I-LITES contains all material of general interest from The Commodore MaiLink, 
newsletter of "Meeting 64/128 Users Through the Mail"  1576 B County Road 2350 
E, St.Joseph, IL. 61873. In addition, each issue contains group information, 
new member information, a "Buy/Sell/Trade" column and a "Questions" column. 
Permission is given to reprint any of this material if credit is given to The 
Commodore MaiLink and "Meeting 64/128 Users Through the Mail". 



The ABC's of Printing GeoDocuments by Bob Hunter 

This article was originally written to be the New Users column in the July, 
1993, issue of geoVISION International and thus intended for new users of GEOS. 
Thus I've limited it to telling how I actually print my GEOS documents rather 
than trying to present a comprehensive treatment of printing techniques. 

About a half dozen years ago I got GEOS 1.2 at a local Canadian Tire store and 
it was love at first sight. Well, not exactly. Somebody had already opened the 
package and removed geoPaint. So I had to wait and wait and wait until the 
store could get another copy of GEOS for me. But the wait was worth it, for 
GEOS provided me with my first utility package, my first paint program, and my 
first word processor. 

And it remains a favorite in my software collection, my still finding its 
Desktop utilities and geoWrite very useful. What about geoPaint? I soon came to 
realize that not even a computer drawing or painting program could turn me into 
an artist. So I use graphics prepared by others. 

But the cream of my GEOS programs is geoPublish, which I like so much that I 
even print the documents that I prepare with it on my daughter's laser printer. 
How? Well, I'll let you in on the secret after I outline how I print my 
geoWrite documents with my dot matrix printer. 

I have a Panasonic KX-P1092i connected to my Commodore 128D by a Xetec Super 
Graphix Gold interface with the following settings: Panasonic, 80-column, 
device 4, no auto line feeds, and transparent mode. And, I have the Star NX-10 
printer driver, which is recommended for my printer by Berkeley Softworks 
Customer Service, selected as the default printer driver on my System disk. 
This I did by choosing "select printer" from the "geos" menu and then clicking 
on "Star NX-10" and "OK" in the dialogue box that appeared. I also have the 
Epson FX-85 super printer driver from COMPUTE!'s GEOS Collection on my work 
disk so that I can select it if I want a high quality printout. 

Before I retired in June, a Star Gemini II was connected to one of the 
Commodore 64's in my classroom, with the Commodore Compatible printer driver 
selected as the default printer driver on the System disk. In preparing GEOS 
documents to be printed on it or other 60 dpi printers, one has to take into 
account that those documents expand on the printed page. Thus, if someone wants 
to print an entire geoWrite document, he/she should set the margins to 1.2 and 
7.2 inches; and, if he wants to print an entire geoPaint document, he should 
use just the left 3/4 of the geoPaint page. 

To print a document, one selects "print" from the "file" menu, which causes the 
dialogue box shown above to appear. The GEOS manual contains a good explanation 
of the various options available in the dialogue box. Usually I just accept the 
defaults and click on "OK" to print. 

Now to how I print geoPublish documents on my daughter's laser printer. I use a 
copy of geoPubLaser patched with Jim Collette's PostScript Patch 2.0 to print 
the document to disk as a PostScript file. Then I use Big Blue Reader to 
transfer (without conversion) that file to an IBM disk. Finally, I give the 
disk to my daughter to print (directly, not through a word processor) from her 
IBM-compatible computer to her laser printer. 


Meet Mr. Commodore 

By Dan Faber 

If you've never heard about Jim Butterfield then you're a very,very new 
Commodore user. In Public Domain programs one always runs across: "Written by 
Jim Butterfield". If you don't know who he is, read on. 

James F. Butterfield was born on 14 February, 1936, in the small town of 
Ponoka, Alberta. Shortly afterwards, his parents took him to Bradford, 
Yorkshire, in central England where he spent his early years and lived through 
World War II. He returned to Canada after more than ten years in England and 
pursued knowledge of mathematics for two years at the University of Alberta. 

