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From Carmel Glover Subject: Microsoft & AppleHi Charles You're the sort of person who would probably know a thing like this. A Philistine last night claimed MS 'owned' Apple. Do you know the exact share MS has in Apple? Is it around 15%? Carmel Hi Carmel; Typical Windoze-acolyte ignorance and disinformation. Not even close. In 1997, when Steve Jobs made his historic and controversial deal with Bill Gates to make Internet Explorer the default Mac OS Browser and dropping Apple's lawsuits against Microsoft for patent infringement, in return for Microsoft's undertaking to continue development of MS Office for the Mac for at least five more years, Microsoft purchased a token $150 million worth of Apple stock as an ernest of its good faith in cementing the deal. As far as I know, that's it as far as Microsoft's "ownership" of Apple. I don't have figures at hand on Apple's current capitalization, but I doubt that a $150 million investment would amount to a 1% share, let alone 15%. These issues take on a sort of urban legend life of their own. There are still a lot of people who believe the US Government bailed out Chrysler with a big cash handout in the early '80s. The government did loan money and provide loan guarantees to help Chrysler (now Daimler-Chrysler) out of its travails, but the company was able to pay every cent that money back, with interest, some eight years early. Charles From Richard Smykla Subject: re: Connecting two Macs - two tidbitsCharles, As to Martin's question about a lower limit of system version for Ethernet connectivity; I routinely connect via AAUI-adapter to a PowerBook 540c running System 7.6.1 from my OS 9.1 PowerMac. Extends the range a bit lower . . . I'm quite surprised that 7.5.5 won't do the same. Perhaps there is some confusion re: the AAUI adapter-as it performs the crossover function, only a standard CAT5 (straight-through) cable is necessary. I'm sure you're aware of this, but some of your readers may not be? Rick Hi Rick; Actually, I'm a bit hazy on issues associated with connecting older Macs using Ethernet crossover cables myself. Thanks for the helpful info. Charles From: Daniel Studds Subject: Appletalk/Ethernet for pre - Mac OS 8Charles- OK, as has been stated the method for pre-OS8 is different to the published instructions. Below I'm doing my best to recreate the necessary steps in System 7.5.5 (also applies to System 7.0, 7.1) Please note that I usually ad-lib this only when I need it so there's a chance I might miss something -- I apologise in advance if this is the case. The method is for the most part similar under Sytem 7 and 8. 1- Open the 'Appletalk' control panel and select Ethernet from the 'Connect via' dropdown box. 2- Enter informations and start file sharing 'Sharing Setup' control panel in the same manner as for the 'Start/Stop' tab of the 'File Sharing' tab under 8.0+ 3- The Users & Groups panel has a new design in 8.0+ but essentially operates the same. Add users/groups using the menu commands and modify their rights by double clicking users. 4- Open Chooser and click 'AppleShare'- ensure that AppleTalk is active. You should at this stage be able to see any other AppleTalk shares on the network. 5- Select the items you want to share in finder and use the 'Sharing...' menu option (under File) to specify access rights etc. This window operates slightly differently from its 8+ counterpart. Folders are not marked as 'Read Only', 'Write Only' or 'Read/Write', rather the option to 'See Files', 'See Folders' and 'Make Changes' are given. In the end, the functionality is the same, although slightly less self-explanatory. FYI, these instructions work (AFAIK ;) on a Macintosh IIcx whose HD I am currently browsing from my iMac. Unfortunately, it's not fast enough to surf the Web, but I've set it up with TCP/IP as an excercise in futility. It has Ethernet capabilities added through a Nubus card, which has both the standard RJ45 socket (which I'm using) and AAUI. Regards,
From Paul Delcour Subject: Connecting 2 MacsHi Charles, For what it's worth: when I connected my G3 and iMac via an Ethernet hub I was fortunate enough to have my neighbour help me out. He had a measurement device telling which wire was which in the ethernetcable. I had them connected with a ready made crossover cable and had to change to 'straight'. Turned out two wires had to be changed, so the 'straight' connection I'd made, ie color to color, didn't work. There was no way I could have found that out myself. With an ohmmeter yes, but the cable span 10 meters and was fixed. :-) Paul Delcour Thanks Daniel and Paul; This information is very helpful. Charles From George Sievers Subject: Once more on Microsoft attachmentsWell, it didn't take long for me to get another MS attachment from someone else today. Below is the relevant portion of my response to the sender. If others out there are tired of getting MS attachments, consider bouncing the e-mail right back at them. They bought Microsoft products, let them deal with the hassle. I won't anymore. George Sievers
Good stuff! Charles From J. S. Oxendine Subject: iBook concerns...Mr. Moore, I was in a retail store and decided to take a look at the iBook. Although it is quite handsome, the keyboard seems fragile compared to other laptop models. Worse, the "delete" key popped off while I was typing and could not be put back in place. I noticed an article of yours related to Apple's quality-control. Have you encountered similar or other complaints about the iBook? I love the look, but don't want keys in my soup! J. S. Oxendine Hi J.S.; Unfortunately, the delete key issue has been an all too common complaint with the new iBooks. Oddly enough, the original iBook also had some key cap failure problems when it first came out in 1999. The issue seemed to have gone away with that machine, and I hope it will be dealt with in the current iBook as well. Reader Chris Long, a new iBook owner, has this to say about the iBook keyboard:
