CompuNotes Notes from The Cutting Edge of Personal Computing January 23, 1998 Issue 111 +=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+= To subscribe, send an e-mail to listserv@peach.ease.lsoft.com SUBSCRIBE COMPUNOTES-L FirstName LastName To unsubscribe, send an e-mail to listserv@peach.ease.lsoft.com SIGNOFF COMPUNOTES-L For Contact and Other Information See Bottom of Publication! +=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+= CONTENTS My Notes: 1=> My Plea for Technical Help -- Results!, mailto:pgrote@i1.net 2=> This Issue's Winner! News: 3=> News of the Week, mailto:pgrote@i1.net Interview: 4=> Interview with Jim Youll, mailto:jyoull@hotmail.com Reviews: 5=> Product: Carmageddon - game/action Reviewed By Doug Reed, mailto:dr2web@sprynet.com 6=> Product: Learning Perl, 2nd Edition by Randall L. Schwartz & Tom Christiansen - book/programming Reviewed By: Doug Reed, mailto:dr2web@sprynet.com 7=> Product: LaunchBoard by Darwin Keyboards - utility/keyboard Reviewed By: Bev Walton-Porter 8=> Product: Magic the Gathering - game/role playing Reviewed By: Karl Roberts, mailto:roberts@theramp.net --- BEGIN ISSUE 1=> My Plea for Technical Help -- Results!, mailto:pgrote@i1.net If you remember in issue 109 I asked for help on the following items: 1) I need a Happy Face bitmap in 800x600 for my background. Can't find one anyplace. It should be the standard yellow happy face on a black background. 2) In Outlook 98 how do I have it open a new instance of Explorer when I click on a link instead of using the open one? Right now I have to SHIFT-CLICK and pick Explorer. 3) Same as above but for shortcuts on my desktop. 4) I need a Man in Black theme as a WAV file. Not the theme song by Danny Elfman, but the pumping sound you hear when you go to their web site (http://www.meninblack.com) . I tried "borrowing" it from the web site but the sound is integrated with a Shockwave download or something. 5) How in the world do I get NetMeeting to work with a proxy server, specifically WinProxy? Yes, I have looked at the knowledge base article, but it is very cryptic. Has anyone gotten this to work? 6) Same as above but the application is a Connectix VC instead of NetMeeting. 7) A web site which lists all the known patches for Windows 95. 8) An easy to use Windows 95 utility which will take the IRQ information from CONTROL PANEL/SYSTEM/DEVICE MANAGER and show me which IRQs are free. 9) A free, automated FTP program where I can A) Schedule FTPs to complete and B) FTP whole directory structures. 10) A free utility where at anytime and anyplace in Windows 95 I can hit, for instance, CONTROL-SHIFT-C and it dumps the CompuNotes contact information into the document or web site I am on. Well, the answers are in: 1) Lots of icons, but only one person came through with an actual background. Duncan Long (mailto:duncan@kansas.net) came through with a background he created for me. VERY COOL! Check out his websites at http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Zone/4686/ and http://www.kansas.net/~duncan/portfolio.html. 2) Someone responded, but the answer didn't work. 3) No answers. 4) Someone suggested playing a CD into a microphone and capturing the sound. Egads! Someone gave me the macromedia files. EGADS! Someone also suggested an MP3 file. EGADS! I need WAVs! Finally, Victor Healy gave me the url http://www.meninblack.com/media/audio/sound1.wav which is what I was looking for! He also suggested CompuNotes going to an HTML format and sent a great e-mail message to show its benefits. 5) No answers. 6) No answers. 7) Tons of answers. The two most popular were http://home.tampabay.rr.com/walbeehm/win95upd.html and http://www.winmag.com/win95/update95.htm. But for the ultimate answer check out http://www.microsoft.com/windows/software/updates.htm. 8) Ok, this was the zinger. I am Mr. Windows 95. Used it since the first beta. Written tons of articles on it. Use it all the time. This goes in the "Wow, I didn't know that" file. Steven says it best as, "Perhaps I misunderstood your request, but you can get this information from the device manager. When you go to the device manager double (left mouse button) click on COMPUTER (at the top of the list) and you will be able to see all the resources by IRQ, I/O, Memory Address, or DMA. Of course this lists the "used" resources, but you can easily tell which ones are not used." 9) No go on this, though several people suggested CUTEFTP and WSFTP. 