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┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐ │ │ │ │ │ C A R R I E R D E T E C T │ │ │ │ The PC Communications Journal For Every Modem User! │ │ │ │ Volume 1, September 1991 │ │ │ │ │ └────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Table of Contents: Welcome ........................................ 2 Product Evaluations ................................ 3 HyperAccess/5 Version 2.0 ...................... 3 Free Speech BBS Version 3.10 ................... 8 Learning Center .................................... 11 Writing a BBS Door (Part 1) .................... 11 Protocol Prowl ..................................... 16 Speed and Reliability Tests of Popular Protocols 16 Potluck ............................................ 20 Archives and Why We Use Them ................... 20 ByteLine ........................................... 24 Feedback ........................................... 28 Product Information .............................. 29 Carrier Detect is published bimonthly by Michael W. Crosson. Contents may not be reproduced without written permission from the publisher. All brand and product names mentioned in this publication are trademarks and registered trademarks of their respective companies. (c) 1991 Michael W. Crosson. All rights reserved. W E L C O M E The third issue of Carrier Detect is finally here and this is the biggest and most diverse issue yet. This edition is about thirty pages and took me a little longer to prepare than the ones previous. Inside you will find a wide variety of material to peruse. I am sure you will find it was worth the wait! Like most new publications Carrier Detect is still changing with every time we go to press. In this issue there are a lot of firsts. In the review department commercial software is reviewed for the first time and in another review I give my first "thumbs down." Also this is the premier appearance of several departments for Carrier Detect: The Learning Center, which will contain a tutorial type articles, Potluck, an area for miscellaneous articles that don't neatly fit into a regular category, and Byteline, a fun, light-hearted section chock full of interesting general computing information. The Carrier Detect Reader Door has generated interest from sysops across the country and I suspect that as more and more articles are released its popularity will continue to grow! Since the last issue, the orginal version has been updated a couple of times already and the current one now is version 1.11. If you do not have the latest version please upgrade as soon as possible. Text searches have been improved and memory requirements have been reduced by than 80K. Please consider registering your CDR-Door if you are running it. Registrations will ensure that the program will continued to be enhanced and keep the programmer (Scott Baker) happy. He generously has donated his considerable programming talent to our journal and deserves some recognition. I added an advertisement section as one of CDR-Door's departments but have not yet sold any space. To help generate some advertisement revenue I have lowered the price to only $10 dollars. I feel this rock bottom price is excellent opportunity for you to advertise whatever goods or services you have to offer. Since computer enthusiasts all across America will be reading your custom ad, it's a natural for advertising large pay BBS systems, shareware, or software and hardware specials. All advertisement revenue will be applied toward the substantial long distance phone charges I incur to distribute Carrier Detect and the operating costs of my public BBS system. One final "first" for Carrier Detect this month. Since my BBS is now a member of Fido-Net BBS, from now on you can file request the journal and CDR-Door directly from my system. Please note that the text edition AND the Carrier Detect - September 1991 - page 2 door editions of CD are now distributed in the same ZIP archive. My system supports file requests up to 9600 baud V.32 twenty-four hours a day. My Fido-net node number is 1:300/28 and you can FREQ Carrier Detect under the magic names: CARRIER - Latest version of CD - text and door editions ALLISSUES - All issues of CD published so far CDRDOOR - The latest version of CDR-Door Until next time, Michael Crosson Publisher and Editor P R O D U C T E V A L U A T I O N S Each month Carrier Detect contains several product evaluations. Most of these will be software reviews but from time to time hardware will be discussed as well. The opinions expressed in Carrier Detect are solely my own or the respective author of the article. Carrier Detect strives to be as objective as possible when evaluating software. Judgments to suitability are made with the typical modem enthusiast in mind and are not geared toward the complete novice nor the power user. Exceptions to this are noted as such in the article. * HyperAccess/5 Version 2.0 Review by Michael Crosson Pros: Easy to learn and use High flexibility and customization Built in text editor and file manager Many emulations and internal protocols Excellent host Cons: Dialing script can be improved Clunky interface at times No crash recovery with Z Modem Relatively expensive Speed, Efficiency, Performance - these are concerns of most everyone as we move into the nineties. It is not surprising then that the computer industry is knee-deep in the hoopla too. The emphasis on CPU clock speeds, disk drive access times, megabytes of memory, disk caches are Carrier Detect - September 1991 - page 3 all byproducts of the public's fixation on speed. Hil- graeve, the publishers of HyperAccess/5 are jumping in on the bandwagon. A recent cover of the manual touts HA5 as "Speed You Can Handle" and their company motto is "High Performance Software to Advance Communications." And lest you forget that HA5 emphasizes speed, they mention "speed" or "fast" more than 10 times - on the cover alone! Strangely, I don't think speed is HA5's biggest selling point. Sure, it's fast but certainly so are many of its high end competitors. Furthermore, I suspect that Hilgraeve itself knows the speed theme is overworked here. Hidden on page 120 in a mundane paragraph entitled "Introduction (To PC to PC Communications)" Hilgraeve tells us that HA5 is first, "An all purpose communications program for accessing diverse systems". Admittedly less dramatic than "Stunning Speed and Power and Agility", but far more becoming, especially since Hilgraeve has stayed true to this ideal so well. It's not easy to create a successful "all purpose" anything because you must meet the needs of many diverse interests. Thus, it's all to easy to fall into the jack of all trades, master of none mode. Many publishers and programmers avoid the problem entirely and focus on specialized needs. Programs that can be recommend to all, containing the right mix of features and power, are rare and deserve our attention. HyperAccess/5 is one of those programs. It meets the needs of most all communications users and does so in a friendly manner. HA5 offers a rich array of features that will delight most modem users. It contains a robust dialing directory, large assortment of internal protocols including Z Modem, A Carbon Copy like remote access capabilities, excellent host mode, English like script language with many verbs and a learn mode, a full screen editor, file manager, and an interactive capture buffer, virus scanner and much more. Space does not permit the listing of every feature that HA5 boasts so only the highlights will be discussed. HyperAccess/5 has a friendly but unconventional look and feel to its interface. It makes extensive use of colorful sliding menus and pop-up menu boxes where the available options are always easy to spot. It is different from the sparse and simple screens on programs such as Telix or Procomm, but easier to master since no memorization of commands is necessary. Extensive context sensitive online help is always available by pressing F1. In the past I thought the sliding screens were pretty, but too slow to be practical. This is a problem that Hil- graeve has solved with release 2.0. Now by default the screens are displayed using direct video writes, a pro- gramming technique that makes a appreciable speed differ- Carrier Detect - September 1991 - page 4 ence. They also include new keyboard shortcut macros that use familiar ALT key combinations found in many popular terms. Like most aspects of HA5 these options are con- figurable and you can use BIOS scrolling (desirable when running Desqview ) and shut off or redefine any or all of the keyboard shortcuts. Customization and extreme flexibility are two corner- stones of this program. HyperAccess/5 has excellent facilities for command, macro and script development. The capabilities range from automatic learning of a log on sequence to the creation of a full fledged BBS system around the HA5 engine. Automation of routine call tasks such picking up new mail on MCI are simple to accomplish. The keyboard can be remapped entirely with custom sequen- ces, even ones that run external programs in DOS. You could even design totally new menus with different fu- nctions then the ones that come supplied with the program. In short, what you do with HA5 is limited only by your imagination and your mastery of the English-like script language. The HA5 user's manual explains how to accomplish all these tasks in great detail and is chock full of examples. In day to day use HyperAccess 5 is a solid performer but not without a few rough spots. The dialing directory can hold up to 250 entries and it is easy to add, delete, or modify the settings on any of them. In addition, the systems can be sorted in three different ways, by name, by frequency of calls or by recent activity. To call a single system is a three step process. Multiple numbers can be dialed so that a connection is made with all of them or simply rotated until a connection is made. Ironically actual dialing is a weak point of the program and often does not function as it should. When multiple systems are selected, HA5 will only dial the first number and then return to the Dialing Directory. This is an irritating quirk because in a large dialing directory it can take some time to find and mark the ones you want to call. Once HA5 returns to dialing menu your previous selections are forgotten and you have to go through the entire selection process again, cross your fingers, and hope that it will work better this time. This is an erratic problem and seems to occur about fifty percent of the time on my system. Another dialing problem concerns erroneous error messages that HA5 displays during dialing attempts. I witnessed HA5 misinterpret various series of events frequently and then display a silly error message such as "Your modem is not connected to the phone line." or "Your modem isn't responding to commands." Plus the dialing capabilities has a serious shortcoming. There is a cap of Carrier Detect - September 1991 - page 5 20 redial attempts to any one system. If you want to dial a system that is busy much of the day, such as a popular bulletin board and perform an unattended mail run, you are out of luck. Once HyperAccess/5 has redialed that number 20 times it stops and displays the message, "Redialed system 20 times without connect." I think that HA5 should be able to redial the system ten thousand times to make a connection if that's what it takes. A final aspect of dialing that I do not care for is that HA5 reinitializes the modem after every attempt whether it is calling the same number or not. The ability to have different initialization strings can be useful but for the sake of speed should be an option that can be toggled on or off. Once you are actually connected to a host everything is smoother in HyperAccess. Plus since HA5 features many terminal emulation modes, there should be few hosts that you won't be able to connect to. Those included are ADM3A, ANSI, Compuserve, IBM3101, IBM3278, RENX3278, TTY, TV925, TV950, VIEWPNT, VT52, VT100, VT102, VT220, VT320, Wang, and a custom one for calling other systems running the HyperAccess/5 host. This strong support for communicating with mainframes and minis as well as PCs make HA5 a natural choice for business applications. File Transfers are a breeze when using HyperAccess/5. Hilgraeve includes a well-rounded selection of protocols that should allow you to transfer files on any system. The program contains ASCII, Xmodem, 1K Xmodem, Ymodem, Ymodem-G, Kermit, Compuserve Quick B, Zmodem and the proprietary blazer HyperProtocol. Of the bunch Hyper- Protocol is the fastest but is not available on most systems now. Including Zmodem, currently the most popular protocol on PC systems is a convenience. It works flawlessly but doesn't contain as many features as the DSZ Zmodem driver. The most obvious omission is crash recovery that allows you to restart an aborted transfer where you left off. However, this isn't a big problem in HA5 because any external protocol can be run from the program once a script is written to call it. Hilgraeve even includes a sample one for DSZ and configured it to run from the control-pgdn/pgup combination. Uploading files has rarely been easier than in HA5. When prompted for the file name you have several choices. You can accept HA5's best guess filename, enter the path and filename manually, bring up sorted directories of your choice and mark files to send or tell HA5 to upload the files in a list that you have created in advance. Beginners and experts alike will like the visual marking method of selecting uploads. It ends all the problems of remembering cryptic filename and outrageously long paths. Two of the best features in the program are rarely Carrier Detect - September 1991 - page 6 seen in other comm packages - yet go hand in hand with the types of tasks a typical session might involve. Hyper- Access/5 includes an excellent full screen editor and a capable file manager. The editor is superb. It offers everything that most stand alone editors do and is simple to use. The text editor allows you to manipulate marked blocks, split the screen and work on two files at once, print files or write to disk, search and replace, reformat text and other fancy functions. Text captured in the capture file and review buffer can be manipulated in the same way and allows you to sending text to the remote system while online. The file manager is equally useful and impressive. From inside HyperAccess you can copy, delete, move, print, and rename groups of files. You also can sort direct- ories, search for files, scan for virus' and get estimates on transfer times. Files are tagged the same easy method as marking them as uploads. If file transfers make up the bulk of your communicating needs, you will be using the file manager often. With other terms browsing around DOS requires you to shell out and load another program such as X-Tree or PC-Tools. While the file manager in HA5 is slimmed down, it provides the most essential features of these popular shells right at your fingertips. There are other aspects of the program that cannot be discussed here in the interest of brevity. These include the host facilities, remote takeover features, script language, and OS/2 versions. It is not possible for me to proprerly test some of the features like OS/2 operation and as such I cannot comment on them with any authority. Others, such as proper treatment of the script language would require a technical article beyond the scope of this review. Based on my familiarity with the rest of HA5 I doubt that Hilgraeve would disappoint in these other areas. As I alluded to in the beginning of this article, I believe that HyperAccess 5 is about as well rounded a communications package as you are likely to find. No matter what the emphasis on your communication sessions is, HyperAccess has you covered. If you need to call a wide variety of computer types, HA5 can do it. If you mostly read and write messages online, HA5 features the exemplarily internal editor and scroll back buffer options and allows you to design custom mail runs with ease. If file transfers are your concern, HA5 comes with a full toolbox of DOS file commands and enough internal protocols to match any situation. And finally if you need to set up a capable host, few programs can match HyperAccess. This is especially with version 2 since it allows you to run other programs on the remote computer as if you were sitting in front of it when two HA5s are connected Carrier Detect - September 1991 - page 7 together. There's little that