========================================================================= (C) 1994 by Atari Corporation, GEnie, and the Atari Roundtables. May be reprinted only with this notice intact. The Atari Roundtables on GEnie are *official* information services of Atari Corporation. To sign up for GEnie service, call (with modem) 800-638-8369. Upon connection type HHH (RETURN after that). Wait for the U#= prompt.Type XTX99437,GENIE and press [RETURN]. The system will prompt you for your information. ========================================================================== ************ Topic 35 Sun Nov 01, 1992 J.LUCIEN1 at 14:06 EST Sub: SPEEDO GDOS!!! A place to discuss the wonders of SPEEDO GDOS, the newest graphics subsystem enhancement for TOS from ATARI Corp. 200 message(s) total. ************ ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 1 Sun Nov 07, 1993 JRH [Roger] at 20:59 EST 'Papa' >automatically. Since Speedo sends a formfeed at the end of its print cycle you >don't need the printer inserting another one. Are you sure about that? I use FirstGraph quite a bit. It uses Speedo fonts, and prints out via SpeedoGDOS. It does not feed the page when it is done printing. I have had to do that manually, and in fact have been meaning to get in contact with ABC.SOLN to see if they could build in an option for a form feed, but have not had a chance to do so yet. Roger ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 2 Mon Nov 08, 1993 M.HEBERT1 ['Papa'] at 00:36 EST Roger, I will have to doublecheck on that. It may be that AtariWorks tells Speedo to put the Chr$(12) formfeed character at the end of the file. The only programs I currently have that use Speedo are AtariWorks, MyDraw and WordFlair II all of which properly eject the page from both my HP Deskjets and Laserjet. I will see what I can find out. 'Papa' ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 3 Mon Nov 08, 1993 R.WILSON36 [Bob Wilson] at 19:33 EST Roger When using GDOS or SPEEDO GDOS a program should send a Form_Advance command or a clear workstation command at the end of printing. However some drivers for the old GDOS did it automatically in which case it was redundant on the program's part. Why not try B/STAT instead of First Graph. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 4 Tue Nov 09, 1993 S.AGARWAL [SANJAY] at 02:24 EST Bob, 1st graph is actually an excellent program and much less buggy than B/STAT. The versatility of graph printouts cannot be beaten. It has the bonus of working quite well with SPEEDO. All we need now is the colour version thjat is capable of saving TIFF files for slide production. (are you listening Peter from ABC.SOLN) :-] Sanjay. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 5 Tue Nov 09, 1993 F-D-PERCIVAL [Fred P.] at 06:12 EST I don't think the form-feed problem is caused by Speedo. I use Word Up, and have used it with three printer drivers. With Neocept's Turbojet driver, paper ejected from my DeskJet. When I switched to FSM, that driver did not eject sheets, and was a real pain in the wrist to use. Now that I'm using Speedo, pages eject again and printing is a lot more fun. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 6 Fri Nov 12, 1993 MPMONTGOMERY at 00:47 EST I cannot get the Citizen 140 to print right with Speedo. Is there another driver? Help! The type has white horizontal lines running through it. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 7 Fri Nov 12, 1993 R.WILSON36 [Bob Wilson] at 18:50 EST Sanjay, to the best of my knowledge ABC is not doing anything with 1st Graph and B/STAT will already save color TIFFs and work with SPEEDO. I must admit that I found 1st graph to be relatively pathetic but my needs are different than most. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 8 Sat Nov 13, 1993 J.TOWLER1 [John] at 02:18 EST Mike Hebert: I downloaded Mydraw 1.1, and it does indeed look pretty good. But I needed to do something which uses arcs, and couldn't find them - only closed arcs (like pie slices). Are they available in Mydraw? Otherwise I'm impressed (Speedo, GEM/3, beziers, etc.). - John ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 9 Sat Nov 13, 1993 M.HEBERT1 ['Papa'] at 04:27 EST John, If I remember correctly selecting a fill for arc segments turns off the radius lines and leaves only the curve line - I'll have to check on that though. I don't use arcs much - I'm one of these crazies that draws an ellipse and then overlays it with rectangles to make an arc! I am hoping to have most if not all the .RSC file translated in the next week or so. Some of it seems to be very colloquial German which makes it difficult for someone who doesn't speak or read a single word of German. 'Papa' Mike Hebert ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 10 Sat Nov 13, 1993 AEO.7 [Gregg] at 21:45 EST I echo 'Papa's' concern.... I know very little German and as such the program, though obviously powerful, is almost useless to me. Is there ANYWAY for us to get the author (or someone, anyone) to provide an ENGLISH version???? I'll have to check, does MyDraw use a .RSC file for it's files or is it all a single program? Gregg (who really likes EasyDraw but would like to find something a bit more powerful AND still supported) ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 11 Sat Nov 13, 1993 S.AGARWAL [SANJAY] at 22:27 EST Bob, I'll give B/STAT anohter look. Colour TIFFs eh? Sanjay. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 12 Sat Nov 13, 1993 M.HEBERT1 ['Papa'] at 22:59 EST Gregg, I just uploaded my 95% complete translation of MyDraw's resource file. I based much of it on M.Valent's work with MyDraw 1.06. The menu is completely translated with exception of one word "ausrichten" which means "align" or "justify". That one is translated in the .RSC file but the .PRG puts it back in somehow. The Dialogs are pretty much complete but I left the alert boxes alone since they were too much for me to handle. It should be available in the next day or so. Give it a try, I think you'll like it. As far as the author doing an English version - money talks! If enough people register requesting an English version with English docs I am sure he will oblige. Judging from the letter he wrote me his English is quite good. 'Papa' ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 13 Sun Nov 14, 1993 A.B.SMITH [Barry] at 06:31 EST Papa- Thanks for the tip on the DIP switches. I'll look into this. What will changing them do to programs that don't exhibit this problem though? - Barry ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 14 Sun Nov 14, 1993 B.SALDANA1 [BOB S] at 12:07 EST Barry - On my Bj 20 with Epson mode I get a bigger character size and slower printing. In BJ/Ibm mode it seems more condensed but probably a more accurate print and of course changing drivers to Hp/Laserjet reveals some of their codes on the page. I use the Bj-10e mode and try to set all programs to use a BJ/Ibm driver. Bob S ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 15 Sun Nov 14, 1993 AEO.7 [Gregg] at 20:23 EST Thanks Papa... I'll check it out. If MyDraw works like I hope it will then it looks like I'll be doing a little registering . Gregg ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 16 Mon Nov 15, 1993 M.HEBERT1 ['Papa'] at 01:08 EST Barry, All properly written programs should insert the formfeed character at the end of the print. Setting your auto page eject off should have no effect on printout from other programs. Printing from the desktop is a different proposition - you will have to hit the formfeed button on your printer to eject the page. If you have NeoDesk there is a menu selection for formfeeding the printer. 'Papa' ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 17 Wed Nov 17, 1993 R.WILSON36 [Bob Wilson] at 18:31 EST Sanjay Color TIFFS if you have a color monitor (grin). B/STAT will not work properly on a TT in color but will I think on a Falcon. The problem lies with GFA basic and is not worth a humongous work around for the very few TTs ever sold. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 18 Sat Nov 20, 1993 A.B.SMITH [Barry] at 06:17 EST Bob & Papa- Thanks. I'll go through the mani9u0al (that's 'manual) and look for siomething referring to AUTO-EJECT. I was looking for FORM-FEED and couldn't find anything of that sort. There are no actual DIP-SWITCHES on this Panasonic KX-P2624, just qa digital set up mode. I printed out some letters to my Congressional delegation using the mail merge feature in Atari-Works and got a blank page between evry letter. Got to fix this I'll have to read the rest of your message OL as it scrolls by too fast, but did you figure out which part of the set up controlled paper el ejection. I couldn't see anything other than line feed refer- ences in my manual. It sure seems to me that there ought to be a way to configure this with in Speedo. Thanks. - Barry ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 31 Sat Nov 27, 1993 M.HEBERT1 ['Papa'] at 13:54 EST Barry, Sorry, I no longer have the manual for my 1123. Page eject was a programmable feature of the printer. I remember having some difficulty getting the proper setup myself. Try looking in the same part of the manual where paper parking is described. If I remember correctly it was in there. As far as configuring it with Speedo - there are just too many printers with too many paper control codes. There are no real standards in that area. This same problem crops up with a lot of other programs on a lot of other computers also. 'Papa' ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 32 Sat Dec 04, 1993 S.NORMAN5 at 00:31 EST The install programme that came with my AW version 1.207, crashes when I run it*S ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 33 Sat Dec 04, 1993 S.NORMAN5 at 00:36 EST Sorry, this is a continuation of the last message which got away from me before I finished it. The install programme for SpeedoGDOS that came with AW 1.207 crashes on my ST (520 STFM 4 Meg, TOS 1.02) with or without auto prgs or accs. It draws a shaded box and then locks up. Has anyone else had this happen? (Get the same problem with the OUTLINE and DRIVERS prgs with AW, although they work fine as ACCs. This second problem has been seen by others.) ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 34 Sat Dec 04, 1993 R.CENTILLIS at 04:38 EST I have been having the same problem installing speedogdos, I got my software from toad last week.WHATS THE PROBLEM????*S ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 35 Sat Dec 04, 1993 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 05:06 EST S.NORMAN5, Yes, a lot of people have reported problems with TOS 1.02 and so far Atari has yet to recitified it. I don't know what they are waiting for. I read a message somewhere that basically said they don't support or care about the older TOS versions. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 36 Sat Dec 04, 1993 B.SEMAAN [BOSEM] at 12:28 EST S.Norman, I thought I saw a patch program in the Library that is supposed to help with TOS 1.02/AW/Speedo. O.K. I found it. #29421 from Atari says it fixes incompatibilities with Atari Works and Tos 1.2 -Bob ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 37 Sat Dec 04, 1993 R.CENTILLIS at 17:49 EST I downloaded file # 29421.It is a fix for a bug in Words (AMERICAN.OVL) FIE. It will not fix the install problem in SpeedoGdos for the people with TOS V- 1.02 .If anyone knows the setup to manually install speedogdos with ATARI WORKS could you please let us with 1.02 tos know THANKS B.C. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 38 Sat Dec 04, 1993 M.HEBERT1 ['Papa'] at 18:19 EST The Atari TOS 1.02 patch for AtariWorks was to fix a path problem where AtariWorks would not load properly because it couldn't find the proper dictionary files. Some people have had problems with the install program with respect to TOS 1.02. Others have had no problem. If the install program doesn't work for you try copying the files from your distribution disk. You will need to create a WORKS folder and within it a WORKSYS folder. In the WORKS folder place WORKS.PRG and (if it exists) WORKS.INF. Place all the .RSC files and dictionary files in the WORKSYS folder. Open the WORKS folder and start WORKS.PRG. If you get the opening screen and proceed through to the WP/DB/SS item selector it should run OK. Click on New (WP is selected by default) then when the program starts click on Quit under the File menu. As WORKS.PRG shuts down it writes a new WORKS.INF file. If that doesn't do it for you let us know exactly what happens. You should be able to use AtariWorks Ver 1.02 on a TOS 1.02 computer. Version 1.207 is the one that apparently is giving problems on ALL TOS versions. 'Papa' ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 39 Sun Dec 05, 1993 R.BENNETT7 [Rodney] at 02:20 EST Wayne Watson, If you still have Tos 1.02, then don't complain. Atari's TOS 1.4 (1.04) is a MUST upgrade in my opinion. It corrects some major bugs (in the long run) with previous TOS versions. If you could afford it, I'd even spend the extra money and get TOS 2.06 with the adapter for ST, Mega ST machines. Toad Computers and other Mail order outlets carry'em. Rodney ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 40 Sun Dec 05, 1993 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 04:21 EST Rodney, Nope, no 1.02 here. Just 2.06 in the MSTE. 1.04 in the spare. I would never go back to anything less than 1.04. 1.04 even pales to 2.06. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 41 Sun Dec 05, 1993 B.SEMAAN [BOSEM] at 08:21 EST B.C. - To manually set up SpeedoGDOS, first creat a folder named sys on the root of drive C:\. Next copy all the fonts from the Speedo diskette number 2 fonts folder into C:\SYS. Now switch to Speedo diskette number 1. Copy SPDGDOS.PRG from the auto folder into your C:\AUTO folder. Open the INSTALL.DAT file for viewing and read over the list of printers. Find the one that matches your printer, or if none match, pick a few of the most likely candidates. Make a note of the filenames of the ones you want. You will find them in the driver folder of the Speedo diskette. Copy the ones you want into your C:\SYS folder along with MEMORY.SYS and META.SYS. Copy the contents of the \ACC folder into the root of C:\. Copy ASSIGN.SYS from the \ASSIGN folder and EXTEND.SYS from the \EXTEND folder into the root of C:\. Your diskette may have 2 EXTEND files in folders called LARGE and SMALL. If thats the case, pick one according to your ram size. Machines with less than 2 megs use the small one, otherwise pick the large. Copy the appropriate file and rename to EXTEND.SYS. The ASSIGN file may be called ASSIGN.PRN. If so, you need to rename it to ASSIGN.SYS after you copy it to C:\. Reboot and use the accessory prgs to install the proper printer driver and setup your paths, etc. See the Speedo manual for info on the Accessories. This should get you started anyway. Good luck. Bob ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 42 Mon Dec 06, 1993 W.PIKE [PACMan] at 09:55 EST Hello all, I have a question re:Speedo. I am using a 520 with TOS 1.04, one of the main word processors that I use is WordUp (ok, but I still like it). Anyhow I am currently using G Plus+ and Turbojet to run my HP500. Would Speedo be of help to me? Would it work with Degas and other programs to let me use the Desk Jet even if the program originally didn't support it, if the program uses GDOS? Thanks ahead of time for the info. Bill Pike ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 43 Mon Dec 06, 1993 BRIAN.H [ST~SysOp] at 19:48 EST PACMan, I still use G Plus+ with Word Up. I use Speedo GDOS with AW. I found the fonts weren't well align with Word Up hence I don't use Speedo. ~~Brian..Written on Monday 06 December 1993 at 08:13 p.m. ADT ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 44 Tue Dec 07, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 03:25 EST Bill, All Speedo would need is a DeskJet driver. I'm sure there is one. Al ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 45 Tue Dec 07, 1993 P.POULOS [Phil Poulos] at 03:31 EST Does anybody know if someone has written a SpeedoGDOS driver for the HP LaserJet series 4 printers (eg. 4, 4M, 4P, or 4MP) yet? Is there someone at Atari (or elsewhere) working on such a driver? I know that there is a growing crowd of us that would like to use the 600 DPI capabilities of these new HP laser printers! Phillip P. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 46 Tue Dec 07, 1993 F-D-PERCIVAL [Fred P.] at 07:29 EST PACMan, WordUp does work with Speedo, but not very pleasantly. It takes a few minutes to start up, due to some sort of recursive font loading. Then you must wait about 15 seconds for each font change once you're in the program. Aside from the waiting, it works pretty well; I have no complaints about the output. But it only recognizes fonts sizes that you manually set with the Speedo DA - it does not do any scaling. Degas Elite works quickly with Speedo, but also does no scaling and is limited to the top 12 or so fonts in the directory; its font selector does not scroll. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 47 Tue Dec 07, 1993 M.HEBERT1 ['Papa'] at 20:36 EST Bill, There definitely is a Deskjet driver for Speedo. I use it almost every day. Poulos, The HP laserjet driver does an excellent job on the HP4L at 300 dpi and should do as well on the 600 dpi HP's albeit at 300 dpi. I think it will take an independent developer to come up with a driver for 600 dpi and they would need a vested interest in doing so - like, for instance, a DTP program built around the use of SpeedoGDOS or a high end graphics editing program that uses SpeedoGDOS for fonts and proof prints. Even with the drop in price of good laser printers they are still too expensive for a great many people. I think Atari/Bitstream did very well for the user community with the variety of drivers they provided. What it will probably take to get the 600 dpi drivers is for enough people to request them - and keep requesting them - or for 600 dpi printers to become as common as FX-80's (of course, by then everyone will want 1200 dpi). 'Papa' ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 48 Wed Dec 08, 1993 JRH [Roger] at 06:48 EST Phillip P., To the best of my knowledge, no one has yet produced a stand-alone Speedo GDOS driver for the HP LaserJet 4 printers (If they have, I would sure like to get it.) I have read more than once of people working on such a driver, but have no idea where any of them stand. That's the bad news. :-( The good news is that if you want 600 dpi output using Speedo fonts with the LJ4, it is possible to get it. :-) That's Write 3, available from Compo, has a built-in Speedo driver that works great with the LJ4. TW3 uses Speedo fonts, as well as bit-mapped and internal printer fonts. TW3 comes with its own set of Speedo fonts, but if you want more, any of the Speedo fonts in the Speedo Starter Kit or the WordPerfect Six Speedo font pack (50 fonts) can be used. I am a recent convert to That's Write, and I love it! It has one of the best implementations of Speedo GDOS that I have seen yet. Not only does it allow the Speedo fonts to be used at 600 dpi, but there is also a 300 dpi driver included that gives printouts comparable to the earlier LaserJet III, which I now consider to be a _draft_ mode printout! I am now using TW3 and PageStream for nearly all of my professional work because of the extremely high quality of the 600 dpi output. Once hooked on 600 dpi, there is no turning back! :-) :-) :-) Roger ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 49 Wed Dec 08, 1993 COMPO at 17:26 EST Phil Poulos - As Papa and Roger stated, there isn't a 600 dpi driver for SpeedoGDOS. That's one reason why, when we were developing That's Write version 3, we decided to build the Speedo scaler right into the program - we have over 50 printer drivers, including high resolution drivers and multi-tray, multi-resolution, and other printer-specific support. That's Write can also use Speedo and other font technologies at the same time, cache fonts, and lots of other neat stuff. I suspect that Atari will release a 600 dpi driver, but I don't know when... Robert ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 50 Thu Dec 09, 1993 P.POULOS [Phil Poulos] at 03:36 EST Papa, Thanks for the reply. Yes, the 300 dpi driver on my Hp LJ 4mp with resolution enhancement looks GREAT, but I still would like to have that extra bit more that I paid for for the 600 DPI printer, especially when using AtariWorks. Of course printing PostScript code from PageStream solves the problem, but for simple newsletters or letters I really do not want to use PageStream. And the prices for the new 600 dpi personal laserprinters (the 4p and 4mp) have really come down! Again, I would really like to see a specific driver for the HP 600 dpi printers (oh well, I can hope for one, maybe - sigh). Roger, I did not know that COMPO's product That's Write 3 uses Speedo fonts. I have been slowly collecting word processors, looking for the elusive "perfect" one. I really do not want to buy another one yet... And I agree, that at least the output from PageStream looks great! Thanks for the suggestions. Phillip Poulos ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 51 Fri Dec 10, 1993 P.POULOS [Phil Poulos] at 03:32 EST Robert, Thanks for the reply. Is there a DEMO for That's Write version 3 on GEnie? Does That's Write also has a PostScript driver? Thanks for your support. Phillip Poulos ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 52 Fri Dec 10, 1993 P.WALDING [Phil Walding] at 21:45 EST I am wondering if someone can help me with the following problem : I am using SpeedoGDOS and am having problems with two programs. The problem that is arising is an error message stating "GDOS Error: Not enough memory for scratch buffer Do not use special effects". I appear to have aroung 2.5 megs of available ram left once the application has loaded and have boosted my cache buffers as far as 150k of miscellaneous and 100k of character , although there only appears to be a few k of character cache used and about 13 k of miscellaneous. I have 20 fonts set for loading. Many thanks Phil Walding ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 53 Fri Dec 10, 1993 M.HEBERT1 ['Papa'] at 22:22 EST There must be a Speedo expert out there, I am also encountering the "GDOS error - not enough memory for scratch buffer. Do not use special effects". I have 63 fonts loaded and my caches are set at 256k character and 256k miscellaneous. That cured the GDOS error when printing directly from MyDraw. I d'loaded Kandinsky last night and am encountering the same message upon loading the program. I get the message and then the program runs and seems to work ok but the menu bar is munged! Printout is ok. I have seen this same error report pop up in the WordFlair Topic. Anyone know what's goin' on? What's the cure or workaround? 'Papa' ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 54 Sat Dec 11, 1993 P.WALDING [Phil Walding] at 00:38 EST Likewise , I had no problem with Mydraw. The problem occurs with Kandinsky and allows use of Speedo fonts , but the effects , such as italics and underlining are only available with the system font. If I have this problem with Kandinsky I cannot use special effect with Mydraw afterwards but if I use Mydraw first I have no problems. I also encountered this problem a couple of days ago (before d/l'ing Kandinsky) when doing a merge of A4 images scanned at 400DPI (with Migraph's Merge It). ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 55 Sat Dec 11, 1993 COMPO at 04:06 EST Phil Poulos - There currently is not a demo of That's Write 3. For technical reasons a simple PostScript printer driver is impractical, for both That's Write and SpeedoGDOS. In a nutshell, such a driver cannot convert fonts or font widths, download fonts, or do other things essential to matching Speedo and PostScript, let alone taking advantage of the goodies PostScript brings to the table. Our approach is to combine Speedo and PostScript seamlessly within the program. In the first quarter of 1994 we will release That's Write 3- PostScript as an upgrade to That's Write 3. It uses Speedo fonts on screen (which retains the speed That's Write is famous for) and outputs true PostScript using PostScript Type 1 fonts (as opposed to a big PostScript image file). Thanks, Robert ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 56 Sat Dec 11, 1993 W.PIKE [PACMan] at 05:16 EST Thanks to Brian, Al, Fred, & Papa, That was the information I needed. I appreciate all the help. An Apple a day makes you wish for an Atari says PACMan ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 57 Sat Dec 11, 1993 A.B.SMITH [Barry] at 05:49 EST Papa- Thanks for your efforts concening my paper feed situation. I'll have to have a serious session with this printer RSN. I noticed the othr night when I tried to run a label seesion out of DATAMANAGER after running AW and SPEEDO the tractor feed labels were out of sinc. Turning the printer off and back on solved the problem, of course. I used to have a similar problem when I tried to print with Word Writer after running Printmaster+. No line spacing. My son called from college with the same situation and WWII after someone had done a screen dump to his printer. Resetting the printer by turning it off solves the problem. - Barry ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 58 Sat Dec 11, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 07:29 EST Phil and Papa, MIKE-FULTON (Mike Fulton of Atari) is THE expert on GDOS world-wide, and he should be able to help. Al ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 59 Sat Dec 11, 1993 S.NORMAN5 at 14:39 EST Rodney, I suspect quite a few people object to being told that they should upgrade their TOS version because software writers can't be bothered to ensure compatability. If you recall back in 85, we were all supposed to be reassured that TOS was rock solid and that was why they were able to put it in ROM. If TOS upgrades are to be expected as a normal event, then ATARI ought to get with it and issue them on disk. Barring that unlikely event, we should be able to expect to run software issued by ATARI. If not, there should be a notice to that effect on the package. If you want to get involved in the endless upgrade spiral, where each release of software requires a new system and new OS, and each hardware upgrade requires new software, then you might as well get into DOS and microsoft applications. Steve ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 60 Sat Dec 11, 1993 F-D-PERCIVAL [Fred P.] at 15:32 EST I run both Works and WordUp with Speedo. I get the 'scratch buffer' error message whenever WordUp loads the Speedo printer driver. There is no problem with printing - just that message. My guess is that WordUp is invading memory that Speedo wants reserved - WordUp is notorious for grabbing all the memory it can, legitimately or not, when composing a page for printing. The message has never appeared while Works is running. So perhaps Speedo is counting on applications behaving better than they really do in the memory pool? ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 61 Sat Dec 11, 1993 MIKE-ALLEN [NM~SysOp] at 16:15 EST Steve, I'd much rather see TOS stay in ROMs. Quicker loading and much less vulnerable to virii and corruption. The cost of a new ROM set runs about $60 which is comparable to the cost of a new disk-loaded OS in the DOS world. (I don't count the DOS 6.2 upgrade.) Most of the apps that break on newer TOS versions have 'broken the rules' in some way - not always, since sometimes the 'rules' weren't defined, but often. On the other hand, most apps will run on lower versions of TOS, but not as well. TOS 1.04 improved a lot of the TOS code. 1.06 (1.62), 2.0x, 3.0x and 4.0x were major upgrades to handle new hardware capabilities. 2.0x and above also upgraded the desktop. I think, all in all, TOS has shown a remarkable stability. (Unfortunately this stability seems to include screwing up the rts/cts handling on the Modem1 port. ) The fact that TOS can be patched via auto folder prgs is often overlooked and is a real plus. John Townsend uploaded a file (I forget what it is called - sorry) listing the various patches required (very few) and recommended for each TOS version. TOS 1.00 had problems. That is why it was followed quickly by 1.02. Really one should be using a minimum of 1.04. Running TOS 1.00 is like using MSDOS 2.0 in the DOS world. For $60 and some manual dexterity the upgrade is easy and well worth it. Mike Allen ST HelpDesk~Sysop Written: 2:06 PM Mountain Time Saturday, December 11, 1993 ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 62 Sat Dec 11, 1993 GRMEYER [Gordon/Sysop] at 18:38 EST Wouldn't it be nice to have a "Speedo font manager" program? One that goes beyond OUTLINE.PRG in that it lets you assign fonts to groups, and then automatically de/install groups of fonts depending on the application being executed. Sorry, drifted off. I'm awake again now. :-) ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 63 Sat Dec 11, 1993 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 19:13 EST I also prefer the TOS on ROM and am glad they have improved/updated it. I have no problems with the $60 uprgade fee for TOS 2.06. It was WELL WORTH IT. 2.0x/3.0x was a MAJOR improvement. My only gripe was that I was required to upgrade to TOS 2.06 from 2.05 on a brand new MSTE when 2.06 had been out for quite a while when I purchased the machine. It's hard going back to even 1.04 after dealing with 2.06 for so long. TOS 1.0/1.02 is just so far behind, etc. It really is worth it to the user to upgrade to the newer TOSes. 1.0/1.02 is just hard to provide support for. I don't have the resources to have TOS 1.0, 1.02, 1.04, 1.06/1.62, etc., etc., to provide support for. Atari however does. Everything I have done that works on 2.06 also works on 1.04. There have been problems on 1.0/1.02 and with legal calls in 1.04 and above. Improvement must continue on. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 64 Sat Dec 11, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 19:47 EST Mike, Great point. Most Atarians don't realize that Atari left space BELOW the start of memory for TOS patches, so that using a patch (if it is written right) won't take up any extra memory. Al ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 65 Sat Dec 11, 1993 C.NICHOLLS [BILL] at 23:07 EST Papa, I got the Speedo GDOS error -- not enough memory for scratch buffer, when running GEMvelope. I cured it by installing a larger cache as recommended in COMPSO's Speedo GDOS startup kit. (50k.) Perhaps a variant would work with MyDraw. By the way, does anyone know if the full English version of MyDraw is coming soon? I would really like to have the manual in English! Bill ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 66 Sun Dec 12, 1993 R.BENNETT7 [Rodney] at 03:13 EST S.NORMAN5, Well, maybe my message came out wrong, but I stand by it. You know, I know that TOS 1.0, 1.2 has some serious bugs in it... specially when you talk about hard drives which most people have now adays. I don't think to many programmers now-a-days even beta test their software for compatablity on TOS 1.0 or TOS 1.2 machines. Upgrading the ROMS ie TOS/GEM should be an on going thing at Atari. I am for one glad to not mess with 20+megs worth of disks to install for an O/S and GEM interface. I am very glad and willing to pop in a new set of ROMS to upgrade my operating system any old day. :-) And the price and trouble is right... if your the type of person who does not want to open your computer up to replace chips, any electronic store will do it for ya. Normally a TOS upgrade comes with an 'installation for idiots' handout as TOAD computers sent me a year or two back when I purchased my TOS 1.4 ROMS. This handout can be given to any electronic repair office and they can install it for ya for cheap. Now, if upgrading is not your bag, then why not just stick with the old software as well? Why upgrade it also? Most new software by the way requires and states that it needs a mimium of 2 Megs of RAM to run... Speedo GDos, Works, MultiTos all state that... so having less than 2 megs of RAM and an older TOS version will hurt ya. (These are the newer versions of those programs listed specifically) I'd hope that everyone would upgrade their TOS. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 67 Sun Dec 12, 1993 M.HEBERT1 ['Papa'] at 04:14 EST Bill, I had the problem in MyDraw with printing when I had 63 fonts installed and cache set to about 170k. Increasing both Character and Miscellaneous caches to 256k cleared that up. The increase was purely arbitrary and I will probably reduce since I _very_rarely_ print directly from MyDraw. Kandinsky is a very different situation. The problem only occurs when using Speedo. GDOS or G+Plus work fine but of course - no Speedo fonts. I tried running caches as high as 512k and still got the GDOS error message regarding insufficient memory for scratch buffer. Today I tried an experiment with ONLY SWISS 721 at 12 points loaded and the caches set to 256k each. I still got the message upon starting Kandinsky. The error message does not seem to affect the operation of the program it just leaves a mess on the menu bar when running under NeoDesk. It's a bit nastier under Teradesk because it erases the menu bar. The same error message occurs when running from the Atari Desktop, Geneva or MultiTOS (at least MTOS puts the message in a box instead of munging the menu bar - Aha! I have found something MTOS is good for). It's a pity that this is happening because it mars what is really quite a nice program. 'Papa' ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 68 Sun Dec 12, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 08:55 EST Gordon, Hmm, sounds like FontMonger or whatever it's called for Windoze. I use it at the office. Al ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 69 Sun Dec 12, 1993 R.WILSON36 [Bob Wilson] at 10:08 EST Papa, try setting the font size in the SPEEDO setup to 96 points or some such value. The ATARI Compendium states that SPEEDO only sets up a small cache to handle effects and the size is enough to handle only the largest size in the EXTEND.SYS file. Perhaps the problem program is internally generating special effects on fonts to get width tables at start up. Just a thought. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 70 Sun Dec 12, 1993 P.WALDING [Phil Walding] at 16:55 EST Bob - I tried setting a font to 200 points as you suggested , but still get the same error message re: scratch buffer. Having read all the postings too date , I suspect that the problem lies with Kandinsky some how. Papa - the problem does cause one major flaw. Once Kandinsky has loaded the text special effects are only available with the system font i.e. underlining , slant , etc. If you set the font to a speedo font the boxes for these special effects options become disabled. With Mydraw these options are normally accessable , ut if Kandinsky has run , the options are no long available in Mydraw. The Speedo handler appears to 'remember' that there is a problem here and locks the facilities for all programs running after. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 71 Sun Dec 12, 1993 P.WALDING [Phil Walding] at 16:58 EST On another matter , has there been any developments with respect to a 600 DPI Laser Jet driver for SpeedoGDOS ? I have recently purchased a Brother HL-10h laser printer and am enjoying the output at 600 DPI. I tried some output from Mydraw and was impressed with the programs features , but would like to be able to see what that is like at 600 DPI as opposed to the present 300 DPI limit. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 72 Mon Dec 13, 1993 M.HEBERT1 ['Papa'] at 03:43 EST Bob, Gave your suggestion re setting point size to 96. Still didn't work. Kandinsky works alright apparently, it's just the munging up of the menu bar under NeoDesk and the menu bar getting blanked out under Teradesk - both caused by the error message staying on screen. Keith Brooks mentioned a problem in printing which I have not been able to duplicate but he runs a TT system and I'm using STEs. 'Papa' ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 73 Mon Dec 13, 1993 M.HEBERT1 ['Papa'] at 03:43 EST Phil, I just got EMail from Keith saying that he got Kandinsky to work without the error message by unloading about 50 of his 93 fonts. I tried on Saturday running with just one font at 12 points and 256k character and miscellaneous caches but still got the error message. Enabling bitmaps didn't help either so that's not it. I am inclined at this point to agree with you that the problem is with Kandinsky itself (or with the Borland C compiler that created the code). You are right about the error message being remembered by the system and interfering with other programs. This is a real disappointment because the program has tremendous potential. I find the user interface somewhat less than intuitive but certainly no worse than many other programs. One feature that appears to be lacking (or maybe I'm just not seeing it) is a "snap to grid" function which I find an absolute must. I would also prefer to see font rotation set the same way as for other objects instead of through the Vector Fonts Dialog box. These are quibbles that can be dealt with through regular use but I'm afraid I'll be back to MyDraw for regular use even with the quirky beziers and not always predictable add/delete points. 'Papa' ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 74 Tue Dec 14, 1993 P.NEREO [Philip] at 11:05 EST I frequently get the scratch buffer message when printing several pages from Superbase Pro with Speedo. It goes ahead and prints OK, so I haven't tried to find a solution. The fellow from Compo seemed to know something about it. I remember he posted a couple of replies to me when I mentioned it in this topic a few months back. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 75 Tue Dec 14, 1993 R.WILSON36 [Bob Wilson] at 18:20 EST Does anyone know what MEMORY.SYS is really for and how I can take advantage of it in programs which I write. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 76 Tue Dec 14, 1993 K.BROOKS1 [Horizon] at 21:12 EST Hi all! I got in touch with Uli who wrote Kandinsky. He says the problem is with Speedo v4.1 and that it has been fixed with v4.2 that Atari has not released to users. His suggestion was to add pixel fonts to the ASSIGN.SYS as a work-around but I didn't find that helped either. I only had intermittent luck running Kandinsky with a reduced set of Speedo fonts. Sometimes I got the error message, sometimes not. So........ where's Speedo v4.2 ????????????????????????? Also, I had a job for work and created a nice graph in 1st Graph, brought that into EasyDraw and coloured the bars as well as the backdrop, added some nice text and then took all of that into Kandinsky for output to a Postscript file. All I got was a 14K document that printed nothing but a blank page. I took the GEM file into Calamus, exported it as a CVG and then took it into Outline 3.0 where I added the text again. Output to an EPS file worked but I need to massage the page positioning yet. The file printed beautful colours on the Xerox Fiery unit at a local print house. The Kandinsky file was no good at all even tho' it did generate a type of PS file for Adobe 2.0 . Sheesh, I sure get tired of converting endlessly just to get colour work output! Maybe Bridge for Calamus will work. Maybe I oughta get a Mac instead. :-) Keith New Horizon ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 77 Wed Dec 15, 1993 PG.MUSIC [PG-Kevin] at 02:25 EST MEMORY.SYS is a driver that lets you generate bitmaps in memory using the VDI to draw to memory. You pass the driver x/y resolution in pixels and the address of your image memory. You can then do whatever you want with the image once you use the VDI to draw it. :) --Kevin ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 78 Wed Dec 15, 1993 G.FUHRMAN [gnox] at 05:12 EST Keith, > Sheesh, I sure get tired of converting endlessly just to get colour > work output! Maybe Bridge for Calamus will work. Maybe I oughta get > a Mac instead. Or PageStream ... it's cheaper than a Mac. ;) gnox ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 79 Wed Dec 15, 1993 R.WILSON36 [Bob Wilson] at 18:12 EST gnox Pagestream is hopless with .GEM files when they have text. As a result it won't help Keith at all. Maybe he should try Corel on a PC. Heck Quattro Pro 5 for windows has better presentation graphics than any graphics package for the ST and they throw in a wonderfull spreadsheet at no additional cost. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 80 Thu Dec 16, 1993 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 05:38 EST You can import the .GEM file into PageStream and then add the text. Then just print it to disk in a PS file. Works like a charm. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 81 Thu Dec 16, 1993 C.KROWCHUK1 [CHRIS] at 22:29 EST I am posting this enquiry for a customer of ours. Chris @ Computer Direct. >I am having problems running the install program supplied with Speedo >GDos, although the install program for works, works! >The system being used is a Mega 2 with TOS 1.02 and a clean boot >drive configuration ;ie, Contrl Panel ACC and, folder100. >The dealer I bought this program from has tos 1.06 and the install >program works. >Has anyone had the same problem with TOS 1.02? >Armand in Edmonton. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 82 Fri Dec 17, 1993 ARCHIVIST [Charlie] at 16:05 EST Chris, yes that problem has come up before. There's a patch program in the library to correct it. It seems to be a problem specific to TOS 1.2 and the Speedo/Works install program. Of course, the patch isn't really nessessary. Your customer could simply install all the files manually. The SPDGDOS.PRG goes into the AUTO folder, and another folder named DRIVERS holds all the fonts and drivers. The accessories go in the root of C, of course. He'll have to re-boot to have the DRIVERS.ACC recognised, and can then finnish configuring SPeedo for his system. Hope this helps. Charlie/sysop ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 83 Fri Dec 17, 1993 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 22:21 EST Chris, The install program doesn't work correctly on TOS 1.0/1.2. Most have reverted to manually installing SpeedoGDOS and AW. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 84 Fri Dec 17, 1993 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 23:45 EST The patch file is for the Dictionary NOT the install program. The patch is needed if his disctionary won't work. The install program will not work as there is no patch (that I know of). ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 85 Sat Dec 18, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 03:51 EST Chris, TOS 1.02 needs a special setup, available here as a patch. Look in the libraries under the WORKS keyword or. Al ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 86 Sat Dec 18, 1993 S.NORMAN5 at 13:00 EST Rodney, Wayne, Mike, I like having TOS in Rom too, but I'm reluctant to open up the box and fool around with it. I've built my own stereo equipment from scratch, and done dozens of other electronics projects for a home recording setup, but I've never had as much trouble as when I opened up an ST. First I got ST TIME and it didn't even fit in the case properly. Next I got XTRA RAM to go to 4 MEG. It didn't work because the MMU actually only supported 1 MEG (so much for a machine that promised upgrading to 4). Replaced the MMU, and the vidoe chip didn't work properly. The dealer ended up replacing the entire mother board and the TOS ROMS to 1.02 before 4 Meg would show, and then the clock stopped working, and the A drive hasn't worked properly since. All this took about 6 weeks. I had better luck more recently adding the ICD SCSI, but I'll never open this thing up again. Everything will pop out and go all over the floor. More likely to get a Falcon and use the ST as a slave sequencer. As for upgrading software, I'm quite willing to stay with older versions if the publishers are good enough to let me know that I will have problems with their newer versions. Atari did not see fit to let me know about that. I don't know why they couldn't do it. Most freeware and shareware authors seem to be able to let you know what versions they have tested on.t out. I started with Dr.T KCS version 1.5 and now I have Omega II (Version 5.0). Runs like a dream on TOS 1.02. So much for my screed, thanks for your advice. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 87 Sat Dec 18, 1993 ARCHIVIST [Charlie] at 16:15 EST Oops. Thanks for the corrections there Wayne. Charlie/sysop ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 88 Sat Dec 18, 1993 C.KROWCHUK1 [CHRIS] at 20:12 EST Thanks Charlie; My customer was able to manually install speedo, he called me tonite to let me know, he was experiencing some problems printing, the page would print all black. Anyone else have this problem? Chris @ Computer Direct ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 89 Sun Dec 19, 1993 MIKE-ALLEN [NM~SysOp] at 02:24 EST Chris, the "black page" syndrome has been reported intermittantly by folks using AW 1.207. I have not seen it reported by AW 1.2 users. I don't know anything else about it nor has Atari commented on it. Mike Allen ST HelpDesk~Sysop Written: 11:20 PM Mountain Time Saturday, December 18, 1993 ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 90 Sun Dec 19, 1993 B.SEMAAN [BOSEM] at 06:31 EST Chris, The most likely cause of an all black printout is an incorrect printer driver. I have an Epson LQ printer and got the all black pages when I used the LQ-570 driver. The solution (for a pre LQ-570 printer) was to switch to the Star NB15 driver. -Bob ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 91 Mon Dec 20, 1993 E.SLICK at 19:56 EST Cris, Mike I just bought ATARI Works and have also experienced the all black page problem I called ATARI and talked to someone who passed on my information to the appropriate people. I also talked to the author of ATARI Works who knew nothing of the black page problem. He to is looking into it. He wanted to know if the problem was only associated with ATARI Works and not with any other programs. Mike, You say that this problem doesn't occur with 1.2? I thought that the driver was the problem, but maybe it is 1.207. Pages 2- seem to print ok except the text is shifted down by a 1/2 inch or just lost (I'm not sure which yet). Does anyone have a solution for this yet? If they call me back from ATARI land, I will post the info here. Their customer service line is w d 408-745-2098. Please call and report the problem-- everyone so they will figure out a solution. ERic ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 92 Tue Dec 21, 1993 E.WELLS at 00:12 EST I just bought the Bitstream font pack for WordPerfect 6.0 and found them all to be TrueType fonts and none Speedo. I'm not too terribly upset because the price was great and I use AmiPro on a PC which can use True Type. Does anyone know which 6.0 fontpack contains the Speedo fonts? Everett ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 93 Tue Dec 21, 1993 D.WALTER7 [Doug Walter] at 01:16 EST Everett, you want the package labeled: "WORDPERFECT 6.0 DOS". It also says "DOS version" on the lower left corner and on the end flaps. You bought the Windows version :-) Doug7 ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 94 Tue Dec 21, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 08:33 EST Everett, The DOS version of the Bitstream font pack is what you want. You got the Windows version. The DOS version says DOS version on the box. Toad sells it. Al ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 95 Tue Dec 21, 1993 L.HINSLEY [Stargazer] at 18:02 EST Everett, What you picked up was the Bitstream font pack for WordPerfect 6.0 for Windows. It contains about 100 TrueType fonts. To get the Speedo fonts you have to get the Bitstream font pack for WordPerfect 6.0 for DOS. It contains 50 Speedo Fonts.. ***** Stargazer ***** ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 96 Tue Dec 21, 1993 BRIAN.H [ST~SysOp] at 19:07 EST I am having a problem with my new Canon printer with AW and SPEEDO GDOS. Please see my question over in the AW topic and answer it there. Thanks. ~~Brian..Written on Tuesday 21 December 1993 at 07:58 p.m. ADT ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 97 Tue Dec 28, 1993 H.WOLFE1 [Harvey] at 21:01 EST > Category 14, Topic 11 > Message 152 Wed Dec 15, 1993 > ATARI.BENLUX [W. Kilwinger] at 20:11 EST > > I know that smaller pointsize sometimes gives a unreadable printout > since Speedo doesn't support 'hints'. Wilfred, I've been meaning to ask you about this message. Prior to this, I have seen messages left by various people including COMPO and Al Fasoldt which say that Speedo does support hinting. Since I use Speedo fonts fairly frequently, I would like to know whether this is definite and if they were misinformed. Thanks, Harvey Wolfe ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 98 Tue Dec 28, 1993 H.WOLFE1 [Harvey] at 21:02 EST This question is probably directed to any font and/or desktop publishing experts out there. When I was using bitmapped GDOS fonts, if I selected a 12 point font, I would get 6 lines of text to the inch. This made sense to me since there were 72 points in an inch and I assumed that the 12 points included the interline spacing. My assumptions may have been totally wrong, but they did seem logical :-). Now that I am using Speedo fonts, if I select a 12 point font, I get about 5 lines of text to the inch. There is obviously much more space between the lines of text. This required me to change all my GEMvelope settings. The additional space between lines also was apparent in That's Write 3, which also uses Speedo GDOS fonts, although it does not use Speedo GDOS. What I'd like to clarify is what is normal with fonts in terms of their sizes and their default (built in) interline spacing. Thank you, Harvey Wolfe ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 99 Wed Dec 29, 1993 G.FUHRMAN [gnox] at 05:07 EST Harvey, I don't know about GEMvelope, but generally it's the application that controls line spacing, not the Speedo driver. At least that's the case with Atari Works. It uses a default which is pretty close to the DTP rule of thumb, which is one point of interline spacing for every 5 points of text size. gnox ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 100 Wed Dec 29, 1993 B.SEMAAN [BOSEM] at 06:30 EST Harvey, I have also noticed the forced wider spacing with Speedo and AW. I assume it to be a deficiency of Atari Works to not allow a narrower gap between the lines, but as I have not tried any other GDOS apps that support Speedo, I could be wrong in blaming Works. However, since AW allows increasing line spacing by points, it should have allowed decreasing by points as well. Bob ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 101 Wed Dec 29, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 12:41 EST Speedo does, indeed, support hinting. All you need to do is look. Wilfred may have said or meant that Speedo does not support kerning. The hinting in Speedo is one of the best features. Interline spacing and the issue of the type shoulder is one that vexes all of us in the publishing industry. Speedo fonts come from a different foundry than earlier bitmapped fonts, and Bitstream has always done things properly. But whether the Speedo GDOS scaler is handling them the way it should is another matter. My assumption is that it is not Speedo GDOS that is the problem but rather the difference in the way older GDOS versions handled this shoulder. I have seen the same difficulty, by the way, in many TrueType fonts, especially ones that were converted from PostScript. Al ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 102 Wed Dec 29, 1993 F-D-PERCIVAL [Fred P.] at 18:28 EST Bosem, Atari Works 1.2 allows you to use negative values for line spacing (although it will not save them in the configuration file). I typically use -2 for 12 point text. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 103 Wed Dec 29, 1993 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 20:28 EST Bob, AW does allow decreasing the line spacing. Set it to a negative number. I usually use -3. Do this after you have created your text though as it is not as nice looking when you are typing. I usually do the whole doc and then set the line spacing and then the page breaks just before I get ready to print. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 104 Thu Dec 30, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 03:25 EST Bob, Works allows negative line spacing. You need Papa's Grafik Guide to Atari Works. Al ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 105 Thu Dec 30, 1993 ATARI.BENLUX [W. Kilwinger] at 13:31 EST Harvey: I might be wrong. I have to check the documentation again. Actually Bill Rehbock can handle this question better than I can. Probable Dan can ask him. Regards, Wilfred ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 106 Thu Dec 30, 1993 B.SEMAAN [BOSEM] at 20:45 EST Wayne & Fred, Well, maybe I'm just stupid, but the only way I've been able to use negative point #'s with line spacing is if I have text with more than 1 space between lines ( i.e. double spaced ). I will try it again though, just to be sure. Alright, it does work. I must have done something wrong before not to get it to work. Thanks for prodding me to try again. -Bob ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 107 Thu Dec 30, 1993 B.SEMAAN [BOSEM] at 21:14 EST Wayne & Fred, Well, maybe I'm just stupid, but the only way I've been able to use negative point #'s with line spacing is if I have text with more than 1 space between lines ( i.e. double spaced ). I will try it again though, just to be sure. Alright, it does work. I must have done something wrong before not to get it to work. Thanks for prodding me to try again. -Bob ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 108 Fri Dec 31, 1993 H.WOLFE1 [Harvey] at 00:06 EST Wilfred, Al, gnox and Bosem, thank you for your replies. I found them very informative. If I understand the general consensus correctly, then it appears that Speedo is doing things correctly and consistently with what Truetype and Postscript both do, e.g. a 12 point font should really occupy a space of about 14 points counting interline spacing. Obviously this is very different from the way GDOS handled bitmapped fonts. In that case a 12 point font seemed to occupy a space of about 12 points including interline spacing. It also appears that at least some other people are also visually uncomfortable with the amount of interline spacing that is standard in Speedo. In case I didn't make it clear earlier, that's why I'm asking this question in the first place. Using a 12 point font with Speedo, the lines appear just a bit too far apart, i.e. more like separate paragraphs rather than part of the same paragraph. At least that's my reaction :-). By the way, while I don't have Atari Works, I have read that it does allow negative line spacing and would that be the reason? Al, just out of curiosity, do the major Windows word processors also allow negative line spacing and is it frequently used? One other question that I just thought of: what is a "type shoulder"? And Al, thanks for the information about Speedo supporting hinting. I know that the printouts certainly look like they are using hinted fonts (actually they're the best printouts using outline fonts that I've ever seen on my Atari laser), but I began to wonder if I was imagining it. Thanks again, Harvey Wolfe ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 109 Fri Dec 31, 1993 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 05:16 EST Harvey, Yes, I also think that the line spacing is WAY to much. It makes the lines take up much more room on the page. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 110 Fri Dec 31, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 08:46 EST Harvey, I haven't done negative line spacing in Windows, so I can't answer the question. (Dumb, but it never occurred to me to try it in Word, WordPerfect, Ami Pro or XyWrite for Win, which are the four I use.) One of the Atari software engineers sent me a very informative private e-mail a while back about Speedo's hinting, and I wish I could post part of it here. The gist is that Speedo does hinting very well. Al ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 111 Fri Dec 31, 1993 D.MCNAMEE [Dan @ Atari] at 16:27 EST I'm fairly certain that Speedo does hinting. I'll check next week when we all get back to work. ;-) Dan ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 112 Fri Dec 31, 1993 M.HEBERT1 ['Papa'] at 16:37 EST Wayne, et. al., The interline spacing is a parameter that may be saved in a blank page document. If you don't like the stock interline spacing just define a blank page document with the preferred font, point size and line spacing. Enter enough carriage returns to fill one page then save it as a template for use whenever you want that interline spacing as the default. I very rarely use New document except to define a new blank page template or sizer for GEM metafiles. A factor that I haven't seen mentioned with regard to interline spacing re point size is the variation in "ascenders" or "accents". Some fonts are not as tall as others even though the point size is the _same_. The "Mutts" will appear to have greater interline spacing than the "Jeffs". 'Papa' ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 113 Fri Dec 31, 1993 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 21:06 EST Papa, Yea, I tried to use the negative values while typing my doc. It made a mess of the display. That's why I just wait till I am finished with what I am doing and then set it. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 114 Fri Dec 31, 1993 M.HEBERT1 ['Papa'] at 21:43 EST Wayne, If the negative line spacing is your _prefered_ spacing then why not create it in a blank page document so it's ready for you any time you want it? Then you don't have to set it later and possibly need to do a bit of reformating. 'Papa' ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 115 Sat Jan 01, 1994 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 04:52 EST Papa, Like I said, when I set the negative line spacing and then try typing stuff, my display is screwed up. It doesn't redraw properly, etc. I am talking a mess by the time I get done with just one line. It is especially bad when I backspace to correct something. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 116 Sat Jan 01, 1994 STEVE-J [DrHfuhruhurr] at 06:41 EST Yes, Speedo does hinting. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 117 Sat Jan 01, 1994 M.HEBERT1 ['Papa'] at 18:02 EST Wayne, Sorry, I missed the point of your previous post. Yes the screen does get a bit messed up with artifacts when using negative line spacing. I don't pay much attention to them since I know they won't print and disappear when the screen is scrolled. Personally, I find it easier to use my blank page template since whatever I see on the page as I am creating it will be what I will get. Reducing line spacing after I have created a document sometimes changes the overall format of the page in ways I didn't want (i.e., widows, orphans and such). 'Papa' ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 118 Sun Jan 02, 1994 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 12:44 EST Papa and all, Under Geneva, pressing the screen redraw hotkey cleans up the screen artifacts from negative line spacing. It's yet another good reason that Works and Geneva go together so well. Al ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 120 Mon Jan 03, 1994 K.BROOKS1 [Horizon] at 00:35 EST Heck, just set up a paragraph with the indents, justification and line spacing you want and save it with COPY FORMAT to whatever name strikes your fancy. Formats are great in Works. Keith ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 121 Mon Jan 03, 1994 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 08:43 EST Keith, Yes, the format function is excellent. Al ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 122 Mon Jan 03, 1994 M.HEBERT1 ['Papa'] at 20:03 EST Now if we could just get the font and point size embedded in the >Paragraph Format/Style. REAL paragraph tagging! 'Papa' ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 123 Sat Jan 08, 1994 B.BEAUCHEA [Bob Beauchea] at 17:06 EST What's the procedure to upgrade Speedo Gdos. I have version 4.11 and I saw that there is a version 4.2 available. How do I get it? Would Atari upload the new version? Thanks, Bob Beauchea ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 124 Sun Jan 09, 1994 M.HEBERT1 ['Papa'] at 16:03 EST Bob, Version 4.11 of Speedo is the latest release in the US. 4.2 is on the market in Europe but has not been released here yet - I have seen reports that there are some problems with it that need tending to first. 'Papa' ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 125 Sun Jan 09, 1994 B.SEMAAN [BOSEM] at 23:50 EST Sorry dude, You misunderstood. Speedo 4.2 is in beta and as such is only available to registered commercial developers. Bob ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 126 Mon Jan 10, 1994 ATARI.BENLUX [W. Kilwinger] at 04:33 EST Bob, Speedo 4.11 is also the official release in Europe. Only one company supplies 4.2(beta) because his software needs it and by giving him 4.2(beta) we saved his x-mas sales. Regards, Wilfred ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 127 Mon Jan 10, 1994 M.HEBERT1 ['Papa'] at 20:48 EST Bob and Wilfred, Thanks for clearing up the the Version 4.2 question. 