ZX/TS
Quick Tip #1- Next time you have some epoxy mixed up, take the time to glue the key into the slot on your edge connectors (RAM Packs, ect.) by placing just a bit of glue at the top and bottom end of the key. I’ve had a few of these fall out and the results of misaligning a RAM pack could be disastrous when you power up. (Sinclair Canada does this on all their 16K RAMs.)
Quick Tip #2- If you are using Radio Shack TP-10 Printer Paper (Cat. No. 26-1332) in your 2040 printer, put two pennies at each end of the roll to keep the smaller TP-10 roll feeding evenly. (How’s that for a cheap fix?)
Quick Tip #3- If you are still experiencing RAM pack wobble and the resulting “white-out”, place some rubber or felt “sticky pads” under the rear two feet of your ZX/TS. This allows the RAM pack to hang off the edge connector, thus not wiggling loose as you press the keyboard.
Tip #4- Substitutions: Many tokens on the ZX/TS computers have numeric values and will be interpreted as such while a program is running. Since tokens are usually stored in a single byte while numbers take up 6 bytes or so, this trick can save quite a bit of space at the expense of slowing down the speed at which the program runs. For example, rather than “LET Z=0”, LET Z= “NOT PI”, “SIN PI”, or “TAN PI”. Likewise, SGN PI = 1, INT PI = 3, COS PI = -1, PEEK NOT PI = 211, PEEK PI = 255, PEEK PEEK PI = 135, LEN STR$ PI = 9, CODE STR$ PI = 31, INT EXP PI = 23, and PEEK PEEK RND = 209. No doubt there are plenty more of these, and for numbers such as 2, which I have not found an expression for yet, use the function VAL. Instead of LET X = 2, LET X = VAL “2”. A whole equation can also be surrounded by VAL, such as LET Z = VAL “2+(404/17)”. You will be suprised at the memory saved by utilizing this trick.
Tip #5- Word Substitutes: In Print statements, strings and prompts, use keywords and tokens to save memory also. Instead of a line like- 20 PRINT “ENTER TODAY’S DATE”, use- 20 PRINT “INPUT TODAY’S DATE”, which saves 4 bytes. Do this by using the keyword THEN after the first quote mark, typing the I key for INPUT, and then deleting the THEN token. Since it is within the quote marks, the computer simply prints it. AND, STOP, THEN, NOT, FAST and RUN are also good candidates to use in this way. Experiment with these and have fun.