HyperAccess can't do when it comes to communication tasks. Plus Hilgraeve's product support has been excellent whenever I have contacted them. HyperAccess is not one of the cheapest communication packages to choose from but it is one of the finest. If you are unhappy with your current communications program, I suggest trying HyperAccess/5. Hilgraeve is so confident you will like the program they offer a refund within thirty days of purchase if "this product proves unsuitable for your applications." That's what I like HyperAccess; it is a class act all the way around. * Free Speech BBS Version 3.10 Review by Michael Crosson Pros: Interesting concept No maintenance required Cons: Poor customer service Uses odd commands Here's a program for adventurous sysops everywhere. I'm talking about the Free Speech BBS and if you decide to run it there's no telling what might happen! Free Speech is a BBS system or door that is dedicated to reading and leaving messages only. That in itself isn't too unusual, but Free Speech puts a few twists on the concept that make it a fascination study of human interaction. However, the package is flawed by exceptionally poor and careless customer service AFTER registration and as such is difficult to recommend. The best way to describe Free Speech is as one long continuous tablet where callers can "write" about any subject they desire. When the BBS saves the message to the tablet, no record is kept of when the post was made or who the caller was. In fact the only way someone would know that a particular person wrote something is if the author signed the message - (but even then it might be an impersonation!). The whole idea is too impose as few restrictions as possible and let people write in an atmosphere of anonymity. In these conditions your callers should feel comfortable candidly expressing themselves on subjects they otherwise wouldn't dare tackle! Free Speech was originally designed by a sociologist as part of an experiment. The author wanted to see what sort of interaction would occur in the situation that Free Door sets up. Would the callers be friendly or hostile, polite or vulgar, discuss intelligent issues or juvenile Carrier Detect - September 1991 - page 8 dribble? I imagine that general patterns emerge although the BBS can't help to take on the personality of the callers to some degree. In my particular case The Free Speech BBS took a decidedly hostile turn after running the software for one month. Things were pleasant enough for the first few weeks and the conversation was mostly light. Two main subjects seemed to be on everyone's mind, females and parties. Once in awhile someone would step up and try to start a thread with more substance but none of these ever took off. Then one caller began to make waves and posted a few inflammatory comments. For better or worse they did upset many callers and all the sudden the Free Speech Door became a virtual warzone! In the spirit of the Free Speech Door, I won't judge whether that is good or bad. The conversation just drifted naturally in this direction. Whether or not the conversation would have reverted to friendlier territory no one can say for sure. In the Free Speech area, that is left up to the users who visit it. Installation of the Free Speech is very easy and offers three different modes of operation. The program can be run as a standalone BBS system, a door, or as a gateway into other BBS software. On my system Free Speech was functioning as a door. The entire installation process took under 10 minutes. There are only a few set up options that you must configure before running Free Speech on your BBS. One thoughtful feature lets you choose the size of the tablet. Each message progressively fills up a portion of the tablet and when space runs out, Free Speech begins at the top again and starts to erase earlier posts. If all this has convinced you to rush out and try to find the Free Speech BBS, read on, I have some bad news. As you might have gathered I think that the Free Speech Program is an interesting idea and several of my callers were enjoying the program as well. In fact, two of the most zealous posters thought it was such a scream that they sent me a donation to register it. It's not hard to forget that you are running an unregistered copy of Free Speech because the author designed it as annoyware. After the short twenty day evaluation, (just barely enough time for my callers to start using it with regularity), a message appears advising users that the evaluation period is over and then string of dots is displayed as you enter the door. These dots serve as a delay and the number of them increases as you move further past the 21 day evaluation period. As a general rule I frown against such tactics that try to force people to register. Except in unusual cases, crippleware and annoyware is promptly deleted off my disk as I prefer to Carrier Detect - September 1991 - page 9 support software authors who trust the shareware market they write for. Unfortunately no mention was made of the annoyware "feature" and it was just one of several surprises Pinnacle Software had in store for me. I sent in the requested twenty-five dollar registration and received a package from Pinnacle more than 6 weeks later. However, due to the cheap diskette mailer that was used, the enclosed floppy disk was bent in several places. Sure enough several of the files on the disk were unreadable but luckily Free Speech was in a compressed file and unharmed. I preceded to unarc the program onto my hard disk and fired up Free Speech. Again, I encountered another major blooper. Pinnacle had sent me the same annoyware Free Speech that I already owned, not the registered on that I was waiting for! To resolve the matter I had no choice but to call Pinnacle in Canada at daytime international long distance rates. To make matters worse I believe that several aspects of the registration details were misleading. Every time a user exits an unregistered Free Speech Door a message appears that says, "Register Free Speech and receive the latest version!", implying there was a newer version available for registered users. However, I was informed by Mr. Campbell that the version I had WAS the latest version. Another deceptive aspect concerned the availability of alternate language modules for the door (besides the English, French and "Silly" ones that are included). The documentation stated that Pinnacle would make these available to registered users, but when I requested one for Spanish Mr. Campbell told me that would cost an additional twenty dollars! I expressed these problems and concerns to the company's President, Tim Campbell, but he was less than apologetic and quite condescending. He implied that I did not understand shareware and told me he did not find any aspect of Free Speech's registration details misleading. He suggested that I call his BBS later and download the registered .EXE file later that day. It was not until I revealed that Free Speech was the subject of an upcoming review in this journal that he became more cooperative. At this point he offered to refund my registration, since I was so unhappy with the situation. Later that evening Mr. Campbell did call my BBS and upload the proper .EXE file and the Spanish modules but I believe that this last ditch effort was too little, too late. I informed him that I was no longer interested in running Free Speech and planned to take him up on the refund offer. The Free Speech BBS is an innovative idea marred by poor customer service. If Pinnacle software had spent a nominal amount of money on a better diskette mailer and Carrier Detect - September 1991 - page 10 taken greater care in shipping out the proper files, much of my ordeal could have been avoided. These small steps would not address all Pinnacle's problems but it would be a change in the right direction. The shareware market is vast and competition is keen. Pinnacle's actions and indifferent attitude suggest to me that they do not value their customer much. If none of this bothers you might want to give Free Speech a try, otherwise I recommend you pass over this and other offerings from Pinnacle Software. T H E L E A R N I N G C E N T E R The Learning Center is an area devoted tutorial articles. It is the "How-To" department of Carrier