'Papa' ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 128 Tue Jan 11, 1994 COMPO at 06:07 EST SpeedoGDOS 4.2 is not in Beta, nor does it have any 'problems.' SpeedoGDOS 4.2 is finished and is available in North America through COMPO Software. This applies only to registered owners of Speedo Starter Kit. Please contact us for details on upgrading. Robert Engberson COMPO Software ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 129 Tue Jan 11, 1994 PG.MUSIC [PG-Kevin] at 08:38 EST Why would someone need to upgrade? What does 4.2 do that 4.11 won't? Also, why isn't Atari making it available to all of us Falcon owners (who got Speedo by default)? --Kevin ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 130 Tue Jan 11, 1994 COMPO at 23:05 EST Kevin, Version 4.2 has minor internal changes, mostly bug fixes. For example, version 4.11 can present font ID conflicts and can incorrectly change the current directory. If it were up to me, this upgrade would be a freebie - that's how COMPO does things. But Atari is charging for it. As for Atari's making it available (or not), I can't answer for them. Robert ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 131 Wed Jan 12, 1994 B.SEMAAN [BOSEM] at 03:04 EST The differences in SGDOS 4.11 and 4.2 are primarily to do with MultiTos. There are 2 versions of 4.2 that I am aware of. One is dated 7-1-93. That one definitely has trouble running Atari Works and Warp9 3.8. Just try marking some text and you'll see what I mean. There is another 4.2 dated 7-17-93. The text marking bug went away, but I'm not sure there wasn't a different incompatibility with that one. But I'm not sure, because I immediately went back to 4.11. I have only been using the 4.2 Speedo with MultiTos, ( which is limiting for testing since MTOS is incompatible with a lot of stuff anyway ), but I just today replaced 4.11 with 4.2 Beta (7-17-93) for non-MTos use and we'll see what happens this time. Unless there is another Speedo 4.2 that's newer than 7-17-93 and does not say Beta version in the code, I have to assume that 4.2 is indeed still beta. Besides, Compo's message fits in with what Wilfred posted about there being one developer over there that has been given permission to package it with their product because 4.11 won't work with it. I would guess that must be Compo he was referreing to. Bob ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 132 Wed Jan 12, 1994 COMPO at 05:50 EST Bob - SpeedoGDOS 4.2 is no longer in beta, and as far as I know Atari decided it was ready for general release, rather than releasing it because a specific developer needed it. Even if that was the case, the developer in question isn't COMPO (we license the scaling engine ourselves and build it into programs that use it, so none of our software uses SpeedoGDOS). If you are unsure in this matter, I suggest you contact Norman in Sunnyvale. We license and publish SpeedoGDOS in our Speedo Starter Kit, and we are distributing version 4.2 for our customers who need or want it. Anyone who purchased SpeedoGDOS (either stand-alone or with Atari Works) and wants the new version should contact me in e-mail for upgrade info. Thanks, Robert ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 133 Fri Jan 14, 1994 ATARI.BENLUX [W. Kilwinger] at 03:44 EST B.SEMAAN [BOSEM]: >Besides, Compo's message fits in with what Wilfred posted about there being >one developer over there that has been given permission to package it with >their product because 4.11 won't work with it. I would guess that must be >Compo he was referreing to. No, I was not referreing to Compo, I ment ROM Software, makers of Papyrus and Heatseaker, the SLM Falcon interface. But things change fast and a few days after I posted that message we offered 4.2 to all Speedo distributors who might change from 4.11 to 4.2 after signing a new contract with Bill Rehbock (or with their local Atari subsidairy) Regards, Wilfred ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 134 Sat Jan 15, 1994 B.SEMAAN [BOSEM] at 07:16 EST Wilfred, Is the 4.2 Speedo you're talking about the same one dated 7-17-93, or has there been a newer 4.2 unleashed? Bob ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 135 Sat Jan 15, 1994 B.KANTOR [Bruce] at 12:40 EST Anyone, I have think I have Speedo v4.0; how do I get 4.11 or 4.2? Regards, Bruce ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 136 Sat Jan 15, 1994 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 22:09 EST Bruce, Check with COMPO. I believe they said they could set people up with the update to SpeedoGDOS. They are online here as COMPO (email). ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 137 Sun Jan 16, 1994 G.ROUSH [Gary Roush] at 18:53 EST Can someone help me obtain an printer driver for me Epson LQ-800 printer? I am surprised that with the popularity of Epson LQ printers there is yet to be a driver found for what I need. I just bought the Works program and can't have good looking printouts til I get the driver I need. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Gary ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 138 Mon Jan 17, 1994 M.MASTALER [Mike] at 03:49 EST Gary .... try the NEC-P series driver; it works for my Panasonic Kx-P1123 24 pin...... Mike ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 139 Wed Jan 19, 1994 M.MASTALER [Mike] at 16:45 EST Hello. I have SGDOS Version 4.1. In using the printer driver utility, I want to set the print quality to DRAFT. So I hit 'convigure' and do what the manual says. But the manual says to hit SAVE, to save my conviguration to disk, but my version HAS NO "SAVE" BUTTON !! My buttons are: remove, configure, custom, setpath, OK, and cancel. The manual says there is supposed to be a "SAVE" and "EXIT" button. I DO NOT HAVE IT. So how does one SAVE settings? Do I need a newer version? And where do I call/write to get the correct version ? Thanks in advance. Mike a ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 140 Thu Jan 20, 1994 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 03:23 EST Mike, I think the OK button is supposed to save the settings. Al ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 141 Thu Jan 20, 1994 B.SEMAAN [BOSEM] at 21:49 EST Mike, You can pretend 'OK' says 'SAVE'. By contrast 'Cancel' means 'Don't Save'. Bob ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 142 Fri Jan 21, 1994 M.MASTALER [Mike] at 02:14 EST Al and Bosem.... Well, OK, :) Seriously, I HAVE used the "OK " button, but it DOES NOT SAVE MY SETTINGS. When I reboot, I still have the printer at the FINAL mode, not the DRAFT mode I set it to. Anyone else have this problem ? Oh, I have a 104-STfm TOS 1.4 and a 24 pin PANASONIC KX P1123 printer. I use the NEC-P series driver. Mike ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 143 Sat Jan 22, 1994 G.SIMUNOVICH [G.SIMUNOVICH] at 01:16 EST I'm having problems with my Speedo GDOS update (V4.2). Using AtariWorks (V1.2) and any font, uswith itlalics and outline on, all kinds of "crap" keeps poping up on the line I'm typeing, eg. the vertical cursor doesn't seem to erase correct and will be left on on screen, the end of characters won't show up. Looks realyly bad on screen, but when I redraw the screen it disappears. This did NOT happen with V4.0! Also It doesn't seem to happen with anyother package (I don't have many except for paint type programs) Does anyone know what's wrong. I have width tables OFF, huge caches (.5 Meg each). Th Thanks, George ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 144 Sat Jan 22, 1994 H.WOLFE1 [Harvey] at 23:36 EST I just realized that I forgot to post this message, so here it is somewhat belatedly. Wayne, thanks for agreeing with me about the Speedo line spacing. I'm glad I'm not the only person who's not comfortable with it. Al and Dan, thanks for confirming that Speedo does support hinting. Harvey ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 145 Sun Jan 23, 1994 G.FUQUAY [GGF] at 00:26 EST Can someone tell me how to use the old bitmap fonts with Speedo? I have read the manual thru and thru and the only thing I can get out of it is that you _can_ do it, but not mention of *how* to do it. I tried copying the fonts to the spdofnts folder and modifying the extend.sys file to tell it they were there, but to no avail. Uh, you don't think they put the _how to_ in the French section do you? :-) GGF ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 146 Sun Jan 23, 1994 B.SEMAAN [BOSEM] at 00:42 EST George, Join the club! Some people believe that Speedo 4.2 is finished and fully functional, but I have my doubts about that. I don't use Speedo with anything but AW so far so I can't speak of how 4.2 works with other progs, but running Atari Works with Speedo 4.2 can be detrimental to your mental health, especially if you use Warp9 (and yes, I do have the latest version of Warp9) and a falcon. I have 2 versions of 4.2, one dated 7-1-93 and the other 7-12-93. The first one won't highlight text when you try to mark it in Atari Works with Warp9 loaded. The second one will only highlight correctly (sometimes) if you've scrolled at least a screen page since the last marking of text. I'm also using Atari Works 1.2 and TOS 4.04, and I can't even get 4.2 to load on my 1040STf/4MB/TOS 1.4. Its bombs away when booting the machine even though 4.11 loaded fine in the same position. What machine and TOS are you using? And with or without Warp 9 v3.8? Bob ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 147 Sun Jan 23, 1994 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 03:24 EST GGF, You treat Speedo just like the older GDOSes when you use bitmapped fonts. They go into the ASSIGN.SYS. There are a lot of tips about ASSIGN.SYS setups in the file libraries here, and they all apply to using Speedo with fonts of that type. Here is a sample: Path = C:\GDOSFONTS\ ; 01p screen.sys ;default screen ; 02p screen.sys ;low resolution ; 03p screen.sys ;Medium resolution ; 04p screen.sys ;High resolution ; SANS08HI.FNT SANS10HI.FNT SANS12HI.FNT SANS18HI.FNT SANS24HI.FNT SANS36HI.FNT TYPE12HI.FNT ; 21 FX80_HI.SYS ;printer driver ; SANS08QD.FNT SANS10QD.FNT SANS12QD.FNT SANS18QD.FNT SANS24QD.FNT SANS36QD.FNT TYPE12EP.FNT ; 31 META.SYS Al ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 148 Sun Jan 23, 1994 PG.MUSIC [PG-Kevin] at 07:02 EST GGF, Bitmapped fonts must be in the ASSIGN.SYS, NOT the EXTEND.SYS file. Why don't you use the application/accessory included with Speedo to add the bitmapped fonts. It will be easier than hand hacking ASSIGN.SYS. Also, you need to set up a bitmapped cache in Speedo at least as large as your largest bitmapped font. --Kevin ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 149 Sun Jan 23, 1994 D.FREELAND [SAXMAN] at 11:24 EST I have SGDOS 4.0. What is the difference? If I need to update, how do I do it? David ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 150 Sun Jan 23, 1994 L.WHITE17 [Lorne] at 15:53 EST I would appreciate some clarification on the Speedo upgrade. Will it allow Speedo, MultiTos, and the lastest Warp 9 to actually work together ? ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 151 Sun Jan 23, 1994 G.FUQUAY [GGF] at 22:01 EST Al, Thanks for the info. Now, let me see if I understand it. The bitmapped fonts should be in the ASSIGN.SYS file just like normal. And the EXTEND.SYS file is for the Speedo fonts. That means that Speedo will read both the extend.sys _and_ the assign.sys file? Ok, I will give that a try. ***************************** Kevin, I have been trying to use the font utility to load the bitmaps, the only thing is, no bitmaps show up in it to load. I just assumed that the bitmaps should be put in the extend.sys file with the others, but that didn't work. The doc is not _too_ clear on that point. ****************************** After the Cowboy - Forty-Niner game. :-) I have tried every configuration I can think of to get the bitmaps loaded and useable, but alas, I suppose it is beyond my ken! I even tried to reinstall Speedo, thinking there might have been something I missed the first time around, but nope, there was no mention of installing the bitmap fonts. I've tried putting them in the same folder with the printer drivers, and putting a path in the assign.sys file. I've tried putting _every thing_ in the spedofnts folder, and putting the path in the assign.sys file. Nothing works. All I want to do is load one bitmap font to use while editing, because someone said that was a good way to eliminate the screen flicker. I think the system font should be an option with Speedo loaded. Is there some particular reason why it is not? Thanks guys, GGF ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 152 Mon Jan 24, 1994 P.POULOS [Phil Poulos] at 03:31 EST Does any one know if there is a BitStream/Speedo compatible Hebrew font that will work with SpeedoGDOS? When Atari developed SpeedoGDOS the hebrew characters present in the resident screen fonts were either stripped out of the Speedo fonts or never present to begin with. Has someone made a generic Speedo font set to match the internal screen fonts? Phillip P. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 153 Mon Jan 24, 1994 B.SEMAAN [BOSEM] at 03:52 EST GGF, You want to put your bitmap font info in the assign.sys file not the extend.sys file. I think you do it just like with the old GDOS, but I have not tried it since I don't have any decent bit-mapped fonts. Bob ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 154 Mon Jan 24, 1994 M.HEBERT1 ['Papa'] at 04:59 EST GGF, . The ASSIGN.SYS file has to be manually edited with an ASCII text editor. DRIVER.ACC(PRG) will not add fonts to the ASSIGN.SYS file and OUTLINE.ACC(PRG) only writes to the EXTEND.SYS file. There are some ASSIGN.SYS editor utilities floating around - Calligrapher had a nice one on their earlier versions. I believe there was one called ASSASIN that is in the library. Using an ASCII editor is still the best way to go unless you will be making changes a lot. . Phil, . There are several Hebrew GDOS font files in the library. I don't know if Bitstream has a Hebrew Speedo font. They have an 800 number that you can get from 800 information. Compo has access to the full Speedo library and may be able to help you. . 'Papa' ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 155 Mon Jan 24, 1994 PG.MUSIC [PG-Kevin] at 08:06 EST Papa, Weird. My old FontGDOS cpx for the DRIVERs allowed installing or disabling bitmapped fonts. And it will work ok with Speedo too. --Kevin ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 156 Mon Jan 24, 1994 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 08:34 EST LONG POST WARNING! GGF, No, the system font isn't an option when Speedo is active. But it IS available when Speedo isn't loaded, as you already know. Here's Doug Wheeler's famous essay on GDOS and ASSIGN.SYS files. Hope it helps: EVERYTHING YOU EVER WANTED TO KNOW ABOUT GDOS (AND MORE) by Douglas N. Wheeler WHAT IS GDOS? GDOS is an extension to GEM which adds new capabilities to your ST. GDOS is available with many commercial Atari programs, as well as to registered Atari developers ($500 if it is to be distributed with a product, free if it is not going to be distributed). The three primary new capabilities are: 1. The ability to use multiple fonts in various point sizes on the screen, printer, and other output devices. 