• S-BASIC Manual

    From fridtjof.martin.weigel@gmail.com@21:1/5 to All on Fri Sep 30 12:11:45 2022
    Does anyone have

    1 - Scan of the S-BASIC manual (Kaypro) SBASIC.COM 5.4b is the
    preferred version, but anything is welcome.

    2 - There are some claims that the source for S-BASIC itself was
    supplied (sometimes). Does anyone have that?

    Fred Weigel

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  • From fridtjof.martin.weigel@gmail.com@21:1/5 to fridtjof.ma...@gmail.com on Tue Oct 4 11:46:30 2022
    On Friday, September 30, 2022 at 3:11:47 PM UTC-4, fridtjof.ma...@gmail.com wrote:
    Does anyone have

    1 - Scan of the S-BASIC manual (Kaypro) SBASIC.COM 5.4b is the
    preferred version, but anything is welcome.

    2 - There are some claims that the source for S-BASIC itself was
    supplied (sometimes). Does anyone have that?

    Fred Weigel
    No answers yet... I presume then that these are "gone"?

    FredW

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  • From Captain Nemo@21:1/5 to All on Tue Oct 4 20:19:24 2022
    1 - Scan of the S-BASIC manual (Kaypro) SBASIC.COM 5.4b is the
    preferred version, but anything is welcome.

    2 - There are some claims that the source for S-BASIC itself was
    supplied (sometimes). Does anyone have that?

    Fred Weigel
    No answers yet... I presume then that these are "gone"?

    I've never seen the source code anywhere for S-BASIC, so you are probably
    right about being "gone".

    I assume that you've done the usual checks (like archive.org) for a scan
    of the S-BASIC manual and come up empty. If that's the case, you are
    probably out of luck there too.

    I have the paper version of the manual that I use on my Kaypro 4/83.

    I think the reason you don't see much about S-BASIC is because Turbo
    Pascal was so much better.

    I did some experiments last year with S-BASIC. Basically, I converted
    some simple MS-BASIC programs over to both S-BASIC and Turbo Pascal. The amount of work needed was about the same - since S-BASIC is BASIC in some keywords only.

    But the overall experience between S-BASIC and Turbo Pascal made S-BASIC
    look pretty dated. There was no IDE for S-BASIC. So it was fire up a
    text editor, enter your code, save, exit, fire up the compiler (which took
    much longer than Turbo Pascal), see you had an error. Remember the error
    line number, fire up the editor again, fix your error, exit the editor,
    run the compiler again. Ugh!

    If Turbo Pascal hadn't come out, S-BASIC would probably have gotten more traction, but with Turbo Pascal as a competitor, there was no draw for S-
    BASIC and it languished.

    There is a Kaypro S-BASIC manual on eBay right now for a reasonable
    price. I do remember seeing that today.

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  • From Stephen Mitchell@21:1/5 to fridtjof.ma...@gmail.com on Wed Oct 5 08:47:09 2022
    On Friday, September 30, 2022 at 3:11:47 PM UTC-4, fridtjof.ma...@gmail.com wrote:
    Does anyone have

    1 - Scan of the S-BASIC manual (Kaypro) SBASIC.COM 5.4b is the
    preferred version, but anything is welcome.

    2 - There are some claims that the source for S-BASIC itself was
    supplied (sometimes). Does anyone have that?

    Fred Weigel
    Fred--
    I have a scan (PDF) I made from my paper copy of the manual. I'll be happy to email you a copy. Your email address is truncated by google groups, but if you email me at ssmitch at gmail dot com I'll send it to you. By the way, although I agree with
    Captain Nemo that interest in S-BASIC pretty much fell by the wayside with the introduction of Turbo Pascal, with it's far superior user interface, S-BASIC had a number of interesting features and I wrote a number of programs with it "back in the day."
    I still have it up and running (I use myz80 running under DosBox on a Windows 7 machine) but only for playing around. If you check out Rosetta Code, there are about 20 examples of S-BASIC code that I have uploaded to that site. As far as I know, the
    source code was never a part of the distribution, but there is a suggestion in the manual (see the discussion of I/O channel 9) that at one point it was planned to include the source code for one of the two supplied libraries (USRLIB.REL) in the
    distribution. But as far as I know, this was never done.

