New and Updated Articles

Clive Sinclair developed the ZX80 and ZX81 computers in the U.K. Those two machines are the prototypes for the T/S1000. Together, they have become the most widely used personal computers in the world, outselling all others.

The ZX81 was the prototype for the now popular T/S1000. Many people in Canada own a ZX81 and belong to one of the many user groups out there. We want to publish your group’s name and address to allow new T/S1000 owners to get in touch with you. There are thousands of new owners out…

The cursor on the screen is a message from your T/S1000 to you. Inside that black square is a white letter and it has meaning. Each cursor carries a different message from the computer about what is happening.

A Timex Canada User Group is a group of people meeting together to share ideas, discuss problems and find answers all relating to the Timex Sinclair family of computers. Usually the group meets once a month, but a schedule designed to answer the members’ needs quickly emerges. The meetings often have time set aside for…

Mastering Your Timex Sinclair 1000 Personal Computer by Tim Hartnell and Dilwyn Jones. Bantam Books, Inc. 208pp pocket paperback. Available in most bookstores throughout the U.S. and Canada for $3.95.

In this programme, 4 “snails” race across your TV screen to a finish line. Can you pick a winner? You can place a bet on the snail of your choice. You start with $50 but the sky’s the limit to the amount you can win. The snails move randomly so no pattern of winners can…

This game is similar to MasterMind. You must guess a 3 digit number in eight tries. The black numbers are used to show the number of correct digits in the correct place. White shows the number of correct digits but in the wrong place.

See how close you can come to 31 without going over. The computer picks random numbers from 1 to 11.

This program cleverly uses the computer to roll a die. It is printed on the screen and is constantly and randomly changing its numbers. You press any key and the die stops at that number. You get ten rolls and the computer takes ten rolls. The higher total wins.

You can use this programme to turn your TV screen into a drawing board.

A computer program is a set of instructions set out in sequence for your computer to follow. To help you make use of your computer immediately. we have provided you with five program printouts. We will publish new programme printouts in every issue of TimeNet.

Reviews of Speedsnake, The Flight Simulation, Mr. Munchee, Frogger, Vu-Calc, and The Budgeter.

When Timex launched its computer, the company was determined to provide top quality peripherals at affordable prices. The 2040 printer completely lives up to that description.

For best results in loading or saving programmes use one of the tape recorders recommended by Timex themselves. Every computer has its own likes and dislikes when it comes to sending and receiving computer signals.

If you are experiencing problems, relax. Don’t Panic! If things are not happening exactly as you thought they should, stay cool. Don’t Panic! If you’re just about ready to throw your hands up in despair, keep calm. Don’t Panic!

This first issue of TimeNet, the Timex Canada Computer Club newsletter is provided free by Timex and the computer club. To receive this newsletter regularly, join the club by filling out the coupon on the back page.

Now that you own a T/S1000 computer, what next? Where do you go for information, help, and support products? What’s available? There is a large and growing support system available in Canada.

Charter members of Timex Canada User Club will be able to take advantage of an unbelievable offer. On your behalf, the Club has negotiated the following special membership joining bonus from Timex Canada.

This is a free sample issue of the Timex Canada Computer Club’s newsletter, TimeNet. To receive this newsletter regularly, you must join the Timex Canada Computer Club. The cost is only $14.95.

Now that you have purchased a T/S1000, let us invite you to join the Timex Canada Computer Club (TCCC).

Le Timenet est disponible en francais en format photocopié. Si vous désirez recevoir la version francais, veuillez l’indiquer sur la formule d’inscription 4 la page arriére de cette publication.

Congratulations! You own the world’s most popular computer. The T/S1000 was the first personal computer to break the $100 barrier in North America (the Smithsonian Institute took it into its permanent collection to honour that fact).

Every member of the Timex Canada Computer Club will receive eleven issues a year of TimeNet, the club’s official newsletter. In every issue of TimeNet there will be special features.