10) One great answer! Terry Blount turned me on to KeyText (http://www.mjmsoft.com/keytext.htm). Great little program, but what is ironic is that I am using TrayText by the same company right now. KeyText takes that a step further! Thanks for all your help! 2=> Winner! This week's winner: dmg@BLAST.NET. 3=> News and Game Bits, mailto:pgrote@i1.net or mailto:dr2web@sprynet.com IBM Wants a Piece of the BackOffice Pie http://www.news.com/News/Item/0,4,18428,00.html Gates and McNealy - Round ? http://www.businessweek.com/premium/05/b3563124.htm Netscape now just like WIIV in the 80s! http://www.news.com/News/Item/0,4,18365,00.html Wow - OS/2 News http://www.crn.com/dailies/weekending012398/jan23digK.asp Data Through the Electric Company http://www.infoworld.com/cgi-bin/displayStory.pl?980123.whpower.htm 4=> Interview with Jim Youll, mailto:jyoull@hotmail.com Never heard of Jim Youll? Maybe you should stop by his website at http://www.agentzero.com/junkmail/index.html and take a look at what happened to Jim when he posted a message against spam on Usenet. In our interview with Joseph Melle, President of the NOIC (http://www.compunotes.com/interviews/ntrvw108.htm), Mr. Melle claimed that it was the anti-spammers who were the "true criminals". Read the following interview, and you can tell me who you think is the "true criminal" mailto:dr2web@sprynet.com (Please note: Jim Youll's interview was submitted before Joseph Melle's) CN: You've had some bad experiences with junk e-mail. What happened? JY: Soon after I used my real name and real e-mail address in a few public postings about junk e-mail, I was electronically "attacked" by some people who didn't like my position. Someone(s) forged my name and address on hundreds of thousands of e-mail messages sent all over the world. Our mail server was bombarded with thousands of bounces and hundreds of angry replies to the messages I'd never sent. The attacks continued periodically from May through August. The mail server is scaled for normal traffic of about 40 or 50 messages a day. During the attack it handled up to 6 messages PER SECOND for hours at a time. I was able to reconfigure it to deal with the load, and as most of the Internet came to understand that these were forgeries, the angry messages came to a halt. Many people all over the world also helped me deal with the attacks and locate the attacker. I guess the short answer is that I had the nerve to demand privacy, and found out the hard way that some people don't want anyone to have that right. CN: How did you get started on your fight against junk e-mail? JY: I never intended to get into a "fight" against anything. I'm just like everyone else who's really tired of receiving pornographic ads and get-rich-quick junk in his mailbox. As the administrator of a small, private e-mail system, things were getting so bad that I now faced DAILY complaints from our small user base, not to mention the extra load all that junk placed on the server, and a postmaster mailbox littered with improperly-addressed junk messages. I had to do something. The junk mail was (and still is) interfering with our ability to do business. My real job is NOT the administration of our in-house mail server. By design, when outsiders behave themselves, the server takes care of itself. But suddenly this flood of junk mail was forcing me to spend ridiculous amounts of time dealing with it. When I found a large group of others who were already hard at work on the problem, I knew I could learn a lot from them, and I knew I wanted to help fight for everyone's right to be left alone. CN: Junk e-mail commonly contains bogus reply addresses. How can you find out who really sent the message? JY: First, the idea of a bogus reply address goes against all the principles of the Internet. In addition to making it difficult to register a complaint with the sender of a message, these forged addresses have caused innocent systems to be blasted with huge loads of bounced messages. For example, if I created a junk mail message "From: getrichquick@compunotes.com", then sent that to thousands of addresses, many (or most) of the messages would be misaddressed and undeliverable. Systems all over the world which could not deliver those messages would "return them to sender"... not to me (since my name's not on there) but to the compunotes.com server... it would be overloaded. This is what my attackers did when they tried to bring my systems down... you end up with hundreds of messages per minute coming at your server from all over the world and there's no way to make them stop. If the junk mailer is trying to sell you something, he has to identify himself with at least an address and phone number... It's often easier to chase this information to find the sender. They still have to identify themselves with real locations and contact information if they want money. Junk mailers sometimes pretend they live in some sort of weird cyber reality, but they're a part of the real world just like everyone else. They're not that hard to identify. And now that Internet privacy proponents are working together to identify the worst junk mailers, it's easier than ever. CN: What is being done about junk e-mail? JY: Private individuals are doing the most - they're working with the junk mailers' ISPs, and complaining to everyone up and down the food chain. It's