TITLE:PROBLEMS WITH COMMODORE by DAN BARRETT
PALETTE:0223 099b 09a9 0b99
BRUSH:04

3Copyright 1992 by Daniel J. Barret.
3All Rights reserved.
3Reprinted by permission.
3This article may be freely distributed as long as it is distributed in its
3entirety. It may not be included in any pubblication without the written
3permission of the author.



2Subject: HELP COMMODORE MY IADDRESS IS FULL OF EELS
3Written by Daniel J. Barrett  -  barrett@cs.umass.edu

Summary: BLAZEMONGER leaks out of .advocacy into .misc

    You people are right.  Amiga OS 2.04 is FULL of bugs.  Last time I
counted, there were at least 12,784.  I don't understand why Commodore
doesn't fix them.  All of my software is running wrong under 2.04 and I
am P*SSED.  Here are some examples.

    I used to run BLAZEMONGER VII under 1.3, and it ran fine.  However,
when I run it under 2.04, some very mysterious things happen.  First of all,
the BLAZEMONGER title screen has changed -- it now says "Running under
2.04", which it never did before.  This is obviously an OS bug.  Second,
whenever I press the "fire" button, a requester pops up and says "YOU ARE A
PIRATE SCUM", and I get a large electric shock.  I don't understand why this
is happening, since my friend said he deprotected the game before he gave me
a copy.

    Lots of my other programs stopped working under 2.04, too.  My text
editor totally barfed.  On my Amiga 500 with 1.3, it runs fine.  So I took a
copy of the editor to my local dealer to see if it would run on the A3000
(2.04) there.  Nope -- the file requester was totally hosed.  It couldn't
find ANY OF MY FILES on the store's hard disk.  The dealer tried to make
lame excuses, like that my files were AT HOME, but he's a total dweeb.

    Even CBM's own programs are buggy.  For example, C:Version used to
work fine under 1.3.  Under 2.04, it prints numbers that are TOO HIGH...
all the way up in the 37's.  This is obviously a bug in the IEEE math
libraries.

    Also, the programs that *I* wrote aren't even running.  And these
programs are totally BUG-FREE.  I mean, I have this great "security
identification" program that jumps to location 0x0000000B of the ROM and
etches my name onto the silicon.  Under 2.04, I get an instant GURU, and
all the blue smoke leaks out of the Amiga case.  Totally lame.

    And there's this AWESOME PD display hack called "IAddress_Violator"
that doesn't run AT ALL under 2.04.  Freakin' Commodore does it again.

    Even worse, under 2.04, my HARDWARE doesn't even work!  After
installing the new ROM myself, I tried to boot the Amiga but it wouldn't
come up.  It didn't even give me a blank screen.  This is another blatant
OS bug because the software should detect when the computer is down and
then reboot automatically.  And don't accuse me of installing the ROM
wrong because I made sure it was installed VERY FIRMLY by pounding it
with a hammer.  I even removed all those extra pins that stuck out over
the edge.

    I called Commodore last week to complain about the bugs.  They are
such idiots on the telephone.  I called up and asked to speak with Irving
Gould, who is the head of CATS.  They said he was "busy" -- yeah, right.
Then they tried to put one of their "tech" people on the phone, but I'm sick
of that shit, so I hung up in their faces.  What a bunch of jerks.

    That's it.  I've had enough.  I'm giving up computers forever and
becoming a nun.



2Subject: Fungus Among Us
3Written by Daniel J. Barrett  -  barrett@cs.umass.edu

Summary: reginald barnflower's international toe-cleaning service

Keywords: yuck

    I read in the newspaper today that the local grocery store is
having a sale on mushrooms -- "buy one pound, get the second pound free!"
Being a long-time reader of this fine newsgroup, I couldn't help wondering
what impact this is going to have on the future of the Commodore Amiga.

    We all know that Commodore is getting ready to announce some new
products at September's "World of Commodore."  Some of us are thinking:
maybe these products will lead to a resurgence of Commodore's past glory.
But Commodore, who obviously does not read our local paper, might have
some surprises in store.  (In fact, the only newspaper Commodore management
does read is the "Iowa State Hog-Jowl", where it gets all the latest hot
business tips.)

    Thanks to the local supermarket, there is going to be an absolute
*run* on mushrooms in Amherst, Massachusetts.  I predict that they'll be
sold out within 2 days.  This onslaught, combined with the current drought
conditions in California, will lead to a mushroom