Welcome to the May 1997 edition of Hard Copy (alias Hardware) By Brian Fouhse (c) copyright 1997 Regina Saskatchewan I hope these ramblings are of some interest to our members and readers. Of course, all the opinions and items mentioned are mine alone, and should not be used as the basis for any investments or purchase decisions without your own considerations. Did you here the one about the new Pentium chip that still can't do math? Time is a precious commodity in the spring, what with the weather being warm enough to be outside. Bad time to commit to editorializing, too. So for your reading enjoyment, (this month only?) I present some of the clippings I've saved from my Internet wanderings of late. (They are unedited, except for margins and word wrap) They include: Don Crabb - Catch 22 situation Commodore missed owning Apple NetObjectsFusion review Clarus, the dogcow Advertising standards for the rest of us Three 3 founders of Apple Rhapsody's current status Rhapsody rumors MAY 16, 1997 VOLUME 11 ISSUE 20 MAC MANAGER DON CRABB Mac users can spread the word, help Apple escape its Catch-22 Apple has an interesting marketing problem, sort of a Catch-22. It has good messages to tell customers about its new product lines, its development efforts for the Rhapsody operating system and the success stories of Mac OS customers. But because its cash flow is still negative, Apple lacks the money to broadcast these messages. As a result, Apple is stuck in the vicious circle of "We have to save money to give the company time to make a comeback and improve sales, yet we cannot improve sales if we don't get our marketing messages in front of our customers. And that takes money we don't have because our sales have not improved." Ads? What ads? Recently, I praised Apple for its in-your-face series of ads called Only Apple. The gist of the ads was to the point: We're Apple. We make computers in key categories that smoke the Windows competition. And here's how. It was great stuff, but only if you read a major U.S. daily newspaper, MacWEEK or a few other computer industry journals where the ads ran. If you're Kent Fanning, for example, a 55-year-old professor of oceanography at the University of South Florida in Tampa, you haven't heard a peep out of Apple. "In our area, I've heard or seen none of these ads," Fanning told me. Word of mouth Since Apple (a) must get its messages out to its customers, (b) can't afford to buy all or even most of the advertising it needs to pull that off, and (c) can't afford to wait for sales to pick up to give it cash flow for a big ad campaign, the company is left with few options. The option I like best is targeted word of mouth. Instead of wasting time and money on changing the minds of some anti-Apple editors and publications, Apple should pitch from a position of strength. It must use recent success stories of Mac customers great and small to make the point that Apple is back, stronger than ever. Then it must take those stories directly to its customers through user groups, organizations friendly to the Mac - including the great number of new pro-Mac Web sites such as O'Grady's PowerPage (http://ogrady.com) and MacInsider (http://www.macinsider.com) - and to Mac champions it has pinpointed nationwide. The place to start is with us - the Mac managers. Apple, give us access to your recent customer success stories and carte blanche to cannonball them along. I guarantee you'll see positive reactions almost immediately. As Professor Fanning told me, "We owe Macs a big debt of gratitude. Two years ago my wife knew zero about computers, and now she does virtu ally all her [teaching], writing and communicating [with] a Performa at home, which is linked to our university through FreePPP and Farallon Timbuktu Pro software." Get these stories out, Apple. And use Mac managers and their networks to help tell them. Did you know? - What might have been.. Sunday, May 17, 1997. In the early days, Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak found themselves with a great product-the Apple II-but no capital to fund its production. And so Jobs began to shop around for investors. One of the companies Jobs targeted was Commodore. He managed to persuade a few executives to visit the garage of his parents' home for a demonstration. Though the executives were impressed with the Apple II prototype, it was Jobs who made Commodore the offer: he would gladly sell Apple to the company for $100,000, two $36,000-a-year positions for himself and Wozniak, and some Commodore stock. Commodore ultimately decided to pass on Job's offer, unwilling to take a risk on the garage based company. Just six months later, the company introduced the woefully inadequate Commodore PET-a product whose technical merit came nowhere near that of the Apple II. REVIEW: NetObjects Fusion 1.0 Friday, May 16, 1997. NetObjects, $495 