PROCESSING WORDS ON THE SPECTRUM

DOMINIC HANDY sets his fingers flying over the keys of his computer and evaluates a trio of wordprocessing packageshat don't actually improve literacy, but make writing on the Spectrum much easier.

Producer: Saga Systems Ltd
Retail Price: £13.95 (Compatible with : tape; Microdrive; Wafadrive; Opus; Beta; Kempston; Gordon disc drive; Saga Mouse)

SAGA SYSTEMS have built a solid reputation in the Spectrum add-on market based on their peripherals Spectrum keyboards predominently. Now they have come up with a piece of software that is best used in conjunction with one of the peripherals they sell. Late last year Nick Buckingham strolled into the Saga offices to see if they would publish his word processor, The Last Word, as he hadn't had much success doing it himself. Saga were very impressed with Nick's program, but wanted the manual re-written and software 'tweaked up on a few points, mainly compatibility with other periperhals. Once this had been achieved , the program was ready for release.

The software is accompanied by a comprehensive manual (which is being updated every time Saga thinks of something extra to put in). The cassette arrives in a NORMAL cassette box (!) and comes with all the relevant programs for transferring The Last Word to the storage medium you have as well as the obligatory introduction letter and a very neat piece of software that can convert any Tasword II file that you care to give it into something that The Last Word understands.

The layout of The Last Word is very easy to follow, and on loading you are put straight into OVERWRITE mode. This shows the large 20 line text file window and a very neatly presented status bar at the top of the screen. This contains all the information you am likely to need during the typing in of the document: cursor status, justification, word wrap and so on... The text window width can have 4 different settings, 40, 48, 60 or 80 columns. I found the tiny 80 column characters tiring to read but the mode is useful if you want to see what the finished output will be like. The actual print line can be extended up to 146 columns if necessary by using the appropriate number of screen lines to accommodate the text.

The Last Word contains all that the average home and business user would need, and more. Text is typed in as normal but when you want to fiddle about with it care is needed as The Last Word is so powerful you could find yourself splicing a text file in a few swift key movements.

Cursor movement is very comprehensive with all the features found in Tasword III except movement paragraph by paragraph. The cursor can be moved around sentence by sentence instead, which I found a bit less useful. The author has also included a useful option which allows the user to input a line number for the cursor to jump to - very useful for moving around in a large chunk of text. Inserting new text into an existing text file is easy, but looks a little strange at first. As insertion begins, all the existing text after the cursor disappears until you go back to OVERWRITE mode this may seem trivial, but I found it very awkward to use, especially when I forgot the gist of the original text.

The facilities for deleting text are also very comprehensive and all types of things can be deleted: the cursor character, to the end of a line, to end of the file or the whole file.

The author has tried to dispose of the laborious marking of blocks of text and plumped for the option of inputting the line numbers instead of block markers. This approach means that blocks of text can be deleted by specifying the first and last lines. This is by far the quickest method. There isn't an actual Move Block command as this can be done using the repeat/delete options.

The first key that a Last Word user should memorise is the REFORM to next firm marker key. This effectively rectifies the mess that is made of a paragraph that you've been playing around with by rejustifying the whole lot. The key is well used as most the The Last Word options do not rejustify after commands have been carried out, leaving tidying up in the hands of the user.

When any main option that could effect your text is chosen a small window opens up at the top of the screen into which commands are entered, which commands are entered. A CALCULATOR mode allows you to use the Spectrum as a normal calculator. This option is very powerful, as the result of computations may be saved as a BASIC variable (m1 to m0) or included in the text. Saved variables may be incorporated in calculations - a powerful and useful facility. The routine, I was told, took up a very small part of memory, so it seems a pity it isn't included in other Spectrum word processors.

The EXCHANGE option allows words in the text to be swapped and can also be used to find a word(s) in the text. If the urge grabs you, every occurrence of a word or phrase can be deleted. During exclusive substitution operations it is necessary to know where all the words you want to change occur in the text as The Last Word just provides a line number and asks if you want to exchange the occurrence of the word on that line. If you don't know where you are in context, you end up guessing! Replacing all occurrences of a word or phrase is straightforward enough; unfortunately the keyboard buffer is not cleared and you can end up with lots of 's's over the text. I felt this option was quite limited on its own - it's only possible to exchange strings of up to 16 characters, and the letters have to be input in upper or lower case correctly…

The Last Word includes an option that allows a simple variable of any length from BASIC to be INCLUDEd into the text file. I found this most useful when I wanted to include saved calculated results or very long bits of text that crop up over and over within an annotated piece of script.

