News - I returned to the development of the NedoLang language, AmoNik added the HDD driver, vBv posted his famous collection of Spectrum software, FlashZX released the full version of the game DinoRun

News
 by Alone Coder

Winter holidays are over.

John Silver recovered and returned to work. In our old group
Invaders8's leg was also broken by me andBasil. We even wrote to Basil 
two Gifts on this matter, which were later included in the kit
ZX-Guide #2.5 Trash. One of the Gifts was even signed"Invalids8 
group" :)

DimkaM integrated branches of the Unreal Speccy emulator fromDeathSoft 
andLord Vader.

At the same timeNedoPC are developing a new version of TurboSoundFM:
TurboFM Pro, where a SAA chip is added. 

Deathsoft continues to restore the 1818VG93 circuit
photos of the crystal.

I returned to the development of the NedoLang language, changed it again
syntax:
- as promised in the description, typing is now done using the '+ ' sign, but
plus is not written in function parameters.
Functions differ from variables in their presencebrackets around (not
after, because variable and function names can be from several
words):+(type)(expr) vs +(type)funcname(...) and +(type)num .
- unnamed function parameters:funcname((type)num,
(type)(expr)), (type)funcname(...)) .
- constants added:const type varname=num .
- Boolean constants are written+TRUE, +FALSE .
- addedforward procedures and functions (the word forward is written
before the parentheses with the list of parameters).
- removed restrictions on unpaired quotes in comments.
I am gradually translating the source code of the NedoLang compiler to NedoLang
(I have already translated 3 low-level modules). But it feels like
The work will no longer need a compiler.
I haven’t touched the assembler yet, because... no loader or linker for
object specialists to check the results. I debug the compiler using
its error messages and comparison of compilation results
with results from older versions.

Hippiman/Conscience has translated their game Dizzy Rescues Santa for PC
into English. I have corrected the translation. Nobody wants
port the DizzyAGE engine toSpeccy?

Arwald/Conscience a year later returned to the development of text
Rusted Souls quest. Now he is finishing his master's degree and writing
diploma I colored a couple of pictures thatLouisa/Conscience
drawn in black and white.

Louisa photographed 2 more of my old notebooks. Total with
taking into account all the archival notebooks and pieces of paper it turned out to be about1500
photos.

AmoNik added the HDD driver mentioned in the last issue.
See it in the newspaper supplement.
┌─────────────────────────────── ───────────────────────────────┐ 
In 2015, I wrote a driver for iS-DOS to work with
CompactFlash cards connected instead of a hard drive to
SMUC controller. This driver supported only CHS addressing.

The special feature of the new driver was that it worked with both
IDE channels simultaneously and required forced open
controller ports, i.e. IDE portsSMUC controller must be
always accessible from the non-DOS address space. This
feature is implemented in the modern version of SMUC v2.

Later, several more versions of the driver were released, all changes in
which boiled down to increasing compatibility with memory cards
which I had in stock.
On the New Year holidays, when everyone was sitting at the table (or lying
under the table), I sat down again at the assembler and wrote a new driver,
which supports LBA28 addressing. This driver has become shorter
simpler, faster and even more compatible with different memory cards.
I was going to test the new driver on all my cards
CompactFlash, which I have, but three of them were installed
various operating systems and I did not touch them. Four
memory cards did not work even with the Scorpio shadow service and on
partitions could not be created. I didn’t test them either.
Another memory card turned out to be so slow that I decided
do not mess with her. Recording speed via 3D13 emulation
was about 3 KB/s. I tested the remaining five cards on
reading and writing, by copying your system one to them
iS-DOS partition, 8 MB in size. After recording, I checked
file system integrity using the arzt+ utility in Verify mode and
after that I checked the checksums of the files using the ch+2 utility. On
one of the five cards had a few errors. But force
I was unable to work with this card as needed.

Just in case, based on the latest achievements of the LBA versiondrivers, I made a CHS version, but in the future I will support this
I'm not planning a version, because I don't see much point in it - that's all
modern devices support LBA addressing, namely for
the driver was written primarily.