working. Service providers are beginning to filter incoming mail, to help reduce the flow of junk to their subscribers. And the providers are beginning to coordinate their efforts so that a master "filter" can be used by many ISPs at once. I think this year we will see the emergence of real-time, distributed filtering systems that will catch the first few appearances of a junk message and kill it Internet-wide. There's legislation pending. I hope that whatever is passed is well organized and very clear. Maybe that's too much to hope for from Congress... CN:Why don't we have the same protection against junk e-mail that we do against junk faxes and telemarketters? JY: We may have some protection - I don't think we've had a good test case yet (If there has been one, I'm sure a few hundred of your readers will tell me). The generators of this junk have tried to persuade people that there's something unique or "new" about the Internet that makes Internet messages different from every other kind of communication. Any reasonable person can see that's simply not true. The junk fax and telemarketing rules weren't written to address technological problems. They aren't there to regulate HOW how the bits or voice or whatever get from sender to recipient. Those laws exist because Congress recognized that people do absolutely have a right to be _left alone_. That is, if I tell you to shut up and go away, you'd damn well better shut up and go away. Don't fax me. Don't call me. Don't bug me. Period. If you don't go away, I have recourse. It's just a matter of time before the laws are explicitly extended to cover electronic mail and whatever comes after. An unwanted intrusion is exactly that no matter how it arrives. CN: Will junk e-mail legislation do any good? Won't the offenders just move "off-shore"? If the legislation is handled well, it will help. Apparently we need an explicit statement of our right to privacy and our right to have our electronic mailboxes left alone. The offenders can move off-shore or to Mars or wherever they want. But if they're doing business in the United States, or using US-based servers or backbones, then our laws will apply and I would expect to have recourse against them. Nothing's perfect. This would be a good start. Isn't it odd that these people claim to be selling things / seeking customers? When is the last time you gave money to a person who berated you, harassed you and annoyed you? Legitimate businesses that have tried junk e-mail have quickly learned that it's not an honest business model. Those which remain in the game are really the get-rich-quicks, pornographers, scams, and the truly clueless. I believe there's a generous number of harassers in there as well. Why else would posters to an anti-junkmail newsgroup be targeted to receive such a large amount of junk? CN: What can the average person do to combat junk e-mail? JY: Write a letter (on paper) to your congressional representatives... TODAY, urging their immediate involvement in the issue. When you receive junk and there's an identifiable sender (Telephone number or address) call and complain. E-mail replies usually don't work (due to the junk mailers' forgeries of sender info) so don't bother. But when you have a telephone number, call to complain. If there's a fax number, write up your complaint and fax it. Better yet, do both. If enough people did this, the junk mailers' ability to "send thousands of messages - free" would begin to become expensive. And if it becomes expensive, they'll stop bothering those people who fight back. I've sometimes been harassed by the people I've called when complaining. Remember to block your caller ID when calling ("*67" is the code in many areas). If you call an 800-number, your number can't be blocked and the recipient may see it either "live" or on a printout later. As for self defense, I've begun advising people to get a separate e-mail address to use when posting to newsgroups, since it looks like newsgroups are a major source of e-mail addresses. I'm against this in principle, but right now things are pretty bad. Get an address at hotmail.com that you only use when posting to newsgroups. If the hotmail account becomes too littered with junk, kill it and make a new one. Reserve your personal e-mail address (that you never post in a newsgroup) for your legitimate correspondents only. Also, ask your service provider to begin filtering for some of the more common junk (certain domains and types of messages are guaranteed to be garbage and can be tossed before you see them). I'm also thinking about building a self-defense toolkit that will be useful to people who want to take a more active role in compelling junk mailers to leave them alone. I'll let you know how it goes. CN: What do you think of AGIS's decision to drop CyberPromotions? Is there hope? JY: The attacks against me came when I called for a shareholder