FIDONEWS -- 12 Aug 85 00:01:50 Page 1 Volume 2, Number 26 12 August 1985 +----------------------------------------------------------+ | _ | | / \ | | - FidoNews - /|oo \ | | (_| /_) | | Fido and FidoNet _`@/_ \ _ | | Users Group | | \ \\ | | Newsletter | (*) | \ )) | | ______ |__U__| / \// | | / FIDO \ _//|| _\ / | | (________) (_/(_|(____/ | | (jm) | +----------------------------------------------------------+ Publisher: Fido 107/7 Chief Procrastinator: Thom Henderson Fidonews is published weekly by SEAboard, Fido 107/7. You are encouraged to submit articles for publication in Fidonews. Article submission standards are contained in the file FIDONEWS.DOC, available from Fido 107/7. Disclaimer or don't-blame-us: The contents of the articles contained here are not our responsibility, nor do we necessarily agree with them; everything here is subject to debate. We publish EVERYTHING received. The Dog Barks in Washington We may be getting some power soon. I'm hearing rumors that a "FidoPAC" is in its first stages of birth. For those of you who are unfamiliar with politics (as I pretty much am myself), a PAC is a Political Action Committee. I gather that they lobby for specific issues, make campaign contributions, and so forth. With this in mind, a FidoPAC sounds like a pretty good idea. It's sure as taxes (literally) that the guys in Washigton are going to be passing laws which affect us. It's only common sense that we should try to provide our input into that lawmaking process. There's a small catch, though. Anything like this takes both manpower and money; mainly money. Now don't scream, we're not talking hugh amounts. True, an effective PAC needs a fair sized war chest, but divided out among us all it shouldn't be that much. And no, this is not an appeal for money. I just want to get FIDONEWS -- 12 Aug 85 00:01:53 Page 2 you used to the idea. Whenever things start moving on this I'm sure you'll hear about it. So start thinking about it now, and be ready to unlimber your checkbook when the time comes. The real question, of course, is how effective anything like this can be. I think it can be pretty powerful; especially if backed up by a strong show of support from the user community. This, too, may get easier. We are all of us so used to keying in our messages on boards or on the net that it becomes a real nuisance to have to actually print something out and put a stamp on it. But I'm also told that a Senator may soon be setting up a Fido of his own. This means you could express your support merely by entering a message as usual. In fact, if we ever do get any politicos on the net I'd suggest that all sysops donate phone charges by setting the message cost to zero. I know I'm horrible about writing letters, but pretty good about sending netmail. I'm sure many or most of you are the same way. I'd so much like to get a congresscritter on the net that I'd donate a copy of our mail system to them if they'd promise to use it. So things may start happening soon. Someone somewhere found an organizer for this sort of thing, which is what we need the most right now. Just be ready to do your part once the ball starts rolling. FIDONEWS -- 12 Aug 85 00:01:54 Page 3 ============================================================ NEWS ============================================================ From: David Horowitz (Fido 107/2) More on software piracy... Yes, yet another person has decided to put there two cents into this issue. Now before you Control-C, lets just set a few facts straight... Software piracy is STEALING! Yes, a crime. Now as far as I know no one has gone to jail yet, but it is no less a crime than walking out of your office with a typewriter. If you walked into your local department store with the intent of purchasing a TV. Color, 25", stereo, and cable ready. You ask the salesman "how much?". Common question, right? He says, "Eleven Hundred Forty Nine Fifty". You say, "Are you crazy?". We all know that a state of the art TV is expensive, but we don't steal it because we can't afford it, now do we? Now, a little more on why software costs what it does... Let's take a look at what it might cost to develop a program. Since Lotus is the hot issue on price, and they probably have spent more than most, we will use it. Now I do not know exactly what things cost, but I hope these are fair estimates. Initial Idea. The cost is time. Now time can not be measured in dollars per say, but what about the fact that while you are thinking about it you are not earning any- thing. Now I know that the inventor of Lotus 123 got the idea in college. He wrote a marketing paper on it. Got a "B" on it too, why? He professor said that the paper was good but