US. Requirements: Power Macintosh (Power Macintosh 8100 or greater recommended), System 7.1.2, 60MB of disk space for a full install, TCP/IP compliance with MacTCP or Open Transport, CDROM. Contact: (888) 449-6400 or http://www.netobjects.com/. The wait is over. NetObjects Fusion WYSIWYG site authoring tool is finally available to the weary Macintosh Web site designer. Web page design can be a painstaking, complicated assignment, but NetObjects Fusion expedites and alleviates some of the more mundane functions of the task. Fusion eliminates the imprecision of HTML, creates individual pages, maintains entire sites with ease, and gives users a real grid on which to place objects with single-pixel accuracy. Unfortunately, like most version 1.0 programs, NetObjects Fusion isn't perfect. For those of us accustomed to bloatware, with a multitude of menu, submenu, and toolbar choices to comprehend, Fusion presents the user with a simplified choice of the five major tasks with which a Web site designer would be involved: site management, page design, overall design style choices, asset (images and scripts) management, and the publishing or uploading of the finished pages to the site server. Site View, Fusion's flowchart-style map of a Web site, provides an easily understood overview of a site's structure. As design changes are implemented on a Web site, the designer can see the changes immediately reflected within Site View. Behind the scene, all internal links are automatically updated as a page's relationship is modified relative to other pages. Site View mode also provides a Finder-like outline view, which presents the site structure as a familiar hierarchical listing. To the right of this window is an information chart containing each page's name, type, completion status, publish status, and comments. We found the Page View design workspace to be Fusion's strongest and weakest points. The layout tools are clear and concise. The contextual popup help descriptions on the toolbar icons are indicative of the kind of foresight the program utilizes. This helped alleviate the need to crack the manual to understand what a particular tool does. The level of text and object placement is unsurpassed-one can actually overlap web elements and have them display in the browser as such. On the weaker side, interapplication drag and drop is not supported, no built-in spell checker is provided, and for those of us who like to tweak our HTML source code, there is no direct editing feature. (Both drag and drop and an HTML editing feature will be included in Fusion's next release.) When importing Web pages originally created in other applications we experienced difficulties with graphics and tables. At present, NetObjectsFusion 1.0 only allows importing of single pages, not entire sites. In our estimation, the Style View mode of Fusion is second in importance only to Site View. The cohesiveness of site design elements is the glue that holds any site together. Fusion provides an array of graphical elements that one can choose from to set a site's style or tone. These elements will automatically be utilized on new pages as they are added. Styles can also be edited and saved or created from scratch and imported. For the Web designer who needs to create a number of sites quickly, the Style View function of Fusion is an invaluable tool. Assets View empowers users with the ability to easily update references throughout a site. If you need to rename a page, you establish that change in the Assets View, and the change then ripples down through every reference in every page in your site. This can save Web designers considerable time when an unforeseen change or update is required. Publishing is a great feature, eliminating the need for a separate FTP client for transferring site elements to the Web server. The program will also generate low-bandwidth or text-only versions of your site, which people with slow Internet connections will dearly appreciate. We found Fusion's documentation to be especially well organized. The Getting Started guide gave enough instruction for the experienced Mac user to begin Web page design immediately. Final Thoughts Despite the fact that NetObjects Fusion lacks some features found in lower-priced options, and the price may be a few clicks too high for some Web site designers, no other program that we have seen truly fuses page design and site management with such ease of use. Fusion is a welcomed addition to any high-end design professional's software list. With its first generation product NetObjects has emerged at the forefront and revolutionized Web site design software. Download a 30-day trial release of Fusion at: www.netobjects.com/ Clarus, the Dogcow Friday, May 16, 1997. Every time you adjust your printer's page setup, you see her. She is the Clarus the Dogcow, and she has become instrumental in