[News] BBC BASIC Beta Testing - 2009/03/06 r720

[lafferjm]

Nice job I really like this thing. So far I have had it crash a couple of times but I am still trying to replicate it so I can let you know what is going wrong. And also there is an error in your documentation. It says alpha+F=> when it really equals <. Also I am using revision 668 on a ti-84+ se and the catalog doesn't work.

[benryves]

And also there is an error in your documentation. It says alpha+F=> when it really equals <.

Cheers, I got F and G backwards in the documentation. I'll correct that.

Also I am using revision 668 on a ti-84+ se and the catalog doesn't work.

Aye, there is no catalogue feature. I removed this from the docs a while back. :\

New version contains the following corrections and features:

• < and > swapped in the keypad documentation.
• Inverted parallelograms are filled correctly.
• REPLACE$ and REVERSE$ routines added to the assembly API.

[calc84maniac]

When I try to use the catalog, it does seem to be doing something... it pauses for a few seconds but nothing else very obvious happens. (This is on a TI-84+SE, r668 I believe.)

[benryves]

What do you mean by a "catalog"? 2nd+0 or *DIR?

[calc84maniac]

Code: Select all

*CATALOG

[benryves]

*CAT is an alias for *DIR, so what that's doing is searching all variables for one named ALOG. Compare with *CAT*.PRG.

[benryves]

The latest version makes one minor correction to the keypad input code.

[bwang]

r684 won't run at 15 mhz on my 84+ SE.

[benryves]

I'm an idiot. Thanks for reporting that. The new download should have fixed my mistake.

[benryves]

I've discovered a whole bunch of file-related bugs; using any file handle opened via OPENOUT, getting a file's PTR# or setting a file's PTR# are very likely to trigger a crash!

I am currently working on a series of fixes, sorry for any inconvenience.

[b-flat]

I have a couple suggestions:

1) Would it be possible to have one of the several exit commands check to see if you have modified your program before you quit (to avoid accidental data loss). AKA, it would be like windows. This can be easily achieved by having a bit that is set anytime you edit the loaded program and checking to see if the bit is set when you exit.

2) I got an "error: disk full" (I think it was on v588, but I'm not sure how to replicate it), when I tried to save my program one time. The problem was that my program somehow got deleted out of this and I had no way to save my current file because the "disk was full." I had over 500k of archive space available at the time and over 20K RAM.

Thanks (as a related note, I updated to the latest version today as well).

[bwang]

With the new version (688) the link port often gets set to a value that causes the calculator to freeze. I have to go to CalcSys to manually change the value of the link port to fix it.

[benryves]

First up, please download the new version which fixes some major crashing bugs in the file handling code. It also adds the EXT# statement (lets you set the size of a file as opposed).

1) Would it be possible to have one of the several exit commands check to see if you have modified your program before you quit (to avoid accidental data loss). AKA, it would be like windows. This can be easily achieved by having a bit that is set anytime you edit the loaded program and checking to see if the bit is set when you exit.

I don't think this would be possible. What is in memory is a copy of the contents of the file, not the actual file, and as such I can't tell if it's been modified or not (as once loaded BBC BASIC forgets about the underlying file). I also can't tell the difference between entering a line of program code and entering a line of test via INPUT (both go via the same routine). I'll be thinking about it, though!

2) I got an "error: disk full" (I think it was on v588, but I'm not sure how to replicate it), when I tried to save my program one time. The problem was that my program somehow got deleted out of this and I had no way to save my current file because the "disk was full." I had over 500k of archive space available at the time and over 20K RAM.

In this instance, this may have been one of the serious bugs in the file handling code that has now been fixed, but it may be a more concerning problem. If you have lots of files, BBC BASIC may end up allocating *all* of the available memory for itself (it normally only allocates up to address $C000), which would leave no room for new files. When you SAVE over an existing file it first deletes the old one then writes the new one. If the new file was slightly larger than the old one it would delete the old one but not be able to save the new one!
Whilst I don't know if there will be an ideal solution to get around this issue, I can at least put the free space check before the old file is deleted, which should at least preserve the old file if there is insufficient room for the new one.

With the new version (688) the link port often gets set to a value that causes the calculator to freeze. I have to go to CalcSys to manually change the value of the link port to fix it.

Did you try using any of the ADVAL functions? I may have fixed it in r700.

[benryves]

Have a nibbles game I threw together in an evening. (If it seems a slow, wait for the second attempt where I turn the speed up).

[calc84maniac]

Wow... that almost beats pure basic!