In Cannonade you are the commander (choose your own rank) of a squad of six men. You have been given as your next objective the capture of an enemy gun emplacement. Your men must outmaneuver the gun’s handlers. If they are spotted as they are advancing, they may be fired upon. When a man is…

Mystery Manor puzzle/game for multiple platforms, including 2068.

IRA’s (Individual Retirement Accounts) are good – those who can afford them. At present you can put up to $2,000. a year into such an account, and reduce your taxable income by the amount of your deposit. You can not withdraw any money until the year in which you become 59 1/2 without suffering a…

Use the SCREEN$ token to read file names from the screen following a disk CAT. I recently purchased a Larken Disk System for my TS2068 and found myself frustrated by the lack of a simple and short disk file LOAD program where I didn’t have to type each file name into a LOAD menu program.…

Did you ever do a lot of repetitive keying or wish you had programmable function keys? Here’s a clever little utility which will do just that. I found it in an old ‘SINC TIMES’ newsletter. It was originally written for the Spectrum and uses the interrupt mode 2. I’ve modified it to run on the…

Here are two commands found in other computer BASICs which are missing from Sinclair BASIC. They are GET and PUT, and are used for transferring screen images. This month’s utility will provide you with these two powerful BASIC keywords. By definition, GET obtains a specific array of bytes from the screen and stores them in…

I like to work with computer graphics on the TS2068 and Ifrequently need to look up bit patterns for User Defined Graphics characters. Knowing the bit patterns of a specific byte can also help to better understand machine code among the many other uses. The following BASIC program will print out all 256 bit patterns,…

The following bit of machine code will allow you to print any text string using a clean, fast 64 column character set. What distinguishes this program from similar ones is that instead of requiring 768 bytes to define the characters (96 characters X 8 bytes per character), this program uses half the usual number of…

My friends often encourage me to put my powerful TS2068 ROM to work for a good cause. What better way than to win the state lottery. Now, I know that lotto number generators are ubiquitous but this one really works (fast). It can be modified for your geographical requirements. All you need to know is…

Occasionally I have a need to print text in 64 column format. Most print methods in common use resort to either setting-up the 64 column mode (using machine code + OUT 255,6), using the Taswide utility, or using the OS-64 cartridge. The following bit of machine code will allow you to print any text string…

One of the fundamental concepts of computer graphics programming is that of viewport clipping, or eliminating all lines of a display outside the screen. Type in PROGRAM #1 and run it to see what happens. Notice that when any line attempts to go beyond the screen bounds you get a “B Integer out of range”…

Most computers using some form of BASIC language provide the ability to generate random numbers. Readers who have used random numbers in programs recognize that random numbers are usually in intergers (whole numbers), but the program may not require it. This is because the random number generator produces a range of numbers between 0 and…

Much has been written about 2068 problems and solutions. I have had an on-going problem with the Oliger equipment. At times the system would not initialize, or the disk drives would not run, or the system would just stop operating. Usually a jiggle of the circuit boards would temporarily get it going again. There are…

This month’s utility gives you a new WINDOW command that will place a user defined 3-D window at any location and any size on the screen using any of the eight available colors. The user can define the line, column, width, height, and color of each window. When using this utility in your own home-grown…

Machine language routine to compress a typical SCREEN$ file up to 1/2 its usual size.

If you are used to SAVEing SCREEN$ files, you may have noticed that the file size is rather large especially if you LOAD or SAVE using cassette storage medium. The file is 6912 bytes long. Another problem to overcome is that if you want to store morethan four or five SCREEN$’s in RAM memory, there…

This is a game I re-wrote from a BASIC listing for the members of the Sinclair chapter of the Motorola MicroColor Computer club back in 1981. The purpose was to show them how smooth a Screen could look on the X81. Also, this program had the HELP in the program were it should be rather…

Howdy T/S 2068 fans! I hope you have all been well. I must apologize for this article being late. I am the Editor for our users group newsletter, the RAMTOP. Let me tell you, that it takes a lot of time! I think at least one-quarter of my time must be trying to convince my…

For starters, would you please dig out your October 1986 issue of ZX-Appeal and read Wilf Rigter’s article on pg 9 entitled “Z Voice” ? Thank you! Now I only have to talk about how to assemble the hardware. The schematic has been slightly expanded in detail over the one published in Oct ’86, but…

