5 ms·

This is presenting a wildly rosy view of the past. In Commodore 64 days you got some book that was all you had. You couldn't email the author of the book or lo

by sien 9y ago

This is presenting a wildly rosy view of the past. In Commodore 64 days you got some book that was all you had. You couldn't email the author of the book or look online. If you got through the huge filter of the initial steps being much harder than today then you were doing well and would go on. However, the endless set ups and downloading every library that is used is going to make maintenance of programs in 5, 10 or 20 years a nightmare.

bitwize 9y ago
Not just some book, usually lots of books, from the fundamentals of BASIC to technical references with complete schematics for the entire machine. I had a Commodore VIC-20 and it certainly came with all these. And even then, experts and resources were available online, for suitably primitive values of "online". Think CompuServe. Another thing we had back then but less so today was magazines, full of programming and technical tips and info, usually tailored to a particular computer family. (So, Commodore magazines, Tandy magazines, Apple magazines, etc.) Once business computing took off, the dominant players (PCMag, MacWorld, etc.) became more productivity-oriented -- but I still learned Windows programming from the free utility and programming columns in early 90s PCMag. And then once the Web hit, the dead tree publishers were fighting over scraps.
- astrodust 9y ago
  The manual didn't tell you anything. The books didn't tell you anything. They scratched the surface, which if you knew nothing might have seemed profound, even mind-blowing, but if you were trying to do anything non-trivial you were left grasping for answers. I tried to build games on the C64 using BASIC and, while I had some success, the results were always limited by the fact that it was in BASIC, it was going to be slow, and that planning and editing your code was extremely painful, you didn't even have a proper text editor. The real way to develop on the C64 was with assembly. Unfortunately, finding information on how to do this was virtually impossible. Almost no books existed, and those that did were rare and expensive. Even when you got the book you were missing huge chunks of knowledge: The CPU itself is just 10% of the problem, the rest is knowing the memory layout, the supporting chips, and so on, stuff that wasn't well known. The methods employed by actual production games were dark and mysterious, often close to protected secrets. You were welcome to painfully disassemble these games, but you also had no tools, not even a basic assembler, unless you went out and bought one. Today it's easier than ever to build games for vintage hardware because everything, every little thing, is lovingly documented. This was absolutely not the case in the 1980s.
  - jonathankoren 9y ago
    Why didn't you just buy the Commodore Programmers Reference Guide[0]? It had an entire guide to C64 machine language, and circuit schematics. The book even tells you to buy the 64MON cartridge if you're serious about programming in assembly. This book wasn't rare. A friend of mine had it, we lived in the middle of nowhere. These programs and cartridges were not rare. I had multiple catalogs for buying these things as kid. The best programming books had code listings on page, and line by line explanations on the facing page. [0] https://www.c64-wiki.com/wiki/Commodore_64_Programmer%27s_Reference_Guide https://www.c64-wiki.com/wiki/Commodore_64_Programmer%27s_Re...
    - ryandrake 9y ago
      Funny... I didn't even know that book existed until I was a few years into learning how to program my C64. I honestly thought you were supposed to figure things out by randomly PEEKing and POKEing addresses to see what they did. I had complete tech illiterate parents and no mentors existed to point me in the right direction. I remember visiting some other kid who had a C64, and his dad had given him the Programmer's Reference Manual. He never opened it and didn't care about programming at all (he just used the thing to play games). I cracked that book open and my mind was blown!
      - u801e 9y ago
        I thought the guide that came with the C64 mentioned the Programmer's Reference Manual. I remember asking my dad to get a copy and he told me that I had to finish the first book before we could get it. > I cracked that book open and my mind was blown! I really wish I had had the opportunity to read through one when I was younger.
        jonathankoren 9y ago
        It did. The last page of the User's Guide[0] that came packaged with every C64 says: > Commodore hopes you've enjoyed the COMMODORE 64 USER'S GUIDE. Although this manual contains some programming information and tips, it is NOT intended to be a Programmer's Reference Manual. For those of you who are advanced programmers and computer hobbyists Commodore suggests that you consider purchasing the COMMODORE 64 PROGRAMMER'S REFERENCE GUIDE available through your local Commodore dealer. Honestly, until I checked the PDF just now, I thought the User's Guide came with a card to order it through the mail. [0] http://www.commodore.ca/manuals/c64_users_guide/c64-users_guide.htm http://www.commodore.ca/manuals/c64_users_guide/c64-users_gu...
- yesenadam 9y ago
  Arghh, I learnt Z80 assembler and Turbo Pascal in the mid 80s without ever seeing any books about either. Not sure how, picked up bits and pieces from computer magazines in libraries. A few years ago in a 2nd hand bookstore I finally laid eyes on Programming the Z80, which I'd heard about but never seen, and I was like "OMG, I would've given a leg to have had that in 1985!" Life with LibGen (and StackExchange) is so vastly different to my childhood isolation from the world's knowledge. I'm constantly profoundly grateful. But wish I'd had that access back then! Although I can't imagine it.
  - Joeboy 9y ago
    Yeah, I'm also not exactly sure how I picked up Z80 asm. I remember leaning heavily on the list of opcodes in the back of my ZX Spectrum manual, but it was literally just a table of opcodes and corresponding numbers so presumably I learned roughly how to use them from some other source. Owning Programming the Z80 was also one of my unattainable teenage goals, along with owning a disk drive.
PacketPaul 9y ago
Ugh, that C64 book had the worst binding. Pages were hard to turn and always falling out.

