Yeah for omnicalc!!!

and i didnt fr0st p0st!
yeah!

Yes, I but I have 319474 post! (eighth)

Hey thanks to no_one_2000 I have a brilliant idea.
Ticalc could the total number of posts in discussion boards in the account info thing, then make one of those toplist things to see who is most active. But, this would probably be pointless because you would have people like no_one posting a whole heck of a lot half the time not on topic, but then again, that is ticalc's staple (users being off topic).

Ticalc needs to make a place for off topic discussions and for members to start discussions about calculator news that they find out about (ie a programmer made a new game and would like to introduce it)

I believe that some restructuring of Ticalc.org is necessary and this deserves its own news item for discussion.

I would like to read about omnicalc and only omnicalc in this news thread.

Thanks

Omnicalc is the best! I like the copy/paste features! The ram recoery is great, too. So is the virtual calc. So is everything. The only thing I don't like is that it doesn't have alpha+on so you need to run mirage which overrides omnicalc's key hooks...
I will try to stay on topic... Want a hotdog?

It does have it. You have to hold On while pressing Alpha. I messed up, v1.01 will fix this :)

Oh, then there's nothing bad about it!

why are sprites the only programming feature?
Why not other tokens that there are already progs for, so we dont need 10000 extra files with our programs?
i.e.
get list of program names
turn calc off
(un)archive programs
get amount of ram free
how about store data to programs? (no more 1000 named lists)

this app really gives us basic programmers some options (especially the link commands), but a lot seems left out.(and im pretty sure its not a flashpage thing, look how big mirage is (same as omnicalc) and all the stuff it can do

I agree. I think that user defined functions should be integrated. they are neccessary to make a good program.

Why not just set up a way for 3rd party asm programers to make their own functions? The TI-OS recognizes 1 byte and 2 byte tokens, which would allow ~65535 tokens.

No, there wouldn't be that many, because some combinations in one byte tokens are already taken. For example, say that 0-191 are reserved for one-byte tokens (most likely this isn't how it is). This leaves just 64 "slots" (192-255) in the first byte for two-byte tokens, which allows for 16384 (64*256) two-byte tokens. The same applies for three-byte tokens, if they're used; some places in the second need to be saved for the third byte. This is similar to the way machine language op-codes work, in fact.

The number of tokens really isn't a limitation, but how would we/whoever standardize which token corresponds to what function? If there was no standard, then each token could be interpreted depending on what token a function decides to use. This is a Bad Thing.

In fact, there aren't anywhere near so many available tokens. Almost all of the bytes are single-byte tokens.
There are only a few "double" token bytes:
5C tVarMat (matrix names
5D tVarList (list names L1-L6)
5E tVarEqu (equation names)
60 tVarPict (picture names)
61 tVarGDB (GDB names)
62 tVarOut (statistics variables)
62 tVarSys (other system variables, e.g. Xmin)
7E tGFormat (graph format commands)
AA tVarStrng (string names)
BB t2ByteTok (miscellaneous rarely-used tokens)
and of these, I believe an application can define only the t2ByteTok tokens.
The last token defined by TIOS is BB,CE, the GarbageCollect command. This leaves for user programs only the last 49 possible tokens. Not a lot of room to work with - very bad planning on TI's part, in my opinion. Of these, Symbolic defines 20 and Omnicalc defines 12, leaving 17 tokens yet to be claimed. I hope these will not be wasted!

** In addition, there are no provisions for 3 byte tokens (would probably crash the OS.)

Well, this just answers the question I had a minute before this posting. :-)

Hey, this supports my claims with concrete evidence! Since we're (not me, the TI community) using two-byte tokens, I think we should reserve much more space for use in three-byte tokens (if they can even be used; I don't know).

This entire token thing is kinda confusing for those of us who don't know what a token is.

Since you program in TI-73 BASIC, TI-80 BASIC, TI-81 BASIC, TI-82 BASIC, TI-83 BASIC, TI-83 Assembly, TI-83 Plus BASIC, TI-85 BASIC, TI-85 Assembly, TI-86 BASIC, TI-89 BASIC, TI-89 Assembly, TI-92 BASIC, TI-92 Assembly, TI-92 Plus BASIC, and TI-92 Plus Assembly, you should know what a token is...

i dont, is that an opcode in basic?

