Mastering machine code on your ZX81 by Baker, Toni (1982) Paperback

by Toni Baker

Book Overview

No Synopsis Available.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0835942619
• ISBN13: 9780835942614
• Release Date: January 1982
• Publisher: Reston Pub. Co
• Length: 180 Pages
• Weight: 0.62 lbs.

Customer Reviews

Easy Machine code

The ZX81 was the first computer I ever owned and I still think was the most fun to use. It was ...affordable for someone who wasn't really sure that computers were all that great of a thing, it was small and it was super easy to use. In those days (the early 80's.) there was very little in the home computer market that was as easy to obtain as a ZX81 (TS1000) that taught us BASIC; most of us who learned to write games in BASIC knew that this little machine had one MONSTER drawback... it was unbelievably slow! Then along came the book: Mastering machine code on your ZX81. If there ever was such a well written book to make the transition from BASIC to Z80 Machine code for the absolute beginer (and the faint hearted...), I have yet to find one after all these years. The book is written for the absolute novice and assumes that you have no knowledge of Machine code or Assembly language. The first chapter introduces you to Hexidecimal and gives you a very simple program for entering machine code. The next few chapters walk you through some of the very basic Z80 codes and compairs them always with BASIC. The further along you go in the book, the more you learn and grasp as everything is explained to you in plain english with LOTS of examples walking you all the way through each chapter. You are shown where machine code can be stored in your computer, how jumps and calls work; how to load registers and how to add or subtract from them; how to print to the screen and how to read the keyboard. There are chapters in the book that let you enter parts of a CHECKERS program that runs through most of the book and explains and discusses each part of the program in various chapters as you enter and test your program, and why they work. There is a Music program and a SPIRAL game, a program that plays LIFE and there's even a BREAKOUT game that you can play. All are thouroghly explained and suggestions are made as to how you can modify and enhance the program. You are given a few homework assignments and plenty of hints; the book has a great appendix and the whole book is layed out to be practicle and very user friendly with the main goal of the book,to have fun while learning something new. -I found on some chapters that going over them a few more times gave me a deeper grasp of the underlying concepts (just re-reading the last paragraph again); and yet other parts were easier than I thought it would ever be. I found this book was exactly the stepping stone I need then (1982) and was the best refresher this past month (11/01) when I reciently got the book again after all these years. Toni Baker is the champ when it comes to making the complicated (and intricate) seem easy and plain to those of us who are not rocket scientist, just tinkerer's and common folk who are willin' to learn, if you just give us the right dose and make it fun along the way.