Magic Cap Users Mailing List

Friday September 20, 1996

From: Wayne Sanderson <whsander@IX.NETCOM.COM>
Date: Fri, 20 Sep 1996 01:05:30 -0700
Subject: Re: Presto! hell

Presto!Mail 1.5 and Presto!Links 1.0 are still new and evolving products. Judging them by any problems with the first release is like predicting doom for
Windows 1.0 and the first Winsock way back when they were first introduced.
Products which, even in their present incarnations, are prone to turning
bellyup with little or no apparent provocation unless your system is set up
just so......
If anybody wants to lobby for their money back, go ahead- it's a free country.
Admittedly, these are not flawless products, which is why there are upgrades
and revisions posted on GM's website; There is already a new PPP package, and
other revisions may pop up from time to time.
If these products are not working, or cause frequent cleanups, try putting it
out here on this list; They take some fiddling to set up in some cases. If
it's something else, ditto. GM monitors this list and comes through with quick
answers.
If it's a gripe with speed, join the club. I personnally hope they crack that
problem some time soon.
GM is breaking new ground with these products. Go to any store that sells
computers and tell them you want a graphical web browsing PDA and they will
look at you like you have two heads. Unless the salesman has a PIC2000.
Since I bought my PIC1000 in January the software and services that are
available have exploded, and most of it is currently unavailable on any other
palmtop product. Some of this stuff you can't even get in Macs or PCs. I don't
know where we'll be in a year, but I can only see the number of solutions and
the quality thereof going up.
There are alot of us out here keeping the faith with GM and these machines.
Before you can keep it, you have to have have it.

From: Roderick Sprattling <boswell@GABRIEL.HEAVEN.NET>
Date: Fri, 20 Sep 1996 08:44:12 -0400
Subject: Re: bookreader

Dan Free writes:

> The potential for commercial application of these
> apps in a PDA context is great, in my opinion.
> Imagine a physician being able to carry
> references as he makes his rounds, a lawyer being
> able to take entire legal codes along with
> him/her to court, or an accountant being able to
> take volumes of tax regulations along when s/he
> goes to audit a client... I'm salivating at that
> prospect in my own profession...

Several Newton developers have done just that for physicians already.  There
is at least one fellow (his name escapes me now - it's been awhile) who made a
business of publishing etexts made with Newton BookMaker. He offers reference
works, such as pharmacopoea, as well as the popular PD works.

Rod

From: Tony SJ <san17@MARS.SUPERLINK.NET>
Date: Fri, 20 Sep 1996 09:16:14 -0400
Subject: Re: bookreader

Roderick Sprattling wrote:
>
> Dan Free writes:
>
> > The potential for commercial application of these
> > apps in a PDA context is great, in my opinion.
> > Imagine a physician being able to carry
> > references as he makes his rounds, a lawyer being
> > able to take entire legal codes along with
> > him/her to court, or an accountant being able to
> > take volumes of tax regulations along when s/he
> > goes to audit a client... I'm salivating at that
> > prospect in my own profession...
>
> Several Newton developers have done just that for physicians already.  There
> is at least one fellow (his name escapes me now - it's been awhile) who made a
> business of publishing etexts made with Newton BookMaker. He offers reference
> works, such as pharmacopoea, as well as the popular PD works.
>
> Rod

Can someone develop medical programs for the Magic LInk

From: Victor Carreon <vcarreon@ASYST.NET>
Date: Fri, 20 Sep 1996 06:19:03 -0700
Subject: Re: Presto! hell

Spoken like a true evangelist. :-)

Wayne Sanderson wrote:
>
> Presto!Mail 1.5 and Presto!Links 1.0 are still new and evolving products. Judging them by any problems with the first release is like
predicting doom for
> Windows 1.0 and the first Winsock way back when they were first introduced.
> Products which, even in their present incarnations, are prone to turning
> bellyup with little or no apparent provocation unless your system is set up
> just so......
> If anybody wants to lobby for their money back, go ahead- it's a free country.
> Admittedly, these are not flawless products, which is why there are upgrades
> and revisions posted on GM's website; There is already a new PPP package, and
> other revisions may pop up from time to time.
> If these products are not working, or cause frequent cleanups, try putting it
> out here on this list; They take some fiddling to set up in some cases. If
> it's something else, ditto. GM monitors this list and comes through with quick
> answers.
> If it's a gripe with speed, join the club. I personnally hope they crack that
> problem some time soon.
> GM is breaking new ground with these products. Go to any store that sells
> computers and tell them you want a graphical web browsing PDA and they will
> look at you like you have two heads. Unless the salesman has a PIC2000.
> Since I bought my PIC1000 in January the software and services that are
> available have exploded, and most of it is currently unavailable on any other
> palmtop product. Some of this stuff you can't even get in Macs or PCs. I don't
> know where we'll be in a year, but I can only see the number of solutions and
> the quality thereof going up.
> There are alot of us out here keeping the faith with GM and these machines.
> Before you can keep it, you have to have have it.

