
       ICTARI USER GROUP             ISSUE 49                 August 1997

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                     *   m   a   g   a   z   i   n   e   *

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                       I C T A R I   U S E R   G R O U P
       G Greenway, 8 Denmark Road, Reading, Berks, RG1 5PA. 0118 756668
                 http://www.elis.demon.co.uk/ictari/ictari.htm
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                              INDEX FOR ISSUE 49                                                        
                              ==================
                              
                ASSEMBLY        Article on hacking / cracking
            
                GFA             GEM graphics functions

                HISOFT BASIC    GEM slider demo 
            
                MISC            STOOP2 Beta -Falcon boot manager
            
                STOS            Stereogram creator                                   
                                                                                                                                                                         
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                                   EDITORIAL
                                   =========
                                   
  Hello again,
    This issue has come out at just the time when next issue should have
done. This has been due  to me taking a short  holiday. I'll try to  get
another issue out near  to the end of  the month, hopefully that  should
bring things back on track. In the meantime, for anyone who hasn't heard
yet, there will be two more Atari shows. The Birmingham show will be  at
the National Motorcycle museum on the  18th of October, the London  show
will be on  the next day  at the  Osterley Hotel, 764  Great West  Road,
Middlesex. Call Goodman's on 01782 335650 for more details.                                                      
                                    
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                                CORRESPONDENCE
                                ==============
                                
To:     ICTARI
From:   David Comeskey
Re:     Serial Ports and MIDI

  Dear User group,
    I am, at the moment writing a music editor program for the Atari ST,
in GFA BASIC V3.5. I have a problem in that I want to support a hardware
devide called C-LAB EXPORT for which the RS-232 port is used to drive  3
additional MIDI out ports, but since the highest baud rate I can set the
serial port to is 19,200 baud and  the rate for MIDI is 31,250 baud  the
EXPORT ports aren't fast enough.

    I wonder if you have any  knowledge either of the Atari serial  port
chip or any fixes or programming  "tricks" or books which might help  me
do this. Certain sequencer programs like Creater and Cubase support this
device, so it is possible.

I have an  assembly language  development program  and some  programming
knowledge, so I  can, if  needed, run  a machine  language routine  from
within BASIC.

                        Yours Faithfully,
                            David Comeskey.

    ------------------------------------------------------------------- 

From:   Giles Greenway
To:     David Comeskey
Re:     Serial ports and MIDI

    I know very  little about MIDI,  but I  think the only  way you  are
going to speed up  the serial port is  by fitting the RSVE  modification
from Systems Soloutions. Have you  tried contacting C-Lab ? Does  Cubase
support the Export device on a standard  ST ? C-Lab noticed a number  of
flaws in the ST and Falcon, which  is why they released the Mark X.  Can
anyone else be more helpfull ?

    ------------------------------------------------------------------- 

To:     ICTARI (Via WEB-pages)
From:   Ritchie Andrews drew2@primenet.com
Re:     Scrolling in windows

    Does anyone  have a  routine to  do smooth  scrolling within  a  GEM
window, is it even possible ?

    -------------------------------------------------------------------

From:   Giles Greenway
To:     Ritche Andrews
Re:     Scrolling in windows

    I've yet to see a scrolling window. Is  this for a game ? All I  can
say is that the whole point of using GEM is to achieve compatability and
a degree of  resolution independence. You  will have to  follow all  the
usual GEM rules  about window updates.  I wonder if  using the GEM  STOS
extension GEMMA could help. The version that came with the last  edition
of ICTARI is already out of date. If your program forces the user to use
ST low res, then  the point of multi-tasking  or using desk  accessories
will be lost, and you might as well abandon GEM. It depends on what  you
want to scroll and its complexity.  To be worthwhile running under  GEM,
your program  will have  to cope  with different  resolutions that  have
different numbers of bit-planes. Can anyone help ?

    -------------------------------------------------------------------

From:   Andy Wilson
To:     ICTARI
Re:     Lattice C

    I have just managed  to get hold  of Lattice C  and, as a  beginner,
would be grateful for any help or info that you deem might be of use  to
me.                                                                                                                                       
    
    In particular I think I'm in need of a book which fully desribes the
principals in layman's  terms. I'm  finding the LC  manuals hard  going.
There are so many questions that I want answered, but don't know who  to
ask.