The Last Word includes the use of TABULATION markers, but they are very inflexible as you can only have one width of TAB column. This means that most tables would be hard to enter using these, nevertheless, moving across the line is much quicker via TAB markers.

All the options are accessed via different combinations of shifts, which means that once you're a proficient user of the program there is absolutely no reason to look at the screen menu system while typing. Where The Last Word scores particularly highly is via its compatibility with practically every disc drive or printer you run with it. Every disk system I could think of, and some I'd never heard of before were catered for with full CAT. ERASE and LOAD/SAVE options, proving that a lot of time had gone into ensuring compatibility - every programmers nightmare.

The printer options cater for all types of visual output, with 24 different control tokens available. Printer tokens, unlike Tasword III take up no screen space and just invert the letter they start at. When an inverted letter is encountered by the cursor, the window at the top of the screen displays the token that is represented at the top of the screen displays the token that is represented at the cursor position. Any number of printer tokens may be placed on one letter, taking up no more screen space. Because of this, the ragged edges of text in the printer output are avoided, unlike in Tasword III where graphics characters are taken as text letters and used in justification of lines.

Overall The Last Word is a very powerful wordprocessor with lots of little things like the calculator and including of BASIC strings to make it appeal to both the first time and experienced wordprocessor user equally. Where The Last Word fell short was in the expansion of each of the options. There is certainly no lack of commands, but each command fulfils its function with no frills attached: things like the printer menu and exchange menu could have been improved. As The Last Word was written to put a new angle on the wordprocessor market, it may take some getting used to, but once mastered it performs beautifully.

FACILITIES
Screen Line (chars): 40,48,60,80
Printer Line (chars): 146
Word Count: Yes

Publisher: Saga Systems
Price: £13.95
Memory: 48K
Programmer: Myrmidon Software

There's no getting away from it. The Last Word, from Saga Systems is different from any other word processor I've seen - and that includes Amstrad Locoscript and Wordstar on CP/M.

It has all the functions required of a word processor and includes commands which you may need when you've got to know the package better. You do not, however, have to know all the commands to write simply structured documents.

The main control keys are symbol shift and extended mode so the program is easiest to use on the Spectrum Plus, or 128, rather than the old 48K machine. Of course, the system will also work well with the Saga Systems keyboard - but then it would, wouldn't it?

The screen is split into the usual status bar sector - at the top - and the document window, which takes up most of the page. Text can be printed on the screen in a number of sizes ranging from 40 to 80 characters a line.

Margins can be set to cope with any paper width. If your printer copes with 100 characters a line, so will The Last Word. However, unlike other word processors with this facility, everything is displayed on screen. For instance, if you set the screen to 60 characters a line and your margins to 100 characters a line, then the left-over characters would be put on the next line of the screen window.

Tabulation positions are also simple to set but slightly inflexible as you can only set one width of margin. You could put a tab marker every eight characters along the screen width. You can clear all those tabs by entering 'one' as the specification, but you cannot set up odd tabs at varying distances along a line.

Once you've set the tabs and margins for your document you can type in the text. Unlike a typewriter, however, you do not have to worry about the end of a line. It will simply split the last word on the line in half or, if the word wrap is in operation, the word which would be split is taken onto the next line.

The four cursor arrow keys are used when editing text line-to-line or character-to-character. Using the extended mode and symbol shift, you can also move through a document word by word, or sentence - not line - by sentence.

Movement around the text file is made simpler with a Goto command using extended mode. That type of command is best used when you need to go to the end or beginning of a file and will do it quickly without panning through the remainder of the document.

Copy can be manipulated in blocks - paragraphs - or whole documents. Lines can be justified against the left, right or both margins, and even centred. If you make an error in layout, blocks of text or even the whole document can be reformatted so that more characters can be put on a page, lines can be made shorter by moving in the margins, and text can be centred.

Blocks of text can be copied from one area of the document to another. You can also delete paragraphs and find words or phrases in the text. The latter option looks at each group of characters, which it deems to recognise as a word, and that can cause problems. If you wanted to find every recurrence of the word 'Gilbert' then The Last Word would find it with no problems unless the word had a comma after it - Gilbert, - in which case it would not recognise it. To be fair, this is a fault shared by other word processors.

You will often want to know how many words are in your document. The Last Word not only gives the number of words but also the number of bytes used to store the text file. Files can be up to 24K long which allows you to put almost 25,000 characters in your documents. Words have an average length of six characters, so the program can hold roughly 4,000 words - enough for the most ardent writer.

