question

[Joona I Palaste]

No, the glorious Sinclair ZX Spectrum was for everybody who recognised a
fine machine when they saw one. Except Germans, who were probably
required by law to use the inferior home-grown product.

Heathen!

So, you chose the ZX Spectrum, because it has 48 kB less RAM (only 16 kB
less if you bought an expanded version), 8 less colours, only beep-beep
sounds, shoddy rubber keys, no hardware support for sprites, less screen
resolution, no support for industry-standard 5.25" diskettes, a BASIC
dialect that was pretty much incompatible with an other dialect, an
overall physical form that resembled an overgrown credit card more than
a computer, and such things? Then I'm lucky I didn't recognise such a
"fine" machine.

 

[Dan Pop]

What? Ah... hehehe. No, wait... Huh? Who?? Err... what???

I'm not sure I really get the joke...

No wonder: Richard Bos seldom makes a good joke and he exhausted his
weekly quota yesterday ;-)

Dan

 

[Irrwahn Grausewitz]

*I'm* not sure you even want to.

Why? Because I'm german?

(IIRC, many units of the ZX Spectrum were
sold in Germany before the C64 hype started).

Regards

 

[Irrwahn Grausewitz]

So, you chose the ZX Spectrum, because it has 48 kB less RAM (only 16 kB
less if you bought an expanded version), 8 less colours, only beep-beep
sounds, shoddy rubber keys, no hardware support for sprites, less screen
resolution, no support for industry-standard 5.25" diskettes, a BASIC
dialect that was pretty much incompatible with an other dialect, an
overall physical form that resembled an overgrown credit card more than
a computer, and such things? Then I'm lucky I didn't recognise such a
"fine" machine.

Maybe he just wanted a machine with which, for example, it was very easy
to draw graphics from BASIC programs, even with embedded text(!).

Admittedly, the eraser keytops were a persistent source of annoyance,
though a big improvement compared to the ZX81.

BTW: CBM BASIC is one of the most brain damaged computer languages ever
designed, especially when you take into account the technical advantages
of the underlying hardware over other common home-computers of that era.

So, there. ;-)

Does anybody have the slightest clue how to get this thread on-topic?

Unfortunately, the C compiler for my C64 is dead due to diskette
failure. It wasn't compliant to any standard anyway. Sigh.

Regards

 

[Joona I Palaste]

Maybe he just wanted a machine with which, for example, it was very easy
to draw graphics from BASIC programs, even with embedded text(!).

Admittedly, the eraser keytops were a persistent source of annoyance,
though a big improvement compared to the ZX81.

BTW: CBM BASIC is one of the most brain damaged computer languages ever
designed, especially when you take into account the technical advantages
of the underlying hardware over other common home-computers of that era.

So, there. ;-)

So your only counterargument was the lack of BASIC support for the
advanced graphics & sound features of the Commodore 64? What about
the fact that the Commodore 64 *DID* have graphics and sound Spectrum
users could only have wet dreams of, if you knew how to use them?
Or the fact that it had loads more of software, partly because it
also came on diskettes and not unreliable cassettes?

Does anybody have the slightest clue how to get this thread on-topic?

Unfortunately, the C compiler for my C64 is dead due to diskette
failure. It wasn't compliant to any standard anyway. Sigh.

So, according to pedants, it was *not* a C compiler then.

--
/-- Joona Palaste ([email protected]) ------------- Finland --------\
\-- http://www.helsinki.fi/~palaste --------------------- rules! --------/
"Parthenogenetic procreation in humans will result in the founding of a new
religion."
- John Nordberg

 

[Dave Vandervies]

Irrwahn Grausewitz <[email protected]> scribbled the following:


So, according to pedants, it was *not* a C compiler then.

Given the time at which it would have been useful[1], it was probably
a K&R C compiler, in which case it could have been a pedant-compatible
C compiler without being standard-compliant.
It's safe to guess, given the close ties to unix that the reference
implementation had at the time, that it had a bunch of extra limitations
that may have made it pedant-incompatible when compared to K&R1 C,
but that isn't a necessary consequence of it being pre-C89.


dave

[1] Well, useful enough to be worth distributing

 

[Irrwahn Grausewitz]

So your only counterargument was the lack of BASIC support for the
advanced graphics & sound features of the Commodore 64? What about
the fact that the Commodore 64 *DID* have graphics and sound Spectrum
users could only have wet dreams of, if you knew how to use them?

Guess why my first computer (not the first I programmed on, that's a
Spectrum) was a C64. I still own it, albeit I "tuned" it slightly, and
once or twice a year it gets reactivated, and it's still amazing what
you can do with it. But still, without Assembler skills or a decent
BASIC extension (á la Simon's Basic, or self-written) it's like a Rolls
Royce without seats.

Or the fact that it had loads more of software, partly because it
also came on diskettes and not unreliable cassettes?

Well, back then I couldn't afford to buy a disk drive, so I used tapes
<shudder>. A friend gave his old 1541 to me a couple of years ago. And,
finally, I managed to use my PC as external mass storage device. C64
goes Gigabyte.