....what?

Next to your posts, click on the button next to your name. On your page (the one that says your a monkey) it says you program for all those calcs...

oh... whoops. heh. my bad.

Yeah, anyone able to explain all this (and preferably also how the heck Omnicalc works??) in normal English to someone with only a bunch of Ti-83 knowledge?

Thank you.

Although I have no idea how omnicalc (just an 86 using FLASH wannabe), I do have a small grasp on tokens, maybe. I take it that everyone here has written and run a basic game on their calc, and probably also knows that it takes a while the first time to start. This is because the calc is tokenizing the program, sort of like how a compiler compiles.

On the 85/86 it works that way.
On the 82/83(+(SE)) everything is tokenized at all times. When we use the "sin(" token, it behaves as if it were a single character. That means you can't place the cursor at the "i". Also, you cannot delete just the "s", if you hit del, the whole token is deleted.

Okay, I had figured that out (Thanks anyway).

So Omnicalc adds a few tokens, but how? How and where are they stored? Can I see it as a shortcut to a normal hidden program? Is it possible to do the same on the normal Ti-83?

Lots of questions... :-)

To the best of my knowledgde, the extra tokens are stored in OmniCalc.
They are *not* shortcuts to programs normally hidden. When you use a standard (TI-OS) token, you tell TI-OS to do something, like make a calculation. The OmniCalc tokens tell OmniCalc to do something. When a program is executed, OmniCalc leaves the standard tokens alone, passing them through to TI-OS. When it sees one of it own tokens, it performs the action itself, "overriding" the TI-OS.
It is impossible to do the same thing on a regular 83. Tokens can only be added because of a "token hook", which the 83- just doesn't have.
If I've got something wrong, please correct me.

I don't know that much about it myself, if you want to know exactly how OmniCalc adds tokens, you'd better ask Detacheds.
Not too many answers :(

Okay, I'm getting the picture.
This doesn't mean that when you use Omnicalc you have an interrupt routine running, right? 'Cos I hate interrupt routines.

me too, but just because i dont know how to program them (their way too confusing)

If you think that is bad planning, you didn't know TI doesn't allow tokens beyond BB,CE in the OS. It refuses to handle them, thus Omnicalc and Symbolic must change them to preexisting tokens during parsing, and then change back afterwards. This involves recursive parsing hooks, error handlers, and lots of other fun stuff. Oh yes, TI did a *great* job with planning...</sarcasm>

Can there not be more if you have a shell that check for wierd combos of tokens like 'tan(STOP' or something like that. Or just install one command, followed by a number that dictates what command is being called?

(Reply if you think I'm off my rocker)

Can there not be more commands if you have a shell that checks for wierd combos of tokens like 'tan(STOP' or something like that. Or just install one command (like 'MyAPP(') followed by a number that dictates what command is being called? (MyAPP(3,arg1,arg2,etc.))

(Reply if you think I'm off my rocker)

I am currently working on an app that does add data storage functions and a free ram variable. It is a shell, much like MirageOS or ION. Only, it runs enhanced BASIC programs. If anyone is interested in helping polish off my app, email me.

invert text
how `bout a line-change commmand?
or graph inverse?

I am no stranger with Sprites. I've been fiddling around with Sprites longer than you have lived! Naw, just kidding... Sprite thing is great in Omnicalc but they left out so many things with sprites. I know at folks at detach knows thing or two with sprites but how could they leave out masking?! How are we suppose to blend our sprites into our background without masking?! Though I may be wrong, can anybody tell me how to blend sprites into the background by using omnicalc's sprites...

Assuming I understand what you are trying to do, then all you need to do is pass 'Sprite' the 'OR' command via the last argument.

There is both XOR and OR masking, it's listed in the manual...

I've tried that Xor and or spriting but all it did was inverted my sprite color... white to black. What am I doing wrong?

Using OR/XOR masks inverts the XOR mask where the OR mask is a 1. The results are as follows (sorry if it's not aligned):
OR XOR result
0 0 transparent
0 1 inverse
1 0 black
1 1 white

As you can see, black and white are reversed when OR is 1.

