Archive Magazine 1996/ARCHIVE_96.iso/text/specials/dtp_guide

Text File | 1995-06-25 | 55KB | 1,158 lines

                DTP on Acorn Computers
                ----------------------

Acorn Computers Ltd produce a range of microcomputers which are
particularly well suited to Desktop Publishing (DTP). A company called
Computer Concepts has developed some DTP software plus a range of DTP
hardware which combines to make an extremely efficient and
cost-effective solution for anyone needing to do desktop publishing.

The aim of this guide is to provide information about the use of Acorn
computers for this particular application and also to compare their
performance and price with systems based on Apple Macintosh and IBM PC
systems (and PC clones).

For the benefit of those new to DTP, we will start by explaining some of
the terms used and some of the basic principles involved. We will look
at the various components that make up a DTP system and see how they can
be implemented using Acorn computers. This will include costings so that
you can see the sort of budget you would need in order to set up a DTP
system for your own particular application.

There is also a glossary at the end of the booklet in case there are
technical words with which you are not familiar.

        DTP Ö The Principles

The basic idea is that, on a desktop computer, you can input text and
graphics to form a document and can easily manipulate the sizes and
positions of the various elements until you have laid out the document
to your satisfaction. The document can then be printed out on a desktop
printer, whether dot matrix, inkjet or laser.

If the document is to be published, you could take it to a printing
company in the form of laser printed sheets (which is how this booklet
was produced) which they would turn into printing plates using a
photographic technique. Some printers, however, can accept the document
on a computer disc from which they can produce originals of much higher
definition than a laser printer. The book, magazine etc, can then be
printed, collated and bound to your specifications.

        DTP Ö The Component Parts

The basic parts which go together to make up a DTP system are:

1)  A computer capable of handling text and graphics with the ability to
    use different font types and styles

2)  A monitor of sufficient size and resolution to provide a workable
    environment for the user

3)  A DTP program including a drawing facility for lines, shapes, curves
    etc, including shading

4)  A printer to print out the documents at as high a quality as
    possible.

You may also wish to add any or all of the following:

5)  A scanner to create electronic images of pictures and diagrams and
    add them into your document

6)  A digitiser to take images from a video camera or other video source
    which you can add to your document

7)  Programs to produce more advanced graphics effects or to reproduce
    complex mathematical equations or to produce graphs and charts to
    present mathematical or statistical information

8)  A library of öclip artò i.e. pictures, drawings, cartoons etc that
    someone with more time and/or artistic skill than you has produced

9)  Extra fonts beyond those provided with the computer and/or the DTP
    packages.

        The Computer

When desktop publishing was first started, it was only available on the
Apple Macintosh computers but there are now DTP programs on many
computers including the vast range of IBM and compatible machines.
However, if you are looking for a system that will allow you to do DTP
work without a great deal of hard work and frustration, you need a
computer that is sufficiently fast that you arenæt always having to wait
for the computer to catch up with you.

Part of the joy of doing DTP is that you can easily change font sizes
and styles or play around with the size and position of the graphics.
However, that joy is somewhat lost if you have to keep waiting for the
changes to take effect on the screen.

This is where Acornæs öRISCò technology (see glossary) comes into its
own. It has been used to produce the extremely fast processors which are
at the heart of Acornæs computer systems. These RISC processors are
particularly well suited to the kinds of tasks involved in running a DTP
system.

(Acorn have been producing RISC-based computers for over five years now
and several other computer manufacturers are now beginning to realise
the power of RISC technology. Indeed, Apple Computers have started work
on a joint venture with Acorn Computers to develop a new range of even
more powerful RISC processors.)

        The Monitor

The visual display is created on a monitor screen which uses thousands
of coloured phosphor dots to create pictures controlled by the computer.
The monitor may look a little like a TV screen but it will be able to
show much more detail than a domestic television.

If you want to see the fine detail of the document you are working on,
you need to have as large a screen as possible and as fine a pattern of
phosphor dots as possible. However, the balancing factor is the cost.
For example, four typical 14" colour monitors have a ödot pitchò
(dot-to-dot distance) which decreases as the price increases:

                Acorn AKF17    0╖42 mm    ú255

                Acorn AKF18    0╖39 mm    ú310

                Eizo 9060S    0╖28 mm    ú530

                Taxan 795    0╖26 mm    ú600

(All prices quoted in this booklet are VAT inclusive and are correct at
the time of going to press.)

The other way to get better resolution is to keep the dot size the same
but increase the monitor size. The Eizo F550i at ú890 is a 17" monitor
with a 0╖28 mm dot pitch. This actually gives more of an improvement in
visibility than the dot-pitch / screen-size ratio might suggest; this is
because the clarity and ease of use also depends on the ability of your
eyes to see fine detail. So the very fact that the display on the F550i
is physically bigger makes it easier to see the detail.

        The DTP Program

The three main DTP programs available for the Acorn computer systems are
Impression Junior (ú90), Ovation (ú110) and Impression II (ú180). If
your budget is strictly limited then you may have to go for the reduced
functionality of Impression Junior or Ovation but, in the long run, it
is better to go for the program that provides the best facilities.
Impression II, which was recently voted the öBest non-PC Business
Packageò in the Computer Shopper Show Awards, can also be extended by
adding the Impression Business Supplement (ú53) which offers various
advanced features for the professional user.

Do not be fooled by the price Ö Impression, at ú180, has facilities
which are comparable with, and in some cases superior to, Mac and IBM
packages costing ú600 and more. See the comparisons later in this
booklet or read Dick Pountainæs article in Byte Magazine, March 1992 Ö
which is referred to on page 10.)