At first, Jim wrote commercials for radio stations in Alberta. He started his 
electronic's career in the Yukon as a Technical Supervisor for CN/CP's 
communication facility that traverses from northern Canada to Alaska. While in 
Whitehorse, he started writing articles for electronic magazines on such 
profound subjects as "Theories of Transistors" and "Applications for 
Transistors". These articles attracted the attention of Bill Cumberland, 
Training Officer for CN/CP Telecommunications in Toronto. Although Jim 
reluctantly transferred south from Whitehorse, he quickly became Head of the 
instructors who trained the technicians to run the huge Montreal to Vancouver 
microwave system. When several multi-million dollar computer systems were 
acquired by CN/CP, Jim willingly jumped into programming the monsters. Since 
the C8401 Collins didn't use an advanced language, such as BASIC or COBOL, he 
had to make it perform in Machine Language. Eventually, he designed some of the 
very first computer programs developed for CN/CP operations, such as, the 
complex passenger-reservation system. Later, he transferred into the Marketing 
Division. As Jim began to work more and more with people and less and less with 
computers, he quit CN/CP in 1981 to become a freelance writer, consultant, and 
teacher. 

His first home computer was a KIM-1 which contained a 6502 microchip. From that 
experience he wrote "The First Book of KIM" in 1976, with two other authors. 
Jim is knowledgeable and comfortable with several different computers. Since 
the early 80s, he has written regular monthly columns, such as: "Machine 
Language" and "CLI Clips" for Compute!, "Machine Language" for Compute!'s 
Gazette, etc., etc. He wrote "Machine Language for the Commodore 64, 128, and 
Other Commodore Computers"; Prentice Hall published it in 1986. Jim was asked 
to create a weekly television program on computers for TV Ontario's 
instructional series. The Commodore 64 was introduced in 1982, just a few short 
months after Jim left CN/CP, so he had the time and opportunity to get to know 
it well. 

Despite all the above, Jim is best known outside of Toronto for his utility 
programs, such as "Supermon+64", "Unicopy", "Copy-all", and dozens more. They 
are all filed in TPUG's library in Toronto. He rarely sold his software and has 
stated, "I would like to foster an environment where people pass out their 
software with reasonable generosity. I think that by showing a good example, I 
might sort of lead the way in that." 

It is obvious that Jim was in the right place at the right time. The Toronto 
PET Users Group (TPUG) was created and developed right 'next door'. Lyman 
Duggan was the actual founder of TPUG, but Jim was helpful and always 
available. Lyman Duggan described an evening at TPUG after their regular 
lectures as follows: "there was usually a question and answer period. Commodore 
often participated. Sometimes Steve Punter (author of Wordpro) and Brad 
Templeton (author of Power) would take on Jim Butterfield in a match of 
knowledge. It was sort of like the young gunslingers after Wyatt Earp". He 
developed a reputation as an international Guru of Commodore computers. 

Jim and his family are still living in Toronto and he continues writing 
articles and columns for computer magazines. 

Acknowledgement: I would like to thank TPUG for providing me with pertinent 
information from past issues of Torpet. I have taken freely from the writings 
of Bill Cumberland, Lyman Duggan, and Gail Hook. A special thanks to Jim 
Butterfield for providing me with information about his early life. 



WHAT THE HECK IS A BIT? 

By: Gregg Hoover 

When I made my first tentative forays into the world of computer programming 
one of the first things I learned was that writers on the subject are often far 
removed, knowledge-wise, from the raw beginner and tend to make assumptions 
that can leave the reader baffled and frustrated.  Probably the most common of 
these assumptions is that the reader is fully acquainted with the concept of 
bits and bytes and what these mean to the computer. 

Let me begin my explanation by boring you with some things you probably already 
know:  When you plug your computer into the wall the cord routs the power into 
the power supply.  This "power supply" would be more accurately called a 
voltage converter since it converts the 110 volts from the power company into 
the voltages used by the computer.  The most important of these voltages is 
five volts and this is the voltage that the computer uses to do its work.  Five 
volts is the only thing that your computer sees, recognizes or uses.  When 
receiving information, the computer recognizes only whether the five volts is 
present or absent on a particular wire.  When sending information, it does so 
by either placing or not placing five volts on the same wire.  Note that what 
we have here is a simple either/or situation:  Either the wire has five volts 
on it, or it doesn't --there is nothing in between.  It is the same as the 
light switch in your room being either ON or OFF. 

