Originally published on: Wed, 07 Apr 2010 00:15:01 +0000
In my early days of computing, I used to read a lot of tech magazines. I had been reading about this “Operating System” called CP/M: Control Program for Microprocessors. The computers I had owned to date really didn’t have true operating systems, so I had a very vague idea of the significance of an OS.
I did understand that different kinds of computers seemed to be capable of running CP/M.
The original version of this post was published on March 16, 2014.
Back in the day, I used to write machine-language subroutines for the Commodore 64 that I would then call from a main program written in BASIC. I found it easier to use BASIC as the higher-order controller over a set of ML functions that usually did things for which CBM BASIC 2.0 was not well-suited.
In one case, I wrote an Xmodem file-transfer protocol handler.
I had originally published this text on Sunday, November 8, 2009. It’s seen a couple of revisions. There’s some C code in this post, but the main point of the post is to provide a way to dump TRS-80 binary CMD files. The source code for all files can be found here:
https://github.com/jimlawless/readcmd
I’ve begun to use TRS-80 emulators to recapture some of the programming experiences of my younger days. The emulator I’m currently using under Windows is trs80gp which can be found here:
In the mid-1980’s, I’d owned a used TRS-80 Model I for about a year when I had a yearning for a newer system. I only had cassette-based storage which proved to be unreliable. I had a 16K machine and I had a few games and tools for the TRS-80. I learned Z-80 assembly language and I was having a lot of fun tinkering, but that particular line of computers had met its end.
“It is practically impossible to teach good programming to students that have had a prior exposure to BASIC: as potential programmers they are mentally mutilated beyond hope of regeneration” – Edsger Dijkstra
My early days of computing began in the late 1970’s. I used to go in to the Radio Shack in the mall where they would let the patrons type stuff into their display-model TRS-80. You could tell that none of the patrons were skilled in any type of computer language as the screen was filled with a line of nonsense followed by a line indicating that a syntax-error had occurred.
In the late 80’s, my programming team was in search of a decent programmer’s text editor for MS-DOS. At the time, a number of editors seemed to have comparable features. Any missing features could often be added via the embedded macro language that each of these editors sported. What was it that helped to make the decision?
The advertisement from American Cybernetics above ( excerpted from the late, great Computer Language magazine ) caught our eye.
Originally published on: Sat, 22 May 2010
The first computer in my household was a Radio Shack TRS-80 pocket computer that my dad owned. My brother got it for him as a birthday gift in 1980.
This was essentially a calculator with a pretty nifty BASIC interpreter built in. The BASIC was not without its own personality. Although it supported arrays, I found that if I DIM’ed an array “A” and placed a value in A(2) … variable “B” would get clobbered.
Originally published on: Sun, 08 Nov 2009
My first computer was a second-hand TRS-80 Model I with 16K of RAM and a cassette-recorder for auxiliary storage. I was 17 years old when I received this computer in the Fall of 1982. My goal? Like many kids my age at the time, I had intended to write a video game or two and live happily on the riches that would befall me.
Originally published in the Commodore Hacking (C=Hacking) electronic magazine #14, November 1996. This post has been reprinted in Commodore Free magazine and other e-magazines. Jim Butterfield passed away on June 29th, 2007 after a long battle with cancer. I grieve with the family and the legions of techies who looked upon Jim as a mentor via his articles and ongoing contact with the Commodore community. Rest in peace, Mr. Butterfield.
Originally posted 5-21-2004. In the early days of 8-bit computing, a programmer’s most often-used tool was the assembler. Due to memory constraints, many of the early 8-bit machines could not run a full assembler. At best, one could hope for some sort of machine-language monitor that would include a mini-assembler and a disassembler.
That was … until Don French came along and implemented a symbolic assembler on the unexpanded VIC-20.