America Online APPLE II DEVELOPMENT FORUM CONFERENCE LOG Tuesday, March 20, 1990 10:00 pm eastern time Topic: Programming Environments Forum Leader: Gary Jacobson (AFA Gary J) AFA Gary J Welcome to the Apple II Development Forum AFA Gary J Tonight's topic is "Programming Environments" AFA Gary J It looks like we need to use forum PROTOCOL, so.... AFA Gary J If you have a question, type a "?" on a line by itself, or if you have AFA Gary J a comment on the current topic, type a "!" on a line by itself. It looks AFA Gary J like "Mac Hater" got the first question in. GA, Mac Hater Mac Hater has Nicholas expanded on his post "there will be a new development tool within Mac Hater 72 hours.." or does anyone (who can tell us) say more? sounds pretty fun. Mac Hater ga A2GS Drop the ! and make it a ? Mac Hater guess not. :) ga AFA Gary J I guess no one's talking, Mac Hater. Anyone? Mac Hater ga with the next question AFA Gary J Ok.. GA, A2. A2GS Not a direct programming Q, but does deal with Devloping for the II.... A2GS As far as I can tell, Apples opinion/marketing of the II stinks.... A2GS Is there anything we can do change it????????? AFA Gary J GA, Pest Pest II I think that perhaps that's a little strong... A2GS You can't be serious?! Pest II I think that there are many people at Apple who'd like to see a healthy AppleII Pest II perhaps they aren't the "right people" though...what I'd do is write to the A2GS Yes, But I'm referring to the guy's who make the $$ decisions (ex. marketing) Pest II "powers that be" the people who can indeed change that sort of thing Pest II Unless you want to infiltrate Apple (like I do :-)) A2GS Unfortunately there have been dozens of writing campaigns and it doesn't look A2GS like they've accomplished anything. AFA Gary J GA with your comment, Tracy AFL TracyP Barney Stone's group may have turned around the top-echelon Matt DTS There have been dozens of campaigns *discussed*. I personally don't know of one that happened. AFL TracyP of marketeers at Apple, but apparently those efforts Pest II Me niether Matt AFL TracyP have yet to translate to the rank-and-file. How else do you A2GS That is a possibility, Matt, But either way I'm sure the head hogs know AFL TracyP explain Apple's announcement of the DMA SCSI card st week, AFL TracyP then a big party for a whole herd of Mac announcements A2GS how II people feel and a letter won't make any difference (nor will 10,000 A2GS letters, unfortunately) AFL TracyP yesterday? Why not include the SCSI announcement with the AFL TracyP rest? Or is Apple still trying to tell us they're ashamed of the A2? AFL TracyP done A2GS Yes, I think they are. AFA Gary J Interesting point, Tracy AFA Gary J GA, Danny AFA DannyH I don't want to sound like an apoligist for Apple but, I think Apple has done AFA DannyH one helluva job for the Apple II users for the last TWO years.... AFA DannyH we hanve seen new peripherrals and new computers as well AFA DannyH as a lot of new System Software with prromises AFA DannyH of even more to come, GA A2GS Oh come on......there hasn't been an ad for a II in the past 2 years A2GS and in that time I've seen 100's of Mac ads, saw one a few days ago!!! A2GS Big deal!!! A2GS I'm talking about future developments (ex. machines) as well as Marketing A2GS which will make the machine strong and improve 3rd party development, which A2GS as this point is virtually Nill, except for a few loyal companies. A2GS Done. AFA Gary J I think we all could run on this topic all night, but it's true, that's not AFA Gary J what we're here for. LordRoland I agree --> new topic. AFA Gary J Let's move on to Markus's question. GA, Markus Markus I've heard APW is going to be updated. Has anyone heard anything? ga A2GS I warned you this wouldn't be a programming Q :) AFA Gary J GA, Roland LordRoland Yeah, APW is being updated. I don't know much though. New linker and stuff. Micol Sys Any day now, from what I hear Markus Any idea how soon? LordRoland Or am I thinking of ORCA? AFA Gary J GA, Coach Micol