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ZDnet has posted an article on the use of OS/2 at Microsemi, a semiconductor manufacturer. The link is:

http://www.zdnet.com/pcweek/stories/news/0,4153,2396836,00.html

I have received a new entry in the MAMERun Joystick Device Driver Contest from Vesa J, which adds several improvements. Vesa has also updated his standards proposal. The total value of cash and prizes is now over $300 US. If you're sitting around bored this holiday this might be a great way to help that big credit card payment in January. (smile)

What is it?

Write your own joystick device driver for OS/2 and you could win $300 plus valuable prizes and earn the respect and gratitude of OS/2 gamers around the world! With the many new games available and the advance of game controllers there arises a need for a better joystick device driver than IBM's advanced joystick device driver. Support for new controller features, such as 8+ buttons or USB, will greatly enhance the OS/2 gaming experience for gamers as well as developers.

For rules and other information check out:

http://home1.gte.net/stefanj/contest.htm

I am looking for additional sponsors for this contest. If you would like to contribute please go to:

http://home1.gte.net/stefanj/sponsor.htm

Any questions can be sent to me at Stefanj@gte.net

I have just uploaded beta 5 of MAMERun to Hobbes:

http://hobbes.nmsu.edu/pub/incoming/

Final expected placement is:

http://hobbes.nmsu.edu/pub/os2/apps/emulator/

You can also find it at the MAMERun Homepage:

http://home1.gte.net/stefanj/mamerun.htm

Whats New Beta 5:

• Changed the interface a bit to make it easier to read and fixed some minor bugs
  
• Removed the tab stops from all objects except the Hotlist
  
• Updated the main menu and popup
  
• Added support for ROM and sample checking
  
• Fixed bug with alternate ROM dir. and duplicate names
  
• All ROMs in the alternate dir are now identified with the suffix '[alt]'
  
• Fixed timing issues with some processes
  
• Added a 'Check for updates' button
  

What:

MAMERun is a FREEWARE PM front end for the DOS version of MAME (Multi. Arcade Machine Emulator). A front end is a program that makes it easier for the user to interface with his application, which usually has a command line interface. MAME is a very popular emulator that allows you to run thousands of classic arcade games on your PC (if you own the ROMs). You can find the MAME homepage at:

http://mame.retrogames.com/

The Official (and very good) OS/2 PM port of MAME was done by Marty Amodeo and is at:

http://emuos2.vintagegaming.com/

Requirements: OS/2
MAME for DOS (I used version .36 beta 12) I STRONGLY SUGGEST YOU USE THIS VERSION SINCE THERE IS A Y2K ISSUE WITH PRIOR VERSIONS!
DOS Support installed
RexxUtil
joystick device driver (for joystick support, download from hobbes or DDPAK)
ROMs (DO NOT ASK ME FOR, OR WHERE TO GET ROMS!!)

SLRN 0.9.6.2 is available at:

http://village.flashnet.it/~rm03703/programs/slrn

or at:

http://www.quasarbbs.com/francesco/slrn

SLRN is a nice and powerful text newsreader, compiled using the EMX 0.9D fix 2 library. It is distributed under the GNU Public License

Version 0.9.6.2 fixes a bug in slrn 0.9.6.1 and adds some new features.

Plucker is an offline HTML viewer for PalmOS which comes packaged with an OS/2, Unix and Linux conduit, as well as a Win32 conduit, with the ability to support other OSes on the way. An included script spiders HTML pages to a user-supplied depth, parses them on the client machine into a easily processed format, and then sends them to the Pilot.

Plucker supports clickable images, italics, multiple databases, configurable display parameters and stylus options, compression, and comes with perl, python and Delphi conduits, and much more!

Plucker is free software under the terms of the Free Software Foundation's General Public License, version 2 or later.

Plucker includes the parser, the conduits, lots of documentations, and the PalmOS viewer program in German and English formats. Please make sure to read the REQUIREMENTS document for further assistance.

You can get Plucker at:

http://plucker.gnu-designs.com

To run Plucker on OS/2 you need Perl and Python for OS/2 up and running as well as Pilot-Link. You can get the precompiled stuff on:

http://cip.physik.uni-wuerzburg.de/~arwagner/palmstuff/

Please download the binaries for Pilot-Link and don't forget the Perl-Interface! We need it to tranfer data from the Desktop to the Palm. NOTE: The perl interface for Pilot-Link is not precompiled with normal Pilot-Link-Distribution for OS/2!