    Steve Mitchell

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  • From Jasmin Loves The Ocean@21:1/5 to Stephen Mitchell on Tue Oct 18 04:51:36 2022
    On Wednesday, October 5, 2022 at 4:47:10 PM UTC+1, Stephen Mitchell wrote:
    On Friday, September 30, 2022 at 3:11:47 PM UTC-4, fridtjof.ma...@gmail.com wrote:
    Does anyone have

    1 - Scan of the S-BASIC manual (Kaypro) SBASIC.COM 5.4b is the
    preferred version, but anything is welcome.

    2 - There are some claims that the source for S-BASIC itself was
    supplied (sometimes). Does anyone have that?

    Fred Weigel
    Fred--
    I have a scan (PDF) I made from my paper copy of the manual. I'll be happy to email you a copy. Your email address is truncated by google groups, but if you email me at ssmitch at gmail dot com I'll send it to you. By the way, although I agree with
    Captain Nemo that interest in S-BASIC pretty much fell by the wayside with the introduction of Turbo Pascal, with it's far superior user interface, S-BASIC had a number of interesting features and I wrote a number of programs with it "back in the day." I
    still have it up and running (I use myz80 running under DosBox on a Windows 7 machine) but only for playing around. If you check out Rosetta Code, there are about 20 examples of S-BASIC code that I have uploaded to that site. As far as I know, the source
    code was never a part of the distribution, but there is a suggestion in the manual (see the discussion of I/O channel 9) that at one point it was planned to include the source code for one of the two supplied libraries (USRLIB.REL) in the distribution.
    But as far as I know, this was never done.

    Steve Mitchell
    Hi Steve,
    Could you please copy me in on a scan of the manual? I've been trying to track one down as well and have had no joy, and it'd be MUCH appreciated! :) Would it be worth putting a copy with the Internet Archive for the sake of preservation?

    Jasmin

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  • From Stephen Mitchell@21:1/5 to Jasmin Loves The Ocean on Thu Oct 20 12:59:48 2022
    On Tuesday, October 18, 2022 at 7:51:37 AM UTC-4, Jasmin Loves The Ocean wrote:
    On Wednesday, October 5, 2022 at 4:47:10 PM UTC+1, Stephen Mitchell wrote:
    On Friday, September 30, 2022 at 3:11:47 PM UTC-4, fridtjof.ma...@gmail.com wrote:
    Does anyone have

    1 - Scan of the S-BASIC manual (Kaypro) SBASIC.COM 5.4b is the
    preferred version, but anything is welcome.

    2 - There are some claims that the source for S-BASIC itself was supplied (sometimes). Does anyone have that?

    Fred Weigel
    Fred--
    I have a scan (PDF) I made from my paper copy of the manual. I'll be happy to email you a copy. Your email address is truncated by google groups, but if you email me at ssmitch at gmail dot com I'll send it to you. By the way, although I agree with
    Captain Nemo that interest in S-BASIC pretty much fell by the wayside with the introduction of Turbo Pascal, with it's far superior user interface, S-BASIC had a number of interesting features and I wrote a number of programs with it "back in the day." I
    still have it up and running (I use myz80 running under DosBox on a Windows 7 machine) but only for playing around. If you check out Rosetta Code, there are about 20 examples of S-BASIC code that I have uploaded to that site. As far as I know, the source
    code was never a part of the distribution, but there is a suggestion in the manual (see the discussion of I/O channel 9) that at one point it was planned to include the source code for one of the two supplied libraries (USRLIB.REL) in the distribution.
    But as far as I know, this was never done.

    Steve Mitchell
    Hi Steve,
    Could you please copy me in on a scan of the manual? I've been trying to track one down as well and have had no joy, and it'd be MUCH appreciated! :) Would it be worth putting a copy with the Internet Archive for the sake of preservation?

    Jasmin
    Be

    I'll be happy to. But Google Groups doesn't show me your email address, so please send me a follow up email to ssmitch at gmail dot com. Several folks have received a copy since my initial response, and I agree it would be a good idea if someone who has
    received it can post it to a site where others can find it.

    Steve

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  • From Tom Lake@21:1/5 to Stephen Mitchell on Thu Oct 27 12:50:11 2022
    On Thursday, October 20, 2022 at 3:59:49 PM UTC-4, Stephen Mitchell wrote:

    I'll be happy to. But Google Groups doesn't show me your email address, so please send me a follow up email to ssmitch at gmail dot com. Several folks have received a copy since my initial response, and I agree it would be a good idea if someone who
    has received it can post it to a site where others can find it.

