PROGRAM PITSTOP
from Your Sinclair #30 (June 1988)

Once upon a time, there was a prince called David McCandless who lived
in a column full of zappy routines, and all the readers programmed
happily ever after!


Another month, another batch of mail to wade through. Hmmmm (sounds of
rustling letters), this sounds good: Finder by Lazarau Lazaros and - oh
look! - Thursten Felstead is back with his Text Organiser. And what's
this? A message scroller? From Christopher Priestley? Well, I'll be a
choccy-biccy! A-ha, here's a useful proggie if I ever saw one, +3 Disk
Catalogue from Robert McSherry. What can you say?

Why should you contribute to Pitstop? And why not? Well, apart from the
world-wide fame, the fan mail, the groupies (slaver, bonk), and the
possibility of a massive #50 for the best routine, there's not much
else. But there's also the chance that a software house may want to hire
you to work on its next megagame. What more could you ask for?

Send all contributions to David McCandless, Program Pitstop, YS, 14
Rathbone Place, London W1P 1DE - and include a piccy of yourself.
Remember there's #50 at hand for the best routine!


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MESSAGE SCROLLER
by Christopher Priestley
from Your Sinclair #30 (June 1988)
[files MSCROLL1.*]

This month I decided to write a ritty-ditty, super slick, interrupt
driven message scroller and ... I did. And very proud of it I was too,
until a certain letter popped in through the post.

Blink.

Someone - by the name of Christopher Priestley - had written a similar
routine, and it was - shock! horror! gasp! - better than mine! And not
just better, much better! Fume!

Method

Well, not that my ego has been shattered and my confidence annihilated,
I'd better tell you how to use this McCandless-bashing program.

First use the hex loader (from Finder) to input the 10 lines of hex,
then save this with SAVE "message" CODE 40300,80 [81, actually. JimG].
Afterwards, tap in the little ol' Basic demo program, and save that with
SAVE "message2" LINE 900.

Info

Right, have you typed in the program? Run the demo? Commented on how my
program would've been better? Yes, good, now here's a list of the
variables used in the program so you can use the routine yourself:

POKE 40301,(start of message)-256*INT ((start of message)/256)
     40302,INT((start of message)/256)
POKE 40322,(character set)-256*INT ((character set)/256)
     40323,INT((character set)/256)
POKE 40326,Window row (0-23)
POKE 40335,Window column (0-31)
POKE 40348,Window length (0-31)
POKE 40375,Scrolling speed (0=fast, 118=slow)

Quite a lot, aren't there? My program didn't have so many ... mind you
my program wasn't so good ... winge ... moan ... winge ... fume ...

Proggies

I still think my program would have been presented better - winge -
here's the hex dump and the Basic demo.


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SCREEN TEXT PROCESSOR (Text Organiser)
by Thursten Felstead
from Your Sinclair #30 (June 1988)
[files TEXTPROC.*]

Two things still amaze me in this world. Firstly there's why my belly
button fluff is always purple, and secondly there's the hatstandedness
of some contributors. I mean, anyone with a name like Monsignor Thursten
S. Coolman Felstead OBE must have a bad case of appellation. Still, his
name is no reflection on his programs, which are moderately sane.

This is a little Basic sub-routine which organises strings of text so
that they don't spill over the edge of the screen and onto your lap. The
program is self-contained, self-instructed and self-simple. So get self-
typing in and stop selfing complaining!


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FINDER
by Lazarau Lazaros
from Your Sinclair #30 (June 1988)
[files FINDER.*]

Cast your minds way, way back to the first ever Pitstop in the Aug'87
issue. Remember it? Remember the little program we had by Khalid Jamil
[or not by him ... JimG] called Peeker which allowed you to rove through
other people's programs, nabbing graphics and things? But there was one
problem with that one; it was in boring old Basic. So now we have the
ultra-refined version - and a few more features - from Lazarau Lazaros
in machine code! Great eh?

Method

This is such a hugely comprehensive program and has a tang of complexity
to it. First use the hex loader to type in the code at address 30000.
Then save it with SAVE "finder" CODE 30000,2048. Now type in the little
loader program (SAVE "floader" LINE 10 [LINE 1, actually. JimG]) and RUN
it, and then play in the Finder code. The code will now load into the
last third of the screen and auto-execute.

KEY  EFFECT
---  ------------------------------------------------------------
1    Inverts current window
2    Show info (yes/no); if "no" then program runs faster
3    Change current address; enter decimal 00000-65535; no delete
4    Change ink on current window
5    Change mode: horizontal/vertical
6    Clear table of graphics
7    Store piccy; stores the address and size of graphic in table at
     23296; uses four bytes; 64 graphics stored max
8    Display graphics from table (good for animation):
     F-forward one piccy; G-back one piccy; H-return
9    Decrease width
0    Increase width
Q    Decrease height fast
W    Decrease height slow
A    Increase height fast (max=127)
S    Increase height slow

When searching through memory:
O    Fast forward
P    Fast backward
K    Slow forward
L    Slow backward
R    Save whole screen
T    Save the graphic from memory onto tape; the first two bytes are the
     size of the graphic
Y    Load graphics into current address
SymbolShift	Return to Basic

Phew! As you can see this is a pretty damn good program and very useful
to boot. It has an interest to the programmer who wishes to tabulate his
graphics, and a use for the amateur dabbler who wants to make screens or
graphics displays. Totally brillo (pad).


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DISK CATALOGUE
by Robert McSherry
from Your Sinclair #30 (June 1988)
[files DISKTOOL.*]

Okay, last up this month is a useful +3 Catalogue program from Robert
McSherry, which would've been in last month if I hadn't lost the
documentation! Anyway, it's an alternative way to menu your disk
contents. To use it is semi-complicated, so listen very carefully (... I
shall say this only wance, etc).

[As per usual, this 128 program was listed on a printer which was not ]
[128-compatible, so the PLAY commands in the DISKTOOL listing were not]
[shown in the magazine.                                           JimG]

Complex or what?

KAY-Blimey, if this NEXT bit ain't complicated, then it ain't
complicated. Ha-ha-ha, just my little puny-poos there. Right, enough
faffing about, and on with the serious stuff:

 1  Type in the catalogue program and save it with SAVE "DISKTOOL".
 2  Type in the controller program, saving it with SAVE "DISK".
 3  Load the DISKTOOL and RUN it.
 4  You'll be greeted with: "How many programs to cat?"
 5  Answer between one and nine.
 6  Next is: "Type in the title of program 1".
 7  Type in the name, not the file name.
 8  Now: "What does program 1 load by?"
 9  You can type in the file name now.
10  Steps 6 to 9 are all repeated for the number of files you entered at
    step 4.
11  Insert your catalogued disk to be, and press any key (that rhymes!).
12  Note that DISKTOOL is not needed on the aforementioned disk.
13  Load the controller program LOAD "DISK".
14  Insert the catalogued disk and type: GO TO 150.
15  The controller will be saved on that disk.
16  Reset the computer.
17  Follow the on-screen loading instructions.
18  Once the controller has loaded, follow the menu.
19  It's all yours; to return to Basic press "Q".


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--
Another Fine Product transcribed by:
Jim Grimwood, Weardale, England (http://www.users.globalnet.co.uk/~jimg/)
--