Sys Or sometime in the near future (next few months) Tamira didn't APW 3 just come out??? Coach101 In the last 6 months Apple issued an update for APW (tools and interfaces) Coach101 that included a new linker, librarian, REZ and DeREZ tools. Markus Yep, got those when they first hit. :) Coach101 There is an APW 2.0 meandering its way through Apple but when it will be Coach101 released would be anybody's guess... I think there is a little more Coach101 information in the development environment area here in ADV.. ga Markus thanks. I'm done. :) AFA Gary J Ok, Thanks Markus (and Coach). Let's move on to Gibber's question. A GibberFC Does anyone know when the new sound tools will be available? A GibberFC I called APDA and they had info on them but no date :( A GibberFC ga AFA Gary J I have no idea, anyone else? LordRoland Hmm. I thought they were coming with Sys. 6.0. A GibberFC The person that had the answer ducked out.. A GibberFC :( Pest II If APDA doesn't know...does anyone? AFA Gary J Release dates are hard to come by with ANY software. Coach101 APDA (phone people) would probably not know until it was deliverable ! LordRoland Matt would've known. AFA Gary J (Especially comeing from Apple) A2GS Dave???? Dave Lyons Sorry...don't know. Dave Lyons (I'm sure APDA doesn't know, though.) AFA Gary J Ok, Let's move on to LordRoland's question. GA. LordRoland OK. I'm working on a term. program. Everything is speeding along fine except LordRoland for the text. I was using the toolkit, but obviously it's too slow. It seems LordRoland that the best way to do it is to zap the char. directly into screen ram. LordRoland Does anyone have any recomendations as to the easiest way to go about doing LordRoland this. I don't relish typing in the individual bitmaps for the letters. LordRoland GA AFA Gary J GA, Pest Pest II Well, I thought that the zapping into RAM method was exactly the sort of thing Pest II that Apple want us to avoid...have you used the COUT routine? Pest II I don't know that it's any faster, but you probably wouldn't have to AFA Gary J COUT? On the graphics screen? LordRoland No, I haven't. It's graphics based. Desktop. I need more speed. I don't LordRoland really care about Apple Guidelines. GA Pest II Ah, I see...thought you meant text text LordRoland Sorry Apple :) AFA Gary J GA, A2 A2GS Seeing as how your somewhat of an "Apple Rebel" like myself :) ..... Coach101 Ga Dave Dave Lyons If you're using QuickDraw, you'll get a *big* speed A2GS What exactly are you trying to avoid (besides the tools)? Dave Lyons benefit from drawing a LINE at a time (with, say, DrawString) Dave Lyons instead of a character at a time. Dave Lyons As far as going by the "Apple guidelines" goes, if you can't get the job done with the Dave Lyons toolbox, by all means do what you have to do. Just realize that rules aren't there to give Dave Lyons fascists something to do, but to maximize compatibility with future hardware and software, Dave Lyons and with other present software (for ex, your A2GS <-- Facist??? LordRoland I hate buffering the text though, cause it just doesn't seem 'natural'. A2GS What are you trying to do/avoid doing? Dave Lyons app will work much better with a DA in front of your window if you're drawing with QD than if Dave Lyons you're drawing right to the screen!). LordRoland I just want the letters up fast. I want the screen to keep up with the modem. A2GS Then use Apple's default font.... Dave Lyons In other words, Apple doesn't invent rules to *annoy* you, but to Dave Lyons make life cool in the long run. LordRoland Not fast enough. A2 Coach101 How fast is fast? A2GS store the bitmaps of the letters in a lookup table.... A2GS (you didn't let me finish :) LordRoland Right on A2GS, but I don't want to type in the bitmaps. I'd prefer to get A2GS Then use an x,y coordinate system to draw the characters at the correct A2GS place on the screen. A2GS So use Apple's defualt font!! LordRoland the font in memory and then bypass QD in getting them up. A2GS Capture