[Please note: this is a text only version of the on-line magazine, OS/2 e-Zine!.  OS/2 e-Zine! is a graphical, WWW OS/2 publication and, if possible, should be viewed in its HTML format available on-line at http://www.os2ezine.com/ or zipped for off-line reading.  Some graphically oriented articles have been removed from this document.]


OS/2 e-Zine!		October 16, 1997		volume 2, number 10
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Copyright 1997		Falcon Networking  	ISSN 1203-5696

                  "Over Half a Million Satisfied Visitors!"


OPINIONS:

  From the Editor
  Chris' Rant
  Isn't It Time?
 
DEPARTMENTS:

  the Beta File
  Answers from e-Zine!
  News from the OS/2 World
  OS/2 Gaming News
  the REXX Files
  How Do I?


FOCUS: Cable Modems & OS/2
  Introduction
  Speed and Benefits
  Installation Day
  Conclusions
  Checklist
  Glossary


OTHER REVIEWS:

InJoy v1.1 - Chris Wenham

-First Looks and Nifty Gadgets-
tSearch v1.00b		Bandit Tagger v1.20
Background Magic v1.1	PowerMOD v0.33
ICQ Java v0.91


READER SURVEY

Results from our September Survey
    Find out what your fellow readers told us last month! 

What do you think about web browsers?
    Answer these 3 simple questions and find out how you compare to
    other OS/2 users.  Results will be printed next month!

Are you a hard core OS/2er?
    You've taken the Cosmo survey, now take the Operating System
    survey!  Do you love OS/2 too much?  Do you have problems
    committing to other OS's?  Answer these quesitions and find out if
    you're a real OS/2er.


CELEBRITY CORNER

Soundoff With Netscape! - Interview
    Each month, OS/2 e-Zine! brings you IBMers, ISVs, OS/2
    industry personalities, and celebrities to share their opinions
    and more!  This month, we bring you a complete log of the recent
    "Soundoff With Netscape" event where two members of the Netscape
    Communicator for OS/2 team were interviewed.

THE OS/2 DEBATE

Focus: What should IBM do with OS/2? - Chris Wenham & Colin Hildinger
    Join OS/2 e-Zine! staff as they debate some of the most
    controversial topics affecting OS/2 users today.  Pick a side
    and join in!


END NOTES:

  Hot Sellers - the top 15 selling OS/2 apps from Indelible Blue.
  Hot Sellers - the top 10 selling OS/2 apps from J3 Computer Technologies.
  Hot Sellers - the top 10 selling OS/2 apps from BMT Micro.


ODDS & ENDS:

* How to Subscribe to OS/2 e-Zine! for FREE.
* How YOU can Sponsor OS/2 e-Zine!
* The Sponsors that Make this Issue Possible


Copyright 1997   -   Falcon Networking
ISSN 1203-5696

***********************************

Will someone buy this thing?

Our debate this month (and the results from our Reader Survey) focus on what IBM should do with OS/2.

Many people's opinion of IBM's marketing of OS/2 is not very flattering.  Some of them (though not all, by any means -- see this month's stats) feel that the only cure for what ails OS/2 is to find it a new parent.  This is a theme that has been debated heavily on the Internet for some time, and despite the near certainty that it won't happen, it's fun to speculate on what could be accomplished if IBM relinquished control.

Could an independent company buy OS/2 or even just the client version of OS/2 from IBM and do something useful with it?  Some say yes, some say no (see Colin's arguments in this month's debate).  While it's an accepted fact that IBM makes money because of OS/2, that's very different from saying they make money from OS/2.  The company purchasing OS/2 would face incredible obstacles, not the least of which would be overcoming media and end-user inertia, fixing all the inconsistencies of the OS that keep it from being really user-friendly, and hiring a good tech support staff.  But if these obstacles could be surmounted, there just might be some long term profit in owning the only real commercial contender to Windows NT (once NT finally becomes a mainstream OS).

But again, some don't seem to think so.

So what if IBM gave away OS/2?  There are two ways they could go about this: give away individual copies of the client themselves -- in essence, free licenses to individual users; or, give the entire code for the client to a charitable organization which would then distribute it.

The first option is, in my opinion, what IBM should have done long ago.  In Canada, for a while before Warp 4 was released, IBM was selling small packages of Warp 3 with the BonusPak with no manual and no tech support, for about Cdn$50.  I know at least a few people that tried OS/2 because of this inexpensive package.  If a similar offer were made where the client was actually free for download or available for a nominal fee on CD (with no manual or tech support, of course), imagine how many more people would at least try it (and become hooked!).  This is how you build market share, just ask Netscape (or Microsoft).

If you don't think people value software if it's free, have a chat with the reported 5+ million Linux users who have been getting their OS versions in exactly this fashion for years.  With a similar solution (I see Walnut Creek bundling the OS/2 client on a CD and selling it for about US$15, much like they do for Linux) and the comparative maturity and polish of OS/2, this would result in millions of extra users over the years.  And I mean real users, not ATMs.

Or, suppose IBM just gave the code away and let an independent charitable organization run with it.  They could sell the client OS (with IBM retaining all rights for the server) for a nominal fee (US$25 per copy?) to pay salaries for a handful of talented programmers to keep enhancing and developing it.  IBM could wash its hands of us end-users once and for all but not have to actually kill the client.  And again, it just might increase end-user market share, which would no doubt ripple upwards to server sales once the mainstream media started reporting on this new phenomenon.

But let's be realistic.  What if IBM refuses to relinquish control of its baby?  After all, they will refuse.  Can we extend OS/2 without IBM's permission?

This is probably the most work of any of my ideas, but it just might be the most workable too.  IBM is not going to be divulging any lines of code to you or me any time soon, but that doesn't mean we can't build on what they have already provided us.  The WPS is incredibly versatile and a great deal of cutting-edge functionality can be added to OS/2 by a good WPS programmer.  And much other functionality could be added too, given the proper determination.

What if some organization were to employ talented people to produce such enhancements?  Such a charity could solicit memberships (a better TeamOS/2 than TeamOS/2?) from end-users and use the funds to pay said programmers, then making the enhancements freely available to all OS/2 users.

There are precedents for this sort of thing (not the charitable aspects, but the 3rd party enhancement aspects) already.  It has been rumoured that IBM almost has font anti-aliasing technology (from Adobe) incorporated in Warp 4 but, for various reasons, left it out.  It has also been rumoured that an OS/2 ISV is or was considering finishing this job and releasing the product for sale.  In the Windows 3.x market, there is the ubiquitous Winsock by Peter Tattam which allowed users everywhere to use Windows with TCP/IP over a dial up connection.  Both these products would or did immensely enhance the value of the base operating system and they didn't or don't require IBM's permission to produce.

In the end, it may be that the future of OS/2 lies not in IBM's hands, and not in OS/2 ISV's hands, but in ours.

***********************************

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Home of the top selling (http://www.fx.dk/injoy/) InJoy dialer, ranked #1 in worldwide OS/2 shareware sales (Jan-97).

(http://www.indelible-blue.com/) Indelible Blue
Indelible Blue, a mail order company, provides OS/2 software and hardware solutions to customers worldwide.

(http://www.kellergroup.com/) Keller Group Inc.
Developers of FaxWorks for OS/2 and PMfax, the fax and voice solution for OS/2, with versions for stand-alone, LAN and Internet Faxing.

(http://www.mensys.nl/indexuk.html) Mensys
The one place to go in Europe for all OS/2 Warp software.

(http://www.pcs-soft.com/) Perez Computing Services
Defend against desktop freezes with Ctrl-Alt-Del Commander and create online documents/help with the IPF Editor.

(http://www.prioritymaster.com/) ScheduPerformance, Inc.
Dramatically improve performance on your OS/2 system now with the patented priority scanning logic and visual priority identification of Priority Master II.

(http://www.softouch.com/) SofTouch Systems, Inc.
Home of the bestselling set of disk and desktop maintenance products for 
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Providing quality software for the home and office.

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Productivity applications:  Relish - time management; Mesa 2 - spreadsheet; Clearlook - word processor; DBExpert - database.

***********************************

Chris' Rant	- by Chris Wenham

What YOU Like About/2

Last month I attempted to explain why I liked OS/2 and was still sticking with it after all this time, even though I've worried and fretted as much as anyone. I also asked you, the reader, to tell me what your reasons were.

The majority of you who responded (and keep in mind, this is hardly a scientific survey) joined OS/2 in the early days of 2.x - 3.0 because, like a good dose of Mylanta, it cured the pain of DOS and Windows without forcing you to give up your favorite apps.  I noticed a distinct lack of 'killer apps' mentioned, except for perhaps the Workplace Shell, but the idea of OS/2 being fun was definitely echoed.  Take for example (dragon.nest@worldnet.att.net) David Graser:

     "Why do I use OS/2?  Because it is fun to use.
     My first computer came with Windows 3.1.  Every time I turned
     around I was getting a "general protection fault".  Windows 3.1
     just wasn't fun to use.  I found myself sinking an ungodly
     amount of money into software trying to get the system to
     run the way I wanted it to.

     Then I saw an ad for OS/2 2.1 with Windows 3.1 support. 
     The price was right, so I decided to give it a try.  It didn't
     take me long to realize the power of OS/2.  It made
     computing fun.  OS/2 is still my primary operating system
     because I have fun using it.  I have added a few shareware and
     freeware Desktop enhancements to enhance the power of the OS/2
     Desktop.  I have especially enjoyed Warp 4."

Some were bemused spectators, like (axberg@ibm.net) Alex Etzensberger:

     "...OS2 is doing almost everything I need it to
     do and I enjoy watching the frenzy that has enveloped the
     Windows world over what to do and where to go from
     here."

This is something I was almost about to write about last month myself (goodness knows why I didn't).  I wouldn't be the first one to liken the Windows scene with a Circus either.  Anyone know what DDE/OLE/ActiveX is supposed to be called this week? ;-)

One of the most interesting stories came from someone who simply signed himself as (ericw@networx.on.ca) Eric and who talked about his early experiences with computers like the Tandy CoCo (Color Computer), Commodore 64 and Amiga, from the times where he sold machines like these, then moved into publishing micro-controller programming, and eventually an Internet Access business.  Eric had dealings with Windows 3.0 and Desqview, passed OS/2 1.3 but stopped when 2.0 caught his attention...

     "As I worked with it, I discovered that it has a
     really flexible architecture.  The pretty pictures have a smart
     brain to back them up.  Documents, files... objects, can have
     types, and programs and tools can declare what types of things
     they work with, so I could choose to hit a file with an editing
     tool or perhaps a compiler or assembler tool if that was
     appropriate, or I could print it.  I could write programs in C
     or C++, and they would automatically appear on the menus of
     the types of files that they handle.  I could use Rexx to write
     "batch files on steroids".  I could write batch files that ran
     in my text editor!  I could create icons for anything and
     put them anywhere I pleased."

While most were satisfied with what they've got, others took the chance to express their disappointments and what they want to see.  If there's some developer out there reading this, pay attention to what the likes of (williamwolson@prostar.com) Bill Olson would pay for 3rd party Win95 support:

     "...the newest versions of Quake (II which is    
     to be out before Christmas) and Links (LS '98) are Win '95
     native and won't run under OS/2 (yet?).  Since I want to
     play these, I have no choice but to dual (duel?) boot
     between OS/2 and Win '95/'98/NT until someone, if ever, comes
     out with a cost effective (~$99) add on to OS/2 to run Win 32
     bit apps."

A number of you directly expressed desires for Windows 95 support or for IBM to, "get off their lazy [rear-ends] and market to the home user."  Even those who didn't put it in so many words still gave me the feeling that it was an important issue with them.  I was happy to see that a few were using the Internet to discover new uses and software to run on their OS/2 systems, with e-Zine! helping them reach that goal (thanks for fluffing our feathers there :-).  I was disappointed that, as pointed out earlier, hardly anyone said they switched to OS/2 because of a great OS/2-only application that they wanted to run.  Most found their darlings after switching, and now praise their copies of Galactic Civilizations and FM/2.

Maybe I should look on the bright side of this, OS/2 is so great it literally stands on its own merits rather than needing third party support to provide the attraction.  But my feelings are still ambivalent, because despite my brain telling me cross-platform is the way to go, my heart still wishes for a real Crown Jewel to call our own.

The most disturbing trend was the lack of "fresh blood", or people joining in the year since Warp 4 was released.  I suppose I should have been expecting this and when you look at the state of the platform today it shouldn't be surprising.  I've always been an optimist though.

One last quote before I go, this one comes from (mrivard@ibm.net) Mike Rivard

     "Why I stick with OS/2 today is its fantastic
     customer service, the wonderful cult-like community of loyal
     users and its Internet stability... I am still learning new
     things about OS/2 after 2 years of heavy use."

Lets keep sticking together.

               - * -

(http://www.spectra.net/~fox/) Chris Wenham is a freelance web designer, writer and Englishman who now lives in Endicott, NY.  In the past he has written comedy, sci-fi, Pascal, Rexx, HTML and Gibberish.  He has been using OS/2 exclusively for the past 2 years.

***********************************

Isn't It Time?	- by Pete Grubbs

There are a lot of Windows 3.1 machines in the world that would benefit from an upgrade to OS/2 Warp.  All we need to do is get the word out.

I have a friend, an old college chum, who works for the University of Pittsburgh, in Pittsburgh, PA.  He's been doing some technical writing for those fine folks for nearly a year now and he's convinced that the battle for personal computing is finally, completely over.  There isn't an OS/2 Desktop anywhere on his campus, the Macs are all being crated up and replaced with shiny new Pentiums running Redmond's second favorite flavor of OS.  The world now does its computing the Microsoft way or it doesn't do it at all.

Never mind Gateway's recent announcement that they will begin production of a new Amiga (complete with a new OS) and will be shipping it this time next year; never mind the flurry of speculation after Bill Gates sank a few million into Apple; never mind that Apple is apparently waiting for yet another week before it files for Chapter 11; never mind the 42% market share that a certain IBM product owns on desktops in the banking industry.

Never mind Ralph Nader.

Those are all blips on the screen which will fade faster than you can say, "delayed shipping date."  Even if it's an admittedly second-rate product, Microsoft's hold on the desktop is unbreakable and anyone who thinks differently just isn't aware of the facts.

You know, my friend could be right.

After all, there are an awful lot of machines out there that are running Windows apps.  We've all seen them.  But stop for a minute and answer this question:  How many of those workstations were running Windows 95 or NT?  Not all that many, right?

How many are still chugging away with Windows 3.1 or 3.11?

A bunch, right?

In fact, according to an article by April Jacobs on the front page of the October 6 issue of Computer World ("Migration Costs Stall NT Drive"), there are a ton of Windows 3.x machines still in use.  Jacobs refers to information from Dataquest, a San Jose, CA, based firm that indicates that, "more than half of those [companies] with more than 1,000 users have no Windows NT Workstations installed.  A quarter of those same companies run 100% Windows 3.x environments."  Chris Le Tocq, an analyst at Dataquest, believes that this is an indication that, "vast numbers of 3.x users remain in corporations."

Just imagine.  Vast numbers of computer users, professionals like you and me, who have to reboot their machines again and again and re-create work that should've been protected by a stable operating system but was lost to yet another GPF.  Thousands upon thousands of desktops that can't do anything much with Java, that can't run a print job in the background while surfing the Web or downloading a file for fear that the machine will lock.  Millions of dollars in potential sales for a company that could provide a stable, robust operating system compatible with all those legacy applications.

Of course, these folks could upgrade to Windows 95, but Jacobs notes that the actual cost to upgrade those machines would average US$200 per site for license and installation.  That, of course, doesn't include hardware upgrades and training.  The cost for upgrading to NT could be between 20% and 50% higher.  Hugh Allan, director of information technology at Dunlop Tire Co., has about 1,300 users and an 80% Windows 3.1 shop.  He's not interested in moving to NT yet because of, "installation costs and application headaches."  (Gee, could that mean that NT doesn't run old Windows 3.x or DOS apps very well?)

What if someone came along with an operating system that didn't need a huge hardware upgrade to run efficiently?  What if that operating system could be easily set up to look just like Windows 3.1?  What if it not only looked like Windows 3.1 but even worked like 3.1, so new users never had to learn a different interface?  What if it offered built-in networking?  What if you could isolate a misbehaving application so it didn't take down the entire system if it threw a GPF?  What if its MSRP were significantly lower than NT or 95?  Do you think someone in Hugh Allen's position might consider installing an OS like that?

Now, I'm just a poor old country boy and what I know of the world off the farm has a lot more to do with colleges and universities than it does with corporate meetings, IT managers and the like.  But it seems to me that there's an opportunity here.  There's a chance to get a bunch of computer users who have never even heard of OS/2 to give it a try.

If someone (IBM certainly comes to mind, but, like most of you, I'm not too impressed with their ability to market OS/2) targeted this market; if someone hit the road with a ThinkPad 760 (or anything rather modest by today's standards but still able to support Warp 4.0 easily); if someone showed up at one of these Windows 3.x shops with a notebook full of stuff like WordPerfect 5.1 or 6.1 for Windows, Quicken 6.0 for DOS, Lotus 1-2-3 for Windows and maybe a smattering of native OS/2 apps (Lotus Notes or SmartSuite '97, the Warp BonusPak, Object Desktop Professional) and started doing the same kind of work that goes on in that shop, day in, day out, wouldn't that get noticed?

Imagine our road warrior sitting at a desk demonstrating how well Warp handles legacy DOS/Win apps, multitasking without crashes or GPFs, printing in the background while he's surfing the 'net or recalculating a spreadsheet, while, all around him, people are rebooting yet again, cursing and grinding their teeth instead of being productive.  Don't you think someone would say, "Hey, what's he got that we haven't?"  Don't you think that there's some potential for sales here?  I have to say that it sure looks that way to me.

Instead of apologizing for Warp's incredible ability to run DOS and Windows stuff better than the "real thing", I'd like to see IBM make those capabilities the focus of a massive, aggressive campaign to get Warp onto these Windows 3.x machines.  I know it's been done before.  I remember the old "A better DOS than DOS, a better Windows than Windows" ads.  In fact, I bought my first copy of OS/2 because of them.  And, yes, there are lots of people who will also remember those ads less fondly than I -- people who won't be easy sells.  But it's my sincere belief that people will support a superior product once they know it's a superior product.  This looks like a golden opportunity to educate a bunch of customers and grab some market share.

But maybe not.  Maybe my buddy in Pittsburgh is right and we're all living with expectations that will never come to pass.  Maybe Microsoft does have the rest of the world thoroughly bamboozled and we're just marking time until the inevitable end.  Still, you never know until you try, eh?

               - * -

(peg5@psu.edu) Pete Grubbs is a self-described OS/2 wonk, a doctoral candidate in English literature at Indiana University of Pennsylvania, a part-time faculty member at Penn State and is currently developing a copy editing/creation service, The Document Doctor, which tailors documents for small businesses.