action against a business partner of AGIS - Alltel Corp., so I was quite pleased to see AGIS implement an acceptable use policy and then (after a delay some of us thought was too long) actually enforce it. Successful businesses are customer- and community-focused, and don't go out of their way to antagonize people. AGIS will be successful if it continues this proactive and Internet-positive stance. In all the months of tolerating junk from Cyber Promotions, we did not receive even ONE message that anyone here wanted. I called Cyber Promotions many times and was told they couldn't stop the interminable messages coming into our server. I was glad to see the junk halted at the source. I'm sure thousands of other Internet users, service providers and site managers were also relieved. 5=> Product: Carmageddon - game/action Reviewed By Doug Reed, mailto:dr2web@sprynet.com Reviewed on: P-166, 24 MB RAM, Nitro 3D card, 16xCDROM MSRP: $49.95 Make no mistake about it: Carmageddon is one of those games that Congress loves to hate. Carmageddon is so gory that in Britain and Germany, separate versions were required to meet their ratings guidelines (the U.K. version is called the "Zombie" version, the German one is the "Robot" version, and the U.S. is the "Blood" version). What could be so bad, comparing it to games like Doom, Duke Nukem, etc...? Well, think of Carmageddon as the computer game version of Death Race 2000 - while the objective of the game is to "win" the race, you get points for running over pedestrians. That's right - pedestrians. Carmageddon features lots of blood and gore, as well as "off-color" language, meaning that this is a game strictly for adults. If you aren't squeamish, you're over 18, and you understand that this is only a game, then you might just want to check out Carmageddon (a demo is available, at http://www.carmageddon.com). Of all of the fun games that I've played this year, this is one of the few that I've found myself really addicted too: I can't seem to get enough of Carmageddon! Now, I should also state that I'm not that thrilled by the prospect of running over pedestrians; it is the other aspects of the game that make it so much fun. Thirty-six tracks; 24 opponents (5 per race); LAN play over an IPX network - these are the things that I find fun about Carmageddon. The premise of the game is fairly simple: it's a car race! But this is no ordinary car race; the objective here is not to cross the finish line first but to cross it with the most "credits". Credits are gained by various means, including hitting pedestrians & farm animals, collisions with other opponents, and knocking your opponents out of the game. All of the cars in the game are very fast, and the action is very, very fast. The ads for the game state that Carmageddon features realistic physics; I can't say I really believe that since you & your car are able to survive incredibly high speed collisions with other cars, obstacles, even go underwater and survive hits with mines! The high speed combined with the collisions with obstacles & cars does, however, result in spectacular stunts. Once I saw an opponent gun their engine and come flying at me, only to hit an obstacle they didn't see in the way. The car flew into the air, twirling over my head before crashing into the ground. Wow! And thanks to the instant replay, I could play it again and again, from any angle! That is what I really enjoy about Carmageddon - the chance to do some totally outrageous feats with a fast-moving car. The graphics are extremely good, even on the non-3dfx version; beyond the gory death of pedestrians you can see the damage you inflict on the other cars. The game starts with a choice of playing either Max Damage or Die Anna (gotta love those names!); the difference is not in the driver but in the car they use. Max drives the red Eagle, a car geared more towards ramming and slamming than speed, whereas Die Anna drives the Hawk which is geared more towards speed. You begin the game with a rank of 99, with the goal of becoming the #1 ranked driver. Improving your rank is based on the total number of credits that you earn during a single race. Credits can be spent on things like in-race repairs (expensive, but sometimes necessary) and improvements between races like improved engines, armor, and weaponry. Sorry, no missiles or guns - strictly passive weaponry here. Also, once you get above rank 75 you can "steal" opponents cars by wasting them, which gives you the opportunity to drive other cars like monster trucks, Ferrari's, a hearse, and even a bulldozer! As you progress, your opponents improve, making it tougher and tougher to knock them out of the race. The AI of the opponents seems to be pretty good - sometimes they all seem to have it in for you, others they seem more occupied with each other. Occasionally, I've even seen them turn tail and run from me after I've