"As owner of a CBM 8032, with 4040 disk drive and an Epson MX-80, I have been reading current and back issues of COMPUTE! ever since my computer dealer introduced me to the magazine several months ago. While I have found much in the magazine of interest, that interest has bordered at times on desperation arising out of statements such as ‘This program will not work with the new ROM or with the 80 column screen.’

How about a program that will rewrite any other program from old or new ROM 40-column to 80-column format, including assembly-language programs? While you are at it, why not a program that will translate from CP|M programs, especially the hundreds of TRS-80 programs, to ‘PET BASIC’. I am sure that many of your readers would ‘rise up and call you blessed.’"

Dr. Harold Peters

Your suggestion is an excellent one, and we would welcome programs which stand between various machines and translate and harmonize. Unfortunately, writing a program which emulates another computer is not an easy task. Some work has been done in this direction, though. In COMPUTE! #6 is "Feed Your PET Some Applesoft." Going in the other direction, in COMPUTE! #8 is "Load PET Programs Into The Apple II." An extraordinary program which snaps the 80 column CBM screen into 40 columns appears in COMPUTE! #12: "Running 40 Column Programs On A CBM 8032." Also, for hand-translations, see COMPUTE! #16, "PET, Apple, Atari: On Speaking Terms." Time permitting, we translate individual programs, often presenting multiple versions of programs appearing in the PET Gazette. In addition, we print several programs each month (in the Applications section at the front of the magazine) with versions for both Atari and Microsoft BASICs.