Easy to Use Point and click Windows tools assist in defining database tables, in designing forms and reports, and in building simple or complex queries to make retrieving data a snap. WindowBase is Windows Integration Powerful DDE supports the exchange of data and graphics with other Windows applications such as spreadsheets and word processors. The WindowBase Menuing System enables the user to automate the access of data through forms, reports and SQL queries via customized drop-down menu selections. Or set-up menus to invoke a spreadsheet and automatically open charts and tables, or start-up a word processor and initiate a mail-merge application. WindowBase brings it all together in a simple to use application. The WindowBase Guarantee No matter what business you're in, WindowBase is guaranteed to work for you. It gives you the power to easily organize, manage and analyze almost any type of information. If you don't think WindowBase is the easiest database you've ever used, return it with your receipt within 30 clays, and you'll get your money back. It's that simple. sim SPI See your dealer or call now 1-800-937-4774 Software Products International 9920 Pacific Heights Boulevard San Diego, CA 92121 All pKx.hit.1 runic* and trademark* are the property erf ilu-ir respeut Circle 151 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 152). HARDWARE Tweaking Windows: New Adapters Boost Speed and Clarity ALAN JOCH Now that the dust over Windows 3.0 has settled, many businesspeople are finding that this GUI is not without its problems. The performance overhead it levies on standard systems, such as 386s and 386SXs, slows many applications to less than blinding speeds. Consequently, screen redraws, menu displays, text scrolls, and other essential Windows operations can be too slow for some people to work comfortably. For others, these delays are reason enough to avoid Windows. But in problems lie potential opportu- nities, and several hardware vendors have recently introduced graphics boards designed specifically to accelerate com- mon Windows functions. I looked at six of these new accelerators: ATI Technol- ogies' Graphics Ultra, Actix Systems' Quantum, STB Systems' Wind/X, Or- chid Technology's Fahrenheit 1280, BCC's TIGA-10, and Artist Graphics' WinSpeed 100. In addition to speeding Windows per- formance, these boards provide a bridge to another developing trend— the high- er-than-standard-VGA resolutions that provide sharper icon and text displays. When teamed with new 15- to 18-inch monitors, which are priced at points that used to define the 14-inch market, the accelerators give businesspeople large, clear, and flicker-free video desktops for the lowest prices ever. The Playing Field For this review, I chose boards from ven- dors that were shipping commercial ver- sions of hardware and drivers in time for testing (more boards will have been in- troduced by the time you read this) . Each adapter includes on-board processors and software drivers optimized to accel- erate window scrolls, cursor movement, redraws, and other tasks. All the boards cost less than $900, and some sell for less than $500. All come with 1 MB of video RAM (VRAM). Similarities aside, this group of six show some fundamental differences in approach to the Windows acceleration problem. The most obvious difference is in coprocessors. For example, the boards from Actix, Orchid, and STB rely on the new 86C911 chip from S3, Inc. This VGA-compatible processor boosts Win- dows performance by off-loading from the CPU such functions as cursor move- ment, line drawing, and rectangle fills. The other three boards variously use a proprietary processor or competing products from Chips & Technologies and Texas Instruments. Conceding the tough competition in this market, some of the board vendors don't stop at speeding up Windows: All promised or were shipping drivers for AutoCAD, Lotus 1-2-3, GEM Desktop, Ventura Publisher, and other applica- tions. A couple of vendors sell accelera- tors that come with a built-in mouse port and mouse. One even includes its own version of scalable screen fonts. Speed Tests I tested the boards under Windows 3.0 using NotePad and Windows applications to re-create real-world experiences as much as possible. My test system was a Compaq 386/20 running Compaq DOS 4.01. My monitor was Nanao's FlexScan 9080i, a 16-inch multifrequency display. I tested each board at 1024 by 768 pixels by 256 colors at the highest vertical re- fresh rate, which for this group of boards was either 70 or 72 Hz. My objective evaluations consisted of timed tests, including a five-page text scroll within NotePad. I recorded the times of multiple trials scrolling text both forward and backward. Next, I created an Aldus PageMaker file made up of three filled geometric shapes, and I timed horizontal screen scrolls forward 250 BYTE- JANUARY 1 992 PHOTOGRAPHY: SCOTT PARKER /AVIS STUDIO ©1992 BVTE ACTION SUMMARY WHATWINDOWS ACCELERATORS DO These graphics adapters provide at least 1024- by 768-pixel resolution and coprocessors that speed standard Windows operations such as screen redraws, text scrolls, and menu displays. LIKES Menu selections unfold instantaneously, repositioned windows redraw with a mouse- click, and you can scroll through pages of text two to four times faster than with Super VGA boards. I DISLIKES The lack of clarity in some displays and only incremental performance increases in others. I RECOMMENDATIONS The S3-based boards offer the best values in price and performance, and, of these, STB's Wind/X provides the added advantage of a mouse port that can free up an expansion slot. I PRICES Fahrenheit 1280, $499 Graphics Ultra, $899 Quantum, $499 TIGA-10,$495($100for optional VGA daughtercard) WinSpeedl00,$395 Wind/X, $499 and backward. Finally, I scrolled an Ami Pro text file in 12-point Times Ro- man in a similar manner. In practice, these tasks can mean the difference be- tween getting your work done efficiently or having enough idle time to ask your- self whether or not the Windows inter- face is really worth its pokiness. My baseline comparison was Orchid's ProDesigner II, a 1-MB Super VGA card built around the Tseng Labs ET4000 chip. Although relatively fast, the Pro- Designer II isn't optimized for Win- dows. As the results in the figure show, a natural break appears in the perfor- mance rankings. The Graphics Ultra and the S3 contestants were invariably the fastest boards. The 34010-based TIGA- 10 and the WinSpeed 100 fell between the leading accelerators and the Pro- Designer II. One exception to this came in my PageMaker tests: The WinSpeed 100 actually lagged behind all entrants, including the ProDesigner II. In the Beholder's Eye Similarly, I conducted a series of subjec- tive tests to gauge how comfortably I could work in the Windows environment. Because winding through menu trees can be tediously slow on some systems, I JANUARY 1992 • B Y T E 251 TWEAKING WINDOWS APPLICATION TESTS Graphics Ultra Fahrenheit 1280 Wind/X Quantum TIGA-10 WinSpeed 100 Pro-Designer II < Better J_ Worse ► — pi I g 1 i r T aa 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 110 120 130 140 150 160 Seconds I I NotePad I PageMaker I I Ami Pro ATI's Graphics Ultra and the three S3-based boards consistently ranked at the top of the performance tests. In most cases, the leading boards ran four to six times faster than the baseline Super VGA adapter, Orchid Technology's ProDesigner II. judged the speed with which each board displayed pull-down selections and sub- menus. Timings were impossible be- cause most of the boards sped up re- sponse times to a flash. Again my basis for comparison was the ProDesigner II: When I clicked on a main menu selection while running that board, I noted a slight but annoying hitch as I waited for the menu to unfold. Similarly, when I moved open windows around the screen, the redraws were not instantaneous. Only the WinSpeed was unable to eliminate these hitches; the re- maining boards boosted redraws enough to achieve an almost immediate response time. Display quality is also subjective, but I found generally good news in this area. All the boards produced clear displays. Some of them, including the plodding WinSpeed, excelled with crisp icons and text that remained readable even at small sizes. Overall, each board achieved its stated goal of improving the Windows experi- ence, although differences in effective- ness, degree of acceleration, installation, and price were obvious. Performance Leader At $899 for the 1-MB VRAM version, ATI's Graphics Ultra