The Last Word has a unique way of handling printer and file compatibility. You can exit to Basic and produce routines to drive the printer, transfer files from other machines or storage devices, and set up text within strings such as names and addresses, which can then be inserted in your documents. All those functions are called when the program reaches a special mark in the text.

Print parameters, such as setting the type of text you require - bold, italic or double sized - can also be set up using those marks.

The markers can be set anywhere within a document and several of them can be run together. If you put two or three in a row you will notice a strange, but appealing attribute of the word processor. You can put hundreds of markers one after the other but they will take only one space in your document.

Once set you can see what effect the markers are meant to achieve by passing the cursor over the black marker blob and pressing the right cursor key. Each marker's job will be displayed in the status window, one at a time, as you page through them. When you've encountered all the markers you have set, the cursor will start to move down the line again.

You can dump your text to a wide variety of printers using Centronics and RS232 interfaces. Setting up the program to cope with your particular printer interface will cause no problems. It includes an interactive menu on which is displayed all the control codes for interfaces. Just turn to the code appendix for your interface.

The Last Word is the friendliest word processor I have used. It has everything you require with a host of extras - a remarkable programming feat given the memory available.

The program even includes a calculator and an alarm clock. The calculator manipulates numerical data within documents - such as lengthy formulae - and the alarm can be set to remind you when to save your files. The manufacturer recommends that you back up your work every half an hour - very sound advice too.

The author has spent two years writing the program. He had no experience of word processors, but merely an idea of what he would want a text manipulator to achieve. He has succeeded in surpassing the quality of all word processors on the Sinclair market, and many in the MS-DOS and CP/M markets.

Whether The Last Word is the last word in word processing, only time - and the other manufacturers who take it up - will tell. As for Saga, it intends to produce a 128K version and updates for the Spectrum. It has no plans to launch it on other machines so, you lucky Spectrum people, you are part of a growing minority which can enjoy the power of The Last Word.

Label: Trojan
Author: Myrmidon, 53 Brunswick Road, Ealing, London W5 1AQ
Price: £14.95 (tape), £19.95 (disc)
Memory: 48K/128K
Joystick: None
Reviewer: Chris Jenkins

Formerly published by the defunct Saga. The Last Word has now been extensively revised and transferred to disc for the Plus 3. The original cut-down 48K cassette versions is still available too.

The Last Word's great virtue is that it is very user-friendly. Unlike popular programs such as Tasword, you can jump straight into The Last Word without worrying too much about the complexities.

The screen display offers four resolutions - 40, 48, 60 and 80 characters per line - so you get a clear display whatever the quality of your TV or monitor. If you type in 40-column mode, you can reformat in 80-column to check the structure of the document before you print out.

The Last Word features all the facilities you could possibly want of a word processor - 148 character line length, 18 redefinable keys for UDGs, and over sixty easily located key commands for Margins, Word Count, Search and Replace, Word Wrap, Block Delete, Copy and Move, Tabs, Case Changes, Justification and so on.

The Last Word has a very uncluttered screen display with a three-line status display and twenty lines of text. Printer support is very flexible - Kempston 'E' Interface, Epson printers, Interface 1, RS-232, TasPrint, DK'Tronics and so forth.

Overall The Last Word has a good claim to be as powerful as Tasword +3 or The Writer, and is arguably easier to use than either of them. At this reasonable price, it's very fortunate that Trojan has saved it from obscurity.

A WORD IN YOUR SPECTRUM

The Spectrum is under-estimated as a word processing machine, says John Wase. Here he reviews eight programs in support of his argument.

Word processing does not require much computer power. PipeDream on the new Z-88 uses exactly the same Z-80 chip as all versions of the venerable Spectrum. Thus the Spectrum, too, should, in theory, provide good word processing facilities, although in practice there are limitations like memory. A 48K Spectrum has around 41K for both program and text file, around 110K for the 128K version, and the screen display at only 32 columns.

Nevertheless, I found eight readily-available packages, plus variants for various models, of assorted prices, features, sophistication and complexity. Each has been written with some particular purpose in mind and all have virtues and vices associated with what is, after all, a compromise, for no word processing program suits everyone or all applications.

The constraints of the 32-column screen are overcome in a variety of ways. In some programs text lines continue along a second or third display line and end with some recognisable symbol, while in others the screen is re-defined to up to 80 characters per line, further augmented by multiple lines or sideways scrolling, giving as many as 148 characters per printer line.

