Upgrade to 64

by Volker Weber

c64sx.jpg

Comments

Well, some time ago, it was pretty simple to launch a program:
Load "$",8
....(some waiting)

Or enter the request directly (if we know the filename):
Load "Summergames",8,1
Run

In LotusScript, it is a bit more complicated:
Dim intResult As Integer
Dim strPath as String
strPath = "calc.exe"
intResult = Shell(strPath,0)

OK, some bad guys do not use Option Declare and use this syntax:
i% = Shell("calc.exe",0).

Now we do not take care about memory. We could limit e.g. the string declaration, but who cares about it? Even the sceensaver takes about 10 MB's, so what?
Well, we do have the possibilities in LS, and we - as programmer - have the responsibility - to code rational.

Just think about it.

What suddenly jumps into my mind:
Todays processors' on-chip caches are bigger than overall machine RAM some 20 years ago.

*fear*

What would have happened back in the 60s if the Mercury and Apollo programs would have had today's computing powers at hand?
I guess they would have crash-landed more often due to software complexity and/or BlueScreens[tm]

Two Floppy drives and 'SPEEDDOS'. Setting and reading the register with POKE and PEEK.
The famous breadbox.

Oh, wow, a Commodore SX-64. I still wish, I had one of those. The plain Commodore 64 was my childhood. Almost everything I know about computers I learned on this machine.

@ martin:
Go and buy one at ebay - around €150 Euro and its yours. We just took one for the holidays and played 'Great Gianna Sisters' at night.
*big smile*

Thomas Nowak, 2004-08-15 21:25

Fortunately I still have a small collection of various C64s and C128s. From time to time I connect one of them to the TV and play some of those good old games. The Great Giana Sisters is an all-time classic.

Post a comment











Shall I remember this for you?




Use your full name and a working email address. Unless you want your comment to be removed. No kidding.



Ceci n'est pas un blog

vowe.net is a personal website published by Volker Weber a.k.a. vowe. I am an author, consultant and systems architect based in Darmstadt, Germany.

rss Click here to subscribe

Hello

About me
Contact
Publications
Certificates
Frequently asked questions
Join the network

Poll

Which BlackBerry could be your next one?

Getting poll results. Please wait...

Local time is 08:13

visitors.gif
130 visitors online

News

Other sources of news, imported into my own format to make them more accessible:

Heise Online
Schlagzeilen
Weather
Blog roll

Archives

As most of my articles roll off the front page rather quickly, I am making an archive of previous posts available here. You can also use the handy search box at the top of the page if you are looking for something particular.

Last 30 days
More archives

Got the T-shirt?

Got the T-shirt?

Systems Architecture

This site runs on an Apache web server on top of the Linux operating system. The content is managed with MovableType 2.661 which is implemented in Perl. Last but not least the HTML code your browser sees is put together with PHP.

© 1992-2008 Volker Weber.
All Rights Reserved.

Impressum