From: Dan Free <dharma@ARI.NET>
Date: Fri, 20 Sep 1996 09:28:02 -0400
Subject: Re: Transferring Text Files to Magic Link

On Thu, 19 Sep 1996, Tony SJ  wrote:
>Is there anyway to transfer text into the Magic Link using
>Magic Xchange?
>
Yes, use the text-chopper program scripted by Luke Derossi.   I think the name
is TextMagic.  I downloaded mine from AOL, I'm not sure where else its
available.  It parcels the desired text into the 8K packet that MagicExchange
needs to have in order to import them to your Magic Link.  Once in your Link,
the text appears as a notebook page....

From: Wayne Sanderson <whsander@IX.NETCOM.COM>
Date: Fri, 20 Sep 1996 07:15:36 -0700
Subject: Re: bookreader

Roderick Sprattling writes:
> Several Newton developers have done just that for
> physicians already.  There
> is at least one fellow (his name escapes me now -
> it's been awhile) who made a
> business of publishing etexts made with Newton
> BookMaker. He offers reference
> works, such as pharmacopoea, as well as the
> popular PD works.

If there is a source of etexts available in Newton book format, perhaps what
we could use is a desktop program to convert this data into MC Bookreader data
packages.

From: Bruce Tong <zztong@MAIL.EV.NET>
Date: Fri, 20 Sep 1996 10:59:31 -0400
Subject: Re: bookreader

> Can someone develop medical programs for the Magic Link?

Yes, infact we are. The Nightingale Tracker project is designed for home
healthcare nursing students. Given the general lack of computerization
in the industry, the Nightingale Tracker may very well be useful to home
healthcare professionals as well.

--

Bruce Tong
Systems Programmer
Electronic Vision / Fitne

Work:

Phone : (614) 592-2511
Fax   : (614) 592-2650
mailto:zztong@evi.ev.net
http://www.ev.net/fitne

Play:

mailto:zztong@eurekanet.com
mailto:zztong@aol.com
http://www.eurekanet.com/~zztong

From: Dan Free <dharma@ARI.NET>
Date: Fri, 20 Sep 1996 11:18:33 -0400
Subject: Re: bookreader

On Fri, 20 Sep 1996, Wayne Sanderson  wrote:

>If there is a source of etexts available in Newton book format, perhaps what
>we could use is a desktop program to convert this data into MC Bookreader data
>packages.
>
There are a many useful Etexts out there, not just Newton formatted.  What is
needed is the app to compress them, and a decent bookreader, like the
Algoresearch one.  For many months now, I've been loading short texts downloaded
from the On-Line Book Page onto my Link successfully for several months now, but
these are umcompressed, and must first be run throught Luke DeRossi's TextMagic
program.  Size is an obvious constraint.  Also, once in the Link, they are best
kept in their 8k notebook page format for ease of reference, becuase to date
there is absolutely no bookmark function available using notebook pages. (Luke
made this observation recently...)  The BIG advantage to the Algoresearch
Bookreader is its *future* bookmark function, which is critical, and the great
compresion, but only so long as the compression app is available so that a user
can compress his/her own text.  Without the compression app, all the hundreds of
Etexts currently available become beyond reach and the Algoresearch Bookreader
becomes nothing more than a neat demo...

From: Paul Linhardt <plin@SONYSOFT.COM>
Date: Fri, 20 Sep 1996 10:35:04 -0700
Subject: Re: Transferring Text Files to Magic Link

>Is there anyway to transfer text into the Magic Link using
>Magic Xchange?

Magic Xchange allows you to use the PC keyboard to enter text into text
into your PIC.  You can cut and paste text from your PC into the remote
keyboard window.  Undoubtably there is some limit on size of the text.

Another very simple method is to cut and paste the text into an e-mail
message and e-mail it to your PIC.  Once you get it on the PIC cut and
paste it to where you want on the PIC.  There is a freeware tool called
Textualizer that helps with this on the Spies site.

