Re: Packman or Packman 2
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Re: Packman or Packman 2
CHRISTOPHER M. BUCKLEY wrote:
>
> Jonathan - thanks for responding - I'm alittle new at this so maybe
> you can give me a little guidance. (Anyone else out there please feel
> free to join in at any time!)
The first thing you and every other "newbie" to ti calcs should do is go
to www.ticalc.org and read everything on the site. Read every FAQ on
there and it should answer all your questions. There's a good FAQ for
this listserve I think as well.
> I saved the file you sent to disk (I believe I have anyway - since I
> haven't had a chance to open it to look at it).
>
> How are these programs written - what language?) and do you know if
> the 82 and 85 are written
> in the same language? I was thinking that I would just type in the
> program by hand once I"ve opened it up and taken a look at it since I
> don't have a linking cable (but am considering the purchase of one).
>
> When one writes a program for one of these calculators, does it have
> to be in the language of the internal features of the calculator (the
> language the calculator was built with) or can one write a program in
> any language and how would one go about translating a program from
> one language to another? Wouldn't this require knowledge of both
> programming languages (unfortunately, something which I don't
> possess).
Real quick: No. All programmable ti-calcs use what's called ti-basic as
their programming language (except for zshell and fargo, which are
assembly level programming methods for the 85 and 92 respectively), but
you have different commands, etc. that you can/must use on each
calculator. Therefore programs written for the 82 are not directly
executable on the 85; in fact you can't even transfer programs b/w them
b/c their transmission protocols are different.
The files are not stored in a readable form on your computer either (the
.82p or .82g files). Like most files on your pc, they're binary. You
won't be able to just open one up with a text editor and see what it
says. What you need to do is goto www.ti.com and download the official
graph-link software (setup82.exe, setup85.exe) etc. regardless of
whether or not you have a link cable or not (the software is free). With
the graphlink software, you can open .82p, .82g, .85p, .85g files etc.
and see in text the whole program. With some programs, the graphlink
software can actually translate it from 82 executable code to 85
executable code and vice versa. However, this doesn't work on all
programs. But if it does, you can look at the translated code and type
that into your calc. You're better off just building yourself a link
cable, though, than typing things in all the time. I highly recommend
building the $5 parallel link (NOT the serial link!!!). Directions can
be found at www.ticalc.org.
As an aside, pacman is not a difficult game to program from scratch
anyway, and would be an excellent excercise if you want to start
programming your calc. (begin by reading the chapters in your manual
regarding programming first, btw.)
--
Best, | Tech Life:
Jonathan Maier | Students get shaft
gt3130a@prism.gatech.edu | Students complain but accept shaft
DJ, WREK-Atlanta 91.1 fm | Life goes on --Gail Rosen 12/14
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