HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: shogun@DIALix.oz.au (Matthew Fitzgerald)
Subject: Re: Writing a StarField. Which method is best?
Organization: DIALix Services, Perth, Western Australia
Date: Sat, 21 Nov 92 12:36:56 GMT

Some coders (like myself) can't stand using includes, ok, system coding is 
a little different - everyone has their own methods!  I know most of the 
hardware registers off the top of my head so why use symbolic names??? No-one
sees y code except me and the other guys in my group, and I document my
code ALOT - which is another reason why I don't use includes!!

I still prefer to do EVERYTHING in hardware... (if I want to multi-task then
I'll use system library functions etc!)  It's fast and it makes your brain
work harder figuring out your own algorithms, you must admit that when coding
with libraries, alot of the work is already done for you!  

Matt (Onodi of Epsilon)
From: Marijan_Madunic@panam.wimsey.bc.ca (Marijan Madunic)
Newsgroups: alt.sys.amiga.demos
Subject: Demo BBS's
Distribution: world
Date: 23 Nov 92 14:47:13 PST
Organization: Commodore Computer Club / PaNorAmA

Here in Vancouver there are no BBS's that carry the latest and best demos
from the various groups that produce these fine progs.
So if anybody has the phone #'s of any BBS's that are in Canada or the U.S.
can you please post the #'s for me. Or if there is somebody out there who
is willing to give me their address so I can send blanks to you to recieve
demos from.

Thanx

Marijan Madunic

-- Via DLG Pro v0.995
From: masc@sbustd.rz.uni-sb.de (Martin Schulze)
Newsgroups: alt.sys.amiga.demos
Subject: Re: Eric Schwartz demos under WB2.04?
Date: 19 Nov 92 12:05:33 GMT
Organization: Studenten-Mail, Rechenzentrum Universitaet des Saarlandes
NNTP-Posting-Host: sbustd.rz.uni-sb.de

ajft@ajft_sun.cs.adfa.oz.au (Adrian Tritschler) writes:
> OK, one question: I was trying to play some of the Eric Schwartz Aerotoons
> last night for a friend of mine and all I get is the left half of the screen,
> the right half is blank and the same colour as the backgd of the left half.
> Worst thing is, I could have sworn I've played these demos under WB2.04 and
> they worked. Any hints?

1st: Dont use an OverScan-WorkBench
2nd: Dont use Productivity or something like that.
     PAL/NTSC works fine other Scrennmodes will force an "out of memory"

The only problem I had on my A3000 was the too fast running animation
called "pogo" :-(



> -- 
> // Adrian Tritschler                 // ajft@ajft_sun.cs.adfa.oz.au      // 

--
Martin Schulze at "Universitaet des Saarlandes"
masc@stud.uni-sb.de
Newsgroups: alt.sys.amiga.demos
From: mknip@niksula.hut.fi (Mats Anders Knip)
Subject: Re: Writing a StarField. Which method is best?
Organization: Helsinki University of Technology, Finland
	<1992Nov17.211753.11335@ntg.com>
	<LUNDMAN.92Nov19150314@kauri.kauri.vuw.ac.nz>
	<OAHVENLA.92Nov19113731@lk-hp-3.hut.fi>
Date: 20 Nov 92 13:57:03

> Well, there's a easy way of getting sure 50 (or 60) fps without turning off
> the interrupts. Use them yourself. Make them high priority ones, and nothing
> can stop you from having all the time you want, while the system is running
> (well, would be if there's time) in background. If you don't mess with the
> copperlists yourself, but use Views for that, you can even switch back and
> forth applications... Now all this is unnecessary on a A500, as all the time
> is probably used anyway, but what if you have a 25MHz 68030? A lot of time
> is left unused, and could be used your something else, provided you don't
> do the blitter waiting in busy loops... There are ways around that too.

