PROGRAM PITSTOP
Your Sinclair, February 1989

Rev up your Speccies, put 'em in gear, 'cos you're in the pitstop and
David McCandless is here.

So far in these Pitstop specials we've covered the noisy world of
music and sound effects, delved into the realm of screen effects, and
now it's the turn of the fancy loader (fwar!). The scope of things you
can do with loaders is mammoth, massive, enormous, large, huge - in
fact rather big really. You can mask or flash a border; speed up or
slow down the loading; build up a screen in an intricate way (a la
Alcatraz) or just have the attributes come at you from all sides; and
you can even - these days - play a game while the game loads. Cor
blimey, the possibilities are endless.

And so I've compiled for you three of the best (and strangest) loaders
ever and squeezed them - quite cunningly I thought - onto these pages.
First is a welcome regular to Pitstop, Simon Owen with simply the most
user-friendly loader in existence. Then, you'll have to deal with
Rogerio Cordeiro Martins and his brilliant InfoLoad program. And then
to end with there's Kevin Gale and his inspired emulation of the
famous Alcatraz loader used on US Gold games.

Next month, normality returns with yet more amateur programs
decorating the back end of the magazine. In the meantime, stay tuned
and keep sending those routines to David McCandless, Program Pitstop,
YS, 14 Rathbone Place, London, W1P 1DE. And don't forget the fifty
smackeroonies available for program of the month.

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MULTI-LOAD
by Simon Owen

Again this month I have the pleasure of bringing you another Simon
Owen masterpiece. Already renowned for his brilliant Sprite Editor and
Sound FX Generator programs, Simon has now curved his skills towards a
more mundane project, the Multi-Loader! Fortunately "mundane" is not a
word in Simon's dictionary; a better word would be "extraordinary" or
"remarkable" or Colman's to that effect.

Method
As well as being excellently programmed, Multi-Load is also a physical
embodiment of the word "simple" to work. Just type in the Basic
program and save it to tape with SAVE "multi" LINE 9999. Then, enter
the Multi-Code (with the help of the Hex Loader program) and save that
with SAVE "multi" CODE 64000,1184. Then, why not RUN it eh?

The Basic program acts as a simple answer/question interpreter. It
turns your selection into a whopping great loader. When using the
program, Q and A move the highlight bar up and down, while SPACE
selects. The choices are (after loading a screen):
(i)	What should be loaded first?
	DATA or ATTRIBUTES
(ii)	How should the data be loaded?
	NORMAL, BACKWARDS, TOP TO BOTTOM, BOTTOM TO TOP,
	LEFT TO RIGHT, RIGHT TO LEFT or RANDOM
(iii)	How should the attributes be loaded?
	NORMAL, BACKWARDS, LEFT TO RIGHT, RIGHT TO LEFT,
	INWARD SPIRAL, DIAGONAL or RANDOM
(iv)	What border effect?
	NORMAL, MULTI-COLOURED or MASKED
(V)	What colour?
	BLACK, BLUE, RED, MAGENTA, GREEN, CYAN, YELLOW, WHITE
(vi)	What speed should it load at?
	NORMAL, MEDIUM, FAST or AAARRGHHH! (Not recommended)

Once you've completed your selection the program saves off both loader
and screen to tape. You must then reset the computer and type LOAD "":
RANDOMIZE USR 64000 to see the final effect. Any combination is
possible no matter how extravagant or stupid. Experimentation is the
key to effective success. Have fun.

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INFOLOAD
by Rogerio Cordeiro Martins

Some programs are quite difficult to break into. Some use complicated
loaders (quite cunning), some encrypt their code (very cunning), while
others fill up the entire memory with themselves, leaving not one
spare byte for a disassembler, monitor or even a POKE. Rogerio
Cordeiro Martins obviously hates the latter type, because he's written
an extremely sly program which overcomes this painful problem by
displaying what's loading on screen as readable ASCII. In this way you
can discover cheat modes, passwords, and hidden programmer's messages.

Method
Here comes an understatement: this program is easy to use, hexadecimal
simplicity. First type in the Basic controller program and save that
with: SAVE "info" LINE 10. Follow that with a saved version of the
code (which I know you typed in using the Hex Loader program). It
starts at 32768 and is 365 bytes long, so you save it with: SAVE
"name" CODE 32768,365.

Information
The program constantly fills the screen up with information. The code
will continue loading even when the screen is packed with information.
Clear the screen with ENTER. Breaking out of the program at any point
is achieved with SPACE. To return to InfoLoad use RANDOMIZE USR 32768.

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ALCATRAZ EMULATOR
by Kevin Gale

The Alcatraz loading system, apart from being fairly notorious in
Spectrum circles, is also the bane of all hackers. But more
importantly it uses an original screen build up routine while it
loads. And this is the part Kevin Gale has emulated in this, his
sensational program.

Method
I'm not even going to make a comment on how easy this program is to
use. [Sigh. Well, don't, then. JimG] Simply type in the listing, SAVE
it, and then RUN it. Now what's difficult about that? [There are
actually two listings, and the second one has to be entered first, as
it sets up the machine code and loads the main program. JimG]

The Features
(i)	LOAD SCREEN
	Select this option to load a normal screen picture from
	tape or Opus disk.
(ii)	EDIT SCREEN
	Select this option to design the way the screen loads.
	Your cursor is shown as a flashing square which can
	be moved around with the cursor keys. To select a
	square use 0: to unselect a square use 9. [The "unselect"
	option doesn't work. Compare lines 27/28. JimG] When your
	creativity is exhausted use Symbol Shift and M. Clear
	the screen with Symbol Shift and 1.
(iii)	SAVE DATA
	Select this option to save the screen data to tape or
	Opus disk; this is useful if you have not finished your
	loader design. Three pieces of data are saved, totalling
	23810 bytes.
(iv)	SAVE SCREEN
	When you've completed your design you can save it
	to tape for use in your own programs. This option can
	only be selected when the picture is complete. The
	picture is saved as a headerless file, 9984 bytes long.
	[I couldn't get this option to work either. It's not clear
	how the program decides that the picture is "complete". JimG]
(v)	SAVE LOADER
	Use this option to save  copy of the loader. It can be
	saved to any memory address from 23296-65441.
	The loader is 95 bytes long.
(vi)	WATCH SCREEN
	An option for all the voyeurs. You can view your toil as the
	program pretends the screen is loading.
(vii)	DEMO DATA
	This creates a demonstration loading pattern to impress you.
[There's an 8th option "LOAD DATA" which McCandless didn't bother to
explain. JimG]

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BYEEEEE!
Send any of your programs to David McCandless, Program Pitstop, Your
Sinclair, 14 Rathbone Place, London, W1P 1DE. Ooh, and if poss, can I
have all contributions on tape please, listings are unnecessary. See
you next month.
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