Second Quarter, 1994


·· NOTICE - PLEASE READ ··

This is our largest newsletter to date and printing the entire newsletter will require at least 25 pages. We encourage everyone to save a few trees and landfill space by reading the edition on your Macs and only printing out the minimal number of pages. If you must print, choose Print... from the file menu and a dialog box will allow you to print specific chapters.

We are strongly considering going paperless by publishing only non-printable versions of future newsletters. To make it easier to read on a screen, we will increase the type size to 14 point Times (this paragraph and the previous paragraph). By going to a non-printable version, we will be able to publish longer and better articles, make better use of color, photographs, and allow Mac users to lead the way to paperless publishing. A printable version may also be available upon request and/or stored on our network BBS; such a version will minimize pages. Your comments, questions, and suggestions are strongly solicited and appreciated. Please reply via Email to ASACMUG. Please DO NOT USE THE REPLY ALL BUTTON.

This newsletter is divided into chapters, with each chapter divided into sections. To scroll up or down sections, use the scroll bar to the right or use the up/down arrow keys. To move between chapters, use the scroll bar at the bottom, the left/right arrow keys, the Contents menu above, or click on the hand at the bottom of each chapter. If you have a small screen, click on the zoom box on the upper right. Clicking on the close box on the upper left will quit this program.

This newsletter primarily focuses on the introduction of the Power Macintosh, Apple's latest line of Macs that offer a tremendous increase in performance and compatibility while being price competitive with IBM-compatibles. We also include a review of Claris' MacWrite Pro word processor (from a former Microsoft Word user), plus the latest user group discounts, events, and news from the Macintosh world.

Enjoy and have fun!

Alex Morando
Newsletter Editor 


Table of Contents

President's Column
Mike Quan

Is it May Already?

Even though it will be a little into May by the time you receive this newsletter, believe me, it is officially the March/April edition. We had a couple more items to include so it was delayed a few days. One of the items is the special offerings from Apple exclusively for user's groups. In addition, we're trying out a new, self-contained format for the newsletter; to switch between chapters, you select them from a pull down menu or use the left/right arrow keys. Let us know how you like it by addressing responses to ASACMUG. Again, DO NOT USE "REPLY ALL" or else you'll be sending mail to everyone on the mailing list.

Special Discounts for MUG Members

Many companies including Apple offer discounts for user group members on refurbished equipment. It is planned to pass along more information on these offers to members after being closely screened to limit communications to only better than average deals. Apple refurbished equipment ranges from to good to excellent deals depending upon your local market. Check out the deals and get your order in if you find something you want. Order forms are available on the ASACMUG BBS, or if you email ASACMUG, we'll be happy to send you a form and information. I'm particularly impressed with the deal on the Centris 610, since it is a good machine today, but can be upgraded to a 40 MHz PowerMac for less than $700 with an Apple PDS card or to a full blown PowerMac 6100/50 (8 mbs memory) with a full motherboard exchange for less than $1000. If you'd like additional information/opinions on a purchase, just email ASACMUG.

A New Era for the Macintosh

On March 15 of this year, the Macintosh began a transition to a new processor family called PowerPC, based upon a RISC processor architecture. The new processor is based upon the processor used in the IBM RS-6000 workstations and offers the promise of a 3-10 times improvement in performance at a much lower price than the original 680x0 processors used since the original Mac in 1984. During it's first month of sales, Apple claims to have sold about 145,000 PowerMacs making the new machines the fastest initial sellers in Apple's history. The PowerPC processor used in the Macs is also being used in IBM's low end workstations and will be used in a new generation of IBM PCs due to be released later this year.

The PowerPC processor is a joint development between Apple, IBM, and Motorola and is the most serious threat to the Intel dominance of desktop computers since IBM introduced its first PC. Intel has the advantage of inertia, with over 80% of desktop computers using the Intel architecture. In addition, the very successful DOS/Windows operating system is closely tied to the Intel hardware. Although it is possible to run DOS/Windows on other hardware platforms under emulation, this requires a significant penalty in performance. The PowerPC has, however, the advantage of lower costs with equal performance compared to the Pentium, the current flagship of the Intel line. The first generation of PowerPC are based on the 601 and 603 chips. Current Power Macs use the 601 chip, with cheaper and faster models (including PowerBooks) due later this year.

The next generation PowerPC, based on the 604 chip, has already begun preliminary shipments to major customers (such as Apple). Systems based on the PowerPC 604, due early next year, will exceed the best Pentium performance by 50-100% (native mode) which will also allow it to run DOS/Windows application at Pentium speeds in emulation mode. This means that a potential Windows user, buying a high end machine, may face the dilemma of finding the Mac the better Windows platform (i.e. equal performance at a lower price) plus offer superior performance when running native Mac applications. If Windows NT ever catches on, the choice is even more clear since NT may run native (i.e. much faster) on a PowerPC at a lower cost.

Okay, Okay, I bought a PowerMac!

I've been impatiently waiting to upgrade my Mac for over a year. I bought my Mac II about six years ago, so I've waited a long time. I admit, I made several upgrades including memory, floppy disk drive, and a Daystar 40 mhz 68030 accelerator. The old Mac operated at about Mac IIfx speeds, but ever before I got a Centris 650 at work, I wanted to upgrade. I decided however to wait for a PowerMac (which has been difficult). I got a great deal on a 16" Apple monitor last December but discovered that it would not work on my Mac II without a new video card costing several hundred dollars. Support for monitors up to 17" is standard on the PowerMacs, so I didn't want to buy a card I would not need in just a few months.

Well, when the new Macs were introduced, I waited a little over month to study the machines, read reviews, and analyze trouble reports before buying. I concluded that the PowerMacs were very compatible with existing Mac software and that Apple had done a good job making the transition as seamless as possible. About 10 days ago, I took the plunge and bought the mid-range PowerMac 7100 (looks like a Quadra 650) with 8 mb or memory, 250 Mb hard disk, and an internal CD ROM. The 16" color monitor worked perfectly, and I even used an old Nubus video card to drive a second monitor from my old Mac II. (Don't worry, the old Mac was not discarded, but quickly claimed by my wife for her classroom projects and general use).