        The Printer

The three main types of printer available are dot-matrix, inkjet and
laser. If your budget will allow, it is better to go for a laser printer
because (a) it provides better resolution Ö 600 d.p.i. (dots per inch)
is fairly standard these days for Acorn compatible laser printers, (b)
it is much faster, especially when using Computer Conceptsæ Laser Direct
printers (ú1100 and ú1595) Ö in fact, to get a faster laser printer, you
will have to spend well over ú4,000, and (c) it is much easier in terms
of paper handling and registration Ö getting the material printed at the
right place on the paper.

If you cannot afford ú1100 for a 600 d.p.i. laser printer, the next best
is an inkjet printer. The resolution and quality of the output is quite
staggering when you consider the cost, e.g. the Deskjet 500 at ú395. The
output at 300 d.p.i. is virtually as good as a 300 d.p.i. laser though
it does depend on the quality of paper used and it is rather slower than
a laser printer.

If you have an existing dot matrix printer, it can probably be used for
DTP on an Acorn system although the results will not be as good as an
inkjet printer. They are also a lot more noisy than inkjets. If you are
starting from scratch, our advice would be not to bother with dot matrix
printers at all and, if you have a limited budget, start with an inkjet.

        The Scanner

For many applications, it is helpful to be able to take diagrams and
pictures from other publications, photographs or drawings and add them
into your documents. To do this, you can use a device called a scanner
which ölooksò at the picture and converts it into a dot pattern which
can be loaded into the computer and manipulated as required. The
effectiveness of this depends on the resolution (measured in d.p.i.) of
the scanner, the number of grey levels (see glossary) provided by the
scanner (very few pictures are really monochrome i.e. truly black and
white), the accuracy of the scanning process and the quality of the
software used to manipulate the images and improve the contrast, etc.

A number of companies such as Irlam Instruments and Iota Software
produces scanners, but the most comprehensive range of scanners for use
with Acorn systems is from Computer Concepts. The cheapest is a
hand-held A5 scanner which works at up to 400 d.p.i. in monochrome or at
reduced resolution in up to 64 grey levels. Being A5 size limits the
width of pictures scanned to 105 mm and being hand-held limits the
accuracy with which you can scan the picture Ö this depends on the
steadiness of your hand as you drag the scanner across the picture being
scanned. This scanner is only ú145 so, especially for monchrome use, it
would be very cost-effective.

Then there is the ScanLight Junior 256 (ú245) which again is an A5
scanner but which produces images in up to 256 grey levels. This makes a
lot of difference when trying to reproduce photographs. The
illustrations on pages 8 and 9 were scanned with a ScanLight Junior 256.

If you need to scan larger pictures, the A4 ScanLight Senior (ú325) can
be used. Although it only works at up to 64 grey levels, it does have
the advantage that it can be bought with a sheet-feeder (ú165, if bought
separately, or ú110 if bought with the scanner). Using a sheet-feeder
improves the scanning accuracy Ö which is more critical on A4 scanners
than on the smaller A5 scanners.

The best quality of all is achieved by the ScanLight Professional
(ú970). This is an A4 flat-bed scanner Ö it looks a bit like a
photocopier where you put the document to be scanned onto a glass screen
and the scanning head moves across automatically under the glass. This
mechanism increases the versatility of the scanning process Ö you can
only feed single sheets of paper through the ScanLight Senior with
sheet-feeder whereas you can put a complete book onto the flat-bed
scanner.

You also get an improvement in accuracy with the ScanLight Professional.
Firstly, it improves the accuracy of the grey level representation
because it uses white fluorescent light and, secondly, its registration
is better because the object remains stationary and the scanning head
moves past underneath it.

Scanners can also be used, with OCR programs (Optical Character
Recognition), to take text from a printed page and change it from just a
picture into editable text that can be included in your documents. This
is an area where Apple Macs are much better served because of the huge
amount of development work needed but there a number of OCR programs
being developed by different companies for the Acorn systems.

        The Digitiser

A digitiser will enable you to take a video signal, from a camera or
video recorder, and turn it into a picture that can be manipulated and
placed into a DTP document. This is a very specialised area and so, for
more information, it would be best to talk to one of the companies
involved such as Wild Vision, Allied Interactive or Pineapple Software.
(For addresses, telephone and fax numbers, see page 18.)

One exciting new device is the ion camera produced by Canon. In
conjunction with a relatively simple digitiser interface which plugs
into the computer, the ion camera allows you to take ösnap shotsò of
whatever scene is in front of you. These are turned immediately into
electronic images that can be stored and introduced into your DTP
documents. The Canon ion camera actually stores 50 pictures on an
internal disc and these can be viewed on a TV or transferred to the
computer.

        Other Programs

There are many other programs which may be of use to anyone doing DTP
work Ö it depends on the kind of application to which DTP is put. Here
are a few examples:

DrawBender Ö allows manipulation of text and Draw files. Includes three
decorative fonts. (ú17)

Equasor Ö allows you to put complex scientific equations into an
Impression document (ú53).

FontFX Ö allows text to be manipulated around various shapes such as
circles, arcs, etc and can be rotated, scaled, shadowed, etc (ú10).

Fontasy Ö similar to FontFX. (ú29).

Impression Business Supplement Ö a set of utilities which increase the
power and range of applications for Impression II. It includes
Expression-PS (for preparing Impression output for printing on
PostScript devices such as professional typesetting machines), a sort
and mail-merge utility and utilities for loading files from other
formats: RTF (as used with Microsoft Word on PC and Mac), WordPerfect,
PipeDream and WordStar (ú53).

Poster Ö similar to FontFX but with a wider range of facilities and
about 20 decorative fonts (ú93).

Presenter and Graphbox are two packages for producing graphs and charts
from statistical data. Prices are from ú43 depending on the range of
facilities you require.

Squirrel Ö a very fast database which can export data into Impression II
for mail-merge purposes. (ú140)

Trace (from David Pilling) and Tracer (Midnight Graphics) are two
programs which can take scanned images and ötraceò them to create
pictures which can be manipulated using a drawing package and can then
be reproduced at any magnification without the öjagged edgesò associated
with scanned images.

