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Vote for Atari and FujiNet in July's BASIC Challenge


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Hello - over in /r/RetroBattlestations the July Challenge is running a BASIC program on a micro that does a graphic on the Mandelbaum set. Like a fractal.

 

Someone had converted the code over to Atari in TurboBASIC XL format, it was listed on a webpage for the challenge. You can see it here:

https://raw.githubusercontent.com/RetroBattlestations/MandelbaumSet/main/Atari-TurboXL.txt

 

The 'challenge' part is to get your old micro to actually load and run the program, no mean feat for almost all these systems... except they still don't fully realize the power of FUJINET....

 

 

I was noodling around and thought it would interesting to run that on my 576NUC+ and show it off on Reddit, but I'm very, very lazy and didn't want to even imagine typing in all that code... I realized that with some tools you can make an ATR disk and move programs to it via UNIX (in my case, OSX). AtariDude wrote a nice little piece on this here: https://www.ataridude.net/posts/2021/Jul/19/creating-and-using-disk-images/ I would make a ATR disk image with the BAS listing, mount it via FujiNet and then somehow convert it over to ATASCII, load it in TBXL and run it! Still, that is pretty complicated...

 

I was starting to do this when conversations with @tschak909 revealed that, of course, the FujiNet could do this much more easily and quickly. He then spent a considerable amount of time last night helping me, showing me how exactly to do this with my NUC. He already has a wonderful ATR image on his TNFS server with the N: Device loading and a re-relocatable version of TurboBASIC XL... exactly what I needed. My challenge was just an XIO call and ENTER command away...

 

So, with his help it became apparent that I could actually load that webpage's content (the BASIC listing) directly into TBXL with just the N: device. And so we did. And it ran.

 

I then made a quick video and submitted a post explaining this for the contest. If you have a moment hope over and give it a vote up, maybe I'll win! The challenge ends on the 31st. You can also enjoy the video and watch the Atari load a BASIC listing byte by byte via the FujiNet, from github.

 

https://old.reddit.com/r/retrobattlestations/comments/oohzer/atari_fujinet_load_basic_direct_from_githubwith/

 

 

 

I will always say: thank you FN team for the work you've done. Thank you mytek for the things you have contributed. Thank you TCH for the time you commit to help others.

 

 

Edited by massiverobot
edits for clarity
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20 hours ago, scorpio_ny said:

Hey @massiverobot !

 

I just went and gave your Reddit post an upvote. Nice work!

 

Good luck! 

 

Thank you I appreciate it. I think it's pretty important to highlight the functions of the FujiNet beyond just mounting disks from the Internet... The fact that the N: device has been created, and @tschak909 has then gone and incorporated them into almost every DOS ever created for the Atari- and put those images on his TNFS server- means you can start experimenting and playing with the N device in just a few clicks. I admit I haven't used BASIC in many years, and never looked at TurboBasic but this little challenge  got me to dig into N device in BASIC enough to realize some of it's potential. And of course being able to ask tschak questions helped a great deal. If there is any aspect of the FN that really transforms it from a 'fancy internet sDrive' into something Atari people can use in novel ways for years to come, it's the N device.

 

TNFS: atari-apps.irata.online/DOS and /DEV

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19 hours ago, sanny said:

Peewh....

 

When I look at the "big auction site"(tm) for this monitor I'm getting funny prices... ?

just looked, and yeah, see the "ebay sellers are nuts..." thread here. I would go to swap meets. At the last VCF swap meet in the spring someone had about 15 of these (assorted sizes) and was selling them for $50 - $80 bucks. So find a local seller that isn't bonkers. There are a bunch of swap meets that have already been held here in the mid-atlantic region.

 

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