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BA-Writer 80 column editor patch


Tursi

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Here's my first stab at adapting BA Writer to run in 80 column mode on the F18A. It may or may not work on a 9938 - I don't set up any of the additional registers or tables, so I would not expect it to. The code is pretty tight and it's tough to find safe locations to stuff new code. ;)

 

In the zip is the original BA-Writer disk, the 80-column patched version, and a text file that lists the patches I made. (I also patched character 0 in CHARA1 to be blank, that's not listed in the text file).

 

If you have your own setup and don't use the full BA-Writer setup, you can just extract EDIT1 and EDIT2, and I'd recommend CHARA1 too. I also made a small edit to FORMA2, but most setups probably won't need it.

 

I have not tested on hardware yet.. if anyone can feed back on that, I'd appreciate it. Also, there are two known issues:

 

1) When loading/saving/printing/etc, the PAB is on the screen so you can see the file transfer occurring. This is just a temporary distortion and I left it there rather than guess where else in VDP might be safe to use.

2) Selecting "recover edits" resets to the Master Title Page if Extended BASIC is plugged in instead of Editor/Assembler. This seems to be true on the original as well. I am not sure what that option even does nor could I determine what it was trying to do.

 

Let me know! Once we've got a couple of acks I'll drop it up on WHTech.

 

bawriter.zip

 

post-12959-0-43768200-1383904749_thumb.jpg

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Please excuse my ignorance, but what exactly is BA Writer? Is it just another word processor or can it be used as a program editor?

 

BA-Writer is essentially a TI-Writer clone, but one that does NOT require the TI-Writer cartridge. One can use it with the Editor Assembler cartridge, or with the Extended BASIC cartridge. Another interesting little thing about BA-Writer, is that if you are using it in XB, you can still use it to load E/A 5 programs. For example, it you are done in BA-Writer, you can use it to load BOOT, avoiding the TI title screen.

 

I just wish I could test it on real hardware right now, but I've just sent my V2 Nano with the fried COM1 back for exchange on a V1 model.

 

Tursi - THANK YOU for giving the growing legion of F18A users in the TI community yet another 80 column program.

 

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Does it have an option to be used as a program editor, i.e. no formatting code inserted in the files? Together with Tursi's 80 col version, this would be an excellent programmer's tool.

That said, I would still find Funnelweb to be a bit more practical because of ease of access to other utilities in addition to the program editor, such as assembler, loader, etc... I wish we could get FW in 80 columns working on the F18A. That would be really something.

 

Another excellent but little known gem of a program editor is Preditor. I love its features, but unfortunately it is only 40 cols. Any takers ? :D

Edited by Vorticon
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You could just try it? ;) Seems to me to be very similar to Editor/Assembler's Editor (but then, so does TI Writer to me. ;) ) It doesn't appear to insert any magical codes anywhere, I'd expect it would work fine for program editing.

 

I never really used it or TI Writer, so I don't know it well. Kevan asked if I could take a stab at it.

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You could just try it? ;) Seems to me to be very similar to Editor/Assembler's Editor (but then, so does TI Writer to me. ;) ) It doesn't appear to insert any magical codes anywhere, I'd expect it would work fine for program editing.

 

 

 

Yeah I know :) It's easier to ask and you guys are so good at answering! :D

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Yes.... wouldn't you have CRs at the end of each line?

 

Hmm.. I guess not in Editor/Assembler. I didn't look at the saved file to see whether it writes them or not. Honestly, I did this as a request, I neither use it, nor know much about it. :)

 

So long as the tools don't mind the carriage return, I can't see it hurting...?

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Yeah, did a quick test, and the Editor/Assembler doesn't like the CRs, anyway. It's okay with them except on blank lines, a blank line reads as a syntax error.

 

I'm not sure if it's worth making a version that doesn't save the CRs.. I'm not sure what role they actually play. They are probably more important to the word processing community. :)

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Yeah, did a quick test, and the Editor/Assembler doesn't like the CRs, anyway. It's okay with them except on blank lines, a blank line reads as a syntax error.

 

I'm not sure if it's worth making a version that doesn't save the CRs.. I'm not sure what role they actually play. They are probably more important to the word processing community. :)

 

The CR are not used in Editor Assembler are they. Those are only used in TI Writer for print outs.

 

I know that RXB routine CALL USER only works with TI Writer as it has to have the CR and Editor Assembler normally never has CR at the end of each line as it is not needed unless printing the file.

 

In REA or standard EA cart it just sends the file to the Printer 1 line at a time.

Edited by RXB
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Yeah, did a quick test, and the Editor/Assembler doesn't like the CRs, anyway. It's okay with them except on blank lines, a blank line reads as a syntax error.

 

I'm not sure if it's worth making a version that doesn't save the CRs.. I'm not sure what role they actually play. They are probably more important to the word processing community. :)

 

I usually use EDIT1 to modify my batch files for 4A DOS because like TI-W, BA-W does leave the garbage at the end. However, if I'm not mistaken, and I might be since it's been over 24 years since I've done it, but I seem to remember that if you do a PRINT FILE to DSK1.filename it will save it all WITHOUT the garbage. Give it a try.

 

Oh yeah, one more thing... If you do a "CTRL 0" you'll turn off word wrap mode, the cursor will turn 'hollow' and then you will no longer get that carriage returns. :)

Edited by Kevan
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Nothing! There is no terminating character. The E/A expects either a DV80 or a DF80 file and knows that each record is one line.

 

...lee

 

How does the system now a record is shorter than 80 bytes in DV80 format? There must be some sort of termination character/byte? Or does the record start with a length indicator?

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Shyt, that makes sense but non-sense at the same time. So the TI file system is based entirely on records, like a batch processing system. That just makes my head hurt, but I get it.

 

Well—interestingly, TI Writer files do have a CR character (0Dh) at the end of every line.

 

...lee

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That's probably because printers require it to be there...

 

I believe printers need both 0Dh (CR) and 0Ah (LF). Otherwise, everything prints on one line. I'm not sure why the programmers of TI Writer needed CR because it limits TI Writer files to 79 printable characters in both DV80 and DF80 files.

 

...lee

Edited by Lee Stewart
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Actually that's true, although the printers I had back in the day had dip switches that controlled the CR/LF behavior so that you could set it up to always do a newline after a carriage return (you'd lose the ability to do strike-through letters, but who uses that?). But the default behavior indeed was to require both.

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I used to drive the sysop of the local BBS completely NUTZ back in 1983! The tutorials I uploaded to the board were made with TI-Writer, and they all had those control codes imbedded in the document. My stuff looked normal on the screen, but every time he went to print them out, they would be double spaced!

After he brought it my attention, rather rudely I might add, I decided to add a few Control G's! :) I had thought about a dozen or so form feeds, but that would have been mean.

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