        Clip Art and Fonts

There are a number of companies producing clip art, e.g. Micro Studio
and Midnight Graphics and there is quite a large body of clip art
available in the public domain. (See glossary)

Most DTP packages come with a range of standard fonts and the A5000 has
three sets of fonts (12 fonts in all) included as part of its ROM based
software Ö in other words, as soon as you switch on the computer, you
have a range of fonts available to you, for both the screen and the
printer. The PD libraries have a number of alternative fonts but,
because of the huge amount of work involved in producing good quality
fonts, many are not as good as those produced on a professional basis.

The aptly named Electronic Font Foundry has been involved in producing
good quality fonts for Acorn systems for a number of years now and has a
range of several hundred fonts available. (The Apple Mac world boasts a
larger range of fonts although at a rather higher price.)ááA


                Acorn, Macintosh or PC?
                -----------------------

There is still a great deal of pressure to use Apple Macs or PC
compatibles (see the articles by Ivor Humphreys and Carol Atack on pages
11 and 12) Ö the reason generally given is the need to be compatible
with other users. Some people write off Acorn systems as being
öodd-ballò and therefore not worthy of consideration. We believe that
compatibility should taken be into account as one factor but it should
not be allowed to obscure the other issues. The questions is, which
really is the best DTP system for your particular needs?

        öYouære biased!ò

Some people will, quite reasonably, say that an Acorn dealer is not
exactly the best person to edit an independent review of the relative
merits of three systems, only one of which he sells! When you see the
price/performance figures, you will think we are exaggerating the claims
and fiddling the figures. In fact, we have done just the reverse. We
have been careful to take the lowest price figures we could find for
Macs and PCs and quoted list price figures on most of the Acorn
equipment and ignored available discount prices. We believe it is more
important to buy systems from companies who will give good support than
to shop around for the cheapest possible prices.

Also, to validate the comparisons, we employed two independent
consultants. Steve Nichols, MAIE, DIP, who writes and lectures about DTP
on Mac and PC systems helped us to compare Macs and PCs. Because Steve
had no experience of the Acorn systems, we also employed Carol Atack, a
journalist and author. Carol uses Macs exclusively in her work but works
closely with several ardent Acorn system users. Carol is very strongly
pro-Mac so, as well as getting her to check the main three-way
comparison, we have given her space to explain why she prefers Macs.
However, I have taken the opportunity to put some counter arguments
alongside her comments. There are, of course, differences of opinion Ö
some things are a matter of taste Ö but Carol and Steve have been given
opportunity to check the facts which, we think, speak for themselves.

        Other Contributions

We have also had considerable help from Rob Sherratt who spends much of
his time during the day doing DTP on a Mac IIci. He then comes home in
the evening and helps his wife Carole to run her commercial DTP business
in which she uses Acorn systems.

We are very grateful to Ivor Humphreys of General Gramophone
Publications Ltd who uses both Acorn systems and Macs in a professional
setting producing both mono and full colour publications. He too checked
through the comparison for us and has also contributed an article about
his experiences in the commercial environment.

        The Comparison

The comparison was done by starting with a system specification and
seeing how well it could be implemented using each of the three types of
computer and seeing how much it would cost. The specification was as
follows:

Å  easy to use WIMP interface and filing system

Å  line / object oriented graphic drawing

Å  good document preparation system with English spelling checker

Å  display 256 colours at better than 640 by 480 pixel resolution

Å  scalable PostScript compatible fonts for screen and printing (about 5
   font families)

Å  fast 600 d.p.i. laser printer

Å  scanning capability of 400 d.p.i. with up to 256 greyscale

Å  ability to create sprite (pixel) graphics in up to 256 colours,
   capture screen images and edit scanned images

Å  as much compatibility as possible with other file systems and formats
   to allow transfer of text and graphics.


                Notes on the System Comparison
                ------------------------------

In a simple table, it is not really possible to do justice to all the
arguments, so here is some more discussion of various issues raised in
the comparison on pages 6 and 7.

        Filing system speed

The reason for the speed difference between Mac IIci and A540 is partly
due to the way Apple have implemented the SCSI filing system which is
acknowledged to limit the speed more than it could. We measured the time
taken to load Impression II and a 2.8M document on an A540 and found
that they loaded into memory in under 10 seconds. To load PageMaker onto
a Mac IIci takes about 30 seconds and to load a large DTP file can take
a similar length of time. However, the difference in speed of response
is not just the speed of the SCSI filing system but is also partly due
to the way the two systems use memory. (See note opposite on memory
usage.)

        Scalable fonts

Whilst it is true that the numbers of fonts available for the Apple Macs
must run into the thousands, there are one or two other points that
should be noted. First of all, the majority of DTP users are unlikely to
want more than a small handful of fonts Ö which are available on the
Acorn systems at less than half the cost of Mac fonts.

Secondly, the vast majority of the Mac fonts are Latin1 fonts, i.e. if
you are dealing purely with western European languages there is no
problem. However, the number of Mac fonts available in Latin2, 3, 4 or 5
is much more limited as is the supply of non-Latin alphabets. The
Electronic Font Foundry has a list of 285 Latin 1 fonts, modest by Mac
standards, perhaps, but these same fonts are also available in Latin2,
3, 4 and 5. They also have 8 Cyrilic fonts, 6 Greek fonts, a Hebrew font
and 48 Indian fonts as well as several symbol fonts.

So, for the vast majority of users, the limited number of scalable fonts
is not a significant factor in the comparison.

        Laser printer speed and cost

The reason that the Laser Direct printers are so fast and so cheap is
that they use a different technique from most laser printers. If you are
using a conventional PostScript laser printer, the computer ödescribesò
the page Ö i.e. what words in what sizes and fonts, and what lines,
shapes, shades etc go where on the page. This page description is sent
down to the printer which has its own micro-processor and memory. The
printeræs processor then works out what dots go where on the page and
then prints the page.

