Books about SuperBASIC

[Simon_Carr]

Me again!

I'm turning into a SuperBASIC junkie... It is so much more logical and easy to understand than BASIC on the spectrum (or for that matter the BBC, which I used a lot in the 80's and very early 90s).

Anyway, I've been searching around for and buying books on the QL, especially in terms of learning SuperBASIC. My question is, which ones do the more seasoned folk on here recommend. I imagine that Dilwyn might have some suggestions , but I have found one or two that seem pretty good (e.g bASIC programming on the QL by the Cryers), but a lot (like the QL series books, of which there seem to be many on eBay at any one time) that are a bit hit and miss.

So, any recommendations for SuperBASIC books that offer a good progressive learning curve, but which start off accessible without being too patronising?

I have no idea how I want to use my flourishing interest in SuperBASIC for, but I want to learn!

[swensont]

The best is the book by Jan Jones, who created SuperBASIC. Her book and another can be found on World of Spectrum:

QL Superbasic: The Definitive Handbook (Jan Jones)
http://www.worldofspectrum.org/infoseek ... id=2000311

Exploring the Sinclair QL - An Introduction to Superbasic
http://www.worldofspectrum.org/infoseek ... id=2000134

Being in the US, I could not get any QL books back in 1986, when I got my QL. I mostly used the documentation that came with the system and what info I could get from magazines and user group newsletters. I really can't recommend any for learning the language (plus it's been so long).

There should be lots of example code available from different sites, esp. Dilwyn's site.

[dilwyn]

As Tim said, the Jan Jones book is the definitive guide, and it ought to be - she was the author of SuperBASIC after all.

I learned SuperBASIC using just the QL user guide originally, although I did buy a few other books later. I can't really say I remember any as being outstanding, although most were reasonably good. The one to avoid is the QL Companion by Boris Allen. It's a bit of a collector's item, but was mostly written from a preliminary QL user guide before SuperBASIC appeared in final form.

There's some QL eBooks for eBook readers on my website if you have one of those machines. If you do, it might be handy to download a QL manual to it to save on desk space - the QL manual is pretty big after all!

The trouble with SuperBASIC is that it's quite addictive, even more so if you use SBASIC on the SMSQ/E developments of the operating system. The more SuperBASIC you learn, the more you realise you could do with it.

One way of improving your skills in the language is to get a source of BASIC listings and work your way through them. In the early days, I used to type in magazine listings from magazines from that period such as QL World, QL User, Popular Computing Weekly and the like. They rarely worked first time but it was fun (and I learned a lot from this) working out what had gone wrong with my misstipyngs. Occasionally there were problems in the listings as published, e.g. short sections of code accidentally missing, or the program only worked on one version of the QL ROM.

If you can get hold of some early second hand QL World and QL User magazines, they used to have pages of listings of programs and it can be fun and educational typing them in - you learn a lot looking at other people's code!

I don't know if you intend to join (or have joined) Quanta - there is a Quanta library for its members with a large number of disks of software, including many, many BASIC programs. There's quite a few articles etc on programming on the Documents section of my website.

I have a load of PD basic programs here on various media which need sorting (games, utilities, all sorts written in BASIC) when (if?) I ever get time to add to my website. A lot of programs already on the website, including some of the games on the Games page are written in BASIC too.

I'm not sure if you've got as far as downloading QL software yet, if not, it might be an idea to read articles about downloading, zipping and unzipping and file transfer on my website to smooth the path a little!

[Simon_Carr]

Dear Tim and Dilwyn

Many thanks for this, very helpful indeed. I'll get a copy of Jan Jones definitive guide, as that sounds like it is the most use in the long run.

What is it about SuperBASIC that is so addictive? I'm astounded that even after 30 years it seems like such a good programming language, with a wonderful sense of structure and flexibility. The more I work with the QL, the sadder I become that it was seen as such a failure back in the 1980s. I do wonder what the computing market would have looked like if the QL launch had been better, and the reception for it was more positive.

I'm still doing very basic things with the QL, but am loving it!

[vanpeebles]

As said the Jan Jones book is superb, it's also worth checking sellymyretro, ebay and even amazon for QL books. For what's regarded as a fairly niche machine there was a lot of books written for it

[dex]

As said the Jan Jones book is superb, it's also worth checking sellymyretro, ebay and even amazon for QL books.

Now I'm selling one on german eBay. http://www.ebay.de/itm/Sinclair-QL-Buch ... 4177599a96

[RWAP]

I ought to also mention the SBASIC/SuperBASIC Reference Manual, as no-one else has mentioned it.

It's basic premise is a rewrite of the QL Keywords and QL Concepts sections, with up to date information covering the QL, Minerva, SMSQ/e, the Thor and Q60 - plus a whole host of public domain toolkits (and Toolkit II).

It explores each keyword - provides useful programming examples and looks at the bugs in each operating system (and any differences in parameters).

It similarly goes on to look at the concepts section - with details on the graphic drivers (including full colour), networking, and other system devices and how to use them.

[dilwyn]

I ought to also mention the SBASIC/SuperBASIC Reference Manual, as no-one else has mentioned it.

Indeed, a superb reference guide with examples and information not in the QL user guide. It's available on CD for £20 these days at http://www.sellmyretro.com - just search for "SBASIC/SuperBASIC Reference Manual for Sinclair QL on CD" or just "superbasic" http://www.sellmyretro.com/search/natur ... superbasic

I haven't got it to hand as I write this, I think it's PDF file versions of the original printed 2 volume (i.e. HUGE!) version. Can't remember if the PDFs are searchable, I seem to remember that Rich said it was created using a special Text87 driver to output the PDFs from the original Text87 files (I'm sure Rich will correct me if I'm wrong.)

[Simon_Carr]

As said the Jan Jones book is superb, it's also worth checking sellymyretro, ebay and even amazon for QL books.

Now I'm selling one on german eBay. http://www.ebay.de/itm/Sinclair-QL-Buch ... 4177599a96

Bid placed.... But the postage !

[RWAP]

Indeed, a superb reference guide with examples and information not in the QL user guide. It's available on CD for £20 these days at http://www.sellmyretro.com - just search for "SBASIC/SuperBASIC Reference Manual for Sinclair QL on CD" or just "superbasic" http://www.sellmyretro.com/search/natur ... superbasic

I haven't got it to hand as I write this, I think it's PDF file versions of the original printed 2 volume (i.e. HUGE!) version. Can't remember if the PDFs are searchable, I seem to remember that Rich said it was created using a special Text87 driver to output the PDFs from the original Text87 files (I'm sure Rich will correct me if I'm wrong.)

Many thanks for the feedback - some lucky people have the 2 A4 binder version (over 1000 pages in total).

The CD version consists of various PDF files - each one contains a section of the manual (for example, kewords A to C).

The manual was all created in Text87Plus4 and then printed originally on the QL before duplication.

To create the PDF version, the files were printed from Text87 running in QPC2, with QPCPrint capturing the output and then printing the file output to PDF.

Unfortunately, the downside to this is that the PDF files are not searchable - this is because of the way Text87 justifies text, by adding micro-spacing between letters (rather than just words) - it gives a better printed output, but does mean that each word is split into its individual characters, and therefore not searchable.