Ask The Readers

Robert Lock, Richard Mansfield, And Readers

Please address any questions or answers to: Ask The Readers, COMPUTE! Magazine, P.O. Box 5406, Greensboro, NC 27403.

Answers

"This is in response to Jerry Stern's question in the August 1981 issue, concerning the use of a keypad controller with the Atari 800. All of Atari's controllers are usable with all of their computers, video game included. And the keypad controller works quite well for repetetive numerical data. However, it is not limited to use with numbers. The computer's response to the keypad controller is defined by the program you write or load into it. Therefore you can use it to output any one of twelve symbols or execute any of twelve commands or any combination of both the above.

There is a program on page H-14 of the Atari Basic Reference Manual that will get you started with using the controller. The Operating System Manual goes into detail on how it works.

Point of Interest: In [COMPUTE! #14] his excellent article, ‘Atari Tape Techniques,’ Richard Kruse mentions that the use of LIST "C"/ENTER "C" can reduce the size of your BASIC program, but that the reason for this is undocumented. The documentation is on pages 2 and 3 of the Basic Reference Manual, under the section titled ‘Variable Name Limit.’" Roberta L. Mevis