Detect. However Articles are not limited to newcomers and in fact may cover advanced concepts. * Writing a BBS Door (Part 1) Tutorial by Scott M. Baker Doors are programs written for a bulletin board system to allow the user to perform other tasks than the bulletin board software allows. For example, a door could be anything from a bbs lister to a multiplayer simulation (such as Galactic Warzone, Yankee Trader, Trade Wars, etc). This article will be a tutorial on how to write door programs. The programs will be written in Turbo Pascal (version 5.5 or 6.0) and will use my DoorDriver routines to provide support for RBBS, QuickBBS, Wildcat, WWIV, etc. Right now, we're just going to stick with my DoorDriver routines since they are the routines that I am most familiar with. In the future, we may explore a C or basic door library, or another Pascal library. This article is the first in a series about Door Writing. I'm not sure yet how many articles we have. If there isn't any support for this column, then it'll probably be just two. If a lot of response comes in, then we'll continue as long as I have time to continue writing. REQUIREMENTS What you'll need: - Turbo Pascal by Borland. Either version 5.5 or Carrier Detect - September 1991 - page 11 6.0 will do. - DOORDR40.ZIP. This is my Doordriver support package for TP5.5 and TP6.0. It includes async support, bbs interfacing, etc. Available from my bbs (602-577-3650) as well as several other sites. - A basic understanding of Pascal (specifically Turbo Pascal). You don't need to be a Pascal wizard or anything, but the more knowledge you have, the better. BASIC ELEMENTS OF A 'DOOR' Ok, time to get started. First lets talk about the basic elements that a door needs. 1) Async communications support. The door must be able to talk to the user through the communications port. Support has to be provided for multiple com ports, locked baud rates, etc. The program also must monitor the presence of the CARRIER DETECT modem line to make sure the carrier is not dropped while the door is in use. 2) BBS software interfacing. The door needs to be able to grab the user's name, time left, and other associated information from the bbs software. Since bbs programs lack standardization, there are several different methods that have to be accounted for. 3) Support for ANSI (color) graphics and animation. Just about every door has ANSI capabilities these days, so if you want yours to be seriously considered, you'd better have it as well. Doordriver will handle the first two points for you automatically when you call the INITDOORDRIVER procedure described below. Doordriver has support for the third point (ANSI graphics), but you'll need to use your own skills in deciding where you wish to put colors, what colors to use, etc. DOORDRIVER PROCEDURES There are a series of procedures that doordriver will provide to you for accomplishing these tasks. Without Carrier Detect - September 1991 - page 12 getting too complex, let's discuss a few of them: PROCEDURE INITDOORDRIVER(ctl_file_name: string); This procedure initializes the door support system, comm port, grabs the user name, and a few other necessary things. The variable "ctl_file_name" is a string containing the name of the control file that your door will use. For now, let's just ignore the control file and use the sample included with the DD package. PROCEDURE SWRITE(out_str: string); This is DD's compliment to the Write() statement of Turbo Pascal. The "S" stands for simultaneous. Output will be written to both the remote user (through the com port) and the local screen. "out_str" is the string containing the data you wish to write. Most of your output will use either this or the following SWRITELN procedure. PROCEDURE SWRITELN(out_str: string); Same as SWRITE, except a carriage return/line feed is appended to the end of the string. This is similar to TP's writeln statement. variable USER_FIRST_NAME: STRING; After INITDOORDRIVER has been called, this variable will contain the user's first name. The string will be all upper-case. variable USER_LAST_NAME: STRING; Similar to USER_FIRST_NAME, this variable will contain the user's last name. As with USER_FIRST_NAME, it is only valid after the call to INITDOORDRIVER has been made. YOUR FIRST DOOR Now that you've seen a few of doordriver's support routines, lets put them to work in the "hello door." The hello door will be simply a door version of the standard hello program. Meaning that it displays "hello world" to the screen. First, a note about my code, I'll be placing line numbers ({1}, {2}, etc) in the code. These are intended for discussion purposes and are not needed in the pascal program itself. HLODOOR.PAS: Carrier Detect - September 1991 - page 13 {1} Program HelloDoor; {2} {3} uses crt, doordriv; {4} {5} begin {6} InitDoorDriver('Doordriv.CTL'); {7} swriteln('Hello World!'); {8} delay(5000); {9} end. Experienced pascal programmers will feel a bit insulted by the simplicity of the above program, but it is a necessary step in learning to use door driver. COMPILING AND RUNNING THE DOOR Once you've got that typed in, then it's time to compile HLODOOR. Using either Turbo Pascal version 5.5 or version 6.0, compile the program to disk. If all goes well, then you'll be left with HLODOOR.EXE on your hard drive. Doordriv.doc (supplied with doordriver) includes infor- mation on how to configure / run the door on your system. For now, let's just worry about running the door in local mode. For local mode, type "/L" on the command line. For example, "HLODOOR /L" will run HLODOOR. Since you are a local user, the door will prompt you for your first and last name. A remote user's information would be gathered from the bbs information file (i.e. DORINFOx.DEF). We won't worry about that for now. ANALYSIS OF CODE Now lets go through the important lines of code one by one. LINE 3: Uses crt, DoorDriv; The "uses" statement is required by Turbo Pascal to tell TP which units we will be using. Obviously, we need "doordriv" for DD's procedures. "crt" is required because we use the DELAY procedure. LINE 6: InitDoorDriver('DoorDriv.CTL'); This is that all-important initialization statement described somewhere above. It tells doordriver to get things all set up and working. The 'Doordriv.CTL' is the name of that "control file" and we won't pay any attention to it for now. Carrier Detect - September 1991 - page 14 LINE 7: swriteln('Hello World!'); This is our screen output. It'll write "Hello World" to both the user and the local screen. Since its SWRITELN and not SWRITE, a carriage return and line feed also will be sent. There are several ways that this could have been done. For example: {1} swrite('Hello'); {2} swriteln(' World!'); - - - or - - - {1} swrite('Hello'); {2} swrite(' World!'); {3} swriteln(''); The output will be the same in the above situations. LINE 8: Delay(5000); This routine is provided by Borland and will cause our program to delay so you can see the "hello world" before doordriver exits and clears the screen. The string "Hello World!" looks pretty plain, doesn't it? Maybe we should put something a bit more impressive in, such as the user's name. This would involve using the variables USER_FIRST_NAME and USER_LAST_NAME. The modification is simple enough: Change line 7 from: {7} swriteln('Hello World!'); to: {7} swriteln('Hello, '+user_first_name+' '+ user_last_name+'!'); As you may have noticed, I used plus signs (+) instead of commas (,) to separate the string parameters in the SWRITELN line. With a standard WRITELN statement, you may use as many variables as you wish, but with SWRITELN, we are limited to 1 string variable. The point is, TP requires us to merge our string variables together with the plus sign. CONCLUSION That's about all the space we have for now. Until our next release, play around with the SWRITE and SWRITELN procedures and see what neat things you can write to the screen. Next time, we'll dive deeper into some inte- ractive communication with the user (i.e. we'll ask him Carrier Detect - September 1991 - page 15 something and then write in back to the screen) as well as play with some more of DD's internal variables. P R O T O C O L P R O W L Protocol Prowl is the place to look to keep up with the latest protocols that hit the streets. In this issue, we have a special