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krpalmerAlthough it may be a poor substitute for actually playing text adventure games, I do keep up with the "Planet IF" aggregator for weblogs about interactive fiction. A little while ago, I began noticing posts there about an upcoming book on a somewhat related theme, promising to begin with a "one-line program" for the Commodore 64 as given in the title and build from it to deeper meditations on a series of related subjects. While I did buy a somewhat similar sort of "platform studies" book prompted by other aggregated posts not that long ago, I suppose I was still mulling over whether to indulge myself again when I noticed a post that, in keeping with the book (collaboratively written by a full ten authors using a private "wiki") being published under a Creative Commons license, there was a free-to-download PDF file available. Whether this will make more people buy the book now than not may remain to be seen, but I accepted the offer.
I can recall similar "start from something small" books, and do have a sense they appeal to some people and not to others. While this book didn't just dwell on basic (and BASIC) computing in the 1980s, also touching on the grander topics of loops, randomness, and mazes, I did have the feeling my own interest in "old computers" added to the attention I paid to the book. At one point, though, the book delved a bit further into "home computing" by trying to "port" the program to the Apple II and the Radio Shack Color Computer, the system my own family had, only to sort of conclude the program didn't work as well on either computer without the extended character set of the Commodore 64. As much as I can't remember even knowing a computer called the Commodore 64 existed when my family was using a Color Computer, I suppose I still bristled a bit with "system partisanship" at the sad conclusion, and started digging into the "CoCo's" own extended character set, wondering if I might hit on something with its black-and-colour checkerboard patterns, but to not a lot of luck. There were one-line programs printed in the Color Computer magazines anyway, but as the Color Computer could accept longer lines of code, I suppose I do have to admit they don't have the same "complexity from apparent simplicity." I might, though, have consoled myself with the thought the Commodore 64's built-in BASIC couldn't call on much of the computer's distinctive hardware without using strings of unrelieved "POKE" commands. (So far as "porting" went, a different chapter went to great lengths to try and replicate the display on the Atari Video Computer System.) I had in fact wondered before if the Commodore 64's limited BASIC in fact encouraged budding programmers to delve into assembly language, helping to bring to an end the era of dilettante problem-solvers, but that of course wasn't quite the point the book was making.
I can recall similar "start from something small" books, and do have a sense they appeal to some people and not to others. While this book didn't just dwell on basic (and BASIC) computing in the 1980s, also touching on the grander topics of loops, randomness, and mazes, I did have the feeling my own interest in "old computers" added to the attention I paid to the book. At one point, though, the book delved a bit further into "home computing" by trying to "port" the program to the Apple II and the Radio Shack Color Computer, the system my own family had, only to sort of conclude the program didn't work as well on either computer without the extended character set of the Commodore 64. As much as I can't remember even knowing a computer called the Commodore 64 existed when my family was using a Color Computer, I suppose I still bristled a bit with "system partisanship" at the sad conclusion, and started digging into the "CoCo's" own extended character set, wondering if I might hit on something with its black-and-colour checkerboard patterns, but to not a lot of luck. There were one-line programs printed in the Color Computer magazines anyway, but as the Color Computer could accept longer lines of code, I suppose I do have to admit they don't have the same "complexity from apparent simplicity." I might, though, have consoled myself with the thought the Commodore 64's built-in BASIC couldn't call on much of the computer's distinctive hardware without using strings of unrelieved "POKE" commands. (So far as "porting" went, a different chapter went to great lengths to try and replicate the display on the Atari Video Computer System.) I had in fact wondered before if the Commodore 64's limited BASIC in fact encouraged budding programmers to delve into assembly language, helping to bring to an end the era of dilettante problem-solvers, but that of course wasn't quite the point the book was making.