it from a SHR screen or something. LordRoland Hmm. I thought about that. I guess that's my only option. Mac Hater is Quickdraw using shadowing? that'll speed up. also preshifted shaston is Mac Hater fast. A2GS It's the easiest (if you ask me) AFA Gary J But as Dave points out, you loose system compatability by doing things that AFA Gary J way. A2GS Mac, using shadowing for such small objects would actually slow things down!! LordRoland I think it was Matt who mentioned reading the actual Font Data. LordRoland On the NET. A2GS Yes, but do you know where that is in ROM? LordRoland Nope. LordRoland Anyone? A2GS Well then your stuck doing it my way :) LordRoland Educated guesses? A2GS You can search for it using the monitor.... Mac Hater you can get the font handle and go from there... LordRoland Stab in the dark? LordRoland I'm on a Rom 02. Is it even in ROM? A2GS First draw the font on the screen....look at the data from within the monitor AFA Gary J The font in ROM? Dave Lyons Hey, you can *get* the font handle with GetFont. A2GS and then search for a string of data in ROM which is identicle. Dave Lyons That's not a problem. A2GS Does that give the address of the FONT data in ROM? Mac Hater you're doing something wrong Lord Roland, TML Pascal has a example of a termina Dave Lyons The *problem* is blasting it to the screen FASTER than QuickDraw already does--you'll have Mac Hater program that runs fine w/ tools. AWGS runs fine. A2GS Are there headers that he'll have to look out for within the Font table? Dave Lyons to sacrifice some of the generality of QD to make it go faster--like lost some clipping, or force Dave Lyons it to be aligned to a byte or word in a certain way, etc. Dave Lyons The font data may be in RAM or ROM...it depends. Dave Lyons (And it doesn't matter much.) A2GS Default Font will be in ROM. LordRoland AWGS uses buffering. I really don't want that. LordRoland The only TML Pascal I've seen runs slow, slow, slow. CMOSness hi all AFA Gary J Ok, It looks like we've run into a dead end on your question, LordRoland. AFA Gary J Anything else? Dave Lyons Which TML was slow? Dave Lyons TML Pascal II uses Text Edit & updates pretty fast. It does suffer from some bugs in Text Edit Dave Lyons itself, but the speed isn't the problem. LordRoland Sorry. I was gone for a sec. V 1.5, dave. Dave Lyons Yeah, definitely check out TML Pascal II 1.x. Dave Lyons (done) LordRoland OK. Thanks everyone. I'm thru. (DONE) AFA Gary J Allright, let's move on to A2GS's question. GA A2 A2GS 2 off the wall questions, one..... A2GS Anyone familiar with OCR (Optical Character Recognition) and where I can get A2GS info on it? A2GS GA LordRoland Not a clue. AFA Gary J GA, Scott :) AFL Scott You can get information on OCR in several books I have that are packed up AFL Scott right now...(I'm moving)... I'll be glad to email you the information once LordRoland Mac had it in 1987 :( AFL Scott I'm settled in my new home. A2GS Where'd you move to? A2GS (not my second Q :) AFL Scott Reston, VA. AFL Scott I haven't moved, yet... Done. AFA Gary J GA with your comment, CMOSness BillP Reston VA??? Who would live there??? :) CMOSness I was just going to say that CMOSness I remember a comp chronicals episode CMOSness about that, and maybe you could get info CMOSness thru them DONE. A2GS Great, I'm looking for info on how to write routines. Mac Hater you're moving with Scott also? AFA Gary J (I'd think that you'd want to be FURTHER away from there, Scott :) A2GS Second Q..... A2GS Anyone know if there are any advantages to using Huffman compression as opposed A2GS to LZW compression? A2GS GA LordRoland Check with Abaton for the OCR. A2GS The scanner people? LordRoland Yeah. They had a mac char. reader in Feb. 1987. I just happen to have the LordRoland ad in front of me. A2GS So where's there II version??????????? A2GS :) A2GS BTW Anyone able to answer my second Q? LordRoland ?? Hack something together. Mac Hater huffman can be faster. ga AFA Gary J A2, as for compression routines, I