treat, a speed and reliability test of several of today's most popular protocols. As you read this bear in mind,"Your mileage may vary." * Speed and Reliability Tests of Popular Protocols Article by William F. Logan Testing by William F. Logan and Jeff White A few months ago Jeff White and I initiated testing of all of the "HOT" protocols. The criteria selected was reliability, efficiency, and speed. We were *NOT* simply searching for the fastest protocol. Let's be honest, you can connect your 2400 baud modem with one of the same, select Ymodem G without MNP, throw caution to the wind and hope for the best. I can assure you a fast file transfer will take place. I also can assure you that if one bit of line noise or interference is encountered you will end up with a corrupted, (and useless) file on your hard drive. We wanted the speed of the transfer to match the reliability of it as well. Various items were standardized upon. First, two files would be transmitted, 35K and 75K in size. These would be transferred in batch when available. If the boards I logged onto Long Distance did not allow Uploads, I would select files as closest to those Kilobytes total as possible for Download. The speed tests were conducted first and then the speed and reliability tests. It was just recently when this final portion of the testing was completed. We first utilized the proper software and ran various noise level test on the line connected to Solitude. With this information in hand we selected times of day when there was no level of noise to times when there should have plenty of garbage screaming across the screen due to the high level of noise. We wanted to find a protocol which was not only fast as Ymodem G but as reliable as Xmodem. The protocols listed below were tested for SPEED of transmission only and the results carefully recorded. We did NOT utilize the timers built into the protocols as we Carrier Detect - September 1991 - page 16 soon discovered that at times these are constructed on a biased basis. We utilized a Digital stopwatch during the transfer and began the clock at the initiation of the transfer and ended it with the actual end of the file transfer. The protocols are listed in the position of speed in which they were recorded with the fastest first and the slowest last. NOTE...THIS IS *NOT* THE OUTCOME OF THE RELIABILITY TEST AS WELL. THIS IS *ONLY* THE SPEED TEST RESULTS. ========================================================== SPEED RESULTS ========================================================== RANK PROTOCOL BATCH AUTHOR ========================================================== 1 Tmodem Y * Micro Tech 2 Zmax [2048] Y Micro Tech 3 Hyper Y ** Hilgraeve 4 Zmodem Mobyturbo Y Omen Tech 5 Mpt Y Matthew Thomas 6 Lynx Y Matthew Thomas 7 bimodem Y *** Erik Labs ========================================================== * REGISTRATION REQUIRED FOR BATCH DOWNLOAD ** HYPER PROTOCOL: Ymodem G was NOT tested. This is an excellent and reliable protocol when utilized properly with an Error Correcting modem. However, it cannot be used correctly without one and thus was excluded. Also Jmodem and Super8K were not tested. Jmodem does not fair well on noisy lines and the shareware version of Super8K is so crippled due to shareware screens it was not selected. To be fair to HyperProtocol the protocol is F-A-S-T when transferring raw uncompressed files. But I decided to pass on this feature as the majority of files on BBSes are compressed files. *** THIS IS NOT AN ACCURATE REPORTING OF THE FULL BIMODEM! BiModem is a technically superior protocol when utilized in the send AND receive mode. This fine Protocol can actually send and receive files at the same time while providing a chat screen. When utilized in this mode the throughput is effectively doubled. In this mode it cannot be beat. However, for the fairness of the test (none of the others are capable of bidirectional transfers) it was Carrier Detect - September 1991 - page 17 tested in one way transmission. Now we arrive with the results that REALLY matter, reliability of transfer. I can take any fast protocol and utilize a speedy hard drive on both ends with disk caching and create speed. But will the file end up in one piece or for that matter end up on your hard drive at all? It is with this in mind that we decided to test for what matters, Reliability of transfer. But I decided to take this one step further and add speed to it as well. This would leave out Xmodem CRC which will just keep ticking like a fine watch on a noisy line. Ward can be proud of what he has put together here. Fine advancements have been made since his pioneering protocol. Note that these protocols were not only tested locally but all across the country. I would pick Mornings, Evenings and Middle of the night to test them. The boards I conducted the test on were located across the nation, from New York to California. During this period I even logged onto a board in Korea very late at night and transferred a 35K file with the winner of our test with no problems at all. I attempted to go through as many switching networks as possible. And, now without further fanfare here are the winners of the Speed and Reliability tests. ========================================================== SPEED AND RELIABILITY OUTCOME ========================================================== RANK PROTOCOL BATCH AUTHOR ========================================================== 1 Zmodem MobyTurbo Y Omen Tech 2 Hyper Y Hilgraeve 3 Tmodem Y Micro Tech 4 Zmax Y Micro Tech ========================================================== Mpt and Lynx were so poor on noisy lines and multiple switching networks that they did not even make the top again. On one occasion on a local BBS during a noisy session Mpt chalked up 536 errors during the 35K file transfer session. It performed the same over noisy long distance lines. Mpt and Lynx are fine protocols when configured correctly on both ends and the user has a clean line in which to transfer. But when they fail, the fail miserably. BiModem was not included within this final test as I did not find one board in my travels across the country that offered this protocol. (Many locally but none long distance) I am sure if offered it would fare well, but Carrier Detect - September 1991 - page 18 this is simply my opinion at this point as I have nothing to back it up with. Now lets pause a moment to go over the results. Omen's DSZ Zmodem MobyTurbo was the overall winner. During ALL the testing this protocol did not fail to function or lock up due to excessive line noise. It would simply downshift to a safe speed and like a fine watch, keep ticking away till it was completed. Yet even during these periods of downshifting the overall speed fared better than the others. In fact as a result of this test I have just standardized to this protocol during all of my transfers. Granted there were times it appeared as if Xmodem was handling the transfer instead of Zmodem but after the spurt of line noise cleared it would kick right back up there again. Since this test Omen has released a graphical version of DSZ called GSZ. It is essentially the same protocol but with a graphical display. Hilgraeve's HyperProtocol was a close second in the reliability test. However when I did run into a problem it would actually lock up the transfer. I received many error messages at times and the worst seemed to be "PIPELINE IS FULL" that one would lock up the protocol. At one point I waited for more than five minutes thinking it would clear up but it never did. Luckily this error would only happen once in a great while. Normally it simply downshifted and continued. However, due to the lockups that occurred it was disqualified from first place. Micro Tech's Tmodem and Zmax are other fine protocols. In Speed, Tmodem cannot be beaten. But again, I received aborted transfers on severely noisy connections. This kept these protocols out of the running for first. Zmax [2048 K packets] did not fair well at all on some connections. I must admit though when I connected with Micro Tech (Long Distance) with either Tmodem or Zmax the speed and reliability of transfer was awesome. If not for a few aborts this would have been the winner hands down. Please bear in mind I am not discussing authors, support policies, registration