***********************************

the Beta File	- by Ryan Dill

Welcome back to the Beta File, your source for the latest breaking news in OS/2 beta development.  Every month we scour the OS/2 world to bring you interesting news of OS/2 software in development.  If you have a product that you're sure is going to be the next killer app, or you want a little free exposure for your beta test, (feedback@os2ezine.com) drop us a note!

               - * -

We'll start off this month with a few updates to beta programs e-Zine has previously mentioned...

Panacea Software's newsreader, ProNews, (mentioned in our (http://www.os2ezine.com/v2n7/beta.htm) July issue) has just had its (http://www.program.com/panacea/pn210b4.zip) fourth public beta (ZIP, 1M) released.  Nick Knight's newsreader extension for the MR/2 ICE e-mail program (aka MR/2 News), mentioned in (http://www.os2ezine.com/v2n6/beta.htm) June's issue, has also been updated -- the latest release is (http://www.apk.net/secant/nick/news38.zip) beta 38 (ZIP, 1M).  More information can be found at the (http://nick.secant.com/newsbeta.htm) newsreader beta page.  IPAD, also mentioned in our (http://www.os2ezine.com/v2n7/beta.htm) July issue, has been updated again; this time to version (http://www.demon.co.uk/cgi-bin/titan/getfile?/IPAD/os2/ipad400b.zip) 0.4.00 (ZIP, 550k).

Also note that (http://www.mainconcept.de/) MainConcept, makers of the popular MainActor/2 animation software for OS/2, are seeking beta testers for the next version of MainActor (see the (http://www.os2ezine.com/v2n9/mactr.htm) review of MainActor/2 in last month's issue of e-Zine!).  If you think you could be a help, e-mail (beta@mainconcept.de) beta@mainconcept.de and let them know.

               - * -

Mikael Wahlgren of (http://www.aditom.se/~ridax/) Ridax programutveckling (makers of OS/2's PM2You and OS2You remote control software) has announced upcoming beta testing of a new product.  Called PM2Web, it grants the ability to remotely control an OS/2 computer, like PM2You and OS2You do, but with a catch: you can do it via the WWW.  Simply load up your favorite web browser, and you'll be able to monitor and/or maintain your OS/2 machine no matter where you are.  Because of limitations with the Web itself, PM2Web can't control your system fully like PM2You, but it will allow you to monitor your OS/2 machine and grant some limited remote control.  PM2Web will complement the full PM2You package nicely.

Programmed with a large reliance on PNG graphics (for more efficiency in Web transfers), PM2Web will work best in a browser which can display PNG graphics -- unfortunately, no PNG plug-ins yet exist for OS/2's Netscape or WebExplorer.  But do not worry.  For non-PNG browsers, PM2Web can also operate in a BMP mode, where it uses normal bitmap graphics instead, with some loss in speed.  Therefore, you can use WebExplorer (Netscape doesn't support BMP images) to control your OS/2 computer.  Until someone comes up with a PNG plug-in for Netscape (hint, hint, developers..), that'll have to do.  (Of course, if you have a browser from another platform (Windows, UNIX, Mac) which supports PNG or BMP, PM2Web allows you to control with it as well.)

Expected to cost a little less than US$70.00 by itself, PM2Web will also be included for free in Ridax's PM2You (and its Windows counterpart, Win2You) product.  If you're interested in beta testing PM2Web, send an e-mail with a description of your system, networking configuration, and any special requirements to (mail@ridax.se) Mikael, letting him know you're willing to help.  Ridax is also in the process of working on Java-based clients for their PM2You and Win2You products, which will allow full control of your OS/2 (or Windows) Desktop, no matter where you're trying to access it from.

               - * -

On the server front, a new FTP daemon by the name of FtpServer is now available in its fourth beta.  FtpServer supports most of the common FTP operations, including the 'reget' feature made use of by some OS/2 FTP clients such as NcFTP.  (If a download is interrupted, the user can log back in to the FTP site and resume the download where it was left off, rather than starting the whole download from the beginning again.)  Security features are as expected in any decent server, allowing you to give users access to only what directories you desire.  If you want, it can also be set up so that users can have access to multiple drives on your machine.

FtpServer is freeware, and may be downloaded either from (ftp://hobbes.nmsu.edu/pub/os2/apps/internet/ftp/server/ftpser04.zip) Hobbes or the (http://www.os2ss.com/incoming/hobbes/ftpser04.zip) OS/2 Supersite (soon to move to (http://www.os2ss.com/archives/hobbes/os2/apps/internet/ftp/server/ftpser04.zip) /os2/apps/internet/ftp/server/).  The author, (peter@ee.newcastle.edu.au) Peter Moylan, has tested the program with all the FTP clients he has available, so he'd like it to now get some wider testing -- any questions or bug reports should be sent to him.  As new versions of the software become available, they'll be uploaded to (ftp://eepjm.newcastle.edu.au/freeware/) his own server first, then to Hobbes.

               - * -

(ivaes@hr.nl) Illya Vaes has ported Tcl v7.5 and Tk 4.1 from UNIX to OS/2, and has made his first public beta available for download.  For those unaware, Tcl is a scripting language used for programming on a variety of platforms, while Tk is a toolkit for using the Tcl language.  (John Ousterhout, the creator of Tcl, gives a good (http://www.sunlabs.com/~ouster/scripting.html) explanation of the difference between scripting languages and mainstream programming languages such as C++.)

Since it's ported from UNIX, Tcl/Tk for OS/2 requires you have the EMX runtimes installed on your machine, level 0.9b or higher.  (You can get level 0.9c from (ftp://hobbes.nmsu.edu/pub/os2/dev/emx/v0.9c/emxrt.zip) Hobbes or the (http://www.os2ss.com/archives/hobbes/os2/dev/emx/v0.9c/emxrt.zip) OS/2 Supersite.)  At the moment, only binaries are included in the Tcl/Tk package, but Illya says that upon finishing beta stages, source code will be provided as well.  Any comments, questions or bug reports with the OS/2 port of Tcl/Tk should be sent to (ivaes@hr.nl) Illya, while any more information desired on Tcl and Tk in general can be found at the (http://sunscript.sun.com/) SunScript home page at (http://www.sun.com/) Sun Microsystems.

               - * -

(http://www.innoval.com/) InnoVal Systems Solutions is seeking beta testers for the upcoming release of NetExtra 2.0 for OS/2 (see e-Zine! 's October 1996 review of (http://www.os2ezine.com/v1n12/netextra.htm) NetExtra v1.0.5).  One area this series of beta tests will be focusing on is NetExtra's ability to copy web sites onto your own computer for you to browse at your leisure while off-line (aka page mining).  According to InnoVal:

     The most significant new features in NetExtra
     version 2.0 are as follows (these features parallel similar
     features in WebWilly Webmaster, the Windows NT/95 equivalent of
     NetExtra):

        1. Web Page Info:  A tiny floating window that you can
        invoke when using the Netscape Navigator or the IBM
        WebExplorer to show the age (and optionally, other
        information) for the page that's currently being viewed
        in your browser.

        2. Results Tree:  Shows you the results of a page
        mining operation in tree form; with each link's title,
        link text, original URL, and the URL of the resulting
        page on your hard drive.

        3. Significant Site List:  A window which ranks the web
        sites you visit the most.  You can click on entries in
        this meta-bookmark to quickly load your most often
        visited web pages into your browser.

        4. Edit URL Source File:  If you are a webmaster, this
        is a very useful feature.  It allows you to seamlessly
        and automatically download an HTML file, edit it with
        E.EXE, EPM (or other OS/2 editor) and automatically FTP
        it back into place on the server.

In addition to these, there are a variety of smaller enhancements and bug fixes.  If you're interested in beta testing NetExtra 2.0, it's requested you get in touch with InnoVal as soon as possible, as they plan for the beta testing cycle to be short and sweet.  To apply, send an e-mail to Marianne Roderus at (innoval@ibm.net) innoval@ibm.net.  No word yet on the final price of NetExtra 2.0, but given the new features just announced, I would expect it to cost a bit more than NetExtra 1.x, which currently has a suggested retail price of US$59.95.  For more information on NetExtra, see its (http://www.innoval.com/netextra/) home page at InnoVal.

               - * -

Finally this month, a new 'beta' version of BootOS2 has been released, bringing the product to version 8.50.  BootOS2 is a useful piece of IBM Employee-Written Software (EWS) which has been around since 1992 and has been enhanced all the while.  It allows you to create another bootable OS/2 system.  Why would you want to bother?  Well, imagine for a second that while fiddling around with OS/2's INI files, you change something that you shouldn't have and now OS/2 won't boot any more.  Since you can't boot OS/2, you can't get back into the INI files to repair them, so you're stuck with booting from your OS/2 installation disks (you remember where you put those, don't you?) and trying to fix things from there.  This is slow.

BootOS2 allows you more power than booting from your installation disks, because unlike booting from them, BootOS2 also allows you to boot with a copy of the Workplace Shell, OS/2's object-oriented GUI.  (The installation disk boot-up is text-only.)  In addition, BootOS2 not only allows you to boot from a floppy, but also from the hard disk -- you can elect to save the 'backup' copy of OS/2 on a small maintenance partition, so the time it takes the system to boot is much faster than if you were using floppy disks.

The last 'official' release of BootOS2 was v8.00 (the last beta version was v8.45), since then a number of bugs have been addressed.  In addition, the program now supports the new 32-bit version of IBM's Chkdsk (CHKDSK32) and various Matrox display drivers.  You can either download the program directly from the author's (ftp://p390.ibm.com/customer/kak/bootos2.zip) FTP site, or from the /incoming directory at (ftp://hobbes.nmsu.edu/pub/incoming/btos2_850.zip) Hobbes (soon to move to (ftp://hobbes.nmsu.edu/pub/os2/utils/system/btos2_850.zip) its final location).  No word yet on when the next official release (v9.00) will be, but since it's been IBM Employee-Written Software for so long, BootOS2 will no doubt remain freeware.

               - * -

(dill@os2ezine.com) Ryan Dill is a student in Computer Science at Acadia University in Wolfville, NS and e-Zine! 's technical 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.

***********************************

Answers from e-Zine!

Welcome back to "Answers from e-Zine!, your source for answers to all your OS/2 questions!  Each month we bring you tips, tricks, questions and answers from our readers and contributors.  If you've got a question or tip you would like to share with us, (feedback@os2ezine.com) send it in!

               - * -

Q --  How do I delete templates?  They just won't go away!  I'm trying to move them by category into subfolders (for less clutter) which works, only something gets left behind!  And it keeps coming back!

A --  Most abstract templates are automatically generated.  When you open a folder which the WPS considers a "templates" folder, it queries each registered WPS class that has the "template autopopulate" flag set and creates templates for the class on the fly.

What you need to do is to use a program to look at the WPS class list and deregister the classes for the unwanted templates.  Then you can delete the unwanted templates and they'll stay deleted.  I use (http://www.softouch.com/unimaint.html) UniMaint for this, but you may be able to find programs that can display/edit the class list on Hobbes.

                - (bsa@kf8nh.apk.net) Brandon S. Allbery

               - * -

Q --  I very often use OS/2 text windows.  When I start the session I write "MODE CO80,40" to have more rows.  My question is if I can do this automatically?

A --  Sure!  Open the Properties / Settings notebook for the "OS/2 Window" object and add the following to the Parameters:

     /k "mode co80,40 & rem %"

The "& rem %" is a trick to keep the WPS from passing a folder name to CMD.EXE, which would produce a (harmless) error message.

                - (bsa@kf8nh.apk.net) Brandon S. Allbery

               - * -

Q --  I have been looking into getting a 3D video card for my PC and one of the ones that I have liked is the Intergraph Intense 3D that uses the Rendition chip set.  Do you know if there are any OS/2 drivers for this chip set?

A --  There are currently no OS/2 drivers for the Rendition chip set.  There are drivers for some other cards though.  Matrox, which isn't that good of a 3D card, but is a good 2D card has good OS/2 drivers; anything made by Elsa will be well supported under OS/2, and they now have at least one card with a 3D (S3 I believe) chip set; and the Rage II chip set from ATI works well here.

Before you write in to tell me about your bad luck with any of these cards, let me say that I've either had good experience with each of them or have heard of an overwhelmingly large number of people who have had.  Remember, your mileage may vary.  Also remember that none of these cards will provide 3D support under OS/2's Presentation Manager right now.  There is supposed to be an OpenGL DDK available in the next quarter which will allow hardware accelerated OpenGL though.

                - (feedback@os2ezine.com) OS/2 e-Zine! Staff

               - * -

Q --  How can I find out about OS/2 user groups?  What groups are around?  Who can I contact?

A --  Well, it just so happens that there are two good lists of OS/2 users groups.  One is maintained by IBM and one is maintained by Ryan Dill, a member of the OS/2 e-Zine! staff.  The URL's are:

(http://www.software.ibm.com/os/warp/pcug/) http://www.software.ibm.com/os/warp/pcug/
     &
(http://www.os2bbs.com/ug/) http://www.os2bbs.com/ug/

It's quite likely that your city has such a users group.  Even if you can't regularly make their meetings it's probably worth taking the time to visit once and join.

                - (feedback@os2ezine.com) OS/2 e-Zine! Staff

               - * -

Tip --  Have you ever wondered how to stop OS/2's automated registration program from coming up?  It's a common annoyance for those with multiple copies of OS/2 installed on their machine or who have had to reinstall -- the dancing elephant just keeps coming back.  Few people know that OS/2 Warp 4 actually comes with a portion of an early version of IBM's Feature Install program which is used to install additions to OS/2 from IBM's web page.

If you open \OS2\Install from the WPS you will find an object called "Installed Features".  If you open this object from the WPS you will get a list of features that were installed when you installed OS/2.  "ART" is the registration program, so you can check the box beside it and click the "uninstall" button, and no more dancing elephant!  Enjoy.

                - (feedback@os2ezine.com) OS/2 e-Zine! Staff

               - * -

That's it for this month.  If you have a tip or question that you don't see covered here, don't forget to (feedback@os2ezine.com) send it in!

***********************************

News from the OS/2 World	- by Ryan Dill

Greetings 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 (http://www.os2ezine.com/news.htm) 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 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!

               - * -

To start with, (http://www.installshield.com/) InstallShield, makers of the well-known installation software for the Windows operating system, have released for evaluation a Java-based version of their InstallShield software which runs under OS/2's Java runtime just fine.  Requiring JDK v1.02, users report it runs well under OS/2's JDK v1.1.1 as well.  InstallShield is a piece of software for developers which automates the installation process of your application.  Once your application is ready for the public, InstallShield makes sure your users can install and start using your application quickly and easily.

An evaluation version of InstallShield for Java was made public at the beginning of September and can be downloaded by any curious OS/2 developers who want to know how InstallShield can help them.  The download and all other information about the Java version are available at the (http://www.installshield.com/java/default.asp) InstallShield Java web page.

               - * -

Now for some browser info.  (http://www.operasoftware.com/) Opera Software, makers of the popular Opera WWW browser for Windows, were thinking about making an OS/2 version of their browser, but due to various reasons they reconsidered.  Well it seems they may have reconsidered again, for the better.  They've started something called (http://www.operasoftware.com/alt_os.html) Project Magic, with which they hope to find out exactly how much interest there is for an Opera browser for OS/2 (and other platforms).  If interest warrants, Opera will ask interested users to put their money where their mouths are and partially fund a version of Opera for their platform with advance purchases.

More specifically: Step one, users interested in seeing an OS/2 version of Opera should e-mail Opera Software and tell them of their interest.  If Opera gets 3,000 or more interested people, then we go to step two.  Step two, put your money where your mouth is.  Opera will contact you and ask for a 'forward payment' of about US$35 to fund the development of an OS/2 version of Opera.  If enough people are serious about their interest, they'll pay.  These funds ONLY go toward development of the OS/2 version -- no other versions, and they create a guarantee that there'll be enough money to continue to develop it.  When the OS/2 version is released, each of those who paid the 'forward price' get a free release version, while everyone else has to pay the regular price, which will be set at, "somewhat higher than the $35.00," you paid.

This way Opera generates an OS/2 (or Mac, or Linux) version of their browser without having to take funds away from their Windows developments.  And OS/2 users get a new browser to choose from, one which is receiving rave reviews from a lot of Windows users.  To add your support to the OS/2 version of Project Magic, send an e-mail to (os2@operasoftware.com) os2@operasoftware.com letting them know how many copies of the browser you'd buy if it were available.

               - * -

J3 Computer Technologies is running quite a few specials nowadays and one that sticks out is their scanner raffle.  To celebrate the coming of the first ever (and certainly not the last) Warpstock end-user conference, J3 is raffling off an Epson ES1000c flatbed scanner.  The prize package includes the OS/2 scanning software (http://www.gate.net/~stidev/applause.html) Applause, (http://www.adobe.com/prodindex/photodeluxe/main.html) Adobe PhotoDeluxe, (http://www.xerox.com/products/software.htm) Xerox TextBridge OCR, ScanTastic, a SCSI cable, and free shipping to wherever you call home.  With all this in one tidy package, you're getting over US$400 worth of stuff!

So how much do you have to pay for $400 worth of stuff?  Would you believe $10?  That's right, J3 is selling tickets on this prize for ten bucks each.  Tickets will be sold up until October 31st, with no limit on the number of tickets per person.  On the 31st, one lucky winner will walk away very happy.  Why shouldn't it be you?  All proceeds from the draw will be used for OS/2-related activities like Warpstock.  So swing by J3's web site at (http://www.os2store.com/) http://www.os2store.com/ to get more details and fill out a ballot or two.  Be sure to check out their other specials while you're there.

               - * -

There have been a lot of updates to OS/2 itself lately.  In preparation for the release of their TCP/IP v4.1, IBM released a series of updates for the basic TCP/IP v4.0 that ships with Warp 4.  As I write this, the latest version of TCP/IP v4.0 is currently 4.02e, so if you don't have this latest update (type "INETVER" at an OS/2 command prompt to check), you might consider updating.

"But why wouldn't I go straight to TCP/IP v4.1?" you might ask.  Well, unfortunately, the just-released TCP/IP v4.1 is designed more for Warp Server than Warp 4, so IBM has included all sorts of server-oriented goodies (that aren't much good to most Warp 4 users) in it and charged for it too.  This isn't to say you won't get a performance increase if you use it -- you will!  TCP/IP v4.1 has a 32-bit network stack, while the older v4.0 shipped with Warp 4 is 16-bit, so your performance increase would probably be good, to say the least.  However, all the server-oriented stuff would probably have to be installed as well, taking up unnecessary disk space.