would not sell. And that the author did not do enough marketing research. Now that's a laugh. Development. How long? For a program like lotus I would have to say one year at a minimum. Now here come the megabucks... A staff of programmers. Making $30,000+ a year. So, to be fair lets say 6 programmers. That's $180,000. Now you can't just let 6 programmers do what they want, you need managers. Systems Analysts, or what ever you want to call them. They earn more. So, two at $45,000. Another $90,000. Ok now you have spent $270,000. You need to test the product, and then debug it. You need to hire testers. Now Lotus 123 was thought to be used by financial experts. They would have to test it. They earn on the order of $25,000 - $30,000 a year. So, two for two months, that's $9,000. Now, they are sure to find bugs. Another three months of FIDONEWS -- 12 Aug 85 00:01:56 Page 4 work easy. Buy now you might have put some of the man power on another project, so 2 programmers, and one manager for two months... $17,500. Now lets just total up to see what it might cost to develop Lotus 123. Now remember at this point the inventor has no guarantee that the product will ever sell, and in fact only received a 'B' on his paper, because a supposed marketing expert said it would not ever sell... $296,500. Nearly Three hundred thousand dollars! And not one penny in return. A substantial risk, I don't think there can be any argument here. Now as already stated, your investment is just beginning. You have to market your product. Now I can not even begin to imagine how much money went to promote 123. I remember prime time TV adds. They cost a bundle! So, lets pick a number that no one would argue over. Another $500,000. Remember full page magazine adds cost too. And Lotus went on an advertizing blitz for a while. Ok, So, Lotus Development spent nearly one millon dollars to develop this program. They put a price of $500.00 on it, how many copies did they have to sell to break even. 2,000 copies. Now I think you might even agree that my estimates on development are quite fair, and I did not include packaging! True Lotus sold more than 2,000 copies, but could you guarantee this, would YOU put up the millon dollars? I think the profits they are making are very fair, it is the American Dream! ------------------------------------------------------------ FIDONEWS -- 12 Aug 85 00:01:58 Page 5 (excerpted from: The Generic Adventure Game System (tm) manual, Copyright 1985 by Mark J. Welch; used with permission.) ---------------------------------- A Short History of Adventure Games ---------------------------------- by Mark J. Welch (125 Bay St., #5, San Francisco, CA 94133) 415-982-4591 (voice) 415-391-9148 (data: WelchNet, Fido 10/459) You probably realize that there is a whole class or genre of computer games called "adventure games." The genre, of course, was itself based on role-playing games, particularly Dungeons and Dragons, a game developed in 1974 by Gary Gygax, who formed TSR. The grandfather of all adventure games was called simply "ADVENTURE," and took place in "Collossal Cave." It was written by Will Crowther and Don Woods on a DEC PDP-10 in FORTRAN. To win the game, one had to capture a bird, dispose of a nasty snake, avoid a dwarf's pointy knives, and figure out what toll a troll wanted to cross a bridge, among many other hazards; the rewards were many but usually had to be sacrificed in order to obtain some other goal. The game was quite successful -- partly because it was virtually the only game available and partly because it was free -- and was quickly copied onto many large timesharing systems at universities and companies. Many hours were spent translating the game so it could run on many mainframes and microcomputers. Other programmers wrote extensions into the game, adding new rooms, hazards, and treasures. There are now two popular versions: very few people ever solve the entire original 350- or 375-point Adventure, although a few have even conquered the 550-point extended version. While some programmers were satisfied by solving, translating, or adding to the original Adventure, others saw an opportunity for new games, on microcomputers as well as mainframes. Some -- like Scott Adams at Adventure International -- chose to add graphics to their adventures. Some had very limited vocabularies and tight, simple grammers like the original adventure: you could "EAT BIRD" or "ATTACK TROLL," nothing more complex. Other programmers sought more natural language and more powerful and complex features: Infocom's Zork trilogy -- a variant on the original Adventure -- and that company's many follow-up text adventures (they, and others, accurately call their