PRESIDENT'S REMARKS

· Version 5 of Microsoft DOS was a lively topic. At least half of the members in attendance have the new version. Do read the various text files in the new version, especially the notes on applications. For a short while, Egghead and WorkPlace are offering this new version at a big discount. IMPORTANT - Do create a Boot Disk first.

· IBM and Apple are now working together; seems to be Them vs. Microsoft and Intel. Apple will provide the software applications; IBM will provide the operating system; and Motorola will provide the computer chips.

· "Vaporware" and hardware "pronouncements" tend to drive everybody crazy. No sooner is one upgrade announced to be released at a future date, than the one beyond that is also announced. Case in point: the 486 50 MHz chip and the 586 chip announced at almost the same time. The corporate world cannot, and will not, wait; it will go with what’s available when needed.

· You can buy the OS/2 version 1.3 for less than a hundred dollars if you already own IBM DOS. You then get version 2 for free when it’s available. Else, you can buy version 2 for an estimated $150 when it comes out.

· Computerland (national) withdrew some local area franchise licenses. Comment from the floor was that the local owner shut down the ones that he owned because he’s in some financial bind - his bank withdrew his loans.

· It’s official - Borland has purchased Ashton-Tate. IBM seems to look with favor upon Borland. Should be an interesting summer.

· IBM and Sieman (Germany) have joined in building 16 megabyte memory chips. Seems to be an effort to reduce dependency upon Japanese suppliers.

· IBM BBS - access now available to members of user groups. It’ll cost you a long distance call to log on to this BBS based in Atlanta. The data phone line is: 404-835-6600. Public domain files are on line as well as information about IBM hardware and software.

OS/2 VERSION 2

Our IBM host and guardian, Chris Mayer, demonstrated a beta version of IBM’s latest OS/2 2.0 offering. OS/2 can run Windows and DOS applications in a multi-tasking environment. While Chris had a few OS applications on the test computer, he had a lot of DOS applications - and ran them like a charm! It was really something to see. Bouncing back and forth between DOS applications without losing a beat.

OS/2 can give almost 620k RAM to each DOS application. You can run Windows in each "virtual" machine and you can have as many virtual machines as you want.

To demonstrate the versatility of OS/2, Prodigy (an on-line service) was started, then WordPerfect and Lotus 1-2-3 were fired up. While using Prodigy, WordPerfect and Lotus were still running in the background (a little slower, but running). Chris then brought up another DOS program (Meta Stock Professional) and flipped back and forth from the stock report section of Prodigy to the Meta Stock program. As if that weren’t impressive enough, he also brought in Flight Simulator and an OS/2 word processor (DeScribe)!

Chris then showed how easy it was to "cut" an object from the Flight Simulator graphic screen (part of a building) and paste it into DeScribe. He said that this procedure works both ways: OS/2 to DOS and DOS to OS/2. Flipping back to Prodigy, the news item about Borland acquiring Ashton-Tate was brought to the screen. He then brought up Windows 3 to show how easily OS can run many diverse applications.

(NOTE: It was difficult to count all the different jobs that Chris was running, but I counted ten (10) applications that were open at one time.) The great thing about OS/2 is that it sets up a virtual machine for each application. Now when an application crashes, only that particular virtual machine crashes, the rest of the system is still running. Contrast this multi-tasking methodology with that of Windows: when one Window job crashes, everything must be rebooted.

OS/2 version 2 will include Windows 3 and it emulates DOS 4.0. It will be offered in two versions. The Standard Edition will take up l5 meg of space on the hard drive and is intended for single users. The Extended Edition needs 25 meg of hard drive real estate and is intended for LAN setups and large relational data base managers. It is believed that the new version will be announced before the fall COMDEX, probably by October. OS/2 is a whole new ball game.

· It makes full use of the 32 bit features of the 386 and higher PCs.

· Has enhanced functions for DOS

· I/O bus makes no difference

· Processor path must be 32 bits

· Uses flat 512 megabyte address space

Memory is divided into 4k pages that can be flipped in and out of the hard drive. It can handle a virtual memory size of 512 megabytes by using a hard drive to simulate actual memory. The flat addressing scheme equates the memory address to the actual address on the hard drive via 4k pages. And while it is stated that up to 16 windowed full screens are available for DOS applications, as many as over 200 have been run.

Once again, Chris has come through with flying colors. He was asked to give this presentation on rather short notice. Plus, he was running a beta version of the new software and had not seen the manual for the new version. Can you imagine the kind of show he could put on after reading the manual and working with the release version? Thank you, Chris, for a great job and an excellent preview of OS/2 and the future of personal computers.

THE WINNERS

Lotus FreeLance - Bob Lamb

50-50 - Edward Purcell u