Since there are only two possibilities for the voltage on the wire (two 
possible STATES; either the voltage is there or it isn't), using machine 
language (hereafter referred to as ML) is a lot like trying to question someone 
who will answer only "yes" or "no".  But at computer speeds, this is not a 
problem, especially since the two states can mean different things at different 
times, depending on what information is being conveyed:  Yes/no, true/false, 
on/off, and so on.  However, continually saying "five volts present" or "five 
volts not present" or any of the other possible meanings is awkward and hard to 
write, so computer programmers use a simpler method of denoting the voltage 
state of a wire:  "1" if the voltage is present and "0" if the voltage is not 
present.  These two digits, one and zero, make up the entire set of numbers for 
the BINARY NUMBERING SYSTEM. 

So how does the computer know if and when to check the wire for voltage?  
Inside the computer is a special circuit called a CLOCK (which also uses five 
volts) that signals the computer when to do its work.  the clock sends out a 
continual stream of alternating 1's and 0's, these numbers being something like 
someone yelling GO!---STOP!---GO!---.  The computer ALWAYS minds the clock and 
when the clock says GO! the computer looks at the wire.  When the clock says 
STOP! the computer stops looking at the wire. 
 Having looked at the wire this one time, the computer has received one tiny 
scrap of information, a single binary digit of either 1 or 0.  This tiny scrap 
is called a BIT (short for Binary DigiT).  While the computer isn't looking, 
the state of the wire may be changed, and when the clock next says GO! the 
computer will look at the wire again, note the wire's state, and have a second 
bit. 

Obviously this process could be sped up considerably if the computer could look 
at several wires at once.  The Commodore 64 and 128 look at eight wires and are 
thus referred to as an "eight-bit machines".  More powerful computers use 
sixteen, thirty-two, and even sixty-four bits! 

Although you'll rarely see it, the term for two bits of information is called a 
MUNCH.  You'll still see the term NYBBLE used occasionally for four bits, but 
the well-known eight-bit BYTE is what you'll be working with the most.  Written 
in binary form a byte might look like this: 

10011011 

That's a set of eight wires with five volts present on five of them and five 
volts not present on the other three.  That's eight bits of information given 
to or by the computer; eight questions answered yes or no, true or false.  All 
bits, without exception, will be either 0 or 1, however, you will occasionally 
see the letter "X" used in a binary number.  This letter represents a bit whose 
value is unknown or unimportant. 

This is what bits and bytes really are; mere symbolic representations of actual 
physical conductors within your computer, the numbers indicating whether or not 
the conductor has electricity flowing through it.  If you were to open your 
computer and touch a voltmeter to the right point, measuring either zero volts 
or five volts, then you will have come as close to seeing a live 
honest-to-goodness bit as anyone ever could. 

But very few programmers ever look inside thier computers because it doesn't 
really matter what a bit looks like or where the voltage flows.  It is much 
easier for a programmer to work with the representations of those things.  
These representations are 0's and 1's on some occasions, but more often a 
programmer will use other representations which make his work easier.  
Regardless of what the programmer uses, he must know BINARY before he can use 
ML, just as you must know the alphabet before you can read. 



Ins n Outs -  Brown Boxes Inc. 
  by Kilroy     (Joe Fenn). 