A method that I prefer is to use "AND" instead of "OR" as the first mask. An advantage to this is that the result is whatever the XOR mask is wherever the AND mask is 0. Results for this method:
AND XOR result
0 0 white
0 1 black
1 0 transparent
1 1 inverse

Basically, make the AND mask a 0 wherever you want the color to be as-is in the XOR mask.

Just my $(1/50). I hope it helps someone. Maybe not.

Holy Bajesus, you make programming sound like a chore. Err... so.... should I use Xor spriting then or spriting to blend to background or vise versa.

For the first mask/sprite, use either OR or AND. For the second sprite, use XOR. Always use XOR last.

To summarize my post above, if you use the AND method, then the AND sprite will have black where you want the sprite to be transparent (or inverse).

Yeah I like Omnicalc but after I downloaded it, my TI83+ wouldn't let me delete any of my files! Does anyone have an answer?

Never mind-
I realized that I accidentally enabled the memory protection feature!

Be happy, now you know how well it works :)

Yep, definitely beats Mirage's mem protect!

I not very experienced with TI graphing calcs-
Was MirageOS just another app like Omincalc that added on extra features?
P.S. What's the big deal about Assembly Programs? How are they different from the regular ones?

I don't know much about MiragOS, but I can tell you about assembly programs.

If by "regular ones" you mean BASIC programs, then assembly programs run 100's if not 1000's of times faster than regular ones. They allow much more power and flexibility in programs.

If you're comfortable with TI-BASIC but feel like it's too slow or inflexible, then try assembly (or C for the TI-9x calculators). Assembly is more difficult to learn and to use, but the results are, more often than not, worth the trouble.

MirageOS is to assembly what Omnicalc/Symbolic is to BASIC. Programs running under Mirage have access to an incredible number of functions, most of which are rather useful but either not provided by TIOS or are simply not worth the hundreds of clock cycles taken up by a B_CALL. There are also routines that are included in TIOS but are themselves programmed poorly and are hideously slow, primarily the graphics routines.
In addition, Mirage provides useful features for the user, such as the ability to sort programs into 10 folders, hide and/or lock programs, and run archived programs without unarchiving.

As to "the big deal about assembly programs"? Assembly programs are direct instructions to the Z80 CPU, and as such, do not rely on an interpreter as BASIC does, but neither is there any program monitoring them and preventing them from crashing the calculator. Assembly programs do run thousands of times faster than their BASIC counterparts, but if they are not properly debugged they can, and occasionally do, cause major problems. Most often the problem is limited to wiping your RAM. (For this Omnicalc's RAM recovery has already become very useful on my own calculator!)

I have some questions about B_CALL. I've seen a B_CALL macro in 83+ asm programs, but what is it exactly? Does it expand to a regular CALL instruction with other instructions or something? My best guess is that it allows for both relocation as well as memory paging of the TI-OS functions.

B_CALL label

expands to

RST 28H
DW label

The RST instruction is like a call, but it takes up only a single byte and references a fixed address (00,08,10,18,20,28,30,38) on page 0 of the calculator's FlashROM. What this does is to call a bit of TIOS code which obtains the address specified, then finds that address on a certain page (1B I think) of the OS code, where a three byte reference to the actual location of the routine is found.
The reason it is not simply expanded to a page swap and call is that it must be used from within an application, which is swapped at 4000-7FFF, the same place where the routine itself will be loaded. On other calculators it is possible to use a direct CALL because the ROM swapped there is an entire 16k of "ld a,XX / out (6),a" or whatever.

In summary: a B_CALL is a kludgy, inefficient way to reference calls on other pages, but this is the way TIOS works. The alternative is to fetch the addresses yourself and set up calls in RAM where they will not be affected by page swaps.

It's me again!
How can I get involved in Assembly Programming?(specifically for the 83+)
Is there software that can help me get started?
(P.S. I have Windows XP)

I have quite a bit of experience in ASM programming for the 83+, and I can help you find some starter files and programs to get you started send me an E-Mail at mattspencer1@earthlink.net

If anybody else needs help learning ASM just contact me.

