Newz From The Prez
by Nathan Block
Nathan has failed again to submit his article in time for this publication!
The Editor
DOM Info by Terry Streeter
Terry has failed to submit DOM info to me in time for the newsletter.
The Editor
Treasurer's Report by Greg Leitner
Although the January meeting got off to a slow start. by the time we set down to have our fornal meeting there were a good representation of our membership present. By the end of the meeting we even had a visit from the former President of MAST who offered his vast library of ST disks to our CLub which we gladly accepted. I hope we will see more material on the ST at future meetings as I would rather use my ST over my IBM any day.
This January meeting was very interesting in that most of the discussion centered around the using of modems to connect to various services, especially the Internet. I can't wait for future meetings where we can see from current users just how these services work and how to negotiate them. I for one have never had the time to sit down and learn about my modem, so I welcome the help from anyone who knows the ropes. This is exactly the kind of help I was looking for when I joined the Ateri Club and now I plan on taking advantage of this opportunity.
Thanks to the attending members who continue to support our Club. We had very good receipts for January which included four memberships (two new ones), disk box and blank disk sales along with our regular Dom sales. All together we had receipts of $122.00, and with only the December BBS phone bill and the January Newsletter expenses for the month our total gain in our account was about $87.00. This brings our balance up to $465.75 for the end of January 1995.
Plan on attending the upcoming meetings and see what your Club has in store for you. With the addition of an ST disk library and tutorials on using your modems, Ateriwriter etc. exciting times are in store for all of us.
Seek & Find ZEALOT Z W X E E R V T B T B Y N M U V P Q Q Z E A L O T V E E W X Q Z S Y N M P L M Q E T E O L J G B A E E B M R Z D H E L W V E X R O V C Y Y B M R M N B V L X O D T O L T E B M W R A G C L P V P R D S O A X H R D R T E J X H E W Q I T A R V X V H J S W G L M W A F V E C I W F E F E I W L P W Y T U M R X A S F O A D M M Y A R N T A D G P W O U I I I E E B M C V W O D T H L I B H A D R C V N D I I L G J P Q D W O T A T U N I U E D I D I H O V U Y I N X W Q L X F H A R X B W R B V C W E B T C I D D A R E X G Y Q J L D G T W P E M L U P A E Fanatic Enthusiast Bigot Sectarian Extremist Radical Devotee Champion Disciple Aficionado Fan Buff Nut Booster Addict
News From The Publisher:
I tried to download the SPACE minutes from the New SPACE BBS, but it seems there is a upload/download ratio now? I havn't uploaded anything yet so I couldn't download the minutes from the last meeting or another article that was there waiting for me to get!
This will have to be addressed at the next meeting.
+----------------------------------------+
| Larry's |
| ACTION! TUTORIAL |
+----------------------------------------+
#3 The First Mistake
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Let's begin with your computer on, and the
HELLO WORLD program in the Editor. Add or
type in the follow text;
PROC stop()
PrintE("End of program.")
RETURN
PROC hello()
PrintE("Hello World")
stop
RETURN
Now press <CNTRL> <SHIFT> 'M' to get to
the Monitor. Enter 'C' to compile the
program. You will then be exposed to a
compilation error. At this point, the
program will not run. Note the Error
number and open your manual to the Error
Code Appendix. You can try to guess what
the error is if given the correct line,
however, sometimes you are not given the
correct line and you must decide what to
look for by the description supplied in
the Error Code explanation.
If text was displayed in the Monitors'
message area, the cursor would be moved to
the start of that same line. If no text
was displayed, the cursor is right where
it was when you left the Editor. In my
case, I had no text line displayed in the
Monitors message area, only the error
number. Your cartridge may be a different
version, and act slightly differently.
The manual explains this error as an
Illegal assignment. It is also an Illegal
function call, for which there is no other
error number. In my manual I have added
in the words "Jump should be Jump()" to
remind me to look for this type of error
too. Other than this ommission, I believe
all the error code explanations are right.
To correct the error, add the parenthesis
after the word "stop" ("stop()") in the
'hello' procedure, then return to the
Monitor to compile it again. It should
compile correctly now, if it doesnt,
recheck your text to find any mistakes.
If everything is correct, go ahead and run
it. Everybody makes mistakes, especially
when first learning the language. Here
are the typos you should be aware of in
the August 1983 Action! manual:
- = This is the line to look for.
+ = This is how it should be.
> = Correct the notes for this line
MONITOR / RUN - Program Execution
>RUN "<filespec>" only works when used
on programs saved from the Editor. (When
it is still in text form.)
-RUN PrintE() <RETURN> does not work.