The following is a description of the Real-Time clock section of the D.A.M. board article which appeared in Time Designs Magazine ( March/Apr11 ‘ 87 page 23). The board features a full-function real-time clock with battery back-up and 1s mappable into eight I/0 port blocks. See attached schematic diagram. 8255 PPI The 8255 PPI is…

Like many of you, I have been fascinated by the idea of speech synthesis. I even bought a GI SP0256 chip only to have it sit on a shelf, silently gathering dust. After all you need a robot or I/O board to make it work, right? Meantime others were having fun and contributing to the…

To put it simply, the Z-SI/0 Card is the best RS-232C I/F available for your T/S2068 at ANY PRICE. This rugged, well made card, which plugs directly into the expansion port of 2068, will allow you to operate any computer peripherals your that require a serial (RS-232) port on your computer. This includes printers and…

This is not a new discovery but thecause it is not mentioned 2068 User Manual, I that it is not used as widely as it might be. Variables may be included in an INPUT prompt by enclosing the prompt in parentheses. That is, with INPUT (X); B the be the prompt will the value of…

To see what VAL$ does, enter: RUN the program and see on the display what each function does. You can use this to print both your formula and its number value from a string variable. Succinctly put, VAL$ gives you the string that VAL evaluates, the right-hand side of the equation for A$, by returning…

You will recall that at the NOV. meeting there was a discussion on the use of VAL$. Robert Ryan actively entered into the discussion, and offers this further demonstration. This program is a short demonstration of one use for VAL$. It inputs a name and then will print the first, last or middle name from…

One of the most powerful, and (Oh, Yes,) useful instructions of the Timex-Sinclair computers is the VAL function Unfortunately, it is also unique to the Timex-Sinclair computers. Te VAL function evaluates an arbitrary numerically-valued string. It only returns an error C, in the case that the string argument does not evaluate to a number. Apparently,…

Many people who use the 2068 have generally no idea what the commands OPEN# and CLOSE# are for and what they can do. These commands were intended for use with the Microdrives, but we can use them an entirely different way. By using the OPEN# command you open up what is called a ‘stream’, or…

What is POINT? Our 2068 manual simply states that POINT tells you whether a PLOT point specified by coordinates is PAPER color (0), or INK color (1). The coordinates for x range from o to 255 and y ranges from o to 175. Note: input other than PLOT also is recognized, but the results are…

Assembly routines that enable error reporting, character printing, beeping, screen manipulation, drawing, string handling, and numeric operations efficiently.

DEF FN and FN commands define and call functions for math operations, string manipulations, and Boolean logic evaluations in BASIC programming.

On page five of the April issue of The Data Expansion (Timex Tips) a routine to convert binary to decimal was given in response to a question about using BIN in programming mode. This short article describes the format to use to make this function work: When you enter the BIN function in command mode,…

You said that you needed to locate a specific variable in the BASIC VARS area of memory in order to use the data in a machine code program. The following procedure will allow the transfer of the location and size of a simple variable to a BASIC program. If you want to locate a variable…

We had quite a few enquiries at the last meeting on using a large printer from Basic. I have given a solution, verbally, before but it seems there is still a great of confusion. Here is an example program and description to help pave your path to gaining the use you desire from your printer.…

After I write the first draft of an article, I go through it, mercilessly scratching out phrases, sentences, and even paragraphs that aren’t absolutely necessary. I do this so as not to take up too much space in the newsletter; others must also have the chance to speak their mind. While this occasionally obscures some…

Anyone who hesitated to build my Universal LROS/AROS Development Board, (SINCUS NEWS, Nov. 1984), because of the cost may want to look again. Although it can run with 2764 EPROMS (or 8264 EEPROMs, if you’re rich) its real power is shown when it’s run with 6264 RAMs. In the LROS mode, you can load in:…

Ultra-Easy Designer Graphics by Paul Bingham When I first ordered my 2068 back in, well, what seems eons ago, one thing I looked forward to most was the machine’s touted User Defined Graphics capabilities. What a boon to an old ZX81 programmer this would be! On the face of it, UDGs looked pretty exciting. No…

Amongst the differences between the Spectrum and the 2068, there are the 2068’s video modes. These modes are not directly reached by BASIC. To use them, we must write some routines in machine language. This machine code toolkit is for the mode called “extended color”. If we type in normal mode: CIRCLE 125,87,50:PLOT 0,87:DRAW 1,0,255…

Program to make User Defined Graphics.