    Steve
    It (along with the compiler itself) is on

    https://web.archive.org/web/20170103152642/http://www.nostalgia8.nl/cpm/basic/sbasic.zip

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  • From Stephen Mitchell@21:1/5 to Tom Lake on Fri Oct 28 16:12:02 2022
    On Thursday, October 27, 2022 at 3:50:12 PM UTC-4, Tom Lake wrote:
    On Thursday, October 20, 2022 at 3:59:49 PM UTC-4, Stephen Mitchell wrote:

    I'll be happy to. But Google Groups doesn't show me your email address, so please send me a follow up email to ssmitch at gmail dot com. Several folks have received a copy since my initial response, and I agree it would be a good idea if someone who
    has received it can post it to a site where others can find it.

    Steve
    It (along with the compiler itself) is on

    https://web.archive.org/web/20170103152642/http://www.nostalgia8.nl/cpm/basic/sbasic.zip
    Sadly, while the zip file includes an introduction, some programming notes, and a HLP file I wrote way back when (1987?), it does not include the manual itself. I would love to upload the manual to some place where folks could easily find it and would be
    grateful for any suggestions.

    Steve

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  • From Martin@21:1/5 to Stephen Mitchell on Sat Oct 29 13:02:43 2022
    Am 10/29/2022 01:12 AM, Stephen Mitchell schrieb:
    On Thursday, October 27, 2022 at 3:50:12 PM UTC-4, Tom Lake wrote:
    On Thursday, October 20, 2022 at 3:59:49 PM UTC-4, Stephen Mitchell wrote: >>
    I'll be happy to. But Google Groups doesn't show me your email address, so please send me a follow up email to ssmitch at gmail dot com. Several folks have received a copy since my initial response, and I agree it would be a good idea if someone who
    has received it can post it to a site where others can find it.

    Steve
    It (along with the compiler itself) is on

    https://web.archive.org/web/20170103152642/http://www.nostalgia8.nl/cpm/basic/sbasic.zip
    Sadly, while the zip file includes an introduction, some programming notes, and a HLP file I wrote way back when (1987?), it does not include the manual itself. I would love to upload the manual to some place where folks could easily find it and would
    be grateful for any suggestions.

    Steve


    A good home would be

    Gene Buckle's "Commercial CP/M Software Archive"
    <http://www.retroarchive.org/>

    Thank you very much!
    Martin

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  • From Kurt Pieper@21:1/5 to All on Sun Oct 30 18:03:48 2022
    Hi,

    here a test with SBASIC.

    comment
    mem.bas -- display CP/M memory map
    written for SBASIC compiler
    Addresses for BDOS and CCP are calculated from BIOS base
    and will reflect actual rather than apparent locations.
    TPA calculation will therefore correctly reflect reduction
    in available memory that occurs when a resident system
    extension (RSX) is installed.
    Update Kurt Pieper Germany
    end

    var msize, tpa = real
    var rsx_installed = string : 5
    var home, rvs, nrm curon, curoff = string : 6
    var clr, cleol, cleos = string : 3

    clr = chr$(12)
    home = chr$(27) + "[1;1H"
    rvs = chr$(27) + "[7m"
    nrm = chr$(27) + "[0m"
    cleol = chr$(27) + "[K"
    cleos = chr$(27) + "[J"
    curon = chr$(27) + "[?25h"
    curoff = chr$(27) + "[?25l"

    print home;clr;curoff;
    print "SBASIC Date: 10/30/2022 "
    print "Test with Z80 Board (sc114)"
    print
    print "Start of BIOS : "; hex$(peek(2) * 100H)
    print "Start of BDOS : "; hex$((peek(2) - 0EH) * 100H + peek(6))
    print "Start of CCP : "; hex$((peek(2) - 16H) * 100H)
    print

    msize = 256 * peek(2) rem BIOS base
    msize = msize - 18944 rem BIOS address in 20K system
    msize = (msize / 1024) + 20 rem adjust and convert to K

    rem Calculate available TPA in K based on apparent BDOS address
    tpa = 256 * (peek(7) - 1) / 1024

    print "CP/M size :"; msize; "K"
    print "Available TPA :"; tpa; "K"

    rem check whether actual and apparent BDOS entries differ
    if peek(2) - 0EH = peek(7) then
    rsx_installed = "No"
    else
    rsx_installed = "Yes"

    print "RSX installed : "; rvs;rsx_installed;nrm

    var x=char
    print
    input2 "End --> Press <Ret> to continue";x
    PRINT "bye";curon

    end

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