27 Mar
2002
27 Mar
'02
7:09 a.m.
At 11:17 27/03/2002, you wrote:
Not really. It's LOCal handling is (always was) pants, it doesn't have
enough variable types, it won't do objects, and it needs line numbers. All
of which, I believe, are fixable with add-ons, none of which I have.
It was also a shame it was impossible to run multiple interpreters,
although that shortcoming was (partially) fixed by the legendary Simon
Goodwin with MultiBASIC.
Point taken. I forget, did one have to do anything with the registers, or
was it a simple case of calling the appropriate TRAP?
Good point. I never had PE (or ICE); still haven't. I must get around to
getting it one day, just to see what all the fuss was about...
Don't forget, the drives themselves were very expensive, especially the
Winchesters.
--
Cheers, Ade.
Be where it's at, B-Racing!
http://b-racing.com
> > This
and that is still was a BASIC machine with no real disks.
>Come on, first of all, a basic like the QL Super Sasic is quite
>different from everything else you know ... QDOS is a multitasking
>OS, and the Basic incooperates all features to use the windowing
>and taskingsystem from within. it is jut not comperable to all the
>MS-Basic crap found on 90% of all old homecomputers.
Hmm...
It *was* revolutionary for 1984, this is true.
And is still one of the best Basic around. However, QDos
is not a
/true/ multitasking OS; it relied on co-operative time-slicing. So, one
badly written task could hog the whole machine (not uncommon...).
Well, true multitasking is as soon as one can have severale
tasks running quasi parallel. Cooperative or not doesn't matter.
In fact I'm a big fan of cooperative system - way less OS overhead
in terms of CPU usage. SuperBASIC was
- still is - fantastic. It far outstripped ALL versions of
BASIC available at the time, and (IMNSHO) was not really superceded until
Visual Basic 2 or 3 - and even then, VB's main improvement was the forms
designer. OTOH, the "window" facility was vastly over-rated.
Unfortunately,
however, it wasn't possible to harness the
tasking system from within
SuperBASIC - that required machine code.
With the 'Pointer Environment' (?) the QL was way ahead. >And adding
a disc controler wasn't that expansive (720K 3.5"), if
>your need did ourtgrow the microdrives.
Erm, it did back then... A basic single-disc
system (3.5", 720K) +
interface cost circa GBP400. The first Winchester disc systems (5MB) cost
over GBP1000 when first available.
Which was a total rip of in both cases. Building a FDC for the
QL bus was straight foreward aut of the design handbook.