by sien 9y ago

bitwize 9y ago

Not just some book, usually lots of books, from the fundamentals of BASIC to technical references with complete schematics for the entire machine. I had a Commodore VIC-20 and it certainly came with all these. And even then, experts and resources were available online, for suitably primitive values of "online". Think CompuServe. Another thing we had back then but less so today was magazines, full of programming and technical tips and info, usually tailored to a particular computer family. (So, Commodore magazines, Tandy magazines, Apple magazines, etc.) Once business computing took off, the dominant players (PCMag, MacWorld, etc.) became more productivity-oriented -- but I still learned Windows programming from the free utility and programming columns in early 90s PCMag. And then once the Web hit, the dead tree publishers were fighting over scraps.

astrodust 9y ago
The manual didn't tell you anything. The books didn't tell you anything. They scratched the surface, which if you knew nothing might have seemed profound, even mind-blowing, but if you were trying to do anything non-trivial you were left grasping for answers. I tried to build games on the C64 using BASIC and, while I had some success, the results were always limited by the fact that it was in BASIC, it was going to be slow, and that planning and editing your code was extremely painful, you didn't even have a proper text editor. The real way to develop on the C64 was with assembly. Unfortunately, finding information on how to do this was virtually impossible. Almost no books existed, and those that did were rare and expensive. Even when you got the book you were missing huge chunks of knowledge: The CPU itself is just 10% of the problem, the rest is knowing the memory layout, the supporting chips, and so on, stuff that wasn't well known. The methods employed by actual production games were dark and mysterious, often close to protected secrets. You were welcome to painfully disassemble these games, but you also had no tools, not even a basic assembler, unless you went out and bought one. Today it's easier than ever to build games for vintage hardware because everything, every little thing, is lovingly documented. This was absolutely not the case in the 1980s.
- jonathankoren 9y ago
  Why didn't you just buy the Commodore Programmers Reference Guide[0]? It had an entire guide to C64 machine language, and circuit schematics. The book even tells you to buy the 64MON cartridge if you're serious about programming in assembly. This book wasn't rare. A friend of mine had it, we lived in the middle of nowhere. These programs and cartridges were not rare. I had multiple catalogs for buying these things as kid. The best programming books had code listings on page, and line by line explanations on the facing page. [0] https://www.c64-wiki.com/wiki/Commodore_64_Programmer%27s_Reference_Guide https://www.c64-wiki.com/wiki/Commodore_64_Programmer%27s_Re...
  - ryandrake 9y ago
    Funny... I didn't even know that book existed until I was a few years into learning how to program my C64. I honestly thought you were supposed to figure things out by randomly PEEKing and POKEing addresses to see what they did. I had complete tech illiterate parents and no mentors existed to point me in the right direction. I remember visiting some other kid who had a C64, and his dad had given him the Programmer's Reference Manual. He never opened it and didn't care about programming at all (he just used the thing to play games). I cracked that book open and my mind was blown!
    - u801e 9y ago
      I thought the guide that came with the C64 mentioned the Programmer's Reference Manual. I remember asking my dad to get a copy and he told me that I had to finish the first book before we could get it. > I cracked that book open and my mind was blown! I really wish I had had the opportunity to read through one when I was younger.
      - jonathankoren 9y ago
        It did. The last page of the User's Guide[0] that came packaged with every C64 says: > Commodore hopes you've enjoyed the COMMODORE 64 USER'S GUIDE. Although this manual contains some programming information and tips, it is NOT intended to be a Programmer's Reference Manual. For those of you who are advanced programmers and computer hobbyists Commodore suggests that you consider purchasing the COMMODORE 64 PROGRAMMER'S REFERENCE GUIDE available through your local Commodore dealer. Honestly, until I checked the PDF just now, I thought the User's Guide came with a card to order it through the mail. [0] http://www.commodore.ca/manuals/c64_users_guide/c64-users_guide.htm http://www.commodore.ca/manuals/c64_users_guide/c64-users_gu...
yesenadam 9y ago
Arghh, I learnt Z80 assembler and Turbo Pascal in the mid 80s without ever seeing any books about either. Not sure how, picked up bits and pieces from computer magazines in libraries. A few years ago in a 2nd hand bookstore I finally laid eyes on Programming the Z80, which I'd heard about but never seen, and I was like "OMG, I would've given a leg to have had that in 1985!" Life with LibGen (and StackExchange) is so vastly different to my childhood isolation from the world's knowledge. I'm constantly profoundly grateful. But wish I'd had that access back then! Although I can't imagine it.
- Joeboy 9y ago
  Yeah, I'm also not exactly sure how I picked up Z80 asm. I remember leaning heavily on the list of opcodes in the back of my ZX Spectrum manual, but it was literally just a table of opcodes and corresponding numbers so presumably I learned roughly how to use them from some other source. Owning Programming the Z80 was also one of my unattainable teenage goals, along with owning a disk drive.

PacketPaul 9y ago

Ugh, that C64 book had the worst binding. Pages were hard to turn and always falling out.