know there are advantages and disadvantages AFA Gary J to either method, but don't recall the specifics. A2GS Compressing or decompressing? LordRoland Probably works through the serial port. Then use a DA to accept the input. Mac Hater decompression. lzw is faster if you search small series of bytes but then data Mac Hater is not always thoroughly compressed (repetetive graphics would be). A2GS Which is faster at decompressing? LordRoland Probably costs alot, so maybe, you shouldn't HACK something together. A2GS What would cost alot? AFA Gary J GA, CMOSness LordRoland The OCR. A2GS Why? A2GS If it's software based. LordRoland All Mac stuff is expensive. Plus, it's high tech stuff. Not really, but... CMOSness I was just wondering, A2, how does OCR fit into DL II (or does it :) A2GS It doesn't :) Just a pet project :) LordRoland It isn't software based, I don't think. CMOSness :) AFA Gary J GA, DHackerott DHackerott I'm also interested in OCR via ThunderScan LordRoland No way, Hackerott. DHackerott What input are you planning on? LordRoland I really don't think it would work. A2GS I'm interested VIA Quicky, but could also be applied to Thunderscan! AFA Gary J A2, why not put up something in the message boards. GA, Scott AFL Scott Yes way... it's possible. You just have to write routines that can match AFL Scott bit patterns...with some error factoring... it's not that hard, it's just AFL Scott time consuming... Basically for each font you need to recognize you need to AFL Scott have an equivalent bitpattern in memory to match each character. A2GS Exactly! LordRoland What is the resolution of Thuderscan. 100 dpi tops. A2GS There are a few hurdles which have to be overcome, it's not that easy. AFL Scott Done. AFA Gary J Thanks, Scott. A2GS I wouldn't use that technique.... A2GS NOT at all accurate. AFL Scott How would YOU do it, then? A2GS Unless you have a bitmap for every FONT in the world! A2GS Hold on.... AFA Gary J That's what character recognition currently has to do, isn't it? AFL Scott Yup. LordRoland Yeah. You need algorithms that'll work with most fonts. A2GS I would use "Feature Analysis". AFA Gary J GA, Marty AFL Marty It's not necessarily the case that you'd need a bitmap for every font AFA Gary J (Most of the recognition stuff I'm familiar with works with a limited type of AFL Marty in the world... AFA Gary J font and font size) AFL Marty All you really need is a bitmap that is "close enough" in some sense of AFL Marty the word. AFA Gary J Right, there should be margin for error A2GS That doesn't offer very much flexibility. AFL Marty For example, we can recognize the letter "x" in a wide variety of fonts... AFA Gary J GA, Bill BillP yea but... BillP won't we have outline fonts on the GS soon anyway. :) BillP ga AFL Marty not because we have memorized the fonts, but because there are elements AFL Marty of the character that identify it as being an x. AFL Marty done A2GS It's easier seen and recognized by the human eye then by an algorithm! AFL Marty I never said it was easy. AFA Gary J GA, Roland LordRoland I heard that we don't have the clock speed for Outline fonts. A2GS That's where Feature Analysis comes in. AFL Scott Explain feature analysis? AFA Gary J GA, Scott A2GS I've heard a lot of things which wren't true about the IIGS !!! A2GS Most weren't true! A2GS Feature Analysis.... A2GS Basically you define a character from the alphabet by the lines and curves A2GS which make it up... A2GS Ex. the letter "A" is made up of 2 diagonal lines plus one horizontal line. LordRoland Does anyone know anyone called Harlock (AO name, of course)? LordRoland Sorry to interrupt! A2GS The letter "D" is made up of one vertical line and one half loop. A2GS Done. A GibberFC Unless it is block lettering... then it has 2 vertical and 2 horizonal A GibberFC ga A2GS Exactly. AFA Gary J GA, Scott AFL Scott Exactly... I think we said that... Marty did, I know... not in so many words.. AFA Gary J Right. AFL Scott however, you have to store the features somewhere... and