I plan to write a full article on the PowerMac next newsletter but here's a quick look of how things are right now. First, I have had almost no problems with compatibility running my existing applications and extensions under emulation. The only problems have been applications that require a floating point processor (FPU) such as MathCAD (I'll have to use the non-FPU version which comes with the program) and an old copy of Fastback II. Switching between emulation and non-emulation modes is handled automatically, the Mac determines whether the code requires emulation or not, and switches to the appropriate mode. The switch is so transparent that the Mac can switch between emulated and native codes within the same program. The user has to do nothing and simply runs his software as if it were a regular Mac.

There is often confusion about "native" mode and running under emulation. Because the PowerMacs uses a totally different processor, the new computer cannot understand the instructions being issued by the existing base of software written for the older Motorola 680x0 processors. In order to run existing software, the PowerMac processor (PowerPC) emulates the older Mac's processor (680x0) using an emulator stored in ROM. To the software, it thinks it's running on a 680x0. This emulation requires a great deal of processing power, so the software does not run as fast as if the it was written specifically for the PowerMac. Fortunately, the PowerMacs are so powerful, that even under emulation, they run as fast as many existing Macs. Native software means that the software is specifically for the PowerMac and no emulation is needed; thus, software can run many times faster than under emulation.

[One neat thing is that any PowerMac you buy will become much faster with time, as more and more of the operating system is converted to native mode (System 7.5, 7.8, and 8.0), and as more people upgrade their existing software. - Ed.]

Applications/extensions that I've run under emulation that seem to work fine include: MacWrite Pro, Word, Excel, MacMoney, Canvas, Dreams, Filemaker Pro, PowerPoint, American On-line, Quickeys, Hands-off, BBedit, Retrospect, Disk Doubler, Norton Utilities, and my own compiled QuickBasic applications. I haven't tried all of my programs so I'll have to report on them later.

How fast is my PowerPC? That kind a depends what you're looking at. The finder is snappier than my old machine, particularly opening windows and scrolling. The emulated applications are generally about the speed of my old accelerated Mac which is about a Mac IIfx. My first native application is DeltaGraph which I was able to upgrade for only $10.00. This application screams and I'd estimate it is at least 5 times faster than my Centris 650 at work. I used to watch as the Mac would redraw a complex 3D contour plot taking many seconds. Although not instantaneous, if you blink, you'll miss it. It will probably take most of the summer for me to convert to mainly native applications, but I'm looking forward to it.

My initial recommendation is that if you have anything below a Centris 610 and need more speed, this machine would be fine to get right now. It will run your existing software at least equal to what you're used to, and with each native application upgrade, the machine will scream. If you're already using a Centris class machine, you'll want to upgrade as soon as your most-used applications are available in native versions. By the way, although I'm not currently running the Window/DOS emulator, I've seen it run and it runs almost as fast as a 486SX-25 PC. I'll have more about this next issue.

Power Macintosh Arrives!
Brian Kendig
bskendig@netcom.com

The PowerMacs are finally available in stores! I've scoured magazines (especially MacWeek) and newsgroups (especially comp.sys.powerpc) over the past few weeks to dig up all sorts of interesting tidbits of information about them, as well as about other things you might see from Apple in the future. I've tried to be as accurate here as possible, but be warned that some of this information might be completely wrong -- especially about products that haven't been released yet. Don't rely on what you read here; verify it first.

Power Macintosh excitement has really been building ever since January's MacWorld Expo [covered in the last newsletter - Ed.], where the "PowerPC -- Get a life" pins worn by the Apple employees were countered by the occasional cry of "I don't want a life, I want a PowerPC!" from the crowd.

What It Is and What It Isn't

A Power Macintosh is basically just a Mac with a very different, very fast new chip -- the PowerPC 601 -- as its brain. The PowerMacs have been designed to be 100% compatible with all other Mac hardware and software that runs on the rest of the current Mac line. (Whether or not they do turn out to be this compatible remains to be seen, but the word so far is that they do a wonderful job.) In fact, if you put a PowerMac 6100 and a Quadra 610 side-by-side and play with them for a while, you probably won't be able to tell which is which unless you peek at "About This Macintosh". The PowerMacs look the same, run System 7.1.2, and can use NuBus cards. They run 680x0 software at roughly the speed of a Quadra 610 (25MHz 040) or a Powerbook 180 (33MHz 030), although I've heard claims that their speed can range on the extremes from a IIci (25MHz 030) to a Quadra 650 (33MHz 040). You should be able to use all of your existing Macintosh hardware and software on a PowerMac at a very respectable speed without having to buy any upgrades.

The real strength of the PowerMac, however, shows when you run "native-mode" software on it -- programs that have been recompiled to take advantage of the PowerPC chip inside it. PowerMacs running native software are roughly two to four times faster than a Quadra 800. Many companies are offering inexpensive upgrades to PowerPC-native versions of their software. The PowerMacs also provide speech recognition without requiring a DSP, and a lot of the performance-critical components in the PowerMacs support direct memory access (DMA) for an extra speed boost. The mid-range and high-end models can run two monitors at once without adding any extra hardware, and all three can be purchased with the "AV option", giving them all the video capabilities of the 660AV and 840AV.

SoftWindows comes bundled in with some PowerMac configurations; it runs DOS and Windows software at speeds approximating that of a 486SX/25. However, it only emulates a very fast 80286 chip, and therefore software that requires a 386 or a 486 won't run on it. (This means you won't be able to play Doom on it, unfortunately, but X-Wing ought to work fine.) There should be a 486 version of SoftWindows ready later this year. I haven't heard yet whether or not there will ever be SoundBlaster emulation for it, but the initial version can only simulate sounds coming out of a PC's internal speaker.

The PowerMacs do not run Unix yet (except possibly for third-party Unixes that are available for other Macs right now). Taligent's object-oriented operating system, based on the PowerOpen standard, won't be available until probably 1996. A/UX will not be available for the PowerMacs. I've heard that IBM's AIX operating system is being ported to the PowerPC's, but I don't know if that includes Apple's systems or not.