nailed them a few times. While I rarely saw them turn "stupid", opponents don't seem to possess the auto-recover facilities that the player does (for example, when you land on your roof), nor the instant-repair. At least at the normal level, this makes the game decidedly unbalanced towards the player - after all, you can knock them out of the game and repair your car in an instant. As you may have guessed, the game contains a lot of humor - the cars and opponents all have humorous names like "Agent Orange" and "Auto Scum". The tracks are also cleverly named, for example, the first track is called "Maim Street" while a later track is called "Mist me". Gameplay takes place in essentially three different environments - urban, desert, and ice conditions. Additionally, some tracks take place underground - a particularly nasty one is a simply figure eight, which features lots of collisions with opponents and is usually a very short race. My wife is appalled at how much I like this game, and sometimes so am I. But I can't seem to get enough - one more race (races are pretty quick - generally taking less than 15 minutes), well maybe one more after that. Carmageddon is pure adrenaline, pure action, pure fun. If you have the capability, be sure and get the 3dfx patch - the improved graphics are supposedly worth it, as is the added increase in frame rate. An unofficial site exists on the web, http://www.carmageddon.com, which contains a lot of nice information and additional downloads. The site also has the demo, as well as the demo of the soon to be released add-on, the Splat Pack, which features new opponents, cars, and 18 new tracks. If you're over the age of 18 and loving racing games that emphasize action over realism, I HIGHLY recommend that you check our Carmageddon. Interplay Productions http://www.interplay.com 16815 Von Karman Ave. Irvine, CA 92606 Installation: Gold User-friendliness: Gold Quality: Gold User: Adults only, but fans of racing games. 6=> Product: Learning Perl, 2nd Edition by Randall L. Schwartz & Tom Christiansen - book/programming Reviewed By: Doug Reed, mailto:dr2web@sprynet.com MSRP: $29.95 US/$42.95 Can There is little doubt that Perl is the most popular scripting language in use on the Web today. Anytime you fill out a survey or query a database, odds are that the script that completes the request was written in Perl. What is funny about Perl is that Perl was not created by Microsoft, Sun, Netscape, or any big name software company you can name. One man, Larry Wall, in search of any easier way to do things on UNIX computers invented Perl. Since UNIX computers were (and still are) the most commonly used web servers, you can begin to understand Perl's popularity. Perl has also gained a following in the Windows NT crowd as a simple scripting tool for automating routine tasks. Almost since Perl's inception, O'Reilly & Associates has been the major publishing authority on Perl, working in close association with Larry Wall and others involved in the development of Perl. Two books came out of that association that are considered to be the definitive guides to Perl: Learning Perl & Programming Perl. Now both books have been revised and updated to cover Perl 5, the most recent revision of the language. Larry Wall does not write learning Perl, although he did write a very nice & humorous intro to the book. Tom Christiansen, whom among other things is to blame for the official Perl web site, http://www.perl.com/ joins Randall Schwartz for this second edition. The book has a fairly light-hearted & humorous touch too it, which is a good things since the subject matter is a little dense. I came to this book a complete novice to Perl, looking to learn something about the language so I could use it in website development. Perl is unlike any other language I have ever seen. Of, some basic elements are there, like if statements and while statements, but what the heck is the chomp command? For the record, it removes the last character from the string of a variable, if the variable is a newline character. Sounds easy, right? Sure it does . Like I said, it is lucky that both Randall and Tom understand that the readers of this book will be complete novices to the subject of Perl, and maybe even novices to the entire subject of programming. The first chapter, appropriately titled "A Stroll Through Perl" takes the reader on a ride to completing a simple script that asks a user to input their name and password to get a simple greeting. This chapter may leave the novice a little swamped, but never fear; this is only the intro! After that things settle down and Randall & Tom quickly dissect the essentials of Perl. Chapters 2 & 3 cover the essentials of variables and arrays, including how to create them and operators that can be used on them to extract values or modify their contents. Chapter four covers the control structures if, while, and