Gilbert factor under fire

MY SUGGESTION for the improvement of the Software Directory is to employ John Gilbert full-time, since of 207 items only 75 have been "Gilberted". Of 27 educational cassettes none has been assessed - surely a gross omission - and of 14 business only five have been tested.

Ian Fletcher

John Gilbert assures readers that he works full-time for Sinclair User, but points out that he would need to be employed 24 hours a day to review everything he receives. He will endeavour, however, to assess as many packages as possible. All educational and business software will be given Gilbert Factors eventually.

TV cabinet is deceptive

I WOULD like to warn fellow readers. I have owned a 48K Spectrum for six months and found it an excellent machine. Recently I changed my TV set, selecting a 16in. Electra colour portable. I was particularly careful in avoiding some Japanese sets.

I found, however, that after about two to two-and-a-half hours' use I lose all colour. On investigation I have found that the Electra case contains a Hitachi set which is not compatible with the Spectrum.

Any Spectrum owner planning to buy a new TV would be well-advised to check the make, as well as the name on the cabinet.

G F Knight

Bridge needs improvements

I BOUGHT a copy of Bridge Player from CP Software as advertised in your magazine. While the bridge is not too bad, I was disappointed with the juvenile games-type approach to the presentation of the program.

May I make a few points to CP and to other programmers who may see bridge as an area worth exploitation? Bridge is, in general, a game which is taken seriously by numerate, logical adults of at least average intelligence who are usually addicted to the game. I mention that because unless one knows the players one cannot cater for their needs. I would suggest that their needs do not include flashy Horizon-type titles; games-type jingles when a game is won or lost; arcade-type flashing scores at £1 a point - and a jingle when a rubber is won; a message to the player that he has missed his chance when passing on an unbiddable hand - very annoying; ridiculous bids from the computer, particularly when looking for a slam.

The display of the hands, the bidding, the table and information are adequate and it is easy to play the cards, but may I suggest that attention be given to removing the arcade flash and using the capacity released to improve the game, particularly the computer bidding, and to speed the shuffle and deal?

J W Evans

Amazing new command

MAY I congratulate you on the creation of an amazing new command for the ZX-81. It is "SLAVE". If you look in issue number 20, November 1983 on page 26 under the heading Speeding Command, you will see what I mean. Also, I was pleased to see that you have increased the size of your magazine to 164 pages. Unfortunately the extra pages seem to be used by more advertisements. Never mind, it is still one of the best Sinclair magazines.

Guy Fullalove

The 'new command' was, of course, a printing error and should have read SAVE.

Identifying the tape version

READERS may be interested in a very useful device I have been employing recently in my programming. I use a Spectrum 48K. I always set my auto-run at the same line number. I use 9950, then the usual SAVE "name" LINE 1. I have now added: 9980 PRINT 48000 - (65536-USR 7962) to the end of any complex program on which I am working.

If, like me, readers employ more than one cassette to update their programs, they will find that whenever the program is SAVEd the number of bytes used will be printed at the same time as the 0 0K, 9980: 1 which appears on line 22.

That number added to the cassette clearly identifies which version one is examining. Of course, for the 16K Spectrum, use PRINT 16000.

Charles Buzzard

Frustration of Manic Miner

ALMOST two months after purchasing Manic Miner for the 48K Spectrum I completed the 20 lethal caverns. Since then I have achieved a high score of 85,185 which took just over an hour.

Manic Miner can be one of the most frustrating games when you make stupid mistakes, so I have written a method of POKEing in a number to allow you to 'die' without losing any 'men'.

First break the program after loading the basic loader - when the screen turns black - and then type-in 'PAPER 7' followed by 35 POKE 35136,0; and RUN; then re-start the tape.

Simon Scott

Functions not in manual

I WAS INTERESTED in John Armfield's article Display in the November issue and got out my Spectrum to educate myself. I found I could do things with INPUT statements which are not mentioned in the manual nor included in any programs I have entered from magazines.

I was trying to write a user-friendly program to input data and produced the following:

10 DIM a(5)
20 FOR i=1 to 5
30 INPUT "Number";  INT i;"=" ia(i)
40 NEXT i

I wanted to print the subscript number of the array a which was to be input and found that ABS i or VAL STR$ i would also work.

If the functions are omitted, the Spectrum expects two inputs, the first being i. If i is input continually in the range 1 to 4, then the loop will also continue from that i.