works "interactive fiction") use a complex vocabulary and permit very long and complex sentences. FIDONEWS -- 12 Aug 85 00:02:00 Page 6 On the earliest microcomputers -- like the S-100 machines, the TRS-80 Model I and the Apple II -- adventure games were the first programs to be made available because they used only text and were written in standard languages, usually BASIC, and were thus easiest to translate. Several efforts have been made to write "adventure game generators," programs which would ask for input detailing the arrangement of an adventure and then generate a BASIC program for the scenario. Unfortunately, these generators too often were not complex enough to generate powerful adventures, or were too complex to use for someone who didn't want to learn a programming language in the first place. -------------- Enter G.A.G.S. -------------- The Generic Adventure Game System* was written in an effort to make writing an adventure game as simple as possible, while still permitting a great deal of flexibility. It *cannot* be used to write an adventure game with as many complex features as Infocom's. To do so would require developing a complete adventure game programming language, as Infocom has done, and would require adventure- game writers to learn a very complex set of rules. [Note: developing ANY playable, enjoyable adventure game takes time. You need to set up a map, and then type in the valid movements from room to room and the full text descriptions for each room, noun, and creature. While using G.A.G.S. is far less complex than writing an adventure game from scratch in Pascal or any other language, it will still take you many hours to write a game using G.A.G.S.] There are two clear advantages to the Generic Adventure Game System (G.A.G.S.). First, G.A.G.S. uses a standard- format ASCII text file for its data, and the adventure game can be modified simply by editing the data file with any text editor. Debugging the game involves playing it: as problems are discovered, the text file can be edited and the game re-played. Once a basic game is developed, it can be extended by adding new rooms or special features (much the same way Adventure was enhanced). Second, G.A.G.S. is infinitely expandable because the complete Turbo Pascal* source code is available. If you decide that another verb should be available, you can add it. If you think the parser is too simple, you can try to patch it -- or completely re-write it. By modifying the source code, you can add new features to the game which aren't available in the basic system. (Of course, modifying the source code could lead to week-long debugging sessions while you try to figure out why this particular procedure is infinitely recursive or why the disk is reformatted whenever you try to move east.) The GAGS manual explains how the source code was written and why, and suggests a number of FIDONEWS -- 12 Aug 85 00:02:02 Page 7 modifications that can be made. ------------------- How to Get G.A.G.S. ------------------- The Generic Adventure Game System (G.A.G.S.) is currently in beta-test. Version 1.0 will be available on September 1, 1985, and will be distributed as "Shareware" (or "User-Supported Software"). Users may freely copy and share the program, but are asked to become registered users by sending $15 to the author, thus encouraging the author to release updates and new software as Shareware -- as well as obtaining limited techincal telephone support. Copies of G.A.G.S. will be sent to many users' groups and computer bulletin-board systems. The complete G.A.G.S. disk will also be available for $10 from the author. (California residents must add appropriate sales tax.) The complete source code to G.A.G.S. will be available to registered users for $25. G.A.G.S. requires a 8088- or 8086-based computer, MS- DOS 2.1 and 256K bytes of memory. It is available from the author only on 5-1/4-inch disks. --------------- Further Reading --------------- Several books are available on writing your own adventure game: Tim Hartnell, "Creating Adventure Games on Your Home Computer" (in Microsoft BASIC), Ballantine/Random House, 1984. Richard C. Vile, Jr., "Programming your own Adventure Games in (UCSD) Pascal," TAB Books, 1984. Frank DaCosta, "Writing BASIC Adventure Programs for the TRS-80" (Model I/III/IV), TAB Books, 1982. Another adventure-game generator program is available for free. Pete Levy has posted a copy of the "Levy Adventure Development System" (LADS) on the Games SIG on CompuServe (GO GAM-310). It's written in BASIC for the TRS-80 Model I and III. ---------------- * "Generic Adventure Game System" and "G.A.G.S." are trademarks of Mark J. Welch. "Turbo Pascal" is a trademark