🚀 go-pugleaf

`Radio Schlock invariably keeps a demo TRS-80 Color Computer on
`display, complete with cassette recorder.  It was trivial to acquire
`most CoCo cartridge software by walking into Radio Shack with a blank
`cassette and dumping a number of cartridges to tape.  This required
`only a single poke to disable the cartridge insert auto-start,
`followed by a block memory save command.

I remember friends doing this, but they didn't know about the poke.
They'd simply cover one of the cartridge's pins with a piece of tape.
Seems there was an interrupt running always looking for cartridge
insertion, even though you are warned several times not to insert
cartridges while the computer is on.  The poke disabled the interrupt.
The tape covered one of the grounded pins.

I only had 32K at the time, and the cartridge was mapped into the upper
32k ROM area.  Sometimes, I was lucky, and the cartridge program was
written entirely in relocatable code.  I was able to move it down into
the lower 32k.  But sometimes, I'd have to go through an entire program
and change all the non-relocatable references to the lower 32k (talk
about having tons of free time!).  This exercise included addresses in
tables (not fun).

My friends were lucky - since they had 64k, they could just map the
cartridge ROM back into the space it was originally intended to occupy.
However, somebody must have caught on, as we found a few programs that
wouldn't work even though they were mapped properly.  Turns out that
the software would write over itself: if it was in ROM form, nothing
would happen, but in RAM...  We quickly solved that problem by making
a switch that would turn off the write line to the upper 32k - this
was possible since we were using 4 banks of 16k RAMS.  [Side note: The
first CoCo I got a hold of had 4k and the infamous cassette.  It's hard
to believe they are still selling the same basic (BASIC) machine, but
now it has 128k (6809 only has 16bit address bus) and CGA-style graphics.
I also remeber my mom asking, "But what will you do with all that memory?"
after I first upgraded to 16k and then to 32k.]

Steve Bjork wrote a lot of CoCo programs that ended up in cartridge form.
At the end of the programs, he would invaribly add some ASCII message.
One of the programs I converted was "Shooting Gallery".  In one of the
screens, targets that looked like faces would alternate between smiles
and frowns, while bunnies hopped in the line of targets above.  If you
shot the face while it was sad, a bunny that you already knocked down
would reappear.  At the end of the dump of this program, he included
what has got to be one of the worst poems/puns I've seen in a long time:

My bunny lies over the ocean,
My bunny lies over the sea,
Somebody just shot a sad face,
Now bring back my bunny to me!

Ugggh...


-- 
Todd Day  |  to...@ivucsb.sba.ca.us  |  ivucsb!to...@anise.acc.com
	The justice system works more quickly in the future,
		since they've gotten rid of the lawyers.