DragonUser20_Dec84.pdf

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The independent Dragon magazine
7 5 p U S 3 . 2 5 D e c e m b e r 1984
•GRAPHICS DESIGNER
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[]Please send me your full colour catalogue_
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•
•
Letters
Telephone number
(All departments)
01-437 4343
Editor
BRENDON GORE
Assistant Editor
GORDON ROSS
Software Editor
GRAHAM TAYLOR
Editorial Secretary
GERALDINE SMYTH
Group Advertisement Manager
DAVID LAKE
Advertisement Manager
SIMON LANGSTON
Administration
THERESA LACY
Managing Editor
DUNCAN SCOT
Publishing Director
JENNY IRELAND
Subscriptions
UK El° for 12 issues
Overseas (surface) e16 for 12 issues
ISSN 0265-0177. Telex: 296275
Dragon User, 12/13 Little Newport Street,
London WC2R 3L0
US address: co Business Press
International, 205 East 42nd St, New York,
NY 10017
including this month information on music-
al Dragons, a n I T T a n swe r a n d h o w t o
secure a program listing.
Snakes alive
Bookbytes
Dragon designs
1
8
23
2 4
Andrew Wo n d se t s n is sn a ke o n a p ill
eating outing in our program of the month
News
6
The latest on GE C's marketing plans and
details of new peripherals and software on
release
Our re vie we rs help you select the books
that are most likely to suit your needs
Clubs
11
Local and national clubs are now providing
an important se rvice to Dragon u se rs —
Gordon R o s s d e ta ils t h e g ro win g c lu b
network
David S a m g iv e s y o u t h e in fo rma tio n
necessary t o cre a te g o o d g ra p h ics a n d
improve your programs
Open file
2
9
Dragonsoft
12
Readers' p ro g ra ms th is mo n th include a
screen editor and a Swapover listing
Dragon software se e ms to have ma d e a
comeback recently, our reviewers give the
lowdown on what to expect
TandytDragon
conversions
38
Jason Nichols lists the Dragon and CoCo
tokens used to represent Basic commands
and sh o ws h o w t o p la y a ta p e o n o n e
micro when it is programmed for the other
Adventure column 5 0
Mike Gerrard continues his survey of the
adventure scene
Chip Shop
15 Dragon Answers
5 2
Keith and Steven Brain re vie w two Ba si-
codes that allow you to tune into the BBC's
Chip Shop show
Brian Ca d g e o f f e rs a ra n g e o f a d vice
including instructions on the Dragon's res-
tore command and information on moving
graphics pixel by pixel
FAI C
Published by Sunshine Books, Scot Press
Ltd. ©Sunshine Books 1984
Typesetting by Chesham Press, Chesham,
Bucks. Printed by Eden Fisher (Southend)
Ltd, Southend-on-Sea, Essex
Distributed b y S.M. Distribution, London
SW9. 01-274 8611. Telex: 261643
Registered at the Post Office as a news-
paper
Dragon and it s logo a re trademarks o f
Dragon Data Ltd
How to submit articles
The quality of the material we can publish in
Dragon User each month will, to a very great
extent depend o n t h e q u a lity o f t h e
discoveries that you can make with your
Dragon. The Dragon computer was launched
on to the market with a powerful version of
Basic, but with very poor documentation.
Articles which a re submitted to Dragon
User for publication should not be more than
3000 words long. All submissions should be
typed. Please leave wide margins and a
double space between each line. Programs
should, whenever possible. b e computer
printed on plain white paper and be accom-
panied by a tape of the program.
We cannot guarantee t o return every
submitted article or program. so please keep
a copy. If you want to have your program
returned yo u mu st include a stamped,
addressed envelope.
Versatile interfacing
17 Competition corner 5 8
Beau Jolly provides the prizes to Gordon
Lees card trick question
Brian Ca d g e t a ke s a lo o k a t a simp le
interface from NCJ Electronics
Editorial
NINETEEN EIGHTY FO UR is a date that has been associated with catastrophe and
terror ever since George Orwe ll wrote h is chilling vision o f the future in 1948. In the
event, of course, 1 984 turned out to be something of an anticlimax. No Big Brother, no
Airstrip One.
For the computer industry, however, 1984 still has a certain significance. The pundits
who had been predicting a massive shake-out in the market drew some satisfaction from
the disappearance of Tyco m and Camputers, though this was balanced to some extent
by the emergence of Amstrad.
