Jay's Commodore Podcast

Episodes

1. 16

   Discovered: Commodore 64C used in an auto repair shop (2018)

   I’ve recently discovered a tweet that showed a Commodore 64C complete with green monitor and 1541-II drive, heavily dust covered, but still working and being used in a Polish Auto Shop. The picture itself was fascinating enough, but I’ve also discovered that it was a screen grab from a video –...

   May 9, 2018

   12m
2. 15

   How to write a text input routine in Commodore BASIC

   In this screencast I’ll show you how to write your own INPUT routine in Commodore BASIC. This comes in handy when you want to reject certain keys from being used when asking users for keyboard input. In my example I’m going to allow all alpha characters (A-Z), as well as SPACE, RETURN and the...

   May 8, 2018

   22m
3. 14

   Flashing Border Colors on the Commodore 128 in Machine Language

   In this episode I’ll show you how to create the iconic flashing borders on Commodore machines. Back in the day, when the system was loading, this was a nice way to indicate that the computer is busy doing something rather than being dead. I’ll show you the principle both in BASIC and in Machine...

   Apr 18, 2018

   8m
4. 13

   Programmatic Loops in Commodore BASIC

   In this episode I’ll demonstrate how to use programmatic loops in Commodore BASIC. I’ll show you how to use the FOR/NEXT loop (available in all versions of Commodore BASIC), as well as the DO/WHILE loops (available on the Plus/4 and C128). Enjoy!

   Apr 17, 2018

   11m
5. 12

   Flow Control in Commodore BASIC

   In this episode I’ll explain the concept of Flow Control in Commodore BASIC. It’s kind of a video update of a post I did a while ago. In essence, it means that we can tell the programme to take a different route in the code depending on a condition that’s met. We’ll explore the IF/THEN ... Read more

   Apr 16, 2018

   14m
6. 11

   How to run Commodore BASIC as a Scripting Language on macOS

   Did you know you can run Commodore BASIC v2 on your Mac and Linux systems as a scripting language? It’s true – thanks to the marvellous efforts of Michael Steil and James Abbatiello. They’ve adapted the original BASIC v2 as featured on the VIC-20 and C64 with additional routines so that it works...

   Apr 16, 2018

   18m
7. 10

   Writing HELLO WORLD in Machine Language on the Commodore 128

   The Commodore 128 has a built-in machine language monitor which makes it ideal for ML development. However, most (or pretty much all) documentation on this subject is geared towards the Commodore 64, making it slightly difficult to get a head start in writing ML code for the 128. Before I forget...

   Apr 13, 2018

   21m
8. 9

   Lottery Statistics in Commodore BASIC

   In this episode I’m adding statistics support to my previous lottery generator on the Commodore 64. I’ll add an array that is updated if my supplied numbers have been matched, and how many times over how many draws this has happened. I’ll also add an option to pause the programme and display the...

   Apr 11, 2018

   13m
9. 8

   Matching Lottery Numbers on the Commodore 64

   In this episode I’m amending my previous lottery number generator to take six lucky numbers from the user to match against the randomly drawn numbers from the Commodore 64. This will allow us to compare what the computer has drawn to the user’s input, as well as keep drawing numbers until the…

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   Apr 10, 2018

   16m
10. 7

    Working with Keyboard Input in Commodore BASIC

    In this episode I’ll show you three ways to take user input from the keyboard in Commodore BASIC. The INPUT and GET commands work on all systems, while the GETKEY command only works on the Plus/4 and C128. I’ll demonstrate how to use all of them. This will come in handy for our little lottery ......

    Apr 9, 2018

    9m
11. 6

    How to print numbers as columns in Commodore BASIC

    In this episode I’m demonstrating how to print numbers in evenly spaced columns in Commodore BASIC. On the C128 and the Plus/4 we can use a nifty little function called PRINT USING for this, with which we can format the output of any printed text or variable. On the C64 and VIC-20 that function...

    Apr 2, 2018

    8m
12. 5

    Sorting an Array on the Commodore 64

    In this episode I’ll demonstrate how to sort a numeric array on the Commodore 64. The same principle works for string arrays, and of course on all other Commodore BASIC computers. The technique I’m using here is called Bubble Sort: in effect we’re comparing the first two items in the array, and…

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    Apr 1, 2018

    6m
13. 4

    How to generate Lottery Numbers on the Commodore 64

    In this episode I’ll demonstrate how to draw random lottery numbers on a Commodore 64. The secret sauce here is not only the RND function to generate random numbers, but also two loops inside each other that prevent the same number from coming up more than once. Here’s the lottery generator code:...

    Mar 31, 2018

    10m
14. 3

    How to build a Word Splitter on the C64 in Commodore BASIC

    In this episode I’m demonstrating how to build a word splitter on the Commodore 64. We’ll use string functions to parse a sentence and split each word off into an array of words so that they can be analysed later (for example, as part of an adventure game). Here’s the code I’m building: 20 input...

    Mar 29, 2018

    10m
15. 2

    How to build a time of day clock on the Commodore 64

    In this video I’ll demonstrate how to build a simple clock on the C64. We’ll go through this process step by step, including the built-in TI and TI$ variables, string formatting with LEFT$, RIGHT$ and MID$, as well as screen formatting. Here’s the code I’m writing – works in Commodore BASIC v2…

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    Mar 28, 2018

    30m
16. 1

    How to create random YouTube URLs in Commodore BASIC v2

    In this episode I’ll demonstrate how to create those seemingly random YouTube Video IDs using a Commodore 64. Here’s the code I’m writing – works in BASIC v2 and above: 10 print chr$(14) 20 gosub 100:x=rnd(-ti):cn=1 30 a$="https://youtu.be/" 40 for i=1 to 11 50 rn=int(rnd(0)*62)+1 60…

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    Mar 27, 2018

    16m