With the Laser Direct, the computer does all the calculation of what
dots go where on the page and that information is then sent down to the
printer. This represents a lot of data to transmit, so Computer Concepts
have implemented a high speed parallel övideoò interface to the printer.

The first reason that the Laser Direct printers are so fast is that the
RISC processors in the Acorn computers are ideally suited to the task of
working out the dot patterns on the paper and do it very quickly.
However, this is not where the main gain in speed is experienced. When
you want to print pixel graphics (scanned images, for example) on a
PostScript printer, the whole of the scanned image data has to be sent
down to the printer as it cannot be ödescribedò by PostScript. As the
link to the printer is not a fast parallel link, this can take quite a
long time which slows down the printing process even further. This can
mean waiting minutes for a printout instead of seconds.

One other result of using the Laser Direct technique is that the printer
does not have to have a powerful processor with lots of memory Ö the
computeræs own processor and memory is more than adequate. This
therefore reduces the price of the printer. Also, because the fonts are
described by the computer, the printer manufacturer does not have to pay
royalties to Adobe for using PostScript, which again reduces the price.

        Memory usage

When comparing systems, it is important to be aware of the amount of
memory used by the different applications. For example, on a Mac IIci,
even with 5M of RAM, it is not possible to have PageMaker and FreeHand
and Word all loaded at the same time. However, on a 4M A540, you can run
Impression DTP, Edit, Paint, Draw and PipeDream (a spreadsheet/WP/dbase
package) all at the same time and still have nearly 1M of RAM available
as a öfont cacheò to speed up the display of the fonts on the screen.

The reason for this very economical use of memory is that the Acorn
operating system, RISC-OS, (see glossary) is in ROM. This also means
that switching the system on is faster as these routines donæt have to
be loaded from disc.

(The other advantage of having the operating system in ROM is that it
makes the computer less vulnerable to viruses. On Macs and PCs, viruses
can modify parts of the operating system with unfortunate consequences.
The Acorn operating system, being in ROM, cannot be changed so the
viruses have to be somewhat Ésmarteræ if they are to do any real
damage.)

The new operating system, RISC-OS 3 (currently only available on the
A5000 but soon to come to the A540 as well) is held in 2M of ROM. This
is means that even more RAM space is saved because Draw, Paint and Edit
plus five other smaller applications as well as three complete families
of fonts (12 fonts altogether) are held in ROM. This again speeds up the
system and reduces memory usage even further.

The other advantage of the Acorn system is that it is very easy, if you
do run short of memory, to reallocate its usage. In the review article
referred to overleaf, Dick Pountain says of the operating system,
öRISC-OS provides an excellent interactive memory manager in its Task
Display window (streets ahead of anything on the PC or the Macintosh)
that allows you to free and reallocate memory on the fly without
quitting any of the programs.òááA


                An Independent Review
                ---------------------

A detailed and independent review of the Acorn system that we used for
the comparison on pages 6 and 7 was published recently in Byte magazine.
(March 1992, pp5ff). The author, Dick Pountain, is a Contributing Editor
of Byte Magazine and the Consultant Editor of Personal Computer World.

The conclusion of Dickæs four page review is that the combination of the
A540, Impression II, A4 ScanLight Professional and Laser Direct is...
öaátremendously capable and likeable DTP system that I would rate as
being comfortably ahead of Ventura Publisher and Aldus PageMaker and
breathing down the neck of QuarkXpressò.

Dick seems to think that the A540 is faster than its rivals and says,
that... öImpression feels faster than any of these rival packages in the
way it updates the screen, scrolls, accepts text entry and, most
notably, prints on the Laser Directò.

Comparing again with Mac systems, he adds that, öImpression is almost as
good as QuarkXpress and the complete system that I reviewed costs ú5476
(+VAT), only about half the price of a sensible (i.e. Mac IIfx based)
Quark system.ò

(N.B. The Mac IIfx is more powerful than the IIci but has now been
replaced by the Quadra range starting at over ú4,500 +VAT.)

His final comment is that öImpression II is good enough for professional
magazine layout; in fact, several Acorn usersæ magazines are already
produced this way.ò (and that includes our own monthly Archive
magazine.)

Dick Pountain certainly does not have a reputation, from his previous
writings, of being öpro-Acornò, so the accolades he gives in this
article are praise indeed.ááA

                A Professional Useræs View
                --------------------------
                     Ivor Humphreys

of General Gramophone Publications Ltd, publishers of öGramophoneò
magazine.

I work in a commercial environment where Acorn, Mac and PC systems are
used. We publish two monthly magazines, several catalogues and one or
two books. We have been using Impression on an Acorn system to produce
one complete section of our main magazine plus a whole raft of other
editorial and advertising pages for some 18 months now and, last autumn,
we published a 680-page full colour book using the same Acorn system.
With some reluctance, we are going to standardise on Macintosh and DEC
computers and, in due course, the Archimedes will fall by the wayside.
There are overwhelming commercial reasons for choosing Macs, but the
decision saddens me because of two major drawbacks of the Mac system.
These are the significant reduction in processing speed and the
relatively poor rendering of fonts on the screen.

        Screen display speed

From the useræs point of view, the Éfeelæ of a system is important and
one of the major factors for someone who has become used to Acorn
systems is that Macs and PCs are very slow in comparison. Waiting for
the screen to update can be extremely tiresome. Users of Macs or PCs
tend not to notice the differences very much (or, in my experience,
refuse to see them). However, going back to Macs from Acorn systems can
be very frustrating Ö as I am currently finding with having to use a Mac
IIci.

