ACAS, Amiga Computing, Media House, Adlington Park, Macclesfield, Cheshire, UK, SK10 4NP or e-mail us: acas@idg.co.uk
I'm hoping you can give me some advice on how to start programming. I have been told that EasyAMOS is the best way for me to learn how to program the Amiga, but I would just like to know if you think this is the best way to start? In the long run I would like to become a games programmer, so what would the best steps be if I want to go in this direction?
Jason Chapman, Bedford
In general, if you want to become a programmer there are three things you need to have and do Š practice, patience and persistence. All are very important. You have to practice writing code so you can learn and understand how program instructions work, you will have to be patient with yourself because you will definitely not become a programmer overnight, and because of this you will have to be persistent and not put off by setbacks or tough problems.
As a start, EasyAMOS, or even Amos itself, is a good starting place. When you start programming you are really just learning about the basics of how programs work, and once you have mastered these basics you can apply this understanding to any programming language. Most conventional programming languages work on the principal of sequence, selection and repetition. Every program runs in a set sequence, and during its execution certain selections can be made and sequences can be repeated.
Using EasyAMOS you will learn how the commands that specify and control each of these stages work, and how to use them, and again this basic knowledge is transferable to other programming languages.
If you are looking to make a career out of programming then, obviously, you should go through the normal educational process - GCSEs, 'A' levels and, finally, get yourself a degree in computer science. While you are generally learning about computing in these courses you can be happily programming on your Amiga - it may even be the case that you can incorporate what you are doing on the Amiga in your course as some sort of course work project.
You should also be aware that EasyAMOS will only be a starting point. Even though you can do some impressive looking things with Amos, it does not allow you to develop the correct programming skills that are required now-a-days. To do this you need to get hold of a 'grown up' language, and your main choices are going to be either Assembler or C. You may want to consider Pascal but the other two are supported and used much more.
Generally, it is taken that if you want to write games on the Amiga you will have to use Assembler to extract every ounce of speed from the Amiga. However, as PCs and the new generation of consoles increase in speed, the need for this absolute speed diminishes and many companies are advertising for experienced C and C++ coders, instead of just pure Assembler programmers. Also, if you undertake any course at university most projects will normally involve C and C++. This is due to the sheer speed of PC processors and the fact that the speed difference between code compiled with C and Assembler for RISC processors is a good deal less than on traditional CISC processors. On top of this, if you are using C and need a speed increase you can just write the time critical parts of your code in Assembler, and this approach speeds project development and allows you to concentrate on tweaking the gameplay.
Another advantage of using C is that it will make using the operating system easier than if you had to use Assembler. This brings in the old do you use the operating system or hit the hardware debate. A few years ago there was a clear divide between Amiga programmers - either you were a demo/game coder or wrote 'serious' system utilities. Game and demo coders needed to get as much memory and speed out of the machine as possible, and the only realistic way of doing this was to get rid of the operating system and code directly to the Amiga's hardware. This then allowed programmers to get amazing results from a relatively slow machine. The downside to this is that as soon as the Amiga's hardware changes, even slightly, these sort of programs can cease to work.
The alternative way to programming is through the Amiga's operating system. Up until recently, demo and game coders have always rejected this approach, citing the need to grab as much memory and to grab every CPU cycle possible. These were sensible arguments five or six years ago but now with faster processors, faster and generally improved graphic operating system functions, and a generally higher system specification - on average our readers have 7.5Mb of RAM - these points lose their credibility. These arguments are borne out by the fact that many recent games, such as Subwar 2050, Breathless and Nemac IV, all run on Intuition screens and multitask along with the rest of the operating system.
You should also remember that the consoles have their own operating systems which are nowhere near as complicated as the Amiga's, but experience gained using the Amiga will greatly help in any job you get. Remember that anything you write yourself can be shown to potential employees, greatly increasing your possibility of getting a start in programming.
The problem with ImageFX that has been troubling Adrian Bernascone is exactly what happened to my machine when I deleted ImageFX. A requester kept on asking me to insert ImageFX and it was driving me mad.
After a good deal of searching and routing through files, I eventually found the answer. It wasnÕt anything to do with assigns, but the fact that ImageFX altered the AmigaGuide ENVARC settings.
Using DOpus, I found that in ENVARC and also ENV there is a directory for AmigaGuide and in this directory is a file called path. Reading the contents of path showed just the words ImageFX.
I deleted the words in the path file, both in the ENVARC and ENV directories, saved it as a blank file, and all went back to normal. I can't get this information direct to Adrian because no address is published, so perhaps you can. I trust the information is of use to you as well.
David Hilton, davidh@enterprise.net
If anyone else is having the same problem you will need to open a shell and type delete envarc:amigaguide/path and this will delete the troublesome file. It seems that AmigaGuide will search for any paths that are listed in this file, probably for AmigaGuides that have multiple parts. I should also thank Dominique Dutoit who sent in the same solution to this problem.
I own an A600 with 2Mb ChipRAM and Kickstart 2.04. I recently purchased a second-hand 80Mb 2.5" hard drive to use with the machine. The drive worked fine in another Amiga, but somehow my A600 refuses to recognise it at all. When I start up HDTools, it does not show up when I go to the bootmenu. I tried to install another hard drive some time ago, but that was a rather old 3.5" unit and I gave up on that project pretty quickly. Is there a chance that I might have broken my IDE-interface then, or have I forgotten to do something?