Poking MODE The 2068 User Manual indicates that the system variable MODE, at address 23617, specifies the cursor (K, L, C, G, or E), and that “Poking the variable will have no lasting effect.” This is not entirely correct. First, the contents of MODE are determined as follows: CONTENTS BIT SET CURSOR (S) 0 NONE…

First the Colors I modified Paul Banisik’s “Second display file initialization routine” from the April RAMTOP (1985), and incorporated it into a BASIC program that would poke attribute values into the second display file. To access this display mode, type “OUT 255,2”. In this mode, the computer looks at the first display file (D_File_1) for…

Many people have asked me which computer is the “best” computer. That has always been a tough question to answer. There ara so many computers on the market, so many different software packages for each, The normal response is to say that the computer that I first purchased – the TIMEX – in the best…

This month the program ideas and hints are from T/S 2068 Basics and Beyond. I hope you find them useful. This program is written to display the power of the “POINT” command. It will draw a maze; then check for walls with the POINT command, as you guide the dot through the maze with the…

First these are machine code programs I got from ZX Computing Magazine and in fact all five programs came from the magazine. The first will break a machine code program that got lost in a loop. The keyboard is scanned by using the interrupt and if break is pressed then it returns to Basic. The…

If you have a program in which does a lot of printing to the screen but at certain times you would like it to print to a printer you can do this. OPEN #2, “P” To turn it off again do this. CLOSE #2 If you want to delete a length of code and it…

The enclosed hardcopy of my dilemma is rather self explanatory, however just to clarify. Line 10: I want “capacitance” to flash but only until the input is printed. Then it is to remain on the screen in a non-flashing situation. What ever you can do to help would certainly be appreciated. Sincerely, Dave Trevor, Phoenix,…

Computer users are painfully aware of the need to input information perfectly if a computer program is to understand them. Here’s a short subroutine that adds intelligence to your programs to make them user friendly. It will compare a user’s input to a list of words that a computer is expecting. If an exact match…

To print a digit on the 2068 you must PEEK 23684 + 256 * PEEK 23685. This gives the starting addresss of the display file and must be increased by increments of 256 up until a value of 2048. To print more than one digit you can increase the original address after storing it in…

Are you tired of having to use the 2068’s ON-OFF power switch to reset the computer? Read on, there is a solution. Do you have & Larken disk system and also one common AC power switch to turn on your computer, disk drive, disk controller, monitor. monitor, and all other peripherals? If you do, you’ve…

Most programs require user interaction through the keyboard, and use the INPUT or INKEYS functions to do this job. This article will discuss some alternative ways to input through the keyboard. Method #1 Hardware generated interrupts are used in the 2068 to update the TV frames counter and to scan the keyboard for pressed keys.…

Program demonstrates printing with variable-width fonts using PLOT/DRAW.

The two joysticks are controlled via Register 14 (I/O Port A) of the Programmable Sound Generator Chip (see Sections 2.1.6 and 2.1.7). Address and respectively. data are passed via Ports 0F5H and 0F6H The joysticks are read by first addressing Register 14 in the PSG by writing a 14 (OEH) to Port 0F5H. data is…

In developing an analog joystick using the ZIP compiler, 1 found that the routine included in the instructions for reading the joysticks is silly. The same machine code is produced by the compiler with the BASIC functions and is usable by the BASIC interpreter.