The initial batch of PowerMacs aren't compliant with the current PReP specification. PReP (the "PowerPC Reference Platform") is a standardization that IBM came up with: any PC that has enough hardware to meet the requirements outlined in PReP will be able to run any operating system that is PReP-compliant. This is what will allow future IBM PowerPC's to run AIX, Windows NT, Workplace OS (OS/2), Solaris, Taligent, and other operating systems. However, PReP-compliant systems will probably not appear on the market until the end of this year. The PowerMac can currently only run Macintosh System 7.1 and emulate DOS and Windows 3.1, and future PowerMacs might or might not be designed to be PReP-compliant. The PReP specification isn't even in its final form yet -- it's scheduled to go beta in a few days, so developers couldn't conform to it even if they wanted to yet. One idea I've heard was that PReP might be modified so that this initial batch of PowerMacs are defined as "PReP-compliant", since they're the only PPC-based systems shipping right now (other than IBM's high-end PowerPC RS/6000 Unix server). We'll see what happens.

The first PowerMacs also only support NuBus, although systems to be released next year (the "TNT" systems) will probably support PCI, allowing them to use the same boards that PCI-equipped IBM PC's can use.

Another important thing to note is that, like all other Macs up to this point, the PowerMacs do not offer "preemptive multitasking" and "protected memory". They will continue to multitask cooperatively and run all applications in one memory space, and this might not change until 1996. (There's more information about this near the end of this article.)

As with any other new computer system, I would *strongly* recommend quelching any "first kid on the block" instinct you might have and waiting a while before purchasing a PowerMac. Beta-testing has proven them to be impressively stable systems, but they need some time out in the real world to shake out any problems that might be hiding behind the faceplace.

Why the weird naming scheme for the PowerMacs? Well, consider that the only other PPC-based system available right now is IBM's RS/6000 Model 250. Apple probably named their machines starting with "6100" to be one up on IBM's "6000". Go fig. :-)

Pricing and Upgrades

Here are the prices of the PowerMac systems, taken from Apple's press release. Note that these do not include a monitor or a keyboard. All prices given are in American dollars. [actual street prices are less and have fallen since this article was written - Ed.]

  MODEL  CONFIGURATION  PRICE
 6100  8/160  $1819
   8/250/CD  $2289
   8/250/CD/AV/2Mb VRAM  $2599
   16/250/SoftWindows  $2519
 7100  8/250/1Mb VRAM  $2899
   8/250/CD/1Mb VRAM  $3179
   8/500/CD/AV/2Mb VRAM  $3989
   16/250/SoftWindows/1Mb VRAM  $3379
 8100  8/250/2Mb VRAM  $4249
   8/250/CD/2Mb VRAM  $4519
   16/500/CD/AV/2Mb VRAM  $5659
   16/1000/CD/2Mb VRAM  $6159
   16/500/SoftWindows/2Mb VRAM  $5309

Here are the prices for PowerMac accessories. (I don't know if the Display Adapter is required for AudioVision displays, or for any display other than an AudioVision.)

 ACCESSORY  PRICE
 NuBus adapter card for the 6100  $ 99
 256k cache card for the 6100 and 7100  $299
 Display adapter  $ 29

Full logic board upgrades cost between $1000 and $2000 and are available for the IIvx, IIvi, Performa 600, and the Centris/Quadra 610, 650, 660AV, 800, and 840AV. These will probably give you a new faceplate (with the "PowerMac" name on it) and a new motherboard, and require you to send your old ones back to Apple. Here are the upgrade board prices (remember that each one comes with 8Mb of memory on the motherboard).

 UPGRADE ITEM  PRICE
 6100/60  $ 999
 6100/60AV, 2Mb VRAM  $1399
 7100/66, 1Mb VRAM  $1499
 7100/66AV, 2Mb VRAM  $1699
 8100/80, 2Mb VRAM, 256k cache  $1899
 8100/80AV, 2Mb VRAM, 256k cache  $1999

A PowerPC PDS slot upgrade card for 040 Macs costs $699 and will double the speed of your system -- put it into a 25MHz 040 Mac, for example, and your system will effectively run at 50MHz. However, the PDS PowerPC card does not give your system the video options and other features that the full PowerMacs have. Upgrade cards are available from Apple for 040-based Macs with a full PDS slot: the Centris/Quadra 610, 650, 700, 800, 900, 950, and the Apple Workgroup Server 60 and 80. Upgrades are planned for the Quadra 605, the LC 550, 575, and 520 and the Performa 550. There currently aren't any solid plans for upgrades from Apple for other models of Macintoshes.

Third-party companies will be offering PowerPC upgrade cards for specific Mac models, but I don't have any information on those right now.

Features and Configurations

There are three models of PowerMacs. Here is the information that applies to all three of them:

  • PowerPC 601 RISC processor, integrated math coprocessor, 32k on-chip cache,32-bit internal data path, 64-bit external data path
  • System bus is 64-bit
  • 4Mb ROM
  • DRAM SIMM slots can hold 4, 8, 16, or 32Mb RAM SIMMs (72-pin)
  • Built-in LocalTalk and Ethernet
  • SCSI, Ethernet, audio and serial ports, and other components support DMA for increased speed and simultaneous operation
  • Serial (printer and modem) ports support the GeoPort Telecom Adapter
  • 256k level 2 cache improves performance by 30% and can be purchased separately for 6100/7100, comes standard with 8100
  • "AV option" (a PDS card) can be purchased to give the system NTSC/PAL video in/out and support for up to 4Mb VRAM
  • Speech synthesis/recognition comes with AV models, can be purchased separately for other models
  • SoftWindows can be purchased for DOS/Windows emulation

Here is specific information for each model:

Power Macintosh 6100/60

  • Quadra 610 case
  • 60MHz PowerPC 601 processor
  • 8Mb RAM (expandable to 72Mb): 8Mb on the motherboard, 2 SIMM slots
  • DRAM video (does not come with a VRAM card, see below)
  • 1.4MB Apple SuperDrive; 160Mb or 250Mb HD; 5.25" empty drive bay
  • Expansion slot for 7" NuBus card or PDS card (like the Q610, needs adapter)
  • Built-in asynchronous SCSI supports up to 7 SCSI devices connected
  • Ports: 2 serial, SCSI, ADB, monitor (supports AudioVision display or standard monitor), stereo 16-bit sound input/output