commands the highest price of the tested accelerators. Graphics Ultra Based on performance and bundled ex- tras, the Ultra makes a strong case for justifying its price tag. For example, the Ultra leads the field in two of the three performance tests. It ran six times faster than the ProDesigner II in the NotePad and PageMaker com- parisons, and it boosted Ami Pro screen scrolls two times faster than the baseline board. The Ultra teams a proprietary Mach 8 coprocessor, an 85 14/ A clone, with an on-board VGA controller for compatibil- ity across the range of low and high reso- lutions up to 1024 by 768 pixels by 256 colors noninterlaced at 72 Hz. A mouse port and Microsoft-compatible mouse come standard with the board. Unique among the tested products are the scalable screen fonts that ATI bundles with the accelerator. Like Adobe Type Manager and similar products, these fonts, called Crystal Fonts, produce high-resolution letters to make proofing and reading of small text easier. Appar- ent resolution increases, thanks to the antialiasing algorithm that adds shades of gray to smooth jagged edges of letters. ATI plans to offer a package of 35 addi- tional Crystal Fonts and support for True Type and Bitstream and Adobe font con- verters. The package should be available by the time you read this; however, ATI had not established final pricing at press time. After installing the board, I loaded the software drivers using ATI's installation program, which provides menus for con- figuring monitor types or adding device drivers and Crystal Fonts. In addition to the Windows drivers I tested, the Ultra also ships with drivers for GEM Desk- top, Lotus 1-2-3, AutoCAD, and Ventura Publisher. As I've already mentioned, the Ultra placed at or near the top in each of the performance tests. In addition, selected menus and repositioned windows ap- peared instantaneously after my mouse- clicks. Less impressive, however, was the 252 BYTE- JANUARY 1992 ViewSonic 7 Rated #1 by InfdM! 20-Inch These two new 1280 x 1024 ultra high resolution monitors will soon be in offices all over the worldThat's because they're so powerful! Consider this: Our 17" and 20" non-interlaced microprocessor-ennanced monitors will automatically adjust the image tjhe way you want. There are 16 preset modes which can be programmed by the efid-useiL With buHj^in memory, these monitors do what you want,;and they don't forget. Plus the crystal clarity and s^harp focus on the non-glare, anti-static screen are simply unbeatable. NQ distortion and low radiation. The ViewSonic 7 even.has a flat/square screen. The ViewSonic 7 (17") and ViewSonic 8 (20") feature a new level of high performance for desktop publishing, CAD/CAM and other graphics-intensive applications. They are designed for PCs; Mac II and Sun systems. 17-Inch ViewSonic? September 2, 1991 Visit your dealer TODAY and see for yourself why ViewSonic monitors, from the 14" to the 20", are becoming a standard in offices throughout the world. ViewSonic® 12130 Mora Drive Santa Fe Springs, CA 90670 (213) 946-071 1 (800) 888-8583 .•Ml products and hrand names arc trademarks of their respective companies. Fax (213) 946-1618 INTERNATIONAL DISTRIBUTORS: Australia (024764777, Fax: 02477-7561); Austria (04252-2700, Fax: 0452-3177); Canada (416-479-5525, Fax: 416479-1834 and 604-270-8561, Fax: 604-270-1953); Germany (0431-548030, Fax? 0431-5480366 and 05732-101932, Fax:05732-101947) Hong Kong (389-8252. Fax: 343-6479); Italy (02-82442156; Fax: 02-8256993); Korea (02-784-2915, Fax: 02-784- 2549); Poland (39-120314, Fax: 39-120314) Spain (93-419-2322, Fax: 93-419-1 178); Taiwan (02-2484072, Fax: 02-240-8238) >***> "' Circle 176 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 177). TWEAKING WINDOWS screen display. The board provided no- ticeable improvement in display quality over the ProDesigner II, but compared to other contenders in this review, the Ul- tra's display was lacking. Icons in Ami Pro were recognizable, but the scissors and other toolbox items looked blurry. Also, the boldfaced main menu text looked muddy, while the Roman fonts identifying applications in the Windows Program Manager were fuzzy. Gang of Three The S3-based products— the Quantum, the Wind/X, and the Fahrenheit 1280— jockeyed for position at the top of the per- formance tests. Although the Ultra often prevailed, the lower-priced S3 pack was never far behind. In the three speed tests, Quantum the S3-based boards accelerated perfor- mance from 2 Vi to 5 times faster than the ProDesigner II. The base price of each board was $499. They each offer Windows resolutions of up to 1280 by 960 pixels with 16 colors interlaced at 43 Hz, or 1024 by 768 pixels with 256 colors noninterlaced at 70 or 72 Hz. Upon availability, each ven- dor planned to offer the Sierra "high- color" RAMDAC and driver for display of 32,768 colors in the 800- by 600-pixel modes. In addition to the Windows 3.0 drivers that I tested, the board vendors also planned to have available by the be- ginning of the year applications driv- ers for AutoCAD, Generic CADD, Ventura Publisher, Lotus 1-2-3, GEM Desktop, and oth- er packages. The Quantum from Actix Sys- tems was easy to install. I needed only to set some DIP switches to configure it for 1024- by 768-pixel operation at 72 Hz. I installed the Wlnd/X board's Windows drivers through the standard Win- dows-installation routine. Documentation was sparse, but it did not leave me with any unan- swered questions. Once installed, the board provided a crisp display. It never led in any of my speed tests, but it ranged in the upper tier. Actix plans to include the Sierra RAM- DAC as part of the board's price (the test board had nei- ther the RAMDAC nor the drivers). The Wind/X performed similarly to the Quantum and differentiated itself with some extras. The board includes a mouse port and Logitech MouseMan. If you already have a mouse installed, you can set a jumper to disable the accelera- tor-based pointer. Like other graphics adapters from STB Systems, the Wind/X comes with a D/A converter that accepts the Sierra chip. Pending availability, STB will of- fer the RAMDAC as a $60 option over the board's base price. Various jumpers allow you to select 8- or 16-bit BIOS interfaces, depending on whether you'll be running in protected- mode environments. Also, jumpers let you configure system clock speeds for monitor resolutions. I left the default set- tings in place— except for setting jumpers for 1024 by 768 pixels at 70 Hz, non- interlaced—and plugged in the board. I loaded the drivers from the Windows Setup and quickly had the accelerator up and running. Installing Or- chid's Fahrenheit 1280 requires you to check and per- haps reset various DIP switches for monitor resolu- tions and refresh rates. Software drivers load using the standard Win- dows Setup. Overall, the Fahrenheit 1280 performed as I ex- pected based on the results of the Fahrenheit 1280 other S3-based boards, except that the driver snowed a slight bug when I experimented within PageMak- er. I drew some squares and rect- angles, and when I selected one of the shapes with the Marquee tool and then deleted the shape, unwanted castoffs in the form of stray lines remained on the screen. These lines disappeared with a screen re- paint. The com- pany says that fu- ture versions of the software should correct this problem. The three S3 boards all performed similarly. Displays were crisp and clear, and menus appeared instantly. I experi- enced no compatibility problems when I TIGA-10 had Windows set up in standard VGA mode. Inexpensive 34010 BCC's TIGA-10 accelerator illustrates how far prices for the TMS34010 copro- cessor have fallen recently. Once the do- main of higher-end CAD applications, Texas Instruments' 34010 chip is now economical enough to compete in the general business market. However, taken in this context, the TIGA-10 looks somewhat idiosyncratic compared to its challengers. Lacking 254 BYTE' JANUARY 1992 NewWave for Windows. Never has $89 done so much foryour organization. The premier desktop managerfor Windows that does a lot more for your organization. Now at a price thaVs a lot less than what you'd expect Thke a look at all you get: Icons: NewWave turns all of your existing DOS and Windows programs and files into icons for an easier-to- > use desktop. Files can have 32 character names. Easily move files around the desktop by "dragging and dropping." File Cabinet: On your real desk are . documents in folders. Your folders are in a file cabinet. NewWave organizes your PC desktop the same