helping Mac folk print without problem. Dogcattle, of course, is her species, so named for its special genetic blending of a dog and a cow. And like all dogcows, she says "Moof!" According the fabled Tech Note 31 (April 1989), the dogcow has its origins in the Mac's Cairo font. Somehow, the iconic creature made its way into version 4.0 ofthe LaserWriter driver, and has been there ever since. Since being adopted by the folks at Apple's Developer Technical Support, the dogcow has developed a mythology all its own. Apple now sells tee-shirts and mugs featuring the dogcow, and if you happen by DTS's Dogcattle homepage, you'll find Tech Note 31, QuickTime movies, and even a quote from Clarus (Moof!). Find "A Nest of Dogcattle" at: devworld.apple.com/dev/dts/dogcow.html Cerebreality: You can't hide your lyin' ads... Thursday, May 15, 1997. Apple Computer has begun its journey back to respectability and beyond, we hope. For Apple, this bandwagon will be pulled by new line of PowerBooks, lightning fast desktop models, and a blistering ad campaign designed to convince the world that the Mac will not only unleash their creativity, but will beat the snot out of any Wintel machine. In other words, Apple is taking the battle to the territory of the enemy. Unfortunately, to compete on this playing field, Apple may have to do what its competition does best: lie, lie, lie! As anyone who has ever worked in Information Management knows, the best way to wring gratitude out of people is to mystify computer technology as much as possible. You didn't think it was technological superiority that makes them talk like that, did you? IM folks have a vested interest in keeping your computer as confusing as possible; they wouldn't want you trying to fix it yourself, now would they? As proof that nerds of all levels are evolved from the same proto geek, it seems that all the big computer giants have adopted this tactic to keep the public in the dark and loyal to the Wintel altar. Take any Intel ad (please). In it you see sweeping animation, CD-ROMs, Internet connections, seamless video conferencing, big games (with graphics not possible, mind you, on anything less than a Silicon Graphics workstation), and multimedia entertainment. All this, we are told, is possible thanks to the Intel Pentium Processor (duh-doo-duh-DOO). Notice that these ads do not say that these things can be accomplished FASTER with a Pentium Processor, they imply that they are possible ONLY with the magic Intel chip. There is apparently even more excitement on the horizon with the fabulous "MMX technology," though the ads give no clue what MMX technology is (maybe it runs the "Northstar System" on Cadillacs). Go out and ask 100 reasonably well educated people what Intel sells. Blink, blink, blink . . . Computers? Most people, even those who use computers on a daily basis, have no idea, because that's the way Intel wants it. I know what a processor does, you know what a processor does, and we know it has nothing to do with your ability to run a CD-ROM drive or connect to the Internet. It may have a great deal to do with the speed at which your computer executes programs and the number of software packages available to you, but it means nothing more. I am as modest as anyone (no, really, I am) and I consider myself on the bulging portion of the computer-savvy curve. So, if I am confused by these little highly-produced slights-of-hand, imagine how Joe or Jane Aptiva feels. One ad is designed to make you think that the Intel Pentium Processor is a CD-ROM drive-the ad even shows the CD going into the chip! What possible reason would Intel have to create this misconception? Because most people who already own or are thinking of buying a computer are concerned with what their machine can do, not how it goes about doing it. If they watch CNN and hear about all these great multimedia encyclopedias on CD-ROM and then see this little Intel ad, they think "cool software=CD-ROM=Intel Pentium Processor." Implied as well is "=Windows 95," but that's another rant. No wonder people are afraid to buy Apple, they think we still use tape drives. The Internet has just made things worse. It has opened a new universe of mystery in which people with goods and services to sell can bend the truth to make them seem like the only ticket taker on the on-ramp to the Information Super . . . oops, thought I was a local TV news anchor for a moment. MCI has really been torquing me off of late. We all know that no one owns the Internet. To get on it, however, you must pay an Internet Service Provider for the privilege of dialing up their server and using their infrastructure. Fair enough. Now, pretend you are a big telecommunications giant just getting into this Internet thing. You need to give people a reason to sign up with you and not that small local ISP with 2,000 subscribers who charges