Re: The background to my presence here
Posted: Mon Oct 12, 2020 12:44 pm
Glad you found my site. I try to cram as much QL stuff in there as I can as the host ISP has been quite generous with the amount of space it uses. As I started to see many QL-related sites closing over the years, I thought it best to gather as much stuff in one place as possible for fear of QL-related software, documentation etc disappearing and never to be seen again.
To help your adventures into SuperBASIC there are things like an online SuperBASIC manual on there - http://www.dilwyn.me.uk/docs/ebooks/olqlug/index.htm
If you go down the route of using QPC2, bear in mind that it uses SMSQ/E, the enhanced version of QDOS. It has an enhanced "SuperBASIC" called SBASIC, and you can find manuals for SBASIC in various formats at http://www.dilwyn.me.uk/docs/ebooks/index.html
As each emulator seems to have its own method of loading and saving files, it can be hard to suggest a method of transferring files between platforms. If it's a BASIC program, that's easy, a SuperBASIC or SBASIC program is essentially just a plain text file as far as the QL is concerned and you can save them in Windows etc without too much problem. The bugger is executable programs (those you start with commands such as EXEC or EXEC_W). The QL and most emulators save these with something called an executable file header. Which Windows, Linux, Mac don't understand. So if you save to a Windows drive, for example, Windows "forgets" this file header and when you copy it back to a QL environment, it fails to work, usually stopping with an error such as "bad parameter".
There are articles on my website about using QL Zip and Unzip to make file transfer easier - this is why all the QL programs on my site are zipped. DO NOT unzip them in Windows/Linux/Mac, that'll lose the header and the programs will not transfer properly. Instead, send the zip file to the QL environment and unzip it there. But how do you get Unzip there in the first place - that seems a catch 22 where you would need a copy of unzip to unzip the unzip program in the first place. What I did there was to cheat - convert Unzip to a BASIC program which would recreate the Unzip program. BASIC programs survive the transfer between systems, so by transferring to QL environment, then running it, it recreates a copy of Unzip to get you started. This program can be found as one of those listed under "JOB2BAS" on my archivers page - http://www.dilwyn.me.uk/arch/index.html. There are two versions of Unzip - 5.32 seems to work for everyone, some seem to have issues with the 5.40. Zipping files with QL versions of Zip protects the file header of executable programs when transferring.
As these "beginner" questions get asked over and over again it would be really great if someone familiar with all the platforms could write a guide which could be placed online somewhere.
Personally I'm a little distanced from the QL scene at the moment as I just don't get time . My favoured platform for QLing is QPC2, although I also have QemuLator. Hardware-wise, I have two QLs and an Aurora card, and hope to get a Q68 later in the year if Derek manages to produce enough to fulfil demand! Our area borders on an area which has just entered lockdown, so if we go into lockdown too, I may just have to stay home and start using my QL systems again over winter!!!
But welcome to the QL scene, I hope your adventures with the QL are successful and enjoyable.
To help your adventures into SuperBASIC there are things like an online SuperBASIC manual on there - http://www.dilwyn.me.uk/docs/ebooks/olqlug/index.htm
If you go down the route of using QPC2, bear in mind that it uses SMSQ/E, the enhanced version of QDOS. It has an enhanced "SuperBASIC" called SBASIC, and you can find manuals for SBASIC in various formats at http://www.dilwyn.me.uk/docs/ebooks/index.html
As each emulator seems to have its own method of loading and saving files, it can be hard to suggest a method of transferring files between platforms. If it's a BASIC program, that's easy, a SuperBASIC or SBASIC program is essentially just a plain text file as far as the QL is concerned and you can save them in Windows etc without too much problem. The bugger is executable programs (those you start with commands such as EXEC or EXEC_W). The QL and most emulators save these with something called an executable file header. Which Windows, Linux, Mac don't understand. So if you save to a Windows drive, for example, Windows "forgets" this file header and when you copy it back to a QL environment, it fails to work, usually stopping with an error such as "bad parameter".
There are articles on my website about using QL Zip and Unzip to make file transfer easier - this is why all the QL programs on my site are zipped. DO NOT unzip them in Windows/Linux/Mac, that'll lose the header and the programs will not transfer properly. Instead, send the zip file to the QL environment and unzip it there. But how do you get Unzip there in the first place - that seems a catch 22 where you would need a copy of unzip to unzip the unzip program in the first place. What I did there was to cheat - convert Unzip to a BASIC program which would recreate the Unzip program. BASIC programs survive the transfer between systems, so by transferring to QL environment, then running it, it recreates a copy of Unzip to get you started. This program can be found as one of those listed under "JOB2BAS" on my archivers page - http://www.dilwyn.me.uk/arch/index.html. There are two versions of Unzip - 5.32 seems to work for everyone, some seem to have issues with the 5.40. Zipping files with QL versions of Zip protects the file header of executable programs when transferring.
As these "beginner" questions get asked over and over again it would be really great if someone familiar with all the platforms could write a guide which could be placed online somewhere.
Personally I'm a little distanced from the QL scene at the moment as I just don't get time . My favoured platform for QLing is QPC2, although I also have QemuLator. Hardware-wise, I have two QLs and an Aurora card, and hope to get a Q68 later in the year if Derek manages to produce enough to fulfil demand! Our area borders on an area which has just entered lockdown, so if we go into lockdown too, I may just have to stay home and start using my QL systems again over winter!!!
But welcome to the QL scene, I hope your adventures with the QL are successful and enjoyable.