senior_falcon Posted May 15, 2022 Author Share Posted May 15, 2022 1 hour ago, Ed in SoDak said: I think I should just sit in the back and watch quietly. <slinks away> Rubbish. No need to get down on yourself. Jeder macht eine kleine dummheit Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+9640News Posted May 15, 2022 Share Posted May 15, 2022 On 5/13/2022 at 5:47 PM, senior_falcon said: I would too, provided Myarc XB 2.12 was available by 1987. I think that date is mentioned in the program comments. Yes, it was. I ran Myarc Extended Basic on my BBS back then with a HRD and 512K card using the Pro-99'er BBS software. It was the fastest BBS around at the time. Beery 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed in SoDak Posted May 18, 2022 Share Posted May 18, 2022 On 5/7/2022 at 10:48 PM, Ed in SoDak said: Perhaps when Ollie did his mods he used one of the Compress XB utilities. Save your program in MERGE format, then run it through Compress, which has options for shortening variable names and other memory-saving tricks. The option that combines lines would be the one that might be able to pull this off. Back in Post #17, I suggested using COMPRESS. I think that's how Ollie created the uneditable lines. Before I could try to duplicate it, I first had to find an emulator that handled creating and using MERGE-format files. That was quite a rabbit hole but I finally got it done today. Here's a snippet of the original listing to line 320: Spoiler 100 ! CONCERTO3 Changes: Ollie Hebert, 1987 110 DATA 1,392,196,1,370,196,2,392,247,1,294,3E4,1,262,3E4,2,294,247,1,392,196,1,370,196,2,392,247,1,247 120 CALL DELSPRITE(ALL):: CALL CLEAR :: CALL SCREEN(2):: CALL CHARSET :: CALL MAGNIFY(1)! Also UPPER CASE only, all for RUN ALL sequencing. 130 CALL VCHAR(1,31,31,96):: FOR I=1 TO 8 :: CALL COLOR(I,16,14):: NEXT I :: DISPLAY AT(9,9):"CONCERTO #3": : : : :TAB(11);"BY COREY" 140 DISPLAY AT(15,12):"AGE 12":" FRAMINGHAM, MASS." :: CALL SOUND(1,111,30):: A,B,C=L :: S=7 :: M=202 :: !@P- 150 FOR I=L TO 605 :: READ A,B,C :: CALL SOUND(A*M,B,L,C,S):: NEXT I :: FOR I=L TO 109 :: READ A,B :: CALL SOUND(A*M,B,L):: NEXT I :: FOR I=L TO 166 160 READ A,B,C :: CALL SOUND(A*M,B,L,C,S):: NEXT I :: FOR I=L TO 50 :: READ A,B :: CALL SOUND(A*M,B,L):: NEXT I :: FOR I=L TO 53 :: READ A,B,C 170 CALL SOUND(A*M,B,L,C,S):: NEXT I :: CALL SOUND(A,B,30):: RUN "DSK1.LOAD" 180 DATA 294,1,220,294,2,247,3E4,1,392,196,1,370,196,2,392,247,1,196,294,1,220,294,1,247,392,1,247,494,1 190 DATA 277,440,1,277,392,1,294,370,1,277,370,1,294,3E4,1,330,3E4,1,294,3E4,1,370,3E4,1,294,494,1,392,494 200 DATA 1,294,370,1,277,370,1,294,3E4,1,330,3E4,1,294,3E4,1,440,3E4,1,294,392,1,494,392,1,294,370,1,277 210 DATA 370,1,294,3E4,1,330,294,1,294,3E4,1,523,3E4,1,294,440,1,587,440,2,494,294,1,440,262,1,392,247,2 220 DATA 440,262,1,392,247,1,370,220,2,392,196,1,370,392,1,330,392,1,294,392,1,392,3E4,1,294,3E4,1,392,294 230 DATA 2,330,196,1,294,392,1,262,392,1,247,392,1,392,3E4,1,247,196,1,392,196,2,262,196,1,247,392,1,220 240 DATA 392,1,196,392,1,392,3E4,1,220,196,1,392,196,1,247,296,1,392,196,1,277,196,1,392,3E4,1,294,370,1 250 DATA 370,3E4,1,294,392,1,392,3E4,1,294,440,1,440,3E4,1,294,494,1,494,3E4,1,294,523,1,523,3E4,1,294,587 260 DATA 1,587,3E4,2,494,196,1,440,262,1,392,262,2,294,3E4,2,370,147,2,392,247,1,370,196,1,330,196,1,294 270 DATA 185,1,262,165,1,247,147,1,220,131,1,247,123,1,247,110,1,220,123,1,196,123,2,294,3E4,2,294,147,2 280 DATA 196,3E4,2,196,294,2,3E4,3E4,1,784,587,1,740,523,2,784,587,1,587,494,1,523,440,2,587,494,1,494,392 290 DATA 1,440,370,2,494,392,1,392,330,1,370,294,2,392,330,1,294,3E4,1,262,3E4,2,3E4,3E4,1,587,196,1,587 300 DATA 220,1,784,294,1,988,294,1,880,330,1,784,330,1,740,185,1,880,185,1,587,3E4,1,659,523,1,740,587,1 310 DATA 784,587,1,880,3E4,1,740,3E4,1,740,3E4,1,740,880,1,1175,587,1,1175,440,1,3E4,740,1,3E4,784,1,1109,880 320 DATA 1,1109,784,2,1175,740,2,880,1175,2,587,3E4,2,659,1109,2,740,440,1,659,330,1,587,294,2,659,330,1,587 I split each DATA line into two separate and shorter lines that could be edited, as seen below: Spoiler 100 ! CONCERTO3 Changes: Ollie Hebert, 1987 *shortened lines test- Ed in SoDak 110 DATA 1,392,196,1,370,196,2,392,247,1,294,3E4,1,262,3E4,2,294,247,1,392,196,1,370,196,2,392,247,1,247 120 CALL DELSPRITE(ALL):: CALL CLEAR :: CALL SCREEN(2):: CALL CHARSET :: CALL MAGNIFY(1) 125 ! Also UPPER CASE only, all for RUN ALL sequencing. 130 CALL VCHAR(1,31,31,96):: FOR I=1 TO 8 :: CALL COLOR(I,16,14):: NEXT I 135 DISPLAY AT(9,9):"CONCERTO #3": : : : :TAB(11);"BY COREY" 140 DISPLAY AT(15,12):"AGE 12":" FRAMINGHAM, MASS." :: CALL SOUND(1,111,30):: A,B,C=L 145 S=7 :: M=202 :: !@P- 150 FOR I=L TO 605 :: READ A,B,C :: CALL SOUND(A*M,B,L,C,S):: NEXT I :: FOR I=L TO 109 :: READ A,B 155 CALL SOUND(A*M,B,L):: NEXT I :: FOR I=L TO 166 160 READ A,B,C :: CALL SOUND(A*M,B,L,C,S):: NEXT I :: FOR I=L TO 50 :: READ A,B 165 CALL SOUND(A*M,B,L):: NEXT I :: FOR I=L TO 53 :: READ A,B,C 170 CALL SOUND(A*M,B,L,C,S):: NEXT I :: CALL SOUND(A,B,30):: RUN "DSK1.LOAD" 180 DATA 294,1,220,294,2,247,3E4,1,392,196,1,370,196,2,392,247,1,196,294,1,220 185 DATA 294,1,247,392,1,247,494,1 190 DATA 277,440,1,277,392,1,294,370,1,277,370,1,294,3E4,1,330,3E4,1 195 DATA 294,3E4,1,370,3E4,1,294,494,1,392,494 200 DATA 1,294,370,1,277,370,1,294,3E4,1,330,3E4,1,294,3E4,1,440,3E4,1 205 DATA 294,392,1,494,392,1,294,370,1,277 210 DATA 370,1,294,3E4,1,330,294,1,294,3E4,1,523,3E4,1 215 DATA 294,440,1,587,440,2,494,294,1,440,262,1,392,247,2 220 DATA 440,262,1,392,247,1,370,220,2,392,196,1,370,392,1,330,392,1 225 DATA 294,392,1,392,3E4,1,294,3E4,1,392,294 230 DATA 2,330,196,1,294,392,1,262,392,1,247,392,1,392,3E4,1 235 DATA 247,196,1,392,196,2,262,196,1,247,392,1,220 240 DATA 392,1,196,392,1,392,3E4,1,220,196,1,392,196,1,247,296,1,392 245 DATA 196,1,277,196,1,392,3E4,1,294,370,1 250 DATA 370,3E4,1,294,392,1,392,3E4,1,294,440,1,440,3E4,1,294,494,1 255 DATA 494,3E4,1,294,523,1,523,3E4,1,294,587 260 DATA 1,587,3E4,2,494,196,1,440,262,1,392,262,2,294,3E4,2,370 265 DATA 147,2,392,247,1,370,196,1,330,196,1,294 270 DATA 185,1,262,165,1,247,147,1,220,131,1,247,123,1,247,110,1 275 DATA 220,123,1,196,123,2,294,3E4,2,294,147,2 280 DATA 196,3E4,2,196,294,2,3E4,3E4,1,784,587,1,740,523,2,784,587,1 285 DATA 587,494,1,523,440,2,587,494,1,494,392 290 DATA 1,440,370,2,494,392,1,392,330,1,370,294,2,392,330,1 295 DATA 294,3E4,1,262,3E4,2,3E4,3E4,1,587,196,1,587 300 DATA 220,1,784,294,1,988,294,1,880,330,1,784,330,1,740,185,1 305 DATA 880,185,1,587,3E4,1,659,523,1,740,587,1 310 DATA 784,587,1,880,3E4,1,740,3E4,1,740,3E4,1,740,880,1,1175,587,1 315 DATA 1175,440,1,3E4,740,1,3E4,784,1,1109,880 320 DATA 1,1109,784,2,1175,740,2,880,1175,2,587,3E4,2,659,1109,2,740,440,1 325 DATA 659,330,1,587,294,2,659,330,1,587 Then I saved it in MERGE format as filename COM (the default incoming file for COMPRESS). Running COMPRESS, I chose Yes for Combine Lines and No for all other options, then I let it work its magic. Once done, I entered <NEW> and MERGEd in PRESS (the default output file for COMPRESS. Finally, saved that again as a regular XB program. That same snippet of code to line 320 is shown here: Spoiler 100 ! CONCERTO3 Changes: Ollie Hebert, 1987 Shortened lines and then COMPRESSED - Ed in SoDak May2022 110 DATA 1,392,196,1,370,196,2,392,247,1,294,3E4,1,262,3E4,2,294,247,1,392,196,1,370,196,2,392,247,1,247 120 CALL DELSPRITE(ALL):: CALL CLEAR :: CALL SCREEN(2):: CALL CHARSET :: CALL MAGNIFY(1) 125 ! Also UPPER CASE only, all for RUN ALL sequencing. 