way - by project with folder icons, and with a file cabinet for storing folders. Folders: Finally, you can file your spreadsheet, word processor and graphics documents together by proj- ect, for easy access. Launch & Load: Just click on an icon- both the file and it's program open . simultaneously- NewWave has linked them together automatically. This means you no longer need to under- stand the Windows program and file managers to get your work done. The Work Group Library makes it easier for you to share information with co-workers. We've done away with network menus and DOS commands, so you can focus on what you want to do — to share information with colleagues as you work together on the same project. Tb share text, graphics, and even spreadsheets, simply drag the file icon onto the server icon and your document is immediately available to others on your network. NewWave will track revisions, as well. So an entire group can work on your project and you will know when data has been changed and who has changed it. Welcome to document sharing, the easy way; the NewWave way Action Edit Objects View Settings Jask Help NewWave's Agent brings automation to Windows. Let ' "The Agent" watch you complete a task just once, like the monthly update of a budget or sales report, and he'll com- plete the same job for you again and again using your existing software applications. You can even automate "The Agent" to work across applications and networks to gather the information you need. And he's far easier to set up than the Windows' macro-recorder-because he remembers your steps while you execute them and allows you to edit right then or make changes later. By using his calendar; you can schedule work for him days or weeks in advance. Just think of how much extra time you'll save by turning " The Agent" loose on all of your recurring tasks. Put NewWave to work for your organization and find out how easy it is to get more done. Now it's only $89. At a price like this it pays to be organized. Call 1-800-848-WAVE ext. 31 and get NewWave for only $89* (suggested retail price $195). But only if you call before 1/30/92. "Limited time offer. Limit one per customer. HP NewWave 3.0 NewWave for Windows. WeVe made a great idea even better. Whnl HEWLETT mL'HM PACKARD Circle 71 on Inquiry Card. TWEAKING WINDOWS VGA compatibility, the TIGA-10 must connect to a separate compliant graphics adapter for when you're running DOS or applications without TIGA drivers. As an alternative to this two-slot solution, BCC sells a VGA daughtercard for $ 100. As part of the standard package, BCC includes drivers for Windows, Auto- CAD, AutoShade, 3D Studio, and Word- Perfect with the TIGA-10. The 60-MHz TIGA-10 displayed a maximum of 1024 by 768 pixels by 256 colors noninterlaced. BCC provides a utility to check for any potential I/O- address or interrupt conflicts that might exist before you install the TIGA-10. After running this utility, I then plugged the card into an expansion slot and con- nected the VGA pass-through cable to the ProDesigner II in an adjacent slot. An in- stallation program steps you through configuring the board. After rebooting, you load the Windows drivers in the stan- dard way. Windows performance improved no- ticeably, but the TIGA-10 lagged behind the products that I've already mentioned. Overall, the board ran the Windows tests roughly twice as fast as the ProDesigner II, yet this represented a clear and slower difference compared to other products. In use, this meant delays in seeing menus unfold and windows redrawn. In terms of display quality, the TIGA- 10 ranks as one of the best. Text was sharp, and icons were easily identifiable. In the scissors icon in Ami Pro's toolbox, each blade and handle hole was clearly defined. Clear But Slow Built around the Chips & Technologies 453 processor, Artist Graphics' Win- WlnSpeed 100 Speed 100 has the lowest price in this roundup: $395. Although that price pro- vides you with an inexpensive entry point into 1024- by 768-pixel by 256- color displays, the board is a questionable Windows accelerator. In the NotePad and Ami Pro tests, the WinSpeed 100 ran only about 1 Va times faster than the ProDesigner II. In the PageMaker test, the WinSpeed brought up the rear— almost a full second behind the baseline board. Menus opened with a delay that appeared comparable to the ProDesigner' s. The same was true for redraw times when I repositioned win- dows. This disappointing performance is tempered somewhat by the clarity of the display. Like the TIGA-10's, the Win- Speed's display was among the clearest and brightest in this roundup. The Windows Winners To varying degrees, all these products deliver on the promise of faster, high- resolution Windows applications. And as new and more expansive versions of Windows and OS/2 appear in the coming months, hardware-based acceleration may become even more important. The growth of high-resolution, large-screen monitors could also give impetus to the popularity of these boards, as competi- tion forces their prices down to commod- ity levels. Then, as now, the accelerators provide a needed boost for those who have com- mitted their workdays to Windows. Al- though quite economical, the WinSpeed 100 didn't offer enough of a performance advantage to compete effectively in this category. , The TIGA-10, with its proven 34010 coprocessor, is a solid product, but with- in the narrow context of Windows ac- celerators, I found other coprocessors to be more efficient. Likewise, I liked the Graphics Ultra's overall performance and appreciated ATI's attempts at value- added extras. However, the Ultra's list price of $899 is more than I'd be pre- pared to pay if my primary goal was ac- celerating Windows. For those who also need to combine a powerful processor with AutoCAD display list drivers for faster redraws, pans, and zooms, the ca- pabilities of the Ultra and the TIGA-10 become more valuable. In the end, I found the prices, speed, and clarity of the S3-based boards im- possible to pass up for Windows work. Within this group, price and perfor- mance are equal. So, ultimately, I give the nod to STB Systems' Wind/X. I don't need a mouse, but, like many people, I'd love to free up a slot as I plow through Windows applications with greater speed and clarity. ■ Alan Joch is a technical editor for the BYTE Lab. You can reach him on BIX as "ajoch. " j COMPANY INFORMATION Actix Systems, Inc. ATI Technologies, Inc. Orchid Technology (Quantum) (Graphics Ultra) (Fahrenheit 1280, ProDesigner II) 4633 Old Ironsides Dr. , 3761 Victoria Park Ave. 45365 Northport Loop W Suite 310 Scarborough, Ontario, Fremont, CA 94538 Santa Clara, CA 95054 Canada M1W 3S2 (415) 683-0300 (800) 927-5557 (416)756-0718 Circle 1237 on Inquiry Card. (408) 986-1625 fax: (416) 756-0720 fax: (408) 986-1646 Circle 1235 on Inquiry Card. STB Systems, Inc. Circle 1233 on Inquiry Card. (Wind/X) BCC 1651 North Glenville, Artist Graphics (TIGA-10) Suite 210 (WinSpeed 100) 174 Component Dr. Richardson, TX 75081 2675 Patton Rd. San Jose, CA 95131 (214) 234-8750 St. Paul, MN 55113 (408) 944-9000 fax: (214) 234-1306 (612)631-7800 fax: (408) 944-9001 Circle 1 238 on Inquiry Card. fax:(612)631-7802 Circle 1236 on Inquiry Card. Circle 1 234 on Inquiry Card. 256 BYTE- JANUARY 1992 Fasten your seat belt and snap in the new Hercules Graphics Station GOLD! Windows acceleration plus: • 32,768 colors • Graphics processor • High resolution • VRAM • High refresh rat< felfflW WARNING! FAST WINDOWS AHEAD ' WiWH*"* ■ V*vW;* Hercules Graphics St High-speed, true color Windows . . . and much more! Call 1-800-532-0600 for details. fflllwii»^^ Circle 69 on Inquiry Card. INTRODUCING DRDOS. 