One of the advantages the newer, bigger computers like the ATARI ST and AMIGA have over the TS2068 class of computers is the “User Interface” that their bigger memory and high speed affords them…specifically, such things as a mouse to sweep a cursor around the screen, and a really nice menu structure that “drops down”…

Often we get stymied by having a character array file having a wrong dimension for the job we want to do. This tool was made to convert TWO DIMENSION CHARACTER ARRAY FILES to THREE DIM FILES. With minor adjustments the program can be used to convert other dimensions to other dimensions. The program was crafted…

SCREEN$ is a very useful function on the TS2068 but it has a few limitations that are well known. It has two principal uses. One is to SAVE a screen to tape. This is explained on pages 160 to 161 and appendix A of the manual. From these sources we learn that… The 6912 bytes…

Schematics and machine code to expand the 2068 RAM with port buffer, clock/calendar, 56K or 64K, expansion bank controller and proper address decoding for EXROM.

Program find and save VARS for Larken DOS or cassette.

TS-2068 PROGRAMING TIPS Reprinted from Synapse 1st + 2nd Displays You can use this routine to move the Function Dispatcher so you can utilize the 2nd Dispatcher. After the 1st use, you then have to use these commands, otherwise you will BOMB OUT! 22nd + 23rd Display Lines If you would like to use the…

MEMORY IMPROVES WITH AGE? Crazy? Perhaps so, but survival of our favorite antique TS-2068 computer depends on it to a degree. Two advances are primarily responsible for this. Both extend the amount and speed of available memory, over and beyond that in the DOCK bank. Disc drives improve speed, accessiblity and convenience pver tape recording.…

A major barrier to fixing the problems in the HOME ROM is one of access. Even though the ROM is socketed, you still have to open up the case and risk damage. This article shows how to replace the HOME ROM without touching a screw. It is not really necessary to replace ROM with EPROM.…

A utility for: data base generation, keyboard reading, character concatenation, screen display, full editing This is an audacious attack upon the most famous weaknesses of the TS-2068, slow data input and poor screen editing. The result is a INPUT SECTION of programming that can be used for many purposes. Programmers have overcome the problems mentioned…

In the preceding issue of QuarTerS we pointed out how SCREEN$ sees various characters and learned that it recognizes only those having an ASCII code of 32 to 127. In this lesson, we digress from Print Position to learn more about how to program around some of these short comings. First of all, consider the…

The Faint-of-Heart Zone Stay away from advanced video modes at any cost! Who needs them? Besides, what we can already do is all anyone really needs. The screen is divided up into 24 rows of 32 characters, each of which can have 8 ink and paper colors plus bright and flash attributes. In addition, writing…

You have Bill Pedersen’s schematics, etc. He, of course, could not physically try them out so I tried out his ideas on my own bypass board until we got it working. Enclosed are the schematics of my version. There doesn’t seem to be any similarity between the two versions but in fact the logic is…

The West Coast Sinclair Show was held in Union City, CA, on 5 June 1999, one week after the East Coast Sinclair Show. Most of the European attendees arrived the Monday before the show and spent the week visiting San Francisco. The day before the show was by Bar-B-Q at my house before the show…

A major barrier to fixing the problems in INTERNAL ROM is one of access Even though the ROM is socketed, you still have to open the case This risks damage, and even then, replacing ROM with EPROM requires wiring modifications This article shows how to replace HOME ROM and EXROM without touching a screw. It…

Part III Before discussing the roll of the SCLD in bank switching, it is desirable to summarize the known functions. 1. Screen Maintenance This is the highest priority operation. The HOME RAM with addresses in chunks 2 & 3 (DRAM) belongs to the SCLD. The CPU has to beg permission to access it. If access…

Welcome back! The first installment might have given you the idea that machine code was necessary for understanding bank switching. Would I do that to you? On occasion, machine code will be presented to support “fixes”, but if you don’t actually make the fixes you can skip it without any loss. We previously discussed how…

What is bank switching? The TS 2068 contains a thin black rectangular chip that is the “boss” — the Central Processing Unit (CPU). It is of the popular variety Z80A which has a long history of success. It runs just about everything but it takes orders from you. The boss has a filing system in…