vectors wouldn't A2GS I'm just trying to point out that using bitmaps is very inefficient. LordRoland Bitmaps won't work. LordRoland Well. DHackerott Has anyone actually used QUICKIE yet? Does it really, really work? AFL Scott be a good choice, IMHO. So how do you plan on defining the choices? AFL Marty I don't recall anyone arguing that they were efficient. AFL Dyfet (I had some nasty modem problems tonight :() AFL Marty Hi Dave! AFA Gary J GA, Gibber A2GS I've used Quickie.... A GibberFC ack.... ga A2GS Defining what choices? LordRoland My dealer has one. I was pretty suprised. AFL Scott For the characters you plan on recognizing? Vectors, angles... what? AFA Gary J GA, Marty LordRoland Hey, I gotta go. Thanks everyone. A2GS Can't use angles (much to complicated and not very useful)..... AFA Gary J Goodnight, Roland. AFL Marty Couldn't you store the bitmap of a "generic" font? Then compare the image of A2GS Plan to use vectors or something related to it....it's the algorithms that AFL Marty the scanned font to that of the stored one and if "most" of the points... A2GS are difficult to come up with...so I'm looking for some OCR books for A2GS some suggestions. AFL Marty are "close enough" to some character in the stored font, you have a match. A2GS Marty, What do you do when there's a wide range in FONT sizes? A2GS Feature Analysis solves this problem and is VERY flexible. Coach101 I think you have all missed on of the basic starting problems.... Coach101 1) You have no idea what is horizontal and what is vertical. But AFL Marty I dunno. I'm just tossing out ideas as they pop into my head. Coach101 you probably know its not pure x or pure y! A2GS That's what the algorithms are for :) Coach101 Two, the old brain very quickly defined a line for you.. Your program AFL Marty If I were doing the project, I'd do it for one font size and AFL Marty improve it from there. Coach101 is going to have to figure out all of that stuff before even looking Coach101 for a character! A2GS Why is that? A2GS One of the main algorithms (besides helping with character definitions) is to A2GS locate a character. A2GS All OCR programs follow the same general rules for locating and defining a AFA Gary J GA, Scott A2GS character.... AFL Scott Not necessary, Coach.. if an approximation map is "taught" to the software and A2GS I just want to know how they do it :) Tamira brb AFL Scott the software has an Orientation option, the main task of the scanning software Mac Hater y=mx+b bye all :) A2GS My guess is that you have to scan the screen for a black pixel on a white AFL Scott would be to only filter those bits which are below a certain threshold. After A2GS screen and from that determine the size and loaction of the character. A2GS Working from the black pixel on. AFL Scott that, the approximation map, or better yet, mask could be used to to tell AFA Gary J Sounds like a slow process to me. AFL Scott what character is present... it's not fast... That's why most OCR equipment AFL Scott does this all on board and just feeds ascii text to a host. AFL Scott The key is the scanner... it's got to be accurate. AFL Scott Done. A2GS Nobody said it was fast or easy....but I don't think it's that slow... Coach101 YEs, I have seen some very good results out of Kurtzweil equipment... Coach101 But, the context is very important. The stuff I have played around A2GS I think an entire page of text (1000 - 2000 characters) could be converted Coach101 with on PCs did not have a strong enought concept of context and would A2GS into ASCII in under 10 seconds.... A2GS and that's a hell of a lot faster then typeing in the entire page! Coach101 change things like Entry_Point to Entry-(&&(&( That is, if shifted its Coach101 line too quickly because it did not know waht aline was... ga A2GS I've seen the results of using the Quickie and I think it's possible to do... A2GS but we'll never know till someone tries. A2GS Done (finally) ! DHackerott Impatienlty awaiting to beta test for you! Coach101 :)