2. Allows the creation of metafiles, which are standardized files intended to be usable by many different applications. This allows files created in one program to be used in another. 3. Support for various output devices with resolutions up to 32,767 x 32,767 (including emulation of this resolution on the screen). This allows graphics to be printed at the highest resolution of the output device. HOW TO USE GDOS In theory, using GDOS is as simple as putting GDOS.PRG in your AUTO folder and booting the computer. In practice, though, a series of conditions must be met. The most important of these conditions is that there must be a valid ASSIGN.SYS file present in the root directory of the boot disk. The following is a typical ASSIGN.SYS file. PATH=C:\GDOS.SYS ; 01p SCREEN.SYS ; default screen ; 02p SCREEN.SYS ; low resolution ATSS10.FNT ; fonts ATSS12.FNT ATSS18.FNT ATSS24.FNT ATTP10.FNT ATTR10.FNT ATTR12.FNT ATTR18.FNT ATTR24.FNT ; 03p SCREEN.SYS ; medium resolution ATSS10CG.FNT ATSS12CG.FNT ATSS18CG.FNT ATSS24CG.FNT ATTP10CG.FNT ATTR10CG.FNT ATTR12CG.FNT ATTR18CG.FNT ATTR24CG.FNT ; 04p SCREEN.SYS ; high resolution ATSS10.FNT ATSS12.FNT ATSS18.FNT ATSS24.FNT ATTP10.FNT ATTR10.FNT ATTR12.FNT ATTR18.FNT ATTR24.FNT ; 21 FX80.SYS ; Epson 9-pin dot-matrix printer ATSS10EP.FNT ATSS12EP.FNT ATSS18EP.FNT ATSS24EP.FNT ATTP10EP.FNT ATTR10EP.FNT ATTR12EP.FNT ATTR18EP.FNT ATTR24EP.FNT ; 31r META.SYS ; metafile driver ATSS10MF.FNT ATSS12MF.FNT ATSS18MF.FNT ATSS24MF.FNT ATTP10MF.FNT ATTR10MF.FNT ATTR12MF.FNT ATTR18MF.FNT ATTR24MF.FNT As you can see, I have divided the file into distinct groups. The first line of the ASSIGN.SYS file is used to tell GDOS where the fonts and device drivers are located. This line must always start with PATH= which is followed by a pathname of up to 64 characters locating the fonts and drivers. Following the path identifying line is the list of device drivers and their associated fonts. Each group is composed of four parts. First if a number representing the type of device: 01-10 Screen drivers 11-20 Plotter drivers 21-30 Printer drivers 31-40 Metafile drivers 41-50 Camera drivers 51-60 Tablet drivers The Atari STs have four built-in device drivers, they are: 01 Default screen (used when an application doesn't care about the screen resolution) 02 Low resolution screen 03 Medium resolution screen 04 High resolution screen Immediately following the device number may be a "load flag" of either "p" or "r". A "p" indicates that the device driver is "p"ermanent and does not need to be loaded by GDOS. Because the ST has it's screen drivers built into ROM, there will be a "p" after devices 01-04. An "r" indicates that the device driver should be kept "r"esident, causing GDOS to load the device driver immediately and hold it in memory. If a load flag is not present, GDOS will only load the device driver when an application opens (accesses) that device. After the device number and load flag is the filename of the device driver as it appears in the disk directory. In the case of ROM-resident drivers, the filename is only a place-holder (but must be present). Keep in mind that the device driver must be in the folder specified in the path line. On the lines following those three items is a list of fonts associated with that device (again, these are the filenames as they appear in the indicated path of the disk). You may have noticed a few lines with semicolons (;) in them. GDOS will treat any text on a line to the right of a semicolon as a comment and will ignore it. Some ASSIGN.SYS files have a device 00 (00p SCREEN.SYS). This can help prevent incompatibilities between GDOS and some older (pre-GDOS) programs. On the other hand, including it can cause other problems. It is suggested you leave it out unless absolutely necessary. EDITING/CREATING ASSIGN.SYS Now, why would you want to change your ASSIGN.SYS file? Well, if you have just one program which uses GDOS, and you are happy with the fonts you have, then there is no reason to change it. But, now that GDOS is beginning to be used more on the ST, many of us are acquiring a collection of GDOS applications and fonts. By editing or creating a new ASSIGN.SYS, you could create a "universal" ASSIGN.SYS and font/driver folder to be used with all of these programs! Luckily, the ASSIGN.SYS file is a standard text (ASCII) file which may be edited with most text editors and word processors. The only requirement is that the file does not contain any formatting codes. This can usually be accomplished in a word processor by turning document mode off, or selecting "Save as text" (check your word processor manual for exact instructions for doing this). If you are using a text editor, such as MicroEmacs or Tempus, there shouldn't be any special saving techniques. Starting at the top, the first thing you may want to change is the PATH= line at the beginning of the ASSIGN.SYS file. By changing this line, you can put your fonts and printer drivers on another disk or hard drive partition (instead of your boot disk). If you are using floppies, keep in mind that this directory (folder) must be present when an application accesses any of the GDOS devices. Also, to speed booting, this directory should be present when GDOS is loaded. Below is a list of my recommended configurations based on what arrangement of disk drives is being used. One floppy drive: Boot disk (drive A) with: AUTO folder containing GDOS.PRG GDOS.SYS folder containing the fonts and drivers ASSIGN.SYS with PATH=A:\GDOS.SYS Any GDOS application(s) (you may wish to create separate boot disks for each GDOS application) Two floppy drives: Boot disk (drive A) with: AUTO folder containing GDOS.PRG ASSIGN.SYS with PATH=B:\GDOS.SYS Font/driver disk (drive B) with: GDOS.SYS folder containing fonts and drivers Application disk (drive A after booting GDOS) with: Any GDOS application(s) (you may wish to create separate application disks for each GDOS application) Hard drive (booting from floppy): Boot disk (drive A) with: AUTO folder containing hard drive boot program and GDOS.PRG ASSIGN.SYS with PATH=C:\GDOS.SYS Hard drive partition C with: GDOS.SYS folder containing fonts and drivers Any hard drive partition with: Any GDOS application(s) (may be on any partition) Hard drive (autobooting): Hard drive partition C with: AUTO folder containing GDOS.PRG GDOS.SYS folder containing fonts and drivers ASSIGN.SYS with PATH=C:\GDOS.SYS Any hard drive partition with: Any GDOS application(s) (may be on any partition) Of course, these are only suggestions, and other configurations may be better for different applications. Hopefully you should now be able to create other set-ups without too much difficulty. There are a few "musts" that have to be observed: 1. GDOS.PRG must be in the AUTO folder of the boot disk. 2. ASSIGN.SYS must be in the root directory of the boot disk. 3. The PATH= line in the ASSIGN.SYS file must contain the complete pathname of the folder containing the fonts and drivers (GDOS.SYS is Atari's current name for this folder--previously, Atari called it GEMSYS. You may, of course, choose any name you like). 4. The fonts and drivers must be in the right place when an application tries to open a device. Adding a new device driver or new fonts is very simple. All you have to do is put the device driver and/or fonts in the correct folder (as defined by PATH=) then add the filenames to the ASSIGN.SYS file. A BIT ABOUT FONTS One question about GDOS fonts that people ask is, "when are the fonts loaded?" Many people are under the impression that all the fonts are loaded when GDOS is initially loaded. This is not true (and cannot be done). An "r" load flag in the ASSIGN.SYS file will cause GDOS to load only the device driver, not the fonts. Fonts are loaded only after an application opens a device and asks for the fonts to be loaded. At that time, GDOS will attempt to load all the fonts for that device. If there is an error (can't find the find, not enough memory, etc.) GDOS will skip over that font and continue with the next one. When an application is through with the fonts, it can "unload" the fonts to free up that memory. Another fact that many people don't understand is that the font filename is irrelevant to GDOS. Each font has a "header" consisting of various parameters, some of these are: point size, font name, and a font ID which is used to identify fonts of the same type (i.e. all swiss fonts have the same ID). Another thing to note is that GDOS does not handle line spacing, this is handled by the application regardless of the actual size of a given font. Some programs use the point size to determine line spacing, and others use the actual height of the font (yes, the point size can be set different from the actual size). For those of you creating your own fonts (with GEMFED, FONTZ!, or any other way), you must assign a unique font ID (from 0 to 32,767) to each of your fonts, and all font of the same type (i.e. Times), but of different size, must have the same ID. You should also note that some GDOS applications can only use fonts with an ID between 0 and 255. Because of this, it is advisable to keep your font IDs in that range. Another thing you must know when creating your own fonts, is the resolution of the devices you are creating the fonts for. The following is a list of most of the currently available devices and their resolution. Low resolution screen 45 x 45 (horizontal dpi x vertical dpi) Medium resolution screen 91 x 45 High resolution screen 91 x 91 9-pin dot-matrix printer 120 x 144 24-pin printer 180 x 180 or 360 x 360 (NEC P-series only) Laser printer 150 x 150 (some) or 300 x 300 (dpi figures for the screen are approximate) As you can see, most of these devices have square (round) pixels. This allows for sideways printing using the same fonts as for vertical (normal) printing. A notable exception to this is with the 9-pin dot-matrix printers, which will distort characters when printing them sideways. Different drivers handle this differently, they either ignore the fact (and print distorted characters sideways), or they print the left and right sides of a horizontal page on two separate vertical pages, which must then be taped together. The first method is the easier (and faster) of the two, but the second method will produce correct characters, and the taping isn't too bad if you are going to photocopy the final product. It would be possible to create separate fonts for sideways printing. but so far this has not been done. Also, some Epson printers have a 144 x 144 dpi mode (double plotter mode) which could be utilized. This would not only allow non-distorted sideways printing, but offers slight higher resolution in the horizontal axis. FONT FILENAMES As I stated earlier, font filenames are not used by GDOS. To us humans, though, consistent filenames can greatly simplify things. With the official release of GDOS (late 1987), Atari adopted a standardized way of naming font files. Here I will explain Atari's idea and add a few extensions. A font filename like ATSS10EP.FNT may look meaningless to someone who doesn't know how the filename was derived, but is, in fact, very functional. The first and second characters (AT) indicates the creator/distributor of the font (in this case Atari). Atari has suggested that these characters be "AT" for all fonts used on the Atari; this seems meaningless to me, as I don't have any fonts for any other computers on my ST disks (why would I?). I feel these two characters can be put to better use to specify the creator or distributor of the font. The third and fourth characters (SS) identify the typestyle (in this case sans serif). These should be unique to a particular rendition of a typeface. The fifth and sixth characters (10) specify the point size of the font. This should be the point size as printed on the device the font was designed for, not the pixel height. Also, sizes less than 10 should have a leading zero (i.e. 06) to maintain the overall structure. The seventh and eighth characters (EP) specify the device for which the font was designed (in this case the Epson 9-pin driver). If there are no seventh and eighth characters, the font is assumed to be for the high-resolution screen. The filename extender on all fonts will be .FNT. Although not many companies/individuals have produced GDOS fonts for the ST (yet), I recommend that all font filenames follow this convention to avoid confusion. I also suggest a few standard identifiers: Creator/distributor: AT - Atari MG - Migraph* TW - Timeworks* NC - Neocept* Typestyles: SS - Sans Serif (Atari's Swiss) TR - Times Roman (Atari's Dutch) TP - Typewriter (Atari) DB - Dingbats (Timeworks' Bullets)* DL - Drury Lane (Timeworks)* MA - Madison (Timeworks)* RK - Rockface (Timeworks)* RA - Ravinia (Timeworks)* CL - Camelot (Neocept)* Device: (none) - Monochrome graphics (high/low resolution screen) CG - Color graphics (medium resolution screen) EP - Epson 9-pin dot-matrix printer (120 x 144) SP - Star NB-15 24-pin dot-matrix printer (180 x 180) LB - Atari SMM804 9-pin dot-matrix printer (120 x 144) LS - Standard laser printer (300 x 300) MF - Metafile MG - Monochrome graphics (high/low resolution)* NC - NEC P-series 24-pin dot-matrix printer (360 x 360)* LL - Low resolution laser printer (150 x 150)* LQ - Epson LQ-series 24-pin printers (180 x 180)* * indicates unofficial representations which I suggest in an effort to standardize font filenames, and to simplify the whole matter. In many cases, the creator/distributor is not important, in which case the first four characters can be used for the typestyle. You will also notice that I have listed typestyles from various companies, I have done this because I recommend that you rename all of the font you currently have to match the above conventions, this will save you a lot of confusion in the future when you may have ten times as many fonts. One thing to note if you create a master ASSIGN.SYS file, is that although the Timeworks Swiss and Dutch fonts are different from Atari's, they use the same font IDs. GDOS could get very confused if you have two fonts with the same ID and point size. My personal recommendation is to replace Timeworks' Swiss and Dutch fonts in the 10, 12, 18, and 24 point sizes with the ones from Atari, as I feel these are much more professional and true to the original Helvetica and Times Roman typefaces. Because the font filename convention has changed since GDOS was first made available, it is helpful to know the old format (which is still being used in many cases). The old font filenames were laid out as follows: cccrttpp.FNT ccc - Creator/distributor (for screen fonts, i.e. MIG = Migraph) or Device (for other fonts, i.e. EPS = Epson 9-pin printer) r - Resolution (i.e. L = low res, H=high res) tt - Typeface (i.e. SS = sans serif, as above) pp - Point size (as above) METAFILES Metafiles are theoretically ideal graphics files (keeping in mind that text is represented graphically) which can be exchanged between different GDOS applications. Metafiles are those files with a .GEM extender. Metafiles are "ideal" in the respect that they are resolution independent. They are simply instructions for the computer to recreate a page on any output device at that device's highest resolution. This is accomplished by storing commands for drawing lines, circles, rectangles, text, etc., unlike most picture files (.NEO, PI?, etc.) which store the dots making up an image. Unfortunately, the metafile standard is not being used consistently yet. This results in programs not being able to read metafiles created by another application. In most