I ran into something I thought was strange. Try this: Run then rewind the tape and NEW. This does not work! For some reason, if you SAVE a string using the DATA token, the string is saved and then can be loaded back into the computer, but not in a form that can be used.…

Circle Fill CAPS Mode

Try this for the 2068. This address is used to select the permanent colors for the screen. It could be useful in your programing. Line 50 sets the screen for white paper and black ink. If this is a 7 you will have the oposite. Anything over 127 will be flashing. If you look more…

Overprinting A demonstration of the TS2068’s OVER and INVERSE print attributes. A base string A$ is drawn at a fixed screen position, then a second string B$ is drawn on top of it in each of the four combinations of OVER 0/OVER 1 and INVERSE 0/INVERSE 1, with each result labelled by the o and…

At the January meeting of CATUG, Bob Swoger said he would like to see a new article by me for our newsletter. Steve Cooper said, “Why don’t you write about some of the special things you can do with the keys.” I was puzzled about what Steve was referring to, then I remember something I…

Anyone who uses a wordprocessing program has done it. Greeting card programs even do it. But what if I want to do it in my own programs? If you are not lost yet, what I am speaking of is Left, Center and Right justification of text lines on a screen display or on hardcopy printout.…

How to Get Straight Columns When Working with Dollar Amounts Once again, programming proves that necessity is the mother of invention. When I began writing my credit card payment program, I knew that I would need a subroutine that would display a ‘dollars and cents’ number on the screen so that all of the numbers…

After The Editor read thru Syd Wyncoop’s excellent dissertation on using direct ink/paper/flash commands embedded within program lines and trying out his suggestions, I took his advice to experiment. I found that about 2 more bytes would be required to revert to normal ink/paper if more than 1 line was involved and I wanted to…

Please refer to Syd Wyncoop’s article on Color Codes in the January issue and my article in the December issue (More On Attributes). I recently read more on this subject that sheds additional light on the use of color attributes. This was found in The Art Of Programming The ZX Spectrum by M James, an…

So you have tried to sort out variables in a long program to determine what the author is doing and maybe make your own changes. And what about using the same variables for different uses? It gets quite confusing to say the least. This program from “The Timex Sinclair 2068” book will give the line…

This utility when MERGED with a BASIC program will list the flow of the program. If you want to see just how your program works, key in GOTO 9800. First, the machine code will load, then you will be asked for the starting line number. Key in the line number you want the flow to…

Key in this short listing to trace the variables in your program. Place it in front of your program and GO TO 5 to use it. You will get a list of the lines that the variable you are looking for is in. BASIC Listing

QUESTION: What is the STR$ function used for? ANSWER: The argument (the expression following the keyword) of STR$ must be a number or a variable that stands for a number (like X). The STR$ takes that number and changes it to a string and assigns it to a string variable (like X$). It can now…

Have you ever been frustrated with a program that had run-time errors caused by bad data, parameters, or values? Consider TOGGLING as a potential solution. Some programs which are designed to receive data from keyboard entry endeavor to edit the entered data to prevent subsequent errors. This can be simple or complex programming, it may…

This is part of a program submitted by Joan Kealy, a member of ISTUG. The entire programs are part of our public domain library which is available to all members. We encourage other members and readers to submit programs to the library. We are particularly looking for ones for the TS1000, the QL and the…

BURT GERMAIN has some Tandon TM-101-4 disk drives for sale at $30.00 each. These are new, full height, 80 track, quad density, 96-TPI, 5-1/4 inch disk drives which come with a manual. Ed Grey tells me that he has successfully used these drive with the JLO Disk System. Send a check for $30.00 per drive…

Joan Kealy has reported the she recently spoke with a Timex Customer Service Rep. During which she was told that ai though they no longer will service out-of-warranty computers, they they will continue to honor warranties to the best of their ability. Ron Havlen (4307 Chambers Rd, Horseheads, NY 14845) has Modem-7 and IMP operating…

The RAMTOP reports that the Nov or Dec issue of Radio Electronics magazine has ZX-81 kits (NEW!) advertized for $49.95! Robert Parrish has announced that he is creating a nation wide user group called The Great American Sinclair User Group. It is suppose to be oriented to telecommunications. So if you desire more information call…