Even if you could only install what you needed though, TCP/IP v4.1 is currently only available to us non-enterprise users through an IBM Software Choice subscription, which is expensive -- the cheapest I've seen it is US$198 from (http://www.indelible-blue.com/) Indelible Blue.  (On the other hand, the Software Choice subscription gives you access to more than just TCP/IP v4.1; if the full Netscape Communicator package is only available by Software Choice, as some rumors say, then you'd get that as well, plus other benefits.  See the (http://www.software.ibm.com/os/warp/swchoice/) Software Choice web site.)

In addition to basic TCP/IP updates, many of the separate TCP/IP-oriented parts of Warp, such as FTP and telnet, have been updated.  The best place to check to see if you have the latest fixes of any part of OS/2 is the (http://www.os2ss.com/masterupdate/masterupdate.html) Master OS/2 Warp Update list.  There you'll also see that FixPaks for OS/2 have been updated -- the latest public FixPak for Warp 3 is now FP32, and for Warp 4 the latest is FP4.  As with all updates, I prefer to follow the rule: "if it ain't broke, don't fix it."  If you're not having any problems, installing FixPaks always seems to create some. (grin)

               - * -

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 (feedback@os2ezine.com) let us know!

(dill@os2ezine.com) Ryan Dill is a student in Computer Science at Acadia University in Wolfville, NS and OS/2 e-Zine! 's Technical 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.

***********************************

OS/2 Gaming News	- by Colin L. Hildinger

It's time once again to check out the latest news that affects OS/2 gaming and gamers.  Each month we scour the 'net and hound ISVs to provide you with a digest of all the events and updates in the OS/2 gaming market, complete with helpful links.  While it has been a bit of a slow month for OS/2 gaming news, I did manage to find a few interesting tidbits:

Cosmic Defender Beta 2

Last month I told you about a beta version of Cosmic Defender, a new 3D shooter/flight sim type of game (kind of a cross between Descent and Comanche in the style of play).  Well, there's a new beta out.  The new beta adds:

o  Joystick control 
o  Mouse control 
o  Different planets 
o  Some bug fixes

Take a few minutes and (http://www.hut.fi/~rahonen/cosmic.html) check it out.

ColEm Updated

The ColecoVision Emulator, ported to OS/2 by Darrell Spice, was updated recently.  The new version sports increases in performance and a few cleanups to the interface.  The update is available from the (http://www.geocities.com/~spiceware/) Spiceware home page.  In further news, it looks like Darrell is getting started porting Handy (Handy is an Atari Lynx emulator; Handy was the original name for the Lynx before Atari bought it), and will likely be porting XNES, a Nintendo emulator.

New Drilling Billy Beta

If you downloaded the second Drilling Billy beta in the first few days after the last issue was published, you may have had trouble getting it to work.  Why?  They accidently forgot a couple of files in the distribution.  If you couldn't get the beta to work, take a few minutes and visit  (http://www.esperanto.dk/billy/) Northwind's home page and get the rest of the files.

Entrepreneur Ships

Probably the biggest game to hit OS/2 since Galactic Civilizations, Entrepreneur is now shipping.  It should be in a store near you in the next few weeks.  Look for a review next month, and if you haven't checked out the demo yet, get it from (http://www.stardock.com/) Stardock's web page.  Also note that the documentation is on-line in Adobe Acrobat format.

OpenGL 1.1 Goes Gold

Look for OpenGL to be an important gaming technology on both the OS/2 and Windows platforms.  OS/2 Warp version 4 shipped with OpenGL v1.0, but IBM has recently released v1.1.  Do you need it?  Not yet, but you will as soon as OpenGL software begins to take advantage of the added features in v1.1.  Look for OpenGL accelerating video drivers for OS/2 in maybe the next 6 months or so, as IBM is due to release an OpenGL DDK (Device driver Development Kit) in the coming months.  There will likely be a relationship between the release of the OpenGL drivers and the release of GRADD drivers from major video chip set Independent Hardware Vendors.

If you want to download OpenGL v1.1, you can find it on (ftp://ftp.austin.ibm.com/pub/developer/os2/OpenGL/) one of IBM's FTP servers.  The files you want to get are oglgold.zip and glut.zip.  Glut.zip is a replacement for the glut.dll in the oglgold.zip file.

Rescue from Kedk

A new shareware shooter called Rescue from Kedk has recently been released.  The gameplay is pretty direct, basically you shoot everything that moves.  It can be found on (http://www.bmtmicro.com/catalog/kedk.html) BMT Micro's web site.

Maxis Games for OS/2 at Micro Center

Finally, last month I mentioned that the Maxis games for OS/2 never made it onto store shelves.  I was corrected (quite politely) via e-mail by a Micro Center employee.  He informed me that all of the Maxis OS/2 games could be found at their store, so if you're looking for them, that would be a good place to start.  Micro Center seems to be the most OS/2 friendly of the major computer stores.

               - * -

(http://www.ionet.net/~colin/) Colin Hildinger is an Aerospace Engineering senior at (http://www.okstate.edu/) Oklahoma State University and has been using OS/2 for the last 3 years.  In addition to being the Games Editor for OS/2 e-Zine!, he maintains (http://www.ionet.net/~colin/games.html) The Ultimate OS/2 Gaming Page and the (http://www.ionet.net/~colin/awe32.html) AWE32 and OS/2 Page in his "spare" time.

***********************************

The Rexx Files	- by Dr. Dirk Terrell

Last month we wrote a REXX program to extract the dimensions of a GIF image, i.e. the number of pixels in the vertical and horizontal directions.  This month we'll do the same thing for a JPEG image.  It would be more accurate to say that we will write code that gets the information from a JFIF, or JPEG File Interchange Format.  JPEG is not really a file type, but a compression method.  JFIF has become pretty much the standard and so the terms JPEG and JFIF are often interchanged.  I will use "JPEG" in the following discussion.

JPEG files are a little more complicated to deal with than GIF files.  JPEG files consist of segments, each of which starts with a two-byte marker that identifies the segment type.  Some segments consist only of the marker, while others have data following the marker.  This article will not be a tutorial on the JPEG format; I will explain only what is necessary to accomplish the task at hand.  The two-byte marker always contains hexadecimal FF as the first byte.  The second byte indicates the marker type.

JPEG files start out with a Start of Image, or SOI, segment.  The SOI segment consists only of the marker, which is hex FF D8.  We will use this to test a file to see if it is a JPEG image.  We'll read in the first two bytes of the file using charin and then  use the C2X() function to convert the bytes to hex.  If the result is "FFD8", then we have a JPEG image.  

/* Read width and height of a JPEG image */
Parse Arg FileName 
FileType=c2x(Charin(FileName,1,2)) /* Read first two bytes and convert to hex */
If FileType="FFD8" then do
...

Following the two-byte marker of some segment types is a two-byte length of the segment.  By reading this length, we can jump ahead to the next segment if the current one is of no interest to us.  After the SOI segment comes the Application Type 0, or APP0, segment.  This segment is used to store any application data.  The second byte of the marker is hex E0.  Since this segment doesn't contain anything of interest to us, we will just skip by it.  After the APP0 segment, things start getting a little more unpredictable.  Segments can now come in different orders, so what we will do is scan through them until we hit the one we are looking for -- a Start of Frame, which has markers of either hex C0 or hex C2.

I mentioned earlier that some segments consist only of the marker, while others have data after the marker.  The ones that have no data are of types hex 01 and hex D1 through hex D9.  All other segments have the two-byte length after the marker, so we'll read that in and jump forward the correct number of bytes to get to the next segment.

Let's put the segment handling code in a subroutine of its own called ReadSegment.  We'll pass the current segment position as an input and return the position of the next segment.  If the current segment is an SOF0 segment, then we'll read in the image dimensions.  In an SOF0 segment, the marker is followed by the segment length as usual.  The next byte contains the sample precision (almost always 8).  The height (number of rows of pixels) is given in the next two bytes.  The two bytes following the height are the width (number of columns of pixels).  These are, of course, what we want to find out about the image.

Here is the code that reads a segment, checks to see if it is an SOF0 segment, and reads the height and width of the images if it is:

ReadSegment:         /* Read a JPEG segment's header */
Arg SegPos

Marker=C2X(CharIn(FileName, SegPos))
If Marker<>"FF" Then
   Return -1
Type=C2X(CharIn(FileName))
Res=SegPos+2                  /* position of next segment */
Select
   When Type="01" | Type>="D0" & Type<="D9" then  /* no length to these */
     len=0
   otherwise
     len=c2d(charin(filename, , 2)) /* read the length of the segment */
end
res=res+len

if type="C0" | type="C2" then do /* this is what we are looking for */
     /* start of frame 0 */
     /* use c2d() to convert bytes into decimal form for human consumption */
     imagebps=c2d(charin(filename))             /* bits per sample */
     imageheight=c2d(charin(filename, , 2))     /* height of image */
     imagewidth=c2d(charin(filename, , 2))      /* width of image */
end
return res /* return position of next segment */ 

The main routine simply loops and calls to ReadSegment until an SOF0 frame is found:

/* Read width and height of a JPEG image */
Parse Arg FileName 
FileType=c2x(Charin(FileName,1,2))
If FileType="FFD8" then do
   NxtSeg=3
   ImageHeight="IMAGEHEIGHT"
   Do While Type<>"D9" & NxtSeg<>-1 & Imageheight="IMAGEHEIGHT"
      NxtSeg=ReadSegment(NxtSeg)
   End
   rc=Stream(F,"C","Close")
   Say "Height:" ImageHeight
   Say "Width:" ImageWidth
   Say "Bits Per Sample:" ImageBPS
   end  /* Do */
Else Do
   Say "This doesn't appear to be a JPEG file."
   Exit
End

This program probably seems a little more difficult than the kinds of things we have done before.  Well, it is.  But it shows just how powerful REXX is.  With the C2D and C2X functions, you can easily switch back and forth between different data types.  With a little documentation on file types, you could write a general purpose program that would return information on many different types of image files.  And if you were really ambitious, you could even write image manipulation routines, although you would probably find REXX a little slow for that.  (A better approach would be to wrap some REXX code around compute-intensive routines written in a compiled language.)

In any case, I hope you found this exercise useful for learning a little more about that jewel of a language that comes with OS/2.  For those who want to see the above utility in full, there is the complete listing of this month's sample program below.

               - * -

(http://www.gnv.com/HTMLWizard/) Dr. Dirk Terrell is an astronomer at the University of Florida specializing in interacting binary stars.  His hobbies include cave diving, martial arts, painting and writing OS/2 software such as HTML Wizard.

***********************************

/* Read width and height of a JPEG image */
Parse Arg FileName 
If FileName="" then Do
   Say "You must enter a filename..."
   Exit
end /* do */

FileType=c2x(Charin(FileName,1,2))
If FileType="FFD8" then do
   NxtSeg=3
   ImageHeight="IMAGEHEIGHT"
   Do While Type<>"D9" & NxtSeg<>-1 & Imageheight="IMAGEHEIGHT"
      NxtSeg=ReadSegment(NxtSeg)
   End
   rc=Stream(F,"C","Close")
   Say "Height:" ImageHeight
   Say "Width:" ImageWidth
   Say "Bits Per Sample:" ImageBPS
   end  /* Do */
Else Do
   Say "This doesn't appear to be a JPEG file."
   Exit
End

Exit

ReadSegment:         /* Read a JPEG segment's header */
Arg SegPos

Marker=C2X(CharIn(FileName, SegPos))
If Marker<>"FF" Then
   Return -1
Type=C2X(CharIn(FileName))
Res=SegPos+2                  /* position of next segment */
Select
   When Type="01" | Type>="D0" & Type<="D9" Then  /* No length to these */
     Len=0
   Otherwise
     Len=C2D(CharIn(FileName, , 2)) /* Read the length of the segment */
End
Res=Res+Len

If Type="C0" | Type="C2" Then Do
     /* start of frame 0 */
     Imagebps=C2D(CharIn(FileName))             /* Bits per sample */
     Imageheight=C2D(CharIn(FileName, , 2))     /* Height of image */
     Imagewidth=C2D(CharIn(FileName, , 2))      /* Width of image */
End
Return Res

***********************************

How Do I?	- by Eric Slaats

Hi all.  I had an inspiring month.  Lots of changes on my desktop.  The first thing that has changed is that I finally completely changed to Warp 4.0.  It's certainly a better system than Warp 3.0!  The problem, though, is making the Desktop as comfortable as it has grown to be over time in Warp 3.0.  You know, just like a real desktop, where you can find all your stuff without blinking.

For some months now I have used both versions side by side but Warp 3.0 is now my backup system and 2.1 is removed permanently.  One of the reasons I made this choice is that I decided to put my old 486 DX2 back to work; I nicked two obsolete Ethernet cards at work and created a small network at home.  This is great for testing stuff I'm working on right now.  I'm in the process of doing an Intranet at work and this setup is great for checking out several packages.

On the server side I've got Windows NT 4 server and Warp 4 installed.  It took quite some time to get Warp to talk smoothly with NT.  It seems that MS is trying everything to keep IBM  off of their network.  Of course this fails because the MS networking technology is based on an IBM legacy.  (Besides, Warp 4.0 peer to peer works better than NT's!)  However, after I used Netscape Communicator on the NT side, I can't wait till the OS/2 version comes along.  It's very bulky, not too fast, but it looks good and it has an impressive array of capabilities.  If you use it with the Netscape SuiteSpot package as server software, the NT look and feel completely disappears.  I'm beginning to understand why MS is so scared of Netscape. <g>

OK, enough of my adventures.  The last thing we did last month was discuss some theory.  I still feel that's always needed, but having practical knowledge is also important.  So now we go back to the programming philosophy I stated for this column.  The first part was KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid).  The second part was, 'Be Lazy', or never do something yourself that the system can do for you.  This month we'll talk more about dialogs, but we're going to look at some very simple constructs and be very lazy!

Until now we have always created frame windows to build our simple applications in.  This means we have had to call all kinds of initial functions to make sure the whole contraption works.  Here's a sample list of stuff that, in most cases, has had to be done:

1. WinInitialize
2. WinCreateMsgQueue 

     -----

3. WinRegisterClass
4. WinCreateStdWindow 
5. while (WinGetMsg (hab, &qmsg, 0, 0, 0))
		 WinDispatchMsg (hab, &qmsg);
6. WinDestroyWindow (hwndFrame);

     -----

7. WinDestroyMsgQueue (hmq);
8. WinTerminate (hab);

The stuff between the lines all has to do with the creation of the window.  And believe me this is the simple form!  In larger applications, windows for the client area will be created, status lines, toolbars etc., etc.  This brings a lot of flexibility, but can also get rather complex.

However, there are a number of applications imaginable in which it isn't necessary to create a frame window.  Maybe a dialog window will be enough.  This has the big advantage that it can be created with a dialog editor!  Applications with a lot of controls in the client area will especially benefit from this approach.  (http://www.bmtmicro.com/catalog/smalled/smehtm.html) SmeHtm (Smalled Html extensions) is an example of an application that is created almost completely in this fashion (through the use of the dialog editor).

The disadvantage to this method is that there is no easy way to attach a menu, scrollbars, an icon, etc. by using the FCF_ flags.  However, there are ways around this problem.  This month we will take a look at how to create an application that will have a dialog as the main window and we'll attach a menu to make it more complete.

A very simple program

First things first.  before we get into the 'difficult' stuff of attaching a menu to a dialog box, let's first examine how a dialog can be used as a main program.  In earlier articles we saw that a modal dialog can be started with the WinDlgBox API call.  With this call we won't have to worry about message queues, message dispatching, etc.  So the following small program will work for any Dialog that the DIALOGID matches for!

void main(void)
	{
	HAB hab = WinInitialize(0);
	HMQ hmq = WinCreateMsgQueue(hab,0);

	WinDlgBox(HWND_DESKTOP,
			HWND_DESKTOP,
			WinDefDlgProc,
			NULLHANDLE,
			DIALOGID,
			0);

	WinDestroyMsgQueue(hmq);
	WinTerminate(hab);
	}

With this program you could execute any dialog on the Desktop.  (Just try it.)  The basic dialog functionality can be tested very easily.  Of course the dialog won't do much because the WinDefDlgProc call for the window procedure is used, but it works!  This means that for simple applications (even ones with a sizing border), we can really simplify our program.  Nice, eh?

Now, to add basic functionality with a 'normal' way to handle the things, we must make some shortcuts.  In a frame-window we can handle things by using the FCF_ flags.  Most of the visual stuff that is done with the FCF_ flags can be done to dialogs with dialog styles.  These can easily be applied with dialog editors.  (We won't delve into the way dialogs are created right now.  This kind of theory will be handled another time.)  There are two major things though that can't be handled by dialog editors while writing .RC files.  These are adding a menu to the dialog and adding a (system) icon to the applet.  We'll attend to both these issues in a minute.  But first:

We're to handle the initialization stuff?

What is the best time to attach an icon or attach a menu to our dialog window?  In the frame window samples this wasn't an issue because OS/2 took care of that during the window creation.  With a dialog, this is different.  Of course we can do it right after the dialog is created in the main part of the program.  Personally, I don't find this a very elegant method, though.  What we would like to do is simulate what happens in a normal frame window creation: handle this stuff during the creation of the window.

Now, every window when it is being created gets a message sent to it notifying it that it is being created (sounds weird, doesn't it?).  For frame windows and the like, this was the WM_CREATE message.  This is the place to handle all the extra initializing of the window.  If you ever try to handle WM_CREATE for a dialog though, you will find that it doesn't work!  Just as dialogs have their own default window procedure, they also have a specific 'dialog is being created' message.  This is the WM_INITDLG message.  So to attach the menu and the icon we will use the event of this message.

Adding an Icon

We live in a visual era.  And if I'm not mistaken, things will only get worse!  So attaching an icon to your application is probably the minimum you'll have to do.  We saw that with frame windows this is really easy.  Simply define an icon in your resource file with the right ID and include the FCF_ICON flag when creating the window.  Of course the defining of the icon in the resource file still has to be done.  If we've done that, we have to start looking for a way to stick the icon to the window.  Now this is a quest in itself!  I often find that when I want to try something new, I simply don't know where to look.  Should I use a function, is the function simply a macro which will call a message, or should we use a message?  I found that in most cases if you want to do something to a window (or any control for that matter), it usually pays to browse through the messages.  And indeed, there is a message that will set the icon for a window; it's the WM_SETICON message.

NOTE: I had a hard time finding this message in my documentation!  When you look it up under "messages", you'll find that it isn't in the index.  And searching for WM_SETICON doesn't give the desired results!  The strange thing is that the WM_SETICON message pops up when you search on the word "icon".  A little bug for the OS/2 team to fix.

