Dear Foundation member, News from RISCOS Ltd No. 14 March 9th 2001 ============== New Fax number for RISCOS Ltd Cardiff Office -------------------------------------------- With immediate effect RISCOS Ltd has a new fax number for its Cardiff Office. The Fax Number is now 029 2049 2326 The old number 029 2044 0071 is no longer in service. RISC OS User Survey now online ------------------------------ The RISC OS user survey will be online at http://www.riscos.com/survey/ on Monday 12th March. We want to build an accurate picture of who the current RISC OS users are and what they are expecting from RISC OS in the future. Please spare a few minutes to fill it in, and please be honest with your replies. News from Pace Micro Technology plc ----------------------------------- 29 JAN 2001 - Pace and Sega Announce A World First In Digital TV Technology Pace Micro Technology and Sega announced the development of the worlds first digital TV home gateway (set-top box) to incorporate powerful video game capabilities. The new device will open Paces digital home gateway to Segas extensive games portfolio, integrating Segas platform into Paces digital home gateway. It will be marketed jointly by the two companies to broadcasters and network providers around the world. This new initiative between the worlds leading developer of digital TV technologies and the global games company represents the latest stage in Paces strategy to enhance and extend the capabilities of the digital set-top box. The first step in this strategy is the incorporation of hard disk drive (HDD) technology similar to that used in personal computers - into the set-top box to create the digital home gateway. By integrating HDD technologies, Pace is creating opportunities for broadcasters and others to develop a host of additional applications for the home, all accessed through a single device. The collaboration between Pace and Sega is designed to provide digital TV customers with on-demand access to hundreds of console quality games with 3D graphics, digital sound and full motion video. Available for all major digital TV platforms including cable, satellite, xDSL and digital terrestrial the device offers significant revenue and marketing opportunities for digital broadcasters. It is envisaged that consumers will access the games in either a pay-per-play format or hire games for a fixed time period. These revenue options are made possible by downloading the games to an HDD currently 40 Gigabytes that Pace has incorporated into its digital TV home gateway. In addition to storing material, the HDD also acts as a jukebox, allowing games to be transmitted wirelessly to and played on portable, hand held devices. Todays announcement is further evidence of the success of Paces home gateway strategy and represents its second commercial application. Last year, Pace introduced its home gateway with integrated personal video recorder (PVR) functionality. The PVR home gateway, which is due to be rolled out to consumers this year by a major UK broadcaster, offers a host of features that turns the set-top box from a pay-TV access device into a fully functioning video recorder. Among the features it offers are the ability to pause a live broadcast, and to start it playing again when the viewer is ready even before the broadcast has finished. The facility to store hours or days of television broadcasts for playback as and when the viewer wishes. The capability to record multiple channels simultaneously, while the viewer is watching another channel, as well as frame-by-frame instant replay. Andrew Wallace, marketing director, Pace Micro Technology said: Our announcement with Sega is a world first. Together, Pace and Sega will offer digital broadcasters a valuable new service for their subscribers, as well as an important source of additional revenues. Paces vision is to change the way in which consumers interact with digital TV technologies. We have created a development path that is leading the industry from the set-top box to the home gateway and beyond to the fully integrated networked home, based upon the digital set-top box as the central control and communications device. For Sega, integrating games into set-top boxes expands its market potential beyond conventional games consoles. Existing users now have a new way to access games, and new users will be attracted since anyone with the HDD enabled home gateway box will have access to Segas own extensive and licensed games portfolio. Hideki Sato, Representative Director and Vice President of Sega Corporation, commented: With the advancement of semiconductor and network technologies, set-top boxes and digital home appliances, the new concept of accessing information from a single device in the living room will become increasingly popular. Entertainment content, most of all games, are becoming the most attractive and sought after element in the expansion of the home network. For more details see the PACE website at http://www.pace.co.uk News from MicroDigital ---------------------- MicroDigital have announced the formation of two subsidiaries:- MicroDigital Europe and MicroDigital Australia. We asked David Atkins about the aims for the subsidiaries. This is his reply... The main objective of MicroDigital Europe is to: Re-assure current European RISC OS users that we are listening to their computing requirements. Be within the local currency zone to be more competative with other platforms. Widen our expertise, knowledge of the market and to improve our support. Markets For obvious reasons we do not wish to get into discussing our plans other than to say that our present range is aimed todays entry level users and those wishing to upgrade from the Acorn A400 series, A3000, A30X0, A4000 machines with the Mico and high end users with the Omega. As for numbers of machines