You do have a point there, but you are forgetting one thing: we are
talking demos here, not utilities - and demos aren't usually run
in the background. A demo is lika a movie - when you watch a demo
you watch the demo and do nothing else. You don't need multitasking in
a demo. Switching off all interrupts is perfectly fine in a big demo
(especially as a bigger demo usually loads via trackdisk from boot...)
as long as you reset the old pointers in the end (naturally...).
--
 *=--------------------------------------------------------------------------=*
 *                     E-Mail:   mknip@niksula.cs.hut.fi                      *
 *     Helsinki University of Technology / department of Computer Science     *
 *=--------------------------------------------------------------------------=*
Xref: sparky alt.sys.amiga.demos:1655 comp.sys.amiga.applications:8681 comp.sys.amiga.introduction:1538 comp.sys.amiga.marketplace:8912 comp.sys.amiga.misc:16882 comp.sys.amiga.advocacy:29168
From: browder@csugrad.cs.vt.edu (Chip Browder)
Newsgroups: alt.sys.amiga.demos,comp.sys.amiga.applications,comp.sys.amiga.introduction,comp.sys.amiga.marketplace,comp.sys.amiga.misc,comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
Subject: Re: Programming
Date: 15 Nov 92 23:38:02 GMT
Organization: Virginia Tech Computer Science Dept, Blacksburg, VA


 Not a flame, but what the heck does AMOS have to do with demos? The only demo
 I have ever seen written in AMOS was the lamest thing I have ever seen. In
 any case IMO it's not worth dedicating 15 articles * 5 newsgroups to. I 
 especially don't see reason for a flood of them here.


+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|              _____  ___    ____   ___    ______ ___  _____  _____  _____  |
|             /     )/ __)  / ___) /   |  / / / //   |(_  __)(_  __)(  ___) |
| RAMchip of / / / // ___) / (_  )/ _' | / / / // _' | / /    / /  __\ \    |
|           /_/_/_/(_____)(_____/(_/ |_|(_____/(_/ |_|(_/    (_/  (_____)   |
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
 (Chip Browder) browder@csugrad.cs.vt.edu - ramchip@megawatts.async.vt.edu
Newsgroups: alt.sys.amiga.demos
From: u920659@daimi.aau.dk (Carsten S|rensen)
Subject: Re: AGA-demo at Anarchy's party...
Organization: DAIMI: Computer Science Department, Aarhus University, Denmark
Date: Mon, 23 Nov 92 04:21:43 GMT

oahvenla@snakemail.hut.fi (Osma Ahvenlampi) writes:

>In article <1992Nov21.212919.61155@cc.usu.edu> slhmz@cc.usu.edu writes:

>>In article <1975@vall.dsv.su.se>, matt-dah@dsv.su.se (Mattias Dahlberg) writes
>>                                  ( Actually, it is 262,144+      )
>>                                  ( REMEBER: 1024 instead of 1000 )
>>                                  ( You're 6,144 colors off!      )
>>                                               |
>>                                              \|/
>>                                               V

>>> =  Regards  =  email:              =  1280x512x256000+  = 
>>> =  Mattias  =  matt-dah@dsv.su.se  =  I love it.        

>Actually, it'd be 16777216, if there was enough pixels. You can use any color
>from the palette even in HAM8 mode, which makes it compressed 24 bit. Think
>about it, 24 bit graphics in 1/3 of the space, and hardware to show it without
>any conversions!

If HAM8 works like I think it does (like the previous HAM (6?)) then the
number of colors must be 262144 + 64.

>--
>Osma Ahvenlampi  -  oahvenla@snakemail.hut.fi   * Workstation power for micro-
>All my opinions are not necessarily really mine * computer price: Amiga := FUN

		 _   SLAMMER of
		//\ __  __ __ _ |_
	       //--\| )(_| | (__| )\/ - BEDTIME FOR DEMOCRACY
		                   / u920659@daimi.aau.dk
From: pjunold@daimi.aau.dk (Peter Joachim Unold)
Newsgroups: alt.sys.amiga.demos
Subject: Re: Music and Code from Demos
Date: 15 Nov 92 16:40:42 GMT
Organization: DAIMI: Computer Science Department, Aarhus University, Denmark

mknip@niksula.hut.fi (Mats Anders Knip) writes:

>> Not true. You can easily do smooth scrolling under VGA using pixel panning.
>> No prob at all. Coding a 8-way scroller under PC can be done too, without you
>> having to update/move the whole screen. Only few PC coders know it, coz they 
>> are still accessing the hardware thru lame highlevel libraries/languages. I
>> guess it's time for some amiga freaks to takeover in the PC world.

