[editor : Carl T. Helmers Jr.] [publisher : Virginia Peschke, Manfred Peschke] [art : Matthew Arnorld, Mary Jane Frohlich, Lynn Malo, Bill Morello] #Magazine
#Abstract
It's More Fun Than Crayons! Read how Mike and Alex Rosner, ages 7 and 5, discovered the joys of computet· art and incidentally proved the need for timesharing computers in the home. On the cover are super stats Mike and Alex at work.
If Isaac Newton were alive today, he'd be immersed in long and complicated physics manipulations, which are ultimately tested using calculations involving multidimensional matrices and matrix operations of linear algebra. Chances are he might be interacting with a computer, with an interpreter from the APL tree of languages. Read Mark Arnold's What Is APL? to find out a bit about APL, a language with a mathematical orientation but utility for general purpose programming as well.
How do you do graphics in a weekend, without spending a fortune? In Beer Budget Graphics, Peter Nelson tells all : how the synergistic combination of a couple of digital to analog converters and an output latch or two brings the world of point plotting to an oscilloscope for about $20 in parts.
In the July 1976 BYTE, we ran a functional specification for a graphics interface in answer to reader Paul Hyde Jr's letter. Practically before the ink had dried on the July press run (figure of speech) reader Thomas R Buschbach sent in this article on how he made just such a graphics interface for his Digital Group system using existing timing logic of the television display unit. Given an existing 8 K memory, processor and television display generator, this high resolution display can be added to a system for as little as $25 in additional semiconductors.
Star Trek freaks should turn to Joe Deres' article to find An Enterprising Display. In the article you'll find information on a design for a television graphics output which can be built from a kit (or your own parts) for less th an $100.
Ira Rampil provides Some Graphics Background Information, including a comparison of several display devices available to individuals.
Don't be satisfied with simple visual readouts. Make Your Next Peripheral a Real Eye Opener by implementing a true vector display using an XY oscilloscope, circuits and software similar to Steve Ciarcia's design. In his article you'll see how to draw a picture of a moderately high resolution Star Ship Enterprise.
Build This Video Display Terminal, advises Alfred Anderson, who took C W Gantt Jr's TV interface circuit described in the June 1976 BYTE, made a few changes, added a few goodies, and wrote a few lines of software. Now he tells you how you can do it.
What's NOT In This BYTE... Software Bug of the Month, Book Reviews, Ask BYTE, a slew of What's New and BYTE's Bits items we were dying to print, lots of good letters, and some dynamite articles. Even using smaller type in places didn't enable us to include much that we urgently wished to. If you missed it this month, watch for it next.
[author : Carl Helmers] #Edito
Extract : « According to an article by Marvin Gold in the September 6 1976 edition of Electronic News, the 16 K dynamic memory chips are almost ready for volume production, and price estimates are quoted. According to Mr Gold's article, the 1976 average selling price of 16 K memory chips will be an estimated $16 each, and when volume production levels are reached in 1977, the average price at the factory will be $12. Assuming a personal computing company which has moderate volume production purchases the 16 K memories at $12, its component cost for a 16 K memory segment is $96, and for a 32 K memory segment is $192 in mid to late 1977. Multiply this by a factor of 3 to 5 to take into account packaging, manufacturer profit margins, and merchant markup; and it can be expected that in mid to late 1977 the personal computer with 32 K memory will have a memory subsystem cost of perhaps $600 to $1 000 at the retail store.