Power Macintosh 7100/66

  • Quadra 650 case
  • 66MHz PowerPC 601 processor
  • 8Mb RAM (expandable to 136Mb): 8Mb on the motherboard, 4 SIMM slots
  • 1Mb VRAM (video memory), upgradable to 2Mb (see below)
  • 1.4MB Apple SuperDrive; 250Mb or 500Mb HD; 5.25" empty drive bay
  • 3 NuBus expansion slots
  • Built-in SCSI supports up to 7 SCSI devices connected
  • Ports: 2 serial, SCSI, ADB, 2 monitor (one for AudioVision display or standard monitor, one for standard monitor), stereo 16-bit sound input/output

Power Macintosh 8100/80

  • Quadra 800 case
  • 80MHz PowerPC 601 processor, 256k Level 2 memory cache
  • 8Mb RAM (expandable to 264Mb): 8Mb on the motherboard, 8 SIMM slots
  • 2MB VRAM (video memory), upgradable to 4Mb (see below)
  • 1.4Mb Apple SuperDrive; 250Mb, 500Mb, or 1Gb HD; space for 2 3.5" storage devices and one 5.25" storage device
  • 3 NuBus expansion slots
  • Built-in dual-channel SCSI: external SCSI supports up to 7 SCSI devices connected; internal SCSI supports internal devices or disk arrays
  • Ports: 2 serial, SCSI, ADB, 2 monitor (one for AudioVision display or standard monitor, one for standard monitor), stereo 16-bit sound input/output

The video options need some explaining. In its base configuration, the 6100 has no VRAM slots, meaning that you have to run video off DRAM (regular RAM) just like the IIsi did. DRAM video tends to be rather slow. The 7100 and 8100 support DRAM video as well, but each also comes with a VRAM card in its PDS slot with 1Mb/2Mb (respectively) of memory on it, upgradable to 2Mb/4Mb. This means that you can run two monitors on a 7100 or 8100 straight out of the box. If you purchase the AV card, then that goes into your PDS slot on any of the three systems (replacing the VRAM card on the 7100/8100), and gives you 2Mb VRAM (upgradable to 4Mb) and NTSC/PAL video in/out. The DRAM video port supports an AudioVision monitor (and "normal" monitors, too, I'd suspect); a VRAM or an AV card will give you a second monitor port (which supports "normal" monitors).

Here is what various amounts of video memory will support:

DRAM (using internal RAM for video):

  • up to 32,768 colors on a 14" monitor or smaller
  • up to 256 colors on a 16" monitor

1Mb VRAM:

  • up to 32,768 colors on a 16" monitor or smaller
  • up to 256 colors on a 20" monitor

2Mb VRAM:

  • up to 16.7 million colors on a 16" monitor or smaller
  • up to 32,768 colors on a 20" monitor

4Mb VRAM:

  • up to 16.7 million colors on a 20" monitor or smaller

I'll say it again: many of the details given above could be flat-out wrong. Please don't make a purchasing decision based solely on what you read here!

Future System Software

While the PowerMacs are capturing the public's attention, Apple is hard at work on many other things. Here are a few of them:

System 7.5 is due to ship this spring. There will only be one kit of it; gone will be the distinction between "System 7.1" and "System 7 Pro", and both the 68k and PPC versions of it will ship in one box. All of the elements of "System 7 Pro" and more will be rolled into System 7.5, and a new installer will only install the software that you have enough memory to run (it won't try to install Quickdraw GX on a system with only 4Mb of memory, for example). The Finder in System 7.5 will be fully AppleScriptable. The Apple Guide (formerly Apple Help) will come with System 7.5. When I saw it at MacWorld, it reminded me vaguely of the hypertext help that Windows and OS/2 provide, but the Apple Guide was organized *much* more clearly and thoroughly. Ask it how to do a task, and it will tell you the steps you need to follow. Ask it for more help, and it will circle in red magic-marker on your screen the things you need to click on. Say you need even more help and it will use AppleEvents to automatically guide you through the process.

I haven't found anything about this in print, but the Drag Manager will probably also arrive with System 7.5. It lets you select a range of text or a graphic in any window, and drag it into place in any other window or to the desktop (where it will appear as a "scrap"). I saw it at MacWorld and was duly impressed by it -- imagine the text dragging feature of Microsoft Word integrated into the system software. I've heard that it will allow dragging anything into anything else where that would make sense; for example, some applications will support having icons from the desktop dropped into their windows.

OpenDoc will probably arrive in System 7.8 later this year. OpenDoc does away with the concept of a document "belonging to" an application; you'll simply have various mini-applications that can work on different parts of your document. Your word processor will let you edit the text in your document, while your draw program lets you edit the graphics. If you want a better spell checker, then just get a better spelling checker application, and it will fit right in with the other application modules.

The Appearance Manager will probably be part of System 7.8 too. I haven't seen anything about that in print either, but according to what I've heard, it will let you customize any part of the Mac's interface to look however you want it to look. For example, imagine a Macintosh that looks just like Microsoft Windows, all the way down to the menubars in the windows. So much for Windows users being afraid of having to learn a new operating system, or for Motif users complaining they hate the Mac's interface!

QuickTime 2.0 will be released this summer. Its biggest feature is more speed: it will playback on an LC 475 in a 320x240 window at 30 frames per second, or in a 640x480 window at 15 frames per second (twice the speed of QuickTime 1.6). If you put an MPEG board in your Mac, it will let you play MPEG movies off a CD-ROM like several CD-I systems on the market can. (A CD-ROM can hold up to 1 hour 14 minutes of full-screen full-motion video and CD-quality sound.) QuickTime 2.0 also lets you play a movie across a network (allowing for "interactive TV"), and it supports MIDI (for music playback) and SMPTE (to sync sound with video).

Apple's new microkernel architecture (code-namd "Gershwin") is due to appear in 1996. This will give the Macintosh protected memory (meaning that when one app crashes, you can kill it and continue using your system without a reboot) and preemptive multitasking (meaning that the system will be more clever about partitioning its time out to applications that are running).