I'm using a  Falcon 4Mb TOS  4.04 and  running LC from  a 135Mb  Syquest
cartridge. My  machine  has  powerUp2,  but to  my  knowledge  no  maths
co-proscessor is fitted. Do any of the above make any difference ?  What
is the ideal set-up  for C programming  ? I feel  that if I'm  confident
with the set-up then that's one less  thing to worry about. I hope  this
isn't asking too much, and hopefully with a little help I'll be able  to
contribute something to the group.

    -------------------------------------------------------------------

From:   Giles Greenway
To:     Andy Wilson
Re:     Lattice C

    You've asked in the right place.  Your memory and HD space are  more
than enough. -Just run the program on the install disk, and say you want
it to install  everything. -You have  enough space. I  *can* recomend  a
couple of books, "Illustrating C" by Donald Alcock (Cambridge University
Press, ISBN 0-521-42483-6) is a  good introduction to the language,  but
you  might  want  some  ST-specfic  texts  as  well.  Clayton   Walnum's
"C-Manship Complete" goes into quite  a bit of detail about  ST-graphics
and GEM,  but  it  is rather  old.  You  might think  about  the  "Atari
Compendium" as a  complete ST  reference (also available  as a  CD-rom).
Both these books might be rather hard to find, I suggest a visit to  one
of the Atari shows, or try the FaST club.

    I fitted a  co-processor to my  Mark-X so I  could run Linux.  (Sore
point, I'm still waiting for the  CD...) I can't remember what  PowerUp2
is ! Remember,  if you  want to  use any  floating point  maths in  your
programs, you must select the  "software IEEE" option from the  compiler
options menu. The  default option is  no maths libraries  at all.  There
have been plenty of C articles in ICTARI, and my efforts show what *not*
to do. Enjoy....

    -------------------------------------------------------------------

From:   ICTARI c/o Paul pickering
To:     Everyone
Re:     ST-mags

    Does anyone have any copies of ST-Review or ST-user that they would
be willing to sell to Paul ? Offers to:

    24 Leith Gardens,
    Tanfield Lea,
    Stanley,
    Co Durham,
    DH9 9LZ.

    -------------------------------------------------------------------

From:   Giles Greenway
To:     Stephen Bruce
Re:     Monitor Cables

[For those who haven't been following  the plot, Stephen had aquired  an
Atari SC124 colour monitor with a mangled cable. John Nicholas Oakes was
able to offer a replacement cable, but  by then a description of the  ST
pin-outs in ICTARI and some  inspired guess-work enabled Stephen to  fix
the cable. Now read on...]
 
    Hello, I've managed to find another WEB-site that deals with cables.
The ST section is still  very much under construction,  but as far as  I
can tell, the pin-outs from the ST correspond directly with those of the
monitor. For those who care the WEB-site is at:

    http://ftp.sunet.se/pub/etext/hwb/hwb.html        

I don't know how one would connect a video to the monitor, but here's  a
description of a monitor to video  SCART cable complete with naff  ASCII
art:

Video -> TV Scart Cable (21 Pin Scart Male -> 21 Pin Scart Male)

    2   4   6   8   10  12  14  16  18  20
 _____________________________________________
/                                            /
|   ||  ||  ||  ||  ||  ||  ||  ||  ||  ||  /
|                                          / 21
| ||  ||  ||  ||  ||  ||  ||  ||  ||  ||   |
\_________________________________________/
  1   3   5   7   9   11  13  15  17  19
  
                        :  TV  : VCR  :   
------------------------+------+------+------------------------
Audio Right Out         :  1   :  2   :    Audio Right In
------------------------+------+------+------------------------
Audio Right In          :  2   :  1   :    Audio Right Out
------------------------+------+------+------------------------
Audio Left Out          :  3   :  6   :    Audio Left In
------------------------+------+------+------------------------
Audio Left In           :  6   :  3   :    Audio Left Out
------------------------+------+------+------------------------
Audio Ground            :  4   :  4   :    Audio Ground 
------------------------+------+------+------------------------
Red                     :  15  :  15  :    Red
------------------------+------+------+------------------------
Red Ground              :  13  :  13  :    Red Ground
------------------------+------+------+------------------------  
Green                   :  11  :  11  :    Green
------------------------+------+------+------------------------
Green Ground            :  9   :  9   :    Green Ground
------------------------+------+------+------------------------
Blue                    :  7   :  7   :    Blue
------------------------+------+------+------------------------
Blue Ground             :  5   :  5   :    Blue Ground
------------------------+------+------+------------------------
Status / 16:9           :  8   :  8   :    Status / 16:9
------------------------+------+------+------------------------
Reserved                :  10  :  10  :    Reserved
------------------------+------+------+------------------------
Reserved                :  12  :  12  :    Reserved
------------------------+------+------+------------------------
Fast Blanking Ground    :  14  :  14  :    Fast Blanking Ground
------------------------+------+------+------------------------
Fast Blanking           :  16  :  16  :    Fast Blanking
------------------------+------+------+------------------------
Video Out Ground        :  17  :  18  :    Video In Ground
------------------------+------+------+------------------------
Video In Ground         :  18  :  17  :    Video Out Ground
------------------------+------+------+------------------------
Video Out               :  19  :  20  :    Video In
------------------------+------+------+------------------------
Video In                :  20  :  19  :    Video Out
------------------------+------+------+------------------------
Ground                  :  21  :  21  :    Ground
------------------------+------+------+------------------------