we expect to sell that's differcult to say other than we are encouraged by the number of orders received and with the level of enquires. When we start shipping we expect a conciderable growth in interest and sales in the European market as we will be in a position to widen our marketing beyond the existing RISC OS world. For further details http://www.microdigital.co.uk/news.html Internet Microwave ------------------ If you have seen the new Arnold Schwarznegger film "6th Day" which is set in "the near future" you would have been impressed with the Internet Connected Taxi and Fridges, amongst other goodies. Some of these are not just pretend, but do actually exist. At the recent Houseware Show 2001 in Chicago, LG Electronics introduced the Internet Microwave, to follow on from their previous Internet Fridge and Internet Washing machine. For full details take a look at :- http://www.lg.co.kr/e_lg/about/news/newsflash/0101/ind_0122-1.html Spot the Acorn Time ------------------- Out now on DVD is "Rancid Aluminium" (rated 18). Set in London and Russia, but actually filmed mainly in Cardiff and Poland, the film features one set with a wide variety of Acorn Computers in use. A free RISC OS Manuals CD is on offer to the first person picked out of the hat to correctly identify the software in use in the office scenes. The closing date is 30th March. Send answers by email to mailto:foundation@riscos.com Where have all the FTP sites gone? ---------------------------------- If you used to spend your time browsing the FTP sites looking for the latest software, you may have found that when you looked for many of your old favourite sites, they were no longer there. However all is not lost as the UK Mirror Service provides a collection of over 150 FTP and Web Sites of interest to academia (and others!) Take a look at http://www.mirror.ac.uk/ and you find some useful gems such as the old Acorn public ftp site and University of Stuttgart FTP Site. Coding Competition ------------------ WIN up to £2000 of Castle products. Castle Technology have agreed to offer the following promotions and prizes for the Coding Competition announced in Newsletter 11. 1. 1st prize - full refund of all goods brought by the individual from Castle from whilst the competition is running (max £2000). 2. Additional Oregano Web Browser prizes for 3 runners up. Discounts for every one who enters. 3. Special 10% discount for people purchasing a Kinetic StrongARM upgrade for the competition. The aim of the Competition is two fold. 1. To encourage new programmers 2. To help produce demos that can run on machines for display purposes. At present the major demo that most people use is the tumbling slideshow which does not show off the full capabilities of new machines. The Competition will be judged at the Wakefield Show in May, but entries need to be submitted on 2 CD's. One to RISCOS Ltd and the other to Castle Technology by the end of Friday 11th May. The rules of the competition will be produce a demo program that runs for at least 3 minutes before repeating. It must run in a high resolution screen mode of at least 800 x 600 x 32K and preferably 1024 x 768 x 32K. It should incorporate Still Images from those supplied with RISC OS 4 in the IMAGES directory on the RISC OS 4 Installation CD and also the Acorn Replay files supplied with RISC OS 3. You will not be penalised if you don't have the Replay files, or don't know how to integrate Replay Movies into other operations. It should have a high quality audio track (i.e a WAV or similar 16 bit Audio track taken from either a free MP3 track or your own composition, but NOT a sample from commercial music CD) and be capable of running itself direct from a CD without the need to install any files onto hard disc. You must allow for a permanent message from a Drawfile to either be displayed permanently on screen at up to quarter screen size, or else programmed in periodically as part of the effects during the demo. Other than that you can include any other original material and effects that you like. Remember the goal is to attract people to want to watch what is going on and find out more about the machine that is running the demo. Entries will be open to both Individuals and Teams. Copyright in the Demo will remain with the Authors, but all rights to distribute the Demo will be given to RISCOS Ltd and Castle Technology Ltd. To enter please register your interest by sending an email to mailto:foundation@riscos.com If you then wish to take advantage of the 10% Kinetic StrongARM discount, your details will be passed onto Castle. STOP PRESS ========== Some very exciting news on the Internet front is almost ready for announcement, but we can't give details just yet! Hopefully we will be able to rush out a special newsletter in the next 10 days or so with full details. ( Subject to the Budget, Foot and Mouth Restrictions, Legal Agreements and Holidays !!) ======== Replying to queries from this Newsletter ---------------------------------------- If you are responding to a specific query in this newsletter please use the appropriate mailto: address to reply rather than replying to the sender of this email. Also don't reply to the general foundation or admin email addresses as your enquiry may not get dealt with promptly. We try to reply to all enquiries within 5 days. But at peak times it may take longer to reply. If you have received this email in error, or wish to be removed from this list then please send an email to mailto:foundation@riscos.com with the subject REMOVE regards -- Paul Middleton RISCOS Ltd ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Copyright ©2001 RISCOS Ltd. RISC OS is a trademark of Pace Micro Technology plc. Certain other product names, brand names, and company names may be trademarks or designations of their respective owners.