The "Macintosh Application Environment" will be introduced on March 22. It lets System 7.1 and Macintosh 68k applications run unmodified in an X window on Sun Solaris Unix and Hewlett-Packard HP-UX systems, with support for DEC Unix coming later. It works with any standard X window manager, including Motif and Open Look.

That's all the information I have for right now (is it enough to keep you busy for a while?). Apple is maintaining a gopher server on "info.hed.apple.com" that contains all their press releases and will probably also have a lot more PowerMacintosh information in the very near future, so a watchful Mac user might want to keep an eye on it.

I'll post more information here as I get it. Enjoy!

_/_/_/ Brian Kendig Je ne suis fait comme aucun
/_/_/ bskendig@netcom.com de ceux que j'ai vus; j'ose croire
_/_/ n'etre fait comme aucun de ceux qui existent.
/ Be insatiably curious. Si je ne vaux pas mieux, au moins je
/ Ask "why" a lot. suis autre. --Rousseau

A Review of MacWrite Pro 1.5

Will Porter
University of Houston
WMPORTER@Jetson.UH.EDU

What follows is a long e-letter I wrote on April 25, 1994, to my friend Paul in Boston, who knows that a couple of months ago I gave up on Microsoft Word and began to use MacWrite Pro as my primary word processor--indeed, as virtually my only word processor. Paul knows that a few years ago I was very enthusiastic about Word, and he wrote to ask my opinion about MacWrite Pro. Here is my response. In a way this updates a document I wrote comparing MacWrite Pro and Word in April 1993 and uploaded last year.

Let me make two things clear up front. First, I do not hate Microsoft Word. I have used it since 1985, constantly. I've written three books with it and started a fourth. I have urged folks to buy it in the past. I have written minimanuals explaining its use for the benefit of my colleagues at the University of Houston. It is a fine piece of work, no doubt about it. I liked the PC counterpart somewhat better, but let's not get started on that.

Second, I do not work for Claris, not even as a beta-tester, nor do I own stock in the company. I do this only because (a) I think others might find this useful and (b) I obviously have too much time on my hands. 

This document was written in MacWrite Pro 1.5.
Will Porter / Houston, Texas
wmporter@jetson.uh.edu (Internet)
75430,1351 (Compuserve)

Introduction

Paul,

Here are some tips concerning MacWrite Pro version 1.5. I have used MacWrite Pro for over a year now, and around Christmas 1993 (even before I got version 1.5) I finally began to regard it as my primary word processor. I now regard it as virtually my only word processor. Weeks go by now in which I do not launch Word. I will read the press releases when Word/Mac ver. 6 comes out. I'm betting on Spring 1995, although Microsoft swears it'll be out this summer. I think they have their fingers crossed behind their backs as they say it, but actually I don't give a darn if it comes out next week. Right now, unless it will write my papers FOR me, I doubt that I will shell out another $100 or so for an upgrade that will immediately lay claim to several megabytes of RAM and something on the order of 15Mb of disk space. What a dinosaur!

In the rambling essay that follows, I update my "MacWrite Pros and Cons" essay of twelve months ago. First, I discuss MacWrite Pro's weaknesses (most of which are more apparent than real); then I enumerate MacWrite Pro's strengths or what I like about it; and finally, I give you a few tips on how to use it, tailored to the prejudices of a long-time user of Word.

Cons

There were lots of things that I missed from Word when I began to use MacWrite Pro heavily: a non-page-layout "Normal" view; the Ribbon; Word's glossaries; the ability to apply so many commands from the keyboard; and the ability to edit the menus and assign keystrokes to almost any command. I have gotten used to all of these things, surprisingly quickly. I hardly miss Word's Normal view at all. The ability to assign keystrokes to commands and/or edit menus is less important if the interface of the program is so well designed already that there are not many improvements or changes needed.

Word's glossaries have been replaced by three things: the glossary functions of both Thunder 7 and Riccardo Ettore's "TypeIt4Me" shareware program, and by MacWrite Pro's Insert file command. I like TypeIt4Me, in fact, even better than Word's glossaries now. I occasionally miss the fact that Word's glossaries include formatting, but in general TypeIt4Me's glossaries are much easier to use.

Word's Ribbon and Ruler are adequately replaced by MacWrite Pro's palettes, which in many ways are more intelligently laid out. (There are so many little quirks involved in the use of Word's Ribbon and Ruler. Using the Ruler's styles list to create a new style or modify an old one is easy once you've figured out how to do it, but who ever figured this out on his own?)

I don't miss Word's outliner. It stunk. I was for a while one of its very few defenders, but in all honesty I have to admit that I almost never used it myself. ClarisWorks 2.x has an outliner, I understand, but I haven't used it. Joan needs an outliner occasionally, and I am wondering if upgrading to ClarisWorks 2 (we have version 1) would be useful to her.

I cannot honestly say that I miss Word's indexing tool, although I have an occasional need for such a tool, and MacWrite Pro does not provide one. However, one of the main things I have come to appreciate about MacWrite Pro is that it is not attempting to do everything. It is a great word processor, with many advanced functions. For writing books, it is inadequate in some respects. But I do not spend most of my time writing books. (MacWrite Pro 1.5 has a table of contents feature, but I have not used it.)

There are exactly three things I do not like about MacWrite Pro:

  1. It is easier to move the insertion point around from the keyboard in Word. I regret that MacWrite Pro didn't take advantage of the numeric keypad the way Word does: the arrow keys are so awkwardly placed. (This complaint was remedied with QuicKeys aliases.) I miss being able to move by sentences (i.e. to jump from one period to the next period). I really do not like what MacWrite Pro does when you are selecting text from the keyboard and you overshoot your target. When you do this in Word or for that matter in FileMaker Pro, you can pull the selection back a word or a few characters as needed. But if you try to do this in MacWrite Pro, instead of pulling the selection back, you start expanding it at the other end. This is just stupid. This could only be useful to somebody who wants to select text from the middle of the target string.
  2. MacWrite Pro's Define Styles dialog needs an "Okay" or "Define" button. After you edit a style's formatting, you just click on inert white space somewhere. Somebody on Claris's normally brilliant interface team was out sick on the day this dialog was finished.
  3. Word offers more control over footnotes, note superscripts, and paragraph formatting of notes. I can live with MacWrite Pro's limitations here, but I miss Word's flexibility.

