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The next meeting will be on 1 February at 5:15 in the Computing Services Centre (ocassionally known as Information Technology Services) building seminar room. The topic will be "communications on your Mac" which will include an Internet update and a demonstration of the capabilities of Geoport technology.
The Internet just gets better and better so be there to see the latest on the web, cool sites, how to search for the information you want. Got an obscure topic you want info on? Come along and see what we can find!
Want to get rid of your phone, answer phone, speaker phone, fax machine, modem, dialler and contact database? Geoport is the answer. All you need is your PowerMac and a Geoport Telecom adaptor. See the short article later in this newsletter which is a summary of a full article in the "Campus LAN" newsletter.
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By Owen Baxter
Apple is in the middle of another crisis. Apple is the type of company that seems to be continuously in the midst of one crisis or another so it is easy to ignore the dire predictions of the so-called business analysts and experts when Apple, yet again, produces what is seen as a bad result. But the current crisis seems to be slightly worse than average so a more extensive change at Apple might take place.
So what is it all about? From what I can gather Apple has posted a loss of something like $50 million for the last quarter of 1995 even though it has sold more computers than ever before.
Apple's Power Macintosh computers are a great success, the transition to PowerPC has been handled brilliantly and new technologies are on the way that put Apple even further ahead of the competition. Apple's market share is either growing slowly or stable depending on who you believe. Apple sells more computers than any other manufacturer in the world, except perhaps Compaq, again depending on which numbers you believe.
The problem is that the price of Macs has been continuously pushed down to the point where profits have been seriously eroded. PC manufacturers can afford to produce the cheapest possible machine because they just churn out nasty little boxes exactly the same as everyone else with a slightly different badge. They don't need to worry about research and development and trying to improve the state of the art in computing. Apple only holds any sort of lead because its technology is clearly better. Keeping it that way costs money and when the price of a Mac drops less is available for R&D.
Don't get the idea that I am suggesting Apple is just there for the good of us users and not to make a few bucks like everyone else - I'm not that naive! But I do believe that Apple is the most important company in the personal computer industry (sorry Microsoft and IBM). If Apple's philosophy and way of operating needed to change in a major way it would be a disaster for computing in general.
So what is likely to happen? Apple will reorganise and lose several thousand employees. Yes, that's all happened before and not just to Apple. Even mighty IBM was forced through a major restructuring not long ago. The encouraging thing is the layoffs will involve mainly administrative and management staff - and let's face it, they're better off without them! Most companies in a similar situation would rather lose engineers and programmers instead of the more senior administrators.
The more serious possibility is that Apple might be bought by another company. Sun apparently have already tried. But there appears to be some secret maneuvoring going on in the senior Apple management, perhaps a merger with another technology company. Take your pick, in the past AT&T, Philips, Sun and even IBM have been mentioned as possibilities. This time the most likely possibility seems to be Sun.
Sun is the leading manufacturer of workstations in the world. The University has several Suns performing complex tasks a bit beyond the capabilities of a desktop machine. What would be the result a such a merger? Well, your guess is as good as mine. The CEO of Sun doesn't seem to be the sort of person that would manage a personal computer company very well according to some sources but there are also indications that such a merger could be very positive. After all workstation and desktop capabilities are converging, what better than a combination of companies currently seen as leaders in each field?
Anyway Apple won't disappear and the Mac won't cease to exist in the immediate future. What will happen in the far future? Your guess is as good a mine, in this industry predictions of the future aren't easy!
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By Owen Baxter
This article is a summary of one appearing in the Campus LAN magazine
One of the important functions which computers are being used for now, and even more in the future, is communications. The current communications devices: phone, fax, etc can be replaced with a computer. In the past several pieces of hardware and software were necessary to achieve this result. The only hardware necessary to achieve this on a PowerMac is the Apple Geoport telecom adaptor cable which connects your phone system (standard analog line, ISDN, etc) to the geoport connector (either of the serial ports) in your machine. The modem is actually a program which runs in the background on the PowerPC processor.
Here's how it works (theoretically):
The same sort of things happens in reverse when you make a voice, data or fax call out to another computer or a conventional fax or phone. If you buy extra software you can even set up a call management system which can navigate through various messages depending on the keys the person types on their phone. For example the computer might say "type 1 on your keypad to hear Owen's latest high score in Marathon, type 2 to hear what Owen did on his holidays, type three...".
So for just one adaptor cable and the software that comes with it you get all of these functions: data modem, fax send and receive, hands-off speaker phone, phone dialler, phone answering machine, phone call scheduler, phone log, contact database. The software implements features only available in expensive specialised machines like the ability to call the computer and enter a code to have it read your phone messages back to you. Because the whole thing is done in software there is no extra hardware to clutter your desk. Its Mac software so of course its easy to use (much easier than using a real phone answering machine or fax, anyway). And finally its much cheaper than buying all the individual parts.
Sounds too good to be true? Well there are some disadvantages too - these are the ones I have found: First and most seriously, you can't fax a paper document unless you scan it first but you can fax a document prepared in any Mac program. Secondly the software doesn't seem to distinguish between voice and data calls properly every time so I need to help by switching programs on and off. For example I use the speaker-phone/dialler/phone-answerer during the day and the data modem after hours. Note that this should work, maybe in a future release of the software it will be more reliable. The data modem is limited to 14.4 kbaud in the current release (which is fast but there are faster hardware modems around). Much higher speeds are possible and remember its a software modem so only a software upgrade is necessary. Finally because the CPU does the work you do notice a slight slow down in the speed of your machine if you are using other programs when a call comes through. This is one area where a second dedicated DSP chip is an advantage.
I have been using this system on my PowerMac 8100/80av for a while now and it is very nice - almost as nice a feature as being able to watch TV on my Mac! If you would like to see any of this technology in action please come to the next meeting.
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