The designers of the early microprocessors never conceived of the large scale integration computer as anything more than a controller in dedicated applications (so the grapevine says). The rumor which was running around some time ago was that one LSI firm's reaction to the idea of a FORTRAN (or other high level language) for their microcomputer was "who'd ever want to do such a silly thing." The history of small general purpose computers implemented with LSI processors since then demonstrates that a lot of people want to do exactly that, and more: APL, SNOBOL, LISP, PASCAL, ALGOL, TRAC™ etc, etc. Similarly, the reaction currently might be "who'd ever want to put more than 64 K bytes of memory in a personal computing system?" My claim is that there are plenty of people who would want to [...] »
TABLE OF CONTENTS
[theme : Graphics System] [author : Nelson] #Electronic #Display #Listing #Assembly #Graphics
Extract : « In the past, graphics systems available to the experimenter have been expensive and complicated or have forced him to settle for limited resolution. The simple circuit described in this article will provide resolution of 128 by 128 dots for under $20 and four times that resolution for just over $20. It requires the use of an oscilloscope as the display device, but it need not use an expensive scope. [...] »
[theme : Hardware] [author : Buschbach] #Electronic #Display #Graphics
Extract : « Since one of the reasons I built a personal microprocessor was to play video games, I needed some type of high resolution graphics display capability. After examining the current unavailability of a low cost commercial product to perform this task, I decided to build my own unit. The main reason, besides cost, was that I wanted a 256 by 256 dot matrix [...] »
[theme : Hardware] [author : Deres] #Electronic #Display #Listing #Assembly #Graphics
Extract : « Many people find games one of the most interesting applications of a computer system. These range from simple games such as Tic Tac Toe, Blackjack and Ping Pong to very complicated games such as Space War. All of these have one thing in common; they are much more fun when played using a video graphics display. With such terminals you can provide instant response and provide a pictorial playing area that cannot be duplicated on any type printing terminal. Can you imagine attempting to play an elaborate game on a Teletype machine? [...] »
[theme : Graphics Systems] [author : Ciarcia] #Electronic #Display #Listing #Assembly #Graphics
Extract : « Have you ever gone to a party and been entertained with some party game which the host introduced to impress his guests and salvage an otherwise boring evening? American life is built upon a succession of gimmicks. We feel we have to be entertained to exist and cannot just have a good, dull time. An example is the success of television as the universal babysitter and now all these overly expensive television games. [...] »
[theme : Systems] [author : Anderson] #Electronic #Display #ComputerTerminal #Listing #Assembly #Graphics
Extract : « I first became interested in microprocessors about a year ago. After much thought, I decided to investigate this rapidly growing field. I did not have any particular goal in mind but I did want to learn how they work and what they can do. Therefore, I decided not to buy a kit but to build my own from scratch. I happened to select the Motorola processor for a number of reasons which I won't consider here. After a few weeks, I had a small system up and running. I even managed to interface an old "TeleTerm" that I borrowed from the Mayo Clinic where I work. Now (I thought) I had the cat by the tail (or the byte by the bit?). [...] »
[theme : Graphics] [author : Rosner] #Experience #Graphics
Extract : « Now that the home computer is emerging from its crystal radio stage and now that we are becoming more applications oriented rather than hardware oriented, we are going to find that we have competition for computer time right in our homes. While I have been putting microcomputers using microprocessors together for almost two years, it wasn't until I hooked up the TV to my present system that my family took interest. [...] »
[theme : Languages] [author : Arnold] #Languages #APL
Extract : « APL is the modest name of A Programming Language, created by Kenneth Iverson. APL is simple to learn, yet in many ways it is the most powerful language in use today. While to the untrained eye APL looks like the strangest computer language around, with the possible exception of LISP, the structure of APL is fairly close to that of more common languages such as FORTRAN or BASIC. This article will look at some of the features of a large system APL. Also, I will explore what features I think a small APL system for a microcomputer could have. [...] »
[theme : Construction Techniques] [author : Burhans] #Tips #Electronic #Build
Extract : « One of the problems in using the Vector or other brands of "wiring pencils" is the poor visibility of the fine #36 wire viewed against the typical background of Vector Blue circuit board material. [...] »
[theme : Graphics Systems] [author : Rampil] #Overview #Display #Graphics
Extract : « Computer graphics has come a long way since its inception as a laboratory curiosity. It is now a widely used tool for human information digesters. There is the old saying: "One picture is worth one thousand words" and thus information packed into computer generated pictures is now used by such diverse people as engineers, doctors, business people, and choreographers. We are now at the point where TV compatible graphics displays are affordable by hobbyists, experimenters, and other randomly assorted computer freaks. [...] »
#Association