  QBB (Quick Brown Box) is named for its creator S. Brown Pulliam.  The box is 
for storage of programs (yours or commercial) and quick  recall by 3 key 
strokes back into your c64 oc c128 RAM. 
 It has a lithium battery which locks the memory in the box for 6 to 10 years.  
If you only used certain programs regularly, you could store your disk drive 
away and not need it for years to come.  First a few cardinal rules to follow.  
Use only the latest (v2) managers for creating your "box loads".  They are as 
follows: (my names) 

      SB64M (small box 64 mgr) 24 BLKS long.(small box means it holds 64 
kilobytes  (or 250 blks approximately) 
      BB64M (save as above but for 128k or 256k Big Boxes. 26 BLKS long. (Big 
box means it holds either 128K (500 BLKS) or 
      256K 1000 BLKS.  Blocks are approximate. 
      SB128M (small box 128 mode mgr) 25 BLKS long.).  Same as SB64M above but 
for 128 mode only. 
      BB128M (big box 128 mode mgr)   27 BLKS long.    Same as BB64M above but 
for 128 mode only. 

     You must use the correct MGR (manager progam) for both the box size you 
are working with, and the mode (64 or 128).  They are not interchangeable, and 
you will have misery if you mix em up.  I use the titles as shown SB64M, BB64M, 
SB128M, BB128M so I can't mix em up. SB (64K small box) BB (128 or 256K big 
box).  The digits 64 (64 mode) 128 (128 mode). The -M- (for manager). 
    Remember, all the above mgrs do essentially the same things.  Transfer 
files from disk to box and vice-versa.  They also permit saving entire boxes as 
a seq file to disk. They initialize a box so it will start accepting your pgms 
from disk. 
   They scratch/or/rename files that are in your BOX. They keep a constant 
count of space available in the boxes. They permit partitioning the box in 
segments. They permit adding SYS addresses to files you load from disk. 
     When you first initialize the BOX with your MGR, a QBB MENU is displayed 
which is self explanatory (almost). Once you have stored all files you want in 
your box (up to its memory limit) then its MGR will save the entire box to disk 
as a long 'SEQ' file with whatever name you choose. 
      Examples: If you have a box full of programmers tools such as "basic 
aid", a scrolling utility, an auto numbering utility, a ML monitor etc, you 
might title your box "BB64-Programing". Be as descriptive as you can when 
choosing names and titles for files you put into the boxes, and when saving 
files or full box saves to disk. 
    Now the easy part!  -The loader. To load a previously saved box load (seq 
file) into a box, use the newest version 2 loader.  I call it "all loader" on 
disk or just plain "LDR" inside the box if I put it in the box.  Its easy to 
identify as its only 2 BLKS long and handles any size box and either 64 or 128 
mode, using either 1541 or 1571 drives.  Of course you must make sure the -seq 
file- is of the proper length to fit into the box you are using.  In round 
figures, any length box load will fit into a BB (Big box) but you would be 
attempting the impossible by trying to put a -seq box load- of say 1000 BLKS 
length into a 64K SB (small box).  The reverse would however work fine.  A 250 
BLK (64K) box load into a 128K or 256K box.   What's even better, that little 2 
BLK loader handles all sizes and both modes. After you start bulding your own 
box of goodies, you do as follows. 
    1. First you set your computer to 64 or 128 mode depending on which type of 
box you are about to create.  If you can't get the computer to switch to the 
desired mode with your QBB plugged in, and you have no extender board in the 
cartridge port, just do as follows  (to build a 64 mode cartridge). 
    2. Put the QBB switch (upper left corner) down (64 mode) and reset 
computer. You are now ready to load the 64 manager which I called the SB64M. 
When its loaded and run, choose "I" to initialize the box and prepare it to 
receive the files you are about to load.  It prompts with "save copy before 
initializing? (y/n). Hit N because you have nothing to save yet (unless you 
just bought a new QBB box and then you would choose "Y" to save the utilities 
that came in your box. 
    3. After initializing-reset the computer and you will see a QBB menu 
showing 30 empty slots displayed with following: *?------.  Now you can put 
your MGR into the Box. Hit "L" (load new program),choose DR# or if you have 
only drive 8 then just hit a (cr). Give the file name "SB64M" if you are 
building a 64K box in 64 mode. Make sure the DR8 has the disk with the 64K MGR 
file on it. After it asks you for the 2 ltr code you wish to assign it, (I 
recommend "MM" as the code as its easy to remember "manager"=MM.  You could use 
"MM" only but that would leave you wondering a week later when you see it on a 
disk and thinking "Oh Gosh! which manager was that and for which Box"?   But 
all is not lost remember the # of BLKS was 24 for a C64 64K manager. Thats why 
its best to code the titles for this very reason. 
    While I know you long time users are getting bored about now, with all this 
kindergarden stuff, I will be following up in future additions with stuff like 
this: Why your ML pgm won't run in your QBB and how to make it run. 
 How to make protected Software go into your QBB and fly right.  How to write 
your own short basic booters and put them into the box so that other files will 
work correctly. What memory areas can freeze or ruin your Box load and how to 
still use them from the QBB.  There are many tricks involved.  At this point I 
wish to thank Mr. Brown Pulliam for his great contribution to the CBM 8 Bit 
society, and his head programmer "GURU" Ms Barbara Mintz. They were my 
teachers. (To be continued in the March MaiLink.) 