        On-screen rendering of fonts

The Acorn systems employ a technique called anti-aliasing which uses
grey edges to enhance the appearance of characters. It makes the screen
display much clearer and avoids the somewhat distorted, jagged look
which is a penalty of the simple black and white rendering used for
fonts on the Mac screens. Apart from being easier on the eye, Acornæs
display enables you to judge the relative positions of characters within
the text much more accurately. So, for example, if two words are
separated by two  spaces (sic) instead of one, you can spot it easily
on-screen rather than waiting for the printout before you pick up the
error. On the Mac, Adobe Type Manager or Appleæs new font technology,
True Type, must be used in order to make the display usable at all but,
in our experience, it still does not approach the standard of the Acorn
system.

        Customisation of screens

Another factor is the customisation of screens. With Acorn systems, you
can switch between any of a couple of dozen, or more, different screen
configurations. You can choose the most appropriate mode for the memory
available, the number of colours to be displayed, the resolution of the
monitor, the visual acuity of the user and the type of job in hand. You
might want to use a different mode when working on a large spreadsheet
from the one you use for laying out a large document with DTP. It may
just be a matter of personal preference Ö you may simply find that you
Élikeæ some modes more than others. You can change mode on an Acorn
system at the click of a mouse button even whilst in the middle of
running applications programs.

        Overall

My overall view is that a Éstand-aloneæ user would certainly be well
advised to choose an Acorn system, although the greater range of fonts
for the Mac is certainly attractive. It is really only the more
established Écompatibilityæ factor (both in terms of new DTP-aware staff
and incoming page-ready software) which shifts the balance towards the
Mac for those involved in professional publishing. Indeed, it really is
only this last point which is causing us to abandon the Acorn
systems.ááA

                Mac versus Acorn: What price excellence?
                ----------------------------------------
                            Carol Atack

Carol has written an article for us about the relative merits of Macs
and Acorn systems. As you will see, she strongly prefers Macs. We have
taken the opportunity to put the other side of some of the arguments.
Where there is no comment, it means that we agree with Carol. We have
only put comments where our views differ or there is a further point
which perhaps should be taken into account.

The game of comparing different kinds of computers is old and invidious.
However, to would-be purchasers looking for the right equipment for
their business, itæs a game which has to be played and the cost of
losing can be high.

Traditionally there hasnæt been much question about the right kind of
computer for desktop publishing. The concept was, if not invented, at
least most vigorously marketed by the triumvirate of Apple, Adobe and
Aldus. There was a time when an Apple Macintosh, a printer fitted with
Adobe PostScript and Aldus PageMaker was just about all there was. Even
now that there is more competition, Apple has kept a firm grip on the
graphics and publishing markets. In the corporate world of occasional
newsletters, reports and memos, IBM compatibles equipped with clones of
the Mac-based software Ö or the same program, translated to the other
platform Ö have also done well.

Acornæs A-series computers are a relative newcomer to the DTP world.
What must they do to gain acceptance? Most Acorn fans trumpet the
quality of the hardware and the operating system. Itæs true that on
paper the Acorn systems offer good performance, but processor speed is
by no means everything. Itæs the combination of processor, system,
operating environment and application software which makes a computer
acceptably fast or unpleasant to use.

        System hardware

The Mac and the Acorn systems are similar in that you can only buy your
computer from one supplier. This tends to limit the options available.
However there are a great many more Macs available, from the entry-level
Classic which can be bought for under ú1000 including high-res mono
screen and inkjet printer, to the high-powered Quadras which can handle
large graphic and DTP files very effectively.

My gut feeling, after using 68030-based Macs (IIci and IIsi) and the
A540æs is that the Mac has a slight performance edge.

        Display options

The display options available for the Mac are numerous. Many DTP
operators prefer a high resolution mono or grey-scale screen and these
are available in everything from the 9" Classic screen to 21" screens,
ideal for laying out A4 magazine spreads. The Acorn systems canæt
compete here; third parties seem only to offer medium sized colour
screens which are not really ideal for DTP.

        Operating environment

The Archimedesæ built-in software includes some pleasant surprises.
!Draw is indeed an excellent application, although it doesnæt offer
quite the depth of features of some of the more powerful Mac
applications. The built-in scalable fonts were an Acorn first, but Macs
have them now in the form of TrueType and within a year or so Adobeæs
ATM technology is going to be built into the Mac operating system.

However, I remain totally puzzled by the people who tell me that the
Archimedes is easy to use because of RISC-OS. The Acorn operating system
includes some good features, such as the ability to drop document icons
on to a printer icon to print. However, compared with the Macæs clean
and classy interface, the Acorn display is hopelessly cluttered. The
lack of a fixed menu bar is one major shortcoming. In fact, the
different roles for different buttons, disappearing side menus and so on
are a major irritation. Also, the drill for saving a document is truly
mind-boggling.

Of course there are irritations to be found within the Finder (Macæs
filing system), but Appleæs commitment to HCI (human computer interface)
research and development, and the resources already expended on
operating system development, mean that one can have confidence in more
improvements being made.

        Application software

Application software is one area where the Archimedes is at a serious
disadvantage. Impression remains the only serious DTP package. Its
development has been assisted by input from professional users, and it
does include a lot of important features. However, many users donæt need
those features and would find a mid-range Mac word processor such as
MacWrite offered plenty of power for the same price. Aldus also does an
entry-level DTP package, Personal Press, intended for occasional and
beginning DTP users and this has a competitive street price of around
ú200.

For serious DTP, Impression remains usable but I have some serious
reservations about it overall. One of the fastest-growing areas in
high-end DTP is full colour repro, and all the major Mac applications
are well-equipped to handle, separate and match 32-bit colour. Whatever
features the software offers, the Archimedesæ colour handling is dated
and I would not recommend it for anyone interested in serious colour
work.