fees, etc. Granted somewhere on some echo a complaint has been posted about one of these. It is no matter to me how the company supports their products. I am only concerned with the support I receive for my registrations. I do not profess to be the Ralph Nader of Telecommunications nor do I wish to be. Keep this in mind as you judge the suitability of a particular protocol for your own use. For this test I was only concerned with the outcome of the file transfer and to the best of my knowledge the results have been reported fairly and accurately. I also Carrier Detect - September 1991 - page 19 might add at a fair expense to me....but I digress. The matter at hand is reliability. As users we want the file to depart our hard drive and reach the remote point with few problems and errors as possible. Personally, I feel that you cannot go wrong with DSZ. I have not conducted tests on GSZ but being as it is simply a graphical DSZ it would perform well. I am sure there are those of you who will disagree and argue these points with me. I can only state what we have found to be true during these tests. - Editor's Note Bill Logan and Jeff White can be reached at Solitude BBS in Tucson, Arizona (602) 747-5236 or through Fido Net at 1:300/21 and 1:300/23 respectively. P O T L U C K This department of Carrier Detect contains articles that do not neatly fit into the other departments that appear regularly. Here the articles could be on anything and will vary in each issue this area appears. * Archives and Why We Use Them Article by Thomas O' Hara Many people new to communications, are puzzled with archived files on BBSes. First, it can be difficult to determine what a file is or does by the rather cryptic descriptions that are found on most BBS file listings. Secondly, a file extension of EXE, COM or BAT may be understandable, but just what is an ARJ, ARC, ZIP or LZH? And then they have to ask themselves "How do you make use of such a file?" To better understand this mess, we should stroll through archive history (this is the O'Hara version, mind you - which may or may not be totally accurate, but close enough). Since there really isn't any known better authority on this branch of history, I guess the responsibility falls on my shoulders to guide you. Somewhere, back in the beginning of the telecommun- ication explosion, someone came up with the idea of a BBS. Now, a BBS is a "Bulletin Board" service or system, and as such, was primarily used for passing messages from one user to another - thus the name bulletin board. Back in those ancient days, fast modems were 300 baud, and the only transfer protocol was a straight Ascii - or text - transfer. The baud rate and transfer type were adequate, Carrier Detect - September 1991 - page 20 of course, since most people couldn't type that fast, nor were the terminal programs capable of handling much more than text. And then something amazing happened. Newer, faster modems came out - blazing along at 1200 baud! - and a gentleman by the name of Ward Christiansen devised a better protocol - Xmodem - the first reliable, error checking one. Suddenly more things could be done in less time, and since Xmodem was able to handle binary code as well as Ascii code, the possibility of transferring executable files came into existence. This was a rather new concept. Again, keep in mind that this is way back in history (according to O'Hara), certainly more than a decade ago. This was a time when home computers were dominated by 8-bit machines such as the Apple or TRS-80. A time when a big file would have been something less than 48,000 bytes in size. Even then, such a file would have taken quite some time to pass, 10 or 12 minutes. And, just like today, such a file might have several data files and/or text files to support it. After all, you DO need at least a short instruction file telling you how to use the program don't you? Fact is, just like today, you might really have to download 5, 6 or more files to get a functional program, and the more files you transferred, the better your chances were that one was corrupted. Some smart person stumbled onto the concept of a "library" file containing ALL relevant files, and thus started the "concept" of archiving. Now, a library file didn't really do anything special to the files, just put them together so you could download one big one. Actually, due to the rather limited error checking performed by Xmodem these extended download sessions may have increased your chance of getting a busted file. After all, line noise was worse back then, and today's modems have improved immensely in their ability overcome this problem. However, our friend that created xmodem improved it and file transfers become a bit more practical. Times change - fortunately. The home computer was no longer to be dominated by 8-bit machines, since "big blue" decided to enter the field with its own "pricey" edition - the IBM PC. This groundbreaking machine was a 16-bit powerhouse with enormous memory of 640K, not the measly 64K that the 8-bit machines used. Incorporating such a high RAM level was probably only done to give the fledgling machines the illusion of incredible power. At that time no software utilized even close to this amount of memory and I doubt that even IBM ever thought that the 640K RAM ceiling would some day become a "limitation" to Carrier Detect - September 1991 - page 21 the programmer. Of course, one of Murphy's Laws state that no matter how much space you have, SOMEONE will find a way to fill it and need more. This also applies to RAM. Suddenly, we are faced with transferring not just 64-80K libraries of files as we did with the 8-bit machines, but now we are faced with libraries that could be 360K - this limit being supplied by the standard floppy diskette - or larger, since hard drives were available even back then. But a Xmodem transfer of a file that large could take over an hour at 1200 baud! And the "faster" protocols, as they came on line, only improved this time marginally. Yes, the advent of the 2400 baud modem halved the time, but this "expensive" peripheral was limited to only the hard core hobbyist and the well to do. Something needed to be done to help out the rest of us. And something was done. To my recollection - and this is history according to O'Hara - the first serious program that attacked the problem was a program called ARC. Through use of programming "magic," this program took related groups of files and not only created a library of them, but compressed the file to a smaller size! Suddenly, these behemoth libraries exceeding 360K could be compressed into a single file, considerably smaller than the originals. Perhaps one that was only 75% the size of the original set of files! A considerable savings in time, and therefore money in long distance phone calls. But this was just the begi.ning. ARC was improved by its developer Thom Henderson, and suddenly became the first archive standard. Then it too was improved on by another developer, Phil Katz, using similar coding techniques. Unfortunately, he chose to continue to use the same file extension, and eventually we ended up with the infamous "Arc Wars" that has lead to different standards and much confusion in general for the public. In addition, there were other players in the field, offering different solutions to the same problem. And suddenly we went from seeing ARCs in the file list to also seeing others, such as DWC, LZH, PAK, ZIP, as well as ARC. And yes, there were still others. Originally, the reason for searching for archiving methods was to create a file package that could be stored in the smallest space possible. However, this enabled files to be transferred from one computer to another in the least amount of time. Put another way, the smallest possible archive is the cheapest possible archive to transfer. And that is why we use archives instead of uncompressed files. But what of the many possible choices for the archiver to be used? It is my contention that the only archiver to use for online storage is the one that makes the smallest archive of any given set of files. Carrier Detect - September 1991 - page 22 Put another way, I advocate NO single archiver as a standard. If a particular associated set of files is compressed into the smallest possible package