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APPLE II DEVELOPMENT FORUM CONFERENCE LOG
May 2, 1989 10:00 p.m. eastern time
Topic: BASIC Programming
Forum Leader: Dave Sugar (AFL Dyfet)
AFA Gary J I know that Marty is hot on BASIC. I know he wouldn't miss this
topic :)
AFL Marty BASIC!
AFL Dyfet Hello Joe :)
AFL Marty Gee... are we gonna talk about QuickBasic? :)
AFA Gary J Hi Joe.
JSchober Hi, Dave, Gary!
AFL Dyfet No, Bbasic Marty :)
JSchober Let's rant and rave about BBASIC //... :)
AFL Dyfet Yeah :)
AFL Dyfet Hi Parik :)
AFL Marty BBASIC?
JSchober Hi, Parik.
AFA Parik hi
AFA Gary J Sounds good to me.
AFA Gary J Hi Parik.
JSchober Blankenship Basic, Marty. Dave co-wrote it. NIFTY set of
additions to ASoft.
AFL Dyfet Bbasic //...closest you will come to QuickBasic on an Apple, Marty
:)
JSchober I like 'em. I use 'em for many things... (NOT EBBS, tho -- not
enough mem!)
AFL Marty Okay... yes, I'm familiar with it (sort of)
JSchober Dave was nice enough to send it to me for no extra charge...
good... since I
JSchober have no extra money. :)
AFL Dyfet Hello Edward.
JSchober So how many of you are going to AFest?? And who's gonna bring me
a present??;)
JSchober Hi, Ed!
AFL Marty Dave, is BBasic a compiled Basic (I've forgotten)?
EdwardF4 Hello!
JSchober Nope, Marty.
AFL Marty I'll being you something Joe (if you're nice)
JSchober It just patches into ASoft... adds graphics, utility, etc.
commands.
AFL Dyfet No, interpreted, Marty...damn fast because it precompiles line
references,
JSchober I'm always nice... to everyone but you, that is. :P :)
EdwardF4 I'm going to AFest. What do you want? Lobster?
AFL Dyfet though :). Has named subroutines, overlays, and fully
structured...
JSchober No, a GS+. :) (Or a TWGS will do...)
JSchober Yeah... the labels are terrific!!
AFL Marty That's too bad Joe. I was gonna get you HyperStudio, but
nevermind now :)
AFA Parik I want all the paper you get from AppleFest
JSchober Sheesh. figures, Marty.. (siiiigh)
AFL Marty Do you still have the demo available Dave?
AFA Gary J I'll take it, Marty :)
EdwardF4 I'm definitely getting HyperStudio.
AFL Dyfet It should be around here somewhere (the demo)...I forget which
forum it was
JSchober ::sulking::
AFL Dyfet originally uploaded to :)
JSchober Dave... this thing on my desk is a DEMO?? ... I can't
imagine what the
JSchober REAL THING is, then!!!!!
JSchober Yo Scott!
AFL Scott Yo, Everyone... AFK..
AFL Dyfet The difference between the Demo version of Bbasic and the live
version is that
AFL Dyfet you cannot edit programs with the demo. You can give it aways as
a runtime
AFL Marty What's the price on BBasic, Dave?
AFL Dyfet module, though :)
AFL Dyfet $49.95+$5.00 shipping.
JSchober That's it?? I guess I've got the live thing. I LIKE it, too. :)
(THANKS!,
JSchober Dave! :))
JSchober Hi, Keebo.
AFL Dyfet Hello Keebo, Scott.
KEEBO Hello, I'm gonna keep quiet. I'm not a developer by any means.
AFL Marty Okay... what differences are there between BBasic and AppleSoft?
JSchober Uhhh... want me to read the manual, or just rant and rave at
random? :)
EdwardF4 I'm not a developer, either. But some day, when I grow up...
AFL Scott <--Underdeveloped
JSchober ;) Scott
AFL Dyfet Bbasic adds some 50 commands to AppleSoft Basic, including
structured
AFL Dyfet programming loops (like while-wend stuff, repeat-until, etc),
named subprogram
JSchober (It makes it easyPascal, ok?? :)
AFL Scott <---Whoops... Underdevelopment.