Yes,OmniCalc is great...
it is just uncompatible with OS1.14
Occasionally, reinstalling comes up with the 'rename illegal tokens'- hit no, the calc crashes.
The extra menu (pressing Vars twice) occasionally vanishes: the only way to make it reappear is to reset the memory of the calc (FLASH and RAM) then to reinstall OmniCalc.
It also does some well-evil things to the Y= tokens: Pressing Y= after changing some settings in OmniCalc results is a spectacular explosion effect. Go into the memory manager beforehand it is shows that all Y= are garbled and about 50000B each.
Please fix it?

If only you could copy/paste into programs, equations etc.

This is a problem, but manipulating the edit screen is actually much more complicated than manipulating the homescreen. To do this, the app would need to identify both the cursor position in the edit buffer, and the position and manner of displaying the edit buffer on the screen. Making this work with an arbitrary edit buffer could be very difficult. I don't see why you can't *paste* into buffers, though...

I WANT A HOTDOG!!! w00t!

see link

they should make one general(off-topic) discussion group that is always at the top of the main page.

the bad part of that is that that one would have 1000 comments and the other ones like 10

A better idea might be an IRC channel (#ti on EFnet, but methinks it's defunct), or even a USENET newsgroup.

#tcpa is far from defunct :)

#ti has every kind of non-calc related discussion.

I agree, that might be a good idea. i think people just post what they wanna say anyway where they wanna say it regardless of the topic, so creating a seperate disscussion board for this would be pointless

I disagree, I think we should have multiple different newsgroups and users would be able to make their own discussions about specific topics in each group - that way there would not be a ti-86 assembly games ideas page with 1000 entries. Smaller disscusions for specific calculators. (we would also need people to delete off topic posts - or reroute them to the specific newsgroup (ie ticalc.news to ticalc.offtopic.fun)

Although this post is off-topic (so was the above one-sorry [:-(]) don't you all realize that you all are being off-topic, when you are trying for people not to be?

to add my 20*1/10 cents, if anything else, ticalc could make a survey, then an article, then possibly a "long lasting" message board, as opposed to the article boards that get a stream of replies for about a week or so.

If someone makes a new game, they should upload it to the site, and then we all see it in the Daily updates, and they don't have to tell us about it! they we have no need for spamming like that! sound good? ^_^

Yeah, that's a great idea! I'd probably get a high ranking to with all the junk I post here!

3.14159265358979323846264338

And all the junk I post here too!

4

ya me too! :-p

3.141592653589793238462633832795;P

C'mon Michael, I know you wanna...

3.14159265358979323846264338 3279502884197169399375105820
I don't know...something like that.

BTW, who's Michael? There are over 300 Michael's registered here, so perhaps you should be more specific.

yeah, who's he? I've never heard of him...
I post a lot of not junk! Everything I post is wonderful and splendid!

GIMME A HOTDOG!!!

he could be talking about lord_nightrose (Michael McElroy) or somthing...

Speaking of first posts i read this on a past article comments
Re: eXor Releases Pang v1.0
Nick Disabato
For the ignorant morons who access this site, here's a post I added to the Phoenix v5.0 article a few days ago:

------

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Phoenix v5.0
Nick Disabato
The next time who ever goes so close to MENTION a first comment on this board will get their comment, along with all replies, mercilessly deleted.

I'm sick and tired of this crap. I want to come home and not see YOUR comment board flooded with pointless BS that has absolutely NOTHING to do with the topic, other than a "congratulations" or a "wow i like this HEY FIRST COMMENT!!!111"

NO.

If you want to post BS that gives you the false sense of acceptance, go to Slashdot or another TI site. Don't do it here.

I refuse to tolerate this any further.

This conversation ends now.

--BlueCalx

Reply to this comment 19 April 2000, 21:34 GMT


------

Please stop your incredibly insolent behavior. Nobody likes it.
I just deleted four of the five comments on this board for a reason, and I could keep it up all night if I have to.

Thank you for your cooperation in advance.

--BlueCalx

Reply to this comment 23 April 2000, 01:58 GMT
=========================== =========================

I agree with nickd. Also, at slashdot you'd instantly be modded down as troll, offtopic, redundant (you can never get first post there, no matter how hard you try), or flamebait. It'd be nice if we had karma here too--that way we could silence people that abuse the forums.