I just want to let you know that I updated some of my Freeware applications:

- InProTrack ('Installed Product Tracker')
- mINI (INI viewer and editor)

You can get them on:

http://www.s.netic.de/kevers/

Well the project has been going for a while and now there is a public release of the generic WIN-OS/2 audio driver for OS/2. We told almost nobody until we had something nice. The driver supports WAVE IN and WAVE OUT. It should work with Warp 3 and 4, if you have no WIN-OS/2 support this should be your rescue! It has not been tested with a very big amount of sound cards but it should work with any card that has an OS/2 PDD driver (native OS/2 support!, so only sound in OS/2 and not in MDOS or WIN-OS/2). One of the cards that has this, for instance, is the aureal card.

At this moment MIDI out is being worked on and MIDI IN will be looked at. MIDI out is working a bit and sometime in the first month of 2000 a release with MIDI MAY come. When WIN-OS/2 functions correctly software SB16 emulation will be looked at. It's just a theory that this will work, but for more info, see the site!

The home page of the project is:

http://home.wxs.nl/~rwklein

Here the first public version can be downloaded. Please don't spread this version so that the Internet won't be filled up with old versions. When it can be spread, we (John and Roderick) will tell when it can be done.

Of all places, there is a fairly good set of OS/2 links at:

http://computingcentral.msn.com/topics/os/os2.asp

Maybe some day IBM will do as good as MSN at posting such information.

In Computer Reseller News, there's a small article by Barbara Darrow about SS in general, so this isn't OS/2 specific. The article is in the December 20/27 edition (weekly publication). It's located at:

http://www.crn.com/thisweek/news.asp?ArticleID=12356

The title is Countdown: Lotus Pulls Back Suite Development. Bottom line is (supposedly): there will be a year or so of maintenance and that's it.

INI tools is an freeware INI editor for binary OS/2 INI and plain-text WIN INI files with integrated tools to compare INI files and search multiple files for a string.

Features:

• edit OS/2 (binary) and WIN (plain-text) INI files
  
• save OS/2 INI files as WIN INI files and vice versa
  
• NLS: English, Croatian, French, German, Russian, Chinese, Spanish and Polish
  
• Translation tool: create your own Language support
  
• configurable toolbar (display on/off)
  
• safe mode (disabled changes) on/off
  
• change data (apps, keys, values) between files and programs
  
• use INI file as template for Rexx script
  
• compare files and write result to INI, Rexx script, report
  
• find (and replace) string in files (exact, partal match)
  
• Install/UnInstall program
  
• documentation in INF format.
  

To download INI tools 1.10, visit:

http://Goran_Ivankovic.tripod.com/

I'd like to announce the release of ConfigEdit/2 v1.6

New to this version: support for the cm2cfg database, mouse drag-drop to move items in the same container, other minor changes.

ConfigEdit/2 is a config.sys database manager which can auto-generate config.sys files from a database which can be either imported or created by hand. It can be used to hold multiple config.sys files and generate new ones. Also manages OS/2's recovery choices!

Home page: http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~dm898/soft.html

There is a new version of the Distributed.net client and proxy server for OS/2.

client: http://http.distributed.net/pub/dcti/current-client/dnetc-os2-x86.zip

proxy: http://http.distributed.net/pub/dcti/proxyper-rc5des/proxyper311-os2-x86.zip

[Editor's Note: These relate to the RC5 64-bit encryption cracking contest where you could win $1,000 if your machine is the one to find the hidden code, and of course you'd be helping to ensure a more secure internet experience by demonstrating the relative weakness of current encryption methods.]

PalmPilot/2

*********************

* Please Be Patient *

*********************

We, Total Results, know we are "behind schedule" -:( Once Total Results has put the question on the net and asked for the need of a PalmPilot integration with the OS/2 WPS.

We got lots of mails. So TR wants to say this to anyone who mailed regarding the TR PalmPilot/2 project:

Despite the lack of updates on the PP/2 site,
Despite the lack of response to people that have mailed us,
Despite any signals of OS/2's x-th death,
Despite this all,
We would like you to know this:

The PalmPilot/2 Project is *not* going to be abandoned by us. (TR) PM Planner/2 is still under development but has been connected to PalmPilot/2. (In Theory) We are by *no* means considering to go "doze", so don't be afraid of that.

Time is the bottleneck. NetLabs OpenSource joinment is being considered.

What do we have by now? (You ask) Nothing useful for you. (Yet.)

But keep watch at WarpCast. This is where we will keep you up to date.

Keep Faith!