Readers may be interested to investigate what other functions and combinations of functions will also work. I expect some can put a USR call to good effect.

Finally, I would just like to say what an excellent machine the Spectrum is. I have had it for six months and can scarcely keep off it. I think there is nothing wrong with the keyboard and the method of keyword entry is a definite boon. I think it is better to play arcade-style games on than both a proper keyboard and joysticks.

Brian Cook

Speed routine investigated

HAVING READ Edward Wright's letter concerning the POKE which speeds the operation of commands on the 16K ZX-81, I decided to investigate. Type-in this short machine code routine:

1 POKE 18000,33
2 POKE 18001,11
3 POKE 18002,0
4 POKE 18003,57
5 POKE 18004,68
6 POKE 18005,77
7 POKE 18006,201
8 PRINT (USR (18000)-16373)/1024;"K"

If you run it, you will find that '3K' appears on the screen. Wright's POKE makes 13K of RAM disappear.

John Dyer

Human error to blame

I FEEL I must reply to Christopher Watkins' letter in the November issue of Sinclair User.

I bought my 16K Spectrum about three months ago and when I first tried to load programs from the manual I could not get them to run properly. After a week of perseverance and re-reading everything in the manuals I began to make progress until I now have a great working relationship with it.

In the beginning it was my human errors causing the bugs - that and my inexperience with the Spectrum.

Although Watkins could have had faulty computers I cannot help wondering whether, like myself, he had not read the Spectrum manual thoroughly in the first place.

G Nunn

Bugs permit high scores

I AM WRITING to tell you about bugs in two programs, Jetpac and Spectres. If on Jetpac you manage to reach the fourth screen - the plane-like aliens - and then stand on the middle platform, the aliens will not be able to get to you and when they crash into the platforms you still score points. This bug allows the player to amass an enormous score without getting hit by an alien.

When playing Spectres you get one extra man every 3,000 points but if you reach 12,000 points the space at the top of the screen where the number of the men remaining is usually shown fills up with little dots. When that happens you seem to have an endless number of men. When I reached that point I left the game playing and noticed that every time a ghost got a man and took him to its den the space where the number of men left is usually shown did not change.

I watched the game play for another 10 minutes but it never ended. This bug allows the player to move round the maze, taking no notice of the ghosts and, like Jetpac, to amass a very big score. It is impossible to start a new game without pulling out the power plug and loading the game again.

I think the Mind Games article is very interesting and would be very pleased if Quentin Heath would review Planet of Death by Artic Computing.

Andrew Horsfield

Quentin Heath hopes to review Planet of Death in the near future.

Not just another edition

I AM an old age pensioner and feel I must write to say how incensed I am at being 'conned' out of £1.95. I bought the Second Sinclair User Annual as a surprise for my grandson who has a Spectrum 48K.

He tells me that it is a summary of the monthly magazines which he has delivered from our newsagent. It would be advisable if, when printing this magazine, you would state that the contents are just another edition of your monthly publications.

B Davies

We are sorry that you feel cheated but we would like to stress that it is more than a rehash of material published previously. The News Section, the Software Review, the Hardware World round-up and the Book Review were all written especially for the Annual. In addition, there are two completely new programs.

Though compiled with the new reader in mind, the Annual nevertheless is a comprehensive review of the last year and, as such, is a useful and inexpensive addition to any Sinclair user's library.

Too many advertisements

I HAVE only one criticism of your excellent magazine and that is the large amount of advertisements compared to the number of articles. In the November issue there were 107 pages of advertisements and only 57 pages of articles.

I think it unfair to boast that there are "164 fact-filled pages" when the majority are advertisements or space-wasting illustrations. It would be in everyone's interests if each advertisement were shown every two or three months on a rota basis or even if you produced a separate magazine.

Simon Stone

To produce a large colourful monthly magazine with only limited advertising would be extremely difficult and not particularly desirable, as many readers find the advertisements useful and informative.

As the amount of advertising has increased, so has the amount of editorial matter, which means there is much more editorial content than previously.

Getting rid of an offending screech

WHEN I was reading some of the letters in the September edition I saw one which told one how to get a magenta and blue border with an irritating screech. It also asked if anybody knew how to get rid of offending screech.

I tested it on my Spectrum and found that by typing-in RAND USR 1327 the screech would be eliminated. I also found that if one types-in RAND USR 1234 it produces a yellow and blue border with a noise similar to that of loading a program.

Anthony McKenna