The following CompactFlash cards performed well:
Sandisk 32 Mb, Sandisk 64 Mb, Silicon Power 1 Gb 80x, Silicon
Power 2 Gb 200x
Worked with errorsTranscend 1 Gb
Not marked:Kingston 1 Gb, Kingston 4 Gb, Lexar Professional
2 Gb 300x, Sandisk Ultra 2 Gb 1SMb/s
Slowed down a lotA-Data Speedy 1 Gb

In the application drivers HDDSMUC(CHS version 1.03)and HDDLSMUC(LBA
version 1.01).
└──────────────────────── ─────────────────── ───────────────────┘ 

vBv posted his famous collection of Spectrum software (a
now also video) on the Internet:

Software, infos, photos:
https://yadi.sk/d/wC8KMdP139XCdc
https://yadi.sk/d/CiG_xY9D39XGUR
https://yadi.sk/d/FUYб2G6039XREL
https://yadi.sk/d/nsjHZGekЗ9XaxK
https://yadi.sk/d/2nkEkob139aZht
https://yadi.sk/d/yPLuhN2y39YuFL
https://yadi.sk/d/OGsXtg2Z39YuFc
https://yadi.sk/d/PTPaSwJЧЗ9WxKu
https://yadi.sk/d/MdalhyqЧЗ9XAed
https://yadi.sk/d/_4-nЗeptЗ9XCHW

Video:
https://yadi.sk/d/ltgHAwl139hkcV
https://yadi.sk/d/rWpdkGM-39g7gh
https://yadi.sk/d/2VCDLF8g39hJHS
https://yadi.sk/d/legUIVEyЗ9n8Q4
https://yadi.sk/d/HgtSaaqmЗ9iSiH
https://yadi.sk/d/VtZocoA139hW5Ч
The last archive ofAmoNik did not open, here are its contents:
https://yadi.sk/d/ЗDELSbyPЗАХНЧW
https://yadi.sk/d/hSBUU9JPЗAHNf9

vBv moved from Krasnoyarsk to Sochi, email remains
same.

Based on this collection, I compiled a list of Spectrum software
originally from the USSR (see next article). This is v0.2 of the list. If you
Do you know any other programs, send them or information about them!
At the same time, I found articles about the history of ATM-Turbo, which were not included in
Info Guide magazine #11. One of them was significantly supplemented by
I’m posting it right there, the second one has yet to be translated.

FlashZX has released the full version of the game DinoRun (as I understand it, by
Easter Egg motifs in Chrome). The demo was last year.

┌─────────────────────────────── ───────────────────────────────┐ 
Hello everyone! 

Thisa simple toy appeared during attempts to write what 
something under Penteva... 
understand graphics, palettes, etc. 

The game runs under ZX Evolution/Baseconf, but will also work on ATM-turbo 2+. 

You are in control of someone running away from an approaching disaster. 
dinosaur Your task is to reach a high plateau, on 
on which your friends are already waiting for you and on which you can escape.. Or, 
if the “game for record” mode is selected, then run as far as possible 
further, gaining the maximum number of points. 
As the game progresses, new opponents appear, you have to run 
faster... in general, everything is according to the classic slot machines. 

Controls: up/down arrows. 
Keys in the game: 
"M" - turn off the music
"ENTER" - pause/continue,
"Q" - exit to the initial menu.

I want to say thank you to everyone whose materials I have contributed in one way or another 
used in the game. 
First of all, for the music - to people like Andrew Fer, MmcM, 
SnowMan, ByteMan, Mast/Ftl. 
Perhaps I forgot to mention someone because everything was redone 
and changed a hundred times... I hope no one will mind. 
Thanks to Hippiman for his help in the early stages of mastering EvoSDK... 
for code examples, etc. Live tips are always better than manuals! 
I also thank everyone involved for creating a great environment. 
EvoSDK development!Game: 
https://yadi.sk/d/g7NEN1GPЗ8nAXz

A configured emulator with a game (for complete beginners there is 
bat file - DINORUN.BAT, the game starts immediately in the emulator): 
https://yadi.sk/d/be_Xбm8V38nBzi

Cheat: adds lives, decide for yourself whether to use it :) 

In the initial splash screen, after the inscription "Presents" 
completely popped up - type the command "morelives" on your keyboard. 
If you managed to type before going to the menu and everything worked out, then 
you will hear a sound confirmation. After this, instead of 10 lives 
will be 30. 

IMPORTANT! - Before launching on the ZX Evo, set the percentage to 14 MHz, for 
correct playback of samples. 
There is a problem with this in the emulator, and the samples are played much more 
faster than they should. So it's better to play for real. 

The game has an ending, so don't be lazy to go through it honestly! 

In general, I ask you not to judge strictly... Happy New Year everyone again! 
and... good luck to everyone. 
└─────────────────────────────── ───────────────────────────────┘