Total Results Inc.
(An OS/2 committed spare time company)

As announced on iSource, the IBM 7524 Interface Support for OS/2 and Windows NT has been "withdrawn from marketing":

http://www.ibmlink.ibm.com/emealets&parms=H_ERIFZP990658

I have no idea what this thing is, and I suppose if you don't know what it is, then it doesn't matter. I guess the good news is that the NT version is also being dropped.

Daniela Engert has uploaded new DANIADSK and DANIS506 updates to Hobbes. Currently they are in the incoming directory:

http://hobbes.nmsu.edu/pub/incoming/daniadsk.zip
http://hobbes.nmsu.edu/pub/incoming/danis506.zip

Their proposed placement is:

http://hobbes.nmsu.edu/pub/os2/system/drivers/storage/daniadsk.zip
http://hobbes.nmsu.edu/pub/os2/system/drivers/storage/danis506.zip

DANIADSK is an IBMATAPI.FLT replacement with additional support for the ZIP-250 (including media swapping), V0.2.3.

DANIS506 is an IBM1S506 replacement with Intel, VIA, Ali, SiS, CMD, Promise, Cyrix, HPT, and AMD support, V1.1.4.

WarpNote 1.9 Released

Download URL: ftp://ftp.bmtmicro.com/bmtmicro/wnote19.zip
Developer Web Site: http://www.geocities.com/rodeodrive/2048/warpnote.html
Secure Order URL: https://secure.falcon-net.net/BMT/order0343.html

Tired of those yellow sticky notes that won't stick on your monitor? Here come the sticky notes that remain where you put them: On your OS/2 Desktop. WarpNote gives you easy access to little yellow windows where you can note down everything you want. The program is simple and easy to use and consumes as little memory as possible. Each and any feature can be configured and adjusted to the user's needs. Extensive scripting capabilities give you unlimited possibilities (a birthday-reminder is included as an example script). A Blowfish encryption interface ensures that private data is stored in a secure way.

WarpNote is an ideal desktop companion, a fire-and-forget solution to keep all sorts of information - e.g. your shopping list or even confidential information like banking data, passwords or PIN numbers.

This is a kind of Christmas edition of WarpNote. I'd like to thank all WarpNote users for their support and the plenty of suggestions I have received, and I wish you all a merry Christmas and all the best for the new year.

New in this Release:

• Introduced popup menu entry that holds the most recent created notes.
  
• Introduced startup delay. This hopefully fixes problems on machines with heavy load during startup folder processing.
  
• Added a missing menu item in the German language module.
  
• Fixed improper behavior of LOAD command in WNCOMM.EXE.
  
• Fixed a couple of wrong result codes in WNCOMM-Commands.
  
• Implemented proper handling of CR-LF pairs at the end of buffer boundaries.
  
• Added hotkey handling.
  
• Simplified Control Center code.
  

There is another OS/2 site with many links and also two software downloads:

CDR/RW Wizard
RadioTrackFR (in arrive!)

My site is UNDER HEAVY CONSTRUCTION.

http://forosoftware.freeweb.org

World Clock is a freeware, configurable clock with Daylight Savings Time, Stopwatch, Alarm, Program launcher, Calendar and World Map for 1 to 9 cities from 550 cities in the provided City list.

New in version 1.10:

• World map
  
• Coordinates (longitude, latitude) for all cities
  
• Display distance between cities or selected locations
  
• Display sunrise, sunset and day length for all cities
  
• Settings notebook
  
• Enable or disable error and warning messages
  
• 150 new cities
  

Features:

• Display for each selected city, country, time, date, Universal Time difference, Time Zone descriptor, latitude, longitude, sunrise, sunset, day length ...
  
• Horizontal or vertical arrangement of selected cities
  
• Minimized or banner view (only cities and time)
  
• World time (Standard time in Time Zones) and World map,
  
• UTC (GMT) Universal date & time (UDT) and/or Internet time ("Swatch beat") in Title bar
  
• Easy calculating the TZ environment variable
  
• Selectable position, size, font and fontsize
  
• Calendar
  
• Alarm and Program launcher for each city
  
• Stopwatch
  
• Add new cities (your own if not in the list)
  
• Install/UnInstall program
  
• Documentation in INF format.
  

To download World Clock 1.10, visit:

http://Goran_Ivankovic.tripod.com/

My second article about remote booting Windows from OS/2 Warp Server is available at:

http://www.matem.unam.mx/~micho/ripl2.html

It contains a couple of more complex constructions involving a RAM drive, and basic observations on Win98 RIPL setup. I have experimented with various Windows configurations, and the one that so far RIPLes the best from Aurora is, somehow surprisingly, Win98 (without IE shell integration).