>Is that so? Cool. I'm sorry for spreading false information, but
>I just assumed that since all platform-games on the PC are comparatively
>jerky it couldn't. I admit at any time that I don't know anything about
>programming PC-graphics.
>Does that mean you can set the screen-start to anywhere in the Video-memory?
>(and scroll superfast without redrawing anything but the new GFX showing
>up on screen - like on the Amiga?)

Talking VGA, you can set the bitplaneptrs in each 64k bank(there's 4 of them)
where-ever you like. You can also set a bplmod value. Super fast scrolling is
possible to yeah. Best newsgroup for that kinda discussion right now is
rec.games.programming - lotsa talk about X/Y mode there.
Newsgroups: alt.sys.amiga.demos
From: mknip@niksula.hut.fi (Mats Anders Knip)
Subject: Re: stb_Euro.dms (Nov92) Nice music, graphics hang :<
Organization: Helsinki University of Technology, Finland
	<crystal.722022327@glia>
Date: 18 Nov 92 16:43:11

 >If it is a LISTING, then where is the list??  Like I said, the program
 >just hung at the first screen, and all that showed was categories.  No 
 >amount of key pressing or button clicking affected it.  It just sat and 
 >played music and showed a single non-informative screen.

Oh please. If the program hung, there is evidently something wrong with
either your setup or the code. Or did you really think anybody would
spend hours of coding a screen that is nothing but a list of subjects?
Please switch on your brain before posting a question like that again.

 >> No, but there is also a collection of really cool bootblox.
 >What are those?

Apparently nothing you would want to have anything to do with.

 >> Sell it and buy some food :)0
 >Are you saying you'd rather that I didn't post??

Why not indeed.
--
 *=--------------------------------------------------------------------------=*
 *                     E-Mail:   mknip@niksula.cs.hut.fi                      *
 *     Helsinki University of Technology / department of Computer Science     *
 *=--------------------------------------------------------------------------=*
Newsgroups: alt.sys.amiga.demos,comp.sys.amiga.applications,comp.sys.amiga.introduction,comp.sys.amiga.marketplace,comp.sys.amiga.misc,comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
From: bdb@becker.GTS.ORG (Bruce Becker)
Subject: Re: Programming
Followup-To: alt.sys.amiga.demos,comp.sys.amiga.applications,comp.sys.amiga.introduction,comp.sys.amiga.misc,comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
Organization: G. T. S., Toronto, Ontario
Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1992 01:10:53 GMT

In article <1992Nov16.165738.5459@ugle.unit.no> eyvind@Lise.Unit.NO (Eyvind Bernhardsen) writes:
|In article <Bxt9zr.JCx@unx.sas.com>, walker@twix.unx.sas.com (Doug Walker) writes:
| > 
| > In article <1e41q2INNne0@ub.d.umn.edu>, rfentima@ub.d.umn.edu (Robert Fentiman) writes:
|[...]



	*****	PLEASE EDIT THE "Newsgroups: " HEADER LINE
	*****	SO THE "marketplace" GROUP IS NOT INCLUDED!!!!


Thanks,
-- 
  ,u,	 Bruce Becker			Toronto, Ontario
a /i/	 Internet: bdb@becker.gts.org	Uucp: ...!web!becker!bdb
 `\o\-e
 _< /_	 	DO NOT TAUNT HAPPY FUN BUSH - H. R. Perotnoid
Newsgroups: alt.sys.amiga.demos
From: lundman@kauri.vuw.ac.nz (L Lundman)
Subject: Re: Writing a StarField. Which method is best?
Organization: Disorganised.
Date: Thu, 19 Nov 1992 03:03:13 GMT
	<1992Nov17.211753.11335@ntg.com>

In article <1992Nov17.211753.11335@ntg.com> ewhac@ntg.com (Leo 'Bols Ewhac' Schwab) writes:

>   >	move.w	#$7FFF,$DFF09A		[ Disable all interrupts ]
>
>	   ARGH!  Why?  It's a STARFIELD!  It's not like you're modifying
>   system lists or trying to DMA hard disk data at breakneck speeds.  So why
>   put the system at risk?  Besides, I might be trying to download more demos
>   :-).