    Hope that helped...
        
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From:   Jason J Railton
To:     Everyone
Re:     SwingShot game demo

  My SwingShot game  demo ended  up in  last month's  STOS folder.  It's
actually written in machine code. The  only STOS code was some  routines
to generate  the data  tables used  in the  game (including  the  baddie
flight paths).

  There's an awful lot of code in the .I and .S files that people  might
be interested in.

  Anyway, the  copy I  got on  the ICTARI  disk was  corrupt, and  froze
during loading. I hope no-one else had this problem.

  I'm a little short of things to send in at the moment, but I did  find
this Autostereogram generator I wrote in STOS several years ago...
                      
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To:     ICTARI
From:   Mathew Bacon
Re:     Graphics formats

[This letter  was partially  answered  in Ictari  48,  but I  forgot  to
include Mathew's original letter ! Here it is. Sorry, GRG.]

  Hello,
    May I start by saying, I was really impressed when I stumbled across
your site ! (thanks to Atari Computing!) well done! - ok I'll cut to the
chase!

I am a HiSoft BASIC programmer and have written several useful utilities
for the Atari ST/STe/Falcon etc. Now I realise that you do not suppo  rt
HiSoft BASIC  as  such, but  I  am writing  a  web design  suite  called
"Web.Wizard" and have come up against some difficulties I'm hoping  that
you may be able to help with !

The suite/integrated package will eventually consist of:
- Wizard function (similar to Home Page Penguin, but with more options!)
- HTML editor "Web.Ed" 
- DTP web design (papyrus idea etc.)
- RTF to HTML converter
- Link checker
- Image map designer

The difficulty I find myself up against is that I cannot load a  picture
format (GIF,JPEG,PNG) etc. so that I can manipulate it and display it on
screen.

Do you know of anyone who has the know how and would be willing to help.
I'm hoping to go semi-commercial with  this (8.99), so I would be  able
to offer a cut for assistance etc.

Regards,

Matthew Bacon (Cadenza Software)

P.S What computer have you designed your site with ?

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To:     ICTARI
From:   Peter Hibbs
Re:     Items for sale

    63 Woolsbridge Road,
    Ashley Heath,
    Ringwood,
    Dorset  BH24  2LX,
           
    Tel. 01425 474415
    
    2-9-1997								

  Dear Giles,
Thanks for the disk with  the previous issues of  Ictari, it is nice  to
see the group is still running.

Here is a list of Atari related programming books which I am selling,  I
would be  grateful if  you could  advertise them  in the  next issue  of
Ictari as  there  may  be  some  members  who  would  be  interested  in
purchasing them.

Title			                     Original Price | Price inc P&P
------------------------------------------------------------+--------------
GEM on the Atari ST		             12.95	    | 7
Atari ST Internals		             12.95	    | 7
Midi and Sound Book for the Atari ST         17.25	    | 10
Atari Tricks and Tips		             12.95	    | 2
ST Disk Drives: Inside and Out	             16.95         | 8
Atari ST 3D Graphics		             16.95	    | 8
Real Time Graphics on the Atari ST	     16.95	    | 8
The Atari Compendium			     39.95	    | 20
Assembly Language Sub-Routines for the 68000 17.95	    | 8
68000 Reference Guide			     12.95	    | 5
Atari ST BASIC Source Book and Tutorial	     Unknown	    | 2
Your First BASIC Book			     14.95	    | 2
Compute Atari ST Volume 2 AES		     18.95	    | 10
Compute Atari ST Volume 3 TOS		     22.95         | 10
68000 Assembly Language Programming	     21.95	    | 10

Good luck with the group,

Yours sincerely,
Peter Hibbs

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