However good Impression is, it canæt hope to answer the needs of
everyone who needs to produce a document. The variety of software
available is one of the Macæs great strengths. You can use PageMaker for
magazines, books and leaflets, QuarkXPress or DesignStudio where design
considerations are paramount, FrameMaker for technical documentation and
so on. Of course, youæd have to learn and buy any of these programs
which you needed, but there is a specialist tool for most types of work.

        Fonts

While the Archimedes offers excellent built-in font technology, one
simply canæt say the same about the fonts available to utilise it. There
are more than there were, itæs true, but they are not the entire
Monotype, Linotype and Adobe libraries. There are also some extremely
sophisticated typographical tools available on the Mac for the creation
of new fonts.

Iæm not sure how many fonts come with the Mac, but my PostScript printer
cost ú1,750 and came with 45 Adobe PostScript fonts in ROM.

        Output devices

Cheap fast printers are an area where the Archimedes scores highly. My
main reservation is that the buyer is then committed to a non-standard
device. Of course, LaserDirects are standard printers under the lid, but
Iæd rather have the comfort of knowing that I was using a standard
PostScript device which was guaranteed to render fonts and graphics
correctly. And I wouldnæt like to be so reliant on a single company Ö
though thatæs an argument against the Mac as well!

There are many companies competing to offer ever cheaper, faster and
higher quality output on the Mac from laser printers. Imagesetting and
slide production are also easier than from the Archimedes, with many
bureaux offering expertise in PostScript and major Mac applications.

        Interoperability

The Mac is much better integrated into the mainstream computer world
than the Acorn systems. Both can read and write PC discs, but with the
Mac you can save files in PC and other Mac application formats from many
programs. Thereæs also much better access to a wider range of networking
standards although the advent of Ethernet on the Acorn computers may
change things.

        Conclusions

I wonæt say ÉThe Mac beats the pants off the Acorn systems for
publishingæ. It might not always be true, although in my opinion it
usually is. At the high-end, design-oriented end of the market, there
isnæt much question that the Mac reigns supreme. However, for an
individual wanting to spend around ú5,000 to DTP reasonably simple
documents which donæt use a lot of fonts, the Archimedes is a
competitive option. However, Iæd still go for the Mac for the better
software, fonts, colour and operating system.

For around ú7,500 I would suggest:

        Mac IIsi 5/40           ú2850

        Radius Pivot            ú830

                  (colour)      ú1290

        QMS PS-410              ú1750

        Aldus PageMaker         ú580

        MacDraw Pro             ú350

        Dayna DosMounter        ú70

        MacPaint                ú115

        MacWrite II             ú175

        Lightning Scan          ú470

This comes to ú7,600 with colour and ú7,200 without. I donæt think,
personally, that 600 d.p.i. is worth it, although 600 d.p.i. printers
are available for the Mac at around ú2,900.ááA

                What about PCs?
                ---------------

It may seem that, apart from the three way comparison table, we are
virtually ignoring PCs for doing DTP and only really considering Macs
and Acorn systems. Part of the reason for this is that it is so
difficult to find expertise in this area of doing DTP on PCs and part of
it is that, when you find someone who knows about it, there is not much
enthusiasm for it anyway.

We thought that our experiences in trying to find someone to help us
assess the effectiveness of PCs for DTP might be illuminating...

        Finding DTP expertise for PCs

Finding out about using PC systems for DTP, proved to be extremely
difficult. We tried a few local dealers from the Yellow Pages but none
of them seemed to know anything about DTP on PCs apart from the names
öPageMakerò and öVentura Publisherò. They would happily sell us copies
of either even though they didnæt actually know much about how to use
them.

We then contacted IBM and asked for their recommendation about the best
PC consultants in the Norfolk area. The first of the two companies they
referred us to said that, quite frankly, if someone wanted to do DTP,
they would advise them to go and see the local Apple Mac dealer and not
use PCs at all! The second company were much more positive at first but
eventually admitted that they really didnæt have anyone who could
demonstrate DTP on a PC. In the meantime, I was ringing round contacts
in the computer industry with the same request, öIs there anybody out
there who can demonstrate DTP on a PC?ò One lead after another drew
blanks.

Then I discovered that the biggest user base of DTP on PCs is in the big
öcorporatesò Ö they often have huge installed bases of PCs which they
use for DTP. So I rang one of my contacts in a large Norwich company who
put me in touch with Steve Nichols who, thankfully, turned out to be
extremely knowledgeable about both PCs and Macs although he had never
seen Acorn systems in action.

The lesson is that if you are thinking of using PCs for DTP, be sure
that you can find someone who is able to provide the necessary expertise
to help you set it up and use it.ááA


                Buying an Acorn DTP System
                --------------------------

When you decide that it is time to take the plunge and buy a DTP system,
you presumably want to get the best value for money. So it may seem that
the best bet is to go to one of the suppliers who offers Acorn systems
at very low discount prices. However, there are one or two other factors
that are worth considering because itæs not just the actual cost in
pounds and pence that determines the value of a system.

        Go to your local Acorn dealer

Firstly it is best, if possible, to go to your local Acorn dealer even
if he doesnæt offer as much discount as some of the mail order
companies. This is partly because it is easier to choose the system that
best suits your needs if you can actually see it in action.* Also, if
you have any problems with your system after you have bought it, you can
get it sorted out much more easily if you have a local contact. If you
do decide to buy by mail order, check whether the company can give you
help over the phone in diagnosing problems Ö there are some companies
who have virtually no technical support personnel Ö which is partly why
they can offer such cheap prices!

Often, when a customer thinks there is a problem with the hardware or
software, it turns out that the problem is just a lack of experience on
the part of the user, possibly due to bad documentation. If this happens
with a mail order company, you could end up sending all the equipment
back to them, and being without it for several days, only to find that
it is working perfectly and has to be sent back again.

