OVER 2 YOU, 034 (14/06/01)

NAVAL HISTORY

I am hoping to write a biography of my father in law's Naval service and  wonder if you or any of your readers may know of web sites that could give histories of the various ships he served on

J. Snell

I am currently writing a history of HMS Ettrick a WW2 River Class Frigate launched by my mother in 1943. I have not found many useful web sites as such however I have found that the various Maritime Museums both in the UK and abroad most helpful by e-mail as was Navy News when I got started, they can often put you in touch with the ship's or class association. Local Record Offices have also been of assistance when relevant and the PRO at Kew is always helpful. I find that if they do not have records they often know a very nice man, or more often lady, who does.

There is a list of Maritime Museums at http://www.mailbase.ac.uk/lists-t-j/history-sources/

files/c_engl-s.mar

enquiries@navynews.co.uk for Navy News for general enquiries

plansandphotos@nmm.ac.uk Greenwich Museum for plans & photos of course

twas@dial.pipex.com Tyne & Wear Archive Service for details of ships built on the North East coast

archives@liv.ac.uk Liverpool University archives hold WW2 information on ships & convoys etc.

enquiry@pro.gov.uk Kew Public Records Office

qldmaritime@ecn.net.au Brisbane Maritime Museum, Australia where I just happened to find plans of the ship I am concerned with, having failed in the UK. They have the last remaining example of the class as an exhibit in dry dock. Pure luck that I came across it and probably no use to you but it shows what can be done.

There are also a great number of books about the ships of the RN. Ones that I have found particularly useful are:

British Empire Warships of the 2nd World war by H.T.Lenton

Allied Escort Ships of WW II by Peter Elliot

The Battle of the Atlantic by D. Macintyre

Ships of the Royal Navy by J. J. Colledge

and for another view

Hitler's U-Boat War by C. Blair

Good luck with your project.

Charles Rowntree,

There is an excellent free mailing list dedicated to ship histories and merchant and naval ancestry. To subscribe, just send an e-mail to Mariners-L-Request@rootsweb.com (or Mariners-D-Request@rootsweb.com if you prefer to receive posts in digest mode), with the single word SUBSCRIBE in the message, nothing else. You will then receive a 'welcome' message explaining how to post to the list, etc. There is also an attached website at www.mariners-L.freeserve.co.uk which
contains guides to tracing seamen's records.
Ted Finch, Buxton, Norfolk.

OBSOLETE COMPUTERS

I am trying to help a colleague, who over many years has collated the day-to-day actions of hundreds of RN Ships. The problem is that the initial files were created on an Olytext machine (I presume a very early word processor). I have been told that by saving the files on the Olytext machine as ASCII files, we should be able to transfer them easily to a PC. This is where the problem comes in - using a standard floppy disk which has always been used in the Olytext, we create the file as an ASCII and place it on this standard floppy, remove it from the Olytext and place it in the PC, but the PC doesn't recognise the disk and asks 'should it format the disk', to which we reply 'no'. We then take a new standard PC formatted floppy and place it in the Olytext and guess what - the Olytext can't read it and asks 'should it format the disk', to which we reply 'no'.

The only other way of transferring the files is by re-typing them - a very long job indeed, or scanning them with OCR software, which is obviously fine if the original copy is clear, but as some of the copy was typed on an old typewriter, the text is not as clear as it could be and leaves much of the text requiring to be re-typed in.

Does anyone have any suggestions on how we can overcome this? I have heard of a company that can transfer the files, but they are asking for around £25 per page and these files could run into 2000+ pages.
Trevor Muston, via email

I never heard of the Olytext, in fact I'm uncertain if it was sold here in America. But being a geek I put a couple hours in on the web looking for solutions. The best information I could find indicates the Olytext uses CP/M 2, which is an operating system that was quite popular on 8 bit machines before DOS. I suggest that Mr Munston find a person who is familiar with CPM to help him through this. Perhaps he can find someone through a local computer club.

There are 3 means of transferring the information. Details for each follow the list.

1.  The Olytext and DOS machine could be connected with a null modem cable via their serial ports. Using a terminal program in CPM on the Olytext such as Kermit or Zmodem and a program on the PC that supports one of those protocols (there are many, including HyperTerminal), the ASCII files could be easily be transferred. This is by far the easiest method.

2. A person familiar with the PIP command in CPM could send the files over the null modem cable to another computer, I think. Some versions of the PIP command may require modification.

3. There are programs that convert CP/M disks so they can be read in DOS. I am told the best is "22Disk". I assume the data is on 3.5 disks so the user should be very careful here and I would make data backup disks at least until accustomed to the task. 

There is a discussion of this issue at: http://www.non.com/news.answers/

CPM-faq.html at Q11 and at

http://www.seasip.demon.co.uk/

Cpm/oldflop.html

Details:

1. The Olytext may already have a terminal program installed that can be used. Otherwise, suitable programs may be found at: http://www.columbia.edu/kermit/cpm.html (generic and specific versions of Kermit. This looks most suitable: Generic for CPM80 2.2  LASM  4.11  91/04/23  M. Freeman BPA. Note there is a version of Kermit for the BBC. It might be worthwhile to borrow a disk and try the BBC version first.