I agree to most of you said in your post about using already defined
constants rather than a numeric number, however, if you didn't turn off the
interrupt it would mean everytime you insert a disk, or press a few keys
or anything similar the star field would go jerky. I mean, if you want
smooth thats the way to go. I don't know any smooth, "real" games that 
doesn't turn off interrupts they don't like etc...

Although I can understand you want multitasking as well, but presonally
if I write something I want it smooth and nice and if you want multitasking
don't run it :)

Ahh well, my 2 cents...

Kef
--
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jorgen Lundman         eMail: lundman@kauri.vuw.ac.nz, lundman@rata.vuw.ac.nz.
8 Atua Street          My thoughts are my own and not VUW's..
Johnsonville,wgtn      "Research indicate that only 21 percent of what goes
New Zealand            wrong here is actually my fault."
Phone: +64 4 478 2724 (GMT+11 hrs) Amiga Archive Admin on ftphost.vuw.ac.nz
Xref: sparky alt.sys.amiga.demos:1662 comp.sys.amiga.applications:8692 comp.sys.amiga.introduction:1543 comp.sys.amiga.marketplace:8929 comp.sys.amiga.misc:16901 comp.sys.amiga.advocacy:29199
From: tim@corcoran.rain.com (tim corcoran)
Newsgroups: alt.sys.amiga.demos,comp.sys.amiga.applications,comp.sys.amiga.introduction,comp.sys.amiga.marketplace,comp.sys.amiga.misc,comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
Subject: Re: Programming
Date: 16 Nov 92 05:58:35 GMT
Article-I.D.: corcoran.tim.02o2
Distribution: world
Organization: Not an Organization
X-NewsSoftware: GRn 1.16f (10.17.92) by Mike Schwartz & Michael B. Smith


> Much pro/anti AMOS text deleted <
>                                 <

For crying out loud people, exercise a little self-control here. This
topic may be important to many of you but 


		QUIT CROSSPOSTING IT EVERYEHERE!!!!


<flame-off>

-- 
[..!{uunet,qiclab,intelhf,bucket}!m2xenix!becca!corcoran!tim]

-----------------------------------------------------------------

Life is like a bad margarita, made with good tequila
                                            - Peter Applebone

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Newsgroups: alt.sys.amiga.demos
From: mckillnm@unix2.tcd.ie (Marky Mark)
Subject: Demos for the A1200 .. FTP Sites ?
Organization: Trinity College, Dublin
Date: Thu, 19 Nov 1992 17:04:52 GMT

I have just got the a1200 and am looking for a good demos that show off
the AAG chip set ... IS there a Plasma generator or something that I can 
get ???

Please mail me with the FTP site and location.....


Thanks 

Mark

--
  _ _ _                 _ _ _                        |  mckillnm@unix2.tcd.ie
 ' ) ) )         /     ' ) ) )    /     /) /)        |-------------------------
  / / / __  __  /_      / / / _  /_ o  // // _  __   |As they say in Russia ..
 / ' (_(_(_/ (_/ <_    / ' (_(__/ <_(_(/_(/_(<_/) )_ |    "Mascow...."
From: d2hacker@dtek.chalmers.se (Magnus Hacker)
Newsgroups: alt.sys.amiga.demos
Subject: Re: Music and Code from Demos
Date: 19 Nov 92 06:46:04 GMT
Organization: Chalmers University of Technology, Gothenburg Sweden

franklin@csugrad.cs.vt.edu (John Franklin) writes:

>Um... no.  The Timex Sinclair 1000 was a door wedge sized and shaped
>computer with a membrane keyboard and came with 2K of memory.  You could
>pump it up to a whopping 16K with an add on pack and you could store
>your programs with any audio cassette recorder that had an input jack.

>The 128K machine that you're thinking of is a Cray in comparison.

Could this be the (in)famous ZX80? (or was it ZX81?)
I remember I was about to buy one of those, but my eyes fell
on a VIC20 instead..

Just think about it... 3.5 kilobytes of RAM!