for, while chapter 5 covers the use of hashes (hashes are arrays with index values that are not simple integers and can include strings). Hashes were a new and radical concept for me! Basic Input and Output commands are the subject of chapter 6, while chapter 7 covers the use of Regular Expressions (a pattern to be matched against a string). Chapter 8 details how to create user-defined functions (i.e., functions that are not normally part of Perl). Chapter 9 covers other command structures not mentioned earlier, including the commands last, next, and redo. Chapter 10 covers filehandles, while chapter 11 covers formats (creating a template for a report, a form of output that Perl was designed especially for). Chapters 12 & 13 deal with the issues of accessing & manipulating files & directories. Chapter 14 deals with process management (execution of commands to the shell). Chapter 15 covers other methods of data transformation. Chapters 16 & 17 detail how to access the system database and manipulate user databases. Finally, chapter 18 describes how to convert scripts in other languages to Perl, and Chapter 19 finishes things out by covering CGI. CGI is the common gateway interface, the means by which Perl scripts are invoked and used on the World Wide Web. To use Perl on the web requires the use of the CGI.pm module which was written by Lincoln Stein, author of the book "How to Setup and Maintain Your Website" (Mr. Stein will be better remembered for creating CGI.pm). Undoubtedly it is this last chapter that will draw the attention of most people that pick up Learning Perl. Learning Perl, 2nd edition is every bit as much a classic as the first edition was when it was released. There is no better book for learning how to use Perl, especially if you wish to use Perl on the Web. Readers should note that O'Reilly did just publish a companion volume, also written by Randall Schwartz, entitled "Learning Perl for Win32 Systems". As you might guess, that book covers the use of Perl on Windows NT, while Learning Perl, 2nd edition is a more generic book. If you are at all interested in creating your own scripts for a more dynamic and interactive website, pick up Learning Perl 2nd edition. You won't be sorry. O'Reilly & Associates 101 Morris Street Sebastopol, CA 95472-9902 http://www.oreilly.com Legibility: Gold User-friendliness: Gold Quality: Gold User: Anyone wanting to learn Perl. 7=> Product: LaunchBoard by Darwin Keyboards - utility/keyboard Reviewed By: Bev Walton-Porter Reviewed on: Pentium 166 Mhz, 24 MB RAM, Windows 95 Requires: 286 or higher, 4 MB RAM, Windows 3.1 or higher. MSRP: $29.95 After test driving LaunchBoard by Darwin Keyboards,Ltd.,one thought kept crossing my mind:where has this program been all my computing life? Humorous thought, but I'm oh-so-serious. LaunchBoard is a desktop and Internet utility which allows computer users the ability to launch a specific program, web site, or productivity tool with the press of one button. Your fingers never had it so simple, and your productivity has never been boosted so radically. The program allows you to reprogram up to 38 keys on your keyboard. But if I had a suggestion, it would be to expand the capability to twice that. Thirty-eight keys seems like a lot, but when you get down to it,more would be merrier. My suggestion would be to add an option of being able to hit the shift key and allow one button to access not just one web site, tool, or program, but two separate ones from each key. But until they come up with an expanded application, 38 keys will work just fine. Installing the LaunchBoard software is a breeze. For Windows 95, NT, and 3.1 users, it's just a matter of inserting the disk and following the short instructions in the manual. Then you simply follow the instructions on the screen. After the installation, the Main Setup screen will automatically appear and you're ready to begin assigning tasks to each LaunchKey. The Main Setup screen is a graphical representation of the 15 function and DOS keys which can be found on the top row of your keyboard. These are the keys set up as LaunchKeys. You can also choose to launch Web sites by these keys, and if you choose this option you'll need to select your browser from the pull-down menu. To set up additional Launch- Keys,the program will lead you to additional screens where you'll have the option of programming up to 23 more LaunchKeys and to configure LaunchBoard. Some of these additional LaunchKeys are found on your numerical keypad, and those are the ones I had the hardest time training myself not to push when I needed to type a number -- several times I had to stop and remind myself to get used to choosing the number keys at the top of the keyboard, not to the right. But only after I'd launched several programs and web sites in error! However, if you can revert back to a key's regular function at any time by pressing the