one half of what you do and provides decent customer service. The answer: tell people that YOUR Internet is faster. Does that sound wrong to you? It certainly grabs my ear every time it comes on. I can tune out all the "there is no race, there are no genders on the Internet" fluff and ignore the blasted emoticon that appears in MCI's tag line. That sort of ham-handed, pie-eyed imagery is what one has to expect from the hype machine. What I can't get around is that MCI either has no clue what the Internet is (which I doubt) or is gearing their ad campaign to take advantage of the Internet's inherent incomprehensibility. The Internet is a tough thing to get your head around. Its ability to cross borders, evaporate distances, and allow essentially free international communication has required a deep shift in the way we view our world. For some people, the adjustment takes longer than others. Let me use my father as an example. Dad has used a computer for a couple of years now at work. It is connected to an internal network at his office in which he can send e-mail and access files on shared drives. Yet, he has no understanding of the Internet. I have devised at least a hundred metaphors to tap into what he does understand to bring him into what he does not. "Imagine if your hard drive was split into a thousand pieces and located around the world." It just doesn't work. My father is a highly educated man (if a bit technophobic), but it is just too big a leap of imagination to bring him out of the world of direct physical connections. People like my father are the targets of these campaigns and, while some are falling for it, many are just washing their hands on the technology all together. And that is a shame. The great holy grail of the computer industry has been the mythical "Other Fifty Percent": those people who cannot or will not buy a computer. This, for example, is the target audience of the WebTV blitz. The assumption is that these folks will buy a computer if only the annoying customization is weeded out. Take updates, upgrades, file saving, and keyboard input out of the user's hands and they will accept a computer because it doesn't feel like a computer. While the enfranchisement of this group is a noble goal and I believe there are many good points behind WebTV, I believe the appeal of these devices will be short-lived. The limited Internet access WebTV offers will be so boring that users will abandon it, or will get a taste for the Internet's true potential and buy a computer. Obviously, the latter would be a good thing, but five hundred dollars is an awful lot for training wheels. Wouldn't it be better to bring people to a computer in the first place? I know, if it were that simple there would be no Other Fifty Percent and if I really had an answer, I would be a rich man. Still my gut tells me that if we stop lying to people and making things more difficult than they are, computers will become a lot less scary. So what is Apple to do? Obviously, the touchy-feely approach of the last few years has not done the trick. Unleashing people's creativity is a mighty and lofty goal but it is no longer Apple's exclusive province; it hasn't inspired people, and it doesn't get a single CPU on a business desktop. I, myself, adored the cynical and iconoclastic approach of the initial ad campaign: the 1984 ad is rightfully a classic and I even loved the offensive "Lemmings" ad that followed it. Apple, however, no longer has the luxury of artistry and subtlety with its life on the line. What they need to do is either follow the lead of companies like Intel and MCI or run at them head-on. The first approach won't do a thing for its market share but it might get them treated more "seriously." The second, on the other hand, might allow them to do what we in the Mac user community have wanted for some time. That is, inform the world that anything that can be done on a Wintel machine can be done on a Mac as fast or faster and a whole lot easier. Show them the stats: cost of maintenance, resale value, ease of upgrade. The Mac has been the top of all these categories for years, but has never crowed about it to the consuming public. Printing it in MacUser is just preaching to the choir. Many people (high-level users aside) buy Wintel machines out of inertia. It's not that they think the Mac is a toy, it's that they have no idea what it is, so they go with what they hear about the most. Above all Apple needs to make some noise, but it also needs to tell people in no uncertain terms who it is and why it is better. For me this means explaining the technology and the humanity of the Mac in terms of how it can satisfy their needs better than the Wintel monolith. Or we could just tell them that the Mac will brighten their whites, raise their children, up their I.Q., clean their toilet, clear up their skin, turn them into