cases, the fault lies with the program trying to load the metafile, not the creator. Many different parameters may be present in the header of a metafile, but only a few of these are required. Many applications expect (and need) some of the optional parameters to be present to properly represent the image. As such, they have difficulty loading files which don't have these parameters. Currently Easy-Draw (version 2.3) is the most capable of the available GDOS applications, and can read just about any metafile. Some of the more recent GDOS applications are allowing the use of GEM image files (those ending in .IMG). These are bit-mapped images similar to those created by the various ST paint programs (but without the screen size and resolution limitations). As is the case with other paint files, these images may be jagged or blocky when printed on a high resolution device. A very important fact about images in metafiles is that the metafile does not actually contain a copy of the image. The metafile only contains the filename of the image on disk. This means that you must not remove the disk containing an image while the metafile is being printed, and every time you print that metafile, the image must be in the same disk (or you will have to change your file). If GDOS can't find the image, it will just skip over it. Be warned. For all you programmers, currently some programs (such as OUTPUT.PRG and OUTPRINT.PRG) have difficulty handling metafiles with large coordinates. Try to keep the coordinate space as small as possible while still maintaining enough for good output quality. MISCELLANEOUS COMMENTS If you are using the Timeworks Desktop Publisher ST (TDTP), you must run the FONTWID.APP program each time you modify the ASSIGN.SYS file. Another important fact is that the relative widths of the Timeworks fonts are not the same for different devices. What this means is that if you create a document with TDTP installed for use with an Epson 9-pin printer, then load the file into TDTP installed for use with a laser printer, the text will be re-flowed. This may result in different page breaks, lost text, extra white space, etc. The best solution to this problem is to create the document with a TDTP installed for the device which will create the final copy. Another idea is to use Atari's fonts (if you have them--they are not public domain), as the relative sizes between devices is very close (there still may be a few differences, but can be fixed readily). It should also be noted that Timeworks' ASSIGN.SYS files is a mess. Apparently they list all the fonts they have available for all their device drivers in one ASSIGN.SYS file. I suggest you create your own based on the information presented here. For those of you who have seen a lot of DEGAS Elite GDOS fonts floating around, don't get too excited. For those to print properly (even blocky), you must have matching printer fonts for the screen fonts. GEMFED or FONTZ! greatly simplify this process, but if you intend to create a complete set of fonts in four or five sizes, you will have a lot of work ahead of you. Anyone creating fonts for the general public (either commercial or public domain), try to remember that not everyone is using the same kind of monitor or printer you are. If at all possible, create fonts for all the devices I have listed above. For those of you creating fonts with FONTZ!, you should be aware that scaling fonts may change the aspect ratio of the characters. I'll say it again: Creating high quality fonts is a lot of work. Period. One thing I didn't mention are metafile fonts. These are not really fonts, but merely width tables designed to keep correct character spacing in a file when used with different GDOS applications. They are rarely used and, in most cases, can be eliminated without any loss of quality. Because GDOS has gone through many revisions, there is some confusion over which is the latest. When GDOS is loaded, a message is displayed on the screen saying it is installed, and the version number. The original GDOS displayed "GEMVDI Installed". After that, it switched to "GDOS Version 1.x Installed". The most common were 1.1, 1.2, 1.3, 1.5, and 1.8. The newest revisions of GDOS display "GDOS RELEASE 1.x Installed", with 1.1 being the newest (1.0 is still widely used). As you can see, it is very important to read the boot-up message when determining which revision you are using. Also, as a sidenote, if you can't get RELEASE 1.0 or 1.1, you should try to avoid Version 1.8, which had some problems. To prevent problems with some of the device drivers available, fonts should be listed in the ASSIGN.SYS file in ascending order by font ID. Some device drivers will not find fonts which are listed out of ID order. Some of the GDOS fonts available have the entire ST character set defined, including greek, hebrew, and other character (most are unused by the average person). As you might imagine, these take up space, usually, more than 50% of the font file! So, if you're running out of memory (especially with a Mega ST2 and SLM804), you can use FONTZ! to strip out the upper characters. Do this by setting the upper ASCII value to 127. Many people who have seen printouts of GDOS text have complained that the text is blocky. This blockiness is usually the result of font scaling. If a device driver does not have a font available in the requested size, it will use the next smaller size, or it may double the size of a smaller font. It it uses the next smaller size, the text will look strange, because it will have the spacing of the requested size, with the character size of the actually used size. When doubling a smaller font, blockiness will occur, and even then, the requested size may not be obtained. The best solution to this problem is to be aware of what size fonts are available, and only use those in your files. Currently there are rumors of a future version of GDOS which supports scalable outline (or vector) fonts. It's important to realize that GDOS does not create the characters. The device drivers are responsible for creating the actual characters, and could be rewritten to support outline fonts without any (or very minor) changes to GDOS. Ever since GDOS was released for the ST, people have been complaining, saying that GDOS was supposed to be included with the ST. While Atari may have planned that originally, I don't believe Atari ever stated publicly that GDOS was to be included. Keep in mind that much of the early ST documentation was based on the IBM version of GEM, and reflects DRI's handling of GDOS, not Atari's. Also, at this time, Atari has no plans to incorporate GDOS into the TOS ROMs. GLOSSARY Aspect Ratio - The relation of width to height. Maintaining a constant aspect ratio ensures the same proportions regardless of size. Device (Graphics Device) - Anything used to create some form of output, usually on a video screen or printed on paper or film. Device Driver - A computer program used to control a device as specified by a "master" application. Font - A typeface of a given style and point size. GDOS - Graphics Device Operating System; an extension to the Atari ST's operating system allowing for the use of various fonts and graphics devices. GEM - Graphics Environment Manager; the portion of the ST's operating system which is responsible for most of the visual aspects of the ST. Header - A portion of a file (usually at the beginning) containing various parameters describing the file. Line Spacing - The distance between successive line of text, usually measured in points. Parameter - A number or other symbol used to represent a given attribute (dimension, color, direction, size, mode, etc.) Pixel - Picture element; a single dot, usually one of many used to create a complete image on a video screen or printed on paper or film. Point - A typographical unit of measure; approximately 1/72". COPYRIGHTS, TRADEMARKS, ETC. This document is copyright 1988 by Douglas N. Wheeler, all rights reserved. This document may be reproduced for non-commercial use without further permission. For commercial reproduction, please contact the author. Any questions or comments about this document can be directed to: Douglas N. Wheeler PSC 3 Box 6096 Travis AFB, CA 94535 (707) 437-3786 GEnie address D.N.WHEELER. This document mentions several commercial/copyrighted products. In each case, it is to be understood that the names are trademarks of their respective companies and are used here only as references. I am in no way connected, either through employment or otherwise, to any of these companies. I cannot be held responsible for any damages resulting from the use or misuse of the information contained in this document. This document was created for the purpose of providing information, it is up to the reader to accept responsibility for the results of the use of this information. I'd like to thank Paul Mazurek, from Migraph, for his comments and suggestions for this document. Al ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 157 Mon Jan 24, 1994 T.MCCOMB [=Tom=] at 12:58 EST How about a library FILE NUMBER NEXT TIME!!!!!!! ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 158 Mon Jan 24, 1994 ST-INFORMER at 17:26 EST I second that file number request... what a waste of online time to have this thing scroll through. You can't stop for fear of missing some-thing at the other end. I pity the Aladdin and Oracle folks who send their program in to gather this stuff and then have this full document forced on them as a download... Not very friendly. A file number and brief discussion of the file would have benefitted more folks and would have not made so many mad about the big file. Rod MacDonald @ ST-INFORMER ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 159 Mon Jan 24, 1994 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 19:38 EST Phillip. Bitstream has a couple of thousand Speedo fonts. There must be one that has the Hebrew set. Bitstream 215 First St Cambridge, MA 02142 800 522-3668 617 497-7514 Fax line: 617 354-7954 Al ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 160 Mon Jan 24, 1994 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 20:27 EST Better still, folks, would be a way for Aladdin (or Oracle) to send a skip notice to GEnie when it caught a LONG POST string at the top of a message, configurable for all those who don't like to read long posts. BTW, it's cheaper for those who want such texts to grab them in an ASCII message than to download by Xmodem or Zmodem. But I'll try to keep them to a minimum. Al ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 161 Tue Jan 25, 1994 C.NICHOLLS [BILL] at 02:03 EST Phillip P., I could also use a Speedo Hebrew font. All I have now is one I hacked in GEM bitmap from one someone else uploaded. Out of date now. Are you reading us, Robert at COMPO? Bill ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 162 Tue Jan 25, 1994 G.E.M. [Gary] at 02:14 EST That whole document "Everything...GDOS..." is already in the library and has been for quite a few years, there was really no reason to post it here. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 163 Tue Jan 25, 1994 MIKE-ALLEN [NM~SysOp] at 03:15 EST Phillip, Bill; Why don't you wander over to the Bitstream RoundTable BB (m1375;1) and ask the Bitstream folks if they have any Hebrew Speedo fonts? I would assume they would know. Mike Allen ST HelpDesk~Sysop Written: 1:08 AM Mountain Time Tuesday, January 25, 1994 ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 164 Tue Jan 25, 1994 M.HEBERT1 ['Papa'] at 03:31 EST I, for one, would like to thank Al for posting "Everything...GDOS" - and give him a swift kick in the rear for doing it. He had already tried to answer the question briefly and succinctly but it didn't seem to get the point across. Perhaps ALL of us who had been trying to answer the question should have made reference to the appropriate library file number. 'Papa' ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 165 Tue Jan 25, 1994 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 08:38 EST Those who think everyone looks through the library each time a file is needed are missing the point. A lot of users never get to the library files; I get e- mail all the time from folks who simply can't find a file, and so I send it to them. I suppose I should just turn them back to the library-search routine and give them a little more practice. But that's not how I do things. As for the long posts, I apologize for wasting time and money. But get a life, guys. At a time when Atari's support for its official online service is at an all-time low, users need all the help they can get. Al ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 166 Tue Jan 25, 1994 PG.MUSIC [PG-Kevin] at 11:27 EST Al, :) It didn't phase me. (the long post). Keep doing things your way. :) Sometimes it reminds me of stuff that I know, but sort of forgot about. :) --Kevin ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 167 Tue Jan 25, 1994 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 18:53 EST Papa, jst shrt ntes frm me frm nw on. :) Al ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 168 Tue Jan 25, 1994 P.POULOS [Phil Poulos] at 19:21 EST 'Papa' & Al, Thanks for the reply to my request. I have ALREADY call the Bitstream 800 number and asked about Hebrew fonts. But unfortunately they told me that they have not produced ANY foreign language fonts. Of course the technician that I spoke to could have been wrong in his statement, but I have no way the verify this. I am curious to know if anyone besides Bitstream has produced fonts in the Speedo format? Is there a conversion program to change type 1 fonts or Adobe fonts into bitstream compatible Speedo fonts? Bill, So far I have had NO luck in finding a hebrew character font. The old FSM fonts did at least have the hebrew characters as part of their set, but the newer bitstream Speedo fonts do not. In fact they do not have other special characters that are common for type 1 fonts, such as right and left quotes. I have also contacted a Hebrew Educational organization in New York about this. Unfortunately they have only type 1 Hebrew fonts, but NOT in Bitstream Speedo format. Maybe Robert at COMPO has a suggestion? Phillip P. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 169 Tue Jan 25, 1994 G.FUQUAY [GGF] at 19:48 EST >Atari-ST RoundTable >You want to put your bitmap font info in the assign.sys file not the >extend.sys file. I think you do it just like with the old GDOS, but I have >not tried it since I don't have any decent bit-mapped fonts. > >Bob I did that with Steno, just like an ordinary sys file. But Speedo will not load the fonts. This is no earth-shaking disaster, it doesn't make AW unuseable, just a little more inconvienent to use. I only want one bitmapped font to do the editing with. Somebody posted that it would eliminate the screen shimmer if you did that. The system font also does that, but it is not an option within Speedo. Thanks, GGF ------------------------------------------ Kevin, Is that FontGdos cpx in the library? If so, do you know the name or number? I search for fontgdos and cpx, and didn't find it. Thanks ------------------------------------------------ Later----- I don't know if this is the proper way to do it or not, but I finally solved the puzzle of loading the bitmap fonts. I simply placed Gdos 1.1 in the auto folder ahead of Speedo, and run both of them on bootup. I loaded AW, and lo and behold, there were Dutch, Swiss, and Typewriter! Works like a charm! Thanks everyone! ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 170 Tue Jan 25, 1994 COMPO at 19:54 EST Although Bitstream's Typeface Library has over 1000 fonts, Bitstream only publishes a couple hundred of them. The complete font library is available from COMPO Software. Sorry, but there isn't a Hebrew font. Yet. (There probably will be in the future). Contact us at COMPO for information. COMPO Software 104 Esplanade Avenue Suite 121 Pacifica CA 94044 Tel: 415-355- 0862 Fax: 415-355-0869 ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 171 Tue Jan 25, 1994 COMPO at 20:48 EST Phil - Bitstream has produced (but not published) foreign language (or foreign character sets, rather) fonts. Again, they are available through COMPO. I'll double check on Hebrew specifically. No one besides Bitstream produces Speedo format fonts, although in special cases other companies publish the fonts. For example, COMPO publishes Speedo fonts specifically for the Atari market (and in some cases, the fonts are Atari-specific). There isn't a converter to- or from Speedo format. Bitstream insists on controlling the availability of the format, which is actually a good thing in that it ensures that you're getting only the highest quality fonts. Speedo fonts by and large do contain true left and right single and double quotes. In fact, Speedo fonts generally have huge character sets (larger and more complete than most fonts). If you can't access the character you want, it's most likely because of the ASCII mapping (which currently can't be changed with SpeedoGDOS, but can with That's Write 3, which has its own Speedo engine). I hope this clears things up. I'll be in touch on the Hebrew font. Robert ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 172 Tue Jan 25, 1994 M.HEBERT1 ['Papa'] at 22:02 EST Al, Gee, after that long post I would think you'ld have no problems at all with your vowel movements. GGF, GDOS and Speedo together? It will be interesting to see who grabs the printer port. I haven't had any problem putting bitmap fonts in my ASSIGN.SYS file for Speedo but it just occured to me that they are not the usual Swiss, Dutch and Typewriter. They are Calamus CFN's coverted to GDOS. I'll bet what is happening is a conflict over font ID number and Speedo is winning. C_FONT lets you assign a font ID number or it will pick one at random for you but might be excluding certain numbers that are already assigned. 'Papa' ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 173 Tue Jan 25, 1994 EXPLORER.1 [] Ron [] at 23:45 EST Papa -- vowel movements? :-) -- Ron ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 174 Tue Jan 25, 1994 COMPO at 23:54 EST With SpeedoGDOS versions 4.11 and earlier, it is quite easy to induce a font ID conflict; SpeedoGDOS 4.2 moves the Speedo font IDs to prevent such a conflict. If you are experiencing a font ID conflict, get SpeedoGDOS 4.2. Robert ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 175 Wed Jan 26, 1994 PG.MUSIC [PG-Kevin] at 00:05 EST Actually it is a _brain_dead_ thing. If I could use the Speedo format and get one of our (PG Music's) True Type fonts converted to Speedo, we'd see a few more things done quickly for the Atari platform. As it stands, the feature that uses the TTF may NOT get ported to the Atari, at least as soon as everyone would like. It really was a DUMB idea to go with a non-published proprietary format. Actually, if Bitstream were so dang confident that they were the best, why do they need to hold onto the format so tightly? Either way, I can't do what I need to do thanks to Speedo. Sure, it looks nice, but... --Kevin ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 176 Wed Jan 26, 1994 R.NELSON48 [Grouch (:{] at 00:41 EST Al - I have received so much good stuff from you that I don't mind a little excess ASCII. Better than folks that run off at the mouth. I wouldn't choose to disable a LONG POST because most are just two or three screens. Yours, however, was exceptional! Too bad I have already downloaded it a couple of times. (:{ Grouch. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 177 Wed Jan 26, 1994 COMPO at 04:14 EST Kevin - Why don't you purchase the Speedo version of the font you need? We sell Speedo (and Type 1) fonts from Bitstream and they're really quite inexpensive. Robert ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 178 Wed Jan 26, 1994 G.FUHRMAN [gnox] at 05:20 EST Robert, > Speedo fonts by and large do contain true left and right single and > double quotes. In fact, Speedo fonts generally have huge character > sets (larger and more complete than most fonts). If you can't access > the character you want, it's most likely because of the ASCII mapping > (which currently can't be changed with SpeedoGDOS, but can with That's > Write 3, which has its own Speedo engine). This is _very_ interesting! I sure hope Speedo eventually enables us to use those characters. I hate using foot and inch marks for quote marks (though not enough to buy a whole nother WP). I trust you'll let us know when and if you have a Speedo version for sale that will handle the full character set. I'm still a bit confused though ... if ASCII mapping is the problem, then when we enter a character in the currently unsupported range by the Alt-keypad method, we should see _something_, even though it may not be the character we wanted. Or maybe I'm failing to understand what you mean by "ASCII mapping"? gnox ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 179 Wed Jan 26, 1994 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 07:30 EST Speedo fonts are much better than True Type. I have seen the difference in printouts. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 180 Wed Jan 26, 1994 PG.MUSIC [PG-Kevin] at 08:13 EST Robert, Because the TTF we use is our own (PG Music). It is a music font. That is why. Also, I'm sure BitStream would not have a reasonable license agreement to use the font _ASSUMING_ they had one which would work fine. Sometimes better doesn't cut it. If you can't get it. It doesn't matter how good it is. :) --Kevin ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 181 Wed Jan 26, 1994 G.FUQUAY [GGF] at 08:13 EST 'Papa' said: > GGF, > > GDOS and Speedo together? It will be interesting to see who grabs the > printer port. I haven't had any problem putting bitmap fonts in my > ASSIGN.SYS file for Speedo but it just occured to me that they are It prints just fine, with either bitmapped or Speedo fonts. I really don't understand why Speedo wouldn't load the bitmaps. I used the exact same assign.sys file with Speedo alone as I used with both Gdos and Speedo. Is there something that should be modified about the font names to get Speedo to recognize them?........ Thanks, GGF ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 182 Wed Jan 26, 1994 PG.MUSIC [PG-Kevin] at 08:37 EST GGF, Did you set your "BitCache" in Speedo to at least as large as the filsize of your biggest bitmapped font? If bitcache is 0, I don't think Speedo will use the bitmapped fonts. --Kevin PS. Hint... check the Cache Options... ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 183 Wed Jan 26, 1994 COMPO at 20:35 EST Gary - You understand correctly. When entering characters with ASCII values 126-255 via ALT-Keypad strokes, you should be getting a character of some sort, unless the application you're running doesn't even support the high ASCII set. FYI, Speedo fonts use GASCII values (since there are so many characters supported in Speedo), and there several different 'Encoding' schemes to map the various characters to ASCII values. These include the Bitstream International Character Set (the basic set), PostScipt Standard Encoding, and others. So you see, what SpeedoGDOS needs is a way to edit the encoding tables. What we did with That's Write 3 is to use external ASCII tables containing the encoding tables so they're easily editable. Robert ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 184 Thu Jan 27, 1994 G.FUQUAY [GGF] at 00:56 EST Atari-ST RoundTable Category 14, Topic 35 Kevin said: >PS. Hint... check the Cache Options... ---------- The Cache Options were fine, and everything is working great now. Thanks for all the tips and hints, everyone. GGF ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 185 Thu Jan 27, 1994 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 03:27 EST Phil, No, there are no Speedo fonts from anyone else, and there is no conversion system. Robert, Bitstream had an ad in a trade mag I just read saying that 1,100 or whatever faces were available, and could be ordered for $35 each. Al ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 186 Thu Jan 27, 1994 P.POULOS [Phil Poulos] at 03:31 EST Robert, Thanks for the info. If a Hebrew font ever becomes available, I would be interested in purchasing it. Could you please EMail any information on availability of a Hebrew font when it becomes avaiable. Thanks for your troubles. Phillip P. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 187 Thu Jan 27, 1994 G.FUHRMAN [gnox] at 05:08 EST Robert, > When entering characters with ASCII values 126-255 via ALT-Keypad > strokes, you should be getting a character of some sort, unless the > application you're running doesn't even support the high ASCII set. My only Speedo application is Atari Works, and it just gives a question mark for any value in the range 194-220 (plus a few others). It's good to know that this is a limitation in Works and not in Speedo. (Or maybe it's not good ... depends on how soon Pradip escapes from the Jaguar cage. :) Thanks for clearing this up. gnox ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 188 Thu Jan 27, 1994 STEVE-J [DrHfuhruhurr] at 06:19 EST A.FASOLDT - You mean we could order ALL the Speedo fonts for only $38,500??? What a deal! ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 189 Thu Jan 27, 1994 PRADIP [Pradip@Works] at 13:49 EST gnox AW accepts any character between ASCII 32 to ASCII 255 and allows them to be part of the text. Since, not all characters are defined in different speedo fonts, SpeedoGDOS shows a '?' mark for the characters which are not defined. Pradip ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 190 Thu Jan 27, 1994 P.WALDING [Phil Walding] at 19:12 EST I have noticed a few comments about Speedo 4.2 and Warp 9 seeming to clash. I have today received and installed Warp 9 V3.80 on my Mega 4 ST and had installed the update to Speedo V4.2 last week. I have a number of of other Auto folder pRG's and ACC's running also and have found no clashes so far. ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 191 Thu Jan 27, 1994 COMPO at 23:19 EST Al - Yes, Bitstream has around 1100 typefaces, but only a couple hundred of those can be ordered from Bitstream in Speedo format (they also publish the fonts in PostScript Type 1 and Truetype formats). COMPO sells the whole library in Speedo and Type 1 formats. Individual typefaces cost $29 each, and that includes both the Speedo and Type 1 formats. We have a catalog of all the fonts in the Typeface Library - it is available upon request. Gary - I think I oversimplified before. Each Speedo font has a whole bunch of characters. Each character gets an Index value. For example, "A" is Index 33. The list of which character is assigned to which Index value is called (for the most part) the Bitstream International Character Set. Now we have to map these characters (or indices) to ASCII values. SpeedoGDOS maps Index 33 (A) to ASCII 65, for example. Another example - Index 153 ("1/2") is mapped to ASCII 171. Index 151 ("1/4") is mapped to ASCII 172. Here's the relevant bit - SpeedoGDOS by default does not map any Index values to ASCII values 194-220. While Pradip is correct that some Speedo fonts may not have every character for every index, that really isn't a factor since SpeedoGDOS doesn't map indices to ASCII 194-220 anyway. There is probably a good reason for this, but I don't know what it is. On the other side, That's Write 3 does map characters to values 194-220. While there is some standardization on this ASCII mapping, there can be (and are) differences. Of course, every program that uses SpeedoGDOS will use the same mapping. That's Write 3's ASCII mapping is quite similar to that of SpeedoGDOS but fills in the extra spaces (like ASCII 194-220). Robert ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 192 Fri Jan 28, 1994 M.HEBERT1 ['Papa'] at 04:55 EST Robert, It would seem that if Speedo does not map those characters that there is an opening for some enterprising soul to write a general purpose remapping program to bring them into the unfilled slots. Maybe, dare I say it, Compo could bring out such a little utility? 'Papa' ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 193 Fri Jan 28, 1994 G.FUHRMAN [gnox] at 05:33 EST Pradip and Robert, Thanks for clearing up the ASCIImapping/Speedo/font/AtariWorks issue. At least I _think_ it's cleared up. Until tomorrow anyway. :) What baffles me now is why the creators of Speedo chose to map (for instance) ASCII 169 and 170 to those useless IBM-set angle characters when they could just as easily have mapped them to smart quotation marks, like Postscript and Compugraphic do. But I don't expect an answer to that question. gnox ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 194 Fri Jan 28, 1994 COMPO at 17:34 EST Gary - > >What baffles me now is why the creators of Speedo chose to map (for instance) >ASCII 169 and 170 to those useless IBM-set angle characters when they could >just as easily have mapped them to smart quotation marks, like Postscript and >Compugraphic do. But I don't expect an answer to that question. > Don't confuse Speedo with SpeedoGDOS. That's Write 3 has the Speedo engine built-in, and we map smart quotation marks to ASCII 169 and 170. Robert ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 195 Fri Jan 28, 1994 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 23:37 EST Steve, We use a LOT of Speedo fonts in our newspaper operation, and wouldn't blink at that price. :) Al ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 196 Sat Jan 29, 1994 STEVE-J [DrHfuhruhurr] at 06:27 EST A.FASOLDT - Well, I'd HOPE they have a volume discount! ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 197 Sat Jan 29, 1994 C.BINCKLEY [-- Chuck --] at 07:14 EST Robert, Can we submit requests for the Speedo Typeface catalog here in the roundtable, or via Email? Or do we need to phone or mail a request directly to Compo? Thanks! -- Chuck -- P.S. OOOO-WEE! We just had another good aftershock here in La-La Land! My guess is somewhere close to 5.0... It's just about 3:25 am here... ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 198 Sat Jan 29, 1994 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 09:46 EST That's quite a bit considering how much I just paid for the 50 font, font pack. Why the big difference? ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 199 Sun Jan 30, 1994 STEVE-J [DrHfuhruhurr] at 05:40 EST I think the $18 50-font pack for WordPerfect 6.0 DOS is enough for me -- considering you're getting them for 99% off normal price!!! ------------ Category 14, Topic 35 Message 200 Mon Jan 31, 1994 M.MASTALER [Mike] at 02:10 EST Remember though, if you JUST buy the Wordperfect 6.0 font pack, the discs are HD (high density!). I bought them from Toad computers, and toad loads them onto 720K disks for us ST people. You pay about $35, but how many of us have the capability to copy High density diskx to 720 disks. Mike ------------