4.0678 CD-ROMs; OCR (2/57)

Elaine Brennan & Allen Renear (EDITORS@BROWNVM.BITNET)
Thu, 1 Nov 90 21:52:13 EST

Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 4, No. 0678. Thursday, 1 Nov 1990.


(1) Date: Thu, 1 Nov 90 00:27 PST (40 lines)
From: <HARDERR@CLARGRAD>
Subject: RE: 4.0669 Observations on CD-ROMS

(2) Date: Thu, 01 Nov 90 10:38 EST (17 lines)
From: "Dr. Joel Goldfield" <JOEL@DUKEMVS.BITNET>
Subject: Bob Kraft's OCR posting

(1) --------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Thu, 1 Nov 90 00:27 PST
From: <HARDERR@CLARGRAD>
Subject: RE: 4.0669 Observations on CD-ROMS (1/21)


I have a CD-ROM reader/drive which is sold under the Apple Computer
label and attaches easily to the SCSI port of either of my Macs. I
can read Discs "formatted" for either IBM or Macs. As Bob Kraft recently
pointed out the problem is in the software used to access the disc and not the
format of the data itself. Apple supplies with the drive files which allow
access to files in various formats (ISO 9660, High Sierra, and Apple's
own beloved Hierarchical filing system.) Need to be copied into the
system folder and teh system rebooted. The disc then appears on the
desktop just like any other Mac disk. Audio formats are also acessible.
There are no hardware changes necessary. I also have a Toshiba XM-5100A
CD-Drive. This machine also "hooks up" to any Mac simply by turning off
the machine, attaching a cable to the SCSI port copying a driver file
to the system folder, rebooting and Voila! Either drive takes less than
5 minutes from start to finish of the installation process.
The Tos hiba also attaches to my DOS machines. Things are considerabley
more complicated there. First a SCSI card must be installed. Next the
config.sys and autoexec.bat files need to be changed. Then the proper
drivers need to be installed. Each product tend to come with it's
own drivers. Sometimes they are complimentary other times exclusive.
The drivers are the key. I suppose, if I were crazy enough (not to
mention able!) I could write drivers to allow my Apple CD Drive to
be attached to the DOS machines. I regulary copy files from so called
DOS CDs onto my Mac harddisk and write little translators for the
resulting files. What I cannot do is to use the search engines that
come with some of the better "DOS CDs" since these are in fact DOS software
but copying files takes seconds. If one has Mac software that is
generic enough, thses files can then be concorded or searched or
manipulated in any required manner. Files are files. Any microcomputer
can manipulate ASCII files whatever their source.
I short, the Mac is much easier to work with, but most CDs assume that
the users have DOS machines. Both are useful.
Ray Harder
Dept Computer Science
Azusa Pacific University
California, USA
(2) --------------------------------------------------------------23----
Date: Thu, 01 Nov 90 10:38 EST
From: "Dr. Joel Goldfield" <JOEL@DUKEMVS.BITNET>
Subject: Bob Kraft's OCR posting

HUMANISTs should note that the summary header for the highly-rated
OmniPage386 is actually a duplicate of the ReadRight review! Be sure to
read more of the OmniPage review to get a better idea of the product.
I've used it here at Duke; it's quite fast and accurate with most
documents (but not accurate with FAXes, unless accurate with most
documents, but not accurate with FAXes unlessthey're sent in superfine
mode.
Regards,
Joel Goldfield

[The duplication referred to is in the _InfoWorld_ OCR review
cited in Kraft's posting -- Allen]