-Paul

---------------------
Sony New Technologies
http://www.sonysoft.com
1-800-739-7337
E-mail: plin@sonysoft.com

From: Paul Linhardt <plin@SONYSOFT.COM>
Date: Fri, 20 Sep 1996 11:01:15 -0700
Subject: Re: bookreader

Dan Free writes:

> The potential for commercial application of these
> apps in a PDA context is great, in my opinion.
> Imagine a physician being able to carry
> references as he makes his rounds, a lawyer being
> able to take entire legal codes along with
> him/her to court, or an accountant being able to
> take volumes of tax regulations along when s/he
> goes to audit a client... I'm salivating at that
> prospect in my own profession...

Years ago Sony introduced a product called the Data Discman which allowed
you to carry and view 8cm discs similar to CD-ROM's in a handheld device.
The Data Discman did not do well in the US, but is continuing to sell very
well in Japan.
One of our engineers, Toby Dunn, developed a large number of titles for
that platform including the Golier Encyclopedia and the Hoover Handbook.
This platform would actually be much better for the types of applications
you mention.

When we began developing applications for the Magic Cap platform, coming
from a CD-ROM background, we began by developing database-oriented apps
(Berlitz, Spell Finder).  It was only after a while that we realized that
the salient feature of this new platform was that fetching targeted,
time-sensitive data is cheap, but storing static local databases is very
expensive.  From that point on, we shifted our emphasis to communicating
applications like OAG, Magic Broker & Farcast.

I think it is more likely that you would want to download a particular
section of the tax or legal code from the web than that you would want to
store volumes on a Magic Link.  Not that I don't think the Bookreader is an
important contribution to the platform....

-Paul

From: Tony SJ <san17@MARS.SUPERLINK.NET>
Date: Fri, 20 Sep 1996 14:34:36 -0400
Subject: Re: Transferring Text Files to Magic Link

Paul Linhardt wrote:
>
> >Is there anyway to transfer text into the Magic Link using
> >Magic Xchange?
>
> Magic Xchange allows you to use the PC keyboard to enter text into text
> into your PIC.  You can cut and paste text from your PC into the remote
> keyboard window.  Undoubtably there is some limit on size of the text.
>
> Another very simple method is to cut and paste the text into an e-mail
> message and e-mail it to your PIC.  Once you get it on the PIC cut and
> paste it to where you want on the PIC.  There is a freeware tool called
> Textualizer that helps with this on the Spies site.
>
> -Paul
>
> ---------------------
> Sony New Technologies
> http://www.sonysoft.com
> 1-800-739-7337
> E-mail: plin@sonysoft.com

Actually, I meant transferring a whole book into the magic link

From: Dan Free <dharma@ARI.NET>
Date: Fri, 20 Sep 1996 15:48:19 -0400
Subject: Re: Transferring Text Files to Magic Link

On Fri, 20 Sep 1996, Tony SJ  wrote:

>> >Is there anyway to transfer text into the Magic Link using
>> >Magic Xchange?
>
>Actually, I meant transferring a whole book into the magic link
>

Yes, there is... but its not necessarily *elegant*....  You need Magic Exchange
and you'll need to download a copy of the textchopper program Luke DeRossi
scripted.  Its called Text Magic.  I know its available on AOL, but haven't
looked in the Spies site.  Text Magic takes an ASCII text and splits it into 8K
chunks.  The Magic Exchange software can only import 8K at a time to your Link.
 Once you've had your text parceled into the 8K chunks, its a simple process to
import them to the Notebook of your Link via the Magic Exchange app. The text
then appears as separate, consecutive numbered notebook pages in your Notebook.

Keep in mind that there's no way to bookmark where you've stopped reading, so it
makes sense to me to keep the text in the "8K page" format, so that finding your
place again is not such a chore.  (Luke commented to this effect the other day,
and its one of the promising things about the new "Bookreader" demo that's just
appeared...)  You *can* however cut and paste them back together.  I tend to
keep the 8k pages too so that I can discard each page as I read it if I don't
need it for future reference.  That frees up space on my PC card.

Hope this answers your question.

From: Dan Free <dharma@ARI.NET>
Date: Fri, 20 Sep 1996 16:02:08 -0400
Subject: Re: Transferring Text Files to Magic Link

>On Fri, 20 Sep 1996, Tony SJ  wrote:
>
>>> >Is there anyway to transfer text into the Magic Link using
>>> >Magic Xchange?
>>
>>Actually, I meant transferring a whole book into the magic link
>>
>
See my earlier post. I just checked the Spies site, and didn't find Luke
Derossi's Text Magic app there.  You *can* find it on AOL under the PDA Forum's
software library for Magic Cap devices...
<----  End Forwarded Message  ---->

From: Paul Linhardt <plin@SONYSOFT.COM>
Date: Fri, 20 Sep 1996 13:16:03 -0700
Subject: Magic Bag 2.0 Upgrade Offer

Hi Gang,

We are doing a mailing to registered Magic Bag 1.0 customers with the below
upgrade offer.

