Category: Applesoft
The A2kit version 4.1 is released. A2kit is an open source, script-able command line interface for disk image and language manipulations, and the engine behind a number of editor extensions for Apple II languages. This update adds a “smart copy” command that allows you to shuttle files between disk images and normal storage with less typing and less thinking. It works much like the cp command familiar to linux users, but it will analyze the disk images and the files…
What better way to say to those around you that you not only love them, but are totally cool than to express your love Apple II Style. Rogerio Neves has shared a lovely little one-liner that does this with a high-resolution heart drawn on the Apple II Screen. If you want to try this yourself, then copy the program shown below and paste it into your favorite Apple II emulator or type it into a real Apple II computer and…
Apple Pugetsound Program Library Exchange (A.P.P.L.E.) has updated the manual for the popular Apple II graphics programming tool Turtlesoft: Turtle Graphics for Applesoft with a new softcover manual. Originally published in 1983 by A.P.P.L.E., the new manual features revised formatting and now includes the 15 sample programs with screenshots. In addition to the original Turtlesoft DOS 3.3 version by Robert Gallup, John Brooks converted it to work with ProDOS. Both Turtlesoft disk images are available and also include sample programs….
Benoit Gilon has announced the immediate release of the Peersoft Applesoft Extensions version 1.5.5. Shown extensively at the recent Apple II Festival France, this extension package allows for user defined functions to be added to Applesoft through both machine language and Applesoft. What’s new? Ability to define up to 10 user defined functions. Such functions could handle up to 2 input arguments instead of just one. Sample functions provided, GCD, LCM, Factorial, Binary operations on 16bits integers, MAX and MIN…
Ivan Drucker has once again released a plugin for Applesoft on the Apple II computer. His new Magic Goto allows for labels to be used instead of line numbers. Accrding to his posting: Magic Goto is now available, so you can program in Applesoft without ever having to think about line numbers, yielding better organized and much more readable code. It lets you GOTO, GOSUB, or ONERR GOTO a label in a REM statement. For example, GOSUB “showMainMenu” will find…
Lincoln, IL – Jun. 18, 2012 – Author David Finnigan has written and published a paperback book covering the Apple II computer. Before the Macintosh and iPod, Apple Computer became famous for its easy-to-use personal computer. The New Apple II User’s Guide covers everything from setup to programming of this important, early computer. The purpose of the book is to serve as a guide to all models of Apple II, and explain the basics of setup, programming, networking, and other…
If one really thinks about it, text files are a kind of virtual memory. You can add strings, retrieve strings. And if the strings are of a fixed length, then you can even replace strings in a text file. But I found the text file commands of DOS3.3 and Basic.system very slow. Some recommendations were to save your strings to a BIN file instead. So I combined the two and created a sort of semi-Virtual memory for strings Applesoft is…
NuInput, the replacement package for Applesoft’s INPUT and GET commands has been updated. Ivan Drucker, the author of NuInput and Slammer has made the latest version 2.0, available for immediate download from the NuInput website. NuInput was initially introduced by Ivan at the 2010 rendition of Kansasfest (http://www.kfest.org) as part of a demonstration he did with both NuInput and Slammer. The latest version of NuInput includes a number of new features including: YZ$ (ST$ template) is no longer needed DELETE…
A new way of writing Applesoft Basic programs has been created by Andres Lozano, known in the Apple ][ world as Loz. Virtual Basic is a complete BASIC with all of the same operators and commands as Applesoft, except that it is written in a style much like other high level languages of the modern era. The entire system for Virtual Basic is a series of python scripts. If you are writing Virtual Basic programs, they can written using…
Wade Clarke has released an update for his Leadlight Adventure. The game itself is quite the adventure. Your are playing a girl Belinda who’s world is slowly falling apart. According to the Leadlight website, “15-year-old Belinda Nettle is studying at Linville Girls High School in Australia’s Blue Mountains. After falling asleep in the library one afternoon, she wakes from her mundane existence into a nightmare. Her classmates are transformed, nameless terrors seek her out across the schoolgrounds, and traps and…
By Mark Phosis Philip Lord was looking for a basic listing of Tetris in a recent post on Comp.Sys.Apple2 and this was the program listing by Mark Phosis. The program was written in 1992 and could definitely be optimized to run faster. The drawing primitives are at lines 200 and 225. It looks like the subroutine at line 800 does collision detection. ============ 10 GOSUB 1000 100 W = W + 1: IF W > LV THEN W = 0:…
By Sean Nolan This year, Christmas comes in June. The TERC BASIC Enhancements, an Applesoft enhancement package, are being dumped (pardon me, I mean released) into the public domain. The TERC BASIC Enhancements add over 50 additional BASIC commands to Applesoft which allow: • Mixing text and graphics anywhere on the screen.• Labeled subroutines with parameter passing and local variables. Improved INPUT commands which simplify catching of user errors.• IF I THEN I ELSE.• Hi-Res SCRN and XPLOT commands.• Non-destructive…
The Aldrich brothers strike again. Remember, folks, you read it first in Call-A.P.P.L.E.. “Convert”, by Ron Aldrich using the disk, will create a text file from an Integer BASIC program listing, call Applesoft, and presto, your program has been converted. After Conversion, list it out and note all the lines that need to be changed to conform to the Applesoft format. This means that the Integer commands that are not compatible with Applesoft must be changed. For example: TAB must…
Here is a quickie about setting up the APPLESOFT ROM card. First, as the instructions indicated, this card will function only in Slot #0 of your Apple ][. This card allows you to make a choice of whether you want Integer BASIC or APPLESOFT to be called with Control-B after you power up. If the switch is in the down position, APPLESOFT will be selected. In addition, it is not necessary to change the switch position to call the non-default…
Perhaps this may be the first disk program published for Apple’s new Disk II. If so, a feather for our cap! The “SAVE” program, listed in column two will ask the user to input the file names of six disk programs, start recording on tape and hit return. SAVE will then consecutively load from disk and save to tape, in one operation, the six named programs. A neat way to make a tape for a friend from your disk collection….
The big news story of this issue is obviously the arrival in town of Disk II and Applesoft II ROM. Rather than do a review, we have hidden behind the pretext of an editorial to state our feelings on the failings of Disk II and A/S ROM. I’ve got a feeling I’m failing? (Oh dear! )) Applesoft II ROM for $100 is like buying 10K of memory for less than half price, since it frees that amount of RAM for…
Note: In line 400 after the first quote, hit the Control key and the “D” key at the same time. This is how the disk system responds to commands within a Basic program, with Control D in a print statement.
Documentation has been cited by Apple Computer as a cause of delay in shipping both the new ROM board and the Disk II. Discs have been rescheduled for shipping during the first week of July, while the Applesoft ROMs should follow within two or three weeks. Well worth waiting for!
Here is a patch to correct one of the few bugs found in Applesoft II. The HTAB function will space 2 places further to the right than intended unless corrected with this patch: POKE (HM-28), 202 where HM = the value of HIMEM: for your Apple. This should be done after loading & prior to running.
This handy little subroutine can be used in two manners; to fill a screen page with repetitive material or to determine the length of a screen page of print statements. Assume line 100 is a print statement with which you wish to fill the page. 100 PRINT” “:GOSUB 400 400 IF PEEK(37) < 18 THEN RETURN 410 POP:PRINT “FOR NEW PAGE HIT ANY KEY”:CALL 756:GOTO 000 Line 400 reads the cursor and finds whereitis on the page. If less than…