Reprinted with permission from "On-Line", May/June 1993, Commodore Hawaii Users 
Group. 



TIPS 

From HAROLD HODGES: If you have a rat's-nest of wires on your computer system, 
I recommend a "cord manager", available from Harring. This is an 8 foot split 
tube that lets you enter or exit cables anywhere, and comes with cable coding 
tags. This is item # TS 112, $14.95, on page 50 of their catalog. Phone 
1-800-622-5221. 

From CHARLES S. DUNCAN: I was transcribing our Christmas letter with the 
computer using The Write Stuff. I wanted proportional print, so I entered a 
reverse "p" at the beginning of my letter. (Proportional print uses less space 
for narrow letters like 'i','l', etc. than those like 'b','n', and 'u' and much 
less than those like 'm' and 'w'; and it has a very neat, professional look.) 
However, when I printed my letter with margins set at 1 space each, the right 
margin of the resulting printout was about one inch inside the right edge of 
the paper. I was using sanserif type style on my Star NX 1000 printer. I 
finally realized that proportional print was actually compressing my type width 
sufficiently to take up that much less room on each line. The problem was 
easily remedied-- I increased the line length on the print menu to 88 instead 
of the normal 80 characters. I had to experiment to find the right final 
number, but with 88, my printout spread across the page like I wanted. 

From Charles S. Duncan: I have numerous manuals for my various pieces of 
hardware and software. Some, like The Write Stuff, JIffydos, and the 1571 have 
small notebook-type manuals, while others, like GEOS 128 and Star NX 1000 
printer have larger spiral-bound manuals. With 15 or 20 of them lined up on the 
shelf, I've spent a lot of time searching for the one I wanted. Eventually, I 
came up with a solution and I'd like to share it. Down the spine of the small 
manuals, in one column (see Figure 1) or in two columns (Figure 2), I printed 
the name of the manual contents. For the larger spiral-bound manuals, I printed 
the names on those tabs which come on bread loaves (Figure 3) and merely 
clipped them onto the spirals somewhere. I can easily find the one I want. 

From NORMAN KEIFER: Here is my procdure for re-inking printer ribbons. I bought 
some red, blue, and black stamp pad ink. After experimenting, I learned how to 
open up the ribbon cartridge, and how much ink to dab on. Then I put the 
cartridge back together and put it in a PINT sized "Ziploc" bag, sealed it, and 
left it for several days to a week. The price is certainly right, compared to 
buying a new color ribbon. I am looking for some green ink now. I have read 
that it is not good for printers to re-ink ribbons, but I'm still using 
printers with re-inked ribbons after over a year.  (Editor's note: I, too, have 
read that it is dangerous to use any ink other than ink manufactured for 
computer printers to re-ink ribbons. Others, like Norman, claim they have been 
doing it for years with no problems. It would probably be safer to buy computer 
printer ink from V-Tech, rather than ink designed for stamp pads.) 