+XECUTE PrintE() <RETURN> is correct.
LANGUAGE / Arithmetic Expressions
>TECH NOTE Using '*', '/', or 'MOD' will
not work correctly on large CARD values.
LANGUAGE / Record Manipulations
-TYPE idinfo=[BYTE level,
-TYPE idinfo=[BYTE level (omit comma)
LANGUAGE / Advanced use of Extended Types
>newrecord=idarray+(reccount*recordsize)
The pointer will point to the next record
not the end of the array.
>In the main procedure;
-"mode=InputB()" won't work correctly.
+"mode=GetD(7)" works fine.
LIBRARY / The PUT Procedures
-PROC PutDE(BYTE channel, CHAR character)
+PROC PutDE(BYTE channel) will compile.
LIBRARY / BYTE color
>For Graphics(0) and text windows:
+Chr. luminance (color number = 1)
+Background (color number = 2)
LIBRARY / PROC Fill
>col and row must be the numbers of the
lower LEFT corner of the box.
LIBRARY / PROC SCopy
>The description is wrong, DEST should be
dimensioned larger than source, or else
identify an array with enough space.
While in the Monitor, enter the line:
? $B000<RETURN>
The '?' requests the Monitor to display
the contents of a memory address. My
cartridge displays:
45056,$B000 = 6 $0136 54 310
This means I have version 3.6 which is the
last version I am aware of. If yours is 7
or greater, LET ME KNOW
------------------------------------------
Until next time!
+----------------------------------------+
| Larry's |
| ACTION! TUTORIAL |
+----------------------------------------+
#4 Sing-a-Long!
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One more aid in correcting errors is the
use of the List option during compilation
of your program. To use this option, you
can go to the Monitor and enter 'O' for
the Option Menu. Continue pressing RETURN
(4 times) until the prompt "List on?" is
displayed, then enter 'Y' <RETURN>. This
option tells the compiler to list the
program in the Monitor message area, as
each line is being compiled. If it does
encounter an error, the listing of the
program stops in the approximate location
of the error. Whatever caused the error
may be listed on the screen, plus all the
preceding lines that compiled before the
error. This can narrow your search down
to about 22 lines of text, instead of how
ever many lines there are in your program.
Using the List option does slow down the
compilation process. You can use it
dynamically (you can turn it on and off)
during the compile process by including a
'SET List=1' (on) and 'SET List=0' (off)
in the text of your program. Try this out
to see how it performs. Here is a short
program to finish off the section on the
Action! Editor and Monitor;
MODULE
PROC verse1()
PrintE("You say good-bye,")
RETURN
PROC verse2()
PrintE("and I say ""hello!""")
RETURN
PROC song()
PROC main()
BYTE ch=764
Graphics(O)
PrintE("PRESS ANY KEY;")
song=verse1 song()
do until ch<255 od
ch=255
song=verse2 song()
do until ch<255 od
ch=255
RETURN
This example gives an indication of why
the parentheses are needed in any call to
a procedure or function. (Remember Error
10 from the last lesson?) Type it in just
as it appears, compile, and run it. In
this example, the word 'song' is used both
as a procedue name and as a variable.
The only distinction between the two uses
are the parentheses following the variable
name:
song=verse1 ; as a variable
song() ; as a procedure
song()=verse1() ; will not compile
Here is another example program:
PROC main()
BYTE ch=764,atachr=763,tmp
PrintE("KEYBOARD TEST PROGRAM")
PrintE("Press any key; Esc=exit")
do
while ch=255 do od
tmp=ch
GetD(7)
PrintF("ch=%U atachr=%U (^[%C)%E",tmp,
atachr,atachr)
until tmp=28
od
RETURN
The above example illustrates one method
of testing for a keypress. In the main
procedure, the BYTE variable 'ch' was used
to test for a keypress. The operating
system from ATARI uses one address to hold
the keyboard value of the most recent key
pressed. From this location the computer
can tell when you have pressed a key, and
will then translate it to ATASCII. The
address of this location is 764 or $2FC.
Action! allows the assignment of addresses
to variables, arrays and procedure names.
By declaring the variable to be residing
at address 764, the program can watch for
any keypresses, just as the computer does.
When no key has been entered, and after
each translation the address will be set
at a value of 255.
Location 763 holds the ATASCII value of
your keypress, after it has been entered
and translated.
Because the GetD(7) statement will reset
ch to 255, tmp was used to temporarily
store the value so that it may be used
in the PrintF statement. You can use this
example to compare the ATASCII values with
the actual keyboard values.
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Next month, Vo-cab-u-lary!