The WM_SETICON message accepts only one parameter, the mp1 should contain a handle (pointer) to an icon.  (Grunt) Now that again, how do we get the handle of an icon?  Yes, we start browsing the help function again, only to bump into another surprise.  If you want to load an icon, you should use a function that loads a pointer.  A pointer is in essence just an icon with a hot spot.  Icons and pointers also both have "shine through" areas.  Well, knowing this, we can find the desired function.  We're looking for WinLoadPointer.  This function returns a HPOINTER type variable.

HWND		hwndDeskTop	//Desktop-window handle.
HMODULE	Resource		//Resource identity containing the pointer definition.
ULONG		idPointer		//Identifier of the pointer to be loaded
HPOINTER	hptr			//Pointer handle return value

hptr = WinLoadPointer(hwndDeskTop,  Resource,  idPointer);
 
The first parameter of this function is a simple default that OS/2 uses.  The HWND_DESKTOP identifier always holds the handle to the Desktop.  The Resource is also easy.  It's the same as with the earlier frame window examples, the resource is coupled to the .EXE file.  This means we don't have to do difficult stuff with load modules and we can use NULLHANDLE here.  Since we know the icon ID, we can finally write the code needed to do the magic we want and place it in the window procedure of the dialog.

HPOINTER hptr = (HPOINTER)WinLoadPointer(HWND_DESKTOP, NULLHANDLE, 1);
WinSendMsg(hwndDlg, WM_SETICON, (MPARAM) hptr, 0l);

Adding the menu

For(http://www.os2ezine.com/v2n10/sample12.zip) this month's sample (ZIP, 17.7k) I used a menu created for an earlier How Do I? column, so don't be surprised by a somewhat strange menu.  The function to load a menu resource is the WinLoadMenu call.

HWND		hwndFrame	//Owner- and parent-window handle
HMODULE	hmod		//Resource identifier containing the menu definition.
ULONG		idMenu		//Menu identifier within the resource file
 
WinLoadMenu(hwndFrame, hmod, idMenu);

We shouldn't be distracted by the fact that this call mentions the use of a frame window.  Don't pay attention to this, and use the dialog window handle in this field.  For HMODULE, the menuID goes the same as for the icon.  The resource is contained in the .EXE file, so a NULLHANDLE will be used.  The MenuID is also known.  This leads to the following code line for this month's sample:

WinLoadMenu(hwndDlg, NULLHANDLE, MAIN);

If we try this it doesn't work (another grunt), but why?  A frame window, just as a dialog window, is constructed out of a set of windows.  There is the client area, the title bar, min, max, close, system menu, etc.  Once a frame window is created it holds these windows in a certain order (we'll attend to that in a coming article).  What we did was load a menu resource, but we didn't tell the frame window (dialog window in our case) that this menu is one of the frame controls and that it is added.  This notification can be given to the frame window by invoking the WM_UPDATEFRAME message.  In this message we must pass the FCF_ flag that identifies the added (or removed) frame control.  The frame window procedure will update the frame window accordingly and thus show our menu.  This leads to the following code in WM_INITDLG:

WinLoadMenu(hwndDlg, NULLHANDLE, MAIN);
WinSendMsg(hwndDlg, WM_UPDATEFRAME, (MPARAM) FCF_MENU, 0l);

To prove this works I added some simple code for the WM_COMMAND message.  Every time a menu command is given, the WM_COMMAND sent to the dialog window procedure will produce a beep.

Well, that's it for this month.  Next month we'll delve further in the possibilities of dialogs.  For now, happy hunting.

               - * -

(eric.slaats@pi.net) Eric Slaats holds a degree in Computer Science and teaches computer technology in Eindhoven.  He is the creator of the (http://www.bmtmicro.com/catalog/smalled/) Smalled utilities.

***********************************

Cable Modems and OS/2	- by Trevor Smith

Editor's Note: this article replaces our regular "Networking with OS/2" column.  Brian L. Juergensmeyer will return next month with his regular feature.

Cable Modem Access Comes to OS/2

Many of you have dreamed of it for months, if not years.  Industry mags have at times heralded it as the saviour of the Internet and at other times condemned it as just another well-hyped bandwagon: Internet access through your cable TV hookup.

This month, we take an in-depth look at setting up a cable modem for Internet access with OS/2 Warp: what is required, what to expect and much more...

o  Introduction: What do you mean, "cable modem"?

o  Speed and Benefits: The dirt on performance.

o  Installation Day: Making it work _with OS/2_.

o  Conclusions: Is it worth it?

o  Checklist: Step by step instructions for installation.

o  Glossary: Some helpful terms.

***********************************

Cable Modems and OS/2: Introduction

Cable modem?  What's a cable modem?

Long ago, in the time of our fathers, when dinosaurs roamed the ARPAnet (sometimes referred to as the "ARPAzoic period"), members of the computer industry had a great idea: modulate a digital signal into an analog signal so it could be sent over a normal telephone line, and them demodulate it at the other end back into a digital signal so it could be read by another computer.  The term "MoDem" was born and the path was laid for the future of end-user Internet and on-line services.

But, as most of you probably know, telephone-based modems suck.  Every few months some company or another feeds the press and consumer masses a new string of buzzwords and the world is amazed at new speed records which seemed unreachable just weeks before.  But, eventually, even 56.6K seems irritatingly slow.  Such is the nature of the Internet -- it's always the slowest link between remote data and your video monitor.

If you're a bright person, you might realize that this tedious process of slightly-faster connections is a losing battle because Motorola, Intel, et al. are increasing the speed of CPUs in leaps and bounds, while modem manufacturers are inching ahead in limps and burps.  The problem is, they're limited by POTS (the plain old telephone system).

And if you're equally bright, you might also ponder, "but what if someone found a completely different route to transmit data to and from my computer?"  Well, luckily for us, a lot of people are just that bright (and ambitious).  As they say, "the future is here."  Right now, many North Americans can finally order Internet access from someone other than the old-fashioned telephone company: their local cable TV provider.

It's called "Cable Modem" service (although the use of the word "modem" is a bit inaccurate here, the word is more generic than literal these days), it's fast, it's got a handful of advantages over "normal" Internet access, it's fast, and, oh, did I mention, it's fast!

OK, enough with the preamble, get to the point.

Yeah, yeah, I know, cable modems aren't exactly new.  Cable companies have been promising Internet service, along with interactive TV and a ton of other gadgets, for years.  But early this month, the day finally came when promise turned into delivery, and my local cable company, a small operator named (http://www.accesscable.com/) Access Cable, paid me a visit.

Cable modem service first appeared in Canada some time ago in limited test markets (notably in Newmarket, Ontario and a few other areas).  Since then, companies from coast to coast have been struggling to get the kinks worked out of what is a very major update to their aging services.  A similar process has been taking place in the US.  Now, finally, customers are getting to put the hype to the test and see the Internet as they've always dreamed of it.

In an attempt to leverage name recognition, many cable companies in Canada are now marketing their services under a similar brand: "(http://www.wave.ca/) The Wave".  The service varies from region to region, but the hardware and performance are basically similar, so if you have "The Wave" in your area, chances are the information in this article will apply to you too.  Even if your service is named differently (for example, if you're in the US), don't give up.  It may still apply.  (By the way, the Wave consortium recently signed an agreement with the US-based @Home network and the two services are or will soon be linked via an extra-strong backbone.)

Naturally, the first question every one of you (at least, everyone who hasn't yet ordered a cable modem) is asking is, "can I get one in my area?"  The answer to that is probably still, "maybe."  Unfortunately, this is a slow and ongoing process and, at this time, large areas that may be geographically attached are light-years apart in terms of Internet access.  For example, here in Dartmouth, NS, we have cable modem service, but across the harbour in neighbouring Halifax, NS, a different cable company reigns and the dark ages persist.  Expect this to change over the next 1 - 2 years until cable modem access is as ubiquitous as the current crop of "ive_got_a_modem_and_linux.com" mom and pop Internet providers.  For now, the only way to determine for sure if you can get access is to call your local cable company.

As an aside, C|NET recently published a (http://www.cnet.com/Content/Features/Techno/Cablemodems/) fairly thorough article on cable modems.  In it, there is a map which pretends to display areas where cable modem service is available.  Somehow, they forgot to even draw the entire provinces of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland on their map (we all stick out into the Atlantic, a bit northeast of the state of Maine), so I guess we can forgive them for not listing us as one of the areas that is serviced. <g>

It's also interesting to note that both C|NET and PC Mag (vol. 16, no. 6, pp. 222, 227) were lukewarm on cable modem access, claiming or implying that the technology hasn't quite matured to the point of usefulness.  The reality of this claim, like many other aspects of this service, varies from area to area.  Once again, check with your local company.

Or, to discover the truth that OS/2 users have found out about cable modem access, read on!

***********************************

Cable Modems and OS/2: Speed and Benefits

So, what's the deal?

Basically, the list of benefits of cable modem access over POTS Internet access is short, but significant.  First of all, of course, cable modem service is a lot faster than a dialup telephone modem.

Secondly, since it uses your cable TV line instead of your telephone line, you won't tie up your phone when you're on-line.

And speaking of being on-line, you will be, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.  Cable modems are always on, connected to the network, so most companies (at least all we have heard of so far) are offering unlimited access.  Also, due to its "always on" status, there is no annoying login delay with a cable modem.  Open Netscape Navigator or your favourite e-mail app and you're in business.

And, finally since you're always on-line with your cable modem, your IP address may remain the same for long periods.  You could theoretically set up a WWW or FTP server and give out your IP address to your friends.  (Because my area uses DHCP to give new IP addresses each time a machine is booted and logs on to the network, my IP will still change each time I reboot.  Some areas use static IPs so you could theoretically register with (http://www.internic.net/) InterNIC for your own domain name and serve it from your home machine.)

Quit playing with me!  How fast is it?

Claims vary widely from one cable company to another, depending on many things (the state of their network, internal marketing decisions, the amount of local competition, etc.), but basically, cable modem service is offered at roughly 500kbps or, in my area, at 5 mbps.

Yes, that says 5 mbps, as in five megabits per second.  But before you get delirious and rip out your USRobotics 14.4 (the cable modem is 347 times faster, after all), you should know that that is only a technical specification.  Real world speeds will likely not ever be that good for you -- they will likely be much faster than your telephone modem, but realistically, not 347 times faster.  For various reasons, it seems that the 5 mbps service offered here is really little different than the 500 kbps service offered by cable companies elsewhere, so don't feel cheated if you're in one of the "slow" areas.

Some of the limiting factors on cable modem speeds are:

1. the available bandwidth on the Internet itself;
2. special considerations for WWW sites;
3. sharing of bandwidth between local cable customers; and
4. possible inadequacies of the cable network itself

First and foremost, you've got to realize that promises of 5 mbps, 10 mbps or 27 mbps access to the Internet is actually more hype than substance due to the structure of the Internet itself.  Because it is a diversified network, bottlenecks abound, and data often doesn't flow too quickly between you and another point.  Some sites might have a great pipeline directly to you, but others might be hobbled by a weak link somewhere.  Also, no matter how fat the pipe between you and (http://www.yahoo.com/) www.yahoo.com is, if 1,000 people in your area are using that pipe at a given time, you're only going to have access to 1/1,000th of that bandwidth.

Depending on your uses of the Internet, another very important consideration may be the speed of WWW sites.  A great deal of time on-line can be spent waiting for WWW sites to reply to your requests for HTML pages, graphics, sound files, etc.  You've all seen the messages: "Contacting host: www.yahoo.com..." and "Host www.yahoo.com contacted.  Waiting for reply..." in Navigator's status line.  Neither a cable modem nor a direct line to God will speed those wait times up.  These times depend on the speed of the remote server and the number of people trying to access that server, so expect to still spend some time staring at blank screens, no matter what technology you're using.

You will also theoretically be sharing whatever bandwidth is available from your cable company with every other customer on your local 'node'.  In my case this hasn't proved to be an issue yet (because we have a ton of bandwidth each and because there are only few customers so far), but it's something to consider for the future.  For what it's worth, my cable company has made vague promises that overall network bandwidth will be raised to meet any needs of increased customers.

Finally, your cable company does have to make a substantial investment to their network to bring you all these wonders.  While the old coaxial cable network that they have lined your city with has tons of bandwidth for one way transmission, it lacks the capacity for good two way transmissions.  There are various solutions to this problem, but one of the best (and most expensive) is to completely upgrade the system to a hybrid of coaxial cable and fiber-optic cable.  This is what Access Cable did here (finishing about a year ago, they tell me), but you should check your provider to see what their status is.

Benchmarking the Internet

The good news is that even with these caveats, you'll still enjoy much faster Internet access with a cable modem than you're probably used to.  For example, in my experience with a USRobotics Sportster 33.6 fax modem, I would rarely see transfer speeds over 3.5 - 4.0 kBps (or 28,000 - 112,000 bps), usually much less.  With my cable modem firmly installed, WWW pages, graphics, zip files downloads, etc. normally speed to me at 30 - 50 kBps (or 240,000 - 400,000 bps), depending on time of day and remote location.  I have even seen extremely good connections with speeds up to 130 kBps (1,040,000 bps) which is approaching T1 speeds (1,500,000 bps).  While writing this article I downloaded a 5.2 megabyte Java runtime file from IBM at a sustained transfer rate of 70 kBps.  Over time, I have found the average file transfer speed of the cable modem to hover around 40 or 50 kBps.

To give you some reference to what this speed means to you, take the (ftp://ftp.stardock.com/demos/entdemo.exe) Stardock Systems' Entrepreneur Demo.  This 11.2 megabyte file takes between 4.5 and 5.0 minutes to download at roughly 40 kBps in the middle of the day over my cable modem.  Try that on a telephone modem.

As with all things, speeds will vary from user to user, and place to place, but it's clear that the bottom speeds here are much faster than can be achieved with a telephone solution.

***********************************

Cable Modems and OS/2: Installation Day

Taking the plunge

But of course, all the information on cable modems in the world is meaningless without some information about using them with OS/2, right?

For months before I finally got connected, I had been teased by Access Cable's promises of "one more month".  So I spent a lot of time reading OS/2 networking newsgroups and found that many people were discussing their personal experiences with cable modems and OS/2.  I was encouraged by the reports I saw, but there were enough questions, complaints and pleas for help that I wasn't completely sure OS/2 would work.

Talking to my cable company provided the same unpleasant answers that many others had heard: "we only support Windows 95, Windows for Workgroups and the Mac," or, "The Wave doesn't support OS/2."

I didn't give up though, and speaking with actual technicians revealed that these claims were based more on marketing than technology.  I was assured that "The Wave" would indeed work with any OS that supported typical networking protocols and hardware.

So I took the plunge and ordered the service.  Before you can purchase an Internet connection through Access Cable, you must first purchase basic cable TV programming.  Since we didn't already subscribe to this service, the installation people had a double duty to perform when they got here.

First the actual "cable guy" arrived, drilled his holes in various places, ran coaxial cable from the pole to my TV and computer, and plugged that cable in to my VCR and the actual "cable modem".

The entire hardware setup is actually quite simple.  The connection is a coaxial cable, just like the one plugged into the back of the TV set, which connects to a small metal "brick" which sits on the floor or your desk.  This is the actual cable modem, in my case a (http://www.baynetworks.com/Products/nav/DA190-2688EC-B.html) Lancity unit.

From there, a typical networking twisted pair wire runs into a Network Interface Card (also known as a NIC) which fits in any open expansion slot in your computer.  The cable company provides either an ISA or a PCI based NIC, depending on your needs (this is covered by the installation fee).  The cable modem has a few green indicator lights but except in an outage situation they are mostly redundant so there is no problem sitting the unit on the floor.

An interesting advantage to this placement is that the unit has "fins" which are actually heat sinks and they are nicely curved so they fit the arch of a foot.  If your feet get cold, you've got an instant foot warmer!  (Please note, my cable company did not recommend this use for the equipment but I've noticed it runs at slightly above body temperature so...)

The Lancity modem is a proprietary unit, as are all units so far manufactured.  At this stage in the industry, you will be required to use the same brand of hardware as the "head end" (i.e. the connection at your cable company) so you will be leasing the unit from your provider.  In my case, as in the rest of Canada and probably the US, this lease fee is included in the price of the monthly service.  Later, as standards emerge, it may be possible to purchase a modem and reduce monthly charges, but that time is still distant at this point.

One person writes on a (http://home.on.rogers.wave.ca/mreid/rogwave/cablemod.html) Rogers Cable web page (Rogers is one of the largest cable companies in Canada):

     ...it would seem that if a cable company was
     dependent on security and management features built into the
     cable modem, that they would want to maintain ownership of that
     modem. This is similar to what is done with cable television
     decoders. So it may be some time, if ever, before we see cable
     modems available on store shelves.

Proprietary units aside, you will not have to worry that there will not be drivers for OS/2 for the particular cable modem your local provider chooses.  This is because the equipment acts exactly like a normal LAN (or, more accurately, a WAN, connecting to a normal NIC.  Thus, any 10BaseT Ethernet card that has OS/2 drivers will probably work with the cable modem.  If the one provided by the company doesn't work, some people have reported purchasing their own 3Com cards to solve the problem.  In my case, the PCI based D-Link card provided did the trick.

Ding Dong.  Cable Guy... er... Cable Gal?

The next step to the installation is getting the hardware to work with your operating system and, as you can imagine, this is the moment of truth for any OS/2er.  A separate technician arrived shortly after the first one and she took care of this end.  After quickly installing the NIC that the earlier technician had left, she moved on to the software end of things.

As advertised, Windows 95 was required (sorry NT, Linux, OS/2, and BeOS users), but luckily I had a licensed copy of the Win95 CD that someone gave me years ago.  I had installed it on my C: partition (previously inhabited by Win3.1) the day before.  With this freshly installed base to work with, the technician slapped in the Win95 CD, added some networking protocols, set up a few passwords and, to my surprise, that was that.  In fact, if she and I had kept our mouths shut while she was here, the whole thing could have been done in less than half an hour.

Naturally one of the first things any good company technician does is to show off how well their service works and my friendly cable gal did not disappoint.  Since I had not installed any software on my Win95 partition (because I had no intention of using it) she asked if I preferred Internet Explorer or Netscape Navigator.  I had hardly gotten the last syllable out of my mouth before she had opened a connection to the server at cable headquarters and began an install of the latest Navigator for Win95, over the cable modem.  Within seconds, the software was installed.  Not downloaded, installed.  Needless to say, I was impressed.

Without being too annoying, I explained to her that I would be repeating her efforts, but with OS/2, after she left and asked for a few pointers.  She was helpful and answered any questions I could think of.  Armed with these answers and my experience watching her set up the system, I thanked her and she took off to make someone else's day.  I set about making the service work with OS/2...

Finally, OS/2

And naturally, it wouldn't work.