6.0 THE DOS THAT CONQUERS SPACE... AND BEVOND More memory applications. Twice the hard disk space. Superior productivity. DRDOS® 6.0 is here. A major upgrade to the award- winning DRDOS® 5.0, this is theDOS operating system that conquers the limita- tions of your PCs memory and hard disk space. Fully DOS-com- patible, with free product lifetime support, its the best thing that ever happened to DOS. DRDOS 6.0 lets you run even the biggest DOS and Windows appli- cations. It loads itself into upper and high memory along with buffers, device drivers, TSRs, and network drivers - delivering con- sistently more memory than the competition on Intel 8088/86, 80286, 386 and i486 PCs and compatibles. Make your PC work for you, not against you. Give your applications more room to run. Don't get a new hard drive, lust get a new DOS. With DRDOS 6.0 s optional file compression, a typical40MB harddisk can holdup to 80MB of data! You also get a high perfor- mance disk cache for dramatical- ly improved software performance. And a disk def ragmentation utility for speedier data access. DRDOS 6.0 gives you the most advanced DOS technology, plus comprehensive password security to protect your system and data, on-line help and docu- mentation, lightning-fast task switching for improved produc- tivity, file recovery commands and much more. Expand your PCs universe withDR DOS 6.0. Let us fax you the facts, or call us for details and the name of the DR DOS reseller nearest you. Get the facts by fax: 1-800-955-DOS6 Request Document 602 Or call ms at: 1 -800-2 74-4DRI MS DOS MS 5.0 DRDOS 3.X UPGRADE 6.0 FULLY DOS-COMPATIBLE MAXIMUM MEMORY ON 1386 & i486 PCs MAXIMUM MEMORY ON 80286 PCs MAXIMUM MEMORY ON 8086/8B PCs DOUBLE THE STORAGE CAPACITY OF TYPICAL HARD DISK READ & WRITE HIGH-PERFORMANCE DISK CACHE DISK DEFRAGMENTATION COMPREHENSIVE PASSWORD SECURITY SYSTEM UNDELETE TASK SWITCHING (NO. OF TASKS) FASTTASK SWITCHING VIA COMMAND LINE OR GRAPHICAL SHELL USING EXPANDED/EXTENDED MEMORY CUT & PASTE BETWEEN TASKS ON-LINE DOCUMENTATION & HELP PC-T0--PC FILE TRANSFER FREE PRODUCT LIFETIME SUPPORT FULLY BOOTABLE » EVEN tfTER INTENSIVE DISK US£ 575k 621k 575k 621k S88k 578k 627k 628k 612k Digital Research. WE MAKE COMPUTERS WORK Digital Reseaich and DR DOS are registered tiademaiks and the Digital Research logo is o trademark of Digital Reseoieh Inc. All other brand, product, ar company names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners. Copyright © 1 991 Digital Research Inc. Circle 53 on Inquiry Card. REVIEWS APPLICATION Ample Waves of Data: Five Tools to Help You Stay Afloat PETER WAYNER One of the curses of the computer age is the tidal wave of data that can wash over us each day. For exam- ple, my local supermarket now offers coupon discounts to shoppers who pro- vide their names along with cash-register receipts. Although this ruse raises con- cerns about privacy, I worry more for the poor clerk who must plow through the terabytes of resulting data to discover possible correlations between ZIP codes and mozzarella sales. Computers helped cause the problem of data overload, and fortunately they can also help solve it. In this roundup, I review five PC and Macintosh software programs designed to help business peo- ple, scientists, and engineers analyze endless streams of quantities, ratios, values, and quotients. For PCs, I evalu- ated Computing Resource Center's Stata, SAS Institute's SAS PC, and SPSS's SPSS/PC + 4.0. For Macs, I tested Mini- tab's Minitab 8.0 and Systat's Systat 5.1. (SPSS also sells a Mac version, while Minitab and Systat also sell PC versions of their products.) The programs are designed for people who must analyze vast quantities of data and make decisions based on the results. For example, marketing directors might use data-analysis software to track de- mand for their products and determine sales trends based on geography, sea- sons, or income groups. As these pack- ages look for patterns, they can also plot the sales data in several different formats to make the results accessible to everyone in the company. A Range of Capabilities Each program helps you cope with on- slaughts of data, but this class of soft- ware doesn't collect information and shouldn't be confused with data acquisi- tion programs. Also, this genre doesn't include related programs such as mathe- matics software (e.g., Mathematica) or scientific visualization packages (e.g., Spyglass). All the packages I looked at provide simple ways to read the data into the pro- gram, perform calculations, and then display the results graphically or numeri- cally. However, there are many differ- ences among the programs. Some, like SAS PC or SPSS/PC + , come with op- tional modules that provide an extensive range of analyses and graph formats. Others, like Stata, are simpler and not as loaded with features. Some of the PC packages, including SAS PC, trace their lineage to old main- frame-based statistical software and have user interfaces that seem arcane on microcomputers. Other packages, such as Systat, were written especially for microcomputers and provide a strong in- terface that would clog the I/O channels of the old mainframes. I tested the PC programs with a 486- based system running DOS 4.1 with 4 MB of memory and a 105-MB hard drive. My Mac was a Ilci running Sys- tem 7.0 with 5 MB of memory and a 105- MB hard drive. I evaluated the packages according to four main criteria: range of data-analysis features, numerical stability, presenta- tion tools, and user interface. I analyzed a set of data I had gathered for one of my research projects. The research involved using computers to match artists and their work. Specifically, the data repre- sented the distribution of pen-stroke lengths across a variety of illustrations. I also ran a sample set of data through the programs to check for numerical sta- bility; this determined how accurately the packages calculated very small and very large numbers. Finally, I evaluated the user interfaces. Naturally, this is subjective, and users of the original mainframe packages may not care a whit about what they can do with the mouse. Statistical Options A range and depth of statistical opera- tions is important if your work involves complicated and rigorous statistical anal- yses. Because of space constraints, I can't list all the analyses possible for each package, but I will summarize each product's range of capabilities. Each package handles the basic statis- tics jobs, such as computing medians, av- erages, standard deviations, and correla- tions between different parts of the data set. If you construct an equation that models the data, all five packages will do straightforward regression to deter- mine how closely the model actually fits the data. You can do the regression in one swoop, or you can let the computer do it a step at a time and add more and more variables until the model and data match well. All five packages will also analyze the variation (called ANOVA) and deter- mine how well the model predicts the data. If you want to check your data for BYTE ACTION SUMMARY WHAT DATA-ANALYSIS PROGRAMS DO They compute various statistical quantities that let you look for trends and patterns in data. LIKES They provide mathematically sophisticated tests for finding patterns and determining whether the patterns could have been caused by random chance. DISLIKES Many of the user interfaces were rudimentary and not well designed. RECOMMENDATIONS For Mac-based statistical analyses and presentations, choose Systat. Although rigorous in its complexity, SAS PC reigned as the most complete package for PCs. I PRICE Minitab 8.0 for the Mac, $695 (single-copy price) SAS PC 6.04, $595 (one workstation, first-time license, must be renewed annually for $275) SPSS/PC+4.0,$195 Stata 2.1, $590 Systat 5. If or the Mac, $795 (Mesosaur time-series statistics module, $395) JANUARY 1992 -BYTE 259 AMPLE WAVES OF DATA consistency, all five programs will com- pute the basic set of statistics, including the t-test, the Kolmogorov-Smirnov test, and many other nonparametric tests. These tests let you determine whether the data is likely to be from a predictable source. The Kolmogorov-Smirnov test, for instance, is useful for checking whether the variable was produced by a perfectly random source. The t-test is useful for determining whether the dif- ference between the means of two sam- ples could have occurred by chance. Stata, Systat, SPSS/PC +, and SAS PC also perform cluster analysis for seg- menting several sets of data into subsets with similar characteristics. These four can also do factor analysis. The latter is a more complicated version of regression in which different variables are grouped into meta-variables called factors; the in- fluence of these factors is then com- puted. SPSS's optional Advanced Statistics Put an end to software piracy! Meet the growing family of security keys from Software Security. Each one a specialist at enforcing your license agreement in virtually any user environment you can think of. Whether it's DOS, UNIX, Macintosh or OS/2..,whether it's a single user installation or a LAN. Simply connect the appropriate key to a single user computer, or a non-dedicated file server in a network, and you control all access to your protected application. Users, however, won't even know it's there. The keys are transparent and won't impact software functionality or the ability to make back up copies. Normal