130 CALL VCHAR(1,31,31,96):: FOR I=1 TO 8 :: CALL COLOR(I,16,14):: NEXT I :: DISPLAY AT(9,9):"CONCERTO #3": : : : :TAB(11);"BY COREY" 135 DISPLAY AT(18,8):"COMPRESS TEST" 140 DISPLAY AT(15,12):"AGE 12":" FRAMINGHAM, MASS." :: CALL SOUND(1,111,30):: A,B,C=L :: S=7 :: M=202 :: !@P- 150 FOR I=L TO 605 :: READ A,B,C :: CALL SOUND(A*M,B,L,C,S):: NEXT I :: FOR I=L TO 109 :: READ A,B :: CALL SOUND(A*M,B,L):: NEXT I :: FOR I=L TO 166 :: READ A,B,C :: CALL SOUND(A*M,B,L,C,S):: NEXT I :: FOR I=L TO 50 :: READ A,B :: CALL SOUND(A*M,B,L):: N EXT I 165 FOR I=L TO 53 :: READ A,B,C :: CALL SOUND(A*M,B,L,C,S):: NEXT I :: CALL SOUND(A,B,30):: RUN "DSK1.LOAD" 180 DATA 294,1,220,294,2,247,3E4,1,392,196,1,370,196,2,392,247,1,196,294,1,220,294,1,247,392,1,247,494,1,277 190 DATA 440,1,277,392,1,294,370,1,277,370,1,294,3E4,1,330,3E4,1,294,3E4,1,370,3E4,1,294,494,1,392,494,1,294 200 DATA 370,1,277,370,1,294,3E4,1,330,3E4,1,294,3E4,1,440,3E4,1,294,392,1,494,392,1,294,370,1,277,370,1,294 210 DATA 3E4,1,330,294,1,294,3E4,1,523,3E4,1,294,440,1,587,440,2,494,294,1,440,262,1,392,247,2,440,262,1,392 220 DATA 247,1,370,220,2,392,196,1,370,392,1,330,392,1,294,392,1,392,3E4,1,294,3E4,1,392,294,2,330,196,1,294 230 DATA 392,1,262,392,1,247,392,1,392,3E4,1,247,196,1,392,196,2,262,196,1,247,392,1,220,392,1,196,392,1,392 240 DATA 3E4,1,220,196,1,392,196,1,247,296,1,392,196,1,277,196,1,392,3E4,1,294,370,1,370,3E4,1,294,392,1,392 250 DATA 3E4,1,294,440,1,440,3E4,1,294,494,1,494,3E4,1,294,523,1,523,3E4,1,294,587,1,587,3E4,2,494,196,1,440 260 DATA 262,1,392,262,2,294,3E4,2,370,147,2,392,247,1,370,196,1,330,196,1,294,185,1,262,165,1,247,147,1,220 270 DATA 131,1,247,123,1,247,110,1,220,123,1,196,123,2,294,3E4,2,294,147,2,196,3E4,2,196,294,2,3E4,3E4,1,784 280 DATA 587,1,740,523,2,784,587,1,587,494,1,523,440,2,587,494,1,494,392,1,440,370,2,494,392,1,392,330,1,370 290 DATA 294,2,392,330,1,294,3E4,1,262,3E4,2,3E4,3E4,1,587,196,1,587,220,1,784,294,1,988,294,1,880,330,1,784 300 DATA 330,1,740,185,1,880,185,1,587,3E4,1,659,523,1,740,587,1,784,587,1,880,3E4,1,740,3E4,1,740,3E4,1,740 310 DATA 880,1,1175,587,1,1175,440,1,3E4,740,1,3E4,784,1,1109,880,1,1109,784,2,1175,740,2,880,1175,2,587,3E4,2 320 DATA 659,1109,2,740,440,1,659,330,1,587,294,2,659,330,1,587,370,1,554,330,2,587,294,1,554,587,1,494,587 TA DA!! All DATA lines are longer and uneditable once again. COMPRESS should work on real iron with any flavor of XB (or XB in an emulator that handles MERGE format properly). Two screen grabs of COMPRESS, left: when first RUN and right: showing the Combine Lines option as the only option used for my test. Last but not least, the files: COMPRESS CONCOMP Concerto list original.txt Concerto shorter lines.TXT Concerto Compressed list.txt 3 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Willsy Posted May 18, 2022 Share Posted May 18, 2022 The question (in my mind) is... Why did he do it in the first place? Seems a lot of trouble for not a lot of gain. 2 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
senior_falcon Posted May 18, 2022 Author Share Posted May 18, 2022 2 hours ago, Willsy said: The question (in my mind) is... Why did he do it in the first place? Seems a lot of trouble for not a lot of gain. Agreed. When XB says "line too long", what is the first thing that comes to mind? 1 - I should shorten the line 2 - I will use an unusual trick that lets me get that line to fit Whether the programmer is a 10 year old newbie or rasmus, they are going to choose option #1. 4 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HOME AUTOMATION Posted May 18, 2022 Share Posted May 18, 2022 3 hours ago, senior_falcon said: Whether the programmer is a 10 year old newbie or rasmus, they are going to choose option #1. I don't know... ...Young programmers can be vewy wascally? 1 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris+++ Posted May 18, 2022 Share Posted May 18, 2022 Maybe he was rubbing his hands together in an evil way, thinking, "Years from now, someone will be trying to figure this out!" 1 1 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+OLD CS1 Posted May 18, 2022 Share Posted May 18, 2022 52 minutes ago, Chris+++ said: Maybe he was rubbing his hands together in an evil way, thinking, "Years from now, someone will be trying to figure this out!" That is dedication to the long con. Best I can do is, "Tomorrow, I will be trying to figure this out." 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+OLD CS1 Posted May 18, 2022 Share Posted May 18, 2022 7 hours ago, Willsy said: The question (in my mind) is... Why did he do it in the first place? Seems a lot of trouble for not a lot of gain. In the past, I have gone through lengths to try out something new, even if it was not wildly applicable to what I was doing. Perhaps just for fun, or maybe just because the tool was available. Something like this could have been just trying out a tool, or a proof-of-concept, or test run for something else. Maybe a trial which did not produce expected results but it worked, so send it out. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
senior_falcon Posted May 18, 2022 Author Share Posted May 18, 2022 There is some strong circumstantial evidence about how this line was created: Only one line is too long to be entered with TI XB, and it is short enough to be entered normally with Myarc XB. If I were trying out some method for entering longer DATA statements than XB normally allows, I would have consolidated the DATA statements so that all or most were close to 255 bytes long. That would be waaay too long to be entered normally with any flavor of XB. But that's not what we see in the program. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RXB Posted May 18, 2022 Share Posted May 18, 2022 I will release a BETA of a RXB titled Mega RXB Here is a map of the idea: Every location in memory of VDP is the same except for Crunch Buffer size, location of Edit/REDO buffer and VDP Stack location. >0820 Crunch buffer 254 BYTES (1 byte for Length) to >091F >0920 Editor/REDO Buffer 762 BYTES to >0C1A (1 byte for flag) >0C1B >0C1C VDP Stack location 16 bytes >0C2C First Free VDP address so 763 bytes less VDP then normal XB. So what could MEGA RXB do, well how about program lines 254 bytes of Tokens instead of current 160 Tokens. Thus current single line is 160 Tokens, and this would increase 95 tokens for a single program line. This would help cut down program lines in XB programs and one heck of a contest for single program line contests. P.S. Would add a new feature of MERGE format DF255 Merge files instead of 163 Merge size now. MEGA RXB is a stand alone product, unlike RXB (year here) thus I will be supporting 2 RXB XB products. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Ksarul Posted May 18, 2022 Share Posted May 18, 2022 So we now know that there were two ways to solve this problem BITD. That is interesting knowledge in and of itself. I strongly suspect that the Myarc XB2 route was used here, just because the trick only appears in one line. That would also increase the likelihood that the original programmer probably never even knew what he'd done here, especially if he continued to do all of his editing in XB2. It will be interesting to see what @RXB does with his extension of the trick--as that may just push XB to another of its potential limits. 