While it is possible to provide a good deal of the information about the packages in tabular form, it really gives little feeling for the strong and weak points, the aims and the overall success of each package. Therefore I have chosen a combination of tables and comment to provide sufficient information to guide you in choosing packages suitable for your needs. The packages are Mini-Office, a suite of programs for younger children; Ramprint, an add-on printer interface with integral word processor; Spectral Writer, bundled with Wafadrive; WordMaster; Word Manager; The Last Word; The Writer and finally, the Tasword family. They are listed in table one, along with the outstanding features of each package, the cost and supplier.

The easiest thing to do is to take them in groups. First, Mini-Office, which has a very simple set of instructions on a cassette-sized book; interpretation by an adult will be necessary. There is a simple test piece to be typed-in; it appeared in big letters an inch or more high in yellow on a black background on my old TV; it is very easy for a child to write a simple letter but with very little more scope.

The normal mode is insert and there is also a crude copy, so letters or lines can be added or deleted; crude tabs complete the features. The main menu offers the usual save, verify, load or options with a further choice of double height, double width, margin setting and characters per line.

It could have been an excellent program to introduce a child to an integrated suite had it been revamped but there are no facilities to use a printer other than the obsolete Sinclair gadget or compatibles, and the other options integrate badly into the word processor. You would need a suitable printer for your child to make the most of it.

The next pair are proper programs, both intended for the serious user, and both released relatively early. Tasword 2, a development of Tasword on the ZX-81, provides a 64-character line, a fixed text length of 320 lines - 10-and-a-bit pages of double-spaced A4. Spectral Writer is similar but with squarer letters some say much more legible. In both programs insertion is by opening a word or a line and then re-justifying; there is no auto insert mode.

LINE AND COLUMN

Line and column are given on-screen but there is no word count. The cursor will move by line, character, or to the start or finish of the text; in Tasword 2 it is very slow. Word wrap is automatic, characters and lines can be deleted, blocks can be moved and copied and there is a crude search and replace.

Text can be justified with smooth or ragged right margin and centred and margins can be set for tables but there are no tabs in Tasword 2 and no headers, footers or auto-page numbering, no mail-merge, conditional printing or macros; just start and finish lines, one copy only. You can put eight printer codes in the program at once and change them whenever you like.

Both programs are good, straightforward, very simple word processors. You can achieve professional results very quickly Spectral Writer scores by having tabs, a line-end bell and is a little slicker but it normally is only bundled with Wafadrive, Tasword 2 is ubiquitous and bundled with Microdrives.

The chief advantage of both programs is that they are very simple; much is in Basic and is easily user-adapted. The major disadvantage is that printer control codes in the text destroys WYSIWYG concept unless you adopt low cunning or a patch. For simple letters of only a few pages they are easy and adequate.

The other processors are, in general, more sophisticated and it is probably easier to deal with their main features in a large table and just comment briefly on their strengths and weaknesses. The simplest is probably Ramprint, a printer interface and joystick port with a built-in word processor on ROM. I found the documentation brief but the gadget easy to use.

Although it contains most features one needs, there are disadvantages. It will work only with tape or Microdrives, for instance, and it will display only 32 columns when you are entering text, making complex work almost impossible, although it will display a 64-column screen to show you what the work will be like at the end.

That apart, having the works in an EPROM means that there is no software to load; plug it in, type one command and go. For straightforward documents, also those needing underlining, italics and other such fancy bits, even page numbering, it works and works well.

Word-Master again is for the Spectrum owner who has no discs. It works well with tape or Microdrive and an EPROM-driven interface. Within limitations I found a program which was specifically aimed at crude desk-top publishing. The documentation could be improved and I did not particularly like its 64-column character set. A further problem is that right justification could not be implemented on-screen, although was satisfactory when printed; that does not help DTP layout.

Against that, several files can be held in memory at once, page numbers, headers and footers are catered for and printer control codes are handled beautifully, either in a command line which does not print but affects the text below or as special characters for the more common sorts, so that H2O can be printed readily without upsetting justification.

PICTURES

Pictures can be incorporated with the graphic commands and text can be printed either to the right or to the left of it; again, instructions are a little sparse. Graphmate, a separate, stand-alone program, produces bar charts or pie charts easily but with provision for labelling axes left to Word-Master. The programs are independent and the products of Graphmate have to be saved before incorporation.