node and LAN operations are unaffected. THE ULTIMATE PROTECTION - FOR SOFTWARE I PUBLISHERS Simple. Unassuming. Ever vigilant. Easy to incorporate into your application package. And quite possibly the most profitable hardware investment a software developer can make. To find out more, call: 1-800-333-0407 IN CONNECTICUT CALL: 203-329-8870 FAX 203-329-7428 EUROPE AND UK: +44 784 43 OO 60 4H* SOFTWARE SECURITY lOll High Ridge Road Stamford, CT06905 Proudly Made in the USA package provides sophisticated versions of nonlinear-regression and multivariate- regression variance analysis. Multivari- ate regression addresses numerous vari- ables that might be related to the data. Both regression analyses are also avail- able in SAS PC's main statistics package and in Systat and Minitab. Systat, Minitab, SAS PC, and SPSS/ PC + offer packages for analyzing func- tions that vary with time. The basic pur- pose of time-series analysis is to look for trends and counteract seasonal varia- tions. Minitab builds these functions into the main module; the other three pro- grams offer theirs as options. Stata pro- vides some of these functions, but not enough for me to consider it a contender in this area. With the Systat and Minitab versions of time-series analysis, you calculate a Box- Jenkins ARIM A model of the data. This model is helpful for looking for sea- sonal or periodic variations in a time- dependent variable. Both packages make it easy for you to analyze graphically the auto-correlations between different times and discover any periodic differ- ences. Systat provides many built-in functions for smoothing data. SPSS and SAS offer more sophisti- cated time-series systems than either Systat or Minitab. SPSS/PC + and SAS PC will estimate the various frequencies of seasonal variation with Fourier analy- sis. This lets you determine whether there may be more than one pattern at work (e.g., vacation passenger loads on airliners are higher on Fridays and in the summer). Both programs also offer the X 1 1 ARIM A package, which was devel- oped by government agencies to do sea- sonal adjustments of monthly data. SPSS's version comes from Statistics Canada; SAS's version comes from the U.S. Census Bureau. One important element in handling seasonal data is dates. Although time may be a continuum, the way we repre- sent it is more complex. Systat, SPSS/ PC + , and SAS PC offer ways to handle the standard day, month, and year for- mat. SAS, for instance, converts a date into the number of days between it and January 1, 1960. Thus, July 4th, 1776, becomes —67019. If you are using the time of day as well, SAS stores this as the number of seconds from midnight, Janu- ary 1, 1960. Minitab sees time-series data as simple sequences with data num- bered case 1, case 2, and so on. These data-handling features make Systat, SAS, and SPSS much easier to use for large projects than programs that don't address the calendar format. continued 260 BYTE* JANUARY 1992 Circle 1 53 on Inquiry Card Mathematica2.0: the standard for technical computing "The importance of the program cannot be overlooked ... it so fundamentally alters the mechanics of mathematics." New York Times "Mathematics has the potential to change the world of science at least as much as word processing has changed the world of writing.' InfoWorld "Mathematics is a startlingly good tool.' Nature Macworld 1991 World Class Software Award Survey 60 50 40 m o 30 5 20 10 I Mathematics MathCAD ■ Theorist Eureka PowerMath M MATLAB All others Mathematics has aiso received best software/new product awards from: Macworld, 1990-91 MacUser, 1989 Discover, 1990 Business Week, 1988 BYTE, 1989 InfoWorld, 1988 Mathematics is currently available for: MS-DOS 386, Microsoft Windows, Macintosh, CONVEX, DG AViiON, DEC VAX (ULTRIX and VMS), DEC RISC, HP 9000, Apollo, IBM RISC System/6000, MIPS, NeXT, Silicon Graphics, Sony, Sun-3, and SPARC. Prices i n U.S. and Canada start at $595. Educational discounts are available. Wolfram Research, Inc., 100 Trade Center Drive, Champaign, IL 61820-7237, USA 217-398-0700; fax: 217-398-0747; email: info@wri.com. Wolfram Research (UK) Ltd., P.O. Box 114, Abingdon, Oxon 0X13 6TG, United Kingdom +44 (235)550 440: fax: +44 1235) 550 445; email: info-uk@wri.com © 1991 Wolfram Research. Inc. Mathematics is a registered trademark of Wolfram Research. Inc. Mathematical not associated with Mathematica Inc., Mathematica Policy Research. Inc., or MathTech, Inc. All otherproduct names mentioned aretrademarksof thairproducers Photo: GeorgeRehroy Available for PC, Macintosh, Unix, and VMS systems, Mathematica 2.0 brings a range of new capabilities to Mathematica, the proven leader in technical computing software. Interactively han- dling numerical, graphical, and symbolic computa- tion at all levels, Mathematica 2.0 adds 50 percent more functions. These include sound generation, differential equations, external program communi- cation, as well as enhancements to Mathematical built-in high-level programming language. Mathematica has rapidly become the standard for technical computing, with more than a dozen textbooks, a quarterly journal, and several newslet- ters devoted to the system. Mathematica is in use at all of the 50 largest U.S. universities, all of the technical Fortune 50 companies, and most of the world's larger engineering firms. In fact, more than 100,000 technical professionals and students around the world are working with Mathematica every day. To find out what Mathematica can do for you, call Wolfram Research at 1-800-441-MATH. Mathematica. 2.0 A System for Doing Mathematics by Computer For Macintosh information circle 1 80, For IBM/Compatible information circle 181, For UNIX information circle 1 82 on Inquiry Card. AMPLE WAVES OF DATA SAS PC and SPSS/PC + have many es- oteric options too numerous to name here. SPSS/PC + , for instance, offers a separate package called CHAID, which performs sophisticated cluster analysis based on the chi-squared test and tree analysis. SAS offers a separate package devoted to manufacturers who do qual- ity-control analysis. (At press time, Minitab introduced a similar package.) SAS also sells a package for managing operations such as network flow calcula- tions or linear programming. It is impossible to say which package is the most sophisticated for data analysis. They all handle the core group of fea- tures successfully. For Mac-based anal- yses, both Minitab and Systat provide an equally solid core of the standard statisti- cal methods. For PCs, SAS PC has the widest range of add-on features, so if you need very complicated procedures, SAS PC is the standout program. Numerical Stability One of the most important features of a statistical package is numerical stability. Some software is written by people who are careful to ensure that the mathemati- cal operations are done with high preci- sion. Other programs are looser and sloppier when handling small and large numbers. The range of acceptable numbers can cause problems. Minitab can only handle numbers between 10" 13 and 10 13 . The manual suggests that you can rescale that particular set of data when you get near the boundaries of accuracy. This fix, though, is cumbersome and potentially confusing if you are not expecting it. Every package has some limitation, but most are much better than this. Stata, for instance, can handle numbers between 10"" and 10". To test the number-crunching abilities of each program, I created a simple file with five variables and nine cases. In the first variable, I placed the numbers 1 through 9. In the second, I put the num- bers 10001 through 10009. The third and fourth columns were filled with the first and second columns divided by 10 8 . The fifth column was filled with the first col- umn divided by 1000. The purpose of the test was to deter- mine how well the programs responded to numbers in a wide range of sizes. The numbers between 10001 and 10009 tested the programs' ability to recognize small variations in size. These numbers were within the range of acceptable values for all five programs. My test demanded that the programs fit a line to all possible pairs of variables. The numbers should generate perfect lines, but the sizes throw the packages a bit of a curve. The results were quite varied. Only Stata and SAS PC handled all 10 cases without trouble. Both SPSS/PC + and Minitab refused to handle the sen- sitive cases when the numbers 10001 through 10009 were the dependent vari- ables. These packages said that the num- bers were too close to a constant. SAS noted this problem, found an answer, and then warned of a potential error with a suggestion of how to fix the problem. Stata plowed through the numbers with- out a blink and did not warn of any poten- tial instability. I felt more comfortable having SAS's warning message. Systat, on the other hand, was both- ered by the small numbers 10" 8 through 9 x 10" 8 . It refused to draw the line because the small numbers were too Old-Fashioned Faxing Just Went Out The Windows ! 