1 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed in SoDak Posted May 18, 2022 Share Posted May 18, 2022 (edited) There's a simpler explanation of why Ollie Compressed the original program. He may have just been trying to shrink the program as originally written by Corey. If Corey had a lot of very short lines, long variable names, many REM statements, etc., the program may have grown in size beyond what could load via cassette, for example, or to fit in just the bare console's 16k. I used Compress for that reason to help a fellow AAer shrink their updated Star Trek game to fit in 16k. They made some changes and the resulting code grew past what would fit in the console alone. Compress shrank it just enough to fit. We don't have Corey's program from before Ollie modified it, so perhaps we will never know for sure. That DATA lines may become uneditable was not the goal, that was just something which happened when Compress was used on the original program to combine lines and the other tricks Compress is capable of. Edited May 18, 2022 by Ed in SoDak 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed in SoDak Posted May 18, 2022 Share Posted May 18, 2022 Further evidence of the above scenario is that lines 120 through 160 are longer than line 310 or any other, for that matter. The program also has pre-scan variables laid out so pre-scanning can be turned off after those lines, making the program start more quickly. All the joined and lengthened lines do not appear to be the work of a thirteen-year-old XB programmer. But it does resemble most any program that has been Compressed. All I was after here was to demonstrate that one of the compactor/compressor programs could have done this with no user intervention beyond choosing which options to employ in shrinking their code for speed, size, removing REMs no longer needed or whatever reason. In that I succeeded. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RXB Posted May 18, 2022 Share Posted May 18, 2022 2 hours ago, Ed in SoDak said: There's a simpler explanation of why Ollie Compressed the original program. He may have just been trying to shrink the program as originally written by Corey. If Corey had a lot of very short lines, long variable names, many REM statements, etc., the program may have grown in size beyond what could load via cassette, for example, or to fit in just the bare console's 16k. I used Compress for that reason to help a fellow AAer shrink their updated Star Trek game to fit in 16k. They made some changes and the resulting code grew past what would fit in the console alone. Compress shrank it just enough to fit. We don't have Corey's program from before Ollie modified it, so perhaps we will never know for sure. That DATA lines may become uneditable was not the goal, that was just something which happened when Compress was used on the original program to combine lines and the other tricks Compress is capable of. If you look at how XB works you will find every LINE of XB code takes 2 bytes for LINE# and 1 byte for length of that line. Thus every time you add a line to XB you use up 3 more BYTES vs 1 token for :: the token to add more commands. So personally I think 3 bytes less is much better choice then make every command a line number. Yes more line numbers are much more easy to read, but it costs you memory and a little speed as it has to go find that line number vs just skip that :: token and continue... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed in SoDak Posted May 18, 2022 Share Posted May 18, 2022 11 minutes ago, RXB said: If you look at how XB works you will find every LINE of XB code takes 2 bytes for LINE# and 1 byte for length of that line. Thus every time you add a line to XB you use up 3 more BYTES vs 1 token for :: the token to add more commands. So personally I think 3 bytes less is much better choice then make every command a line number. Yes more line numbers are much more easy to read, but it costs you memory and a little speed as it has to go find that line number vs just skip that :: token and continue... Exactly this. I've created some bloated XB programs with lots of REM and ! comments to help remind me of what routines were doing and other notes to myself. At some point I'd Compress it to delete all that, shorten my long variable names and crunch the program down to use less memory and disk space. A few times, I had to Compress it, as I'd run out of RAM space and couldn't add more code till it was crunched down in size. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GDMike Posted May 18, 2022 Share Posted May 18, 2022 3 minutes ago, Ed in SoDak said: Exactly this. I've created some bloated XB programs with lots of REM and ! comments to help remind me of what routines were doing and other notes to myself. At some point I'd Compress it to delete all that, shorten my long variable names and crunch the program down to use less memory and disk space. A few times, I had to Compress it, as I'd run out of RAM space and couldn't add more code till it was crunched down in size. Just thinking about that if it were me, I suppose I'd make a separate document just for notes and leave comments out? Maybe that would help the program too?? Just my thoughts on that..im really not trying to be rude just thinking about this a bit. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+OLD CS1 Posted May 18, 2022 Share Posted May 18, 2022 51 minutes ago, GDMike said: Just thinking about that if it were me, I suppose I'd make a separate document just for notes and leave comments out? Maybe that would help the program too?? Just my thoughts on that..im really not trying to be rude just thinking about this a bit. I do this with TIdBiT. My source document contains tons of notes and documentation, and the translator strips all that out. I suspect I could also create programs at tidbit99 which would defy the interpreter crunch buffer limitations. Another tool outside of the XB environment, but not any more of a cheat than the COMPRESS program. (Matter of fact, I just tested and, yes, tidbit99 can create a program file out of that listing with the too-long line.) 1 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
senior_falcon Posted May 19, 2022 Author Share Posted May 19, 2022 (edited) 15 hours ago, RXB said: If you look at how XB works you will find every LINE of XB code takes 2 bytes for LINE# and 1 byte for length of that line. Thus every time you add a line to XB you use up 3 more BYTES vs 1 token for :: the token to add more commands. So personally I think 3 bytes less is much better choice then make every command a line number. Yes, it would be silly to write lines so that they only had one statement. I think that in general lines should have a number of statements. What number? I dunno, but just not so many that the line becomes cumbersome. For what it's worth, as far as length goes, it makes no difference to a compiled program how many statements are in a line. I just created a line with a DATA statement that contains 26 strings that are 100 bytes long. No problems reading the DATA and the line is perfectly usable, but it can only be partially listed. (edit) DATAX is a 3 line program. Line 1 reads the 26 strings stored in the DATA statement in line 256 and prints them on the screen. Line 2 is GOTO 2 DATAX Edited May 19, 2022 by senior_falcon 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