If the print in this column seems different from usual, it is because this article is being produced on the new 2068 computer from Timex. Sam Barron has received two sample machines from corporate headquarters and he has graciously allowed TIMELINEZ to borrow one. This is probably the first published matter in the world to…

It has been said here before that the computer is a number oriented machine. Every thing that it does, it does by the manipulation of numbers. Basic is a language akin to English, devised solely for the benefit of us humans. The computer itself doesn’t need Basic, and early models of computers did not have…

In the preceding chapter we learned that logic is number oriented, and that conditions which are TRUE are replaced by the computer with a logic value of 1, and conditions which are FALSE are replaced by a logic value of 0. Program lines with statements containing a single logic condition usually present no problem to…

This series of articles is called Timex Logic rather than computer logic because not all computers treat and/or use logic as fully as the Timex computer can. Some of the logic operations described in this series cannot be used on many other computers, including one fruity one, widely pushed onto our public school systems. This…

If you are like me, you have never used the VAL$ function. There is no good explanation in any of the manuals. The “Quick reference guide” states that the function evaluates a numeric expression without its bounding quotes as a string expression. This is only a partial truth. The function can be used on any…

In January SDU Bill discussed the use of SCREEN$ files as a means of conserving RAM in programs such as SMART TEXT. Each SCREEN$, of course, takes 6912 bytes in disk file space or two cylinders in SDOS. The following demo listing shows how up to the maximum of 704 characters in a 32-column text…

One Monday morning at the Timex Literature Department Mary was given a task that would normally been assigned to Gus, the Mathematician. Gus had his usual Monday morning problem. Now Mary majored in Greek Literature, not Greek Mathematics symbols. But, never the less, Mary was given the task of writing the part of Appendix A…

For many of us, computer logic is a bit difficult to understand, and articles like the one reputed to be by Sharon Z. Aker in the July ’88 issue of UPDATE muddies the water more. On page 14, under the title of Priorty, the article states that NOT B<C is interpreted as (NOT B)>C. This…

Reprinted from CTM, March/April 1985 Some time ago when first attempting to translate a “SPECTRUM” program for operation in the TS-2068, I was exposed to a BASIC command that I had not see before — “IN”. This aroused my curiosity and I began to work with different values and methods of writing the command as…

Timex planned to manufacture and sell a 3068 computer with 1 meg. of memory, 256 colors, and virtual memory for a target price of $199.95. This was just one of the bits of information that was revealed by Mr. Billy Skyrme, the President of Psion America, formerly of the Timex Computer Corp., during the Feb.…

Last time we found that every BASIC for every computer contains a “BRICK WALL” that can prevent the computer from doing what you want. Since the wall is different for every computer, we concentrated on the TS1000 and we found a couple of places where we could “smash into it”. As mentioned last time, I…

Here’s a nice beginner’s project for owners of ZX-81s, TS 1000’s and TS 1500’s. Although numerous keyboard expansion articles have been published, all require opening the computer to get at five signals that don’t go to the rear connector. This circuit uses a little extra hardware to produce five equivalent points, so the computer needn’t…

I really hate this damn machineI really wish they’d sell it.It never does just what I wantbut only what I tell it!! — graffiti written onuniversity computer Actually, that poem is a bit optimistic. Even when you tell your computer to do something, it may instead do something else. It knows nothing about the decimal…

“When I use a word”, Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, “it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less.” “The question is”, said Alice, “whether you can make words mean so many different things.” “The question is”, said Humpty Dumpty, “which is to be master, that’s all.” — Lewis…

Shoot everything that moves!!! Don’t let them pass you by or you’ll lose points. Features the famous 3-WAY JOYSTICK SYSTEM! Loading name WEIRDBALLSProgram type Arcade gameWritten by Eric Boisvert

You have heard of shoot’em up games? Well, how about a splash’em down game? Yes, a major breakthrough in computer technology has brought us this weird game!!! All you have to do is to open your hand and let go of the balloon! The faster the pedestrians (notice Eric is one of them, go get…