Cardex also supplied Headliner on a separate tape. It will produce headlines in a variety of styles for subsequent incorporation. This is a useful suite as it stands; further development and the production of disc/128K versions using more interfaces would make it still better.

Word Manager 4 is aimed at a different end-user, evident from its being bundled with Mail and Address Manager II. The review version 4.2 has a number of improvements over earlier issues, including a completely re-written Address Manager II. All saves and loads are in Basic and I liked particularly the single keypress to modify and transfer everything to disc. The 64-column character set looked almost like script, unlike any of the others; I liked it. The normal screen is bright. Lines longer than 64 characters are wrapped round and shown on the line below - not bright.

The instruction book was adequate. Some features were easy to use but I did not like the constant switching between modes to use cursors and delete, the lack of on-screen prompts - particularly caps - or the way in which paragraphs were completed before on-screen justification took place.

Page numbering is there but not headers or footers. Address Manager II is a database specific for Word Manager; Mail Manager takes the text from Word Manager and the names and addresses from Mail Manager and integrates them. There are conditional indices for Mr. Mrs. M/s or Miss but no real conditional printing is available.

For circulation of simple club letters or even, at a pinch, a short club magazine, this would do the trick satisfactorily if you get used to the vagaries involved in editing and, at the price which includes all three programs, it is unbeatable.

In contrast, The Last Word has a very well-produced and extensive manual. I found it very easy to use. Again, all the loads and saves are in Basic but you will have to type-in some new lines - supplied - to get it working from Microdrive or disc; a novice might not like this.

The screen display is changeable from 40, 48, 60 or 80 characters per line - not too good on a monitor, better on a large television set where the slight fuzz causes the eye to assume a good deal. It has most of the features one might expect, like headers, footers, page numbers, selected printing from Basic and mail-merge, with its own data files.

Because lines are terminated by a carriage return symbol there is no insert mode; you have to split a line to insert letters or words. Screen refresh is a trifle slow and the program is 48K, although the author says that there is the possibility of a 128K program in the future.

That said, everything else is good. Control codes do not disturb justification; by screen wrap-around you can get up to 148 characters per line; formatting is very flexible, exiting into Basic to insert your own routines is encouraged and examples given.

Tutor files loaded from tape help you to learn to manipulate text and load and save mail-merge information. Although I had never used it previously and am very familiar with another processor, I found the keys logical and liked the program.

NO COLOURS

The Writer is in two versions, 48K and 128K. Although Softek was very helpful on the telephone and promised to send both programs, plus The Artist, plus a pre-release version of The Filer, they did not arrive in time for this review. Fortunately I was able to borrow a 48K version of The Writer. It is well-presented with a good instruction book. No colours are used; the screen is uniformly white letters on a black background and looks very smart.

The 64 characters a line lettering is clear, square rather like Spectral Writer - and easy to read. The normal text manipulations are on symbol or extended mode and the program starts in insert mode. Press "Edit" and move the arrow over the top-line menu; up comes an overlay menu with obvious choices for all the things like file handling, saving and so on.

Printing includes mail-merge, conditional printing and can include calculations. All in all, a very impressive package. I found it easy to use, too, and liked it. The 128K version contains a pagemaker facility which imports pictures from The Artist. I had hoped to be able to look at this, too, and compare it to the Word-Master DTP facilities.

Finally, the Tasword series. Tasword 3 uses the same black on white character set as Tasword 2 - adequate and readable but scarcely exciting - but there the similarity ends. Because, unlike several of the other programs, all loads and saves are in machine code, there are a number of versions to fit various machines and devices, including Microdrive. Opus and Disciple discs, but there is no tape version, because to fit in all the features and still keep a respectable length file, the main menu is fed in as an overlay; it is frustrating to have to wait seven seconds for it to load from Microdrive or Opus.

All the standard features are present; mail-merge from Masterfile or from its own address lists produced from within the program, headers, footers, pagination, plenty of control codes to send, print several text files sequentially, print multiple copies, customise program, overtype - standard - or insert mode, word count, space remaining - do not fill it too tightly, though.

The main menu is, like all the Spectrum Taswords, accessed by symbol shift and A; the rest is easy. The manual is well-printed and laid-out and a tutor file is included. The 128K versions are almost exactly the same, except for the control key for insertion and some tidying as the Amstrad Spectrums no longer have symbols on the keys.

