SOUND OFF!


The purpose of this section is to provide a forum for our readers to voice their opinions and thoughts on issues related to OS/2. If you have an observation, concern, gripe or compliment regarding something, please feel free to send them to the OS/2 CONNECT editor for inclusion in this section, at: Title & Publisher or complete the form at the bottom of this page.

The opinions expressed in this section are those of the individual writer and do not necessarily represent the opinions of the editor or publisher of OS/2 CONNECT. NOTE: Letters may be edited for inappropriate or offensive language.


MAY EDITORIAL

I enjoyed your editorial in the May 1998 issue. I agree with your observations and parallels between Paramount's and IBM's management just not "getting it" regarding interest in their products.

One aside, however, most folks who identify strongly with the Star Trek mythos prefer to be known as Trekkers, not Trekkies. In terms of the ending on the words, "-er" versus "-ie," the Trekker is one who is active in the Star Trek experience. A Trekkie is one to whom the experience passively happens.

Keep up the good work. I hope you're not flooded by e-mail from passionate Trekkers -- but if you are, I hope they remain polite.

- David L. Richard
April 14, 1998

EDITOR's NOTE: Thanks for the tip; it makes the comparison to "Teamers" even more meaningful.


NO LUCK WITH SCANNERS

Bought a 1975 MB-450SEL. It works. Bought a Mustek 1200SP SCSI flatbed scanner - No OS/2 support, company wrote two messages to me saying, "We never have supported OS/2 and never will." I took it back to the store.

Bought an HP 5100C w/enhanced parallel pass-thru-port, which enables you to plug your printer (my HP DeskJet) into it, without the need for an additional PP on the PC bed. No OS/2 support. No plans for OS/2 support, either from IBM or HP. So, we take another trip to return OS/2-not equipment.

It seems that OS/2 has, as a part of it's bad stigma, the underderlying fact that IBM has so badly reniged on promises to other vendors that they are very unsupportive of the OS. This problem, which has resulted in my noted bad experiences with device support, should be the clearest priority on the list to WarpCast - if you are ever asked.

So, I siteth here with a nice box with a nice scanner for Windows 98. It helpeth me not. ;)

What question should I be asking here? How about, "What is the better color flatbed on the market that will work with a native OS/2 driver?" If the answer is, "there are none!," then we should be loading Linux into the PC.

- Ray Waechter
Downingtown, PA, USA
April 14, 1998

READER'S RESPONSE: For SCSI scanners, the OS/2 port of SANE is a good scanner package. It is freeware. Although it only has a command line interface, I wrote a PM front end for it in VisPro/REXX and published it as freeware; Have a look at SANE661.ZIP and PMSAN025.ZIP - both available at HOBBES, SHAREWARE, OS2 Supersite and other OS/2 archives.

SANE supports a wide range of scanners. My program has solid support for HP scanners and has development code for Microtek. I wrote the program because, like Ray, I found scanner support under OS/2 to be very frustrating. Feedback from around the world has been very positive and I hope that many more people find my program useful.

- Stan Irish
Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
April 30, 1998

I DISAGREE...

I can't agree with what I read in your newsletter.

We can read good news everwhere except in your newsletter, where we find bad feelings, continuos attacks on IBM, OS/2 and so on...

Ok, I agree with you when you say that IBM marketing politics are very lame.... But do you surf the Internet? I've seen OS/2 banners (from IBM!!) on CNN, on Borland'site, on Yahoo, on Alta Vista and so on...

I've never seen such a thing around in 1997!!

On ZD, PC World, IDG etc. IBM talks about OS/2 (and not bad!!)!

We've many new updates, including FixPak 5, FixPak 6, then a lot of new drivers. A good number of applications are coming, for example, Ceres Sound Studio is outstanding!

People, are getting exhausted from MS upgrades and lame OSes; people are searching or alternatives. OS/2 is the best choice!!

Everyone is getting tired about Multimedia Encyclopedias or crap like that!!

OS/2 is a strong platform to surf the web, or as graphic workstation, or for CAD, or to produce web-pages, SOHO and so on!!

OS/2 is no longer "for banking only"! IBM's goal is to steal the NT and Win95 market, not to kill off OS/2!

To fight MS in its market, of course, they've to put OS/2 on the backburner for a while! Not forever!

OS/2 is not an operating system for kids or computer-lamers! OS/2 is strong and good even without native media encyclopedias or lame-games!!

I like OS/2 like it is!

So, stop complaining, and support OS/2, because you don't!!

- Massimo Sangriso
System Administrator
Webmaster "OS/2 AT HOME!"
Italy
April 14, 1998

EDITOR's NOTE: Thanks for your comments. Long time readers of the newsletter understand my position on OS/2: there is perhaps not a stronger proponent of OS/2 than yours truly. My work with the newsletter, OS/2 user groups, the product priority lists, conversion of my company's products to OS/2, and the "Connect the World with Merlin" project speaks for itself. However, I do have a real problem when a vendor turns its back on an excellent product and allows inferior products to capture the market. It may be acceptable to you, but IBM's lackluster marketing efforts and indifference towards its customer base is too much for me to swallow. Where I come from, we call this "Grasping defeat from the jaws of victory."


