April 1979 — Vol 1 No 3

Overview

The masthead is now "WASHINGTON APPLE PI" — the name has stuck. The 3/31/79 meeting at GWU drew 38 attendees and adopted the constitution. First slate of officers: Bernard Urban President, John Moon Vice-President, Mark L. Crosby Program Chairman, John Ditman Treasurer, Genevie Urban Secretary. Tom Bottegal of GWU establishes an "APPLE II HOTLINE" (676-6853) and grants Pi members access to GWU's library and 8 Apple machines. The April issue carries the founding-era's first heavy technical content: a 4-page CALL/PEEK/POKE reference table for Integer BASIC, a BASIC↔6502 machine-language interface tutorial by John Moon, plus member-contributed programs.

Table of contents

Articles

Editor's letter (pages 1–2) — Bernard Urban

Reports 38-person turnout at last meeting. Announces Tom Bottegal's Apple II Hotline at GWU (676-6853) and GWU library access for members (xerox: 5¢/page). Eight Apples available for show-and-tell after formal business. Raises the copyrighted software exchange question: should the group sanction free sharing of commercial programs? Urban opposes during GWU meetings; promises discussion at next session.

"Look out PLATO — Here comes the APPLE!" (page 2)

Note that Ron Thorkildsen at the Exceptional Child Center of the University of Utah has interfaced a videodisc and touch panel to the Apple; he'll present May 17 at the Pentagon Motel in Arlington on tutoring learning-disabled children.

Minutes of 3/31/79 (page 2)

Constitution adopted. First officer slate: Urban (P), Moon (VP), Crosby (Program), Ditman (Treasurer), Genevie Urban (Secretary). $1 voluntary contribution to cover deficit. Group authorizes Bernie to pursue incorporation of all local Apple groups into one entity for not-for-profit status and 3rd-class mail privileges.

Green Apples — Andy Rose's game accepted (page 2)

Andy Rose's LO-RES game SHOOTOUT (written by two 11-year-olds) was accepted into APPLE's Software Bank. Apple sent him Volumes III, IV, V of their contributed-software collection in exchange — and he's sharing them with the group.

"Super Starwars" software review (page 3) — Mark L. Crosby

Review of SUPER STARWARS from Programma International (3400 Wilshire Blvd., LA, $15.95): three modes (auto-fire, manual, remote torpedoes), 0–9 difficulty levels, real-time hyperspace effects with sound. Crosby is impressed: "the simulation is most complete, three-dimensional, full of good sounds, real-time and a real challenge to even the most seasoned gamester."

"A Real Ball-Bouncer!" (pages 4–5) — Howie Mitchell

Applesoft II HI-RES program plotting the trajectory of a ball dropped/thrown into a room, bouncing off a tilted board. Inspired by Crosby's Lissajous program. Includes Howie's notes on each tricky line: how a Ctrl-G in a PRINT statement is invisible to listings but rings the bell; a freefall calculus variation; the surprising fact that bounciness > 1 produces "a most surprising result".

"CHR$ for Integer Basic" (pages 5–6) — Jim Rose

A clever workaround for the omission of CHR$ from Integer BASIC. The trick: dimension a single-letter string variable V$(1) first, then POKE 2053, <byte> exploits the recursive relation V$ = POKE 2053, ASC(V$) to emulate CHR$( ASC( V$ )). Three constraints (single letter variable, dimensioned first, byte value 160–223). Rose notes Wozniak ("the WOZ") "built ASC into Integer Basic but omitted the companion function CHR$" — early Wozniak reverence.

CALL/PEEK/POKE partial listing (pages 7–8)

A two-page reference table compiled by Ed Avalar of ABACUS (Feb 1979 Vol 1 Issue 42), edited by Crosby with permission. Maps Apple ROM Monitor operations (clear screen, set cursor, HI-RES/LO-RES toggles, register restore/save, speaker toggle, SWEET 16, scrolling, etc.) to their BASIC CALL/POKE form and their machine-language equivalents. A canonical Apple II programming reference of the era.

"BASIC to Machine Language Routine Interfacing" (pages 9–11) — John L. Moon

Tutorial on calling 6502 routines from BASIC with register values. Walks through hand-assembling LDY/LDX/JSR $F940/RTS into a POKE 0, … BASIC initialization, then builds a general-purpose subroutine using reserved variables A, X, Y, PC$ that can call any 6502 routine and retrieve return values. Tail of the article: a BEEP example calling $FF3A, plus VTAB, character output, and a forward reference to Don Williams' Integer BASIC↔Monitor Floating Point routines coming next month.

"TO GET THE 'MOD' FUNCTION WHILE USING APPLESOFT" (page 11) — Mark L. Crosby

One-paragraph tip: DEF FN MD(X) = X - INT (X/256) * 256 gives MOD 256.

"Exchanging Newsletters" (page 11) — Bernard Urban

Reciprocal newsletter agreements with four groups, copies available in the GWU library:

Training & Development sessions (page 12)

Inaugural T&D session at next meeting (April 28): "Programming in 6502 Machine Language" chaired by John Moon.

Calendar of Events (page 12)

Club news / events / announcements

• Officers elected (Urban, Moon, Crosby, Ditman, Genevie Urban)
• Constitution adopted
• Apple II Hotline live at GWU
• Next meeting: April 28, 9:30 AM, GWU Thompkins Hall Room 206
• Agenda items: incorporation progress, soliciting ads, copyright issue, nomination of officers, T&D 6502 session

Notable advertisements

None yet (next meeting agenda includes "solicitation of ads for the newsletter").

Key quotes

• "Word that we exist is indeed spreading, and we are evolving into a professional, useful and fun group with something of interest for all APPLE users, including… our green apples." — Bernard Urban (page 1)
• "For some mystifying reason the WOZ built the string-to-integer function ASC into Integer Basic but omitted the companion function CHR$…" — Jim Rose (page 5)
• "A free newsletter to the first person who stumps the HOTLINERS!" — Bernard Urban (page 1)

Entities

People: Bernard Urban, John Moon, Mark L. Crosby, John Ditman, Genevie Urban, Tom Bottegal, Andy Rose, Howie Mitchell, Jim Rose, Ron Thorkildsen, Mani Alexander, Jim Nielsen, Daphne Schor, Raymond Fox, Kim Brennan, Ed Avalar, Steve Wozniak (as "the WOZ") Topics: Constitution and By-Laws, 6502, 6502 Machine Language, APPLESOFT, Integer BASIC, HI-RES Graphics, Apple Software Bank, Copyright and Software Sharing, Computer-Assisted Instruction References: SUPER STARWARS, Programma International, ABACUS, AMRAD, Association of Personal Computer Users, Chesapeake Microcomputer Club, NOV APPLE, George Washington University, Apple Software Bank

Connections to other issues

• Continues organizational arc from 1979-03 — V01 N02 (constitution drafting → adoption)
• Forward reference: John Moon's Don Williams floating-point routines promised for 1979-05 — V01 N04

Open questions

• Is "Ed Avalar" the same person as "Ed Avilar" listed in the newsletter-exchange section (page 11)? Possible typo — they're both connected to ABACUS in the Bay Area.