of Borland International. "MS-DOS" is a trademark of Microsoft. FIDONEWS -- 12 Aug 85 00:02:04 Page 8 Mark J. Welch, 125 Bay St., #5, San Francisco, CA 94133 415-982-4591 (voice) 415-391-9148 (data: WelchNet, Fido 10/459) ------------------------------------------------------------ FIDONEWS -- 12 Aug 85 00:02:04 Page 9 Update on ROVER (a Fido Clone) Bob Hartman Sysop 101/101 The UN*X Gateway This is an update to an article published in the FIDONEWS about a month ago. In that article I stated that I was working on a Fido clone, and was starting with the message area. Well, the message area is now complete, and can be used from the console just like Fido in test mode. The current version is now called ROVERMSG instead of ROVER. This is because the full emulation system is going to be called ROVER, but I could see no reason why I should not continue to have the message base be a standalone program. Anyway, for those of you who have been using ROVER, the current version is 1.6 (August 8, 1985), please call my board and download the latest version. Thanks to all of you who have helped in the debugging process. Now on to more specifics. ROVERMSG now is a more or less full emulation of the Fido message system. The only differences have to do with parsing of input at certain points. Since the ROVERMSG parser is very small and simple, it cannot do some of the things that Fido does. The differences are minimal, and probably will not be noticed by 99% of its users. The good news is that I have added some functionality where it was needed most. I allow command line arguments to be set in an environment variable so that a long command line does not have to be typed each time the program is run. I also allow the user to use his favorite editor to edit messages, rather than the simple Fido line editor (although that also exists in ROVERMSG). Basically, at this point ROVERMSG is finished and I am working on the rest of ROVER. Work on the rest of ROVER is also proceeding smoothly. Currently all of the menus can be reached, but most of the options do nothing yet. Also, there is no support for using the COM ports. I am very interested in hearing from people that have public domain code for all of the different file transfer protocols for the file area. If anyone could send me the code for XMODEM, YMODEM, MODEM7, KERMIT, TELINK, etc. I would really appreciate it. Please, if you FidoNet it to me, try to make the name of the file something original (I would hate to have one person's XMODEM.C get overwritten by another). I am particularly interested in code that is written in C, but I will take ASM or PASCAL also. Finally, anyone interested in beta-testing the full-blown ROVER from the console (use it like in test mode FIDONEWS -- 12 Aug 85 00:02:06 Page 10 and see if it does what you expect), please contact me. The beta-testers for ROVERMSG have done a GREAT job, and if any of you would like to continue testing ROVER, just let me know. ------------------------------------------------------------ FIDONEWS -- 12 Aug 85 00:02:07 Page 11 Sam was your average 15 year old American teenager, except for one thing, he had a computer and a nack to get into things he wasn't supposed to get into. He would charge his peers to get into the schools computer and change grades. $10 for a D, $15 for a C, $20 for a B, $25 for an A and $100 a shot for credit changes. He did have on policy though, he would not look at someones grades unless he was paid for it and said they wanted it changed. One day sam went to far! He dropped the credir rating of his english teacher because she flunked him on purpose becasue he wasn't one of her favorites. After he did this he swithed his grade and went to bed. The next morning he heard the front door bell. "OPEN UP it's the FBI" came a demanding voice. "oh well" sighed sam "they got me" He opend the door to find his best friend standing in the doorway. "Whatcha trying to do?" yelled Sam "give me a heartatack!?!" "nahhhh" replied Bob "Just came over to tell you that my mom said out English 1 teacher was in the store and couldn't buy a dress because her credit ratings had been slashed" bob continued "hmmmmm wonder who could have done that?" Sam replied stupidly "When are you gonna give this crap up?!?" asked Bob "In time" sighed Sam "in time" "I just hope the she doesn't put 1 and 1 together and get Sam Sulivan!" stated Bob "She won't! she has no more brains that a donkey!"said Sam hotly "Maybe, but I wouldn't be to sure." Bob said solemly Sure enough that afternoon the password to the banks computer didn't work and the five O'clock news a small blurb about the fact that the banks computer had been broken into. Sam wolfed down his dinner