The Japanese also made their long-awaited entrance into home computers with the
much-hyped MSX. But, despite the Japanese domination of the hi-fi and electronics
markets, there a re so me doubts a s to whether they will simila rly take over the micro
market. T h e Z8 0 , e ig h t b it , sta n d a rd a ro u n d wh ic h M S X i s b a se d m a y b e t o o
old-fashioned when compared with the newer 16-bit offerings from Sinclair et al.
Dragon, despite hefty cash injections, failed to overcome its cashflow and overstock-
ing problems, with the result that it wa s sold to Spanish company Eurohard. Dragon
software houses immediately started to convert their programs to other machines, if they
had not done so already.
Jack Tramiel, the ma n wh o founded Commodore and built it up into a multi-million
pound company, resigned in a boardroom dispute. But. he bounced back within months
to buy troubled Atari from Warners. So, 1984 has been a year of considerable change for
the computer industry, if not quite the watershed envisaged by Orwell. What 1985 holds
in store is difficult to predict, other than that the market will become yet more competitive.
To misquote an ancient Chinese proverb: " We live in interesting time s.
-
December 1984 Dragon User 3
OUR BEST EVER GAMES
AND
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otHE
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20 adversaries to combat.
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Brilliantly programmed using
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Cartoon character animation in
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Race and chase through the
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Protect your craft from laser
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Letters
Sing
Dragon
IT MAY interest some readers
who wish to use their Dragon to
control a musical keyboard that
they can in fact do so with the
recently released Casio MT 2000.
This is one o f a selection o f
mini-keyboards fr om Casio, i t
costs E130, and to link it up to the
Dragon 32 the keyboard has an
accessory interface — the PA 1.
This costs MO, and plugs into the
Centronics socket via a printer
cable.
Using this system, the compu-
ter can be used to select one of
the eight preset voices, start or
stop one o f t h e s ix preset
rhythms. and can play up to eight
notes — so the computer could
beused as a sort of "sequencer''
to build up a melody, or chord
accompaniment, which can b e
played whilst you pick out a tune.
Obviously, it does not have the
facilities of the MIDI system, or of
asynthesiser. However, it does
provide the Dragon with an excel-
lent sound system at a reasonable
price. The software must (at pre-
sent) be home grown, but there is
not too much heavy programming
effort involved. I have this system
myself and am basing a project
for college on it.
Which brings me on to ask if
anyone could tell me the function
of each pin in the Centronics
socket (Busy. Strobe and so on)
This will form a major part of my
project and I would be very grate-
ful for any help received.
Raymond McKean
4 Mirlield Avenue
Higher Black fey
Manchester M9 2WN
This is the chance to air your views — send your tips. compliments and complaints to Letters
Page, Dragon User, 12-13 Little Newport Street. London WC2R 3LD.
not so much of a problem as the
manual carefully explains the indi-
vidual functions of components
used in the interface and gives
Basic and "annotated" machine
code examples for use.
The board has proved to be
particularly popular with schools
and colleges throughout the
country and is used for numerous
applications from robotics, artifi-
cial intelligence and speech rec-
ognition, t o controlling 30-ton
pneumatic hammers. security
systems and laboratory experi-
ments.
Dr Mark Varney
Electroanalytical Technology
8 Access Road
West Derby
Liverpool L12 41)
1
/V
50 PRINT (",fi 65, "ENTER FIRST
N U M B E R ' ' ;:G O SU B
10000:A= VAL (AIS):AIS="
( AIS=''" clears the string
-
variable for next input)
60 PRINT 6T
- SECOND NUMBER"::GOSUB
'!? 10000:B -VAL ( AIS) :AIS-
9 7 ,
Note the semi-colon after the
-
-
print string to ensure that the key
E N T printed after the re-
pressed is
E R to enter. This should be
quest
omitted if the keypress is to be
printed on the line below.
Using a s imilar subroutine
(omitting line 10002) to input an
entry code to use the program or
even to "enable
only e k
- b Ir canabreak the program I
think o have finally "secured" it.
I
s
Richard Gunn
t h a t
Swansea
WGlamorgan
The volume setting on the TV
has to be set fairly high to obtain
a normal sound level.