Months ago I got adventurous and followed some advice I had found (again, in that darn vol. 16, no. 6 of PC Mag, this time on p. 376) on cleaning out an OS/2 system.  If you don't have networking installed, the theory went, you don't need a lot of files that Warp 4 installs by default.  So, in a fit of housekeeping, I deleted a ton of non-vital files.  Needless to say, when you then decide you do want networking support installed, you need those files back.

I got a few errors and since I was starting to panic, I decided to just start fresh and reinstall Warp 4.  Once I did, my problems ended (for the most part).

If anything, the "installation" with OS/2 was actually faster than with Win95, reinstallation of the OS notwithstanding.  Warp 4 automatically detected the D-Link card and installed drivers for it.  Since Access Cable uses a Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) server, I chose the setting for DHCP in the appropriate place in the setup process.  Warp then asked me to do the normal networking setup of any protocols I wanted.  I selected TCP/IP and continued.

Hello?  Is this thing on?

The first problem that I had was actually my own ignorance.  When setting up Win95, the cable technician had installed TCP/IP (for normal 'net stuff), IPX (for a local game server they have running) and NetBEUI (to share files across the local network).  Because of this last one, NetBEUI, the Win95 system requests a password and logs me on to the network each time it boots.  I had not installed NetBEUI with OS/2 at first, so there was no such logon prompt.  My machine booted and just sat there.  So, naturally, I thought there was some other step I had to take to get things going.

Feeling a little foolish because I didn't know what to do next, I called one of OS/2 e-Zine! 's local networking gurus.  When he said to try pinging some hosts, I explained that I hadn't gotten connected yet but he told me that yes, indeed I had.

To my surprise, he was right.  I was able to ping the company's name server, although nothing else.  We quickly found that I had not set the router's IP address, so I opened the TCP/IP Configuration Notebook (just open a command prompt and type tcpcfg.exe followed by Enter to do this) and did so.  We had to guess at the router's IP address since it was not provided by the technician when she was here, but it followed a fairly standard formula and my "expert" got it right on the second try (and he has my deepest gratitude and respect because of it).  There are various other settings that you may want to tweak in this notebook, including what services to auto-start at boot time, so you might look through its pages at your leisure.  (And by the way, this notebook contains settings that are helpful for _all_ systems, even ones that only use dialup Internet connections.  Have a look at it.)

Once that was done, the machine was on the 'net, as simple as that.  I fired up Navigator for OS/2 and PMMail, and sure enough, I was airborne.  Transfer speeds were identical to what I had seen with Win95 use and everything seemed to work well.  (There were a few minor exceptions to this: isolated FTP sites behaved oddly, but this is probably not related to the cable modem, and my ISP either fixed them quickly or is currently working on resolving them.)

The next step

As I mentioned, the cable person installed IPX and NetBEUI for Win95 when she was here.  I passed on IPX but thought I'd take a shot at NetBEUI.  I didn't see any reference to NetBEUI as a protocol I could install for my new network during the initial setup phase, but luckily, a few months ago, we published an informative article by our very own Brian L. Juergensmeyer on (http://www.os2ezine.com/v2n7/warpwin.htm) getting OS/2 to work on a Windows network with NetBEUI.  Basically, NetBEUI is called "File and Print Services" in the OS/2 network installation utility, and once I knew that, I had it set up in no time.

I must say though, the obtuse naming convention that IBM used for NetBEUI was not the only strange default behaviour I observed.  While everything worked well without tweaking, the setup was much less user-friendly than it should have been.  Many icons and notebook pages were unfamiliar and named differently than their Windows counterparts (NetBEUI is, after all, a widely used Microsoft protocol, so why not just call it NetBEUI?).

Also, in some cases the OS/2 Warp tutorial indicated default icons, locations and names for objects while my system actually used different icons, locations and names.  For example, I had to go looking for the "logon" object and I could not find any object to change my password, although the tutorial said there would be one in the "Connections" folder.

And many network related objects were scattered around my system.  Some were in the "Connections" folder, some in the "System Setup" folder, and some in other places.

However, with a little digging and playing, everything did work.  I was able to log on to the local cable network and download files from their server (an NT server, by the way).  And, of course, all these problems are OS/2's fault, not my cable company's.

Overall, installing a cable modem from Access Cable with OS/2 Warp 4 is not hard at all.  Anyone with any computer experience (even those with no networking experience) should be up and running in less than an hour.  (For a complete check-list of what you'll need to set up OS/2 Warp 4 for cable modem access, see the step-by-step installation instructions below.)

***********************************

Cable Modems and OS/2: Conclusions

With the good, comes...

No service is perfect, and so far I have run into a few problems with my cable modem too.  First, and most important, is the problem mentioned earlier regarding access to some FTP sites.  There appear to be two different problems at work here.  The first is with the way Access Cable has set up their network.  They pull some trickiness with IP addresses so some FTP sites refuse anonymous access because they can not do a "reverse name server lookup".  The second problem appears to be with UUNet, the company that sells Internet backbone service to Access Cable.  For some reason, some FTP sites have strange lag-time behaviours when I try to access them through UUNet.  Access Cable is working to fix both these problems and neither is a show-stopper for now.

I must admit that another glitch I observed in the first few days of the service gave me some satisfaction.  The DHCP server (and name server, which is on the same machine) at Access Cable runs Windows NT and the machine crashed (badly) one night.  Service was out for about 6 or 8 hours and when it was restored, for some reason my machine didn't automatically reconnect like it was supposed to.  When I spoke with tech support, they were very friendly, despite my use of OS/2, and even agreed with me that NT might not have been the best choice for a mission-critical server.

A few other times, there have been short hiccups in the service, but nothing remarkable, and certainly less than with many dialup ISPs.  Despite the problems described above, overall, Access Cable's Internet service has been very good and the system has worked nearly flawlessly with OS/2.

The price of all this bliss

As I mentioned earlier, Access Cable, like many other providers, is requiring that users have at least basic cable TV service.  If you are like me and did not subscribe to cable television, this can add Cdn$15 - $20 per month to the cost of 'net connectivity.  And the cost of that connectivity is not exactly cheap either.  The monthly fee in Dartmouth is Cdn$65 per month (about US$45), including the rental of the cable modem.  If you're willing to commit to one year of service, this price drops to Cdn$55 per month.

There is also an installation fee of Cdn$150 at the time of hookup for the service (and an installation charge for cable TV service too, but that was waived in my case).  "Luckily" many companies are currently "discounting" this installation fee by $100 so the total for installation is really only $50, and you do get to keep the Ethernet card.  And, of course, there is tax on all these prices (15% here -- your rate will, of course, differ).

This may seem like a lot to you, but one well known OS/2er put forth a good argument on Usenet.  Ethan Hall-Beyer said:

     Given that the $55 a month it is costing me equals
     the rate I paid for a dedicated 2nd phone line + unlimited
     monthly modem ISP, I can't complain too much! I had X2 before,
     and this is oodles better.

If you need verification of that logic: he's right!

Cable, cable, cable

So is it worth it?

In a word, YES!

I waited in anticipation for over a year for my cable modem access.  I visited Access Cable's offices frequently and called them repeatedly.  I even stopped the marketing manager in a local grocery store one time to grill him on the latest ETA of the service (sorry Michael).  Despite that wait and the anticipation it built, I am not disappointed with the reality of the situation.

Most importantly for me, the service is basically transparent to the OS you use.  While most cable companies will not officially support OS/2 or other advanced OS's, those OS's themselves should have little trouble handling a typical cable modem hookup.  In a world that's moving ever more rapidly towards Microsoft standardization, this is a refreshingly intelligent acknowledgement that many of us do use other software.

Overall, I'd say for anyone who is more than a casual user of the Internet, the benefits of cable modem service will outweigh the slightly higher cost.  And besides, don't you want to tell your friends about the "unbearably slow" 30 kBps file transfer you just had to endure? <g>

***********************************

Cable Modems and OS/2: Checklist

If you're one of the lucky residents of an area where cable Internet access is currently available, the following instructions will help you prepare and install the service with OS/2.

Keep in mind that these instructions will only be 100% relevant if your cable provider uses identical hardware and software to my local provider, (http://www.accesscable.com/) Access Cable.  If your cable company does differ somewhat though, the following information should still give you an idea of what you need to get your service up and running.

What You Will Need

The basic goal of setting up a cable modem with OS/2 will generally be to surf the 'net.  In order to use all the standard Internet services, you will need the following:

               For Basic Internet Connections

	--------------------------------------------
	Required Item		Where To Get It
	--------------------------------------------
Cable Modem			Provided by cable company
Network Interface Card
(Probably a 10BaseT Ethernet card)	Provided by cable company
Driver for NIC			OS/2 Warp 4 Installation CD,
				(http://service.software.ibm.com/os2ddpak/index.htm)
				OS/2 Device Driver Pak On-Line or NIC manufacturer
IBM TCP/IP			OS/2 Warp 4 Installation CD

	--------------------------------------------
	Required Info		Where To Get It
	--------------------------------------------
Domain Name			Provided by cable company
Nameserver IP address		Provided by cable company
Router IP address			Provided by cable company
Subnet Mask			Provided by cable company
Mail and News server addresses	Provided by cable company
Whether DHCP is used or not	Provided by cable company
IP address
(needed if DHCP is not used)	Provided by cable company
	--------------------------------------------



Since cable modem service basically attaches your computer to a large network spanning entire neighbourhoods, you may also want to take advantage of other network abilities than just Internet services.  If you want to be able to share files and other resources over your cable company's network, in addition to the above, you will need to the following:

               For File and Print Sharing

	--------------------------------------------
	Required Item		Where To Get It
	--------------------------------------------
File and Print Client		OS/2 Warp 4 Installation CD
(also known as NetBEUI
on Microsoft networks)
	--------------------------------------------
	Required Info		Where To Get It
	--------------------------------------------
Username for network		Provided by cable company
Password for network		Provided by cable company
	--------------------------------------------


Installation Instructions for TCP/IP

Again, remember that these instructions apply to setting up "The Wave" cable modem service provided by Access Cable, with OS/2 Warp 4 (no FixPaks).  Your setup may differ slightly -- check with your cable company's technicians.

1. Allow the cable technicians to physically install the cable modem and Ethernet card and connect all cables.  If at all possible, have the cable technician install the service using a supported operating system and verify that everything works properly with that operating system.  Take note of any settings such as name server and router IP addresses, usernames and passwords, news and e-mail servers, etc.

2. Insert the Warp 4 Installation CD in your CD-ROM drive.

3.Open the "Install/Remove" folder (in the "OS/2 System" -> "System Setup" folder) and double-click on the "Selective Install for Networking" object.

4. From the first dialog, select the "Advanced Installation" radio button and click "Next".  (Note: this process may work with the "Easy Installation" method but I have not tested it.)

5. From the "OS/2 Warp Setup and Installation" dialog, select the "TCP/IP Services" check button and click "Next".

6. In the left side of the next dialog window ("Configuration") you will see a tree view which should display two things: "TCP/IP Services" and "Network Adapters and Protocol Services".  Click on "TCP/IP Services" and the TCP/IP settings entry fields will be displayed on the right side of the dialog.  Select the drive to install these services on from the drop down list.  If your network uses DHCP, select this check button (Access Cable _does_ use DHCP; others may not).  Now fill in the remaining fields: "Router", "Host Name", "TCP/IP Domain Name" and "Name Server".

The "Router" for Access Cable is 10.1.0.1; other companies' router addresses will differ.  For "Host Name", enter any name you would like your machine to have on the network.  For "TCP/IP Domain Name" simply enter "WAVE", or a full domain name, such as wave.ca.  Enter the IP address for your name server in the "Name Server" field.  Access Cable's name server is 10.1.0.5 but again, your server address will vary.

6. Next, click "Network Adapters and Protocol Services" in the left side of the dialog to display the setup options for your NIC.  Again, select the drive to install the services to from the drop down list.  Hopefully your NIC has been auto-detected by OS/2 and is listed in the entry field in the right side of the dialog, just under the heading "Current Configuration" .  If it is not, you may have to add it manually by clicking the "Add adapter..." button and selecting an adapter from the list.

Since you asked OS/2 to install TCP/IP, just under the line identifying your network card there should be a line that says "0 - IBM TCP/IP".  If there is not, you should click the "Add protocol..." button and select the appropriate line in the pop-up list of protocols for TCP/IP and press "OK".

7. Click the "Install" button and sit back.  OS/2 will find all the appropriate drivers and software from the Installation CD and add them to your system.  When the installation utility finishes, it will ask you to reboot your machine.  Once you do, you should be in business.

8. After rebooting, test the connection by trying to ping your name server.  (NOTE: You do not have to perform any "login" to start using TCP/IP services over your cable modem.  It is "automatically on" as soon as you boot Warp 4, once it is installed.)  To do this, open an OS/2 command prompt and type:

     ping 10.1.0.5

(Substitute your name server's IP address in the above line if you are not an Access Cable customer.)

9. Once you've established that you can see your local name server, try pinging a few other sites.  You don't have to use IP addresses; you can ping the more easily remembered domain names such as "www.os2ezine.com" or "www.ibm.com" instead. 

10. Once you've established (by pinging sites) that you have a connection the Internet, fire up Netscape Navigator, or your favourite e-mail application or news reader and fill in all the relevant e-mail addresses, passwords and mail and news server addresses and start surfing.  You're on the 'net!

Installation Instructions for File and Print Client, AKA NetBEUI

If you want to be able to log on and off your cable company's network and grab files from their servers, you will need to install the "File and Print Client", also referred to as NetBEUI by your cable company.  To do this, follow steps 1 through 4 above and then:

1. From the "OS/2 Warp Setup and Installation" dialog, select the "File and Print Client" check button and click "Next".

2. In the left side of the next dialog window ("Configuration") you will see a tree view which should display four things: "File and Print Sharing Services" and under that, "Network Adapters for File and Print Sharing" and "User ID and Password"; and "Network Adapters and Protocol Services".  Click on "File and Print Sharing Services" and the settings entry fields will be displayed on the right side of the dialog.  Select the drive to install these services on from the drop down list.  Now fill in the "Workstation name" (with anything you want) and "Domain Name" fields (wave.ca in my case -- check with your cable company for your domain name).  Leave the check buttons below these fields blank -- make sure the "install sharing" box is NOT checked.

3. Click "User ID and Password" in the left side of the dialog to display the setup options for your account on the network.  Enter the user name and password that your cable company representative supplied you with in the appropriate fields.

4. Next, click "Network Adapters and Protocol Services" in the left side of the dialog to display the setup options for your NIC.  Again, select the drive to install the services to from the drop down list.  As with the TCP/IP installation, your NIC should have been auto-detected by OS/2 and should be listed in the entry field in the right side of the dialog, just under the heading "Current Configuration".  If it is not, you may have to add it manually by clicking the "Add adapter..." button and selecting an adapter from the list.

Since you asked OS/2 to install the File and Print Client, just under the line identifying your network card there should be a line that says "0 - IBM OS/2 NETBIOS".  This is IBM's name for what Microsoft calls NetBEUI.  If this line is not present, you should click the "Add protocol..." button and select the appropriate line in the pop-up list of protocols.

7. Click the "Install" button and sit back.  OS/2 will find all the appropriate drivers and software from the Installation CD and add them to your system.  When the installation utility finishes, it will ask you to reboot your machine.  Once you do, you should be ready to log on to the network.

8. The networking installation routine will have added a new folder to your "Connections" folder called "Network".  Open this and you will find a "Logons" folder which contains objects to log on or log off the network.  Unlike with Windows 95, you will not be prompted to log on to the network when you boot OS/2.  You can log on at any time you wish though, and if you try to access network resources without logging on first, OS/2 will prompt you for a username and password.  For now, double click on the Logon object and fill in your username and password.  You will briefly see a dialog telling you that you were logged on to the network successfully.

9. Also in the "Network" folder is a folder called "File and Print Client Resource Browser".  Basically this folder contains all the folders (one for each remote machine on the network) and other resources available on your "LAN".  Browse through them to see what's on the network but remember, most people will not have their machines set up to allow you access to their files.  Typically though, your cable company will have a server (in my case it is named "Europa") with some goodies on it that you can copy to your local workstation.

Important note: When setting up NetBEUI with Windows 95 it is extremely important to turn file and print sharing _off_.  This is how you ensure that others on the network are not able to read, copy, and delete files on your computer.  With OS/2, I was unsure how to guarantee that file and print sharing was turned off (if you know, please (feedback@os2ezine.com) let me know!).

10. That's all there is to it.  When you're done playing around on the network, it is a good idea to log yourself off.  You can do this with the "Logoff" object in the "Logons" folder or by selecting the appropriate menu item that is now available on the Desktop's pop-up menu. 

Happy surfing!

***********************************

Cable Modems and OS/2: Glossary

To assist those less familiar with cable modems, or modems of any kind, we have prepared the following short list of some of the terms and definitions used in the associated articles.  This is not meant to be exhaustive but should cover the basics.  If you would like a definition for a term not listed here, please (feedback@os2ezine.com) ask us!


Backbone
     The large, permanent connection that connects a network to the
     larger Internet.

Bandwidth
     The rate amount of information that can be transferred over a
     given amount of time.  Typically referred to in Kilobytes per second (kBps), Megabits per second (mbps), Bits per second (bps) or some similar measure.

Cable Modem
     A newer variation on the traditional idea of telephone modems. 
     A piece of hardware that connects to a high speed WAN (Wide
     Area Network) to bring Internet access through your cable TV
     system.

Coaxial Cable
     The thick copper wire that the cable TV company runs from the
     pole into the back of your VCR (and cable modem).

DHCP
     Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol.  A network protocol which
     dynamically assigns IP addresses to individual workstations as
     they connect to the network.

Ethernet Card
     A type of Network Interface Card (NIC).

Fiber-Optic Cable
     A cable made of thin strands of glass that transmits light
     flashes over great distances at rapid speeds.  Typically
     fiber-optic cable has excellent bandwidth and is uses to
     supplement the older coaxial network already in place by cable
     companies.

IP
     Internet Protocol.  Typically used as in, "IP Address": the
     numerical address a workstation is referred to on a network. 
     Example: www.os2ezine.com is actually equivalent to the IP
     address, 207.100.156.245 (notice that there are 4 pairs of
     numbers in all IP addresses).

IPX
     Short for Internet Protocol eXchange.  A LAN protocol developed
     by Novell and used as the default protocol in Novell
     NetWare.  Also used widely by game developers for LAN based
     gaming.  Internet gaming that uses IPX will normally encapsulate
     the IPX packet inside a TCP/IP packet.

kBps
     Kilo Bytes Per Second.  One thousand bytes (of data transferred)
     per second.

LAN
     Local Area Network.  The term used to describe networks commonly
     found in homes, small business and even larger businesses.  A
     group of computers (between 2 and ??) connected with a network in
     one small area.

mbps
     Mega Bits Per Second.  One million bits (of data transferred) per
     second.

