Mousehole Report

By Rusty Hodge , Mousehole BBS

In Anticipation

As of this writing, we at The MouseHole are anxiously waiting to hear about the new Macs that are about to be announced. But since you will have undoubtedly heard yourself by the time you get this issue, it makes all last minute speculation seem in vain. Oh, well, thats life.

Next month, we'll let you hear about all the exciting things that happened at MacExpo in San Fransisco; it should be great. But for this month, the exciting happenings still seem to be Finder 5.0 and 5.1, the HD-20 and Multi-Mac. (Multi-Mac is an exciting new program that gives your Mac true multi-tasking abilities. And we thought Switcher was as good as it could get!) So, without further ado... - Rusty

In offence of Microsoft

MACOWACO

Well after almost two years and LOTS of angry letters they finally sent me my update to Multiplan. The finder on the disk was 1.O!

Mactutor clarification

BRETT

The information that was printed in the December MacTutor from one of my posts about the configuration of the "future" mac, refers to the unit planned for third quarter 86 and not the "Mac +". The Mac + is an interum upgrade before the "new - improved" Mac shows up. For those interested; Apple has confirmed UNIX will be available on a Mac. (Note: it says -a- mac), Silicon manufactures have confirmed Apple has many VLSI projects under way - one being a rumored graphics controller (that will directly interface with quick draw routines, i.e. bit planes).

So far I haven't been wrong, but it gets harder day by day to get information out of Apple. Maybe they mean it when they said they would keep quiet about future products.

Multi-Mac

DON

Some Multi-Mac experiences and notes: As MacoWaco said, MM won't run on any volume except the boot volume. Even if the new volume has the System and Finder on it. Never, never, never try to rum MM twice. The Mac locks up solid. Never try printing inside a program that resides on another disk with a system file. Not only will you bomb out to the flaming pits of perdition the moment you activate another program (especially communications software), BUT you can completely screw up the disk that program is on. I did this once with my MS-Word disk. MM fornicated the Word disk so thoroughly, I couldn't get the drives to even recognize it as Macintosh disk. It is best never to insert another disk into either drive that has either a System, Finder, ImageWriter or LaserWriter file on it while you are running MM. Only run programs on non-System disks. Never try to run MM on a HyperDrive ... unless of course you enjoy using Backup to restore most of your Hyper to its original state. Never run the PRAM utility under MM. It will not only bomb the Mac,it can screw up your parameter RAM. This IS easily fixed, but that doesn't mean it isn't annoying. Never use Donald Brown's MockWrite under MM, unless you close it between applications. It bombs effortlessly. Don't use the continuation DA under MM. Not only is it unnecessary, but it will really confuse the Sheol out of the Mac trying to execute two programs that shouldn't work anyway.

All in all, Multi-Mac is an amazing program. Maybe whats-his-name will get it to run on a hard disk one of these days.

DEVIN B. KING

I have recently been able to run MultiMac 2.8 on my MacBottom 20 with the 2.01 software. Also, I have noticed that MM will not run with some modified systems (i.e. FKEY installations).

Speed up Finder 4.1

ANT KILLER

(Well, a little!) Open Finder with the Open File command in FEdit, then find these hex strings and change to 4E71's (NOP's). If they're not at these exact locations, just do a hex search for the strings.

Sector: 13     Pos:220  
Look for:   486E FFE0 A8A1
Change to:  4E71 4E71 4E71
Sector: 13     Pos:308  
Look for:   486E FFF8 A8A1 486E FFE0 A8A1
Change to:  4E71 4E71 4E71 4E71 4E71 4E71
Sector: 13     Pos:380  
Look for: 486E FFE0 A8A1 486E FFE8 A8A1 486E             FFE0 A8A1
Change to:  4E71 4E71 4E71 4E71 4E71 4E71 4E71           4E71 4E71