FEEDBACK Convert GEOS files: In response to Willis Patten's question about a 
program to convert GEOS files, I forwarded to him a PD program called CONVERT 
which will convert GEOS files to PET ASCII. It will convert files back to GEOS 
which have been converted, but will not convert any other files to GEOS. After 
converting files and loading into a word processor, you will find some garbage 
at the beginning of the file, then a lot of carriage returns before you find 
the file. David Rumberg 

Ottawa FreeNet Update: This is an update to Dan Faber's article in the last 
MaiLink about the FreeNet BBS. Dan sent me a letter updating his article, but 
it was received too late to correct his article. His last paragraph should have 
been changed to the first paragraph and read as follows: 

    "Invitation!! I am logged-on to FreeNet. Any readers of MaiLink interested 
in talking with me on FreeNet? It's easy if you have access to Internet through 
your local BBS; my electronic address is:  ac282`freeNet.carleton.ca. Send me 
your electronic address and I promise to reply." 

    I am sorry we were unable to get this correction into the last issue.  
Internet can be accessed through GEnie and DELPHI. On GEnie you can send and 
receive electronic mail through Internet. According to some mail I received 
from DELPHI, you can directly access other computers on Internet through their 
Telnet feature. Once on Internet, you can connect with computers worldwide, to 
universities, BBS's, FreeNets, NASA, etc. I don't subscribe to DELPHI, but I 
may give them a try. They are currently offering 5 free hours of access to try 
it out. (Phone 800-695-4005 for questions). It is likely that the other 
services offer Internet access also, or will add it in the future. Anyone 
finding any additional information should forward it to a MaiLink editor. David 
Rumberg 

More on FreeNets and other Bulletin Board Services: If you live in a community 
that offers a local Freenet, you may be able to access Internet through it, 
without signing on to DELPHI or other services that may be quite costly. 
Recently, "Prairienet" was set up in Champaign, Illinois. It is sponsored by 
the University of Illinois, and funded by the University and individual donors. 
I can access Prairienet at no cost beyond a local phone call. It allows me to 
reach Internet easily, and I have been able to communicate with Dan Faber 
through Internet. My Internet address is: jpnan`prairienet.org If you have 
Internet access, leave me a message. 
    Prairienet offers local information of all sorts, in addition to the masses 
of information available on Internet. It has 32 phone lines, so it will have to 
get considerably busier before I will ever have to wait for a sign-on. Watch 
the papers for mention of proposed or new publicly funded FreeNets in your 
locality, they seem to be becoming more common. 
    Some members who live in small towns or rural areas distant from large 
cities have asked about the possibility of accessing some of these services at 
a reasonable cost. I am afraid that is still in the future. You need access to 
a "node" that allows you to connect with such pay services as Genie, 
QuantumLink, Delphi, etc., and these nodes are usually in moderately large 
communities. You can reach the node in the nearest large town by phone, but 
every minute of board-access will be charged at the rate of a personal call to 
that town, plus the charges of the network itself. 
    FreeNets are located in centers of population, and while usually available 
to anyone in a large area, (Prairienet is "free" to all residents of Illinois, 
for example), they are really only "free" if you can reach them without paying 
long distance rates. At some time, I hope that everybody will be able to access 
some kind of national bulletin board service, without having to pay excessive 
phone bills. That time, I am afraid, hasn't come. 
     I am just very lucky in that while we live 12 miles from Urbana and 15 
miles from Champaign, the toll-free area for those two cities extends out to 
include our home. If it didn't I would never have started telecommunication at 
all. I could reach about 35 local bulletin boards toll free and at no cost, if 
I wanted to. Actually I use only two or three. Through one of them I can reach 
"FidoNet", a national network which includes message boards on many topics, 
including a Commodore board devoted to 8-bit machines. There I can read 
messages on Commodore topics from Tom Adams, Bill Wolff, new member Karen 
Allison, Jack Vander White and GaeLynn Moranec, publisher and editor of CEE-64 
Alive and many other knowledgeable people.  Jean Nance 