Modem
     Modulator/Demodulator.  Typically used to refer to a piece of
     electronic hardware that sends and receives data from and to your
     computer over an external line.

Name Server
     A computer on a network that maintains a list of all known IP
     addresses and their text equivalents.

NetBEUI
     Microsoft implementation of the NetBIOS protocol.  NetBIOS is
     short for Network Basic Input Output System.  NetBEUI is
     essentially NetBIOS with enough "enhancements" to make it a
     Microsoft protocol, although it is compatible (and almost
     indistinguishable) to other NetBIOS derivitives.  OS/2 LAN
     Server 2.X-3.X used a different derivitive called IBM
     NetBIOS.  See Brian L. Juergensmeyer's
     (http://www.os2ezine.com/v2n7/warpwin.htm) article on networking
     OS/2 and Windows for more information.

Network Interface Card
     The electronic "card" that fits in your computer's expansion
     slot to allow it to connect to a network, typically a LAN,
     but also, in our case, a cable modem.  Also referred to as an
     NIC.  NICs are typically supplied in versions for ISA bus and
     PCI bus computers.  Many cable companies are supplying free NICs
     with cable modem service.

POTS
     Plain Old Telephone Service.  The normal telephone lines that
     you use to speak on your normal telephone, and sometimes to
     dial in to your telephone-based ISP.

Router
     A device (usually dedicated) on a network that negotiates
     information requests and transfers between network segments
     (piece of a network).  Used mainly to connect LANs and WANs
     to each other and the Internet.

T1
     A very fast (approximately 1.5 mbps) dedicated connection to a
     communications network, traditionally very expensive to install
     and lease.

TCP/IP
     The most commonly used protocol to send and receive information
     over the Internet and, increasingly, other networks.

Twisted Pair Wire
     A type of cable that is often used to connect Network Interface
     Cards (NICs).

WAN
     Wide Area Network.  A version of a LAN that is spread over a
     large geographical area, possibly not entirely in the same
     building.  Cable modem service uses traditional LAN networking
     technology, but spreads it over a large area, thus making it a
     WAN.

***********************************

InJoy v1.1	- by Chris Wenham

InJoy is an Internet dialer that's gleefully easy to set up and use.  It replaces the standard 'Dial Other Internet Providers' program that comes with Warp's Internet Access Kit, offering auto-learning scripts to let novice users get going right off the bat, and advanced PPP tuning options for the power user to squeeze as much speed out of a dialup line as possible.

Installation

Installing InJoy is a matter of creating a directory and unzipping the distribution file's contents into it, then running a REXX script that will create a folder and program icons on your Desktop.

Configuration

Configuration of InJoy is where the program shines and offers the most features.  Most of the time you'll only need to enter the basics such as phone numbers, login names, passwords and applicable hostmasks and DNS entries.  InJoy lets you set up multiple Host profiles just like IBM's D.O.I.P. program does, making it possible to choose from more than one service provider.  

Hit the "PPP Options" button and you can start dipping into the nitty gritty of connection parameters and optimizations.  InJoy lets you toggle several compression options on or off as well as providing access to change MRU and Restart Timer settings.  If you're confused, you can pick from "Make Fast", "Make Slow" and "Default" buttons to instantly load different speed profiles.  Depending on the performance and capabilities of your ISP, as well as the condition of your phone line, you can just hit "Make Fast" and know InJoy is making the most efficient use of the line possible.  If you're having problems you can 'ease up' on the Restart Timer numbers and other options until you get a working solution.

In my testing I found that the values set by "Make Fast" were too much for my ISP/Phone line to handle; lowering some of the settings gave a more reliable connection.

Auto Learning Scripts

IBM's D.O.I.P. never had a feature that would automatically learn how to login to your ISP and start a PPP session, and thus it became a necessary chore to either write a script from scratch or find a 'close enough' one and modify it for your particular ISP.  InJoy fixes this beautifully.  When first setting up your host you can let InJoy dial it and watch you as you manually login.  Then all subsequent times that InJoy dials that host it will use the script it learned to log in for you.  The scripts themselves are still editable and you can replace your login and password with %LOGIN and %PASSWORD variables for added security.  

When we tried it, the Autolearn feature worked flawlessly.  No editing of the script was necessary.

CPS Rates

InJoy keeps a real-time account of your overall CPS rates, keeping track of session statistics like total bytes sent, total received, CPS sending, CPS receiving, average CPS and highest CPS.  There's even a small bar graph that'll display the current line usage.

Unfortunately the Internet isn't the most constant of all networks and the CPS rate can often swing wildly back and forth as chunks of data squeeze through.  Still, it's infinitely useful if you have an internal modem and need some kind of replacement for the lights that tell you if the connection is alive or dead, doing something or stuck.

In addition, InJoy can keep a log of your monthly connect time.  With it, you can see how much time you've been spending on the Internet for each day or month, along with connect and disconnect times.

Ticker

Toggle this feature on and InJoy will periodically check the author's server for news, announcements and commercials which will then either scroll by in the main window or can be displayed on a graphical (PM) ticker you keep on your Desktop.  Several companies have already begun posting announcements and advertisements this way.  I had a number of problems with this feature though: for one, the textual ticker isn't very useful when you want to select URLs for browsing -- you need to be running the dialer in a window, and if the URL is broken by word wrapping you'll have to fix it yourself.  Secondly, sometimes the PM ticker doesn't start up at all.

Masquerading and Dial-On-Demand

But perhaps the best "power user" features of InJoy are the IP Masquerading and Dial-On-Demand capabilities.  IP Masquerading, as described in an (http://www.os2ezine.com/v2n3/injoy.htm) earlier e-Zine! article, allows you to share a single dialup connection on a LAN.  With this you could wire your whole office up to the Internet using only one phone line.  And as the Dial-On-Demand feature suggests, this line may not even have to be a dedicated one.

Dial-On-Demand is pretty self-explanatory.  Available only in the 'Pro' version, InJoy can disconnect from the Internet and wait until one of your applications, such as an e-mail program or browser, tries to open a socket.  While the application is waiting InJoy will automatically dial back into your ISP and establish a connection.  This can be useful in the office scenario described above, or for automated programs that connect to the Internet on an irregular basis, such as the (http://www.ionet.net/~colin/rc5.html) Bovine RC5 client.

Conclusion

Even though InJoy is a character-mode program, you soon come to realize that it doesn't really matter, and that its features make that detail a trivial one.  All PM Internet applications work transparently with it, some even showing better performance thanks to InJoy's optimizations.  

               - * -

InJoy v1.1
     by (http://www.fx.dk/) F/X Communications
     download from (ftp://ftp.bmtmicro.com/bmtmicro/injoy1_1.zip) BMT Micro (ZIP, 604k)
     Registration: US$20 (basic); US$35 (extended)

(http://www.spectra.net/~fox/) Chris Wenham is a freelance web designer, writer and Englishman who now lives in Endicott, NY.  In the past he has written comedy, sci-fi, Pascal, REXX, HTML and Gibberish.  He has been using OS/2 exclusively for the past 2 years.

***********************************

First Looks and Nifty Gadgets

First Looks and Nifty Gadgets brings you reviews of the new and novel.  Each month we take a look at what's just hitting the streets and some tiny, but tried and true products that are still helping people be as productive as possible. 

This month we look at: tSearch v1.00b | Bandit Tagger v1.20 | Background Magic v1.1 | PowerMOD v0.33 | ICQ Java v0.91

tSearch v1.00b

tSearch is a cute little program, not much thicker than the WarpCenter, that will accept search engine queries or URLs into its entry-field and send the results to your currently running copy of Netscape.  The program is pre-configured to work with most popular search engines such as AltaVista, Excite, Yahoo and even the OS/2 archives at Hobbes, but you can also configure it to work with nearly any other search engine too.

Like a disembodied web browser's "Location" field, this program will easily squeeze into the blank space you have left in your WarpCenter and can be summoned to the top from wherever you are just by pressing Ctrl-Alt-L.  With a right click you can change which search engine it uses for queries, or merely leave it to forward, directly to the browser, whatever URL you type.  (Netscape itself will automatically complete the URL if you just type "os2ezine" for example.)

With this neat little gadget you can finally get rid of the 'Location' box in Netscape and devote a few more pixels to web browsing pleasure.

tSearch v1.00b
     by (young@dungeon.com) yWare
     download from the
     (http://www.os2ss.com/archives/hobbes/os2/apps/internet/www/util/tsrch100.zip) OS/2
     Supersite (ZIP, 45k)
     Registration: Freeware

               - * -

Bandit Tagger v1.20/Bandit Adder v1.00

Have you always envied people who seem to have a different witty remark in every e-mail or Usenet message?  Bandit Tagger is one utility that'll let _you_ be the envied one.  Once installed and configured, Bandit Tagger will append a line to every message you send out, drawing from a predefined file of quotes/jokes.  You can elect to either select a random line from the file for each message, or use tags from the file sequentially, beginning to end.  Either way, Bandit Tagger will pop up a message showing you which tag it selected.  You can also have multiple tag files -- one for OS/2-related tags, one with general tags, etc.

Bandit Tagger will work with various programs on the market today, including PMMail and PMINews, Internet Adventurer, Post Road Mailer, and MR/2 ICE.

Unfortunately, there is no way to easily add a new tag to a desired file.  For example, if you see a cool tag of someone else's that you want to... errr...  "borrow", you have to manually load up the tag file and add the new tag to the end, then save it.  This is where Bandit Adder comes in.  the Adder is a little program that works with Bandit Tagger, and allows you to more easily add a tag to your favorite tag file.  Simply copy the desired tag to the clipboard and run Bandit Adder.  It'll pop up a dialog showing you all the possible tag files you can stick the new tag in -- just pick the right file, and the tag's automatically saved in it.  Bandit Tagger and Bandit Adder make a great combination for those who want some variety in their signatures.  (Editor's note: a new version of Bandit Tagger -- v1.26 -- has recently been released.)

Bandit Tagger v1.20/Bandit Adder 1.00
     by (http://www.gbar.dtu.dk/~c918704/) FA Partners
     download from (http://www.gbar.dtu.dk/~c918704/packages/BanditTagger_v126.zip) FA
     Partners (ZIP, 487k)
     Registration: CardWare

               - * -

Background Magic v1.1

If you don't like looking at the same old Desktop background day in and day out, you might try using a little magic on it.  Background Magic is a cool gizmo which makes it easy to randomly change your Desktop background after a certain interval.  Set it to switch every 5 minutes or so and tell it the location of a few good BMP files, and your boredom is lessened.  As well as switching after a set interval, the program also has the capability to change backgrounds on system startup, or whenever you press Background Magic's Change Now button in its configuration dialog.

Background Magic is also cool for anyone who doesn't use the Workplace Shell as their primary interface for OS/2.  People who use a program like MDesk or FileBar can't use OS/2's normal method for displaying a background bitmap on the Desktop, since it's part of the WPS.  Background Magic works around this problem, allowing these users to have backgrounds to their hearts' content -- just set Background Magic to run (minimized) on system startup, and you don't even have to know it's there.  Even if you don't have an alternate shell, Background Magic's randomizing ability for backgrounds alone makes it worth taking a look at.

Background Magic v1.1
     by Matt Schellhaas
     download from (ftp://ftp.bmtmicro.com/bmtmicro/bmagic11.zip) BMT Micro (ZIP, 59k)
     Registration: US$10.00

               - * -

PowerMOD v0.33

PowerMOD is a new MOD file player (digital music) under development that, while only supporting one file format so far, has at least one set of features that no other native OS/2 MOD player has yet: Ultracool real-time graphical displays.  PowerMOD sports both a rainbow colored, multichannel wave display and a Fourier "LED bar-graph" display, both updated in real time.  These are both fascinating to watch and definitely loaded with "Way cool!" value to show off to your non-computer-using friends.

PowerMOD also has a set of special effects, like echo, quality and tempo, that can all be mixed in real time too.  Adjust the slider bars as a file is playing and hear the music change instantly.  (Unfortunately, at this time users can not save their own effects combinations.)  And finally, PowerMOD also has a few preset effects combinations like "Cave", "Hall", "Stadium" and "Telephone".

PowerMOD v0.33
     by (http://nuts.ml.org/) Antony T.  Curtis
     download from the
     (http://www.os2ss.com/archives/hobbes/os2/apps/mmedia/music/mod/players/pmod033.zip) OS/2
     Supersite (ZIP, 52k)
     Registration: Freeware (or so it seems)

               - * -

ICQ Java v0.91 Preview

If you're subscribed to WarpCast or if you read comp.os.os2.apps, you've probably seen mention of the Java version of ICQ.  What is ICQ?  Well, to answer that, you just have to realize what the name means: I seek you.

ICQ is a nifty program from Mirabilis that lets you track when your friends across the world are on the Internet (actually you track when they're running ICQ).  What can you do with this information?  You can send them messages, files, and URL's.  You can also start chat sessions or Internet phone connections with them from ICQ.

The Java version of ICQ doesn't yet contain all of the features of its Windows cousin, but it's the first truly useful Java program I've run across.  It lets you send messages and URL's, but it doesn't yet let you send files, chat, or start an Internet phone session.  The web page says that these features will be added in future versions.

The first preview was v0.90 and worked with Java 1.02.  It worked quite well, but it was more than a one meg download and it had some problems with OS/2's JIT compiler, so it ran as an interpreted program and was a little slow.  Luckily, speed isn't something that's very important with ICQ, and I was able to use it for some time.  The new v0.91 is written for Java 1.1.x and performs better.  It is also less than 300k.  The difference between these two versions released just weeks apart shows how much Java has grown between versions 1.0.x and 1.1.x.

You may not have a use for ICQ but I do since I have friends in different cities and we use it to communicate easily without charges from the phone company.  Sure, there have been chat programs around for decades, but I've seen nothing quite this convenient for this specific purpose.  ICQ Java really shows the future of the Internet.

ICQ Java is also a good reason to download Java 1.1.1 for OS/2 and (ftp://ftp.hursley.ibm.com/pub/java/fixes/os2/11/runtime.exe) the latest update (EXE, 5.2M).  You might note that a new version of IBM's "Feature Install" program has been released (version 1.2), so you will want to download and install it before installing Java 1.1.1.

     ICQ Java v0.91 Preview
     by (http://www.icq.com/) Mirabilis LTD.
download from (http://www.icq.com/pub/java/ICQJava_Preview_091.zip) Mirabilis LTD. (ZIP, 290k)
Registration: Free while in beta

               - * -

That's it for this month.  Tune in next time for more reviews of neat gadgets and first looks at new OS/2 tools.

***********************************

September '97 Reader Survey Results

IBM is the company we all love to hate.  On the one hand, they have provided us with what is probably the best operating system in the world.  On the other, many feel they have hobbled that operating system with inept marketing and strategic blunders.  Some feel so strongly that IBM has harmed OS/2's chances to succeed on its own merits that they loudly argue it's time to cut the strings and sell or give OS/2 to some third party.

To find out what you think, last month we asked, "What should IBM do with OS/2?"

Answers to our survey were accepted from September 16th until October 13th.  We had a total of 2,464 replies to our questionnaire with 112 "spoiled" entries (replies were considered "spoiled" if they did not contain an e-mail address, if they were incomplete or if they were duplicates).  This left 2,352 valid replies.  The results were as follows:

Has IBM done a good job developing OS/2?

IBM's programming gurus can be proud of their accomplishments -- at least our readers think so.  Nearly one in every two people surveyed last month (48.3%) said that IBM's PSP had done a "good" job developing OS/2.  More importantly, another 36.9% felt that PSP had done an "excellent" job.  Obviously OS/2 users are happy with the technology that runs their computers.

What about the 14.9% of people who don't think IBM is the cat's meow when it comes to programming?  Even in this group the majority (11.3% of the total surveyed) felt IBM's efforts were acceptable.  Only 57 people (2.5%) thought IBM had done a "poor" or "horrible" job.

Has IBM done a good job marketing OS/2?

IBM's report card is not nearly so rosy when it comes to marketing their brilliant product though.  A glance at the tables below will quickly show you that the answers were nearly reversed between our first and second questions last month.

Almost as many people who thought IBM did a "good" job developing OS/2 thought that they did a "poor" job marketing it (47.3% of our readers).  Worse, almost that many again (45.2%) thought they did a "horrible" job marketing our OS of choice.  Obviously our readers don't feel that IBM's management and programming staffs are on the same level.

What should IBM do with OS/2?

Finally last month, we asked the question everyone really wanted to answer.  And answer you did!

Perhaps surprisingly, most of our readers feel IBM is still the proper steward for OS/2.  Almost half (49.5%) said that IBM should, "Keep OS/2; focus more on end users."  The next largest group was comprised of people who also feel that IBM should retain ownership of OS/2.  However, these people (nearly 1/4 of our readers, or 23.0%) feel that IBM should create a subsidiary solely to develop and market OS/2.  That's overwhelming support -- 72.5% -- for IBM to retain ownership of OS/2!

But there were dissenters, of course.  Approximately 15.9% of our readers thought IBM should either sell or give away OS/2, and 9 readers (0.4%) even told us that IBM should, "Officially stop producing OS/2!"  Maybe that would finally stop those "OS/2 is dead" rumours. <g>

               - * -

In addition to asking our readers what they thought, our staff members also "had it out" on this topic this month.  Don't forget to check out the complete debate featured in this issue.

Also, don't forget to fill out this month's questionnaire and check back in November for complete results!

 


               Complete September '97 Survey Results


Has IBM done a good job developing OS/2?
	
Category					Count	Percentage
They have done an excellent job		868	36.9%
They have done a good job			1,137	48.3%
They have done an acceptable job		265	11.3%
They have done a poor job			51	2.2%
They write code like janitors (horrible)	6	0.3%
I'm not qualified to say			25	1.1%
----------
TOTAL					2,352	100.1%
Note: the extra 0.1% in the above table is due to rounding errors.


Has IBM done a good job marketing OS/2?

Category					Count	Percentage
They have done an excellent job		3	0.1%
They have done a good job			19	0.8%
They have done an acceptable job		145	6.2%
They have done a poor job			1,113	47.3%
My dog could have done better (horrible)	1,064	45.2%
I don't have any opinion			8	0.3%
----------
TOTAL					2,352	99.9%
Note: the missing 0.1% in the above table is due to rounding errors.


What should IBM do with OS/2?

Category					Count	Percentage
Stay the course, things are fine		81	3.4%
Keep OS/2; focus more on end users		1,165	49.5%
Create IBM subsidiary solely for OS/2	541	23.0%
Sell or give OS/2 to a non-IBM company	192	8.2%
Donate OS/2 source code to public domain	181	7.7%
Officially stop producing OS/2		9	0.4%
Other (please use our feedback form)	109	4.6%
I don't know, I just don't know!		74	3.1%
----------
TOTAL					2,352	99.9%
Note: the missing 0.1% in the above table is due to rounding errors.