AFL Dyfet modules that can be called, disk overlay modules (in addition to
conventional
AFL Dyfet chaining), an advanced new file system in place of 'Basic.System'
that gives
AFL Dyfet you full control, hires text, special graphics stuff, and a lot of
new
AFL Dyfet string functions.
AFL Dyfet In Bbasic //, all the commands are integrated directly into
Applesoft.
AFL Dyfet No wierd flaky &syntax's to remember :)
JSchober (no &'s!! YAY!!!)
AFL Marty That sounds pretty neat. Structured programming and all...
JSchober It all makes sense, really. CIRCLE h,v,color,arc. Stuff like
that. VERY NICE
AFL Dyfet The BBASIC list command also does automatic program indentention
and it has a
AFL Dyfet line editor and other hand-holding things :)
AFL Dyfet Anything I left out Joe? :)
AFL Marty What kind of fees do you require for the run-time module?
AFL Dyfet Hello Mark. Welcome aboard.
AFA Gary J Hi Mark
JSchober LOL... I don't think so; not other than the specific commands and
whatnot. but
AFL Dyfet No fee for distributing runtime.
JSchober it's a NIFTY development system -- it has all the things that
AppleSoft ...
MarkLC Hello all...what's the topic?
JSchober should've had in the first place. It's also extremely fast...
JSchober Fast. Fast fast. :) Mark, we're ranting and raving about
Blankenship BASIC,
JSchober (BBASIC). :) Hi, Mike!
AFL Dyfet Hello Nuzz, welcome aboard.
AFL Marty Where do I send my money?
AFL Marty <-- software collector ;)
AFL Dyfet One of two places, Marty...either HyperDyne Software, PO BOX
60664-1156,
AFL Dyfet Chicago, Il. 60664-1156 (make that PO BOX 641156 :), or to
BlankenShip &
AFL Dyfet Assoc., PO Box 47934, Atlanta, GA. 30362.
AFL Dyfet Hello Matt :)
AFL Marty Great! Thanks Dave!
AFL Dyfet No problem, I can use the money :).
AFL Dyfet Hi, Twolfe1
Twolfe1 Hello, what's the topic?
JSchober We're... uhh... ranting and raving. :) Just relax; only Marty
bites.
AFL Dyfet Well, as Joe said...:). Tonight's topic here is Basic, Twolfe1,
though this
Twolfe1 thanks, I'm always here, just not visable.
AFL Dyfet chat is rather informal tonight, so feel free to speak up...
MarkLC anything?
JSchober Anything, sure. :)
JSchober Anything on BASIC, that is.
AFL Dyfet We can take it :)
AFL Marty Micol Basic?
AFA Gary J Doesn't have to be BASIC at this rate :)
JSchober Shoot... :) <tho I know nothing about it, Marty>
AFL Dyfet True...tonight is informal...
AFL Marty I hear they're coming out with a new version for the //e.
AFL Marty version 3.0
AFL Dyfet Micol?
AFL Marty yep
AFL Dyfet I've spoken to those people a couple of times in the past...a
little odd in
AFL Dyfet some ways :)
JSchober They must be Apple programmers indeed, if they're odd. :)
AFL Marty Seems like a fair assessment :)
AFL Dyfet I remember when they tried getting their own ProDOS 16 load file
standard
AFL Dyfet accepted.
Nuzz I have a question.. In converting a DOS program to ProDos, the
HIMEM command
AFL Marty Anyhow...
AFA Parik They're canadian. :)
AFL Marty I'm a beta tester :)
Nuzz failed HIMEM:28761
AFL Marty GA with Nuzz's question... I'll wait.
JSchober Mike... HIMEM under BASIC.SYSTEM =must= be divisible by 256...
(ie., it must
JSchober rest on a page boundary.)
JSchober Shift it down as needed. :)
AFA Gary J ...or up.
JSchober 28762 will do.
Nuzz Ah, well then, that's it
JSchober No, that can't be right...typo. Hold.
JSchober 28672 will do. :)
JSchober Well, Gary, if something BLOAD's right to the edge of HIMEM,
moving it up is
JSchober kinda bad... :(
AFA Gary J Depends on how much memory you have to play with.