That is it. Really. Okay, I might mention one more thing which is not very important to me. Overall, Word's table features are superior. I miss the way that Word's tables knew that I would probably want the text in row 4, column 1, to be formatted the same way the text in row 3 of the same column was formatted. Adding another row to a column seems to challenge MacWrite Pro, which responds a bit reluctantly. My work does not involve lots of long tables, but if it did, this might be a factor weighing heavily in favor of Word. On the other hand, small tables are easier to create in MacWrite Pro and much easier to edit. Word's three-level ruler seems to confuse a lot of people. In MacWrite Pro, you can change the width of a column in a table by--get this--just dragging the column separator! Why didn't Bill Gates think of that? You can merge cells easily too, for some neat effects. My suspicion is that 90% of the users out there will find MacWrite Pro's tables actually better implemented and easier to use. The other 10% who need real table power will prefer Word or WordPerfect, and with good reason.

There are a few things that I miss in MacWrite Pro. Occasionally I would like to be able to number a group of lines automatically. I can work around this pretty easily however with a section that has two columns, one of which is very narrow. In fact, such an approach gives me considerably more flexibility than Word's auto-numbering scheme. And of course I can view the line numbers on the page as I work (unlike Word).

I miss Word's "hidden text" character format, because it made it possible for me to create footnotes whose reference numbers were not visible. (I used this all the time in Latin texts that I annotate for my students.) This is admittedly a very specialized need.

There is nothing in MacWrite Pro to correspond to Word's "first page special" section format. You can indicate in a MacWrite Pro section that you want a title page, but what that means is that headers and footers will not print on that page at all.

This last complaint, however, is instructive. At first, this lack of separate headers and footers for "title pages" struck me as a terrible failing of MacWrite Pro. I soon learned however how to compensate for this lack using one of MacWrite Pro's real strengths: text frames. You simply set up a text frame on page 1 of a section, and place into it whatever header or footer text you want. I am so used to this now that I actually prefer it.

Another example of using a strength of the program to overcome a weakness. As I said, long tables are not MacWrite Pro's forte. Actually, no table can be very long in MacWrite Pro: a table is a type of frame in MacWrite Pro, and no frame can straddle a page break, so no table can be more than one page long. This can be somewhat inconvenient: it means that you have to regard tables more or less as graphic elements, rather than as continuations of your body text.

Now Joan's paralegal had been using Word's tables to create summaries of documents and these were often more than one page long. I discovered a work-around that takes advantage of MacWrite Pro's superior section formatting. In MacWrite Pro, the columns in a multi-column section do not have to be the same width as they do in Word. Furthermore, there is in MacWrite Pro a "column break" character that you can use to force text in column 1 (say) of a three-column section to stop and jump up to the top of column 2. (I often wanted to do this in Word and couldn't, except clumsily, by inserting Returns.) With these features in mind, I came upon the idea of creating many short sections (each starting "next line" rather than "next page") with multiple columns of varying widths, and using these column breaks to move from column to column (instead of tabs, as in a table). I haven't created a ten-page document this way, and I fear that if I did it would be an inordinately large file for all the formatting involved, but it seems to work fine in some respects, better than using tables.

In general, I have decided that MacWrite Pro deserves the name "pro" if you allow it to compete only in the word processing category, and do not require it to compete in the category of book-processing, which it is not designed for. (You may remember that Word back in version 3 or so began to call itself a "document processor" rather than word processor.) I have to say, however, that Word's book or document-processing skills are not all that great either--or all that necessary. University of Nebraska Press did not set the pages of my book from my Word files, as of course I did not expect them to. And if you *were* actually going to do page layout for a book, well, using a page-layout program rather than a "document processor" might be advisable. The only considerable advantage I can see to Word is its indexing function, and I am not planning to have need of that again any time soon. AND Mike Steiner on the development team for MacWrite Pro at Claris is working on an AppleScript script that will index MacWrite Pro documents.

MacWrite Pro's strengths, or what I like about it

Lots. Really. I like this program a lot. It is fun to use, most of the time. It reminds me of what I liked about the Macintosh when I used one for the first time in 1985--when I wrote my first paper (an article on Horace) in MacWrite (version 4, I think). I feel like MacWrite Pro gets in my way much less than Word did. Using Word was like flying a commercial jetliner, while using MacWrite Pro is like driving a sportscar. If you need to move 150 people cross country, you need the jetliner. And flying a jetliner does give you a sense of power. My word processor's bigger than your word processor! But for ordinary running about, the sportscar is both more fun and more efficient. And if you get into the Zen of the thing, you can also begin to sense that MacWrite Pro's intelligence is a kind of power, but a more subtle, civilized kind. Sure, you can't expect to do color separations, create a fully-functioning spreadsheet with graphs, or compose music in MacWrite Pro. But if you want to kern a couple of letters, you have no alternative. Neither Word nor WordPerfect offers true kerning. To me it boils down to how much you care about text.

I like working in any number of reduced views. I work at 80% a lot. If my default font is Palatino 12, the type onscreen is quite legible, and I can view over two-thirds of a page. I have to go down to 70% or so to view an entire page on screen at once.

MacWrite Pro's frames are infinitely easier to work with than Word's and I use them all the time, especially the text frames. Placement, editing, text-wraparound, and the rest--MacWrite Pro beats the heck out of Word in this department. Today I created a piece of stationery for printing 30 small Avery labels. Every label was a frame: there was no actual text in the document at all. The document had one, three-column section, and there were ten label-sized frames in each column of the page. Doing this in Word would have been a nightmare.

MacWrite Pro's "variables" are more flexible and much easier to use than Word's glossaries for page number, date, time, etc. It is easy in MacWrite Pro, for example, to have a footer showing the page numbers in this format: "Page x of y" where "y" is the total number of pages in the document. MacWrite Pro has a variable that shows you the last time a document was modified, which I am now making heavy use of. Variables are a good example of the intelligence of MacWrite Pro's interface. Word's variables are glossaries. To view the date glossary options, you have no choice but to go into the glossary list and scroll through them. They are numerous, to be sure, but also somewhat bewildering, and they are in a list with the glossaries for times, pages, versions, and several other things.