REVIEWS QwikPik / QwikStash 

David Rumberg 

         QwikStash is a shareware program for GEOS64 users that have ram 
expanders.  The program is an auto-execute file that will copy files from your 
boot disk to REU and swap the REU with your boot drive.  This allows you to 
place application files in your REU and be ready to run them from the REU when 
your GEOSscreen appears.  There are three files for the program: QwikPik, 
QwikStash, and the doc file. 
         First, put QwikPik on your boot disk and run it.  The program checks 
for REU and keeps track of available memory.  You will have a screen showing 
the first 8 pages of your boot disk.  You can select any programs shown up to 
the amount of memory in your REU.  Be sure to include DeskTop & an input driver 
if your are going to use the swap option.  Then select save & quit.  Your 
selections will be stored in a fill called QwikData. Then run QwikStash (it 
must be the last auto-exec file on your boot disk).  Here you tell the program 
if you want to use the swap option.  The next time you boot your GEOSdisk, the 
selected files will be automatically loaded into your REU and the swap made (if 
selected).  
         The program is shareware and the author's name (John F. Howard) and 
address appear in the doc file and in the info box.  The programs are available 
on GEnie and probably other services, or I will send them to you if you send me 
a disk & enough stamps to return to you. 

RECOMMENDATONS. 

CEE-64 Alive! Review 

By Tom Adams 

Cee-64 Alive! is a disk magazine, which began in 1992 with 5 issues per year, 
and expanded to 6 issues in 1993.  Subscriptions are by the year; when one 
subscribes all back issues for that year are mailed along with the current 
issue. 
   Generally, the front side of the disk is filled with articles, while the 
back side contains programs and documentation.  There's a nice mix of technical 
and non-technical articles.  A potpourri of information is in a regular feature 
called "Littlebits" which includes tidbits of helpful hints, programming 
information.  BBS phone numbers, and information from printers to disk drives 
to keyboards.  Other regular articles include a column on telecommunicating, 
and GEOS articles for both the casual user and the programmer. 
    Some very handy and/or plain fun programs have been published, including an 
adventure game, 1581 disk drive utilities, a GEOS cassette sleeve template, a 
manipulator for fonts (non-GEOS type), and printer utilities. 
 The last issue included new Koala pictures which had been converted from the 
Atari computer platform.  Tutorial programs for BASIC programmers with articles 
to accompany the tutorials have also been on recent disks. 
    One of my favorite articles from CEE-64 Alive! is on their Demo disk, and 
was in the first year's issue.  It's a survival guide for those of us who have 
always wanted to know to create an archive using ARC250.  I had never been able 
to create an archive until I read the article by Gaelyne Moranec. 
     CEE-64 Alive! sent out a bonus disk in 1992 with the Demo version of The 
Fun Graphics Machine.  Since then, they have included files that can be viewed 
with the Demo, or used with the registered version of FGM.  The mailing and 
disk labels used by CEE-Alive! are also from the Fun Graphics Machine - it's 
refreshing to see the visible support of Commodore products by a Commodore 
magazine. 
    Jack Vander White is the publisher, and was editor of the first year's 
issues.  Gaelyne Moranec began as editor with the 1993 issues.  Both Jack and 
Gaelyne have regular columns in the magazine.  There's a personal touch to this 
magazine that's hard to describe, but I think it's the positive attitudes that 
both the publisher and editor convey about their Commodore computers. 
 My biggest complaint about CEE-64 Alive! is that I can't take it to the john 
with me. It's very good reading! 

CEE-64 Alive: Box 23211, Sacramento, CA 
 95823 

Sample disk (Vol.0 #1) $3.00 (Vol.1 #1-5) 5 issues ending 12/92  $20.00 (Vol.2 
#1-6) 6 issues ending 12/93  $25.00 Please make checks or money orders payable 
to JACK VANDER WHITE. 