and ran to Bob's house and asked what he sould do. "Welllllll" said Bob " lay off for awhile, let things blow over." Sam did this for about two weeks but ended up getting back into it. A student at his school heard about his service and paid him $50 to change two grades from B's to A's. Well as you can guess Sam was caught. At 18 the only thing he does with his computer is his homework and programing. He does no more hacking. He wishes that he would have never started but now it is to late. Now in his spare time he tries to explain to young hackers what their FIDONEWS -- 12 Aug 85 00:02:09 Page 12 doing might be fun, but it is dangerous and there are high risks. This story isn't true but it has probably happened a hundred times all ready. If you know of someone doing this please stop them now, and explain to them what they are doing to to the future of telecommunicating. Mike Ringer 437/117 soon to be the sysop of Ollie's board 300/1200 ------------------------------------------------------------ FIDONEWS -- 12 Aug 85 00:02:09 Page 13 Some observations on long distance phone services Those of you who actually read the nodelist distribu- tions may have noticed that the phone number for the Wash- A-RUG FIDO (109/483) was recently changed to (703) 359-6549. The reasons behind the change may cause you to think twice before chosing an alternative long distance service. The both phone lines are provided by Hadron Inc. (they pay for my computer habits). The original line went through the office PBX system (no big deal) and was working fine. At least that is what I thought, until I saw the first phone bill. Our PBX make use of a computerized call routing scheme. In theory, it will select the lowest cost carrier for all long distance calls. It also seems that the service used for all calls west of the Mississippi is SBS. Again it would appear to be no big deal. FIDO bundles up the mes- sages to save time and money, and the routing optimization further reduces the costs. Right? Well, that was what I thought. Seems that "Murphy" (never forget him!) was out to prove otherwise. For a few nights last month, FIDO 109/483 was unable to connect to FIDO 100/22 to deliver a file. No big deal, FIDONET tries to connect 20 times and then gives up till the next night. All told, total of 40 attempts over 2 night, with only one connect that lasted 45 seconds. No big deal. WRONG! Seems that SBS is unable to differentiate a call that completes from a call that does not connect. That means 40 calls at $0.30 each! If you extend that over a month or so, you can see that the nonconnecting calls can wind up being more expensive than the one that get through. So, I got another phone line for Wash-A-RUG. It is an external AT&T long-line, with no call optimization to muddy the waters. As a side benefit, the new line has consider- ably less noise on it. The old number still answers, although the amount of noise introduced by the call forward- ing is horrendous. The moral to the story? Check out your alternative long distance services carefully. And NEVER forget that Murphy is out there, lurking in the shadows, just waiting to prove "If anything can go wrong, it will" SYSOP - 109/483 (Wash-A-RUG) - 109/74 (The Bear's Den) ------------------------------------------------------------ FIDONEWS -- 12 Aug 85 00:02:11 Page 14 For those of you that use [*shudder*] Wordstar on your PCs, here are a few suggestions having to do with editing and printing Fido-format documents (those following the standard format of Fidonews and the various manuals). This comes as a result of my trials and tribulations experienced in downloading and printing the entire to-date library of Fidonews and the Fido manual... and my attempts to gather them into an easily handled format - loose leaf binders. I don't know how the format that Fidonews (and manuals) use was arrived at, but I assume that it was in order to be able to quickly use the DOS "TYPE" command to scan or print. Indeed, this works out rather well, except for two things that can't be done easily : format the page so that the punch holes don't chew up words, and print using printer control commands like doublestrike, LQ mode, etc. The following was arrived at using Wordstar vers. 3.3 and an Epson FX-80 printer. It allows me to print documents on continuous feed paper and leave room on the left for punch holes. Start Wordstar and call in the document to edit it. Make sure your cursor is at the beginning of file, usually on the "F" in the word Fidonews on page one (if that's what you're working with). Now put in any print-control commands you might want. Next set your margins. I use left= column 5 , right= column 85. It's important to maintain