MacWrite Pro's variable options appear to be less numerous than Word's but only because they are so unobtrusively provided for you. You get to them in the Edit menu via the "Insert variable" pop-out. Date is one of the options. Normally you just pull over to "date" and MacWrite Pro inserts the date, formatted as you have previously specified in your Preferences file. However, you can override the default format by holding down the Option key while you pull down to this command (or while you type the keyboard command). This brings up a little dialog that has three options for you to choose among:

  • Format: 4/25/94 or April 25, 1994, &c.
  • Order (for 4/25/94 format): mm/dd/yy, dd/mm/yy, yy/mm/dd
  • Update: never, always, when modified, next open

All in all, this produces TWENTY-EIGHT permutations. And Word? Word has exactly seven date glossaries. Hmmm.

Text handling? Forget the competition. MacWrite Pro offers letterspace justification. It doesn't kick in always or immediately, but it kicks in when its needed. For working with narrow columns of text especially, this is imperative. In a narrow column of justified text, Word will leave a gap at the end of a line that contains a single word. MacWrite Pro on the other hand will distribute the slack among the characters within that single line.

MacWrite Pro's kerning and character space options are without parallel. This is admittedly a somewhat esoteric feature. But I absolutely love it. It's what attracted me to MacWrite Pro initially more than anything else.

Character styles are useful, although it has taken me some time to understand how and why, and I haven't quite mastered them yet. One use I make however is this: I create two character styles called "Default" and "Latin." Latin is exactly like Default (say, Times 12) except that Latin has the Language attribute "None." When I start to type some Latin, I just type Option-Command-2 to switch to the Latin character style--and then MacWrite Pro's spelling checker does not beep at me after every word. When I'm done with the Latin text, typing Option-Command-1 puts me back into my default, which has the Language attribute "U.S. English" and thus invites spell-checking.

MacWrite Pro's autosave and automatic backup options are excellent, superior to Word's.

Printing? How about back-to-front printing--something Word should have gotten around to years ago, but hasn't yet. Also you can collate pages if you print multiple copies of the same document.

(One weakness of MacWrite Pro here: You cannot specify that it print an individual section of a multi-section document. You cannot print just the current selection, either. However you can SAVE the current selection, which you cannot in Word. This is a toss-up.)

Finally, I very much like the fact that MacWrite Pro is fully scriptable. AppleScript and OSA are clearly the way of the future. Big applications like WordPerfect and Word that do everything you can imagine wanting to do with your computer and some things you cannot, are the way of the past. I think this "bigger is better" neurosis goes back to WordPerfect for DOS. DOS was such a pain to deal with that the average user was abjectly grateful for a program that did things like file management, printing envelopes and labels, and so on. But that was then and this is now. With any luck, Microsoft's domination of the Mac word processing market will end with Word 6. Power Mac users are already checking out WordPerfect, which has the only nativized Power Mac word processor on the market. But WordPerfect 3 clearly is NOT "it." MacWrite Pro may be "it." The the thing I like about MacWrite Pro most of all is its graceful self-confidence, its lack of pretension or ostentation. This may be a marketing weakness, I am afraid. MacWrite Pro could add a few features without selling its soul, but it could not start touting those features the way Word and WordPerfect do. MacWrite Pro's greatest strength is precisely that it does NOT rub your nose in all its power. It is there to serve you, not to challenge you. People who look to their word processor to provide life's next big challenge need to get outdoors more.

Conclusions

I think the rest of the program can be figured out by any Mac user with prior word processing experience. When you get the software, look at the manual. In general I think it is excellent. And when you don't find the answer, let me know or contact Claris Tech Support on Compuserve. The folks they have answering questions on CIS are about the best I've ever seen represent a company. Good luck.

Will

Adobe PhotoShop on the Power Macintosh
by Lyle H. Nishida
Seattle, Washington

Of all of the application software for the Macintosh, perhaps the biggest performance hog of all is Adobe Photoshop.

Well guess what? Adobe has released a free Plug-In to get started with the PowerMacintosh.

From Adobe's "read me" file enclosed with the Plug-In:

Adobe Photoshop 2.5 was engineered to ensure maximum productivity with future acceleration technology. To this end, the user-interface code was isolated from the image-processing "engine" code that performs pixel manipulations. The PowerPC Accelerator plug-in replaces the entire Photoshop image-processing engine with a native engine. Using this plug-in, Photoshop users with Power Macintosh computers should realize speed gains of 1.5 - 4 times over a Quadra computer (for in-memory images).

This plug-in speeds all built-in Photoshop functions on the Power Macintosh, such as effects, resizing, rotating, compositing, feathering, color conversion, and all built-in filters including the Blur, Blur More, Gaussian Blur, Motion Blur, Add Noise, Despeckle, Median, Sharpen, Sharpen More, Sharpen Edges, Unsharp Mask, Emboss, Facet, Find Edges, Fragment, Mosaic, Trace Contour, Custom, High Pass, Maximum and Minimum filters.

The accelerator does not, however, accelerate plug-in filters, such as the Color Halftone, Crystallize, Wind, Wave, Sphereize, Extrude, Twirl, Tiles, and Pointillize filters. Similarly, the PowerPC Accelerator does not affect third-party plug-ins, such as Aldus Gallery Effects and Kai's Power Tools. Note that the Lens Flare filter currently does not work on the Power Macintosh. Adobe Systems will post an update to this filter when it is available.

Essentially what it does is take all of the built in filters and process them in Native mode on the Power Macintosh. When I tested it on a Power Macintosh 7100 vs. a Quadra 840av the Gaussian Blur function was about 2 times faster. I surmise that since the PowerMacintosh 8100 is about 150% faster than the 7100 there would be a comparable gain there too!