Sigh... those were the days...
--
Magnus Hacker, d2hacker@dtek.chalmers.se

Is this my signature?
Newsgroups: alt.sys.amiga.demos
From: ss@cch.coventry.ac.uk (WeaponX)
Subject: Re: 1/2 Meg Chip --> 1 Meg Chip RAM!
Organization: Coventry University
Date: Wed, 18 Nov 1992 09:14:40 GMT

now the kcs board allowed me the option to use that half meg as a ram
disk or as fast ram (i thought). Before i got my hard disk the half
meg was a ram disk but once i installed my hard disk i completely forgot
to install the kcs ram disk thus (i thought) leaving the half meg as
fast ram BUT

after several upgrades of the kcs board (software based by the way
the kcs board is a pc emulator and good at it) i think my extra
kcs half meg had made my chip ram upto 1 meg of chip ram.(i dont
know how)

The only reason i know this is that a computer magazine (cant remember
which one) gave away a demo of ceaser but it would only work if you
had 1 meg chip ram. So my cousin who lives with also has an amiga
his being a 1.3 a500 without a kcs board tried the demo but to 
no avail.

So i tried out the demo. (i think i may have copied to my hd can't
remember) and to my amazement it worked!! (Total Amazement). My
cousin and i could'nt understand how but i figured it was the extra
half meg which i think, not to sure but i believe the kcs board
had defaulted the half meg to chip ram. (I have the old chip set)

So i believe there must be a way to turn your memory somehow into
1 meg chip ram.
How this helps
-- 
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Two's Company Three's Kinky!
					S.Sidhu
JANET ss@uk.ac.coventry
From: masc@sbustd.rz.uni-sb.de (Martin Schulze)
Newsgroups: alt.sys.amiga.demos
Subject: Re: Lsd_Joe2.dms > 720k!
Date: 21 Nov 1992 09:22:07 GMT
Organization: Studenten-Mail, Rechenzentrum Universitaet des Saarlandes
NNTP-Posting-Host: sbustd.rz.uni-sb.de

cs_e375@ceres (Andrew Weakley) writes:
> 	Sorry if this has been asked a million times before but:
> 
> 	I am trying to transfer the 2nd disk of LSD Jesus On E's demo from
> an msdos disk to the Amiga, however, the filesize is 960k and will not fit
> on a msdos disk.

There is a tool availeble called "PCRestore223.lha" 
This nice Tool (needs Kick2.0) enables you to restore disks written via the 
PC Backup-Command onto an Amigadrive :-))
Get it. It's worth it.


> 			Thanks.....
>  Andrew Weakley - BCS 2 - Kingston University - EMail: cs_e375@kingston.ac.u

--
Martin Schulze at "Universitaet des Saarlandes"
masc@stud.uni-sb.de

Newsgroups: alt.sys.amiga.demos
From: tfinn@crash.cts.com (Aaron Grier)
Subject: Re: Music and Code from Demos
Organization: CTS Network Services (crash, ctsnet), El Cajon, CA
Date: 15 Nov 92 14:52:19 PST

In article <MKNIP.92Nov15121629@blob.hut.fi> mknip@niksula.hut.fi (Mats Anders Knip) writes:
>> Not true. You can easily do smooth scrolling under VGA using pixel panning.
>> No prob at all. Coding a 8-way scroller under PC can be done too, without you
>> having to update/move the whole screen. Only few PC coders know it, coz they 
>> are still accessing the hardware thru lame highlevel libraries/languages. I
>> guess it's time for some amiga freaks to takeover in the PC world.
>
>Is that so? Cool. I'm sorry for spreading false information, but
>I just assumed that since all platform-games on the PC are comparatively
>jerky it couldn't. I admit at any time that I don't know anything about
>programming PC-graphics.
>Does that mean you can set the screen-start to anywhere in the Video-memory?
>(and scroll superfast without redrawing anything but the new GFX showing
>up on screen - like on the Amiga?)

You can do some register level hacking of the VGA card and get some ultra-
smooth scrolling going, both horizontal and vertical.. I imagine that
diagonals wouldn't be too hard either. It's just all this damn register
level hacking you HAVE to do to get anything done.

For instance... you can set up the screen to have a virtual resolution of
640x400 w/ 256 colors, but you can still only access 64k of that memory at
a time. Newer VGA cards have 1Meg of RAM onboard, yet you still have this
dorky 64k window with which to do all your "magic." Makes it a damn pain
for the programmer.