JSchober Well, if you're BLOADing non-relocatable m/l code, you CAN'T move
it up...
JSchober unless you have the source, of course...
Nuzz It was 28671 so that's pretty darn close
AFA Gary J True
JSchober I thought you said 28761, no? Well, whatever it is, just make it
rest on a
JSchober page boundary and you're ok. :)
Nuzz I made a mistake too :) 28671 it was
JSchober LOL
JSchober Anyone have an & or CALL routine that left or right justifies a
string??
AFL Dyfet For printing?
JSchober Yeah. I currently use ? LEFT$(STRING$+"<lotsa
spaces!>",field_length), but
JSchober all those spaces eat memory. :(
AFL Dyfet Well, Bbasic II does have a formatted 'output' command :)...
JSchober ;) I know that, but EBBS is too tight on RAM to use BBasic. :(
AFA Gary J :)
AFL Marty Why don't you use SPC ()?
JSchober I wish I COULD... Marty: you can't use SPC() in a
concatenation... unlike
JSchober almost every other BASIC. :(
JSchober It's a function, but it doesn't act like one...
JSchober (whatever THAT means)
AFL Dyfet How about printint with TAB()?
AFL Marty There must be some work-around.
JSchober TAB()?? well, TAB or SPC() is the same... it WOULD work, but then
you'd need
JSchober a ? STRING$SPC(field_length-LEN(STRING$)) type thing, which isn't
too much
AFL Dyfet I'm not sure if tab is implimented correctly in Applesoft, but in
theory,
AFA Gary J But you could do ? STRING$;SPC( )
JSchober better than the other way. I want something TIGHT.
AFL Marty Buy more memory :)
JSchober Doesn't help; Applesoft only has a 36K or so core.
AFL Dyfet you should be able to print string$;tab(field);string$;tab(start
of next field)
JSchober TAB to a column?? Nope. :(
AFL Marty (that;s Claris' colution :)
AFL Dyfet Hmm...in every other basic I use that's what TAB does...
JSchober That only worked under Integer %) BASIC.
JSchober Hmmm. Actually, I just looked at the infamous "A Touch of
AppleSoft", and it
JSchober SAYS the same thing that you say. But it doesn't WORK for me. :(
Does TAB()
JSchober use the Z-page htab location??
AFL Dyfet It might...
AFL Dyfet It does need to know your current print position, after all...
JSchober Hmmm. I MIGHT have a z-page conflict. I'll have to look into
that... (if I
JSchober DO, I should shoot myself!)
AFA Gary J I just tried it on my //e, Joe. It works for me.
JSchober Really?? HMMMM. I'll take a look. That could help immensely if
it works.
JSchober But I'd bet all of my $4.14 that I tried that, and it didn't...
:|
AFA Gary J I've had some situations where tab wouldn't do what I wanted, but
I don't
AFA Gary J recall the specifics.
AFL Scott (I wonder if Joey get's an allowance?)
JSchober No, Scott. hmmmm, Gary. I wonder if they'll have any info on
this in the
JSchober Tech Reference library here on ALPE...
AFA Gary J I think the problems I had were related to 3rd party 80-column
firmware.
AFL Marty Don't shoot yourself... let me do it :)
JSchober :P Marty. Well, I'm using the GS... that should be Apple
compatible. :)
AFL Scott ROTFL!!!:)
AFL Dyfet Never do to yourself what someone else is willing to do for you?
JSchober But I'll take a look, and see if I can get it to work. Thanks for
the hint,
JSchober Dave and Gary. :)
Nuzz Can I ask a non basic question
JSchober Hi, Dave!
AFL Dyfet Sure Nuzz, go ahead.
AFL Dyfet Hi Dave!
Dave Lyons I've been looking over Matt's shoulder, but I thought I'd prove I
actually exist (at least as much
Nuzz Is there a tool call that will allow for inverting text in a
window.
Matt DTS There's Dave "Niftier than what??" Lyons...
Dave Lyons as I existed before, anyway).
JSchober LOL
Dave Lyons Inverting text in a window?
Nuzz ALA a word proc.