So, according to pedants, it was *not* a C compiler then.

To be even more pedantic, there was no C standard at that time.

Regards

Irrwahn

 

[Joona I Palaste]

Irrwahn Grausewitz <[email protected]> scribbled the following:

(snip)

Maybe he [Richard Bos] just wanted a machine with which, for
example, it was very easy
to draw graphics from BASIC programs, even with embedded text(!).

Admittedly, the eraser keytops were a persistent source of annoyance,
though a big improvement compared to the ZX81.

BTW: CBM BASIC is one of the most brain damaged computer languages ever
designed, especially when you take into account the technical advantages
of the underlying hardware over other common home-computers of that era.

So, there. ;-)

So your only counterargument was the lack of BASIC support for the
advanced graphics & sound features of the Commodore 64? What about
the fact that the Commodore 64 *DID* have graphics and sound Spectrum
users could only have wet dreams of, if you knew how to use them?

Guess why my first computer (not the first I programmed on, that's a
Spectrum) was a C64. I still own it, albeit I "tuned" it slightly, and
once or twice a year it gets reactivated, and it's still amazing what
you can do with it. But still, without Assembler skills or a decent
BASIC extension (á la Simon's Basic, or self-written) it's like a Rolls
Royce without seats.

That didn't prove the Commodore 64 was *worse* than the ZX Spectrum.
That only proved its BASIC was worse than the ZX Spectrum's.
Also, to be pedantic here, you didn't need to know squat about
Assembler to use the Commodore 64's graphics and sound. All you needed
to know was to what numbers to give the POKE command and the PEEK
function. I serve as living proof of that, having done sprite graphics
on the Commodore 64 (albeit very poorly, because I suck at drawing)
years before I learned even the most basic concepts of Assembler.
Contrast it with C: How much Assembler do you need to know to be able
to do this kind of thing?
char *reg = (char *)0xD020;
reg[8] ^= 1;

To be even more pedantic, there was no C standard at that time.

So if it was a C compiler then, it isn't any more.

--
/-- Joona Palaste ([email protected]) ------------- Finland --------\
\-- http://www.helsinki.fi/~palaste --------------------- rules! --------/
"As a boy, I often dreamed of being a baseball, but now we must go forward, not
backward, upward, not forward, and always whirling, whirling towards freedom!"
- Kang

 

[Irrwahn Grausewitz]

(snip)



That didn't prove the Commodore 64 was *worse* than the ZX Spectrum.
That only proved its BASIC was worse than the ZX Spectrum's.

Agreed. (BTW, in case you didn't notice, I prefer the CBM64)

Also, to be pedantic here, you didn't need to know squat about
Assembler to use the Commodore 64's graphics and sound. All you needed
to know was to what numbers to give the POKE command and the PEEK
function. I serve as living proof of that, having done sprite graphics
on the Commodore 64 (albeit very poorly, because I suck at drawing)
years before I learned even the most basic concepts of Assembler.

Bwahahahaaa. Hmmp, sorry, just bursting out, yeah I remember those PEEK
and POKE orgies. Drawing a line across the screen took forever and a
day. Sprites OTOH were a very useful feature and not too hard to
control with spaghetti BASIC.

Contrast it with C: How much Assembler do you need to know to be able
to do this kind of thing?
char *reg = (char *)0xD020;
reg[8] ^= 1;

Err, what's your point?

So if it was a C compiler then, it isn't any more.

Oh it is (err, were, if it was still with me), but not a standard
compliant one. According to your logic gcc isn't (doesn't incorporate)
a C compiler. However, I could live with it, as long as it translates
my programs into working executables.

Regards

 

[Sheldon Simms]

Unfortunately, the C compiler for my C64 is dead due to diskette
failure. It wasn't compliant to any standard anyway. Sigh.

How can this be a problem? Just google yourself a new copy.

-Sheldon

 

[john]

This is implementation-defined as it's more a feature of the underlying
machine architecture than of BASIC. Not all BASIC dialects support that
syntax of SAVE in the first place.

/-- Joona Palaste ([email protected]) ------------- Finland --------\
\-- http://www.helsinki.fi/~palaste --------------------- rules! --------/
"The trouble with the French is they don't have a word for entrepreneur."
- George Bush

Claim: President George W. Bush proclaimed, "The problem with the
French is that they don't have a word for entrepreneur."
Status: False.



http://www.snopes.com/quotes/bush.htm

 

[Joona I Palaste]

/-- Joona Palaste ([email protected]) ------------- Finland --------\
\-- http://www.helsinki.fi/~palaste --------------------- rules! --------/
"The trouble with the French is they don't have a word for entrepreneur."
- George Bush

Claim: President George W. Bush proclaimed, "The problem with the
French is that they don't have a word for entrepreneur."
Status: False.

http://www.snopes.com/quotes/bush.htm

I think I'll have to remove that quote, or at least insert (allegedly)
after the name George Bush.
But please, if you're only commenting on my signature, please snip away
the actual article, to make the context apparent, and avoid needless
quoting.

