-*- Mode: Text -*- This file is a directory of software and documentation for Atari 8-bit machines (400, 800, XL series, XE series) that lives in this directory; Terminator.CC.Umich.EDU:/atari/8bit/. Note that this file describes ONLY the software available for 8-bits; please look in /atari/ for descriptions of what's available for ST's. The format here is as follows: Each section of this document contains the file name(s) of a program or set of programs, and a blurb describing briefly what it is. More extensive documentation is available in the doc file listed in each section. Although no guarantee is made about any of this stuff being bug-free, we do attempt at least to accurately describe the behaviour of each of these programs, in order to make them useable by someone other than wizards. Bug reports, info requests, etc should all be send to Info-Atari8@NAUCSE.CSE.NAU.EDU. Getting started: All the stuff in this directory is available via anonymous FTP anywhere on the Arpanet. The best way to get this code into your Atari is to copy the files you're interested in to some local machine, and then copy them to your Atari at your leisure. This reduces load on the Arpanet, and gives you a local copy for times when the net is slow or unreliable. It also makes it easier to reliably transfer stuff down to your Atari, as you'll probably be using phone lines or something; you can use Kermit or Xmodem from your local host to your Atari. Most of the code mentioned here is ARC'ed. If you don't know what that means, don't worry too much about it, all it amounts to is an easy way of collecting groups of files together into one place, and providing error checking to make sure they get copied intact. It also compresses the data, saving storage space. You'll need an ARC file unpacker to take these files apart; there are versions of ARC available for lots of machines, including the Atari 8-bits; you'll find a good one in this directory, called 'supunarc.com'. It, of course, is not ARC'ed. Remember to use binary mode when transferring .arc and .com files. The next thing you should consider is method of reliable file transfer between your local host (or whatever host you're talking to) and your Atari. The most popular choices are Kermit and Xmodem. Kermit-65 is available here, uuencoded. For ACTION! users, there is a Kermit written in that language here as well. In addition, there are several non-public-domain terminal-emulator and file-transfer programs available, such as Chameleon, OMNICOM, etc. One further note: Some of these ARC files contain text files in *nix form, ie they use a *nix newline, tab etc, instead of an Atascii newline, tab etc. These files can be converted back to Atascii text by using the utility program A2AT (that stands for ascii to atascii) in ASCII.ARC. Here's the list. Enjoy! ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: A65 Files: A65.UUE UUencoded ARC, includes source and Doc. Blurb: This is a PD assembler, written in M6502 code. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: Ace C. Files: ACEC.UUE UUencoded ARC, includes docs Blurb: This is a C compiler and runtime support package. All the files required to compile and link programs, as well as the doc, are concatenated together; so they need to be separated with an editor before decoding. The compiler generates p-code, part of the runtime package is an interpreter for the p-code. Ace C is apparently an early version of what later became Deep Blue C, and Lightspeed C. See also CC8. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: ACSTERM Files: ACSTERM.ARC Action source, doc, termcap Blurb: Another terminal emulator. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: ACTRTL Files: ACRTL.ARC Action source and Doc Blurb: This is supposed to be a Run-time library (48K, Action! v3.6) for Action!. It's not what I expected. Let me explain. Action! has a set of library routines (i.e. Print, Open, XIO, Graphics, etc.) built into the Action! cartridge, and whenever a program uses any of these routines, the resulting source code does a JSR into the cartridge memory. Of course, this means that any Action! program using any of the library routines (99% of all Action! programs) won't run without the cartridge. The standard Action! run-time library consists of a rewrite of all the library routines built into the cartridge. It replaces the cartridge routines with Action! or machine code alternatives with the same functionality. The library is #INCLUDEd into a program, and compiled with it. This run-time package does something different - it copies part of the Action! cartridge, and runs a couple of 'fix' programs on the results. The resulting file is then loaded into memory as a replacement for the Action! cartridge with respect to the system library entry points. A run-time package of this form has some serious drawbacks: - it is extremely version-dependent. There have been a number of different versions of the Action! cartridge since it first came out, all of which have essentially the same functionality but different internals. The 'fix' programs provided in this package only work with Action! release 3.6 - which is not the version I have. - it is wasteful of space - more of the cartridge is copied then would otherwise be necessary, adding to the size of user programs and reducing available memory. - most importantly, it may result in some legal difficulties. If someone writes a program, uses this package, then releases the program to the public domain, for example, they can be legitimately charged with copyright violation, since part of that resulting program is a (nearly) verbatim copy of part of the Action! cartridge. This is a very serious matter! As for the functionality of the package - it half-works on my system, since my Action! version is different from the author's. Programs which use I/O and related routines work fine, but programs using graphics don't. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: Action Runtime Files: ACTRUN.ARC Action source and Doc Blurb: A PD action runtime library ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: Action! Tutorial Files: ACTUTOR1.UUE UUencoded ARC of lesson text files ACTUTOR2.UUE UUencoded ARC of sample programs Blurb: This is a cookbook-ish sort of thing for learning to use Action!. It's split into a bunch of lessons, describing how to use various features of the language and tools. It comes with sample programs illustrating what the lessons are talking about. I don't have Action!, so I can't evaluate how accurate/useful it is. ACTUTOR1.ARC Byte count = 38370 Checksum = #x6549 ACTUTOR2.ARC Byte count = 25219 Checksum = #xF67E ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: ADDMEM Files: ADDMEMA.ARC ARC (Side A files except for DOS & DUP) ADDMEMB.ARC ARC (Side B files) Blurb: Side A contains instructions for adding 256K of RAM to an 800. Side B contains instructions for adding 256K to a 800XL and adding 256, 512, or 1024K to a 130XE. Unarc each file onto one side of a single density disk. Write DOS 2.5's DOS.SYS & DUP.SYS to side A and boot with BASIC enabled. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: ALbug. Files: ALBUG.ARC Source, macros etc Blurb: This is a machine-language debugger, including a disassembler. It's alleged to be an Atari version of Lady Bug for other 6502 powered machines, like the KIM, etc. Does all the usual debugger-ish things, breakpoints, alter memory, poke around etc. Takes up about 3K bytes. No doc available, but it's quite easy to see what's going on from the source. (Maybe if jrd gets his shit together, he'll document it for real, and post his updated version...) ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: Amodem42 Files: AMODEM42.ARC Basic source and Doc Blurb: Another terminal program/file transfer thing. This one claims to be aimed at accessing RCPM BBS software. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: ARCV Files: ARCV.ARC Doc, executable Blurb: A viewer for ARC files. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: ARCX12,ARC12 Files: ARCX.ARC Doc and executables Blurb: Ralph Walden's buggy, slow arc utils. Use Super-Arc. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: AtariRS Files: ATARIRS.ARC UUencoded ARC, asm source Blurb: This is a replacement for the 850 RS232 driver. It seems to fix some of the bugs that the one in ROM has. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: ATERM Files: ATERM.ARC Basic source Blurb: Terminal emulator ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: AUTO850 Files: AUTO850.ARC Basic source Blurb: Writes an AUTORUN.SYS file for 850s. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: BINHEX, HEXBIN Files: HEXBIN.BAS Basic source BINHEX.BAS " " Blurb: These programs encode and decode binary files (like programs) to and from a simple hexdump format. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: Blackjack Files: BLAKJACK.ARC Action! source Blurb: This game compiled but wouldn't run on my system. I havn't tried it with a vanilla dos (i.e DOS 2.0) or with an Atari 400/800 translator, however. That's all I can say about that one. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: Bobterm Files: BTERM110.ARC ARC, executables and doc Blurb: This is a reasonably spiffy terminal emulator. I've only used it a little, but it seems to work pretty well, and the doc seems pretty good. It does have a few wierd behaviours when used with SpartaDos X, but that's discussed in the Doc. It does a bunch of variants of XMODEM file transfer; it does not do Kermit. It appears to only do VT52/40-column terminal emulation. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: BUGFIX Files: BUGFIXD.ARC Basic source Blurb: Patches Tape handler, fixing some (??) bugs. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: CC65 Files: in subdir cc65, *.arc. Blurb: This is a fairly complete set of tools for developing C programs on the Atari 8-bit. Included are a compiler, assembler, linker, object code librarian, and misc utilities. Source for all these things in included. Because there's quite a lot of it, these files are kept in a subdirectory, "cc65". ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: CC8 Files: CC8.ARC ARC, docs and binaries Blurb: CC8 is a another C compiler in the ACE/DBC family. It produces p-code usable with either the ACE or DBC linker. This posting contains only the compiler, so you'll need ACEC (above) as well. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: CHECK Files: CHECK.ARC ARC, source and doc Blurb: This is a short program which calculates the length, checksum, CRC code, and # of lines for any file - It is easy to use, very fast, and works like a charm. The results appear to be correct. To use it, simply run it, type the filename of the file to be checked, and voila! You're done! It doesn't use wildcards in the standard way - it just 'checks' the first file matching the wildcards. (i.e. *.