User Group Discounts
Apple Refurbished Products Available
May 1, 1994

Performa 430 $699.00

68030, 16MHz, 4MB Ram, 120MB Hard Drive, 256 Colors, 14" .39 Monitor. Great for home use, light business and education. Comes with At Ease and ClarisWorks. Keyboard, Mouse and system software included (Modem not included). This product is refurbished with a 90-day warranty. Product in stock, but limited supply! Orders taken through May, 1994, and product shipped within 2 weeks of order. ($30 shipping and handling. $85.50 for AK or HI) Product#M2853LL/A

Centris 610 $759.00

68040, 20 MHz, 4MB Ram, 80MB Hard Drive, PMMU chip integrated. Low cost 040 machine. PowerPC upgradable! Supports one internal half-height 5.25 inch peripheral, such as a hard disk drive, a CD-ROM drive or a magneto-optical drive. Monitor, keyboard and mouse NOT INCLUDED. Limited supply! This product is refurbished with a 90-day warranty. Orders taken through May, 1994, and product shipped within 2 weeks of order. ($15 shipping and handling. $35.25 for AK or HI ) Product #M1345LL/A

Personal LaserWriter 300 / Jag II Bundle $549.00

300 dpi, 4 pages per minute, 39 TrueType fonts included, QuickDraw enhanced with GrayShare, Networkable, 2MB virtual Ram buffer. This LaserWriter is refurbished with a 90-day warranty. Jag II gets rid of jagged edges on screen and when printing (see below for more details). Orders will be taken during month of May, and shipped within 2 weeks. (Does not include serial cable, $15 shipping and handling except in AK or HI). Product #M2047LL/A

THIRD PARTY UGMPP DEALS:

9600 Baud SupraFAXModem V.32 $119.95

Including Cable and FAXcilitatex Software. Create custom fax cover sheets, send and receive faxes in the background. SilentAnswerx lets you receive both fax and voice calls on the same phone line. 5 Year Warranty! Limited Supply! Order now, same week shipping. ($15 shipping and handling except in AK or HI, 2-day UPS). Part #UGCSupra

Dynodex v3.0 $11.95

Winner of MacWeek awards, 4.5 mice from MacUser and 1993 World Class Award. Wide range of database functions. Dialing functions, export or import to and from any database or word processor, print out preformed addresses for personal organizer. 3-D Color interface, 22 fields (all renameable), extensive notes field, automatic caps, shorthand keys, and more! Same week shipping. (Available now, same week shipping, $5 shipping and handling except in AK or HI) Part #UGCDyno

JagII $49.95

REDUCED Price! Street price is $89! Remove jaggies and enhance your digital and printed images. This award winning graphics utility is packed with new features. Works with B&W or color images, scans and bitmapped clip art. Jag II supports TIFF, EPS, Photo CD, Photoshop, MacPaint, PICS, and QuickTime. Received 4 star rating from Publish Magazine (November, 1993) (Available now, same week shipping, $5 shipping and handling except in AK or HI) Product#UGCJAG

May orders only taken from May 1 through May 31.
FIRST COME FIRST SERVED, WHILE QUANTITIES LAST.
Questions? Call the User Group Connection at 408-461-5700.

*Must be a user group member in good standing with a registered Apple User Group affiliated with the User Group Connection to participate in this program.

UGC will only accept orders sent in one of the following ways:
FAX ORDERS TO: 408-461-5701 or E-MAIL orders to:
· APPLELINK: USER.GROUPS
· AOL: APPLE UGC

Master Card, Visa or cashier's checks payable to: USER GROUP CONNECTION

Send cashier's checks to: User Group Connection, P.O. Box 67249, Scotts Valley, CA 95067-7249

Refurbished Apple products are equipment that has been returned to Apple by existing resellers. It may have been returned for any of a number of reasons,including discontinuation of that model, a return by a customer, or a malfunction in the product. All returns are checked for proper function, repaired if necessary, repackaged, and marked "refurbished" on the box.

Refurbished products include a 90-day warranty.

(If you don't plan or want to be in L.A. this June, you may safely ignore this message :-)

Summertime in Southern California - must be time for MacFair!!

The Los Angeles Macintosh Group would like to invite you to MacFair LA '94 -- "THE Macintosh trade show for Southern California!"

Friday and Saturday, June 17th and 18th, 1994
9 am to 5 pm (seminars begin at 10 am)
Burbank Airport Hilton Convention Center
2500 Hollywood Way, Burbank, California

Mac Fair LA, hosted by the LAMG and co-sponsored by Apple Computer, is a two-day event filled with exciting exhibits and seminars, dedicated to Macintosh users. This is a great opportunity to see exhibitors such as Adobe, Aldus, Claris, Frame, Fractónal, Broderbund, Radius, RasterOps, and many more present the latest hardware and software solutions at over 125 exhibitor booths. Special rock-bottom discount prices will be available.

Attend dozens of exciting seminars with industry leaders such as

  • Bob "Dr. Macintosh" LeVitus, author of "Dr. Macintosh" and "Stupid Mac Tricks," and contributing editor to MacUser magazine
  • Robin Williams, author of "The Little Mac Book," "The Mac is Not a Typewriter," and "How to Boss your Fonts Around."

Other topics include PowerPC, graphics, multimedia, digital video and photography, PDAs, DTP, telecommunications, Powerbooks, networking, CD-ROMs and more. Participate in panel discussions with

  • Deborah Branscum, executive editor, and other editors from Macworld magazine.
  • Editors from MacUser magazine.

Win prizes at the popular LAMG giant raffle featuring tens of thousands of dollar$ in prizes ... for only $2 a ticket.

Grand Prize - a special to-be-announced product from Apple Computer!

Prices for the event are $10 in advance, $15 at the door for exhibits only, and $45 in advance, $65 at the door for seminars and exhibits. Special discounted parking is also available. For further information or discount coupons, call (818) 574-8047.

See you at MacFair LA '94!

Click above to exit the newsletter

The ASACMUG newsletter is an independent publication not affiliated or otherwise associated with or sponsored or sanctioned by Apple Computer Inc or AlliedSignal, Inc. The opinions, statements, positions and views stated herein are those of the authors or publisher and are not intended to be the opinions, positions or views of Apple Computer Inc. or AlliedSignal, Inc.

© 1994 ASACMUG Apple®, Macintosh®, FDHD®, and Mac® are registered trademarks of Apple Computer.