The main menu appears instantly and the text file is large, between 40 and 50 pages of double-spaced A4, which is a tremendous advantage if you write complicated documents and need to keep referring to what has gone before. The new +3 version appears similar to the user but contains code enabling a spellchecker to work and the extended mode bug which locks the main menu has been fixed.

The biggest disadvantage is the lack of justification when control codes are inserted - redeemed by a patch from Seven Stars Software; against this is the ease of use and the fact that Tasword and Masterfile are both available on a range of machines, even PC compatibles. Again, I liked Tasword; it works well and is good value.

Compared to most other machines, the choice of word processors on the Spectrum is wide and some are technically very good. There is no need to buy that new Amstrad or PC-compatible if all you want is a word processor, particularly if you have a +2 or a +3 with their good keyboards. After all, Tasword is very similar on the PC. Moreover, the PC will not play budget games as well when you are not using it.

FAX BOX
Title: The Last Word
Publisher: Saga Systems
Price: £13.95

It's a fair attempt to be 'the last word' in wordproceasing on the Spectrum. But the general style has been to pack as much power in as possible at the expense of some of its rivals' friendliness. It's perfectly usable on a simple level but some of its more complex facilities require a bit of effort from the user.

TLW has most of what you'd expect - around 22K free for text, copious cursor control, justification, block copy and delete, search 'n 'replace and so on,as well as support for both tapes and microdrives. But it also has some tricks you wouldn't; 40, 48, 60 or 80 (yes - 80) characters across the screen. The last mode is a bit hard on the eyes to say the least but it does work and it's great for getting documents just right before printing.

There's also an alarm clock to remind you to do regular saves, and a 10-memory calculator with access to Basic functions and variables for example!

TLW also has vast numbers of print-formatting codes. These range from the usual underline, double width and so on (set up for your printer via codes that grab current Basic variables and insert them in your text) to codes that stop printing and start executing a chunk of a Basic program you've written. They return to printing when the routine's done its job. It's therefore possible to use TLW as a programmable 'text-processor' - you can do conditional printing, mail-merge and all that if you set it up correctly. But there are a 101 other serious applications just waiting for you to discover them.

Performance is nice and quick with keyboard buffering to keep up with the 2001 jet-set. But there are some curious bits that'll slow you down. To insert text, you 'Open up' the document, type in the new text and then close up (thank you, nurse). This can be a bit slow - especially if all you did was miss one letter out! Also, you don't mark blocks of text but refer to them by their line numbers - that's another two bytes of your brain used up.

Eccentric it might be but TLW is certainly very usable and, after a while, quite likeable. It's the obvious choice if you fancy exploring the programmable printing side and know what you're up to. Lesser technofreaks might like to stick with programs that do mall-merge and the like without going near Basic. The choice is yours.

RAGE HARD!

You wanna know what's hardest in hardware? Once again YS whips out the magic screwdriver in our first hardware round up of '88.

It's been ages since we did a really ripping hardware spread, so we thought it was about time. After a bit of barking at Phil Snout to get his screwdriver out and look at these beasts, we've pulled together a positive cornucopia of hoopy hardware and super software, to turn even the most soft-boiled trainspotter into a hard-boiled egghead.

The star of our show is Miles Gordon Technology's Plus D disk interface, the only real alternative for tape users to upgrade to a +3, from the designers of the Disciple. Check out the review further on.

Other contenders for the hardware crown are the Multiface family from Romantic Robot, the plastic pal who's fun to be with; a couple of wacky Multiplugs for those of you who work all your household appliances from one socket; an aerial switch so you can plug all your computers, game consoles and videos into your telly at the same time; and Computer Cupboard's nifty little Trojan Light Pen for you to scribble on your screen. Worra lorra lorra stuff.

As well as all this hardware, we've got a brain-boggling selection of the most fascinating hardware-based software. So, let's cut the babbling and launch into the reviews.

The Last Word
Computer Cupboard
£14.95 cassette

Word processing isn't an application you immediately think of in connection with Spectrum computers. But with the advent of The Last Word, all that changed. A sophisticated full featured word processor which, due to the +2 and +3's new keyboard, makes any kind of writing a piece of cake. There's an 80 column screen, up to 148 characters line length, mail merge for those important mailshots. a calculator for you to do Apple Macintosh impressions on, and over 60 commands for you to input and edit the text to your taste. The code for loading and saving is even user alterable allowing you to customise it to your own system. Also available on +3 disk (£19.95)

In summing up, it's nice to see so many good British products in this hardware lineup. There's not many computers you could say that of, and fewer that could match the quality and design of the peripherals represented here.