senior_falcon Posted May 19, 2022 Author Share Posted May 19, 2022 (edited) 7 hours ago, Ed in SoDak said: There's a simpler explanation of why Ollie Compressed the original program. He may have just been trying to shrink the program as originally written by Corey. If Corey had a lot of very short lines, long variable names, many REM statements, etc., the program may have grown in size beyond what could load via cassette, for example, or to fit in just the bare console's 16k. The problem with that scenario is that the program is too long to fit into the bare console's 16K. After the program is loaded there are 8379 bytes left in ram, making the program 16109 bytes long. Of course, that doesn't prove that Ollie didn't compress it just to make it a bit smaller. (EDIT) I looked at a couple of the line lengths in the compressed version of the program and they 161 bytes long, which of course would make them uneditable. If it was compressed by Ollie, perhaps it was compressed in such a way that all the lines were short enough to be editable except that one. It seems the lines can be much longer than the "official" maximum of 159 bytes. If compress caps the line length at 161 like the two I looked at, then that seems like a bug to me because it make the line uneditable for little gain in compactness. Edited May 19, 2022 by senior_falcon 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
senior_falcon Posted May 19, 2022 Author Share Posted May 19, 2022 (edited) To follow up on my post above: I checked that you can indeed create a line that is much longer than 159 bytes. I made a line with a DATA statement that contained 2 strings of 100 bytes for a total of 206 bytes in the line. Of course, you cannot edit the line, but it can be listed with no problems. So the upper limit of the line length would seem to be 255 bytes. I checked the length of each line in the program that Ed compressed and found that the length of the DATA lines bounced around from 156 to 161, with many of them being at 161. None was longer than 161. I think this is an error in the compress utility. If you didn't care about editing the line and wanted to squeeze the maximum number of bytes into a line, then they should be packed as close to 255 bytes as possible. If you wanted to retain the ability to edit the compressed program, then the maximum length should be capped at no more than 159 bytes. Just to muddy the waters, it could be that they used Myarc XB, in which case you would be able to edit those lines. Edited May 19, 2022 by senior_falcon 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RXB Posted May 19, 2022 Share Posted May 19, 2022 18 hours ago, Ed in SoDak said: Exactly this. I've created some bloated XB programs with lots of REM and ! comments to help remind me of what routines were doing and other notes to myself. At some point I'd Compress it to delete all that, shorten my long variable names and crunch the program down to use less memory and disk space. A few times, I had to Compress it, as I'd run out of RAM space and couldn't add more code till it was crunched down in size. Yea but if you could extend lines 94 more tokens that would really save RAM like say DATA or say a Strings. Less line numbers means more RAM. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RXB Posted May 19, 2022 Share Posted May 19, 2022 14 hours ago, senior_falcon said: Yes, it would be silly to write lines so that they only had one statement. I think that in general lines should have a number of statements. What number? I dunno, but just not so many that the line becomes cumbersome. For what it's worth, as far as length goes, it makes no difference to a compiled program how many statements are in a line. I just created a line with a DATA statement that contains 26 strings that are 100 bytes long. No problems reading the DATA and the line is perfectly usable, but it can only be partially listed. (edit) DATAX is a 3 line program. Line 1 reads the 26 strings stored in the DATA statement in line 256 and prints them on the screen. Line 2 is GOTO 2 DATAX 2.88 kB · 2 downloads Great but MEGA RXB would top out at 252 Tokens per line, be saved Program Image or IV254 and have a new Merge format of DV255. Have to account for 1 length byte of line and 2 bytes for line number. Working on it... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed in SoDak Posted May 19, 2022 Share Posted May 19, 2022 (edited) 8 hours ago, senior_falcon said: To follow up on my post above: I checked that you can indeed create a line that is much longer than 159 bytes. I made a line with a DATA statement that contained 2 strings of 100 bytes for a total of 206 bytes in the line. Of course, you cannot edit the line, but it can be listed with no problems. So the upper limit of the line length would seem to be 255 bytes. I checked the length of each line in the program that Ed compressed and found that the length of the DATA lines bounced around from 156 to 161, with many of them being at 161. None was longer than 161. I think this is an error in the compress utility. If you didn't care about editing the line and wanted to squeeze the maximum number of bytes into a line, then they should be packed as close to 255 bytes as possible. If you wanted to retain the ability to edit the compressed program, then the maximum length should be capped at no more than 159 bytes. Just to muddy the waters, it could be that they used Myarc XB, in which case you would be able to edit those lines. Frankly, I wouldn't know the limits of COMPRESS. I've never studied the code and perusing it now there's a lot of variables to understand their use and follow the flow. It's from the XBTOOLS disk by Jim Swedlow, 1987. On the same disk, he has another program called DATAPRESS DATPRESS that only combines DATA statements. Allows easier entry and debugging with short lines, then run through DATPRESS to combine as much as possible into single lines. This keeps the program compatible with Console BASIC, if that's the goal. EDIT TO ADD: I tried DATPRESS and DATA lines were identical to those made by COMPRESS. This is an interesting thread and I've learned a couple new tricks. Listing of COMPRESS: Spoiler 100 ! COMPRESS 110 ! VERSION 6.0 120 ! (c) 1987 130 ! By Jim Swedlow 7301 Kirby Way Stanton, CA 90680 140 ! 150 DATA "VERSION VCHAR SPRITE SPGET SOUND SCREEN SAY PEEK PATTERN MOTION MAGNIFY LOCATE LOAD " 160 CALL INIT :: GOTO 180 :: G,B,M$,H$,T,C,S,W,R,V :: DIM F$(40):: Q,C$,H,U,L,I$,G$,K$,O,P,A :: DIM D$(390),E$(390),D(3),E(390):: J$,F,J,N,L$,M,K,B$,A$,I,@ :: !@P- 170 DATA "LINK KEY JOYST INIT HCHAR GCHAR ERR COLOR COINC CLEAR CHARSET CHARPAT CHAR " 180 I,A,B,C,@=1 :: DISPLAY AT(@,8)ERASE ALL:"COMPRESS 6.0": :"COMPRESS makes an XB programas small as possible." :: C$="PIO" :: H$="@"&CHR$(190) 190 I$="Delete before line 160? N Delete all ! tails? Y" :: J$="Replace @? N" :: B$="PRESS" :: A$="COM" 200 DISPLAY AT(6,@):"Delete REM & ! lines? Y":I$: :"Replace variable names? Y":J$: :"Replace sub names? Y Replace 1 with @? Y" :: M$=CHR$(200)&CHR$(@)&CHR$(49) 210 DISPLAY AT(15,@):"Combine lines? Y": :"Print new names? Y":"Printer":C$: :"Old file: DSKn.COM":"New file: DSKn.PRESS" :: GOTO 310 220 I=6 :: GOSUB 630 :: F=I :: IF F THEN J,G=@ :: DISPLAY AT(7,@): : : :: GOTO 240 ELSE IF J THEN DISPLAY AT(7,@):I$ :: J=0 230 I=7 :: GOSUB 630 :: B=I :: I=8 :: GOSUB 630 :: G=I 240 I=10 :: GOSUB 630 :: H=I :: IF H THEN K,C=@ :: DISPLAY AT(11,@):: GOTO 260 ELSE IF K THEN DISPLAY AT(11,@):J$ :: K=0 250 I=11 :: GOSUB 630 :: C=I 260 I=13 :: GOSUB 630 :: Q=I :: I=14 :: GOSUB 630 :: V,R=I :: I=15 :: GOSUB 630 :: S=I :: IF F AND H AND Q AND R AND S THEN DISPLAY AT(24,@)BEEP:"At least one must be <Y>" :: GOTO 220 ELSE DISPLAY AT(24,@) 270 IF H AND Q THEN DISPLAY AT(17,@): : : : :: T,L=@ :: GOTO 300 ELSE IF L THEN DISPLAY AT(17,@):"Print new names? Y Printer":C$ :: L=0 280 I=17 :: GOSUB 630 :: T=I :: IF T THEN M=@ :: DISPLAY AT(18,@): : : :: GOTO 300 ELSE IF M THEN DISPLAY AT(18,@):"Printer":C$ :: M=0 290 ACCEPT AT(19,@)SIZE(-28)BEEP:C$ :: IF C$="" THEN DISPLAY AT(24,@):"Printer name invalid." :: GOTO 290 ELSE DISPLAY AT(24,@) 300 A$="" :: I=21 :: GOSUB 640 :: A$=B$ :: I=22 :: GOSUB 640 310 DISPLAY AT(24,@):"Inormation correct? Y" :: I=24 :: GOSUB 630 :: IF I THEN DISPLAY AT(24,@):: GOTO 220 ELSE K$=CHR$(255)&CHR$(255):: INPUT "DSK? ":G$ 315 IF LEN(G$)=1 THEN G$="DSK"&G$&"." 