MISCELLANY 

CMD NOW SOLE DISTRIBUTOR OF GEOS. Here is a message seen on the FidoNet 
bulletin board system, dated November 19, 1993. 
   "Effective November 15, 1993, all Commodore programs previously manufactured 
and distributed by GeoWorks (formerly Berkeley Softworks), will be manufactured 
and distributed by Creative Micro Designs, Inc. CMD will take over support 
functions for these programs for all current registered users and future 
purchasers. Source code and ownership of the programs remain with GeoWorks, who 
currently has no plans for upgrading these products. Information concerning 
prices and support will be forthcoming as policy is set by CMD." Have a nice 
day  ;-)  From DOUG COTTON, Director of Technical Services, Creative Micro 
Designs, Inc. 

(Editor's Note: Obviously, GEOS is now an orphan, but we are glad to hear that 
CMD has picked the poor baby off their front steps and intends to give it a 
good home. Now if CMD could just get the right to manufacture C-64s and C-128s, 
we would be all set.) 

CORRECTION: 
    On page 10 of the November issue of MaiLink I was misquoted. The text read 
"According to CMD's comparison chart, JiffyDOS isn't of much assistance unless 
you are using the 1541 drive." This is NOT what I said. I said that if you use 
FASTLOAD with your 1541, JiffyDOS isn't of much value. But with a C-64 and the 
1581 it is of great  assistance. I have the CMD comparison chart which they 
don't send out anymore. With the C-64 and 1541 it claims a 10-times load 
improvement and a 3-times saving improvement. FASTLOAD is about the same, maybe 
not quite as fast with loading. FASTLOAD is available for around $20-30. and 
there are thousands being used. This compares with JiffyDOS which costs $50 and 
takes up to an hour to install. 
    According to CMD, JiffyDOS is of very little speed value when the C-128 is 
used with the 1571 and 1581. For speed with the C-128, the best way to go is 
FASTLOAD if one also uses the 1541. That would provide DOS wedge commands only 
for the 1541, though. I would think other more recent cartridges would provide 
commands for all three disk drives. (I saw SSI advertising Super Snapshot as 
such an option). The big speed value of JiffyDOS is when the C-64 is used with 
the 1571 and 1581. I have a C-64 and 1581 and find it great when I use my 1581. 
I have little experience with FASTLOAD and the 1541 and 1581 (with JiffyDOS)- 
all with the C-64. I have some skills with the screwdriver and drill. If you 
have these, I think the JiffyDOS is the best route to go. If you don't, the 
cartridge may be best although it does use the port which RAM expansion also 
needs.  From DICK RIGHTER. 

(Editor's note: I apologize for this error. It is in no way the fault of the 
November editors, David Rumberg and Willis Patten. I copied the material from a 
letter Dick sent me, and sent the file to Willis. I apparently introduced the 
error in editing Dick's comments or in copying the information.) 

COMMODORE SURVEY 
    Omicron, Inc., a software production company is pleased to announce the 
First Annual Commodore 64/128 computer census. The goal of this census is to 
give software and hardware manufacturers an accurate representation of the 
number of Commodore 8-bit users there are, and the hardware they own. This 
information will be crucial to these manufacturers in deciding whether or not 
to support the Commodore 8-bit computers. The results of this census will 
determine whether or not Omicron, Inc., as well as several other software 
companies, will participate in a joint venture to import European software 
titles. 
    To participate in the census, please send the following information:  1) 
What Commodore Computer(s) do you own (C-128, C-64, etc.)? 2) What disk 
drives(s) do you own (1541, 1571, 20 meg Lt. Kernal, etc.)? 3) What RAM devices 
do you own (1750, 1764, Qwick Brown Box, RAMLink, etc.)? 4) What peripherals do 
you own (1351 mouse, 1670 modem, NX-1000C Printer, etc.)? 5) What type(s) of 
software are you interested in (adventure games, word processors, GEOS 
products, spreadsheets, etc.)? 6) On an average how much do you spend on 
computer software in one year ($10, $100, etc.)? 

Please mail your answers to: Omicron, Inc.  Official Commodore 8-bit Census  
1406 Euclid #1,  Berkeley, CA. 94708-1944 From TOM ADAMS. 

(Editor's note. It would seem that if you don't want to put your name and 
address on this survey because you would prefer not to get unwanted mail, the 
information should be just as valuable to Omicron if it is anonymous.)