8,732
edits
Changes
→Value
The book is a great value in the fact it is actually two products: a good collection of programs and a great resource of programming techniques. Since programs are included from six different authors, the book has a myriad of program styles, any of which is worthy of emulation. However, the book really is a value in the fact that there are more programs and less book. That is to say, a majority of the space in the book is occupied by program listings, and very little occupied by the author's thoughts on world politics and their relation to programming in BASIC.
==The author responds==
Thank you very much for sending
the advance copy of the review of my
book, "Programs for the TI Home
Computer." The few passages in the
review that I question are outlined
below.
1. " ... the publishers pull a dirty
trick ... "-I agree, except that MY
book was published in February of
1983 when other publishers thought I
was crazy for doing a book of programs
specifically for the TI.
2. " ... quality ... ranges from very good
to poor." -I think the word "poor" is a
bit subjective. The author admits that
the programming is not ''poor'' so
perhaps he means that the particular
programs that did not appeal to him
(ie. Ten-Up, Video Tape Finder, Airline
Guide) were uninteresting to him.
I realized that the users of the 99/4A
were a diverse bunch, so I tried to
include a wide variety of programs.
Never did I expect all programs to
they truly are), a more fair statement
might be, "I did not find this game to
appeal to all tastes. As a mattr of
fact, some of the programs in the book
that were my least favorites have
turned out to be favored by many
readers. It all depends on what the
reader is looking for. For example,
some may think that "Keyword Article
Search" is a useless program, but I
have received many letters from users
who like it, and a review in Popular
Computing devoted two paragraphs to
it. The same review said that th educational
programs in the book were
"interesting and unusual," while Mr.
Bobbitt seemed rather unimpressed
by them. The point is, neither is
"wrong"; the two reviewers merely
have different tastes. So, instead of
saying programs are "poor" (unless
be very interesting." Or, "Some may
not find programs such as Video Tape
Finder and Airline Guide to be particularly
useful to them."
3. " ... while not free from errors" -All
program listings in the book are
printed directly from tested versions
and will run as listed. Of course, a typing
error on the part of the user could
create a problem with any program.
The only program that cm1sed a problem
after publication was Numerology,
and this was due to circumstances
beyond my control. The program
was tested with both versions of
Extended BASIC in existence at the
time of publication. After the first edition
of the book came out. TI made
changes in Extended BASIC and did
not tell anyone about it. Anyone with
the latest version of Extended BASIC
could possibly get a "recursive subprogram''
message. The correction
was made in the Second Edition.
Thanks for your consideration of my
comments.
'''— Steve Davis'''
