
           The Connecticut CP/M Users' Group -- CCP/M

     CCP/M meets on the second Tuesday of each month at the 
Farmington Public library, Farmington, CT, from 6:30 to 9:00 PM.  
Interested persons are encouraged to attend.  Directions: Exit 39 
(Route 4) off I-84, West 4 miles, the library is in a civic 
buildings complex on your right.

     CCP/M is a not-for-profit computer users group, maintained 
by its membership, for the purpose of increasing the utility and 
enjoyment of computing with "CP/M type" computer systems.

     While the world of micro computing, especially business 
micro computing, moved more and more to the IBM MS-DOS standard, 
CP/M systems remained a viable, and indeed a more practical, 
solution for many computer users.  The producers of CP/M, Digital 
Research Inc., offered some improvements to the operating system, 
including its CP/M-Plus product which added many features not 
found in CP/M 2.2, the most common CP/M version.  A few computer 
manufacturers are still producing CP/M based computers.  In fact 
some of the systems being produced are better than those produced 
in CP/M's most prolific years.

     A suprising fact is that an enhancement to and partial 
replacement for the standard CP/M operating systems was developed 
by independent programmers which has evolved into a superior 
operating system.  This new operating system, the Z-SYSTEM, is 
currently available for nearly every CP/M type computer system.  
This new system is much more efficient, flexible and powerful 
than standard CP/M.  Many Z-SYSTEM based computer systems enjoy a 
performance advantage over IBM PC MS-DOS systems!  Recently, 
automatic installation of this new operating system was 
developed.  Converting from CP/M to Z-SYSTEM, and even reversing 
the process, is now quick and painless.  At a cost of well under 
a hundred dollars, the new dynamic Z-SYSTEM packages are a 
practical way to dramatically improve the utility of CP/M type 
systems.

     Our user group has a special arrangement with the producers 
of the dynamic Z-SYSTEM products.  We can provide a substantial 
discount for our members purchasing these products thru CCP/M.  
It's just one of the benefits our group provides its members.  
Over the years our group has also collected a large library of 
public domain and shareware programs and information files.  
Public Domain programs are programs released to the general 
public and may be used and copied without charge.  Shareware 
programs are released in a slightly different way.  There is no 
charge to try the programs, the authors do ask that a fee be sent 
to them if, and only if, you find the program of use to you.  
Often, by sending in this reasonable fee, the author will supply 
extra features or information that make the program even more 
valuable.

     Beside free software and discounts on various products, our 
group offers other advantages to its members.  Because many of 
our members are experienced CP/M and Z-SYSTEM users, we have a 
wealth of expertise on which to draw.  Our group has regular 
meetings where topics of interest to CP/M type computer users are 
presented and discussed.  If you have a modem as part of your 
system you can call our online bulletin board system and exchange 
messages and catch up on CCP/M news.  This system also supports a 
way of exchanging programs and other files over the phone lines.  
We currently send out a monthly newsletter, on disk, containing 
useful programs as well as articles and information files.

     Aside from all these benefits we offer the opportunity for 
our members to participate in the planning and function of our 
group.  If you have ideas or suggestions, this group is willing 
to listen.  The vitality of CCP/M rests in the willingness of its 
members to participate fully in all the aspects of the group's 
activities.  The dues we charge could never compensate those 
doing the work, for the effort and time it takes to provide the 
benefits we all enjoy.  At present nearly all our expenses are 
for such costs as printing and mailing the newsletter.  No one 
gets paid for writing articles or editing or managing the 
software library.  All these tasks, and many more, are done for 
our members by our members.  What you put into CCP/M is 
proportional to what you can expect to receive.

For more information, contact

Lee R. Bradley
24 East Cedar Street
Newington, CT  06111

BRN 89