(*Some people might be tempted to go to a local dealer in order to see
the systems in operation and then buy it from a mail order company. If
this sort of thing happens, it could contribute to putting the local
dealer out of business. Part of the reason he has to charge higher
prices than the mail order company is that he has to pay his
demonstration staff. Then, if local dealers go out of business, the
level of support available drops and everyone suffers.)

However, having said all that, not all Acorn dealers are equally
knowledgeable about DTP. Norwich Computer Services has produced a list
of some Acorn dealers who say that they have knowledge and expertise in
this area and are prepared to demonstrate DTP systems to potential
customers. This list is published as an advertising supplement to this
booklet.

        Use mail order if you must

What if your local dealer is not able to give the kind of support you
need? Well, we would urge you to choose a mail order company that really
knows about DTP. Basically, you want to find someone who will provide
you with guidance in choosing the system that best suits your needs;
they must provide help and advice in getting the system installed and
working effectively and they must also be skilled at trouble-shooting,
both software and hardware, if things go wrong later.

        What about N.C.S.?

You will not be surprised to hear that we, at Norwich Computer Services,
believe that we meet the criteria in the paragraph above!

We publish a monthly magazine about Acorn computer systems, applications
and hardware. This means that we have access to all the latest
information on hardware and software. The magazine is produced on an
A540 using Impression, so we are actually using DTP on Acorn systems on
a every day basis.

We have over four yearsæ experience of operating a telephone technical
support service and we have considerable knowledge and expertise on the
hardware side. We also undertake repairs of computers and peripherals.

        Conclusion

Our advice then is to buy from your local Acorn dealer but if you really
want to use mail order, why not give us a ring on 0603Ö766592?ááA


                Pride & Prejudice
                -----------------

Here are three reasons not to buy Acorn systems.

Å  Acorn systems are too cheap Ö If you have a choice of two systems,
Acorn at ú5,900 and Mac at ú12,100, you somehow feel that the Mac must
be better Ö just because it costs more.

Å  Acorn systems are used in schools Ö More Acorn computers have been
sold into schools in the last 9 months than any others Ö but imagine the
scenario... You have just bought your beautiful new Acorn DTP system and
a colleague (or worst still one of your rivals) walks into your office
and says, öNew computer, I see. Oh yes, my kids use those at school!ò.
Ouch!!

Å  Macs MUST be better Ö No Mac owner likes to think that he paid twice
as much as he needed to have done when he bought his first system, so
the Acorn systems CANæT be as good.

Pride and prejudice are not the most sensible criteria to use when
choosing a DTP system.ááA

Some Useful Addresses

If you want specialist information about DTP and associated products,
the following list of companies may also be of help. (The numbers in
italics are fax numbers.)


4mation (DTP book, fonts & borders)
        11 Castle Park Road, Whiddon Valley, Barnstaple, Devon EX32 8PA.
        (0271Ö25353) (0271Ö22974)

Acorn Computers Ltd
        Fulbourn Road, Cherry Hinton, Cambridge  CB1 4JN.
        (0223Ö245200) (0223Ö210685)

ALSystems (ion camera & digitiser)
        47 Winchester Road, Four Marks, Alton, Hampshire GU34á5HG.
        (0420Ö561111)

Capsoft (fonts & borders)
         8 Old Gate Avenue, Weston on Trent, Derbyshire  DE7á2BZ.

Computer Concepts (DTP hardware & software)
        Gaddesden Place, Hemel Hempstead, Herts  HP2á6EX.
        (0442Ö63933) (0442Ö231632)

Dalmation Publications (fonts)
        37 Manor Road, Teddington, Middlesex TW11 8AA.

Data Store (utilities)
        6 Chatterton Road, Bromley, Kent.
        (081Ö460Ö8991) (081Ö313Ö0400)

David Pilling (trace program + clip art)
        P.O.Box 22, Thornton Cleveleys, Blackpool  FY5 1LR.

Design Concepts (fonts)
        30 South Oswald Road, Edinburgh  EH9 2HG.

Digital Services (Squirrel database)
        9 Wayte Street, Cosham, Portsmouth PO6 3BS.
        (0705Ö210600) (0705Ö210705)

Electronic Font Foundry (fonts)
        Granville House, 50-52 Upper Village Road, Ascot, SL5á7AQ.
        (0344Ö28698) (0344Ö872923)

G.A.Herdman (clip art)
        43 Saint Johns Drive, Clarborough, Retford, Notts  DN22á9NN.
        (0777Ö700918) (fax on same number)

Hampshire Microtech Centre (fonts)
        Connaught Lane, Paulsgrove, Portsmouth, Hants  PO6 4SJ.
        (0705Ö378266.)

Ian Copestake Software (DTP utilities)
        1 Kington Road, West Kirby, Wirral, L48 5ET.
        (051Ö625Ö1006) (051Ö6251007)

Iota Software Ltd (Scanner & OCR)
        St Johnæs Innovation Centre, Cowley Road, Cambridge  CB4 4WS.
        (0223Ö421542) (0223Ö421543)

Irlam Instruments (OCR) 133 London Road, Staines, Middlesex  TW18 4HN.
        (0895Ö811401)

Longman-Logotron (fonts, art programs)
        124 Cambridge Science Park, Milton Road, Cambridge  CB4á4ZS.
        (0223Ö425558) (0223Ö425349)

Micro Studio Ltd (clip art)
        22 Churchgate Street, Soham, Ely, Cambridgeshire.
        (0353Ö720433)

Midnight Graphics (clip art)
        5 Victoria Lane, Whitefield, Manchester  M25 6AL.
        (061Ö766Ö8423) (061Ö766Ö8425)

Norwich Computer Services
        96a Vauxhall Street, Norwich  NR2 2SD.
        (0603Ö766592) (0603Ö764011)

Pineapple Software (digitisers)
        39 Brownlea Gardens, Seven Kings, Ilford, Essex  IG3 9NL.
        (081Ö599Ö1476)

Risc Developments Ltd (Ovation DTP)
        117 Hatfield Road, St Albans, Herts  AL1 4JS.
        (0727Ö40303) (0727Ö60263)

Sigma Press (DTP book)
        1 South Oak Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire  SK9 6AR.