Amiga is all linearly addressed is it not? IE video memory occupies some
memory address, with none of thist 64k stuff?

Intel should've dropped the 64k swapping thing with the introduction of the
80286!

agrier@gompers.gompers.edu (real internet addy)
tfinn@crash.cts.com (UUCP address)

Newsgroups: alt.sys.amiga.demos
From: u920659@daimi.aau.dk (Carsten S|rensen)
Subject: Re: '040 specs + DEMOS on A4000
Organization: DAIMI: Computer Science Department, Aarhus University, Denmark
Date: Wed, 18 Nov 92 10:42:55 GMT

geirh@solan.unit.no (Geir Haugen) writes:

>Here are some specs to water all demo coders' mouths!

>First off, a comparison of common effective-address instructions in the
>68020 and 68040:

Arrrgghhhh!!!! I MUST OWN ONE!!!!

>Now let's compare the built-in FPU in the 68040 with a 68882:

Whaaaaa!!! *sob*

>Note: The 68040 only implements a fundamental subset of all 68882
>      instructions in hardware. All other 68882 instructions (i.e.
>      sin, cos, exp) are emulated in software.

Eh, how fast are they then?

>Enough of that...

Good! Was thinking of stealing one...

>Buy a A1200 (or better: a A4000) and start coding for AGA!!

How are we supposed to do that? No focken HW guide!!! Anybody found out
some of the new regs yet? Geir?

>Geir

Slammer/Anarchy
Carsten Soerensen
u920659@daimi.aau.dk

>----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>      //COMMODORE                   Geir Haugen, Trondheim, Norway
>  \\ // AMIGA 4000/040              Norwegian Institue of Technology (NTH)
>   \X/  SERIAL #187                 Internet: geirh@solan.unit.no
>----------------------------------------------------------------------------

I want one too!!!!!


Newsgroups: alt.sys.amiga.demos
From: oahvenla@snakemail.hut.fi (Osma Ahvenlampi)
Subject: Re: Writing a StarField. Which method is best?
Organization: Helsinki University of Technology, Finland
	<OAHVENLA.92Nov20171852@lk-hp-4.hut.fi> <By4H2q.CJs@csugrad.cs.vt.edu>
Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1992 16:23:13 GMT

Me:
>>The display switching just comes as a byproduct, the big thing is that,
>>provided enough power, you can watch demos and download new ones at the same
>>time. Even if YOU don't do anything else while watching a demo, you might wis
>>that your computer does.

In article <By4H2q.CJs@csugrad.cs.vt.edu> franklin@csugrad.cs.vt.edu (John Franklin) writes:
>I'd tend to agree with you on that point, it would be nice to be dl'ing
>another demo (or fonts or whatever), or doing some other meanial, 
>non-interactive task while watching a demo.  However, most demos are not
>stable enough that I'd want to try it.  Besides, if a demo starts pulling
>down time at just the point when something else (say a comm program) wants
>time to prevent overflowing buffers or send an ACK, odds are the task is
>going to die.  The more stuff, or rather, the more stuff*demand that you
>have on a multitasking machine, the more likely it is to die.

Only if the demo is badly written. If the coder goes to such lenghts to give
you multitasking even while the demo is running, it's not a big deal to make
it a bit friendlier still... Do all time-consuming things in a normal task,
and use a VBlank interrupt to synchronise them. Now, if it's for example 3D
vectors, the picture can be calculated and drawn in a task, and when it's
ready, put onto screen. Moving around, ie. updating eye/object coordinates
can be done in the VBlank, and you get variable fps, while the movement
speed stays constant... With a 68020+, the things done in VBlank take so
little time (NO DMA loops in players, okay? Use NotePlayer!), that term
programs would have no problem, even with faster modems. I have only 68010,
but I can raytrace, play music with MultiPlayer, use an editor and download
at the same time, at least up to 9600 bps... Don't know about higher speeds.
--
Osma Ahvenlampi  -  oahvenla@snakemail.hut.fi   * Workstation power for micro-
All my opinions are not necessarily really mine * computer price: Amiga := FUN