"Interestingly, I pulled the keyboard on my iBook to install my RAM upgrade, and I was SHOCKED at how THIN that keyboard assembly is! The keys themselves are very shallow, and the assembly they're mounted to is like a triple-thick sheet of aluminum foil -- very flexible and THIN beyond belief! And yet, i LOVE the feel of that keyboard! it's far superior to my old 3400c's ..." From John H. Farr Subject: Netscape 6.1 cacheHi Charles! I'm playing with Netscape 6.1. Surprisingly, there doesn't appear to be any way to use a RAM disk for the browser cache. Wouldn't that speed things up? Any info on this would be appreciated. John Hi John; I hadn't thouught about this issue, but after receiving your note I checked in the copy of Mozilla 0.9.3 I'm using, and you're right; there appears to be no way to set the cache to a RAM disk. Being able to do so would indeed probably speed things up, and Mozilla Netscape 6.x is not entirely finished yet, so they may add that option in the future. I'm still waiting for a way to save Web pages as text files. Charles From Paul Delcour Subject: Shields and ports Internet safetyHi Charles, a friend of mine pointed me to: Where they have 'Shields up'. A test where they try to get into your computer to see if you're safely on the Internet and cannot be visited unwantedly. They also have a ports test. However, these are for Windows users. Do you or anybody else know of a Mac test like this? :-) Paul Delcour PS the tests are all negative in my Mac case! Hi Paul, Haven't heard of a Mac equivalent. My hacker friends tell me that Macs are tougher to hack into than Windows PCs. Charles From Terry Devlin Subject: Re: Is it Browsers or WebsitesHi Charles Many thanks for your thoughtful comment and reply to my aside on Applelinks recently. I suppose what strikes me (apart form the very obvious fact that this is a much bigger issue over there than in Europe) is that in many ways it all seems so Black and White. One is Liberal or Conservative. Over here matters seem to have a grayer shading. On the issue of Big Government I imagine that many North Americans would be appalled by European systems, which largely are a variant of the tax and spend mentality. We look to the state to provide almost all Education - primary, secondary and university, Health, Social Welfare - including permanent Assistance for the Unemployed, the ill and disabled, support for the Arts - usually in a way strongly independent of Government, as well as a national broadcasting service. While private business does supply alternatives in many cases - for instance you can have private health insurance in Ireland, but it will not necessarily provide a better service (though undoubtedly a faster one for non-emergency procedures). While there are variants among the Countries of the European Union, this is essentially the model we work on. And Europeans have shown themselves to be willing to endure much higher tax rates to support this range of services, and even to export this in a cross border way. For instance, when Ireland joined the EU we were among the poorest and now, through massive capital transfers from other countries in the EU along with some wise decisions by (various) Governments, we are among the richest. And this transformation took place in less than 30 years. On the other hand, we have in Ireland, sought to reduce the Government's involvement in business affairs, have privatised a number of State Companies, and plan to do more, while also striving to reduce the overall tax burden. One of the problems facing the electorate in many European countries is that there seems to be little choice among the political parties as they all agree on so much. The differences for us seem best expressed in non-economic terms. Conservatives tend to be pro-Life, liberals and radicals are more likely to be pro-Choice, Conservatives are in favour of limiting immigration, Liberals are more open to it. (This is a very hot subject in Ireland now, for the first time in our history Immigration and not Emigration is an issue). But for me, most fascinating of all is the issue of gun control. In Ireland there is simply no legal way in which a private citizen can own a handgun, semi-automatic rifle or any of the other weapons we hear about on the news over here. In fact, the State is so concerned about this issue that it will supply you with an armed guard (from the police) rather than a weapon if your life is in danger. Of course much of this legislation came about because of the conflict in Northern Ireland over the last thirty or so years, but it is worth noting that there is no, and I mean no, effort to change things even though the war is probably over. And this in a country where we do have armed criminals - armed bank robbery was a popular pastime for a while during the seventies and early eighties, largely due to the "fund-raising" efforts of several of the participants in the Northern conflict - and we do have armed drug gangs who do use their weapons. But even with this the rate for unlawful killings in Ireland is approximately 50 per year. The logic we use is as follows: most murders are domestic in nature, the products of domestic assaults. If there is a lethal weapon available, then these assaults are more likely to be fatal, so remove the lethal weapon. It is when I consider these issues that I find that I am - in the European sense - a liberal. As to my view of the world, I neither subscribe to the idea that the world is an inherently pleasant or unpleasant place, that's in the eye of the beholder, but rather that events have a tendency to upset the best laid plans, so contingency planning is an essential part of everything. As for human nature, I believe that people act out of their perceived best interest, and socialisation is the process of teaching someone that their best interest lies in getting on with their neighbour rather than stealing from him. The interesting thing about this is that it demands that both parties compromise - back to that gray area again. Regards
Hi Terry; Thanks for your additional thoughts. I appreciate that Ireland is a special case in this regard, but in North America and elsewhere, scientific analysis does not support the assertion that anti-gun legislation translates to lower crime and fewer gun-related injuries and deaths. Several US states that *loosened* their handgun carry permit laws experienced significantly decreased rates of certain crimes. Here in canada, where it has been virtually impossible for private citizens to own and keep handguns legally in their homes (they may be owned and stored at a certified gun club under very restrictive regulations) since 1934, handgun crime has been higher in the 1990s than ever before. One of the complaints re: politics in general here in Canada is likewise that the parties are more the same than different from one another, at least when they are in government. Also, the most contentious liberal/conservative dialectic in the Canadian political arena seems to focus on social/moral issues like abortion, gay rights, affirmative action, immigration, and other political correctness hot-button topics, rather than economics. Perhaps things are not so different. Charles Note: Letters to Moore's Mailbag may or may not be published at the editor's discretion. Correspondents' email addresses will NOT be published unless the correspondent specifically requests publication. Letters may be edited for length and/or context. Opinions expressed in postings to Moore's MailBag are those of the respective correspondents and not necessarily shared or endorsed by the Editor and/or Applelinks management. If you would prefer that your message not appear in Moore's Mailbag, we would still like to hear from you. Just clearly mark your message "NOT FOR PUBLICATION," and it will not be published. CM
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