by, say PKZIP, then the online file should be a ZIP file. However, if the smallest compressed file is created by LHA, then it should be an LZH file, and so on. In reality, you will find that the tighest compressed file will either be an ARJ or an LZH. I have rarely found that PKZIP creates the smallest possible archive, ditto for PAK and ZOO. An archive is, well, an archive - a place for STORING records, information, etc. The same is true of an archive file. Essentially, we use it as a storage file for infrequently used programs, if, in fact we ever actually do use them. Since storage is expensive - as is transfer time - I store the archives in whatever archive format creates the smallest file. After all, the fewer the disks I have to maintain, the better off I am. And since I am NOT a "command line switch guru," nor do I ever intend to be one, most of my files are stored as LZHs. And here is where I am forced to vary from my OWN logic. In nearly 80% of all cases, right now the smallest archive is created by ARJ. Why, then, do I store most of my files as LZHs? Mostly, it is because I don't have excess funds to use to register ARJ, and LHA is a free program. And I do not recommend continuous use of a shareware program without registering it. At some point in time, ARJ will be registered, and at that point in time, my personal files will be mostly converted to that archive format. One further point of clarification needs be made here, and that deals with the extensions EXE and COM that you also find in file lists. Ususally, these are NOT merely executable files, but are instead a form of file called a "self extracting archive." When you "execute" it by typing its filename, you start a process that causes the file to "unpack" itself into its associated files. This can create problems for you. When dealing with one of these types of archives, that is a file ending in EXE or COM, make sure there is enough space on the disk you are on to hold the expanded files when you execute it. Even more basic, make sure that you are not in a directory on your hard drive where you don't want miscellaneous files to be placed. All of the modern archivers create self extracting files and there is the possibility of running a self extracting file that would actually overwrite existing files on the system. I believe that most of the self extractors will warn you of this situation, but some may contain an overwrite switch that would foil this safeguard. I also suggest that you always look at the Carrier Detect - September 1991 - page 23 contents of a self-extractor first. This will help avoid the possibility of accidental overwrite. This may mean you have to have a copy of every archiver available (or a multi-format archive viewer such as Debuerg's File Viewer) but it is worth it. Although many boards test all files for virii, it is possible to bury one in a self extracting file inside a standard archive. For safety's sake, you might consider taking precautions such as starting your TSR virus checker before you run any new software. I hope you found this information interesting and useful. At least one of the original intentions of this text has been met; To provide a clear statement as to why we use archives in telecommunications. I also hope that you can get a general understanding of the meanings attributable to the different file extensions. - Editor's Note The ARJ archiver mentioned in the article is free for non-commercial personal use. B Y T E L I N E Fast facts, tips, comments and rumors on all kinds of computer related topics. * BYTELINE - July 1991 by Tom Garcia and Michael Crosson DEAR GOTTFRIED: Thanks for last month's tip on using SETVER. I got MANIFEST to work with DOS 5.0 by telling the MSDOS.SYS version table that I was using Ver. 3.3. ... Dear B.W. You are using the beta version of DOS 5 I see. The "real" DOS 5 has the version table in SETVER, not in MSDOS.SYS but the method of adding/deleting files from the table is the same. With the new way of doing things you have to have this line in CONFIG.SYS - DEVICE=SETVER.EXE. ANYONE USING DR-DOS? It is being offered for $79.95 with a certificate letting you buy LOTUS Magellan for $19.95. DR-DOS is version 5. Was there ever a version 4,3,2,1? [Gottfried jumping in here - The previous version of DR DOS was ver. 3.41. And, DR- DOS 6.0 will catch up with MS DOS 5.0 by incorporating a task switcher]. SYMANTEC's ON TARGET (sets up schedules) free demo disk. Call 1- 800-228-4122, ext. 303-P. SYMANTEC JustWrite for WINDOWS free demo disk. Same #, ext. 106- P. The program is temporally on sale for $79. Carrier Detect - September 1991 - page 24 Free FOXPRO 2.0 Demo Disk: 1-800-837-FOX2, offer PCD-701. CHARISMA PRESENTATION software working model: 1-800-733-3729, Ext. 5050. GEO WRITE reminds me of AMI PRO except it is faster in its GEOS environment that looks like WINDOWS but isn't. Too bad the current version doesn't have a speller, thesaurus or search & replace ability. It does have some nice looking fonts, all of which show up on my VGA screen in true WYSIWYG manner. My old 9-pin Epson prints out the nine supplied text fonts in any size from 4 points to 792 points (one character per page!) [Gottfried here to say: Ver. 1.2, free to all registered owners, has the Houghton-Mifflin spell checker with a 100,000 word dictionary.] THE GEO ENSEMBLE package also is lacking when it comes to any kind of a spreadsheet/database feature except for a basic name & address program. [Gottfried here again. The ver. 2.0 release of GEOS ENSEMBLE will have a spreadsheet that will work with Lotus WK1 files.] I HAVEN'T WRITTEN much about PSL in almost a year. That's because I haven't seen a copy of their PSL NEWS. I like the magazine but if I pick up a copy I can't put it down 'till I have read the whole thing. That's "information overload" because it takes an hour or so to get thru it. So, I cut off my nose to spite my face and let my subscription lapse. They recently sent me the June issue anyhow.... At one time I had a magazine article in the works about shareware and PSL would have had a prominent place in said article. I was writing about PSL, CompuServe's Forum Libraries, and local Bulletin Boards. CompuServe was undergoing big changes every month or so and when I got the article just about ready it was suddenly out of date. After that happening a few times I quit and went to work on something less challenging. PSL MENTIONS some problems with DAK but a letter to the editor about DAK sez, "Never have I had a problem." PSL lists a good deal on a laptop (EPSON) from DANMARK...... For a free copy of PSL NEWS call 1-800-2424-PSL. A NOTE FROM Gottfried Lopez: I find $5 per disk from shareware from PSL to be exorbitant. If you want one disk it's $5 plus 4$ shipping. Before I got religion and went straight I bought disks from many sources including the infamous Mr. Moto in Nevada and never did I pay more than $2.50 per disk. And this was for name brand stuff. REMEMBER THE PROBLEMS I had with DANMARK and the computer that didn't have (as advertised) a VGA monitor? I have Carrier Detect - September 1991 - page 25 tried again to buy a low cost XT type computer to use as a backup, this time a $249 job (MEMOREX) from a company in New Jersey. Will let you know how that works out. AT SEA ON A BATTLESHIP. Last month I spent four days aboard one of the Navy's two remaining battleships. While there I put in a slight amount of work (telephone answering) in the Information Officer's work space with fellow UofA grad Lt. Rob Raine. He does a lot of things on the ship, one of which is publishing the ship's newspaper and also the "plan of the day." A desktop publishing package I never heard of is used. Rob has his own TOSHIBA laptop computer and WORD PERFECT 5.1. The official "issue" word processor is WP 4.2 but other versions plus WORD, WORDSTAR, etc., have been brought on board by the crew. Navy supplied PC's are ZENITH brand and all 54 are in stand-alone mode. Computers are strapped to desktops and monitors are in turn strapped to the computer. This is not for theft prevention but rather as a protection in rough seas. You probably got the same mailing from Microsoft that I got re. DOS 5.0 and how you can "upgrade" for only $99.95 direct from MS. Gee, thanks Bill. MS sez I can now get "direct support" from