320 DISPLAY AT(24,@):"Checking Disk" :: OPEN #@:G$,INPUT ,INTERNAL,RELATIVE :: INPUT #@:I$,I,I,I 330 INPUT #@:I$,K,J,P :: IF I$="" THEN CLOSE #@ :: DISPLAY AT(24,@):A$;" not on disk" :: STOP 340 IF I$<>A$ THEN 330 ELSE CLOSE #@ :: IF ABS(K)<>2 OR P<>163 THEN DISPLAY AT(24,@):A$;" not a merge file" :: STOP ELSE IF I<2*J THEN DISPLAY AT(24,@):"Not enough free disk space" :: STOP ELSE DISPLAY AT(24,@):"Initializing" 350 D(0)=@ :: A,L=0 :: I$,J$="" :: OPEN #@:G$&A$,INPUT ,DISPLAY ,VARIABLE 163 :: OPEN #2:G$&"XXX",UPDATE,DISPLAY ,VARIABLE 163 :: OPEN #3:G$&B$,OUTPUT,DISPLAY ,VARIABLE 163 :: READ A$,G$ :: G$=A$&G$ :: IF H AND Q THEN 720 360 DISPLAY AT(24,24):">15" :: FOR I=@ TO 26 :: D$(I)=CHR$(64+I):: NEXT I :: FOR J=@ TO 14 :: DISPLAY AT(24,25):USING "##":15-J :: FOR I=@ TO 26 :: D$(J*26+I)=CHR$(64+J)&D$(I):: NEXT I :: NEXT J :: GOTO 720 370 DISPLAY AT(24,9):"data" :: IF LEN(J$)>LEN(I$)THEN PRINT #2:SEG$(J$,LEN(J$)-@,2)&CHR$(139)&CHR$(0):: J$=SEG$(J$,@,LEN(J$)-2) 380 PRINT #2:K$ :: RESTORE #2 :: CLOSE #@ :: FOR I=0 TO U :: L$=F$(I):: FOR M=0 TO LEN(L$)-2 STEP 2 :: B$=SEG$(L$,M+@,2):: K=0 :: GOSUB 680 :: NEXT M :: F$(I)=L$ :: NEXT I :: IF V>=0 THEN A$=CHR$(0)&CHR$(0)&H$&M$&CHR$(0):: GOTO 400 390 LINPUT #2:L$ :: IF L$=K$ THEN 500 ELSE GOSUB 690 :: A$=L$ 400 F=ASC(SEG$(A$,3,@)):: IF S OR POS(A$,CHR$(131),3)OR POS(A$,CHR$(132),3)OR POS(A$,CHR$(168),3)OR F=154 OR F=163 THEN PRINT #3:A$ :: GOTO 390 410 LINPUT #2:L$ :: IF L$=K$ THEN PRINT #3:A$ :: GOTO 500 ELSE GOSUB 690 420 B$=SEG$(L$,@,2):: GOSUB 650 :: F=ASC(SEG$(L$,3,@)):: IF F=131 OR F=154 OR F=163 THEN PRINT #3:A$:L$ :: GOTO 390 ELSE IF F=147 THEN 470 430 IF POS(A$,CHR$(147),3)OR POS(L$,CHR$(161),3)OR M THEN 460 ELSE IF LEN(A$)+LEN(L$)<166 THEN A$=SEG$(A$,@,LEN(A$)-@)&CHR$(130)&SEG$(L$,3,255)ELSE IF POS(L$,CHR$(132),3)THEN 460 ELSE 450 440 IF POS(A$,CHR$(132),3)OR POS(A$,CHR$(168),3)OR POS(A$,CHR$(131),3)THEN PRINT #3:A$ :: GOTO 390 ELSE 410 450 F=POS(L$,CHR$(130),3):: IF F THEN I=LEN(A$):: IF I+F<166 THEN A$=SEG$(A$,@,I-@)&CHR$(130)&SEG$(L$,3,F-3)&CHR$(0):: L$=SEG$(L$,@,2)&SEG$(L$,F+@,163):: GOTO 450 460 PRINT #3:A$ :: A$=L$ :: GOTO 440 470 IF SEG$(A$,3,@)<>CHR$(147)OR M THEN 460 ELSE M=LEN(A$):: IF M+LEN(L$)<167 THEN A$=SEG$(A$,@,M-@)&CHR$(179)&SEG$(L$,4,255):: GOTO 410 480 M=LEN(A$):: I=POS(L$,CHR$(179),4):: IF I=0 OR I+M>166 THEN PRINT #3:A$ :: A$=L$ :: GOTO 410 490 A$=SEG$(A$,@,M-@)&CHR$(179)&SEG$(L$,4,I-4)&CHR$(0):: L$=SEG$(L$,@,3)&SEG$(L$,I+@,255):: GOTO 480 500 DISPLAY AT(24,@)BEEP:"FILE COMPRESSED!" :: PRINT #3:K$ :: CLOSE #3 :: CLOSE #2 :: IF T THEN STOP ELSE IF A=0 THEN DISPLAY AT(24,@)BEEP:"No subs or variables renamed" :: STOP 510 DISPLAY AT(24,@)BEEP:"Printing variable list" :: OPEN #@:C$ :: PRINT #@ :: IF H THEN 570 ELSE PRINT #@:"Variables in Main Program":"New Old": : 520 FOR I=@ TO A :: F=0 :: O=.1 :: B$="" 530 FOR J=I TO A :: K=E(J)-INT(E(J)):: IF K=.4 THEN 550 ELSE IF K=O THEN PRINT #@:D$(E(J));B$;TAB(6);E$(J):: F=@ 540 NEXT J 550 IF O=.1 THEN O=.2 :: B$="$" :: GOTO 530 ELSE GOSUB 710 :: I=J :: IF K=.4 THEN PRINT #@: :"Variables in Sub ";SEG$(E$(I),2,99);SEG$(" renamed "&D$(E(I)),@,20*INT(E(I))):"New Old": : :: F=0 560 NEXT I :: GOTO 600 570 IF Q THEN 620 ELSE PRINT #@: :"Subprogram Names":"New Old": : :: F=0 580 FOR I=@ TO A :: IF E(I)-INT(E(I))=.4 THEN PRINT #@:D$(E(I));TAB(6);SEG$(E$(I),2,99):: F=@ 590 NEXT I 600 GOSUB 710 :: PRINT #@ :: FOR I=@ TO A :: IF E(I)-INT(E(I))=.3 THEN PRINT #@:"Sub ";SEG$(E$(I),2,99);" CALL'ed but not in a SUB statement";SEG$(" * renamed "&D$(E(I)),@,20*INT(E(I))) 610 NEXT I 620 CLOSE #@ :: DISPLAY AT(24,@):: STOP 630 ACCEPT AT(I,26)SIZE(-@)VALIDATE("YN")BEEP:K$ :: IF K$="" THEN 630 ELSE I=K$="N" :: RETURN 640 ACCEPT AT(I,17)SIZE(-10)BEEP:B$ :: IF B$="\\\" OR B$="" OR B$=A$ THEN DISPLAY AT(24,@):"File name invalid." :: GOTO 640 ELSE DISPLAY AT(24,@):: RETURN 650 FOR I=0 TO U :: M=@ 660 M=POS(F$(I),B$,M):: IF M>0 THEN IF M/2=INT(M/2)THEN M=M+@ :: GOTO 660 ELSE RETURN 670 NEXT I :: M=0 :: RETURN 680 K=POS(J$,B$,K+@):: IF K=0 THEN L$=SEG$(L$,@,M)&B$&SEG$(L$,M+3,255):: RETURN ELSE IF K/2=INT(K/2)THEN 680 ELSE B$=SEG$(I$,K,2):: GOTO 680 690 DISPLAY AT(24,@):"Compressing line";ASC(L$)*256+ASC(SEG$(L$,2,@)):: M=2 700 M=POS(L$,CHR$(201),M+@):: IF M=0 THEN RETURN ELSE B$=SEG$(L$,M+@,2):: K=0 :: GOSUB 680 :: GOTO 700 710 IF F THEN RETURN ELSE PRINT #@:"** NONE FOUND **" :: F=@ :: RETURN 720 LINPUT #@:A$ :: P=@ :: L$=SEG$(A$,@,2):: W=ASC(SEG$(A$,2,@))+256*ASC(A$):: IF W=0 AND R=0 THEN DISPLAY AT(24,@)BEEP:"REMOVE LINE 0" :: CLOSE #@ :: CLOSE #2 :: CLOSE #3 :: STOP 730 IF A$=K$ THEN 370 ELSE DISPLAY AT(24,@):"Preping line";W :: N=3 :: IF L THEN I$=I$&L$ :: L=0 :: IF LEN(I$)=254 THEN F=@ 740 K=ASC(SEG$(A$,N,@)):: IF K=0 OR K=147 OR K=163 THEN 920 ELSE IF K=201 THEN 900 ELSE IF K=200 THEN 850 ELSE IF K=199 THEN 870 750 IF K=161 OR K=157 THEN 880 ELSE IF K=131 OR K=154 THEN 910 ELSE IF (P=0 AND K=130)OR(P AND(K=138 OR K=241))THEN P=@-P :: N=N+@ :: GOTO 740 ELSE IF K>128 THEN N=N+@ :: GOTO 740 ELSE J=N 760 N=N+@ :: K=ASC(SEG$(A$,N,@)):: IF K>31 AND K<129 THEN 760 ELSE B$=SEG$(A$,J,N-J) 770 IF H OR(B$="@" AND C)THEN 740 ELSE M=@-(SEG$(B$,LEN(B$),@)="$"):: O=D(0) 780 FOR I=O TO A :: IF B$=E$(I)THEN 800 790 NEXT I :: IF I>390 THEN PRINT "This program is too big to be COMPRESSed * see the DOCS" :: CLOSE #@ :: CLOSE #2 :: CLOSE #3 :: STOP ELSE A=I :: E$(I)=B$ :: D(M)=D(M)+@ :: E(I)=D(M)+(M-(K=161))/10 800 B$=D$(E(I)):: IF M=2 THEN B$=B$&"$" ELSE IF M=3 THEN B$=CHR$(LEN(B$))&B$ 810 IF M<3 OR Q=0 THEN A$=SEG$(A$,@,J-@)&B$&SEG$(A$,N,255):: N=J+LEN(B$) 820 IF K<>161 THEN 740 ELSE R=@ :: D(0)=A+@ :: D(@),D(2)=0 :: IF V=0 THEN V=-@ 830 IF T OR I=A THEN 740 ELSE O=E(I):: B$=E$(I) 840 FOR I=I TO A-@ :: E(I)=E(I+@):: E$(I)=E$(I+@):: NEXT I :: E(A)=INT(O)+.4 :: E$(A)=B$ :: GOTO 740 850 IF SEG$(A$,N,3)<>M$ OR P=0 OR R THEN 870 ELSE IF V=0 THEN V=N :: IF SEG$(A$,N-2,2)=H$ THEN V=-V :: GOTO 870 860 A$=SEG$(A$,@,N-@)&"@"&SEG$(A$,N+3,255):: N=N+@ :: GOTO 740 870 N=N+2+ASC(SEG$(A$,N+@,@)):: GOTO 740 880 M=3 :: I=ASC(SEG$(A$,N+2,@)):: B$=SEG$(A$,N+3,I):: N=N+3+I :: IF B$="POSITION" OR B$="DISTANCE" OR B$="DELSPRITE" OR POS(G$,SEG$(B$&" ",@,8),@)THEN 740 890 B$=CHR$(200)&B$ :: J=N-I-@ :: O=@ :: IF Q=0 THEN 780 ELSE IF H OR K<>161 THEN 740 ELSE A,I=A+@ :: E(A)=0.4 :: E$(I)=B$ :: GOTO 820 900 N=N+3 :: IF S THEN 740 ELSE B$=SEG$(A$,N-2,2):: GOSUB 650 :: IF M THEN 740 ELSE U=U-(LEN(F$(U))=254):: IF U>40 THEN S=@ :: U=40 :: GOTO 740 ELSE F$(U)=F$(U)&B$ :: GOTO 740 910 B$=SEG$(A$,N+@,3):: IF B$<>"@P-" AND B$<>"@P+" THEN IF N=3 THEN 930 ELSE IF G=0 THEN A$=SEG$(A$,@,N-@)&CHR$(0) 920 PRINT #2:A$ :: GOTO 720 930 IF F OR(B AND W<160)THEN 920 ELSE J$=J$&L$ :: L=@ :: GOTO 720 TOOLDOC: Spoiler EXTENDED BASIC TOOLS (c) 1987 Jim Swedlow Release 1.1 Extended Basic TOOLS (XB*TOOLS) is a group of programs that will help you write, revise, debug and analyze Extended Basic (XB) programs. TABLE OF CONTENTS Important Information...............2 System Requirements.................2 First Things First..................2 Overview............................3 Running XB*TOOLS Programs...........4 Defualt File Names..................5 REFERENCE...........................6 COMPRESS............................7 NAMECHANGE..........................8 