2. There is a patch for the pip command for systems that need it at: http://www.seasip.demon.co.uk/

Cpm/oldflop.html. CPM is before my time so I can't comment further.

3. I located a shareware copy of 22Disk which I will share with Mr Munson if he contacts me. It can also be found at: "http://www.seasip.demon.co.uk/

Cpm/oldflop.html"  Note that the copyright holder still exists. Their site is: www.sydex.com.  Here's what they told me: "please tell us about the system from which your CP/M diskettes come. There are some CP/M formats that CANNOT be read with standard PC hardware, and there are others that create special hardware considerations

Dave Null,

I have not seen an Olytext machine, but I have resolved a similar problem with another system. The machine is probably an Olympia Olytext 20 word-processor. This runs under CP/M on a Z80 processor, just as my Amstrad PCW did. The CP/M file format differs from MSDos in the way it organises the directory, splitting the disk into 16 groups. Normally one would put everything into Group 1, but the Locoscript word-processor supplied with the PCW used all the groups.

Sydex did/do supply a set of DOS utilities for transferring between CP/M and DOS disk formats called 22DISK. I have used these to transfer CP/M files to my old 486 PC. I don't see why they should not work on a modern system, the program opens in a DOS window from Explorer on my P2 system, but I cannot find a CP/M disk to open.

The Olytext 20 is mentioned in some of the documentation, but not in the list of available formats, but then neither is the PCW 3.5 DSDD disk, but it works thinking it is a 5¼" disk!

Another reference on the Web suggests that 22DISK is available as a download
from the Sydex web-site, but if it is not, I still have my original floppy and the files are only 300Kb, supplied in 2 zip files complete with PKUNZIP. I would be willing to e-mail them to Trevor Muston.
Geoff Bryan,

This is dredging from the past but from memory, the first time I converted files from an Olivetti "word processor" we used a serial cable and the Kermit file transfer program.  Kermit used to be supported in the UK at Lancaster University on their bulletin board. You need two copies, one for each piece of hardware, and a serial cable to connect the two machines together.  Basically, the process works like FTP; you establish a server process on the Olivetti, and a client on the PC.  Then you use the client to transfer the files over to the PC.  I think, but someone can correct me, that a program like Laplink can run on the PC end and talk to the Kermit server and give you a more "graphical" environment (?) but its been a while since I've done anything like this. On the "newer" versions of the Olivetti, the machines used a "version" of DOS - I think 3.3.  It used to be possible to format the floppy as "DOS readable", and then files could be saved to it and read on a PC!

Tim Lewis, Tim_Lewis@alliedtelesyn.com

I suggest that he tries to use an Apple Mac for this, as it will recognise other disks. For example a PC will not see an Apple floppy, but a Mac will see both. So I suggest that he puts an Apple formatted disk in the Olytext, to see if it will transfer the ASCII, or the usual Olytext one, then see what happens when he inserts them into an Apple. Peter Davenport,

TAKING STOCK

I need, ideally, to run a spreadsheet (Excel) with all my stocks and shares listed on it, and be able to download (off the net) daily or more often prices so it can update automatically. Can this be done without getting tied up with a portfolio with an on-line company, and having to be registered with a supplier of said prices?
Chris J Catton, via email

With respect to Chris Catton's query I think that a £15 program called 'StockHistory' would do the trick. More details from:
http://www.btinternet.com/~mike.franklin/

stockhistory.html
Frank Marshall,

FILOFAX PRINTING
Can you tell me if you know of a PC software diary/schedule package, which will specifically produce a hard copy of a diary that can be printed off in hard copy format suitable to be put into a Filofax (Personal size paper)?  What I am looking for is a diary that I can maintain on my PC, but print off to update a hard copy every now and then.

Nigel Morton, via email  

Have a look at: http://www.digita.com/content/products/

organiser/organiser.asp I have been using Organiser on my Amiga since 1994 and now it is a  free download from Digita for the PC. Organiser has many Preferences so you can customise it to suit your needs and also has the ability to print out pages to fit various size FiloFax page sizes.

Michael Domoney,

CAN YOU HELP?

I am looking for a telephone database whereby as I type the number in, a display of names, addresses and telephone numbers appears. 

Ivanhoe, via email

Is there a site where I can check my "full perm" pools entry, simply by entering my weekly numbers? 

A Cross, via email

What is the best way of linking a list of business contacts to a calendar? I want to record contacts as I meet them, possibly using a hand-held computer, and then be reminded when I have to contact them again. I haven't found Outlook to be the best solution - is it me or is there an alternative?

Andy Bullen, via email

I often receive information in plain text format and would like to put it into Word documents or a web page. Usually this results in a boring session clicking the end of each line and pressing delete to "join up" all the text by getting rid of "hard" carriage returns etc. Does anyone know of a utility, which will do this automatically?  Usually it's not too long a job but I just got a text document that is a megabyte long!
Richard Limebear, via email

Could you tell me the addresses of some UK pen friends organizations, which can be joined by foreigners?
 I. A. S, via email