Dave Lyons Yeah, and there's Matt "You about done?" Deatherage.
JSchober Uhhh... selecting stuff, you mean. Hmmm...
Nuzz right Joe
Dave Lyons If you want to make a rectangular area inversed, use InvertRect.
For a more complicated shape,
Dave Lyons InvertRgn will come in more handy.
Dave Lyons Anybody want a warped mousepad? I have 2. (Actually I can't give
them away, but feel free to
Dave Lyons tell me how to unwarp them.)
AFA Parik wash 'em
DaviesDoug rub cheese on em'
JSchober Put a dictionary on 'em overnight... (or maybe a fat mouse)
AFA Parik it shrunk one of mine down and it turned it into a coffee holder
AFL Dyfet You into heavy handed mousing, Dave?
JSchober LOL
Nuzz Use a big mouse on them
Dave Lyons Oh, how 'bout Inside Mac I-III? I've got one of those....
AFA Parik grab the Information Exchange
JSchober That'll do... :)
AFL Dyfet I knew it! He's being conditioned to program for the Mac!
JSchober Ugh... :(
AFA Gary J Oh no!
AFL Dyfet It starts with the books...subliminal stuff in the margins...
AFA Gary J All the rumors are true!
AFA Parik ack
AFL Dyfet Next he will have AppleShare up...
AFA Gary J Coming soon.... "Nifty McList"
JSchober And then.. the Apple II will be replaced by a Mac II. Chaos from
there on. :(
JSchober LOL Gary
AFL Scott Floppies, Parik?
AFA Gary J ...or is it McNifty List?
AFA Parik ;)
DaviesDoug it's McLifty Nist
AFA Parik Mac The Nifty
AFL Dyfet No words, Gary...just Icons for machine code instructions on a Mac
desktop...:)
JSchober Nah, Nifty McList sounds better. Just hit OA/Ctrl/ESC on the Mac,
and up it
AFA Gary J Ooooh.
JSchober comes... (of course, not compatible with older Mac keyboards)
AFA Parik nah, dave's a good II dude. He'd take any macs he gets and shred
em.
DaviesDoug (: alright, who turned my monitor on backwards?
JSchober Parik's been watching Guts and Glory... :)
AFA Parik (oh yeah, remember to get fawn hall as your secretary)
JSchober LOL
Dave Lyons Nope, no McNifty List yet, but I must admit I moved the source
code over to MPW & used MPW IIgs
AFA Parik MPW!?!?!?!
JSchober UGHHH!!! :(((
Dave Lyons assembler to build version 2.70p.
JSchober And look at that... "no McNifty List **YET**"?!?!?! :(
JSchober There was 2.6p, too, if memory serves... or 2.5p, or along those
lines.
Matt DTS Look at it this way - if Apple's going to throw a 16 MHz machine
and lots of storage at Dave...
AFL Marty ---===[} Dave
Meathook I offer a service converting Mac into Fish tanks, If you're
interested.
JSchober LOL
Matt DTS ...he might as well use it to build better Nifty Lists, dont'cha
think? (any better ideas?)
AFA Parik does it involve intense pain for the macintosh?
AFL Marty How about paperweights?
DaviesDoug sure couldn't use a IIGS
AFL Marty or doorstops?
AFL Dyfet Yeah, throw a 16mhz GS at him instead :)
Dave Lyons Nope, 2.70p isn't available yet. One of these days I'll have time
to polish it off into something
JSchober YEAH!!! ()()()()()
Dave Lyons nice. No fancy promised-for-3.0 features yet, either.
DaviesDoug i'm impressed
AFL Marty Macs make nice targets on the shooting range :)
AFA Parik so it won't replicate money yet, huh
JSchober It's already polished, Dave. Lookit that, those Macs are
corrupting you
AFL Marty (ready on the left... ready... pull!)
JSchober already... they're UNPOLISHING YOUR PROGRAM!!!
DaviesDoug Yah, the new debugger does a lot that Nifty List does now,
yipeee!!!
AFA Parik Hi pal!
Paladin13 Wow! this place has really picked up?? Hello all.
AFL Dyfet Hello Paladin.