the 80 column difference between the two... you might want to set each one proportionally higher or lower depending on how much room you want to leave on the left... I would think, though that with the left at more than 10 you'd start to lose text off the right side of the page. Now just do a ^QQB to start continuous paragraph reformatting, and hit the number 1 after it starts to speed it up. When it gets to the end of the file, hit the space bar to stop, and save it with ^KD... you can even be doing all this while you're printing the last one - but don't set the reformat speed faster than 5 or so, or the printer slows down. - Larry DiGioia 13/384 FIDONEWS -- 12 Aug 85 00:02:13 Page 15 ============================================================ FOR SALE ============================================================ CopyX is now available CopyX.com is a comprehensive, user friendly Fido maintenance utility featuring pop-up windows, designed to reduce the amount of time required to maintain files.bbs The COPY function employed within the program allow files to be moved from one disk. or subdirectory to another with overwrite protection. This is nothing special about this, but what makes CopyX.com special is that it allow you to enter the file description and after the file is copied it appends files.bbs with the file name and description. Then prompts you to delete to original. For example to copy a file from your upload area to your sysop area you would: 1-enter file name >copyxdmo.com 2-give the file path >b:\bbs\sysop 3-describe f >Demo of CopyX the ultimate sysop utility 4-delete original >y That's it, the file is now in the sysop area, the files.bbs listing has been updated, and the original has been removed. Time required 30 - 45 sec. Not bad ah ? When using the file compare function, CopyX will read through files.bbs and compare it to the directory listing if it finds any `missing' files it prompts you to remove the line from files.bbs (y/n) . If files are found in the directory that are not in files.bbs you can add them by pressing a single key, then entering the description. Other options are skipping the file or deleting it from the directory. To round out the package a separate function allow you to scroll through files.bbs a line at a time, deleting files (and description) or adding/changing there description as you go. Additional supporting functions include displaying the directory, listing files.bbs (or any other text file) and changing drives. CopyX is currently being distributed in two versions. The first CopyXdmo is a demonstration version in which users are encouraged to distribute freely to their friends and other bbs operators. I hope that it will be available on all the major fido BBSs. The demo version is identical to the real version except that it will not save data to files.bbs. This program can save you hours of work. If you value your time at more then $ .50 per hour, you need this program. To order send $25.00 to the address listed below. FIDONEWS -- 12 Aug 85 00:02:15 Page 16 Send Fidonet mail to 19/439 or US Mail Robert Graham 1004 Cooper SQ Circle #267; Arlington Tx 76013 FIDONEWS -- 12 Aug 85 00:02:15 Page 17 ============================================================ NOTICES ============================================================ It is with great sorrow that we must announce the death of Andrew Fluegelman. We have almost no details at this time, except for confirmation of his death, apparently by suicide. We had hoped to get someone closer to the scene to provide some details, and we tried to find someone who knew him to write a proper obituary, but as yet we have failed. We never knew Mr. Fluegelman, or even very much about him. We do know that he has exerted a profound influence on the personal computer marketplace. He is probably best known as the author of PC-Talk, which is probably the single most popular communications program for the IBM-PC. But he is also the first person to distribute a major program using the freeware concept. In fact, the very term "Freeware" is a trademark of The Headlands Press, the company he founded. Personal computer users everywhere owe a debt of gratitude to Andrew Fluegelman, and he will be sorely missed. ------------------------------------------------------------ The Interrupt Stack 27 Nov 1985 Halley's Comet passes closest to Earth before perihelion. 24 Jan 1986 Voyager 2 passes Uranus. 9 Feb 1986 Halley's Comet reaches perihelion. 11 Apr 1986 Halley's Comet reaches perigee. 19 May 1986 Steve Lemke's next birthday. 24 Aug 1989 Voyager 2 passes Neptune. If you have something which you would like to see on this calendar, please send a message to Fido 107/7.