***********************************************************************
* *
* Current revision date for PCPRICES.ARC is September 5, 1986. *
* There are over 2300 lines of IBM PC product price information. *
* *
***********************************************************************

The file PCPRICES.ARC contains three files. They are XREF.PRN,
AUTO123.WKS, and PCPRICES.DOC (this file). Together these files provide
a current IBM price list and a method for automatically loading the
prices into a LOTUS 1-2-3 spreadsheet.

The file XREF.PRN contains commercial prices of most or all of IBM's PC
product line (including hardware, software, and documentation). There
are several fields of data in each "row" (or record) in XREF.PRN (see
the XREF.PRN record layout below).

The file AUTO123.WKS is a sample "autoload" macro that the user may
modify to meet his or her needs. It may serve as a guide to writing
your own macro to process the XREF.PRN file. As delivered, the
AUTO123.WKS macro will cause LOTUS 1-2-3 to automatically load the
XREF.PRN file into a spreadsheet. It then adjusts the cell width where
necessary to accomodate the data. Dollar figures are formatted in
American standard notation ($0,000.00), and the price column is moved to
a more convenient (for viewing) place.

There are more rows of data here than Version 1 of LOTUS will handle.
(There is a limitation, I believe, of 2048 rows in Version 1 of LOTUS.)
There may be methods and techniques of splitting the data in the
XREF.PRN file across two (or more) Version 1 spreadsheets ... I'm
not a LOTUS person so I don't know. However, Version 2 of LOTUS will
handle the data in XREF.PRN just fine. The spredsheet ends up with the
product description field in the last cell in each row. However, since
some of the descriptions exceed 80 characters, Version 1 of LOTUS will
truncate the display of these longer description fields. (You can, of
course, move the cursor to the row in question, enter the LOTUS EDIT
mode and see the entire description in the area at the top of your
screen.) Once again, Version 2 of LOTUS does not have this limitation.

Non-LOTUS users may be able to develope techniques to load the data in
XREF.PRN into other spreadsheets or databases.


-XREF.PRN Record Layout -

NOTE: Each field (except the first and last fields) are enclosed in
the double quote character (").

The fields (in order of their occurrance in the XREF.PRN file) are:

4 (the number 4 is the first field of each record)
"Feature code"
"Part number"
"Type/Model"
"Publication"
"Misc."
"VPA catagory"
"Ordering Vehicle"
"Description"
Price

So the record looks like this:

4"featurecode""partnumber""type/model""publication""misc.""vpacatagory"
"orderingvehicle""description"price

(Of course the real data line is all one line (that is greater than 80
characters) ... it is shown here on two lines only for ease of reading.)

NOTE: Where a field does not apply to a particular line the field
contains a hyphen (-). Where the field does apply but the data
was unavailable the field contains a question mark (?).

The XREF.PRN file was produced on an IBM mainframe as a by-product of
producing a complete PC Product Reference manual. It was then downloaded
to an IBM 3270-PC and ARCed onto a diskette (along with the AUTO123.WKS
and PCPRICES.DOC files) into the PCPRICES.ARC file. The source file from
which XREF.PRN is produced was created and is maintained by Larry Shick
(an IBM employee). The information contained in the source file and in
XREF.PRN is provided as a convenience to IBM marketing personnel and
their customers for information purposes only. OFFICIAL IBM PRICES ARE
ONLY AVAILABLE FROM YOUR IBM MARKETING REPRESENTATIVE. (What that means,
folks, is that if one of the prices or something else is wrong you can't
hold IBM's toes to the fire or hang 'em for false advertising !)

I hope you find the XREF.PRN file useful.

Bruce N. McCausland
Rockville, MD