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Best of all, the power and flexibility of BitFax for Windows is available now for only $79;00; see your software dealer or call BIT Software today! BitFax for Windows is compatible with fax-modems made by AST, Best Data, Cardinal, EHgita r n, Texas Instruments. Zolirix, Zoom, and'others; call for compatibility check. Copyright 1991 by BIT Software. All product names used are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies. Circle 254on Inquiry Card Blast into faster color imaging in Windows® with Truevision 1024-32.™ Truevision 1024-32 dramatically accelerates color imaging under Windows and lets you slide intoy our next operation without losing a creative stride. Just pick it up and move it. With Truevision 1024-32, screen refresh in high-res graphic applications is almost instantaneous. And you can zoom in (up to 8x) and pan around your entire image in real time. Want more? Truevision 1024-32 is also a bootable VGA card. A re you ready for 32 bit graphics? Truevision has been for six years. So when your future calls for 32 bits per pixel, you won't need hardware upgrades or a whole new accelerator. You're ready now. What are you waiting for? Truevision knows all about high-resolution graphic standards and the need forspeed. The Truevision 1024-32 Graphics Engine satisfies both. Anything less, and you're juststanding still. ^Truevision* Circle 171 on Inquiry Card (RESELLERS: 172). 7340 Shadeland Station, Indianapolis, IN 46256 INTERNATIONAL: Canada 416/940-8727 France 33-1-3-952-6253 Italy 39-2-242-4551 U.K. 44-628-77-7800 West Germany 49-89-612-001 Other international 617/229-6900 Windows is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corp. ImagePrep is a registered trademark of Computer Presentations, Inc. TruevL Graphi provides accelera- tion for graphics and imaging appli- cations operating under Windows. This single-slot solution features 32 bits per pixel and resolutions up to 1024x768. Call 800-858-TRUE ) 7991, Truevision, inc. AMPLE WAVES OF DATA close to 0. When I experimented with exception- ally large numbers (e.g., 10 l29 ) SPSS/ PC + crashed completely and I needed to restart the software. This could be a rude awakening if you are in the middle of a calculation that goes awry. SAS PC man- aged to fit a line to numbers with magni- tudes such as 10 100 , but occasionally it got the ^-intercept wrong. Stata truncat- ed their values. The data set I used in this case is not especially complex or sophisticated, but it did reveal several important differ- ences among the programs. Minitab, SPSS, and Systat each refused to do the problem and forced me to rescale the re- sults. Note that I did not test the accuracy of the line fit, because this will vary from machine to machine and more spe- cifically from math coprocessor to math coprocessor. Mac-based analysts should be wary of using either Minitab or Systat with diffi- cult numbers. Minitab failed to draw some of the lines, and Systat decided that many small numbers were 0. The PC users should be happiest with SAS, be- cause it had no problems; Stata's perfor- mance, however, made it a viable alter- native. Presentation Power The graphical presentation of data can be just as important as equation crunching. In many cases, you can spot important correlations when the data is graphed in the correct way. Each package offers basic graphs, in- cluding scatter plots, that let you look at the relationships between two dimen- sions of data, bar charts, pie charts, and box charts. These graphs are handy ways to visually describe the mean and stan- dard deviation of a set of data. Histo- grams and line drawings are also all standard with the reviewed packages. Each of the five packages can handle this basic set of graphs. All the programs also let you combine these graphs in many different ways. You can overlay or juxtapose the basic graph primitives. Stata, SAS PC, and SPSS/ PC + will place a symbol at each point in a scatter plot and let you scale the symbol in relation to data. For example, Systat' s graphics package will let you use several different variables to control the shape of the symbol. Thus, a big blob at the twelve o'clock position of the symbol would sig- nify a big value of one variable, and the size of the protrusion at six o'clock might signify another symbol. Systat will also allow weather vanes to signify direction at a certain place. Also important for data presentation are 3-D graphics, which show relation- ships among numerous variables. Nei- ther Stata nor SPSS/PC + offers this ca- pability. SAS PC does a nice job in 3-D graphics, and it even lets you select the placement of the lighting source. However, Systat reigns as the best package for 3-D graphics. You can create 3-D surface plots and scatter plots. The fun begins when you start mixing graphs together. One option lets you merge two surfaces. Another option lets you place the graph in a three-sided "box" with scale tick marks. Systat can draw 2-D plots on these walls to bundle even more information into the package. SAS PC, Systat, and SPSS/PC + can all create map plots. The packages come with outlines of the U.S. When you pro- vide numerical data, the packages will fill the states with a pattern that corre- sponds to the values. SAS PC also pro- vides a neat 3-D map option that extrudes the shape of the state based on the data. Thus, if you created a plot of earthquake danger, you would see California tower- ing over the other states. Overall, Systat is my choice as the best graphics package (see screen 1). Its plots are sophisticated, and the program offers many different format choices. Some of the dialog boxes might be a bit clearer, but even so, the boxes are still better than the rest. For PCs, SAS PC provided the best graphics among the test programs. It even had some sophisticated options that Systat doesn't provide. Stata offers good 2-D graphics. SPSS/PC + is the worst among the test packages. If you ask for a plot, you will get one generated by the program's old teletype interface. The mapping software is the only integrated graphics format in the program. For other types of graphics, you must use SPSS/PC + with Harvard Graphics or Graph-in-the-Box. User Interfaces Some of the PC packages were developed before the rise of GUIs, and the remnants of old mainframe interfaces live on. This is good for anyone who doesn't want to learn a new command set. Unfortunate- ly, this also means that some systems are more cumbersome than they need to be. For example, SPSS/PC + 's GUI is merely OK. The top half of the screen contains a tree-like menu system with every possible command in the SPSS rep- ertoire. At the bottom of the screen is a command window. When you select a command, the program types it for you at the cursor in the command window (see screen 2). Then you must use the func- tion keys to drop into the command win- dow and execute the command. Experi- enced users will want to avoid the menu system and the added effort of looking for the right command. The advantage of this technique is that you slowly build up a program to run in the command window. If you need to run it again, the program is already con- structed. However, I often needed to re- fer to the manual to make sure I was doing things correctly, because the menu will allow unparsable commands to be generated. The SAS PC environment makes even fewer nods to the invention of the GUI (see screen 3). The interface provides three main windows: one for a program, one for commands that run programs, and the third for the data. However, this interface is not just a leftover from the mainframe days, it's a form of torture. When I first tried to get the simple in- troductory example working, I failed re- peatedly. If I made one mistake, I would get lost in a maze of errors. To make File Edit Data Graph Stats Goodies Editor Screen 1 : Using data contained in an easily edited spreadsheet format (background), Systat builds three-matrix scatter plots (foreground) and other sophisticated presentation formats. 264 BYTE* JANUARY 1992 o A «flp k^ i^ %?