John Nash
Sheringham
Norfolk
Jolly
good news
FOLLOWING a recent article in
your publication regarding the
Valuepacks. we have had a num-
ber of letters from Dragon users
asking where they can purchase
the pack.
Unfortunately, due to lack of
dealer and distributor response
and support, w e w ill not b e
releasing this pack. However, as
aspecial offer to your readers we
would be quite happy for them to
write t o us for the individual
games and instead of paying the
normal E5.50 price from the re-
tailer, they can obtain four games
for E14.99
The games are:
Leggitt, Pedro, Cosmic Cruiser.
B.C. Bill.
We are also about t o release
Arcadia for the Dragon and we
would include this game which
will also retail for E5.50. The total
for the five games will be E18.00.
This means a saving of E7.00 on
the five games:
Colin Ashby
Beau Jolly
19A New Broadway
Ealing
London W5 5AW
Secure
program
. . sing
INANSWER to the simultaneous
pleas from M Webb and J A Gill in
October's Letters Page for A to D
converters, I would like to point
out that Electroanalytical Technol-
ogy has been marketing a general
purpose "control interface" for
some months now.
The board, which plugs into
the cartridge port, has both ana-
logue (A to D and 0 to A conver-
ters) and digital inputoutput faci-
lities (TIL, input interrupts and
relay options). For the purpose of
controlling voltage-controlled
oscillators. the D to A converter
has an 18V output voltage swing
which should easily control a
musical synthesiser. Software is
FOR SOME time I have been
trying t o "secure" a program
using information fr om y our
magazine such as that to disable
the LIST, LLIST and break keys. I
have even included a subroutine
to -
tried the "run-on-error" routine
co
lprinted in the magazine but this
d
has the effect o f freezing the
s
machine rather than running it
t
(but at least it presents access to
a program).
the
r tHere is a subroutine I use to
input from the keyboard. If INPUT
"
is
o used the break key successfully
breaks the program:
n
10000 AS-INKEYS: I F A $ -
r
THEN 10000
-
e
10001 IF AS-CHRS(13) THEN
RETURN
s
10002 PRINT AS:
e
t10003 AIS---AIS-FAS ' t o create
strings
a
10004 GOTO 10000
n Using the VAL function to con-
d the string to a number if
vert
h
necessary. For example:
a
v
e
1 ( 5)
2 (–)
3 (6)
4 (–)
5 (–)
8 (–)
7 (3)
8 (–)
9 (2)
10 ( - )
ITT
answer
WITH REFERENCE t o Gerald
Woodward's letter (October. Dra-
gon User), I too purchased the
same model ITT TV/Monitor and
initially had the same problem.
I finally solved it by trial and
error and using the pin connec-
tion diagrams provided with the
TV and also Dragon Data's "In-
formation for machine code us-
ers".
I have used a 5-pin DIN plug
with 2 x twin core wires con-
nected to the Dragon's monitor
output, one to pins 3 and 2 for the
video, and the other to pins 1 and
2 for sound ( 2 being earth).
These are connected to the TV as
follows:
Video signal to the SO 239 UHF
socket with the outer section as
earth. The sound signal is taken
to the Audio In socket with the top
pin as earth and the second wire
connected to the lower Audio-
Signal Input.
Across
the Atlantic
I AM writing on behalf of Dragon
users in the USA. The company
that originally distributed the Dra-
gon i n America i s n o longer
supporting the Dragon. There
seems to be very little hardware
or software available and as a
dealer this leaves me and my
Dragon customers in a spot.
In looking through your maga-
zine I see many sources for
products, but almost all of them
are not distributed in the United
States. I would b e mos t in-
terested in hearing from any com-
panies that have a USA distributor
or who want to give details on
shipping products to America.
Ray Sharp
Computer Corner
1044 N Baldwin Avenue
Marion, IN 46952
USA
December 1984 Dragon User 5
Software Top 10
Hunchback
O
c
e
a
n
Mystery of the Java Star
S h a r d s
Hungry Horace
M e l b o u r n e House
M r Dig
M i c r o d e a l
Cuthbert In Space
M i c r o d e a l
Kriegspiel
B
e
y
o
n
d
Chuckle Egg
A
&F
Dragon Chess
O
a
s
i
s
Ring of Darkness
W i n t e r s o f t
Eightball
M i c r o d e a i
Chart compiled by Websters Software

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