Due to the demise of PersonaLink, we do not have valid e-mail addresses for
many of our customers.  Hence I'm broadcasting this offer on the brown list
to reach those of you we no longer can reach directly .  I'd like to
encourage you to send us your new e-mail addresses if you'd like to be
informed of upgrades & new software from SNTI.

If you haven't visited our web site in a while, we have a few new sections:
        - a copy of this upgrade offer
        - the scandalous original artwork for the Magic Bag box!!!
        - a form to sign up for our mailing list.

Thanks,

-Paul

---------------------

ATTENTION MAGIC BAG 1.0 GAME PACK CUSTOMERS

When Sony New Technologies released version 1.0 of the Magic Bag Game Pack
last year, we released it with a password copy-protection scheme that meant
that customers had to register their software in order to get a password
key to run the games on their personal communicator.

Many of you were very understanding and registered the software without
comment. Others of you sent us constructive criticism challenging the
wisdom of our using a copy protection scheme.  Additionally, we assumed
that we could guarantee a 30 minute turn-around of password requests.
Unfortunately, due to some glitches in our password server, we found that
this was not always the case.

Some time ago we came to the conclusion that your constructive criticisms
were right and that our password protection scheme was too much of a burden
on our customers.

As a result, several months ago we released version 2.0 of the Magic Bag
Game  Pack with password protection removed.

Registered Magic Bag customers can get the update in one of two ways:

(1) Send us your original Mac or PC floppy diskette to:
Sony New Technologies
One Lower Ragsdale Drive, Suite 150
Monterey, CA 93940
ATTN: Magic Bag Update 2.0
Make sure you include a return address.

(2) Send e-mail to sonysoft@sonysoft.com with "Magic Bag Update 2.0" in the
subject line from an Internet account that accepts attachments. We will
e-mail back a zipped archived of the 6 games in Magic Xchange format. Be
sure to include your first & last name and specify Mac or PC versions in
the body of your e-mail. You must have PKUNZIP (PC) or Stuffit Expander
(Mac) to decompress the games. Please note: if for some reason you are not
in our database of registered users, you may be required to provide proof
of purchase (e.g. to fax in a copy of your receipt or manual cover to
408/642-6412).

If you purchased a password protected version of Spell Finder for the
Envoy, Reversi or SubShop you can also contact us to arrange an update.

I apologize for any inconvenience our registration scheme has caused and
appreciate your patience and support. Above all, thank you for buying our
products.

                                  Paul Linhardt
                      Manager of MagicCap Software development
                              Sony New Technologies
                                 1-800-739-7337


---------------------
Sony New Technologies
http://www.sonysoft.com
1-800-739-7337
E-mail: plin@sonysoft.com

From: Boris Foelsch <boris@genmagic.com>
Date: Sat, 21 Sep 1996 00:56:33 GMT
Subject: Re: bookreader

plin@SONYSOFT.COM (Paul Linhardt) writes:

>...SNIP...

>I think it is more likely that you would want to download a particular
>section of the tax or legal code from the web than that you would want to
>store volumes on a Magic Link.  Not that I don't think the Bookreader is an
>important contribution to the platform....

>-Paul

One could envision a stripped down Data Discman configured as a Magic Bus
peripheral :-)

-Boris

From: Tony SJ <san17@MARS.SUPERLINK.NET>
Date: Fri, 20 Sep 1996 23:22:18 -0400
Subject: Concept Kitchen

This may be a stupid question but...
I just got the protective anti-glare film from Concept Kitchen.
Whenever I pull one off the screen, it seems that I might be
pulling out the Magic Link's own film covering!  Am I just
paranoid, or will this sticky concept kitchen film ruin
the LCD screen in any way?

From: Alan Latteri <alatt@POBOX.COM>
Date: Fri, 20 Sep 1996 22:41:46 -0000
Subject: Re: Concept Kitchen

>This may be a stupid question but...
>I just got the protective anti-glare film from Concept Kitchen.
>Whenever I pull one off the screen, it seems that I might be
>pulling out the Magic Link's own film covering!  Am I just
>paranoid, or will this sticky concept kitchen film ruin
>the LCD screen in any way?


The method that the protective film uses to stick on the LCD is static
electricty.  No glues or toxins involved.

Alan