LINEMOVE............................8 DATAPRESS...........................9 PRINTER.............................9 ASCHART.............................9 PRINT*TEST.........................10 On Pre-Scan........................10 LOAD...............................11 End Notes..........................12 EXTENDED BASIC TOOLS * Release 1.1 * Page 1 IMPORTANT INFORMATION XB*TOOLS is distributed under the FAIRWARE concept. Please pass it on to your friends and your user group library without charge. Fairware is a marketing technique that appears to be unique to the computer world. You can get and evaluate software before purchasing it. It allows, in fact encourages, you to make copies for other potential customers. The risk is born completely by the person marketing the software. I hope you find XB*TOOLS useful. If you do, please send what you think it is worth (up to $15) to: Jim Swedlow 7301 Kirby Way Compuserve 72407,2677 Stanton, CA 90680 GEnie J.SWEDLOW If you send me fair consideration I will advise you of updates, fixes and future offerings. I cannot afford to do this unless you support this Fairware effort. This software carries no written or implied warranty regarding its performance or suitability. Neither the author nor any subsequent distributor accepts any responsibility for losses which may be incurred from its use. SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS You must have Extended Basic, 32K, at least one disk drive, RS232 and a printer. Two of the programs, REFERENCE and PRINTER, require an 80 column printer. They will produce neater and more compact print outs with a printer that is Epson or Gemini compatible. FIRST THINGS FIRST Before using any of the XB*TOOLS programs, I strongly recommend that you: 1. Make a working copy of your XB*TOOLS disk and place the master in a safe place. Do not write protect the working disk. 2. After printing (and reading) this documentation, remove the docs file from your working disk as it takes up too much space. 3. After you use PRINT*TEST and ASCHART, move them to another disk. You must keep as much free space as possible on your XB*TOOLS working disk. EXTENDED BASIC TOOLS * Release 1.1 * Page 2 OVERVIEW The XB*TOOLS programs take a program that has been saved on disk in Merge format and either extract information or modify it: REFERENCE produces a list of key items and a reference list for each one. Listed are line lengths, variables, line number references (GOTO, etc), subprograms (built-in and user) and DATA and DIM lines. A suggested pre-scan variable list order is also printed. You can print any combination of items. COMPRESS takes a program and eliminates memory hogs. Variable names and user sub program names are replaced with one or two character names, 1 is replaced by @, REM and <!> lines and <!> tails are removed and, where possible, lines are joined. You can deactivate any of these functions. NAMECHANGE changes the names of up to ten variables at a time. LINEMOVE will delete, keep or resequence a block of lines and will move a block of lines from one part of a program to another. DATAPRESS goes thru a program and combines DATA lines to the extent possible. All line references (RESTORE nnn, etc) are honored. PRINTER prints the line lengths of all program lines and, if requested, the line contents, character by character. Your XB*TOOLS disk also comes with these programs: ASCHART prints a chart of all ASCII codes, their characters, the HEX value and the TI BASIC tokens. PRINT*TEST helps you determine printer compatibility. LOAD is a multipurpose disk cataloger, program runner and file printer. EXTENDED BASIC TOOLS * Release 1.1 * Page 3 RUNNING XB*TOOLS PROGRAMS These are general instruction for running the XB*TOOLS programs. Read the individual instructions before using any of the programs. A single sided, single density, one drive system is assumed. 1. Place the disk with the program you want to modify or analyze in drive 1 and bring the program into memory: >OLD DSK1.SOURCE Remove the disk and file it. This will assure that you have an unmodified copy of your source program. If you are using COMPRESS, read the COMPRESS instructions to see if you need to RESequence your program. 2. Place your working copy of the XB*TOOLS disk in drive one and save your program in Merge format: >SAVE DSK1.OLDFILE,MERGE See 'DEFAULT FILE NAMES' for recommended file names. IMPORTANT: If your program uses more than 50 sectors you may not have enough room on the XB*TOOLS disk especially if you run COMPRESS or LINEMOVE. To avoid this, it is safer to save larger programs on a blank disk. The disk with the Merge file MUST be in drive 1. The disk with your XB*TOOLS program, however, can be in any drive. Now run your program: >RUN "DSK1.XB*TOOLS*PROGRAM" You will get a title screen with the program defaults. Some programs will ask you for needed information. REFERENCE and PRINTER will ask you for your Program Name. This is NOT the file name you used to save the Merge file but the actual name of your program. The name you enter will appear in the print out. Then you are asked if everything is correct. If so, press <ENTER> to start program execution. If not, enter <N> and the options you want. EXTENDED BASIC TOOLS * Release 1.1 * Page 4 RUNNING XB*TOOLS PROGRAMS (continued) 3. If you are using REFERENCE or PRINTER, you are done. For the other programs, you must retrieve your program from the disk. The commands are: >NEW >MERGE DSK1.NEWFILE On longer programs, it may take a while to read the program from your disk. Do not worry as long as the Disk Controller and Memory Expansion lights continue to blink. Next save the revised program on disk (you may want to RESequence it first). Until you have determined that the new program is satisfactory, you should retain the original version. DEFAULT FILE NAMES The XB*TOOLS program cannot read a program that is in Program or Memory Image format. The program must be saved as a Merge or Display Variable 163 file. Each of the XB*TOOLS programs has preset defaults for the Merge file names. By using these default file names, you can save several steps in using the XB*TOOLS programs. These are the default file names for the old and new files: XB*TOOLS Program Old File Name New File Name REFERENCE REF ---- COMPRESS COM PRESS NAMECHANGE NAME CHANGE LINEMOVE LINE MOVE DATAPRESS DATA PRESS PRINTER PRINT ---- COMPRESS and LINEMOVE will not allow you to use <\\\> (three back slashes) as a file name as both programs use it as an interim file. EXTENDED BASIC TOOLS * Release 1.1 * Page 5 REFERENCE REFERENCE prints a list of various key elements of your program. I designed it to help me debug programs and to set up pre-scan. For each item you choose, REFERENCE will give all places where that item is referenced. For example, if you print variables, and <A> appears five times in line 150, 150 will appear five times in the list for <A>. After you boot REFERENCE, it will ask you for a 'program name'. This is not the name of the disk file, but the name of the program. The name you enter will appear in the print out. Variables are sorted by those in the main program and those in each user defined sub program. At the end of the main program variable list will be a proposed pre-scan order. See 'ON PRE-SCAN' for more information. If the variable is an array, it will appear with parenthesis "A()". The size of the dimention and the number of elements are not shown. Variables that are DEFinitions will have "def" after their names. You are warned of variables that are used