a nine-year-old Hindu boy, and double on sax. Step right up. Greg Kramer gak@spots.ab.ca Did you know? - The THREE Founders of Apple Thursday, May 15, 1997. If you ask any Mac aficionado who founded Apple, chances are they'll tell you it was "the two Steves". This, however, is a mistake. When Apple was registered as a partnership on April 1, 1976, there were three names listed -- Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, and a gentleman named Ron Wayne. According to Owen W. Linzmayer's "The Mac Bathroom Reader" ($12.99, from Sybex), Ron Wayne was an engineer at Atari who Jobs recruited by offering him 10% of the new company. As Jobs launched into high-powered sales mode, making heavy commitments to deliver product with the intent of running a debt with suppliers, Wayne began to get cold feet. As he saw it, he was liable for 10% of Apple's debt. Having been burnt by previous investments which failed to pan out, Wayne wasn't in the mood for any more losses. If the company couldn't be built from the ground up, he didn't want any part of it. And so Ron Wayne tendered his resignation a few short months after the company had formed, receiving just $500 for his share of the company. Linzmayer's "Mac Bathroom Reader" puts this value in perspective: As of 1993, 10% of Apple Computer, Inc. would have been worth $290 million. Rhapsody's Current Status Rhapsody is currently way ahead of schedule, a very rare occurance at Apple. Some Apple employees have even claimed that the system is so far in development that they are going to start adding in "mac-like" tweaks soon. He is a run down of the current status: Has reached internal build 8, which has beginning interface framework based a little on the never finished NextStep 4.0 and alot of MacOS 8 for a graphical interface rather than the text only setup in earlier development versions. Can run extensions and applications. Has working Blue and Yellow Boxes to run under the MacOS and Rhapsody. The Blue Box, the MacOS part, has been reported to run many MacOS applications. Over 3 weeks ahead of development schedule. Apple is considering using OpenTransport for Rhapsody despite earlier claims of stopping its development. The reason apparently is that OpenTransport is more user friendly than Rhapsody's TCP setup. The Yellow Box will be based on OpenStep and called "Concert" and will be ported to run on Windows 95 and Windows NT or any machine with Intel hardware. Can run a Quake beta (shoot 'em up game from ID Software, the makers of DOOM). April 1997: MacOS Rumors Talks About Rhapsody (5/11/97) The new MacOS Rumors site has a lot of tidbits about Rhapsody. Among the highlights: Apple has the Blue Box done to the point that an engineer was surfing the web with an unnamed browser (which means Open Transport, PPP, and Serial DMA, among other things, are very far along). Apparently, this is on top of the Copland NuKernal, but will be ported to Mach very soon. Development of Concert iv7 is going very well, with Display PostScript support shaping up quite nicely. OpenGL support is a bit more problematic. The iv7 interface is looking to be strongly based on Tempo, but there have been some reports of the NeXT Dock and other NeXT-influenced items cropping up, too... Some Netscape developers with roots in NeXT programming supposedly have a Communicator PR3 build running on Rhapsody. The Concert iv7 build may be ready in time for display at WWDC. There's a PDF file with a few snapshots and comments from the first time the Rhapsody kernal ran a debugger in command-line mode at Apple. Quake on Rhapsody at WWDC? (5/4/97) Here's a very exciting tidbit. Remember the news item "id Software Developer Talks About NeXTstep," from our March 22nd News? The one where John Carmack committed to personally porting id's popular Win32 games to Rhapsody if Apple made it easy to do the high-end graphics stuff he needed to do? Well, Apple might have done it. I've heard that there will be a Quake port demoed for Rhapsody at WWDC, along with some other "suprises." Geez, I wish I was able to go... Rhapsody iv6 Seeded within Apple (5/4/97) Rhapsody.Info is reporting that the Rhapsody iv6 build is now fully seeded around Apple for testing with components such as QuickDraw 3D. Development on the new user interface is starting in earnest, and will probably start to eat into the three weeks Apple is ahead of schedule. The iv6 build supposedly includes support for extensions and a fairly stable Blue Box, which has been tested with quite a few current applications. Other New Rumors... (5/4/97) Other rumors surfaced at the end of April, so make sure you check them out if you haven't seen them lately... ------------------------------------- Better close for now. Hope to see you at the meeting, I'm looking forward to "touching" the PowerBook 3400 and eMate 300. Brian Fouhse bfouhse@cableregina.com