***********************************

Reader Survey

Have you ever wondered what your fellow OS/2 users are doing with their computers and how they're doing it?

Each month, OS/2 e-Zine! takes the pulse of the OS/2 community on a different topic and presents you with the results.  This month's topic: What do you think about web browsers?

Just fill in the form at http://www.os2ezine.com/v2n10/survey2.htm and check back next month to find out how "normal" you really are!

-----

Do you have an idea that you think would make a (feedback@os2ezine.com) good survey question?

Don't forget to check out the complete results of last month's survey, in this issue!

***********************************

Are you a hard core OS/2er?	- by Chris Wenham

Have you ever wondered how you stack up against OS/2 power users?  Take this simple survey, add up your points and see how you rate.  Are you a real OS/2 user, or just a cornflakes eater?

1: You've used OS/2 for:

a) A couple of months
b) A couple of years
c) A decade
d) You were beta testing it when the Macintosh came out

2: You drag and drop:

a) Colors and fonts to customize your Desktop
b) Objects to manipulate files
c) Objects to the shredder
d) Other operating systems to the shredder

3: You use:

a) Dual-boot to get into another operating system
b) Hibernate/Trapdoor to get into another OS
c) Boot Manager to get into another OS
d) DOSiX to run WinNT, Linux and VMS under Warp 4 concurrently.

4: Have you ever:

a) Downloaded an OS/2 game?
b) Purchased an OS/2 game?
c) Won an OS/2 game?
d) Sat down and ported one from Unix using the EMX libraries?

5: Your bookshelf contains a copy of:

a) OS/2 Warp: Unleashed
b) SPG's ColorWorks V2 hardcover manual
c) The entire Redbook series
d) All of the above

6: You bought a Zip drive so you could:

a) Keep your naughty pictures stored on it
b) Keep your clients' files stored on it
c) Keep your backups stored on it
d) Knock pens and stuff over by placing them in front of the unit and clicking 'Eject disk' from the drive's Desktop object

7: Your primary file system is:

a) FAT
b) VFAT
c) HPFS
d) TVFS

8: Your greatest dilemma is:

a) Whether to run OS/2 or Windows 95
b) SmartSuite vs. StarOffice
c) PMView vs. Galleria
d) WarpSans... or Helvetica... hmm...

9: The first thing you do after unpacking a new computer is:

a) See what bundled software it came with
b) Read the instruction manual
c) Browse around a bit before lunch
d) Boot it up with the Warp 4 install disk in the A: drive

10: The number 16 accurately describes:

a) Your age
b) The megabytes of memory you have installed
c) The number of major OS/2 applications you own
d) How many WarpCenter trays you have

11: Your programming skill with Rexx is at the level of:

a) Getting two programs to run one after another
b) Setting up a filter for your e-mail client
c) Updating your home page automatically
d) Running a small local government

12: You are printing a document, formatting a floppy, installing an application off a CD-ROM, downloading 3 files, listening to an .mp3, rendering a 3D scene and browsing the web at the same time because:

a) You're in a frantic hurry to complete your midterm report before the deadline tomorrow, and it's already 3am
b) You're one more goof-up away from getting a pink-slip and you're desperate to appear productive
c) Your neighbors are visiting and you want them to think you're a high-powered hotshot
d) It's a slow day

13: When buying a car, the most important feature you look for is:

a) Antilock brakes
b) Passenger side air-bags
c) CD Stereo
d) Workplace Shell integration

14: When going to the movies you:

a) Cheer for the good guy
b) Cheer for the bad guy
c) Cheer for the computer nerd
d) Squint at the screen to see if the computers they're using run OS/2

15: When you find yourself awake at 4 a.m. it is usually because:

a) You're that poor schmuck from question #12
b) You drank too much coffee late in the day
c) You don't think it's a big deal if you sleep until 11 a.m., even if it means that you'll get that big red spot on your forehead from sleeping at your desk
d) Those darn Torians are kicking your butt and you know that if you go to sleep they might take over your class 26 planet in the Kwilas system

Ratings:

Give yourself:
5 points for each question you answered a)
10 points for each question you answered b)
25 points for each question you answered c)
50 points for each question you answered d)

Now total your score and find your ranking from the following table:


Score		Ranking
0 - 100		You're the twit from the "My retractable coffee-holder has
		broken" story.

105 - 250	"I'm familiar with computers, but not OS/2"

255 - 400	Someone could mention "WPS" or "HPFS" and you could still
		follow the conversation .

405 - 550	You know the Workplace Shell like the back of your hand.

555 - 700	You dream in Rexx.

700+		You ARE David Barnes.


               - * -

(http://www.spectra.net/~fox/) Chris Wenham is a freelance web designer, writer and Englishman who now lives in Endicott, NY.  In the past he has written comedy, sci-fi, Pascal, Rexx, HTML and Gibberish.  He has been using OS/2 exclusively for the past 2 years.

***********************************

Celebrity Corner

Soundoff With... Netscape

As part of the (http://www.gt-online.com/~tandie/soundoff.html) Soundoff With... series of events, held regularly on IRC, the following interview was conducted on July 18, 1997 with two members of the Netscape Communicator for OS/2 team; Dan Libby and Michael Kaply. Dan and Michael were using the nicks (IRC handles) 'danda' and 'ForU2Play' respectively, but for the purpose of this article those nicks have been replaced with their real names. The removal of general IRC noise, unanswered questions, and rearrangement of questions answered out of the order in which they were asked are the only other modifications to this transcript.

This interview is republished with the permission of the (http://www.gt-online.com/~tandie/soundoff.html) Soundoff With... organizers.

               - * -

tandie: Welcome to #OS/2! Tonight we are hosting a Soundoff With... Netscape event! Our guests tonight are Dan Libby and Michael Kaply of the Netscape Communicator for OS/2 Project team. For the event tonight the channel will be moderated. We would like to thank our Guests tonight for agreeing to come to this forum. Would either or both of our guests like to make an opening statement, after which we will ask for questions from those in attendance. Michael?

Michael: I just wanted to say thanks to everyone for coming out... rest assured, despite anything you have heard, we are actively working on Netscape Communicator for OS/2.

tandie: Dan, care to make a comment?

Michael: I will try to answer all of your questions, but for obvious reasons I might have to occasionally throw in a NO COMMENT :):)

Michael: Any comments dan?

Dan: Comments?  Not really.  I think we are making good progress.

Michael: All right, then lets take questions

Ice63: Will you meet the IBM proposed goal of one web year (90 days) after the Windows version?

Michael: We have publicly stated that we are working toward a third quarter ship date. Based on the math, that would be within a web year :) You will certainly see a beta in that time frame

Dan: ..and a screen shot very soon.  a REAL one.   :)

Moldavia: Will there be any improvements, or new features in the OS/2 version over the Windows version?

Michael: We are trying to at least have the OS/2 specific features that were in 2.02 such as speech and additional drag and drop. We have some other ideas on some OS/2 specific improvements,... but I can commit development people to those, I can't identify them. We are certainly trying to make the OS/2 version better

Abraxas: I'd like to hear a comment (if possible) on the reported conflict between Communicator and Lotus, and what that portends.

Stryder: Is it true that IBM has exerted considerable pressure to debundle the communicator portion from the OS/2 release ?

Michael: That's a very sensitive topic, and I will dance around it as best I can..... There certainly has been discussion of unbundling the browser, but as it stands, my plan of record is to produce Netscape Communicator for OS/2.... If I am told to just do the browser, I will just do the browser... That's all I can say right now

Stryder: How badly did the departure of Warnett affect the timetable/feature set of the release ?

Dan: Martin was a valuable member of the team, but his departure did not affect the timetable to my knowledge.
Michael: Dan is correct

Desp: Will there be integration with the OS/2 desktop in version 4?

Michael: We will have at least the same level of integration as 2.02 and Windows...
Dan: Integration like IE integrates with Win*?  No.

os2hq: Okay, how much will Com/2 cost?  Upgrade discount for current Nav/2 users?

Michael: I can't comment on any pricing issues

BamaFan: How much of the development effort is being done by IBM...

Dan: the team is made up of a majority of IBM members and a few of us Netscaper's (4 at present) Mike, how many IBM'ers?
Michael: I think 6, plus some contractors
Dan: Everyone works together though in one area.  Company distinctions are mostly irrelevant.
Michael: Either way, it is definitely a joint effort

Le_Barman: Does the fact that there's no MSIE/2 allow you to take more time, to do a better job?

Michael: Our timetables are based on windows timetables combined with quality.  Out goal is to put out a comparable windows product with as high as quality as possible. Not having competition doesn't affect that

Matinee: Could netscape release an API kit like webex which allows you to implement a browser view within a client window?

Michael: What WebEx does is pretty cool, but unless a browser were designed from the ground up to do that, it wouldn't be practical.... we understand the requirement, and it is on our list.
Dan: I doubt a "browser in a window" API is technically feasible at this point but may be in the future.  There are no plans that I am aware of. Although I can certainly see that it would be nice for OS/2 developers.  There are probably some legal issues...

young: has dumping OpenClass netted the program any speed gains? Will C/2 use it's own Java runtime?

Michael: dumping openclass has definitely helped speed.... Although openclass is a very powerful set of tools. As far as Java goes, I can't discuss that right now. I can say we will have Java :)

Ice63: Do you know if there will be later versions of Netscape/2 (4.01, etc.)

Michael: Well, since Netscape is already at 4.02.... :)  We will probably ship at the 4.02 level

Egon: is the issue of NS/2 not being able to be closed (either with a process killer such as Process Commander or WatchCat) being addressed?

Michael: Egon, we were not aware of that problem, so no

Desp: Are there plans to have NS/2 available from the main NS download page? (Thus allowing better visibility for the platform)

Michael: desp - we are working to make it available from the netscape pages

Sentience: Where should we be watching for news on the upcoming betas and screenshots?

Michael: Sentience - the best place to watch is the netscape unofficial home page - (http://home.netscape.com/people/danda) http://home.netscape.com/people/danda
Dan: I will also post anything significant on my page: people.netscape.com/danda

Korig: Are there any plans to add a WebMap like in WE to netscape/2?

Michael: Korig - no plans for a web map currently. History is much improved though
Dan: The History list in Communicator should provide most of the functionality of WE's Webmap.

fonz_: Are you guys leaning away from using OCL?  If so, how hard is it to sync development with the other platforms?

Michael: fonz - we are not using OCL. We have invented ways to keep us synced with the other platforms and currently it is working very well
Dan: Michael: U should clarify that we are not using it in 4.0.  OCL WAS used in 2.02.
Michael: Thanks dan

Scanner2: why does Netscape/2 see transparent graphics as black backgrounds? when I turn off the color palette option the transparent graphics are transparent but the colors are all funky.

Michael: scanner2 - I don't have enough info on that problem. We had some transparency problems with two color bitmaps

BlizArd: I read in Info Week in May that MCI is using about 2000 OS/2 clients on their intranet running WebEx...do you know if they have switched to NS/2?

Michael: blizard - I have no info like that. But I am jotting it down :)

Ice63: Sorry for being so stubborn, but do you mean Q3 for the beta or the final? (in follow-up to the 1st question of the Soundoff)

Michael: ice63 - I am not going to be that specific :)

KoolAde: my question is if it based on windows timetable why do we not have a beta already?

Michael: KoolAde - the windows product was/is a moving target. We had to pick points in time to sync with it. Because of this, we are off from their timetable.

fonz_: What's the job market like at Netscape?  Do they have a stock option plan, just in case they become like another Microsoft? :)

Dan: yes, there is a plan.  Don't think we are THAT optimistic yet though.... well maybe some of us.

Awake: Will Communicator /2 retain the ability to use windows 3.1 plug-ins?  will the seamless.dll problem be fixed?

Dan: C/2 should use Win plug-ins.  seamless fix?  Mike?
Michael: Yes, Comm will support windows 3.1 plug-ins....
Michael: Seamless fix might be in the new plug-in pak released a couple weeks ago

Pendragn: Will the type ahead from the windows version be included?

Michael: I will check on that

Hotdan: Will Com/2 include a modem dialing app similar to the one included with 3.0 gold for Windows?

Michael: No to the dialing app

Kryton^: How do I get the 128 bit version?

Michael: 128 bit version of 2.02 or Communicator?

Matinee: What are the RAM requirements like (roughly) for the new version? In netscape 2.01 for Windows even if you switch load graphics off it still loads some background images - are pages *completely* graphics free with v4? (sorry, various reasons cannot check here)

Michael: Ram requirements have not been determined yet. They should be similar to windows.  I believe the image problems have been fixed. Note however that if an image is in cache, it is loaded even though loading images is turned off

Korig: Is there competition between those working on the OS/2 and those working on the windows versions of the netscape products?

Michael: no competition. we are working together

DSOMber1: How will encryption be handled especially for international customers? Any support for the SET protocol?

Michael: As you know netscape has been given permission to export 128 bit encryption. The only exception to that is France. No info on the SET protocol

Korig: Is Netscape/IBM encouraging products such as RealAudio to be ported to OS/2?

Michael: We are definitely trying to get people to port to OS/2. RealAudio has been an uphill battle, though, and I don't think you will see it happen

Stryder: Are you viewed as renegades from the rest of Netscape due to the platform you work on ?  IE do you have the *FULL* support of all of the Netscape Corp ? How long is the agreement between IBM and Netscape for and thus likely to produce new versions ?

Michael: We are not considered renegades. We participate actively in their meetings and we are acknowledged as a platform just like anyone else.  Come on, they have a Linux version :) :)  I can't comment on contractual agreements though

Orpheus: Are you going to be concentrating more on performance, stability, the feature set, or a balance of the three?

JoeAdmire: I want to follow up to the question about the bug where NSN/2 won't properly shut down. I have a direct interest in that bug, since it bit me just tonight.  It seems to be connected with Java - and I'm astonished that nobody at netscape seems to be aware of the problem, by the way.  Do you know what the current status is of IBM's efforts to bring Java support in OS/2 up to the current standard - I don't know if it's 1.2?

Michael: I have not heard of this problem, it has not come in through our defects... As far as Java, IBM has released a beta of Java 1.1 and it is being updated continuously.

Abraxas: Are there any plans to incorporate PGP support into Navigator?

Michael: 4.0 does support SMIME and vcards and stuff, I know of no specific things pertaining to PGP. France has laws specifically prohibiting some encryption types. For instance SMIME is disabled in the french version.

Moldavia: Will there be any performance issues with running Communicator/2 on Warp3 vs. Warp4?

JoeAdmire: Why not France (re: 128-bit encryption)?

DeBolle: We all know it's much easier to program for different OS's from a common base and port it, did you use much from the Windows-base for OS/2 or is it entirely different? You just said you weren't aware of the 'not closing' problem. Are there bug reports Is there anything you would like to tell about the project that isn't mentioned here already?

Michael: I'll start with the bug thing... right now, we have a few 2.02 bugs that we will address if necessary. I am trying to avoid 2.02 development at this point. As far as the porting question, we are certainly trying to keep a common code base with the windows version, because that makes our lives easier... we have developed ways to leverage the windows code as well as create a very OS/2 specific version and Open32 is not one of those ways

Rijn: Will there be a NetCaster for OS/2? *Rijn* How is support for NetCaster/2 going?

Michael: I see no technical reason why Netcaster will not be available. It is Java based. WE are not, however, at a point where we are testing it

os2hq: Based on my use of W95 with MSIE at work, MSIE can't download more than one file at a time, whereas Nav/2 has done 3 simultaneous here, while checking mail & playing a game.  When will you guys do some kind of shoot out comparing these for the public???

Michael: I'll keep that in mind for my demos :)

JoeAdmire: Not really a question, but I would like to point out that if the not-closing problem (which you say you are not aware of) has not been addressed to date in 2.02 should turn up in Communicator/2 as well, you are going to hear a *lot* about it from users.  Please do look into this problem.

Michael: I disagree with that statement. You should NOT expect to see 2.02 problems in Communicator
Dan: egon: what is the not closing problem?  anyway, I'm sure you will see all NEW and IMPROVED bugs in Comm/2.   ;)

JoeAdmire: what occurs is that NS/2 will hang or lockup and it will NOT close unless you reboot... Please tell Danda that the not-closing problem is something that often turns up when Java is enabled and the browser freezes and won't shut down

Ice63: Are rumours than NS 5.0 will be written in Java true?

Michael: Netscape has stated that they will have a pure Java browser in the 5.0 timeframe

Le_Barman: Will C/2 be less memory-hungry? 12mb RAM requirement seems a bit abusive.. How about implementing a "remove currents frames" option thingie, for when some bad html got us stuck with some frames from a previous page?

Michael: We are actively working with performance to reduce our memory requirements
Dan: 2.02 had a remove frames.  Just drag the desired page onto the Netscape icon.  BTW, that was an OS/2 only feature.

RudMan: Can you give us an idea of the estimated size of C/2 ? Will C/2 run on the largest current OS/2 platform, v2.11?

Michael: It should be about the size of the windows version, and I don't have those numbers. We have not received requirements to run on 2.11

Wobbly: When Communicator/2 gets released, will it be maintained at the same level as the windows product at the same time, or will there be an ongoing delay for the OS/2 product?

Michael: We believe our release dates will get to the windows version once we ship our first version

Korig: could you ask whether Java & frames will be more reliable in the new version of Netscape/2 ? Does netscape have any sort of idea how many people are using their Netscape/2 product?

Dan: People using it - I don't know.  Mike, does IBM have any download #'s?
Michael: Unfortunately, we don't have numbers on users of 2.02 for OS/2

DynoMutt: how about a feature which would append "www." and ".org/.net" to a sitename entered on the URL line if ".com" doesn't work?

Michael: dyno, sounds like a good idea. i'll put that one down

Rijn: Will Communicator/2 be cancelled when Communicator goes 100% pure Java?

Michael: Although netscape is working on a 100% Java client, they have not said that they are discontinuing their windows version
Dan: Kzin: Unknown.  Regardless, Communicator will run on OS/2 either way.

Guardian_: will we have any juicy plug-ins like windows versions?

Michael: You need to encourage plug-in developers to develop for OS/2. Harass them :)

Astral: In the spirit of Windows compatibility, will left mouse drag & drop support be added?

Michael: We are investigating the possibility of having this configurable

Korig: Are there plans to add a No-Cookie option to the security/preferences page?

Michael: Comm 4.0 has a no cookies option
Dan: That option exists in Communicator already.

JimJ: When will Netscape include support for Java 1.1.x?

Michael: I can't comment on future netscape/java product plans
Dan: I can comment.... but then I'd have to kill you all!

Awake: who can we contact at realaudio to harass for a plug-in? :)

Michael: I'll get a name for you

Dirac: Why have you chosen not to use Open32?  Speed?