 

[Richard Bos]

So, you chose the ZX Spectrum, because it has 48 kB less RAM (only 16 kB
less if you bought an expanded version), 8 less colours, only beep-beep
sounds, shoddy rubber keys, no hardware support for sprites, less screen
resolution, no support for industry-standard 5.25" diskettes, a BASIC
dialect that was pretty much incompatible with an other dialect, an
overall physical form that resembled an overgrown credit card more than
a computer, and such things?

No. I preferred the ZX Spectrum because it was a hacker's machine,
rather than a games player's toy.

Richard

 

[Dan Pop]

I think I'll have to remove that quote, or at least insert (allegedly)
after the name George Bush.
But please, if you're only commenting on my signature, please snip away
the actual article, to make the context apparent, and avoid needless
quoting.

Another failure to engage the brain. He was commenting on the signature
*in the context* of what you wrote in the body of the post. Devoid of
that context, his comment would be as silly as your post that triggered
it.

Dan

 

[Joona I Palaste]

Another failure to engage the brain. He was commenting on the signature
*in the context* of what you wrote in the body of the post. Devoid of
that context, his comment would be as silly as your post that triggered
it.

I don't think there is anything in john's reply that concerns anything
other than what I wrote in my signature. If you think otherwise, please
indicate clearly what such material there is.

--
/-- Joona Palaste ([email protected]) ------------- Finland --------\
\-- http://www.helsinki.fi/~palaste --------------------- rules! --------/
"I am not very happy acting pleased whenever prominent scientists overmagnify
intellectual enlightenment."
- Anon

 

[Christopher Benson-Manica]

Unfortunately, the C compiler for my C64 is dead due to diskette
failure. It wasn't compliant to any standard anyway. Sigh.

There was a C compiler for the C64?? I am going to A) have to get my hands on
it, and B) get my mom to send me our old C64

 

[Dan Pop]

Does anybody have the slightest clue how to get this thread on-topic?

Sure: just mention the conformance issues of its C compiler, according to
the K&R1 specification.

Unfortunately, the C compiler for my C64 is dead due to diskette
failure. It wasn't compliant to any standard anyway. Sigh.

The only 8-bit C implementation that was conforming to K&R1 that I have
used was Aztec C II for CP/M-80.

Hisoft C for ZX-Spectrum (the only C implementation for the Spectrum I'm
aware of) was ridden with conformance issue, WRT K&R1. The most important
ones were:

- No floating point support.
- long was a 16-bit type.
- Any cast had to be prefixed by the "cast" keyword.
- Casts and sizeof only accepted primary types or typedef'ed types. To
cast something to char *, you needed to do something like this:

typedef char *charp;
char *screen = cast(charp)16384;

- Initialisers not supported for automatics.
- No block scope identifiers (except for the outermost block of a
function definition).

The idea was to keep the compiler as small as possible, so that it could
be still used without a microdrive or disk. This means that the about
40K of available memory had to contain, *at the same time*, the following
things: the C compiler, the C runtime support (including most of the
standard library), the text editor, the source code of the C program,
the generated executable code, the compiler's internal tables.

It was possible to compile code directly from audio tape, but it was so
unpractical that it was mostly a theoretical possibility. Fortunately,
it was possible to write non-trivial programs without having to resort to
this "feature". The most complex program I wrote with everything in
memory was a tetris implementation.

Undefined behaviour basically meant that you had to reload everything
from audio tape (and redo the last unsaved changes to your code
The same penalty for entering an infinite loop.

And, of course, for anything real fun (graphics or sound) you had to
resort to inline machine code (C literally didn't know anything about
such things). Having a copy of the Disassembled Spectrum ROM (yeah, that
was a *real* book, written by Logan and O'Hara) handy was a must when
dealing with such things, after getting bored of implementing stacks
and binary trees ;-)

Dan

 

[Dan Pop]

I don't think there is anything in john's reply that concerns anything
other than what I wrote in my signature. If you think otherwise, please
indicate clearly what such material there is.

His comment to your signature is a parody on your comment to Richard Bos'
statements about BASIC. The parody is completely lost if the parodied
text is removed.

Dan

 

[Joona I Palaste]

His comment to your signature is a parody on your comment to Richard Bos'
statements about BASIC. The parody is completely lost if the parodied
text is removed.

How can you be sure it is a parody? If it is really true that GWB never
said such a thing, then it's a valid criticism even by itself.

 

[Irrwahn Grausewitz]

Hisoft C for ZX-Spectrum

And, of course, for anything real fun (graphics or sound) you had to
resort to inline machine code (C literally didn't know anything about
such things). Having a copy of the Disassembled Spectrum ROM (yeah, that
was a *real* book, written by Logan and O'Hara)
handy was a must when
dealing with such things, after getting bored of implementing stacks
and binary trees ;-)

Similar on/for the 64er, I just fail to remember the Author's name(s),
and it's not handy right now, but without you were almost lost...

Regards