Copyright (c) 1982 by Sig/M-Amateur Computer Group
of New Jersey Inc., Box 97, Iselin NJ, 08830-0097
The SAM76 language deals mainly with the manipulation of
text, which contain expressions, scripts and procedures written
by the user. They can contain both character strings and
program instructions. SAM76 is an interactive, surprisingly
powerful language, which appears to be good for gaming and
artificial intelligence applications. Powerful, recursive
macros or procedures may be constructed. It is a language
which encourages intellectual juggling.
reviewed by Stan Ericson, Rockford, Il.
A 240 page text book entitled:
SAM76 The First Language Manual
is available {perhaps} from your computer store
and {surely} from the publisher:
SAM76 Inc.
Box 257 RR1
Pennington, N. J., 08534
U.S.A.
Price is $15.00 postpaid if cash with order.
Otherwise terms are:
$30.00 net 30 days (postpaid) plus
$5.00 for each copy of the invoice required by
the purchaser in addition to the original one which
is furnished free of charge. {U. of FLA. please Note}.
Details of the language may be found in back issues
of Dr. Dobbs', and Creative Computing.
Send a Self Addressed Stamped envelope for a free reference
sheet which lists the commands and gives some examples.
SAM76 Inc.
Box 257, R.R.1
Pennington, N. J., 08534, U.S.A.
-
Available materials and prices effective May 1, 1980
Machine Readable materials:
SAM76 Distribution Disk - $20.00
Contains object code for 8080 and Z80
Source code for graphics functions,
real time clock and some miscellaneous
other functions; variety of applications
scripts, and demonstrations as well as
miscellaneous tutorial material.
Available formats (see NOTE A,B,C,D)
SAM76 Distribution TRS80 cassette $20.00
Contains object code for TRS80, and
some demonstration scripts. Included
with cassette is brochure for TRS-80.
SAM76 Adventure Game $25.00
Available formats are "A,B,D"
SAM76 "Hershey" graphic incremental vector tables
I - Occidental Fonts excluding Gothic $20.00
II - Gothic Fonts and Oriental Index $20.00
III - Oriental Fonts $20.00
Set of three disks $50.00
Available formats are "A,B"
SAM76 Distribution and Adventure for North
Star - Single Density system - 2 disks $40.00
Notes:
A - 8inch single density CP/M format
B - 5 1/4 inch - Micropolis MOD II CP/M
C - 5 1/4 inch - TRS-80 CP/M or TP/M
D - 5 1/4 inch - TRS-80 standalone
For other formats contact SAM76 by phone (609) 466-1129
TERMS: All above prices are net - payment with order
cash, money order or personal check - no credit
cards. Prices include shipping postpaid fourth
class for printed matter unless disks included
in which case first class. Add $2.00 for first
class for books alone. Overseas add $7.00 for
AIR book rate.
Net 30 prices are those quoted above multiplied
by two. One copy of invoice furnished gratis,
if additional copies are required add
$5.00 for each desired copy.
By Ward Christensen:
Whenever you get a new piece of software, you want
to see it WORK. You don't want to have to do a lot of
reading. Trouble with that attitude, you might miss some
of the more interesting things available. SAM76 falls into
that category.
I'm going to tell you enough to at least see your computer
spit somethng back at you under SAM76. Then I'm going to tell
you to read "BOOK.DOC" and get the documentation.
I found that copies of S.COM which were generated on
one system were not necessarily transportable to another
system. Trying it, my disks performed some unnatural acts
with the head load solenoid until I smashed reset. So
I therefore have (wrongly or rightly) deleted the S.COM
file from the disk, and instead suggest you generate your own.
You generate your own copy of SAM76.COM via the following
procedure (this somewhat duplicates S.DOC):
A>ILRAW which brings in a "raw" SAM76
A>CPMSETL set up for CP/M running SAM at 100.
SAM76 comes to life at this point.