$r* Frankly, paying anything at all is pretty nauseating. But that's nothing compared to the feeling you get in your stomach when a drive fiill of data goes down the drain. So you pay. Then you pay again. For upgrades. Or quarterly "updates." But even that doesn't buy you much peace of mind. Because each new day brings an average of six new viruses into the world. Which means all anti-virus programs are inherently obsolete. Except one. Introducing Untouchable'." The only software in the world that gives you 100% protection. Today. And tomorrow. Like other anti-virus software, Untouchable is equipped with a TSR monitor for patroling your system memory, plus a scanner/remover for examining the files on your disk. Between them, these first two lines of defense can Only Untouchable Network ivesyou centralized virus protection. Now you can install, monitor and control without having to leave your seat ■ecognize and oblit- erate hundreds of the little buggers— enough to protect you from 95% of the potential carnage. If you find that statistic reassur- ing, then you probably like the odds in Russian Roulette. If you don't, you'll want to «U! know that Untouchable is equipped with a unique third line of defense, which lias been mathe- matically proven to be, well, untouchable. Instead of looking for viruses, this third line of defense looks for changes in your executable and system files. If the change is but a single byte, Untouchable will spot it and, using our patent-pending recovery tech- nique, reconstruct the file to its original state. The process is known as Generic Differential Detection, and certain other programs claim to perform it, too. But only Untouchable calculates file signatures using not one, but two proprietary algorithms that can't be reverse-engineered. Only Untouchable guarantees 100% safe recovery of infected files. (Unlike other programs that proudly generate corrupted files, Untouchable knows when the jig is up and doesn't attempt recovery.) Only Untouchable can provide centralized network virus protec- tion. In fact, Untouchable Network has enough virus alerts and report- ing mechanisms to settle the stomach of even the most nervous Netware® administrator. And only Untouchable is backed by our vaunted 24-hour toll-free technical support and a one-year money-back guarantee. IfyouVe worried about viruses — and you should be —don't reach for the Maalox® Reach for the phone. Dial 1-800-9264289 Ext. 77. You'll feel better right away. Circle 310 on Inquiry Card. AMPLE WAVES OF DATA matters worse, SAS PC erased my care- fully typed lines, so I would need to re- type them to try again. I only discovered that F9 was a magic recovery key after retyping the commands twice. I eventu- ally got the hang of the program, and all these problems were technically my fault, but I think a better-designed inter- face would fix many of them. SAS offers two solutions. One is called SAS/AF, which is another programming language that enables you to create menu-driven applications for SAS. It is a product for programmers who need to create easy-to-use interfaces for clerks and data-entry people. A program called SAS/Assist is a menu-driven alternative to running with the standard SAS inter- face, but it is not as flexible as basic SAS. The other solution is the new SAS for Windows, which is scheduled to be re- leased by the time you read this. The mathematical core of SAS is very solid, and Windows may provide it with a more competitive user interface. Using the main Stata program is like using a teletype. This doesn't mean it is complex, however, and I had no problem using it. The command syntax is a bit un- usual, but you'll be able to figure it out. For instance, you need to type exit, clear to leave the program instead of simply typing exit. The program also has a set of menus and dialog boxes that are similar to the Mac interface. You choose a command and fill out some box selections, and the program does every- thing immediately. There is no interplay between command window, menu, and program. This was an easier interface to use than SPSS/PC + 's or SAS PC's. On the Mac side, both Systat and Minitab have menu and command win- dows that work symbiotically, but they differ greatly from their DOS cousins (see screen 4). Although Minitab and Systat are technically converting your mouse-clicks into typing in the command window, you need never move to the command window to execute an instruc- tion. Often, you can ignore the window entirely if you want. Some of the more complex operations, such as file merging in Systat, can be accomplished only SPSXll.QUL CHftP3.DftI OWP4.DAI CHftPS.SPS CHftP3.SPS CHfiP13.SPS SftLEl.CHI SPSfiQCL.OUL lAItlvifir^i IBNDTEST. INC IRHDTEST .L IS SPSHCF .OUU SPSSfi .EXE SPSSX .EXU CHAP5.DAI CHftP9.BAI CHfiPBJftI CHAP2.DAT CHAPlB.EftT CHflPll.Bftl CHftPS.BfiT CHflF7.DAT CHAPlZ.DflT CHftP13.DftT CHAP6.SPS GHftPT.SPS CHAP8.SPS CHAP4.SPS CHAPZ.SPS CHftPS.SPS CHAP1B.SPS CHAP11.SPS CHfiP12,SPS CHAP12B.SPS SPSSft.DUL SPSfiFfiCT.QUL SPSS.Ifi- MMlBMiSPSftHPT.OUL SflLEl .SHU SPSflOUM . OUL SPSftlTIS . OUL SPSABEGR .OUL SPSflHU .Cvt SPSACLIIS.OUL SPSffflLIB.Om.SPSAFRS.Om SIAIIESI.IHC SIftlTEST.LIS Screen 2: SPSS/PC+ executes analyses 1 ' fil'll Y fHMMMi Size; 1821 Created: 83-27-1991 69151 from tree-like ess Esc to remove the Files menu commands, which are , displayed at the bottom of the command window as you select them. Ultimately, this interface proved SET 'FILE " ■1 — iiis— «^wjteT|usaj tedious. 3 "or tuo-nay scatterpicts, ;tylr. on the options line histojf ran F matr ix F oneway F box r star I bar f pits } raplil Display a graph specify two variables, for other styles, specify a . The style options are! or Mstoyrans (specify one variable) or scatterplot rwtrix (specify 3 or nore variables) or one-way scatter plots; (specify I or wore variables) or box plot (specify I or wore variables) or star cli art (s pec if y Z ov nore v ariables) or bar cha or pie cha rt (sp rt (sp ecify 1 or nore va ecify ?. or nore va Hahles) riables) ll so see help for graph. Graph has nany nore capabilities. Uariablu(s): HHHHHI options: | Kim telp Defaults Uar. H F2 i Nanes Inter Quit 3 FIB Esc Screen 3: Although SAS PC was the most sophisticated package overall, its command window will seem antiquated to many PC users. through the command window, but I had no problem doing real tasks without it. Many repetitive and complex tasks are better accomplished by creating a com- mand file and executing it. In addition, the menu trees have only two levels, so you don't feel like you are digging deeply for a particular com- mand. When you select a graph or statis- tical operation, both Systat and Minitab open up a dialog box that lets you set the rest of the options. Systat 's menus are graphically based, and although this may seem to be a cosmetic distinction, this menu design was easier to use and under- stand than Minitab's. PC users who care about user inter- faces should consider Stata, which, de- spite its idiosyncrasies, is much cleaner than SPSS/PC + or SAS PC (see screen 5). However, if the user interface is one of the selection criteria you care most about, you should buy a Mac or wait for a Windows version. For the Mac, I liked Systat 's interface better than Minitab's, but there was not a great difference. Manual Dexterity The importance of the manuals varies from package to package. I started up Minitab and Systat on the Mac and gen- erated statistics and plots without even consulting the manuals. The interfaces are good enough to make things easy. Only when I attempted some complicated tasks did I need to turn to the manuals. However, the three PC products are im- possible to use for the first time without the manual next to the machine. The companies recognize this, fortunately, and offer nice hand-holding segments, like quick-start guides, at the beginning. The manuals vary widely in writing style. Parts of the SAS manuals seem aimed at Ph.D.s, while Stata 's manual is chatty. Both Systat 's and Minitab's are straightforward and simple. SPSS's manuals spell out every detail. The range of information about statis- tical analysis also varies among the man- uals. Large parts of Minitab's manual cannot be understood by statistics nov- ices. The SPSS and Systat manuals do a better job of providing solid introduc- tions to the subject. SPSS's time-series manual, for instance, offers 13 case studies showing how statistical methods can be applied to analyzing data. Most of the manuals were good, but I truly enjoyed reading some of SPSS's