them. Yeah, and at only $2 a minute. I can now "recover critical deleted files." I can't recover ordinary lost files? Who decides which files are "critical"? The new Task Swapper "ends the time- consuming quit-load-quit routine." The quit the old and load the new program strategy is faster than the task-swapper in my tests. Oh well, at least EXTEND-A-NAME PLUS works now, which it didn't with the Beta test version. If you want a better price for DOS call EGGHEAD as they have a $39.95 special. SHAREWARE AUTHORS TAKE NOTE: What This World Needs is a WINDOWS that isn't actually WINDOWS. Some sort of a GEOS like graphics package. None of the multi- tasking, expanded/extended memory management. No big "eats up all your disk space" installation. Something that simply lets you run a program like WORD FOR WINDOWS with low overhead. It doesn't do anything but let you run a single written for WINDOWS program. Am I dreaming? * BYTELINE - August 1991 A LITTLE MORE INFO (maybe more than you want) on GeoWorks. The new Ver. 1.2 (free to 1.0 registered owners) has a spell checker, support for 300 additional printers, and built in TETRIS for the game players GEOS is a program that looks like WINDOWS but runs on an 8088 (or better) Carrier Detect - September 1991 - page 26 computer. The GEOS ENSEMBLE program has things like a word processor with quite a few features but is only 58K in size. The draw program is about 32K. Ver. 1.2 is the latest GeoWorks and Ver. 2.0 should be out about Jan. 1992. Version 2.0 will have more capability, such as a spreadsheet. Then comes Ver. 3.0, a full blown 32 bit operating system that you are supposed to use (?) as a Novell front end.. Will it all happen? The company is still a small 75 man operation. Guess we will have to wait and see. The companies pitch is: Pay us 1% of your sales and we will give you a runtime graphics environment that looks like WINDOWS and that you can run on any computer anyone owns. The people with just an XT or AT on their desk can get familiar with a GUI on the cheap. A $100 application ($50 wholesale) costs just 50 cents royalty. And, we at GEOS do all the work for you on printer drivers and the GUI menu. All this came to my attention via the America On Line application which runs under GEOS. It has a nice look and feel to it. But, with this stuff you are talking only look and feel. No multi-tasking even if you have a 486. Sure, with a 512K 8086 you don't have the hardware for any kind of mult- itasking but you can still run the snazzy looking GEOS and its programs. As for multitasking on a computer that isn't a server: Who needs it? Why would you want or need Word Perfect running in the "background." What's it doing in the background? Nothing. With GEOS you can shrink Word Perfect to an icon and it's still there but not actually running. Same thing you do with Switch-It, Carousel or DOS 5.0's task switcher... List price for GeoWorks is $199 but CompuServe members and GEnie members often get gangas. MICROSOFT HAD GOOD experience with the Beta testing (7,000 copies) of DOS 5.0 so they are doing the same thing with WINDOWS 3.1. It comes on 7 HD disks. Has a much better "look" to it than ver. 3.0, plus other enhancements. MY XT CLONE from MEMOREX came out of the box and was up and running in 5 minutes. It cost $249. Came with 640K, one 360K drive and a keyboard. There is a serial port, a printer port, and video output for both color (CGA) and a mono graphics monitor. I had to supply my own monitor and cable. Fortunately I had an amber TAXAN monitor not in use with anything so I plugged it in. The MEMOREX runs at 4.77 or 10 MHz. It's a slimline with just two available slots. I stuck a hardcard in it which left one slot but because of the size of the hardcard I'm only going to be able to put a short card in the remaining slot. A shorty modem card would be a good choice. The only problem is the built-in clock-calendar. I can't use it 'cause there is no software to set it or pick up the time and date on boot. I need ACER (they built the thing) software STIME, SDATE and TODAY. All in all, it's a good backup computer in case your main job goes on the fritz, like while doing your Carrier Detect - September 1991 - page 27 taxes on April 14th! The 360K drive is a grave limitation if all your data files are backed up on 720K, 1.2 meg, etc., disks. Then the backup computers usefulness becomes something less than useful. The best thing to do is ZIP data 2 files and save them to low capacity disks. I formatted some 360K disks to 420K with MAXI and ZIPPED all my WORD files files that happened to come to 410K. HAVING SOME KIND of weird troubles with your computer? Trashed directories and wrecked FATs? After many months of problem free operation all of a sudden something started sending my floppy A: disks to that big DEL in the sky.... "Round up the usual suspects" came to mind. Number one suspect is always my cache program. I REMed that in AUTOEXEC.BAT and all returned to normal with drive A:, though everything was a little slower overall. After damage control procedures were taken care of I redid PC- CACHE with the I/a option (ignore drive A:) and things are fixed but who knows for how long? FIFTH GENERATION SYSTEMS sent a nice flyer offering good deals on their products such as FASTBACK 3.0 and BROOKLYN BRIDGE. They have a BBS where you can download, ask questions, etc. Or, as they put it in the flyer "lease [sic] questions." Their 24 hour seven day a week toll free technical line is their pride & joy. They say, "Set your alarm one night for 3:00 am and call us. Our technicians are alert and ready!" The BBS is at (504) 295-3344, 0,8,1 at 300,1200, 2400 baud. FREE DEMO DISK of Q&A 4.0 by calling 1-800-228-4122 Ext. 102-P F E E D B A C K I am interestested in getting as much feedback as possible regarding Carrier Detect and welcome suggestions or any other comments you may have. If you are a software publisher or shareware author and want to submit your program for possible inclusion in future issues you are welcome to do so. Finally, if you are interested in writing an article or review, please let me know! To make it as easy as possible to reach me, I have set up a new Bulletin Board System that is based in my home. Since last issue I have switched software and am now running Wildcat! 3. In addition I have purchased an Intel 9600EX V.32/V.42 modem and a 2nd 40 Meg Hard Drive dedicated to the BBS. I would like to offer callers 100 megs of files but have exhausted my BBS budget. If anyone who finds this Journal valuable would like to send in a Carrier Detect - September 1991 - page 28 donation to help support and expand the BBS it would be greatly appreciated. Symmetry - The Home of Carrier Detect Call today and download the Carrier Detect Reader Door! (602) 296-2248 1200/2400/9600 V.32/V.42 supported Fidonet node # 1:300/28 24 hours a day (unless I am programming!) First call access to Carrier Detect Related Files and programs reviewed in the current issue. Home Mailing Address: 640 Avenida Princesa, Tucson, AZ 85748 I also can be reached on GEnie as (M.CROSSON) - since Electronic Mail on GEnie is a part of the flat rate *Basic Services this may be the cheapest way to contact me (provided you have a GEnie account)! P R O D U C T I N F O R M A T I O N Following is product information for the products reviewed in this issue of Carrier Detect. If you are interested in purchasing or evaluating any of the products please note the publisher's address listed below. In addition, all current shareware programs featured in Carrier Detect will be made available to first time callers on the Carrier Detect Support BBS: Symmetry BBS - Tucson, Arizona, (602) 296-2248 1200/2400/9600 V.32/.42 supported, 24 hours a day. Fidonet Node 1:300/28 HYPERACCESS/5 distributed as commercial software version 2.0 suggested list - $99.95 for DOS only $199.95 for DOS and OS/2 version published by - Hilgraeve Inc., Genesis Centre, 111 Conant Avenue, Suite A, Monroe, MI, 48161 Toll-Free Orders 1-800-826-2760 FREE SPEECH BBS distributed as shareware version 3.10 cost - $25 dollars registration fee published by - Pinnacle Software, P.O. Box 386, Mount Royal, Quebec, Canada, H3P3C6 (514) 345-9578 (voice) (514) 345-8654 (BBS) available for download on GEnie in the BBS roundtable Carrier Detect - September 1991 - page 29