NETWORK INSTALL AND TEAM OS/2?

Tim, keep up the great work - we appreciate it. A couple of quick questions - do you know if IBM plans to fix their Networking Install portion of Warp 4? It seems that the only way I can get networking to work properly is to re-install Warp from scratch and install the LAN card drivers, client, etc. during the initial install. Selective Install for the LAN clients just doesn't seem to work for us. Any ideas?

Team OS/2 - what's the plan with their web site? I stopped going there months ago because nothing seemed to change. I think it's a great idea to register users - what are they waiting for?

- Kevin Salisbury
Salisbury Electronics
Canterbury, CT, USA
March 30, 1998

EDITOR's REPLY: Although I have personally not run into any problems networking with Warp 4, you might want to check out the following web pages:

IBM OS/2 Warp 4 Install Page - http://www.rs6000.ibm.com/pspinfo/obi/
Warp 4 Tuning Tips - http://www.ee.newcastle.edu.au/users/staff/peter/os2/tuning.html
Warp X-The Future with OS/2 Warp - http://www.jmast.se/warpx/warpx.htm

As to Team OS/2 (http://www.teamos2.org/): although unconfirmed, I suspect that it has met the same fate as IBM PC User Group relations which terminated earlier this year due to budget cuts.


OS/2 SUPPORT FOR IMATION DRIVES

I had already purchased the Imation 120Mb external drive for use on another system. As OS/2 users might know, Imation does not yet have the driver code in OS/2 format.

The following does work, however, if you are willing to work within a DOS session:

  1. Set up a DOS session where the DOS version is DOS 5.0 or earlier, I used the VMDISK generated image file of a DRDOS 3.0 boot disk. (Be sure to have the FSFILTER.SYS and the FSACCESS.EXE on the disk as well).

  2. Edit the CONFIG.SYS file to include the DOS drivers for the LS-120 drivers for the external drive system.

  3. Run this up as a DOS session. The session then starts with the next available drive letter and one can read/write the external drive.
After getting this working, I had a BIOS setting problem on the next bootup. Therefore users are cautioned to have a clean shutdown when doing the DOS route.

Perhaps if OS/2 users complain to Imation (they have a contact address under their web page http://www.imation.com/) 3M might eventually prepare an OS/2 driver.

- Jim Courtright
Milwaukee, WI, USA
March 23, 1998

APRIL EDITORIAL

I just read your editorial entitled "Good News for Java Users" in the April issue of OS/2 CONNECT.

IMO, it's not only an excellent editorial, but it's also most relevant to the current concerns of the OS/2 user community.

- Larry Lavins
OS/2 SIG Leader, Philadelphia Area Computer Society
March 17, 1998

WHY ALL THE FUSS?

Interesting comments (March Editorial) but why all the fuss? The name of the game in the western world's industrialized economy is bottom line and how one achieves that is inconsequential. Short term gain will inevitably bring long term pain however you might perceive it. The allowance of monopolistic situations will inevitably bring disaster but the upper echelon of management is never held responsible for bad economic decisions; they are so frequently rewarded with outlandish payouts when the crunch comes. So much for OS/2 advocates - it is a very good operating system and one which the millions of home users could be using with an adequate marketing program but to no avail.

- Herb Baldwin
Red Deer, AB, Canada
March 17, 1998

PROBLEM WITH NOVELL SERVER

I am currently using OS/2 Warp version 3. I have gone from running a mixture of 802.3 and 802.2 to strictly 802.2. After "unbinding" the last Novell Server from 802.3 I could no longer log my OS/2 system on to the network. Once I rebound the network to the 802.3 I could then logon to the network. What could be going on here?

I would appreciate any help with this matter.

- Mark Martin
First Commerce Bank
Tel: 706/335-3270
March 12, 1998

EDITOR's NOTE: Any user or consultant with expertise in Novell Server and OS/2 is encouraged to contact Mark directly.


THANKS

I just visited your web site for the first time off a link from the OS/2 Supersite. I must say I enjoyed the speed of the server, the content snd the editorial. I am just a home user and business user of OS/2, not into games and the like. I am also quite anti-Microsoft/Intel, upgrade every six month mentality.

Thanks for the refreshing viewpoints; If I could only get a version of Quicken for OS/2......

- Chris Youngs
Humble, TX, USA
March 11, 1998

EDITOR's NOTE: Thanks for your note. If you like Quicken, be sure to check out Spitfire Software'a InCharge accounting software for OS/2 at: http://rampages.onramp.net/~landeck


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