Geir Sandstad, geirrs@stud.idb.hist.no
Normally, if your Amiga does not recognise the IDE drive straight away then there is a definite problem. It is possible that you have a very early version of the A600 shipped with a version of the operating system that did not recognise the IDE interface, even though there is one on the motherboard. If you have version 37.299 of Kickstart or earlier then your A600 will fall into this category. You can find out your version of Kickstart either by loading workbench and selecting 'about' from the Workbench menu, or you can type 'version' into a shell. One way around this would be to get the Kickstart 3.1 upgrade which has replacement ROMs.
If this is not the problem then I would guess that the IDE interface is damaged in some way. More unlikely is that the jumper settings on the hard drive are incorrect. It may be set up as a slave IDE drive but even so, I would have thought the Amiga would still recognise that it had a drive connected.
I have several questions to ask. The first are related to my intended purchase of a laptop PC and the rest have just been collecting dust in my mind for some time.
The most straightforward way, and the least usable, is to connect your PC and Amiga via a serial cable and use a terminal program such as Term or NComm to transfer files between the Amiga and the PC. If you only want to transfer files on an irregular basis, such as once or twice a day, then this would suffice.
On the other hand, if you want something a little better there is a program called EasyLink which gives you software on both the Amiga and PC side and allows you to access and transfer files on either machine using a GUI. As I have not been able to try it out I cannot comment on exactly how it works or how good it is, or whether it will work with MS-DOS, Windows 3 or Windows 95. The best solution would be if you could link the PC and Amiga using an ethernet card. The only ethernet card for the A1200 that I know of is the i-Card, but unfortunately they are in short supply and are very expensive, especially when you compare it to similar PC cards.
The other possibility would be to remove your internal disk drive and fit the second hard drive in the remaining space. If you have an external disk drive then use this as a replacement for your lost internal drive. Therefore, the answer to your question is yes, but it is a bit of a performance.
Hello out there. This is the first time I've tried this, so be gentle with me. My question may seem really basic to many people, but I need to know if I can use different SCZIPs for my A3000. I'm ready to get some more and I'm trying to figure out the best solution.
I currently have 80ns SCZIP, but will I be able to use 60ns and 70ns chips or will I have to stick with 80ns? With the current price of SCZIPs here in Canada being so expensive, is there any other realistic option? Can you give me any suggestions or advice?
Gordon, Canada
The types of Zips that the A3000 will accept are either static column or page mode. Static column is better and allows the 030 to access burst mode for a 10 per cent increase in speed.
You can either put in 256x4-bit or 1Mx4-bit chips, but do not mix and match them. With all banks populated you will either have 4Mb FastRAM or 16Mb FastRAM respectively. If you currently have 4Mb of FastRAM then the current chips are 256x4-bit SCZIP chips. You should be able to mix the speed of the Zip chips but they will only run as slow as the slowest clock speed you have fitted. You might as well go for the fastest clock speed you can get because they will not be that much more expensive, and if you get an accelerator in the future you will benefit from the faster RAM.
Unfortunately, for you anyway, due to the favouring of SIMMs in the computer market the price of Zips has dropped far slower than the price of SIMMs, and recently, with the world supply of SIMMs back up to speed, SIMM prices have dropped even more dramatically. As you already have the full complement of 256x4-bit Zips on your A3000, it looks like your only option is either get rid of them all and change them for 1Mx4 Zips or to go for a Zorro II/III RAM card or accelerator card. A new Zorro card is not going to be cheap but if you go for one of the new accelerator cards you will get a much faster machine, more memory and usually a fast SCSI-2 interface.
I have a printing question. Did you cringe? Various printer manufacturers claim their printers will do 5ppm but in reality it is more like five minutes per page, even on an A4000 with 8Meg! I use FW 3.0 with an HP-540 at 300dpi. I need this sort of quality but faster. Is a Post Script printer in order or an accelerator card? I want to pump out a 100 pages an hour not per day. Help!
Sean, via the Internet
There are many different variables that effect the speed of printing a document including the software, printer, printer driver and the type of document you are printing. You currently own an HP Desk Jet, so realistically I cannot see you managing to get the sort of throughput you require. If you look at the HP specification you can print one to two pages a minute on greyscale mode, or 1 colour page in four to seven minutes.
With a Desk Jet there are, however, a couple of things that can help increase the page output. Firstly, extra memory cartridges can be bought. You may have noticed that when printing a page, Final Writer will usually finish outputting to the printer before the printer actually finishes. This happens because the HP only has a 32k buffer which is only enough data for a few centimetres of output. With one of the memory upgrades you can load the whole page to the HP and do multiple prints of that single page.
A possible alternative to buying a RAM expansion for your printer is to use the CMD command which comes as standard with the Amiga system disks. The CMD command allows you to redirect the data that As you have an A4000 it should be fast enough to keep up with the printer, and it may be the case that your A4000 is hanging around for the HP to keep up. If this is the so, you should consider a print spooler.
The other way of increasing throughput is by using printer fonts. Normally, each time Final Writer has to print a page it generates a 300 dpi bitmap and sends this to the printer. If Final Writer could use printer fonts then it would send a description of the fonts to the printer instead which would store this in the memory cartridge. All Final Writer has to do then is tell the printer to print an 'A', instead of having to generate the bitmap itself. Even so, if you are printing lots of graphics you are still going to be stuck with the HP printing at around one to two pages a minute which is probably not enough.
This leaves you with the option of getting a fast Postscript printer. If have reservation about the claims of the printer manufacturers, you are right and wrong. The five page per minute printing speeds claimed by the manufacturers are for repeat prints, and this is a similar situation to the HP. If your Postscript printer has enough memory you can download an entire page to the printer and tell it to print x copies of that single page. This will then be printed out at 5ppm or whatever the top speed of that printer is. You can then send the next page, which could take a little while, and then run off another x copies of that.
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