April-May 1987 AMIGAZINE! "PageSetter" Available Desktop Publishing Dale C. Pace The buzz words of this year are "Desktop Publishing". There are a lot of people who think this an ideal application for the Amiga. I agree! Now all we need is software. There are at least four programs due to bring Desktop Publishing to the Amiga. "PageSetter" by Gold Disk Inc. of Ontario, Canada (retail $149.95) is the only one that you can buy now. This is another example of a phenomena I have been watching. Commodore claims the Amiga is a "business" machine. It's a claim I feel is really limiting the value of the machine since it really doesn't take a very powerful machine for business applications -- just look at the IBM PC. But in order to sell a lot of machines the business community must accept the machine for an application they think is important. The strange thing is that very little software is written for the Amiga in this country that could be called business like. But there are several examples of good business software from Europe and Canada; a couple of databases, spread sheets, and some integrated software packages. I think the reason is that in Great Britain, Europe and Canada, Commodore is taken seriously as a business computer builder and amusingly, IBM is not well liked at all. "PageSetter" another Canadian product is serious desktop publishing software. "PageSetter"'s opening screen -- the Desktop -- is a brown field with a double column of formating tools along the right side, similar to "Deluxe Paint." One of the pull down menus allows you to change the Desktop, paper and ink colors but not to save them as defaults. They are saved with a document so that when you reload it you will get the same environment. But if you don't like their default colors, plan on changing them each time you start a new document. The color changes only apply to the screen. "PageSetter" does not have the ability to produce color printouts even with a color printer. "PageSetter" gives you many of the tools you need to create very nice flyers, newsletters and signs. It has a text editor, a graphics editor, and a truly amazing printing facility that will produce output that can approach that of a laser printer from your lowly dot matrix printer. One thing to be aware of is that on some printers if you print from the Desktop rather than using the "PagePrint" utility program that comes on the disk you may get some white lines at regular intervals in your printout. My printer, a Centronics GLP, using the standard Epson driver does this. Another reason to use the utility is that you can print while working on something else. Yes, it nicely multitasks as any good Amiga program should. The text editor has the necessary tools to write copy for your new publication. First of all you can load files from other editors and word processors, specifically from "Scribble!", "Textcraft", and "generic". Generic is used for most ASCII format files including "PageSetter". You can find, replace, cut, paste and exchange blocks of text; all of the things you would expect from any text editor except formatting. Since the main program has more formatting capabilities than any word processor, it would be confusing and redundant to also have formatting here. Actually, I don't want to leave the impression there is anything missing in the text editor. In fact, it is quite adequate. I am using it right now to write this article. There are a couple of things that annoy me about this editor. One is that it runs in graphics mode. So once you fill the screen with text, any additions cause an entire screen rewrite, not just scrolling. It is not a problem, once you get used to typing ahead of the screen, since nothing is lost during the screen rewrites. There is one other minor annoyance; the program allows you to change the colors for the layout screen but this is not used in the text editor. For some strange reason they have chosen white letters on a black background. I would have chosen the reverse and I am sure some of you would have other ideas. After all, this is an Amiga and user customization is one of its best qualities. One of the nicer features of the editor is that you can save (or print) your text to a file or print it separately from the rest of the document. In other words, you can use it just as a text editor apart from the "Desktop Publishing" features. The other major module of the program is the graphics editor. When you select it from the menu you are presented with another "Desktop" with a smaller set of tools. The tools are a subset of those you would find in "Deluxe Paint" or other graphics programs. Since it only works in black and white, that eliminates many of the choices. You may draw elipses, rectangles, use a large assortment of backgrounds, spray can and simple brushes. There are fifteen fill patterns available for backgrounds and large areas that might be colored, if colors could be used. The tools provided are enough for most of your needs, especially since you can import graphics, in medium resolution IFF format, from other programs. "PageSetter" includes almost one hundred pieces of clipart that you can load and modify for use in your documents. The editor allows you to resize, reflect the images horizontally and vertically and with the magnify gadget you may modify them a pixel at a time. You also may enter text, using the standard Amiga fonts, (or any others that you have in your font library) which may be modified with the editor. "PageSetter" works in 640 x 200 mode in order to be as close as possible to the resolution of most printers and the results can be quite impressive. It allows you