Rijn: Will there be a Communicator/2 Professional? Will ISP's be able to sell Communicator/2 also? I'm interested I'm a ISP manager.

Michael: No current plans on pro. I need more info on the ISP thing

Remei: What other projects does Netscape have for OS/2 other then NSC/2?

Michael: Again, I can't comment on any other OS/2 projects, just my own :)

KoolAde: why are we having to wait until the third quarter that seems like we are waiting almost a year behind the windows product

Michael: you are actually only waiting three months :)

young: will c/2 have the html editor built in.

Dan: yes, HTML editor will work for HTML and for mail.

DSOMber1: A different question. How can the OS/2 community help you (Netscape)? What can we do to help in the development of Netscape/2 and Communicator for OS/2?

Michael: There are a few thing...
Dan: create plug-ins!
Michael: I have to tell you guys that some of the trashing of us personally and our product is a real bad thing for morale
Drumpig: send then a fruit basket....
Dan: fruit baskets are ALWAYS appreciated.  Donut baskets also!!!
Michael: We are working our butts off here :) Secondly, even though it seems like the normal support channels don't work, we do get feedback from there, so please try to send bugs there instead of two dan personally.... E-mail should only go to dan when you want to spam him

Korig: Do you (danda and foru2) use OS/2 on your home machines? (Do you know if others on the Netscape/2 team do/don't use it at home)?

Dan: I use OS/2 on my home machine and have for years.
Michael: I do use OS/2 on my home machine as do many members of the team. I also have to use windows for a number of things

Rijn: Will there be petition be made on the Unofficial Netscape site for Plug'n support?

Dan: A petition is not a bad idea, I will look into it.

Steve_UK: will Communicator come with Netscape Conference, as per '95 version? :)

Michael: Currently, we are not doing conference. There are many technical reasons for this, mostly because it does not use Netscape technology

Anonymous: Will C/2 allow the multi user's as in the windows version?

Dan: I believe so.  Mike?
Michael: yes. That's what you were fixing today, dan

mandie: Will Comm/2 be ready for debut by Warpstock Oct 25, 26?

Michael: I don't base my dates on Warpstock :)

Kzin: Will you add replaceable animated icons to change that N/comet anim you have? If not. please consider (html replacement or not) (if you want a sample of the Webex way, I'll send it to you :)

Michael: OK, there will be no way to replace the icon from a web page, but netscape has the ability for a user to replace his/her own personal animated icon... I understand the webex way, and if they had perhaps standardized that or sent it through a committee, that would be OK, but the syntax itself is basically a hack

Acid_Joe: Q. Do you see Java as becoming the language for OS/2?  Will future development of OS/2 products be contingent on the success of Java?

Michael: I definitely see Java as playing a huge role in the future of OS/2.

ShadowM0: Can you comment on the possibility of a future version of Netscape which is itself written entirely in Java?  Will this help bring the release dates for various platforms closer together?

Dan: I believe it would bring the release dates closer yes.  Possibly concurrent.

Drumpig: How/what URL's are selected to be stored in that history pull down , and can u delete them from there

Michael: The history pull-down is basically where forward and back will take you. You can't remove items from them. Communicator does a much better job of managing this

Korig: Are there plans to have FTP resume in the new versions? Has any consideration been given to bundling InterCom with NS/2?

Michael: Not sure of the FTP resume issue. Dan knows better than me
Dan: kzin: yes there is in 4.0. (FTP resume)
Michael: NO plans to bundle intercom

Joc: What plug-ins will be included, if any?

Michael: same plug-ins as 2.02

Awake: will Comm /2 be VoiceType enabled?

Michael: We are working to have comm/2 voice support on parity with 2.02

Rijn: What parts of Communicator will the OS/2 Communicator have? Does IBM look at Communicator/2 as a business app or a home app?

Michael: I don't look at communicator as either. It is simply a browser
Dan: Bill says it is a "Home app and a PLATFORM for business apps"
Michael: As far as what pieces, we are working to be on par with windows, although I have said conference is not going to be there right now due to technical limitations

Le_Barman: Who is Bill?

Dan: Bill is Bill Law.  He is a fellow Netscape employee.  He wrote a good deal of openclass... and we give him a hard time about it.   :)

nRij: How would a 100% Java Communicator fair in performance to a OS/2 native Communicator.

Michael: IBM is actively working on Java performance. The better Java performs on OS/2, the better a Java based browser should perform

Asteroid: My question: what do you see as the biggest challenge for the OS/2 version of Communicator?

Michael: biggest challenge for communicator... hmmm. Trying to maintain a development schedule consistent with the windows platform while the windows product was still being developed

Lord_Zirk: what is the target memory requirement for NS Communicator/2

Michael: Same as windows currently

Rijn: Will Netscape Conference ever make it to OS/2? *Rijn* Will Communicator have a auto dial feature to call up while I'm at work and get my email and stuff?

Michael: No comment on future of conference right now, and as far as the auto dial goes, if windows has it we will, unless you mean the actual internet dialer which we won't have. Communicator supports offline browsing
Dan: There is an Offline and Online mode.  Not sure about unattended dialing....

Asteroid: What can the "ordinary" OS/2 user do most effectively (without seeming like a pest) to encourage plug-in providers to write native OS/2 versions?

Dan: Not sure what the ordinary user can do beyond politely asking the vendor to provide a plug-in.  The LAST thing you want to do is to be rude to them as this will just give OS/2 users a bad image and make them LESS likely to want to provide any type of support.

tandie: At this time, the official event is over... we would like to thank our guests for coming and sharing so much with us. We would alos like to thank all who made this event possible, SofTouch Systems, our official sponsor, Calinet Solutions, VOICE and The Undernet PR Committee

tandie: If our guests would like to make a closing statement?

Michael: I just want to say thank to everyone. Keep on supporting us and we will try to deliver great products for you.
Dan: Be sure to check out my page every so often for the latest updates.  And please send me any news you receive about new plug-ins, etc.  Thanks!

tandie: Thank you, once again Dan Libby and Michael Kaply from the Netscape Communicator for OS/2 Project team. It was an honor having you at the Soundoff With... Netscape event, keep up the Great work, it's really appreciated. For any interested, logs will be available in 2 hours at (http://www.gt-online.com/~tandie/soundoff.html) http://www.gt-online.com/~tandie/soundoff.html.

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The OS/2 Debate	- by Chris Wenham & Colin Hildinger

IBM is the company we all love to hate.  On the one hand, they have provided us with what is probably the best operating system in the world.  On the other, many feel they have hobbled that operating system with inept marketing and strategic blunders.  Some feel so strongly that IBM has harmed OS/2's chances to succeed on its own merits that they loudly argue it's time to cut the strings and sell or give OS/2 to some third party.

To get to the bottom of this issue, this month, OS/2 e-Zine! editors, Chris Wenham and Colin L. Hildinger debate the question, "What should IBM do with OS/2?"

               - * -

Chris:   At the very least, IBM needs to license OS/2's code to a third party, if not outright sell the client version.

IBM wants to sell OS/2 to medium and large businesses, not us.  As a result home and small business customers feel left out of the action and all the best technologies being developed for OS/2 are not useful to us (e.g.: Workspace on Demand).  Selling OS/2 to a vendor committed to this "SOHO" market, or even to a consortium of vendors, and the continued grassroots efforts of users already in full swing (such as Warpstock and VOICE) will give OS/2 enough "oomph" to survive in this market.  Possibly even enough to have moderate success as an alternative platform for people who can't find what they need in Windows 95 and the Mac.

Colin:  While I agree that this sounds like a great idea, I don't think it's at all reasonable.  Why?  The simple answer is: $$$.

Operating systems don't make money, so this third party would have to have some other reason to take on such a venture, and quite frankly, no one would have the motivation or the resources to do it except IBM.

Ideally this company would be responsible for packaging, distributing, advertising and supporting OS/2 end users.  In order to sell a significant number of copies they'd have to significantly lower the price (a visit to CompUSA last month showed that Warp 4 was about $20 more expensive than even Windows NT 4.0, and about 3 times more expensive than Windows 95) and they'd never be able to handle the massive support, development and advertising costs required to succeed without other revenue sources.

Chris: A small start-up called (http://www.be.com/) Be seems to think they can get away with it, somehow.  I'm not privy to their business plan but I don't think they would be spending an enormous amount of money developing a new OS from scratch if they didn't think they could make back their investment later.  Now, a company taking over the client version of OS/2 would have it much, much, easier than Be, precisely because they'd be getting an operating system that's already fully developed, time-tested and installed on a number of 'seats'.

How could they make money?  An operating system is a great 'foot in the door' for selling complementary products and services.  Create a turnkey package that wires a small business together and "just plain works".  Create a bundle of software that covers all the bases a home user would need (finance, word processing, Internet, games) and package it and the OS together with a "one click" install program.  Do the same thing, but with software targeted for small businesses and home offices.  But make sure there's plenty of good strong products in the bundle, not just weak ones or "lite" versions.  This scheme worked for bundling sound cards with CD-ROMs and speakers, it could work for OS/2.

Colin:  The key to the whole scenario is money.  IBM has no reason to give up a product that is making money to another entity.  There are no other entities with the money to effectively maintain and develop OS/2, much, less market it.  As for Be, I don't know what they're doing.  Obviously, they either have a very good source of financing or there are a bunch of starving programmers and engineers developing BeOS and the BeBox.

Chris:  The unspoken assumption we've had so far is that, if sold, OS/2 would only go to a small company, not much, bigger than Stardock or Be.  Well, that doesn't have to be the case. There are companies out there with the money to buy or license OS/2 who would make money from it, at least indirectly.

Intel could take OS/2 off IBM's hands and in one move quickly solve a number of their problems.  With it they can put features and performance into OS/2 that only a chipmaker could manage, making Windows look miserable in comparison without even having to deliberately "break" it.  With their own OS, which Intel could make the 'standard' in little more than a year, there won't be any more embarrassments like the Pentium Pro -- a 32-bit optimized chip which performed so dismally under the half-n-half Windows 95.

Or perhaps Motorola, another chip maker who could quickly revive and polish up the PowerPC version of OS/2, ready to have something to sell should Apple bite the big one and take with it the remaining market for PowerPC chips.  Besides, what are they going to do now that they can't sell Macintosh clones anymore?

And in either case, IBM doesn't have to give up the OS/2 they're selling to banks.  Microsoft didn't give up Windows NT when they licensed the source code to Citrix for their WinFrame technology...

Colin:  I think you're missing my point.  Intel has no real reason to care about OS/2.  Sure, Windows 95's dismal 32-bit performance caused them a setback with the Pentium Pro chips, but I'd be willing to bet that they're quite happy with the sales of their chips and the profits they're making.  Selling more copies of OS/2 wouldn't increase the number of chips they'd sell, it would only increase the number of those CPU's which would run OS/2.

OS/2 PPC is incomplete at best.  Right now Motorola is probably a little uneasy, but don't look for them to care about OS/2.  If Motorola were considering something like you describe, I would look for them to do it with Apple (with Rhapsody, not MacOS) or with Be.

Simply put, the benefits you see from licensing OS/2 are nowhere near the negatives.  The best option is for IBM to get its act together.  IBM is the only company which can recognize the benefits of spending hundreds of millions a year on OS/2 and it just happens to be the company which currently owns and markets (OK, so this is debatable) it.  No one else has any reason to care, except of course OS/2 users.

Chris:  This is pretty much, why I think OS/2 should be set free.  I'd love IBM to do just as you say -- oh boy, I'd think we were invincible then -- but I'm not convinced they'll do this and I'm tired of waiting to be proved wrong.

Colin:  I think that most people who want to see IBM sell/license/spin off OS/2 want this because they're frustrated with not seeing IBM do things right.  The problem, and the thing people forget, is that no one else has a good reason to, "do things right."  Only IBM has good reasons to care.

               - * -

Want to join in our debate?  (feedback@os2ezine.com) Send us your suggestions and opinions, and stay tuned to future issues of OS/2 e-Zine! for more debates on issues close to OS/2 users hearts.

(http://www.spectra.net/~fox/) Chris Wenham is a freelance web designer, writer and Englishman who now lives in Endicott, NY.  In the past he has written comedy, sci-fi, Pascal, Rexx, HTML and Gibberish.  He has been using OS/2 exclusively for the past 2 years.

(http://www.ionet.net/~colin/) Colin Hildinger is an Aerospace Engineering senior at (http://www.okstate.edu/) Oklahoma State University and has been using OS/2 for the last 3 years.  In addition to being the Games Editor for OS/2 e-Zine!, he maintains (http://www.ionet.net/~colin/games.html) The Ultimate OS/2 Gaming Page and the (http://www.ionet.net/~colin/awe32.html) AWE32 and OS/2 Page in his "spare" time.

***********************************

September's Top Selling Apps from Indelible Blue

Note: This list represents only the monthly sales figures of Indelible Blue, Inc.  Please read our disclaimer for more information.


This	Last	Product			Developer
Month	Month
	
1	9	IBM AntiVirus		IBM
2	8	OS/2 Essentials		Stardock Systems
3	1	BackMaster		MSR Development
4	1	VisualAge Java Pro	IBM
5	4	FaxWorks Pro v3		Keller Group Inc.
6	15	Escape GL		Snowstorm Software
7	2	BackAgain/2 Pro		Computer Data Strategies
8	13	Process Commander		Stardock Systems
9 (tie)	7	Hobbes CD-ROM		Walnut Creek
9 (tie)	14	Unite CD Maker		Cirrus
10	6	Partition Magic		PowerQuest
11	--	DeScribe Voyager Plus	DeScribe
12 (tie)	5	GammaTech Utilities	SofTouch Systems
12 (tie)	7	Performance Plus		Clear & Simple
13	--	Remote Services Mgmt.	International Software Sols.
14	12	QuickMotion		Practice Corp.
15 (tie)	--	Seagate Backup		Seagate
15 (tie)	--	ARCsolo			Cheyenne Software

               - * -

Compiled by (http://www.indelible-blue.com/) Indelible Blue, Inc. - Your Single Source for OS/2 Solutions.

***********************************

September's Top Selling Apps from J3

Note: This list represents only the monthly sales figures of J3 Computer Technologies.  Please read our disclaimer for more information.


This	Last	Product				Developer
Month	Month

1	--	ColorWorks V2			SPG
2	1	VisualAge for Java Professional	IBM
3	4	IBM Antivirus Desktop Edition	IBM
4	--	SmartSuite 96 Upgrade		Lotus
5	--	MD+F Vol. 1			Modular Dreams, Inc.
6	9	MD+F WebAK			Modular Dreams, Inc.
7	8	FaxWorks Pro v3 UG		Keller Group Inc.
8	--	DeskMan/2			DevTech
9	--	Unite CD-Maker			Cirrus Technologies
10	3	Book: Getting to Know OS/2 Warp 4	

               - * -

Compiled by (http://www.os2store.com/) J3 Computer Technologies - Serving the Global OS/2 Community, large and small!

***********************************

September's Top Selling Apps from BMT Micro

Note: This list represents only the monthly registration figures of BMT Micro, Inc.  Please read our disclaimer for more information.


This	Last	Product			Developer
Month	Month

1	2	InJoy			F/X Communications
2	3	PMView			Peter Nielsen
3	1	PMMail			SouthSide Software
4	8	ZOC			EmTec Innovative Software
5	10	iLink/2			BMT Micro
6	--	CandyBarZ		PsychoSemantic Software
7	--	Inet.Mail		Hethmon Brothers
8	--	FC/2			Brian Havard
9	4	SIO			The Software Division
10	--	ScreenSaver		Siegfried Hanish

               - * -

This list is compiled by (http://www.bmtmicro.com/) BMT Micro -- Your Source for Over 100 Quality Shareware Applications.

***********************************

Top Sellers Lists Disclaimer

-----

Our "top sellers lists" represent sales figures compiled for OS/2 e-Zine! by BMT Micro, Inc., Indelible Blue, Inc. and J3 Computer Technologies.  Falcon Networking does not verify these lists and makes no guarantee of their authenticity.  All inquiries regarding products appearing or not appearing on these lists should be directed to the relevant retailer.

The publication of these lists is not meant to indicate an endorsement by Falcon Networking of any of these companies or of the products featured on the lists.

Readers should note that the rankings indicated in each of these lists represent only the sales of each individual retailer.  They do not, necessarily, represent sales across the entire OS/2 industry.

There are many different sales channels in the OS/2 industry and different software vendors rely heavily on some while other vendors rely more heavily on others.  Also, not all retailers carry all existing OS/2 products.  Readers should take these facts into consideration when interpreting the "top sellers lists".

The BMT Micro "top sellers list" represents only the top selling OS/2 shareware applications available through BMT Micro, Inc.  The BMT Micro CD is excluded from the figures to avoid distorting the results.

The Indelible Blue "top sellers list" represents only the top selling OS/2 applications sold by Indelible Blue, Inc.  OS/2 Warp and OS/2 Warp Connect are not included in these rankings.

The J3 Computer Technologies "top sellers list" represents only the top selling OS/2 applications sold by J3 Computer Technologies.

***********************************

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***********************************

Corporate Sponsors

(http://www.bmtmicro.com/) BMT Micro
Your complete source for over 175 of the best OS/2 shareware applications available.  Drop by today and check out our WWW catalog or download the .INF version.

(http://www.fx.dk/) F/X Communications
Home of the top selling (http://www.fx.dk/injoy/) InJoy dialer, ranked #1 in worldwide OS/2 shareware sales (Jan-97).

(http://www.indelible-blue.com/) Indelible Blue
Indelible Blue, a mail order company, provides OS/2 software and hardware solutions to customers worldwide.

(http://www.kellergroup.com/) Keller Group Inc.
Developers of FaxWorks for OS/2 and PMfax, the fax and voice solution for OS/2, with versions for stand-alone, LAN and Internet Faxing.

(http://www.mensys.nl/indexuk.html) Mensys
The one place to go in Europe for all OS/2 Warp software.

(http://www.pcs-soft.com/) Perez Computing Services
Defend against desktop freezes with Ctrl-Alt-Del Commander and create online documents/help with the IPF Editor.

(http://www.prioritymaster.com/) ScheduPerformance, Inc.
Dramatically improve performance on your OS/2 system now with the patented priority scanning logic and visual priority identification of Priority Master II.

(http://www.softouch.com/) SofTouch Systems, Inc.
Home of the bestselling set of disk and desktop maintenance products for 
OS/2: GammaTech Utilities, UniMaint, and FileStar/2!  ---- Your System's Safe and Sound with SofTouch Around

(http://www.stardock.com/) Stardock Systems
Providing quality software for the home and office.

(http://www.sundialsystems.com/) Sundial Systems Corporation
Productivity applications:  Relish - time management; Mesa 2 - spreadsheet; Clearlook - word processor; DBExpert - database.

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Copyright 1997   -   Falcon Networking
ISSN 1203-5696