%bf,g/= Reads in G.SAM. If it accesses the
wrong disk (I was actually running
on B: for example, and it went to A:
to get "G.SAM") then type:
%sdu,1/= Select disk unit 1 (B:)
%bf,g/=
%G/= Will run G (upper case - case matters
almost everywher in SAM76 - incorrectly
specifying a name due to having the
wrong case might cause an error
message, or might just "cr/lf")
SAVE 63 S.COM or B:S.COM
You now have a copy of SAM76 to run. Try the demo
program:
S
%bf,news/= Bring in file "news". If it goes
to a: and you want b:
%sdu,1/=
then try the %bf,news/= again
%lt, /= Will list the texts in memory. The
' ' after the comma is the delimiter
to use when listing.
%vt,P/= View the text of "P", which is the
mainline function of NEWS. It calls
p1, p2, p3, and p4, then itself again.
%A/= Runs news itself.
CP/M users might find SAM76 a little "unfriendly" in that
it uses control-x for line delete instead of control-U, and
that control-s to suspend output, is not implemented.
But one of the ideas of this language it to experiment,
dissect, see what makes a program tick. Within 1 hour's
experience with SAM76, I rewrote "P" in "NEWS" to pause
for character input before re-executing itself. Thus the
lack of ^S didn't seem so serious.
The more I see the more interesting I get. I have decided
I'm interested, so the next step will be to send in an order
for the book.
Have fun...
P.S. I was unable to generate a copy of a COM file which
would successfully run "S NEWS". It always tried to go to
drive A, while SAM was on drive B:. I diddled with "%sdu,1/="
to select the B: drive, but was unsuccessful. Mind you,
I DIDN'T try very hard - just an hours diddling or so. I'll
await the book before getting more serious. The DDJ article
from volume 3, issue 1, is a start, but doesn't have
everything, and I'm sure some things have changed since then.
----------------
Now, about that book: If you have successfully gotten
this far, you must be serious, so get the book! Here's a
copy of "BOOK.DOC":
A 240 page text book entitled:
SAM76 The First Language Manual
is available {perhaps} from your computer store
and {surely} from the publisher:
SAM76 Inc.
Box 257 RR1
Pennington, N. J., 08534
U.S.A.
Price is $15.00 postpaid if cash with order.
Otherwise terms are:
$30.00 net 30 days (postpaid) plus
$5.00 for each copy of the invoice required by
the purchaser in addition to the original one which
is furnished free of charge. {U. of FLA. please Note}.
Details of the language may be found in back issues
of Dr. Dobbs', and Creative Computing.
Send a Self Addressed Stamped envelope for a free reference
sheet which lists the commands and gives some examples.
The file with the "h" in its name is as the name
suggests a version of the SAM76 language
assembled to operate at 8000 HEX. You may chose
to put this in rom or ram above a 32 K CPM
system, or better yet give copies of it to your
diskless impecunious friends and sucker them in
to get the book and learn all about SAM76.
Don't forget to zeroize the "POA" location if your
friend does not really have a disk or he
will get strange things when doing the "@@f" function.
"S.COM" is an example of the use of SAM76 in autorun
mode of operation. In effect "S.COM" is nothing
more than (in this case ILRAW primed with CPMSETL)
a version of the SAM76 interpreter which has been
reloaded prior to saving with a script written to
recognize a command string and act on it.
Procedure is as follows:
1. Bring in a copy of SAM76, either through the
sequence ZLRAW/ILRAW and CPMSETL/ZAPSETL or if you
prefer just S.
2. Bring the file "G.SAM" thus:
%bf,g.sam/=
3. Examine the text "G" that has been brought in
and desirably analyze it - use %vt,G/=.
4. Execute G thus: %G/=
5. This will take you back to the operating system
and now save the file thus: SAVE 63 xxx.COM.
Use of xxx.COM allows you to specify a command string
which is examined by "G" in the following manner:
xxx yyy drive
where xxx is the name of the file you saved,
and yyy is a file (yyy.sam) which contains the script
you wish to invoke, the first of which must be named
upper case "A" (at least as long as you do not change G).
and drive is the drive number on which yyy.sam exists.
If you omit drive, then drive 0 is assumed, if you omit
yyy then you will get SAM76 in its normal form.