Dave Lyons Joe, there's still GOBS of room for improvement--I have a two-page
to-do list, including stuff like
Dave Lyons a command language for letting you do toolbox calls in real
time.
AFA Gary J Nice idea
JSchober Wow, Dave. :) But... I thought that was 3.0. The Mac is still
corrupting
JSchober you. :(
Dave Lyons Howdy, Paladin.
DaviesDoug good
Paladin13 Boy I've been a couple night up all night copying disks
Paladin13 gota fix the last bug in my program though the printing had any
luck
AFA Parik :) which program Paladin?
Paladin13 I just made an educational program about animals for kids
Paladin13 Its called ANIMAL TRACKER
Nuzz Speaking of printing... Has anyone come up witha way to set a page
size smaller
Paladin13 Dave any luck on my printing problem
Paladin13 ?
Nuzz than 11 in.
JSchober I'm gonna run for tonight, folks... take care, all, and may your
Macs shrivel
JSchober up and die! :)
AFA Parik :)
AFL Dyfet Gnight Joe.
Paladin13 Dave?
AFL Dyfet I think Dave is busy raiding Matt's fridge :)_
Matt DTS Dave's in here, not over there with his computer. (We're at work)
Printing true (not QD) text?
Dave Lyons Explain your prob again for everybody, Paladin...I don't have any
breakthroughs for you.
DaviesDoug fridge? matt?
Dave Lyons Whoops, Matt will be right back....
AFL Marty after these messages :)
Dave Lyons Whoops, he was back before I even said it.
Paladin13 Ok problem is
Paladin13 at start up the printer will print the text fine I use the code
very in
Paladin13 TML pascal print a text file
Paladin13 Works fine except after I print a graphic
AFL Marty Bye all
Dave Lyons Okay, when you say "...will print the text fine," how are you
printing the text? Toolbox calls will
Dave Lyons explain it to me best.
Paladin13 Then Once I have printed a graphic I try to print text...And now
it cannot
Paladin13 print regular... I've tryed to reset the printer, Set it in a
different mode
Paladin13 just about everything
Paladin13 Draft mode
Paladin13 It prints in draft mode that is why it think it must have
something
DaviesDoug solution : don't print graphics :) wow, wonder if DTS would hire
me?
DaviesDoug nope, couldn't pay enough
Paladin13 Uses the Texttools to initialize the printer port
Dave Lyons We'd pay you in Hex addresses...$117745, etc.
Paladin13 Boy alot of people on tonight A-link is really slow
DaviesDoug that much, 1,144,645 per year, wow, maybe it would be worth giving
up.....
DaviesDoug $82,000 per year
Paladin13 to do with the printrecord being set
AFL Dyfet One catch, the money is not in decimal currency...:) and has a
smiling WOZ
Nuzz Maybe you could do both Doug
AFL Dyfet on the bills :)
DaviesDoug yah, I could fly to cupertion in the morning, and back to Orem at
lunch time..
Paladin13 It works fine but for some reason PrPixelMap is leaveing the
printer
Paladin13 in a state that is not draft or something wrong
Paladin13 The correct information comes out it just doesn't line feed
Paladin13 Any IDeas ??????
Dave Lyons Paladin, do you have the Firmware Reference manual?
Paladin13 <------Need to fix his problem so he can whip out 500 copies
before friday
Paladin13 IMPORTANT WORKS FINE ONLY AT START UP...
Paladin13 Isn't there a field in the Printer record for line feed and draft
modes???
Dave Lyons Looking up some info in my Firmware ref, Paladin...may or may not
help.
Paladin13 Dave ...Matt ... Are you still with me?
Paladin13 I have to get this fixed before applefest...Any suggestions.. I
have to
Paladin13 have to leave out that feature because of line feeds
Dave Lyons Paladin, did you say that turning the printer off and on after
printing graphics did not solve the
Dave Lyons problem? (I think you did.)
DaviesDoug acting.........
Paladin13 Hate to have to leave that feature out
Dave Lyons Try sending Ctrl-I L E to the printer port.
Dave Lyons Be sure to do this only for a direct-connect port, though...don't
go sending that to any driver that
Dave Lyons happens to be selected.