only once. If you opt to print out sub programs, you can limit the list to user defined subs or you can list all subs. You can print the lengths of the lines in your program. This can help you when modifying and combining lines. Remember that the maximum line length is 163 characters. REFERENCE can print up to a total of 700 items. If your program has more, REFERENCE will include a warning on your print out. If this happens, you can run your program thru REFERENCE twice. You might want to do variables one time and everything else on another pass. If your program has more than 50 user subs, all variables in the 50th and subsequent subs will be listed as part of the 50th sub. At the end of the program, you will get some stats on your program. Included are: the number of lines; the approximate program size (including the line number table); the number of variables and the aggregate number of times they are used; the number of sub programs and the total number of references; and, the number of line numbers referenced and the number of references. Depending on what you select and what is found, some of this data may not be printed. One of the fields on the default screen is "Printer type". There are four possible answers. If your printer will support NEITHER compressed print NOR underlining, enter <N>. If your printer does compressed print but NOT underlining (like the TI 99/4 printer), enter <T>. If your printer is a Gemini 10X or will support 136 compressed characters per line, enter <G>. If it is Epson compatible or will print 132 compressed character per line, enter <E>. Currently, the XB*TOOLS only support Epson style command codes. PRINT*TEST can help you decide which option to use. EXTENDED BASIC TOOLS * Release 1.1 * Page 6 COMPRESS COMPRESS was designed to make the maximum use of XB's memory saving abilities. Each of its functions is switchable on the default screen - you can do as little or as much as you wish. I strongly recommend that you do NOT run your program thru COMPRESS until you have fully tested and debugged it. If there are errors in the source program, COMPRESS may aggravate them. Furthermore, a COMPRESSed program with changed variable names and combined lines is more difficult to work on for the original programmer. DELETE REM and ! LINES will strip these lines from your program. They take up memory and slow execution slightly. You can opt not to remove lines below 160 to protect you program header. If your header runs beyond line 159, RESequence your program so that it is in line numbers less than 160. You can also opt to strip ! tails. COMPRESS will not remove pre-scan tails. COMPRESS can remove up to 127 REM and ! lines per pass. If there are more, you may need to run your program thru COMPRESS more than once. There is no limit to the number of ! tails that can be removed. REPLACE VARIABLE NAMES will rename numeric and string variables with new names of one or two characters. Names longer than three characters slow program execution noticeably. You can opt not to do this. Further, you can protect the variable @ from being replaced. REPLACE 1 WITH @ will replace the number <1> with @ each time <1> appears except inside DATA, DIM and OPTION BASE statements and user written sub programs. This saves two bytes of memory for every replacement but does slow execution slightly. If the first use of <1> is not @=1, your compressed program will have a new line number zero that reads <0 @=1>. You read that last bit correctly, the new line number will be zero. You cannot get to that line number from your keyboard but you can RESequence your program and line zero will become a normal line. REPLACE SUB NAMES will rename user defined subprogram names with new, one and two character names. Up to 390 variables and sub program names can be replaced. If there are more, the balance would not have new names. This can cause problems if a variable that retains its original name has the same name as was assigned to another variable. Therefore, COMPRESS will halt execution if it reaches this limit. If this happens, you should replace sub-programs in one pass and variables in another. Do NOT print a cross reference list. If your program might reach this limit, you should run it thru REFERENCE first. PRINT NEW NAMES will print a cross reference list of all names that were replaced in new name order. EXTENDED BASIC TOOLS * Release 1.1 * Page 7 COMPRESS (continued) COMBINE LINES will make a console BASIC program into a multi-statement XB program. If your program is already in multi-statement form, COMPRESS will squeeze your lines (including DATA lines) together to the extent possible. The TI manual states than an OPTION BASE statement must be in a lower line number than the first DIM. I have found that it need only be before the DIM but can be in the same line. COMPRESS, therefore, will mix OPTION BASE and DIM on the same line. Should this ever present a problem, move the OPTION BASE statement to a lower line number. Your COMPRESSed program should load and run faster and use less space on your disk and in memory. NAMECHANGE NAMECHANGE goes thru your program and replaces from one to ten variable names with new names. There is no edit on the old names but the program does make sure that the new names meet XB conventions. If the old name is a string, the new name must end with a dollar sign <$>. You cannot replace a string with a numeric or vice versa. The new names can be up to ten characters long. If you are replacing less than ten names, enter a blank for the next old name to get to program operation. If your new name is longer than the old name, NAMECHANGE will check each time it makes a replacement to make sure that the revised program line is not too long. If it is, execution will stop and you will be told of the problem. LINEMOVE LINEMOVE gives you three options: KEEP will let you keep a block of lines in a program. For example, suppose you want to use lines 150-300 from one program as the basis for another. Choose <K>eep and indicate the line number range. LINEMOVE will go thru the program and write only lines 150-300 (or whatever you choose) to disk in the new file. Line number references (GOTO, etc) are NOT updated. OUST will delete a block of lines from your program. If you want to delete lines 300-400, for example, choose <O> and that line number range. The new program will be a duplicate of the old one except that those lines will be missing. Again, line number references are not updated. EXTENDED BASIC TOOLS * Release 1.1 * Page 8 LINEMOVE (continued) MOVE will move a block of lines from one place in a program to another. During preparation, LINEMOVE will make sure that there is adequate room for the move. You can use this function to resequence a block of line numbers within a program. You could resequence an entire program, but TI's RESequence is faster. All line number references ARE updated, as appropriate. LINEMOVE looks for line numbers within the range you specify. For example if you opt to OUST lines 492-2000 and the program has lines from 100 to 1000 in increments of 10, the new program will contain lines 100 to 490. DATAPRESS DATAPRESS goes thru a program and combines, to the extent legal, DATA lines. If the source program runs in console BASIC, the new one will too. All line number references (RESTORE nnn, GOTO nnn, etc) are honored so that program execution will not be impaired. This allows you to write short DATA lines, which are easier to enter and debug. Then DATAPRESS will squeeze them together which saves disk and memory