Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/5/84; site cbdkc1.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!cbdkc1!gwe From: gwe@cbdkc1.UUCP ( George Erhart x4021 CB 3D288 WDS ) Newsgroups: net.micro.mac Subject: FLASH!!! New/old rumors from BMUG BBS/MacQueue BBS! Message-ID: <1256@cbdkc1.UUCP> Date: Wed, 18-Dec-85 19:45:49 EST Article-I.D.: cbdkc1.1256 Posted: Wed Dec 18 19:45:49 1985 Date-Received: Thu, 19-Dec-85 05:36:01 EST Reply-To: gwe@cbdkc1.UUCP ( George Erhart x4021 CB 3D288 WDS ) Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories, Columbus Lines: 192 [ for your enjoyment! ] These are two news articles that I pulled from the Berkeley Mac Users Group BBS for your reading pleasure ... they are original from the MacQueue BBS as the message indicates. I will be real happy if the prices and improvements listed here are for real! ------------------------- George Erhart at AT&T Bell Laboratories Columbus, Ohio 614-860-4021 {ihnp4,cbosgd}!cbdkc1!gwe ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Category: 1 Rumors (moderated by OLIVERWENDELL JONESIII) Message #: 322 Submitted: 12/16/85 23:03 Submitted by: TIM BRACE Subject: MacPlus Info (relayed from MacQueue BBS--661-7374, with permission) MacPlus By Alt-Sysop Steve Maller I recently got a look at Apple's Tech Note Z-1. This is a confidential technical note covering the new ROMs. Unfortunately, I was not able to persuade the loyal developer (who is the owner of said Tech Note) to allow me to photocopy it for myself. Therefore, what follows is my best recollection of the details of the Tech Note: First, a few hardware changes: - 800K internal floppy with internal speed control (up to 200% improvement in performance!) - SCSI interface port - New keyboard with built-in 10-key pad - 1 megabyte (1024K) socketed RAM expandable to four megs with the new 1 megabit RAMs (when they're available) - 128K of ROM (up from the current 64K) - the rest seems to have stayed the same (including the 7.8 mhz 68000 and screen handling) However, the exciting stuff is what is in the ROMs. The Tech Note covers the changes in the ROM on a Manager-by-Manager basis. Remember, this is a thumb- nail sketch of what I saw. Resource Manager Mostly speed increases and similar optimizations here. Some interesting new features including more intelligent and much faster resource file compacting. The new manager reads resources into RAM (I think) when they are to be re-written to speed the shuffling of resource maps and such. Also, the Resource Manager now does high-speed reads when launching an application for all the 'preload' resources in that app's file. This will drastically speed up launching of an application. Quickdraw Some neat stuff here! Atkinson has been real generous with his wisdom, and included a lot of MacPaint's more spectacular items in the new ROM's. You can now do a 'seed fill'; this is best described as what happens when you use the Paint bucket in MacPaint. You can also do lasso simulations with another new Quickdraw ROM call. But, the most spectacular changes to Quickdraw are in the area of speed. That "...hand optomized assembly language" that was one of the selling points of Quickdraw was apparently not quite as optomized as one might have thought! A list of speed improvements is quite impressive. DrawText was sped up by 50%; CopyBits was improved by anywhere from 60-400% depending on the scaling involved; vertical and diagonal LineTo drawing sped up by over 100%, and more that I can't remember. This all has interesting ramifications... Font Manager Andy Hertzfeld has written the new Font Manager. (An interesting bit of trivia is in order here. Andy has apparently written four or five of these critters, of which this one was chosen for it's superiority. Only a real nerd can get off on writing Font Managers enough to write four or five of 'em!) In general, most of the improvements are performance related. There can now be 32,000 fonts, not the previous limit of 512. SCI Manager There are a number of new ROM calls to support the new port. I guess they are the standard low-level stuff like _Read, _Write, _Control, etc. Window Manager Here, you are given the routine that zooms a window out to cover the screen. I believe this will be covered in the window's title bar by a new little icon or something in the default Window defProc. TextEdit The default clikLoop now covers the problem of a user scrolling the selection off the screen by scrolling the text in the direction of the dragging mouse. Also, fractional spacing is now allowed, to better facilitate the LaserWriter's extra capabilities. File Manager The most obvious difference here is HFS. Remember, there is now a path possible which might be quite complex. Most applications' habits are quite nasty here, and many blow up under HFS for this reason. For example, Bill Duvall's EDIT refers to a file called FILE on a disk called DISK as "DISK:FILE". Supreme no-no now. It is important to use the vRefNum returned by the SFPackage... A lot of system resources like MDEF's, WDEF's, CDEF's, Chicago12 font, DRVR's have been built in to the ROMs. This should also speed things up significantly. That's all I can remember. The new ROMs will answer a lot of criticism about speed problems with the Mac, and make that adventure known as "...programming the Macintosh" even more interesting and challenging than it ever was. I'm excited. Are you? 12/16/85 The Mac Plus Facts We've learned that several weeks ago Apple held a meeting for the press and dealers in which they announced tentative pricing as follows: Mac Plus - $2700 68000 CPU, 1 meg socketed RAM, SCSI Port, New keyboard, New ROMS, 800K drive 800K Drive & ROM upgrade - $300 The new drive will not only be twice as big, but also twice as fast! System Board Swap - $600 for 512K boards, - $800 for 128k or third party upgraded boards The System Board Swap does not include the new internal drives. The public announcement will be made just before the MacWorld Expo (1/15). Wow. Alt-Sysop Steve Maller Category: 1 Rumors (moderated by OLIVERWENDELL JONESIII) Message #: 323 Submitted: 12/16/85 23:10 Submitted by: TIM BRACE Subject: MultiMac (relayed from MacQueue BBS--661-7374, with permission) MultiMac by Leo Laporte, Sysop #202 6 15 Dec 85 13:54:38 From: Sysop To: All Subj: MultiMac I've picked up some info about MultiMac. For those of you who don't know - MultiMac is a multi-tasking shell that works like Switcher. Unlike Switcher, however, MultiMac allows multiple programs to be working at the same time. Clicking on the window of a program will make its menu bar active. Any processing the program is doing continues even if its menu bar isn't active. The latest version is 2.8. It is not, howver, public domain. Nor is it available for downloading. I had inadvertently posted it for a few hours, but it's no longer on the board. The version I saw was written in 4th(!) and worked well, although it was very fussy about its environment. According to the rumor mill, it will be out soon, from a Canadian company, for around $40. This will be the one program everyone who uses a Mac will have to have! Keep your eyes peeled. -- George Erhart at AT&T Bell Laboratories Columbus, Ohio 614-860-4021 {ihnp4,cbosgd}!cbdkc1!gwe