Southern Printers (clip art)
        47 Drake Road, Willesborough, Ashford, Kent  TN24 0UZ.
        (0233Ö633919)

Wild Vision (digitisers)
        15 Witney Way, Boldon Colliery, Tyne & Wear  NE35 9PE.
        (091Ö519Ö1455) (091Ö519Ö1929)

Word Processing (DTP guides)
        65 Milldale Crescent, Fordhouses, Wolverhampton, WáMidlands  WV10 6LR.


                Further Sources of Information
                ------------------------------

Å  Archive Magazine is published by N.C.S. and is available by
subscription only. (ú17 for twelve monthly issues from N.C.S.) It has a
64 pages each month, providing news, views, latest products, reviews and
technical articles. There is a small amount of advertising, but most of
the magazine is filled useful information. It carries a regular DTP
column, occupying about 9 or 10 pages each month, which is produced by a
team of four voluntary sub-editors who all use DTP in a professional
setting. Membership of Archive entitles you to special discounts on
hardware and software bought through Norwich Computer Services.

Å  Budget DTP Ö is a book by Roger Amos, published by Dabs Press. It
shows how you can use Draw and Edit to do DTP on Acorn computer systems
without going to the expense of buying a DTP package. It costs ú13 inc
p&p from N.C.S.

Å  öCreating the Right Impressionò is a review article by Dick Pountain
in Byte magazine, March 1992, page 5 ff. This covers the A540,
Impression II, ScanLight Professional scanner and Laser Direct HiRes 8
printer.

Å  DTP For All Ö Bruce Goatlyæs book, published by Sigma Press, contains
information about all aspects of DTP on the Acorn range of computers.
(ISBN 1-85058-248-3) It costs ú13 inc p&p from N.C.S.

Å  DTP Seeds is a book of ideas for DTP Ö ú8.45 from 4mation or ú8 inc
p&p for Archive members from N.C.S. This book has 100 pages of sample
DTP output to show what can be done using the DTP facilities available
on Acorn computer systems.

Å  First Impression Ö a tutorial package for Impression II. It consists
of 250 pages in a ring binder and contains thirteen tutorial chapters
and eleven appendix chapters plus a couple of floppy discs with sample
documents and templates. First Impression contains reminders, hints &
tips and self-assessment tasks. The cost is ú29.95 from öWord
Processingò or ú28 for Archive members from N.C.S.

Å  Good Impression Ö a 207 page book of layouts, designs and graphics
which can be created with Impression. All the ideas illustrated are
presented on three floppy discs which are included in the package. It
costs ú26.95 from ÉWord Processingæ or ú25 for Archive members from
N.C.S.ááA


                Glossary
                --------

d.p.i. Ö dots per inch. On a desktop printer, the text and graphics are
reproduced by rows and rows of tiny dots. The smaller the dots, the
better the definition of the resulting printout. This is defined by the
number of dots per inch that the printer can lay onto the paper. The
same idea is used for scanning. When scanning a picture or diagram, the
grey level (see below) of rows of tiny areas of the picture are assessed
by the scanner. The closeness of the areas being differentiated is
measured in dots per inch.

Fonts Ö Characters on the screen and on the printed page can take on all
sorts of different shapes. A font is a set of characters that have been
designed so that all the letters of the alphabet and a whole range of
other special characters (200 or more in a complete set) have the same
style. There are also sets of related fonts using the same basic style
but with the characters angled (italic) or made heavier (bold) or both
(bold italic).

Grey levels Ö A photograph may have some areas completely white and some
completely black. Most areas, however, will be somewhere in between. If
you wish to represent that picture electronically, you have to judge the
Égreynessæ of each part of the picture. If you represent this on a scale
of 0 to 15 (16 grey levels), it will not give such a faithful
representation of the picture as if 64 or 256 grey levels are used.
However, the more grey levels used to represent each point on the
picture, the more data is being used. For example, a full A4 picture
scanned at 400 d.p.i. could occupy as much as 12 Mbytes!

Operating system Ö This is the set of öhouse-keepingò programs within a
computer that look after screen display, filing systems, etc.

Outline fonts Ö These are fonts that are described mathematically by
using equations to define the curves that make up the outline of the
characteræs shape. Using these equations, it is relatively simple to
work out how to display any font at any size, either on the screen or on
a printer where the shape has to be reproduced as a series of dots.

Public Domain (PD) Ö There are a number of enthusiastic people who
produce programs and clip art which they want to make freely available
for other people to use Ö rather than trying to make money by selling
them. The material is distributed at cost by various individuals and
agencies. There are quite a number of PD libraries dealing with material
for Acorn computers. (Norwich Computer Services runs one such library,
part of which raises money for charity Ö over ú15,000 a year, in fact.)

RISC Ö This is an acronym for Reduced Instruction Set Computer.
Companies like Acorn realised that the trend to more and more complex
computer processors wasnæt necessarily the best way to increase the
overall speed of computer processing. These complex processors were
spending the majority of their time doing simple tasks anyway. What
Acorn did was to make the processors simpler, which meant they could
work much faster doing the simple jobs like pushing text around and
drawing dots on the screen. This is partly why RISC processors are so
well suited to DTP applications Ö though the explanation is grossly
over-simplified!

RISC-OS Ö This is the operating system (see above) used on Acornæs
RISC-based computers.

WP (Word-Processing) Ö In the early days of microcomputers, all they
could do was allow you to handle text to create documents, i.e. to
process words. These days, however, many of the programs that are
referred to as word-processors can also handle pictures, so the
distinction between WP and DTP is becoming less clear.ááA