* will match the first file in the directory) ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: CHKFRAG Files: CHKFRAG.ARC ARC, executable Blurb: The freeware ICD utility. Describes disk fragmentation. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: Codebuster Files: CODEBUST.ARC ARC, executable and doc Blurb: This is a rather bright disassembler. It allows for preloaded definition files, and can disassemble pieces of things in memory, executables, boot blocks etc. It seems to have a few problems under SpartaDos, but other than that works pretty well. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: Compile-to-disk Files: CMPTODSK.ARC Action source Blurb: This is one of the Action modules by Clint Parker made available by him thru his BBS and the OSS BBS (not public domain, but may be used in "not-for-profit" ways). Some of them have appeared here, but I don't think this one has. (thanks to BL for this) ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: Cstrings Files: CSTRING.ARC Action! source and Doc Blurb: This is a set of Action subroutines for manipulating C style strings. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: CX85 Files: CX85.ARC ARC, Assembler source Blurb: This is a driver for a CX85, driven off of VBL. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: Daisy Dot 2 Files: DDOT2.ARC Arc, Main program, fonts DDOT2DOC.ARC Arc, doc, font utils Blurb: Daisy Dot 2 is a desktop publishing package. It mostly consists of a fancy text formatter, and a bunch of fonts, and some utility programs. It uses graphics mode on Epson compatible printers to generate very nice looking output, by formatting lines internally, then dumping the bit image to the printer. It's fairly slow, but effective. It comes with extensive docs, intended to be printed using Daisy Dot. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: DIRT Files: DIRT.ARC ARC, exe, source, doc Blurb: A replacement directory list command for SpartaDos. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: DLI Files: DLI.ARC Action source and Doc Blurb: Sample code for handling Display list interrrupts in Action. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: DIS6502 Files: DIS6502.ARC ARC, executable and doc Blurb: DIS6502 is a general purpose disassembler for Atari binaries. It will accept input from memory, a disk file, or a set of disk sectors (with or without sector headers) and output to screen, disk or printer. It's bright enough to give the user a chance to change disks for big files, and does a good job disassembling random things. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: DISKCOMM Files: DISKCOMM.ARC ARC Blurb: This thing says it's a disk image cruncher/uncruncher. It does roughly the same thing as ARC etc, but for disk images, not files. I haven't tried it, so I can't comment on whether it works. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: DSKCOM32 Files: DSKCOM32.ARC ARC Blurb: Disk image <==> file(s) converter. Seems to work like DISKCOMM. Not sure if compatible. Optionally makes use of 130XE RAM. This is the program which created the files on this archive with the .DSK extension. This is also the program you need to convert the .DSK files back to usable disk images. (Note, .DSK extension was picked arbitrarily as program will convert to any filename, not just *.DSK. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: DOS. (?) Files: DOS.ARC 6502 machine code source Blurb: ?? This appears to be the source to some DOS or other, but it's not obvious from perusing it what it is, and there are no comments or anything in the code. I suspect that this is the output from some disassembler. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: DSKRPM Files: DSKRPM.ARC Basic source and Doc Blurb: Disk RPM checker. May not be very accurate, due to BASIC slowness. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: 850 Express! Files: EXP850.ARC ARC Blurb: Terminal emulator for modems connected to 850 interface. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: Antic Public Domain Forth Files: FORTHA.ARC ARC (Side A) FORTHB.ARC ARC (Side B) Blurb: Implementation of fig-Forth language. PD disk has the following printed on label: "Boot without BASIC & type 10 UE" "XL's need Trans. Docs on side 2" Un-arc FORTHA.ARC & FORTHB.ARC to create FORTHA.DSK & FORTHB.DSK. Then use DSKCOM32.ARC(OBJ) to uncrunch the single density disk images and generate a usable disk. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: FrOst Basic Files: FBASIC.SHR Shrunk file Blurb: FrOst BASIC, by Frank Ostrowski. FrOst BASIC is a version of Turbo BASIC that does NOT use the hidden memory under the O/S ROM. (See also Turbo Basic) It is designed to run on the older 400/800 computers which do not have this hidden memory. FrOst BASIC can also be run on XL/XE machines with SpartaDOS (which uses the hidden memory for its own purposes) and other DOS versions not compatible with Turbo BASIC. FrOst BASIC is identical to Turbo BASIC except that memory available to user programs is somewhat reduced when FrOst BASIC is used. The Turbo BASIC compiler and runtime system are NOT intended for use with FrOst BASIC. See the entry for Turbo Basic for further information. Use SHRINK to unshrink this one. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: Games 1 Files: GAMES1.ARC ARC Blurb: Livewire, Roundup, Retrofire, and Rambugs. There's a blurb in the ARC describing them. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: Gemini Files: GEMINI.PRD Printer driver source Blurb: This is a printer driver for use with Gemini-10X printers and Atariwriter+ ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: GOE Demo Files: GOEDEMO.ARC ARC, binaries GOEBLURB.ARC ARC, Genie discussion Blurb: This is the GOE demo disk. Just take the arc an unpack it onto an otherwise empty Spartados disk, and boot it. (Unfortunately, it only works with Spartados. There's alleged to be a DOS 2.x driver around somplace, but I don't have it here) It's actually a pretty spiffy demo; GOE looks like a cool product. Uses an ST mouse. The discussion is the GENIE discussion about GOE with the author. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: Gterm Files: GTERM.ARC ARC, binaries and doc GTPIX.ARC ARC, sample pictures GTXXXPIX.ARC ARC, X-rated pictures GTerm is a 'graphics terminal', which basically means it knows how to display pictures in various formats, as well as ordinary ascii data. See the README file, it explains how to get at the real documentation (it took me a while to figure it out!) ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: Harvey Files: HARVEY.ACT ACtion source Blurb: This program is an implementation of a rather idiotic Analog game involving a rabbit running around eating numbers and shooting at walls. It doesn't run correctly anyhow. Strangely enough, in the comments, you are told to compile the program with 'lower-case on' (i.e. case sensitive syntax), yet the program won't even compile with case sensitive syntax, since variables are sometimes spelled in lower case, and sometimes in upper case, for no particular reason. This one should probably be considered a hacker's special, just like blackjack. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: KBIN Files: KBIN.HEX Hexified binary? Blurb: Some sort of Kermit, for a 1030? ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: Kermit Files: KERMIT.ARC ARC, contains; KCOM1030.ACT Part of Kermit ACTION! source KCOM850.ACT " " " " " KDIAL.ACT " " " " " KERMIT.ACT " " " " " KFUNC.ACT " " " " " KIO.ACT " " " " " KMAIN.ACT " " " " " KMENU.ACT " " " " " KPRO.ACT " " " " " KTTY.ACT " " " " " KERMIT.DOC Docs for building and using Kermit KERMIT.PNS Kermit phone numbers on SCORE Blurb: This is an implementation of Kermit written in ACTION!. ([jrd] someone should fill in comments here about how it really works, as I don't have ACTION!) ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: Kermit-65 Files: K65EXEC.ARC ARC, executables K65DOC.ARC ARC, docs. Blurb: This is an implementation of Kermit written in 6502 machine code. In includes a pretty complete file transfer facility and a good terminal emulator. Complete documentation is provided. Read the doc to see which of the binary versions you want. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: Keybuf Files: KEYBUF.M65 M6502 source Blurb: This is a little frob that sets up a typeahead buffer, maintained by a VBLANK routine. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: MACH-DOS Files: MACHDOS.ARC ARC Blurb: DOS which works with several different densities and sizes of RAM-disks. Try it for yourself. Un-arc MACHDOS.ARC to create MACHDOS.DSK. Then use DSKCOM32.ARC(OBJ) to uncrunch MACHDOS.DSK into a usable single density disk image to uncrunch the sigle density disk image and generate a usable disk. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: Madlibs Files: MADLIBS.ARC Basic source, blurb Blurb: This is a fairly cute madlibs game, in basic ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: Music Files: MUSIC.ARC Basic source Blurb: This is JHS's little aleatoric music generator. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: MYDOS (v 4.50) Files: MYDOS45M.ARC ARC, contains compressed disk image, and various doc files Blurb: This is a complete DOS for Atari 8-bitters! It's somewhat similar to DOS 2.0/2.5, but has considerably more features. It claims complete compatibility. I can't provide a real review here, as I didn't really use it long, just played with it a little. Part of the distribution is a bootable single-density disk image, packed with DISKCOMM. You'll need that util to unpack it. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: NEWDIVI Files: NEWDIVI.ACT Action source Blurb: This is apparently a fix for bugs in the divide routine in (some versions of?) Action. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: Omnicom Files: OMNICOM.ARC ARC, executable and blurb Blurb: Omnicom is a shareware version of the terminal emulator part of OMNIVIEW, by C David Young. It supports 80-column display, kermit, xmodem etc. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: Draper PASCAL Files: PASCAL.ARC, PASDOC.ARC Draper Pascal, compiler, utils, and doc. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: Rambugs Files: RAMBUGS.ARC Arc, binary Brurb: A decent bug-zapping game. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: Ramdisk256 Files: RAMDISK.ARC 6502 source Blurb: This claims to be a ramdisk for 256k equipped 800XLs. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Name: R-DRAW version 1.3 Files: RDRAWA.ARC ARC (side A) RDRAWB.ARC ARC (side B) Blurb: Drawing program for 130XE. Side A contains docs. Boot side B while holding