Control + Alt + LaunchKey. Other shortcuts are available, as well, such as using the function keys (Control + F4 or Alt + F3) to override the program. Once you customize the other keys, you can then click on the configure LaunchBoard button. This is the button which allows you to set up One-Touch Internet Access, turn off your Caps Lock key, temporarily disable One-Touch Internet Access, and specify if you'd like LaunchBoard to begin when your computer starts up. The latter is highly recommended by Darwin Keyboards Let me note that the One Touch Internet Access option is a must. This allows you to effectively access the Internet by pressing one button -- no typing of passwords or extra keystrokes. Once installed, you're just a keystroke away from surfing the Net! Once the LaunchKey is pressed, your modem will dial, your Web browser will open, and you'll be taken directly to the Web Site of the LaunchKey you selected. It couldn't be simpler. If you choose for LaunchBoard to automatically steer you toward Web sites, it's important to know the program is compatible with American On-line (AOL) 2.0 or later, CompuServe 3.0 or later, Netscape Navigator 2.0 or later, and Microsoft Internet Explorer 3.0 or later. Simply select your browser from a pull-down menu and you're ready to roll. Beyond programs and Web site launches, you can also begin Windows Tasks, documents, and productivity tools. Productivity tools include passwords, saving, printing, a "to do" list, macros, and Windows Explorer, among others. You can save your current document, start the Windows calculator, view a directory of your A: drive, or even list the contents of your computer. Finally, you can use LaunchBoard to set up Darwin Tools. These are nifty little tools such as AOL Keyword, which will access your favorite places within America On-line. There's also an option for "Hot Doc", which will open a frequently used document. You can also use this to enable or disable LaunchBoard. Included with your software you'll find a set of 72 keycap labels for popular Web sites and software programs. There are also labels for general Web site categories and Darwin Tools, and Windows Tasks. If you have a program not listed in the pre-printed keycap labels, you'll find blank ones that you can design using a ballpoint pen. These labels adhere directly to the keycaps, and usually bond better after 24 hours. The graphics are quite handy. For example, the word processor label shows a hand writing with a pen, while the label which executes LaunchBoard pictures a rocket blasting off. Darwin Keyboards also offers similar time-saving products, such as the LaunchBoard keyboard, which is bundled with LaunchBoard software, and The SmartBoard, a split keyboard with a patented key layout which fits the natural movements of your hands and fingers to aid in typing faster and with more comfort. They also offer The NoteBoard, a full-sized keyboard designed to work with notebook computers. For ease of installation and use, LaunchBoard comes out on top. Even if you're a novice PC user, the instructions and setup are so very easy you will wonder why other programs aren't as user-friendly. By saving time and keystrokes, LaunchBoard can speed up your productivity by leaps and bounds. If you're interested in checking out the upgraded release of LaunchBoard 2.0 from Darwin Keyboards, you can download a free trial from http://www.darwinkeyboards.com/demo.htm. If you should have any questions regarding LaunchBoard 2.0, point your browser to http://www.darwinkeyboards.com/launch.htm. Darwin Keyboards, Ltd. 915 Bryant Street San Francisco, CA 94103 (415)-621-1151 WWW: http://www.darwinkeyboards.com Installation/Ease of Use: Gold User-Friendliness: Gold Quality: Gold User: All 8=> Product: Magic the Gathering - game/role playing Reviewed By: Karl Roberts, mailto:roberts@theramp.net MSRP: $48.99 Requirements: 100MHz 80486, 16 MB,Windows 95, 4x CD-ROM, 92MB free HD space, SVGA, sound card Let me start by telling you a little about myself. I have been involved with role-playing, card, and computer game having to do with fantasy for about 20 years. I still play Advanced D&D, Vampire, DC Superheroes, am involved in numerous gaming conventions including Gen-Con, and Twin-Con, my card game of choice is Highlander, and my current favorite computer games are Masters of Orion 2, Civ 2, and Daggerfall . Microprose has done it again this time with Magic the Gathering. This card game for your computer has it all from expert to novice Magic players, even if you've never played Magic the Gathering before spend some time with this game and it can turn you into a competent dueler. The game it self is broken down into 4 subcategorizes, The Tutorial, Duel, Deck Builder, and Shandalar. The tutorial for Magic the Gathering is possible the best opening movie or tutorial I've seen in a long time, ranking up there with Activision's