to transfer objects to the page in either a 1:1 or 5:4 ratio that is closer to the actual ratio of screen to page. This can prevent much of the distortion you would normally get with the transfer from screen to print. It is suggested that any graphics to be transfered from other paint programs be produced in 640 x 200 mode to avoid distortion. Now that you have your articles written and have decided on graphics to include, it is time to start laying out the pages. This is done back at the main desktop. There are menus to create pages, boxes (where the real action is) and set various parameters and relationships. You can set the format of a single page or defaults for all of your pages. You may tell the program the size of paper you want to use for your final product. Four standard page sizes are available or you may set your own custom size from 2" x 1" to 8.5" x 14". Within your page you may set the number of columns and their widths which will be positioned to fit the current page limits. These columns are automatically placed on the page if you don't build your own boxes. Boxes are the next and probably the most important tools in "PageSetter's" repertoire. Everything on the page will be in one or more boxes. Boxes may overlap other boxes. boxes may be opaque or transparent, outlined or not, filled with a background pattern or not. Boxes may be linked and must be linked to continue an article from column to column, page to page. Linked boxes may have unlinked boxes between them. Your graphics and clipart are placed in boxes to be moved about the page. It's really amazing what you can do with them. Like pages, boxes have their own formats, also default or unique. Some of the options were mentioned above. Others are: different fonts, sizes, and characteristics such as bold, italics, shadow and outline. The text in a box may be flush left or right, centered, or justified. Other parameters available in the box requestor, such as "Leading" and "Tracking", require more explanation and a little practice. After you think you know where everything will go in your newsletter; you select the pencil tool, position it in the first box to contain an article, and click. The article, that you have just brought into the text editor and left in the buffer when you exited, flows into the box and continues into any boxes linked to the current box until the article is complete. Wow! It takes seconds to do what I have spent hours doing manually. The same procedure is followed for graphics. You may look at your work in progress at three magnifications: full page -- you can't read it or tell what the graphics are but you can see the full layout, two thirds of the page -- you can make out some of the words (if you are using a large font) and graphics are visible, and one eighth of the page visible -- now you can see every detail (a pixel on the screen equals a pixel on the printer); what you see is what you get at this magnification. The manual that comes with "PageSetter" is kind of small -- very small type -- but fairly complete. Actually, I would think that the producers of publishing software would give you first rate written material. First, you are given the usual configuration info -- you need 512K and they recommend an Epson or compatible printer -- though any printer in preferences may be used. The second chapter is a good tutorial; from booting the machine to building boxes and formatting pages. After the tutorial you should be able to start creating your own work of art. The lack of an index is a definite minus. The manual does give many useful hints and information you will need to help create your chosen type of document. There are hints on: the type of material to include, where to get photographs, and what is eye catching to your readers. The kind of stuff the beginning publisher will need as much as how to operate the program. There are two utility programs that come with "PageSetter"; "PagePrint" that I mentioned previously and "PageIFF" a program to save your pages as IFF format files. The files may then be loaded into paint type programs and further modified -- maybe add some color? The size of these files may be up to 95K. The only program currently able to handle this size of file is "DPaint II". I must add, that another reason to use "PagePrint" rather than to print from the main program is that it prints faster -- though still very slow. These programs were probably last minute additions since they are not mentioned in the manual but documented in a "Read_Me" file. Since creating a quality newsletter, flyer or even an advertisement is an art; the most any desktop publishing program can provide is a good set of tools. "PageSetter" has at least a better than average set of basic tools. You must add your own ideas and a little work to produce a masterpiece. Don't forget "PageSetter's" current competitors, including "PageMaker" and "Ventura Publishing" for the Mac and IBM PC cost $400 to $700. It is an excellent value. Gold Disk has just released "LaserScript"; PostScript support for laser printers. This program -- it's in the stores -- also is reported to add the ability to save format templates. Also released is "FontSet I" a set of over 25 fonts for dot matrix printers. These products are listed at $44.95 and $34.95 respectively. They sure are keeping the prices right. I have really had a lot of fun with this package. Now I need to find my own something to publish. It will take me quite a while to grow beyond the powers of this program. Also, I must mention that it is "not" copy protected. PageSetter, $149.95 Gold Disk Inc. P.O. Box 789 Streetsville, Ontario L5M 2C2 Canada