be- cause of their completeness, including plenty of case histories. So, when using a PC, I would choose SPSS's manuals. For the Mac user, it's a toss-up, but Systat 's are generally better than Minitab's. continued 266 BYTE- JANUARY 1992 unm i ii SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT Graphical fonm and a robust programming language combine to create powerful Windows-based applications. Pointer Label 4j"A Frame - Check Box Combo Box - -&g Horizontal Scroll Bar Timer Directory List Box HI -5E TU -e *£ ab (♦] - Picture Box - Text Box Command Button Option " Button - List Box _ Vertical Scroll Bar Drive List Box .File List Box Visual design tools provide a graphical way to create graphical applications. A powerful Wndows system that lets you de\dop powerful \\Mows apps. With the Microsoft" Visual Basic" programming system, you can have it both ways. Start with a robust, structured language, one of the fastest compilers around, and an interactive source -level debugger. All tightly integrated in a programming system that's extensible via direct calls to the Windows API or other dynamic-link libraries (DLLs), and even new types of controls. Of course, all that power can be put to good use. Namely remarkably powerful applications. Any app you create can have a graphical interface that includes multiple win- dows, drag and drop, and all standard Windows controls. Not to mention dynamic data exchange (DDE) for interoperability with other Windows applications. The result? You can produce any kind of Windows applica- tion—each one a compiled, distributable EXE file. So call us at (800) 541-1261, Dept. V68. We'll be glad to tell you more about the system that has it all. © 1991 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. Printed in the U.S.A. For more information inside the SO United States, call (800) 541-1261, Dept. V68. Customers in idi the U.S. and Canada, call (206) 936-8661. Microsoft and the Microsoft logo arc registered trademarks and Windous and Visual Basic are trademarks of Microsoft Corporation. PROGRAMMER'S CHOICE Key Features • Fast, full-featured programming language. • Create .EXE files with no royalty or run- time fee. • Visual design tools for click-and-drag development of graphical applications. • Sophisticated Windows-based applica- tions can include all standard Windows controls, multiple windows, dialogs, custom menus, drag and drop, and pro- grammatic graphics. • Paste-link and programmable dynamic data exchange (DDE). • Support for dynamic-link libraries (DLLs). • Online, context-sensitive Help. • Detailed online tutorial. • Sample code and full-featured exam- ple applications. • Incorporate bitmap graphics, meta- files, and icons. • Sophisticated debugging tools. At the 1991 Spring Comdex/Windows World, the editors of BYTE judged Visual Basic the "Best of Show "In the July WINNER 1991 issue o/BYTE, Edi- tor-in-chief Fred Langa called Visual Basic "a milestone product" Microsoft AMPLE WAVES OF DATA What to Choose In the end, there are many different rea- sons for buying data-analysis packages, so any recommendations about which of these five to buy depend on your applica- tions. If you are Mac-based, your work File Edll Calc Slat LUIndom Graph Editoi involves moderate-size jobs, and you are mainly concerned with producing graphs and seeing how well a model matches the data, I recommend Systat. The Macin- tosh version is quite sophisticated and user-friendly. The Minitab software also uses the Macintosh user-interface para- digm well, but the program does not have as large a range of graphics as Systat. Stata is certainly a solid choice: Its user interface is simple, and the statistical core is solid. continued Screen 4: Although Minitab faithfully adheres to the style of the Macintosh environment, the program 's graphing abilities fall short of those of other data-analysis packages. Screen 5: To build charts and graphs within Stata, you simply enter commands into input boxes at the bottom of the screen, and then the program does everything immediately. Whenever you want to process graphics or texts, "ARTEC" scanner products will help you to reach your goal. We also support "FAScinator" image processing software & "FAScinator OCR" OCR software, The FAScinator is a highly inclusive image processing software, provides an unlimited mult-window working enviroment. It supports not only a variety of display modes from B/W up to 16.7 million true colors. But also contains a powerful drawing & painting capability including numberless text fonts. Also it provides many file formats compatible with most popular packages such as colorix, pc paintbrush, ventura publisher and so on. The "FAScinator OCR", a professional OCR software package, makes text files of all image file that you scanned through a scanner. That will be useful without retyping. For desk top publishing presentation work or Advertisements, you will benefit from using the "ARTEC" A400Z, A2J56C & A4000C SCANNER. * The "SCAN KIT PPD'fS||^^*: notebook PC use scanner. &&'''•'■-■ ULTIMA ELECTRONICS CORP. MAIN OFFICE 9F, NO 18. ALLEY 1. LANE 768. SEC. 4. PATE ROAD. TAIPEI. TAIWAN. R.O.C TEL (02) 788-5470 {REP.) FAX: (886-2) 788-5657 • 788-5655 USA BRANCH 1 156 ASTER AVENVE. SUITE A SUNNYVALE CA 94087 USA TEL (408) 246-9208 FAX: (408) 246-9207 SPAIN: TWCCOMPUTERS.A C/PORTUGALETE. 8 BAJOS 0801-1 BARCELONA SPAIN TEL: 4312000 FAX 4227849 DENMARK: UNIPRO SCANDINAVIA BIRKEMOSEVEJ32. 8361 HASSELAGER. DENMARK TEL: 4586286366 FAX- 4586286870 OEM WELCOME! Circle 1 74 on Inquiry Card. HOLLAND: SOECOMACOMPUTERS NED. BV REKVELDEN 46 5503 N2 VELDHOVENTHENETHERLAND TEL- 31-40-533515 FAX: 31-40-544535 g Co. rjFD 1 I i J ■ " WORLDi ITBCUAM rsftfi? EDITORS 3-M-ro BATfiffi? ■i—fc ** jiriiOCT The SfesS=- ft ,T^ fi 7.0-9 .9 3-12 Ovewew 3 LU 512KB *£,"« ««^r: «2 ^ SYSTAT is rated #1 by Software Digest®. In fact, SYSTAT is the only statistical analysis package to receive top honors from InfoWorld, PC Magazine and PC Week. According to Software Digest: "It is the only program that successfully blends robust features, good usability and performance, and many areas of uncommon strength from analytical graphs to powerful programming." SYSTAT. The statistics speak for themselves. ZZ^^ZZ^— For more information call or write: SYSTAT, Inc. 1800 Sherman Avenue, SYSTAT Evanston, IL 60201-3793 TeL 708.864.5670 Fax: 708.492.3567 ~^^^= 9 For international representatives call: Australia 61.3.8661766, Canada 416.424.1700, Denmark 45.64.406575, Finland 358.0.6923800. France 33.1.40935000, Germany 49.61.265950 (DOS), 49.30.310423 (Mac), Italy 39.587.213640, Japan 81 .33.59023 1 1 , New Zealand 64.71 .562675, Norway 47.3.892240, Sweden 46.7.6076207, Switzerland 41.31.416611, The Netherlands 31.340.266336, UK London 44.81.6926636. For IBM/compatible information circle 163; for Macintosh informa- ©1991 SYSTAT, Inc. Software Digest is a registered trademark of NSTL, Inc. fion drl|e , 64; fm Rese)|er inqoirieS/ lirde , 65 on |nqoiry Card . Circle 1 28 on Inquiry Card. AMPLE WAVES OF DATA Make Your Best Work Look Its Best! 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Personal T£<, Inc. • 1 2 Madrona Ave. • Mill Valley, CA • Fax: 41 5/388-8865 FaceiTerm UNIX Windowing For Character Terminals & PCs Q ncrecise productivity by giving users simultaneous access to multiple UNIX applications on a character terminal or PC. Facetlerm™ Features ■ Multiple, concurrent UNIX sessions for each user. ■ Hot key between word process- ing, DBMS, office applications, 3270 emulation, and any other UNIX application. ■ Screen print. ■ Cut & paste between applications. ■ Pull down menu interface. ■ Full or split screen display. TRY IT! Full featured evaluation for 30 days. Only $50 + shipping and handling. © Structured Software Solutions, Inc. 214/985-9901 4031 W. Piano Parkway Suite 205 Piano, TX 75093 Fax 21 4/61 2-2035 SAS PC and SPSS/PC + are good choices for people who already know the respective languages or who are consid- ering implementing a large data manage- ment system. Both packages offer data- entry front ends that allow statistics novices, such as store clerks, to enter in- formation without regard to what the sta- tistics experts may do with the data later. These packages also offer a wide range of specialized statistics capabilities that you can purchase as options. For its over- all sophistication, I give SAS PC the nod for PC-based analyses. ■ Peter Wayner is a consulting editor for BYTE. He is also working toward a Ph.D. in computer science at Cornell University. You can contact him on BIX as