Mechwarrior 2 and Ghost Bear Clan cinematography. The tutorial opens with the beautiful White Sorceress and diabolical Black Wizard teleporting onto the screen. The graphics and effects are top quality, the teaching of the game and player interaction helps get the rules across. The most amusing aspect of the tutorial is when creatures our summoned by the mages and miniature replica's appear on the battlefield (table) dancing, fighting, and strutting there stuff. The tutorial is well made and thought out and will help the beginner or novice to understand the rules. The duel allows you to challenge the computer to a regular game of Magic. Here you may pick your opponents deck, a deck you designed, one of the many decks the computer has available from the game, or have a random deck assigned to you or the computer. The nice thing about playing the computer is it won't let you cheat and all rules are according to Wizards of the Coast. These rules are the up to date rules from the makers of the game. Any time you need more information on a card you right click the card and you can get Wizards of the Coast official rules clarification on that card. In the duel you can single duel or run the gauntlet which lets you single duel or the best of three, also you can pick the how difficult your opponent is, there is 4 settings. The deck builder speaks for it's self allowing you to customize decks and register them with WoC if you have a modem. These decks can than be used to duel the computer. The last part of this review will cover Shandalar, in this game world you must battle the minions of the 5 colored wizards (red, green, black, white, and blue) than the wizards themselves, if you defeat these wizards than you can try there master to free Shandalar. If any one wizard captures 5 cities they win the game. You start out by choosing a color for yourself and a difficulty level, there are 4 skill levels. You start out with a basic deck in the color of your choice, you win and lose cards by dueling creatures for ante, completing quests, finding, or buying them at towns. In the game you start out with 10 life points and can acquire more through mana links with towns or dungeon duels. The creatures vary in strength which affects their life force counters, and of course battling creatures is done with Magic Duels to determine the victor. The campaign world consists of numerous towns, cities, dungeons, monster lairs, and the five wizard towers. The over all game is well made with only 3 minor flaws: 1) there is no load game feature except at the start up of a game session; 2) there is no undo button (if you make a mistake in combat you have to live with it, most frustrating after a 1 1/2 hr combat to hit the wrong key and lose what you should have won!); and 3) on the main map your icon is in constant motion, you must always give it direction without being able to think your movement through. Some other nice features of the game include being able to concede a match which is hopeless to win. The graphics that are shown when you free a captured city are neat and interesting. In every city and town there is a card market where cards can be purchased, at random intervals this market will suggest various card combinations you can purchase and use in your deck. The game allows you to sell unwanted cards there prices vary according to rarity, the money is used to purchase food, buy off creatures, and magic items called World Magics, these items are powered by mana stones which can be found, won in duels, or given for completed quests. Mana stones can also be traded for cards. Up to 3 different decks can be built, stored, and swapped out when ever the player is in a town or city. This game has so many variables it should never play the same way twice. MicroProse-Spectrum HoloByte USA 2490 Mariner Square Loop Alameda, CA USA 94501 (510) 522-1164 (510) 522-9357 FAX http://www.micropose.com/ +=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+= Managing Editor: Patrick Grote -- mailto:pgrote@i1.net Assistant Editor: Writer Liaison: Doug Reed-- mailto:dr2web@sprynet.com Assistant Editor: Robin Nobles, mailto:smslady@netdoor.com Archives: ftp://ftp.uu.net/published/compunotes/ Website: e-mail: mailto:notes@compunotes.com Want to Write for Us?: mailto:writers@compunotes.com fax: (314) 909-1662 voice: (314) 909-1662 +=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+= CompuNotes is: Available weekly via e-mail and on-line. We cover the PC computing world with comprehensive reviews, news, hot web sites, great columns and interviews. We also give away one software package a week to a lucky winner for just reading our fine publication! Never dull, sometimes tardy, we are here to bring you the computing world the way it is! Please tell every on-line friend about us! CompuNotes B440 1315 Woodgate Drive St. Louis, MO 63122 notes@compunotes.com (C)1998 Patrick Grote