News from the OS/2 World - by Ryan Dill

reetings all, and welcome again to OS/2 e-Zine! 's monthly news update. This column is designed to go over certain topics that e-Zine! 's own News Folder might have missed, or only glossed over.

We still believe our News Folder can't be beat when it comes to up-to-the-minute, accurate information, but it usually contains more "official" things like press releases and such. This column will include a bit more detail about things we think are of interest to OS/2 users everywhere. Grassroots support, off-the-record news and updates -- stuff that other sources may have missed -- you name it, we've got it!

A new version of the popular shareware text editor Smalled has been released. Version 2.00 of the program adds a slew of new features, including a backwards search and replace function, multiple undo/redo, a customized floating toolbar, a copy of the Smalled Clipboard Extensions, programmable text tools, and more. In addition to the new features, many of Smalled's existing features have been improved, including the drag-and-drop printing capability, the HTML stripping function, and Smalled's file dialogs.

Smalled's interface in general has been spiffed up as well, with extra toolbar items and icons in the status bar of the program. The new version of Smalled can be downloaded from Smalled's web page at BMT Micro The $18 price tag registers both Smalled and the Smalled Clipboard Extensions, and for $25, you get Smalled HTML Extensions included as well.

In the browser market, there's a new version of Netscape Navigator available from IBM. This new version includes support for IBM's WorkSpace On-Demand, as well as the support for Java v1.1.x that IBM's been beta testing for a while now -- it allows you to use either Java 1.0.2 or Java 1.1.x to display Java applets, and performance when using Java 1.1.x is greatly improved. IBM has also updated the Netscape Plug-in Pack, with which you can play things such as AVI and MPG video and WAV and MIDI audio right through your browser. You can download the updated Netscape Navigator and Plug-in Pack both from IBM's Netscape 2.02 web page.

Also in Netscape news, the Netscape Navigator for OS/2 Warp Unofficial Home Page went 'off the air' in late January when the maintainer, Dan Libby, moved on to another project at Netscape. The reins of the site have been taken up by another Netscape member of the development team, Bill Law. Therefore, from now on the new address of the web site is http://people.netscape.com/law/os2nav/.

Netscape stunned many on January 22^nd when it announced that it planned to release the source code for its next version of Netscape Communicator to the public, in order to "...ignite the creative energies of the entire Net community and fuel unprecedented levels of innovation in the browser market." After a few days, the OS/2 Netlabs stepped forward and announced that it intended to take the source code (once released in March) and port a version of Netscape Communicator 5 to OS/2. The OS/2 Netlabs is an organization of programmers who attempt to solve the problems of OS/2's relative lack of applications (compared to Windows) by allowing programmers and users alike the opportunity to discuss what programs are needed in the OS/2 community, and then making possible a collaborative programming effort to produce those programs. For more information about Netlabs' version of the browser, called Warpscape, see the Warpscape web page.

OS/2 is going to get a version of the Opera web browser. An announcement from Opera Software on February 5th stated that a deal has been reached with a software company called Binary Concepts from British Columbia, Canada to do the porting. Binary Concepts plans to use IBM's Open32 porting library to port the Windows version of Opera to OS/2 for starters, "...which will be replaced/converted over time into a solid and native OS/2 version...". This will allow Opera to get a product out the door and into the eager hands of OS/2 users as soon as possible, but also promises various OS/2-specific improvements after the initial version has been released. For more information on Project Magic, the browser initiative from Opera which resulted in the OS/2 version becoming a reality, see the Project Magic web page.

IDK Incorporated has released version 1.0 of DupeFind, which they claim is the world's fastest duplicate file finder for OS/2. Designed to save disk space by searching out extra copies of file you don't need duplicates of, DupeFind has a number of impressive features: It can find duplicate files inside Zip archives, works on multiple file systems (FAT, HPFS and NTFS if you have Peer networking set up), and can even find duplicate files if you rename them! Not only does it have the features, but it's small and fast, compared to similar utilities like Clone Cleaner and Dups! .

Tested over large networks, it can easily handle scanning large numbers of files, and its Smart Viewer technology makes it easy to check out files before they're deleted, to make sure you don't want to keep them. With international language support, prioritizing (big files handled first, so you get back as much space as soon as possible), VoiceType support, and more, this is one gizmo anyone pressed for disk space should try out. IDL is currently offering a time-limited demo of version 1.0 downloadable from the the Dupe Find web site, where a copy of the complete user's manual is online.

A German company by the name of edv-beratung wimmers has created a new tool for OS/2 users interested in improving the look of their OS/2 system or applications. think::xels! is a collection of over 1200 high-quality icons and symbols for OS/2 which can be used by OS/2 end-users, developers and administrators alike. For users and administrators, you can use the icons to replace your normal system icons and improve the look of your OS/2 desktop(s) (see an example).

For developers, the icons and symbols can be used to give a polished, professional look to your application without the hours of painstaking work drawing your own images. As well, think::xels! icons support animation and 'statechanging', so can give a whiz-bang look to whatever actions your program does (see an example). Work is even under way to convert think::xels! to a Java-compatible format to allow even more widespread usage.

edv-beratung is allowing think::xels! to be tried out for free for a 30 day period, at which time it must be purchased. One can buy a Desktop license for individual users, a Developer's license which grant permission for the images to be reused in your own program, or an Administrators license, which offers discounts when buying in bulk. More information can be found on the think::xels web page.

While on the subject of visual enhancements, the system enhancement Dialog Enhancer (mentioned in November '97's Beta File) has finished its beta stages and is now available as shareware from BMT Micro. It has also just recently received an update since being released. The installer program has been updated to version 1.29g, and the data file has been enhanced as well, including an extra goodie: support for WinOS2 programs as well as OS/2 programs! Now the look of whatever WinOS2 programs or plug-ins you use can also be enhanced to look more OS/2-like, making OS/2's Windows support appear even more seamless. For those who have already downloaded and registered Dialog Enhancer, the updates can be found here:

• Installer program: v1.29g (ZIP, 280k)
• Data Pack: v2.01 (ZIP, 681k)

For more information about Dialog Enhancer, see the Dialog Enhancer web page.

That's it for this month. If you have a tip that you want followed up or a news item you think should be reported, don't hesitate to let us know!

Ryan Dill is a student in Computer Science at Acadia University in Wolfville, NS and OS/2 e-Zine! 's Assistant Editor. He is reported to be relieved that, with the advent of Warp 4, talking to your computer is no longer considered a sign of mental instability.

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