Copyright 1983 by Semper Software, 585 Glenn Ellyn Place, Glenn Ellyn, IL 60137
16K RAM required, supports T/S 2040 printer.
As you read this review, please keep in mind that I am NOT a serious programmer. While I have fiddled around with FORTH and fouled up other peoples BASIC, I lack a certain patience required for serious creation. Creating software is for gifted artists, I just slap on a quick coat of paint.
PARTIAL PASCAL is at the very least an interesting creation. Since this was to be my first experience with Pascal, I turned to the only beginners text readily available to me. “GETTING STARTED IN PASCAL PROGRAMMING” by Jose Camara & Frederick Puccetti (TAB Books, Inc., ISBN 0-8306-0188-0) aided considerably and I believe that my limited experience with FORTH also helped. PARTIAL PASCAL comes with a very well written manual containing over 50 pages. The arrangement is such that the “complete editor” and “diagnostic messages” may be referred to quickly. (And I can assure you that the Pascal novice WILL refer to them frequently!) The manual is not intended as a complete Pascal tutorial, but as a guide to this particular version of the language. The manual does contain a generous number of demonstration programs which should be studied with attention to syntax; Pascal can be as “Picky” as FORTH!
Partial Pascal loads in about 5 minutes. The loading pattern sometimes resembles the patterns experienced with some of the fast-load programs. This is a normal situation, let it run!
Once loaded, the program offers one a choice of Edit, Compile, Load and Execute. Typing in ones source program is rather slow for an experienced typist as keyboard response leaves something to be desired. Source program may be SAVEd to tape (just in case of you-know-what). The next step is to compile your program, and that is where PARTIAL PASCAL begins to show its true worth. A program occupying a single screen is compiled (literally!) in a flash if no errors are present! I timed one program containing 77 lines which was compiled in 15 seconds.
The compiled program (now referred to as “object code”) may be saved to tape from whence it may be called and executed by the third menu option. The short programs I tried were executed at a satisfying speed. A program (from the volume referenced above) which was supposed to generate a 49 number “Fibonacci sequence” began displaying negative values about the 24th number. Whether this constitutes a “bug” I will leave to those more literate in Pascal. Otherwise, the execution was beautiful!
I have spent quite a few hours playing with PARTIAL PASCAL, and I have experienced a couple of crashes. One I am certain was related to the 2040 Printer, the other may have been a tape loading error. On another occasion a short program did not compile on the first try, but did on the second without any changes being made.
Despite these problems I have mentioned, and some generalities in the “Why didn’t they. . .” category, I believe PARTIAL PASCAL is quite worthy of a place in the T/S Program Library. I intend to explore it further (Pascal adventure games, maybe) and hope someday to see a 2068 version! TSH