Robert Radford

I drop in here only occasionally so I apologize in advance if this question has already been answered. Will TacOps be available for Mac OS X?

I'm running TacOps in OS 9.1. TacOps has been one of the most reliable programs I have ever had.

It took me until the second page before I found any real discussion of responsibility of the person or company who creates a war game, movie or novel for the forseeable impact on those who experience it. As was mentioned, constant exposure to violence, for instance, can desensitize some people from a more normal perception of the ethical issues. Playing, as well, can divert people into concentration on means rather than ends. I don't think it is merely unbalanced people who are influenced. Work with neural networks indicates that all learning is cumulative and that current opinions are a blend of all that has gone on before. This means that we all have to be conscious of our effect on others. In a war game, particularly one that does not emphasize the violent aspects, it may be possible to justify the effect by pointing to the benefits in training officers to avoid some of their more costly mistakes and in informing the public so that they can evaluate military information. There is considerably less justification for violent movies or novels as edification is a minor factor and the benefits go mainly to the producer. Sometimes, there is an attempt to justify the work by reference to art but I find that "art" is mainly in the mind of the person who benefits financially and in the minds of a mindless claque which seeks spurious second hand reputation from the activities of others rather like sports fans which judge themselves by the success of the team they support. [This message has been edited by Robert Radford (edited 02-21-2001).]

A friend teaches first year science at a good university. He suggests that high schools should wean students from the need to be taught and prepare them to learn. He finds that students have received too much ego stroking to the detriment of any understanding of the extent of their abilities. At university, one has to deal with the cold equations that have no respect for one's inner worth.

I tried screen capture a number of times (20, to be exact) but all pictures showed the offending icon appearing normally despite the actual appearance visually. And I am using TacOps 3.05 as I am a faithful user and updater.

I increased memory as you suggested and the greying appeared only in the right half of the use terrain/entrenchment icon. To eliminate even that greying, I raised the memory allocation even further but the greying in the right half of the icon still appears. I'm now at a 25 Meg allocation and testing on the Basic Training (Canadian) module. Luckily, I have lots of RAM. I suppose I will have to wait for MacOS X to solve the problem.

I recently upgraded my 200 MHz PowerMac 7300 with the addition of a 400 MHz Sonnet G3 processor. The Orders box in TacOps immediately began to show some curious behaviour. When I click on any Order icon, the use terrain/entrenchment icon shows a series of grey horizontal lines. Otherwise everything works properly. Is the use terrain/entrenchment icon particularly sensitive to speed changes?

I tried Combat Team Oldham as a template. I set up my forces and saved before commencing battle. Using the saved file as a template, I then had a series of five games in which OpFor entered from the road at Centre East. Thinking the problem was with the template, I recreated the template and had a further run of OpFor entry from Centre East. Am I just suffering from a run of luck or have I misunderstood how to create a template?

I should also mention that the problem is intermittent. I turned PGP back on i.e. with the Extensions Manager, but haven't had a problem since the first report. If I recall correctly the last time I had the problem it was intermittent as well. Several menus would just disappear in the middle of the game and remain off on restarts, to return only if I turned PGP off.

I'm using Mac System 9.0.4 with TacOps 3.05 and PGP 6.5.8. The problem occurred before with System 8 but I don't remember the PGP version.

I have installed versions of PGP (the privacy software) several times on my PowerMac 7300 over the last few years but, each time, I have run into menu problems with TacOps in which menus like SetUp and keyboard commands like Look simply disappear from TacOps. The functionality returns only when I disable the PGP control panels. Is this a problem that anyone else has experienced?

OpFor was at the extreme right hand of the screen with no units anywhere near the objective. I'll look for the incident to happen again and report.

In one of my many forays into Battle Group Dennis, OpFor did something strange. It entered from right-centre, proceeded near to the objective and then retreated back to the right where it stayed the whole game under artillery and aircraft fire. After sufficient reduction in OpFor numbers, I was able to employ my helicopters to increase attrition and in the end had lost one mortar unit which was acting solely as an observer. I thought OpFor would at least try a last minute charge and had my forces prepared for it. It is really strange to watch the clock tick away with OpFor doing nothing.

Somehow, Major, you come across as a tad compulsive.