space and speeds loading. COMPRESS also does this if you elect to Combine Lines, but it also does other things that makes a program incompatible with console BASIC. PRINTER PRINTER gives you the lengths of all of your programs lines. It can also dump, in decimal, the contents of each line. After booting, PRINTER will ask you for a program name. This is not the name you used to save your program as a Merge file but the actual program name. It will appear in the print out. The line content list is useful if you want to learn how TI codes BASIC lines in memory and on disks. A better understanding of this can make you a better programmer. See 'ASCHART'. See the last paragraph in REFERENCE for a discussion of choosing the printer type. ASCHART ASCHART prints a list of all ASCII codes, their character, the TI key to get that code (if any), the HEX value and the use of that code as a token for a TI BASIC command or statement. This program should run on any Epson, Gemini or compatible printer. EXTENDED BASIC TOOLS * Release 1.1 * Page 9 PRINT*TEST PRINT*TEST will help you pick the printer type for REFERENCE and PRINTER. Run it and answer the on screen questions about what your printer does. Be sure that your printer is turned on and is 'on line'. PRINT*TEST will then suggest a printer type. See the last paragraph under REFERENCE for additional information. ON PRE-SCAN If you do not currently use pre-scan, read the instructions in the XB manual supplement. You can look at the use of pre-scan in the XB*TOOLS programs for examples. DIM statements do not need to be executed in program operation. Your TI reads them only during pre-scan. Therefore, you DIM statements can be part of the pre-scan list. If you want to DIMension a variable at 10, just put A() (or whatever variable name) in the pre-scan list. DEF's can also only appear in the pre-scan list as they are only seen during pre-scan. Both DEF's and DIM's must be set off by line seperators. This is an example of a valid pre-scan list: 140 CALL INIT :: GOTO 150 :: CALL KEY :: CALL CLEAR :: A,D,R,R$ :: DIM Q(3) :: E,A$ :: DIM B(50),C$(2) :: R(),Z$ :: DEF X=2*M :: !@P- During pre-scan, your TI makes a table with all the program's variables and the memory locations for each variable's value. The table is in reverse order of incidence. The first variable found in the program is at the end of the table and the last variable found is at the beginning of the table. Each time you use a variable, your TI must search the variable table from the beginning. Your program, therefore, will run faster if commonly used variables are at the beginning of the table. For that reason, REFERENCE lists variables in reverse order of use. This is not always the best order as a variable used only a few times may be in the middle of a major program loop and hence be accessed more often. EXTENDED BASIC TOOLS * Release 1.1 * Page 10 LOAD LOAD reads a disk's directory and then displays a menu from which you can load programs and print files. LOAD should be saved as <LOAD> on your disks so that it will auto boot when you select Extended Basic. LOAD is based on many disk menu programs including one from Tigerclub. SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS You must have Extended Basic, 32K and at least one disk drive. A printer is optional. LOAD should work with any printer including the thermal printer. ON PRESSING KEYS Sometimes you must hold a key down for a bit before it takes effect. FEATURES AND OPERATION LOAD starts by scanning the directory of the disk in drive 1. Each file is displayed as it is read. You can interrupt the scan by pressing any key. This is helpful when the file you want is low in the alphabet or when you want to scan a disk in another drive. After reading the disk directory, LOAD compares the size of the various programs and files on the disk with the space used on the disk (unless you interrupted the scan). If there is a discrepancy, this information is displayed. This can mean that there is an error in the disk's bit map or that the disk has one or more bad sectors. If this happens, you should copy your disk, file by file, to a freshly initialized disk. Using a sector copier such as NIBBLER or TURBO COPY will NOT solve the problem. You must use a file copier like DISK MANAGER 1000. You will then see the disk contents, 16 files at a time. Before each file is an alpha identifier (A, B, C etc). Pressing a letter will: PROGRAMS If the file is a program or INT/FIX 254 and the last character of the name is not an asterisk <*>, LOAD will try and load the program. If the file is an assembly language program or a memory image data file, the attempt may either lock up your system or empty RAM. If the last character is an asterisk, execution will stop and you will be told to load the program in TI BASIC. Place an asterisk at the end of the name of any BASIC program that will not run in Extended Basic. OTHER FILES LOAD will print any other file. DISPLAY files will be printed completely but you will only get the first variable in each record in INTERNAL files. Numbers in INTERNAL files may print as alphas if they have more than 8 digits. EXTENDED BASIC TOOLS * Release 1.1 * Page 11 LOAD ------- OTHER FILES (continued) You can choose any of four different print modes: <T>EXT PRINT will print the file as it is on the disk. <F>ILE PRINT will replace any character with an ASCII value outside the 32-127 range with an asterisk. This can save paper but is slow! <S>CREEN will print the file on your screen. <Z> aborts the file print mode. If you opt for a screen display, pressing any key will pause the screen scroll. In paused screen or print mode, pressing <Z> will abort the file print. There are six control options at the bottom of each screen: PAGE UP/DOWN Allows you to move between the various screens if there are more than 16 files on the disk. DELETE FILE Deletes any unprotected file. You will have two chances to abort. PRINT CAT Prints a disk catalog on your printer. CHANGE DRIVE LOAD starts by reading the disk in drive one. Use this if you want to look at another drive or rescan the current drive. Try running LOAD with drive 1 empty. STOP Ends the program. ERROR TRAPPING This program has extensive error trapping when disks and printers are being accessed. If you can fool LOAD without modifying the program, please let me know how! PROGRAM MODIFICATIONS Line 120 has three variables: D$, P$ and F$. P$ is the printer name and will accept any legal name. If you do not have a printer, set P$="NO". LOAD comes with "PIO" for this variable. D$ is valid disk drive numbers. These must be NUMERIC. LOAD comes with D$ set for two drives ("12"). F$ is the first drive LOAD checks and comes as "DSK1.". END NOTES Your comments, suggestions and problems are all welcome. Please specify the version number of the program. If you want a reply, sending a self addressed stamped envelope (SASE) will speed my response. The only thing that keeps the 4A alive is our continued support. EXTENDED BASIC TOOLS * Release 1.1 * Page 12 Here's the above files plus the complete XBTOOLS suite in DSK format. compress list.txt tooldoc.txt XBTOOLS.dsk Edited May 19, 2022 by Ed in SoDak more info 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+OLD CS1 Posted May 19, 2022 Share Posted May 19, 2022 3 hours ago, Ed in SoDak said: Here's the above files plus the complete XBTOOLS suite in DSK format. Neat tools. Now I want to compile them 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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