This stops the FrameRects (Zooming effect) from happening when you open or close a window from the Desktop, kinda weird, why do this? I don't know! [Makes it look like it's opening up, silly! (Probably left over from Jeff Raskin's original notebook Mac concept.) -Ed ]

Hard Disk Notes

GARY VOTH

Apple has in beta-test a large (36k) DA for the HD 20 called Backup. It is not available yet, however, and probably won't be before the 1st quarter of' 86. Like HFS itself, it is probably meant to be an "insanely-great" implementation of what is usually a straight-forward utility. Because it takes time to develop optimum Mac software, we will probably have to live without it for a while longer. Expect it to support all HFS-compatible hard disks and the 800K drives as a backup medium. [THANK YOU APPLE!! -Ed.]

I am still using Finder 5.0 (supplied with the HD 20). I have about 7M loaded onto the disk now and am not experiencing the slow Scrapbook phenomenon. The Scrapbook works just fine, much faster than with floppies. What advantages are there to Finder 5.1? [Bug fixes... -Ed.]

Random notes: Copy II Mac Hard Disk 4.2 will install Jazz onto the HD with no apparent problems. However, do not try it with anything else! All copy protection schemes which use the invisible/locked/protected file method, ordinarily the easiest to circumvent, will cause a system error. Copy II does not yet handle the new Finder flags properly.

You can also install Excel by making a copy of the program disk with Copy II Mac 4.3, then running the Microsoft hard disk install utility off of the copy disk. NEVER install from the master disk itself, as Microsoft allows only one installation, period. You cannot "un-install" your copy of Excel to move it from one hard disk to another!

The latest version of ResEdit and FEdit can each handle the HD 20 in a limited way. ResEdit seems to work well, but FEdit is safe to use only in peek mode. ResEdit allows the setting of most Finder flag bits except the protect bit. That means that, for now, I haven't been able to run a copy of Word on the hard disk without the Word master. It is a simple matter to unprotect Word (or Multiplan, File and Chart), even if you can't directly copy the key file from the floppy to the hard disk. Simply use ResEdit to make a new blank resource fork, name it "Kensh Rutha" (or whatever name Microsoft uses), then make it invisible, locked, and protected. Voila! The only catch is, we don't have a utility for HFS to set the protect bit yet! [Why? Sounds suspicous...-Ed.]

By the way, most of you that read the trade papers are probably aware of the hoopla surrounding the hidden messages planted in Microsoft's MS-DOS applications. People have discovered worms that supposedly destroy "illegal" copies and browbeat the user with threats. Well, one of the hidden files on the Excel master disk is called "Tsunami," after the giant tidal wave...

More Hard Disk Comments

BRETT

With all this talk about the HD20, I just had to make a quick comment about my Hyper. I am (shock.. gasp...) content! I love my 10 meg Hyper/512K RAM Mac. With the Aztec development software and a few other common (macpaint, macwrite, ...) programs always loaded, it does all I need. If I don't want to see it I just boot off a floppy. I don't need problems with new drives, new operating systems, new bugs... Bliss, for once with a computer I have true bliss!

MouseHole Mailbox: Draw Complaints Remedied

Alan Lee

In response to More Draw 1.9 Complaints, Bob Denny (Mac Tutor, Dec `85) and Draw Bugs, MacoWaco (Mac Tutor, Oct `85)...This "bug" only seems to occur when "custom rulers are in use. To see the the remedy (in Draw 1.7,at least): Create a box, type some text while the box is selected, creating a centered text in the box. Group it. Select Turn Grid Off from the Layout menu. Then grab the grouped "object" with the arrow and drag it around in circles, 5 or 6 times. (Watch what happens to your text!) Draw tries to align the box and the text to the grid treating them as independent objects when the Grid is Turned On.

Free Upgrade!

HIGH ORDER BYTE

The Wall Street Journal reported today that Apple is offering a free upgrade to all its Mac owners. Just come in to any Apple dealer, and free of charge, they will grind Steve Jobs name off the inside back cover of your Macintosh. (Hee hee!)