Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!husc6!uwvax!vanvleck!uwmcsd1!ig!agate!ucbvax!pro-carolina.cts.COM!delton
From: delton@pro-carolina.cts.COM (Don Elton)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.apple
Subject: scrolling and the unenhanced //e
Message-ID: <8806201416.AA12217@crash.cts.com>
Date: 20 Jun 88 10:55:57 GMT
Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Reply-To: pnet01!pro-simasd!pro-carolina!delton@nosc.mil
Organization: The Internet
Lines: 43

Re: the problem of losing data when the firmware on an unenhanced //e is used
for scrolling in a comm program.

TIC - Talk is Cheap - currently uses firmware scrolling.  This works fine on
the enhanced //e, the //c, and the IIgs.  Data is lost on the unenhanced //e
if you're using over 300 baud though it's not lost at up to 19,200 baud in
mose cases with the above named computers.  

Sure TIC could add its own scrolling code and bypass the problem and it might
do so eventually if I find a better reason than this to do my own scrolling
but for now it's a conscious decision of how the program should work, not an
oversight as some would have you to believe.  

You see, the //e enhancement kit has been on the market since March of 1985
and has been installed in every //e sold after this date and in a significant
number of the //e's sold after this date.  There's no decent reason not to get
this inexpensive upgrade.  If I add scrolling code, one way or another, it
will penalize the vast majority of users using machines that can do decent
scrolling as it will take up valuable program space that can be used for
something more useful like new script language commands, conferencing modes
etc etc.

Maybe the solution is to just go ahead and use 65C02 op codes and more liberal
use of MouseText to drop unenhanced //e support altogether but there's no
overriding reason why this has to be done.  In my experience TIC has been the
program to convince many people that they need to break down and get the
enhancement kit so at least people can get a general feel of the program
before they get the upgrade so they can decide if it's worth it to them.  In
that respect it makes good marketing sense for me to advise in my docs that
the enhancement kit is "strongly recommended but not absolutely required"
(since you can always add nulls at the host end).

I don't consider requiring the enhancement kit any more of a shortcoming
though than requiring a //e as opposed to the II+ or the Apple I for that
matter.  Life moves on.

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