SINCE the hurried launch of the QL, Sinclair Research has been promising a package of routines and programs which will provide a better interface between SuperBasic and QDOS. At the same time this would add commands and functions which are useful but which are not included on the basic machine.

QL Toolkit, written by Tony Tebby, is the result and provides a host of software extensions which are split into functions in the form of SuperBasic commands, machine code programs, SuperBasic programs, filters and founts. The extensions can be booted into memory on power-up, using the function keys as usual. Once loaded a digital clock is displayed in window #0 the time on which can be altered using other functions provided within the package.

Once loaded it is possible to toggle between command entry, performed in window #0 and a SuperBasic full screen editor which highlights SuperBasic lines containing errors.

Other SuperBasic extensions include commands to check, on QDOS, jobs currently running. Those allow the user to multitask machine code jobs from SuperBasic and to alter their priorities. A set of demonstration routines is available for those who do not know how to use 68000 code but who want to see QDOS multitasking in action.

Other extensions deal with files and microdrives. One command gives a flexible 'read device directory' function which can be used to page through lists of files on microdrive rather than watching them go scrolling by at high speed.

It is also possible to use a form of random access storage with files on microdrive. Those react in a similar way to disc random access but recall of data is, of course, significantly slower.

Filters, if you did not know, are programs which perform single operations on input data before passing it to another program for output. QL Toolkit has seven of those including a conversion to upper case routine, and routines to copy, concatenate and split files into pages.

The machine code programs within the package are mainly examples for the multitasking extensions. They include a clock with hands, an alarm clock and some graphics demonstrations.

The SuperBasic routines, for the large part, consist of file copiers using one or two microdrives. It is possible to make a full copy of all files on a microdrive in less than two minutes or to select files for one or multiple copies. The last two programs rely on the user putting the names of the files to be copied into data statements within the routine.

No toolkit package would be complete without its copy routines and these do their work with efficiency. As it is possible to trap software copying programs you will find that you cannot make a master copy of such products as Psion's QL Chess but that the copiers come in handy when you have a lot of raw data to duplicate.

Despite its heady price the Toolkit does the QL justice and should find a place in any QL owner's library because it accomplishes a variety of involved tasks quickly and efficiently.

Unfortunately, if you intend purchasing it you should also buy the QL Technical Manual. The documentation provided with QL Toolkit is excellent but if you want to exploit it to the full the technical manual should be at your side. Another first class product from Sinclair Research.

GRAPHIC sprites are suddenly in vogue and Digital Precision has released the QL Super Sprite Generator to ensure that it captures that part of the market which is interested in making the most of the superb graphic capabilities available.

Sprites are user-defined graphics which have been magnified two or even three times. The Kit provides a set of Superbasic extensions and two demonstration programs called Alien and Bird.

As the example titles suggest, the demos are simple but it is possible to move the sample graphics around the screen with the arrow keys. The examples also demonstrate how slow the sprites are when controlled by Superbasic in an animated display. The switch between sprite-frames is slow and the resulting image is jumpy and flickery.

But those are only examples, the idea of the kit is to set up the sprites and then deal with them as you wish. To design a sprite you load in the design program. The program runs in a similar fashion to those UDG generator programs of which you see so many in magazines. A grid is drawn on the screen and, using the arrow keys, you can move around the squares of that grid.

Once finished you can file the sprite frame. To make an animated display just create several frames, each one a progression in movement from the last. It is possible to reverse the direction of the sprite within the design program.

When you are happy with the result you can enter the construct program which asks you the frame order in which you want to put your sprite. It then puts the frames into a single file which can be called by your own programs.

The package contains everything which you will need to produce animated sprites but it is dramatically over-priced. For a similar package on the Spectrum you would expect to pay £6.00. The excuse may be the price of microdrives but, taking development costs into account, the price could be cut by at least a quarter.

SUPERBASIC is not the ideal medium for producing good pictures on the QL, but the machine has the potential for graphics of great sophistication. Talent Computer Systems has now released GRAPHIQL to remedy the situation.

The program is an aid for developing graphic screens, and incorporates several features which make it easy to construct complex designs with a minimum of effort. The most impressive of those is a magnification facility, which allows you to blow up any section to 16 times actual size in order to make adjustments to artwork.

Eight colours are available, but stipple and airbrush 'splatter' effects are easily produced to give an almost infinite range of shades and combinations. That is done through the use of a doodle pad, which operates much as an artist's palette. By defining a small box on the, pad, you can then fill it with patterns, ranging from abstract shading to brickwork or even a small house or tree. That pattern, called a texture, can then, be painted onto the main screen.

Freehand drawing is supported, but a variety of circles and ellipses, squares and rectangles can be produced using a 'rubber band' system where the shape can be stretched or compressed until it is satisfactory. You can recolour areas, rotate and reflect shapes about the screen and use a 'paint brush' of any thickness.

The manual supplied with the program is 60 pages long, but to their credit the writers have decided to assume users have no experience whatever and spell out each operation in great detail, with examples and suggestions. In fact, after reading through the manual once and trying the examples as you go, you should be able to remember most of the command keys available.

If the program has a fault, it is in speed of operation, which is a little slow if you already know exactly what you want to do next. However, Talent has packed a great deal into the package, and uses it to produce its own title screens, which is surely one recommendation. Certainly anybody interested in computer graphics will want to own GRAPHIQL.

FOLLOWING Chess, it was only a matter of time before Backgammon was written for the QL. The ancient game has taken a few knocks since computer programmers got their paws on it, and the Digital Precision version is about par for the course.

A Quill document included on the tape provides a description of the program and the rules of the game, for those who do not know or can only read words on a TV screen instead of the box insert. A copy facility allows you to make a backup of the various Basic programs which do the business.

The game is neatly presented, although nothing like as spectacular as it might have been if written in all-singing all-dancing 68000 code. To move, you type in the number of the two points involved. It would have been friendlier if the cursor keys could have been used to lift and move pieces.

Digital Precision might have been wise not to include certain features of the rules in its description. The QL is simply not interested in doubling dice and will not even recognise a gammon victory, where you get all your pieces off before the QL removes one. Its game is generally poor, even at the highest level of four, and any reasonable player should thrash it. Some of its moves are positively anile, especially at the lower levels.

Worse still, it cheats. According to the rules, you must play both dice if you can. It's no good moving one to make yourself unable to play the second. Digital Precision knows that, because it is on the insert. The QL clearly doesn't, and can smugly play accordingly.

A computer which cheats when, nine times out of ten, it ought to be able to beat most people at any remotely intellectual game, is an unlovely thing. Digital Precision should teach the QL good manners if they plan to continue producing software for it.

WHY air traffic control simulations should be regarded as sellable products to the micromarket is one of the great mysteries of the software industry. Shadowsoft has brought out Area Radar Controller for the QL, in which you can relive the worst nightmares of the Gatwick control tower staff.

The program is written entirely in Basic, and one hesitates to say it would not disgrace a Vic 20 because Vic 20 owners might get uppity. The screen shows two little runways and some squares around the edges of the screen which are the exit points for aircraft.

There are three types of plane involved - slow, medium and fast. They represent something quite new in aviation because they only move in ten directions, north, north-east etc, and up and down. You use a series of abbreviations to instruct various aircraft to move.

By Klono's viscous frontal lobes, what on earth is going on? The QL is capable of stunning graphics, fast code, and has a spacious memory to exploit. Much more of this sort of fast-buck garbage and any mass market the machine might have attracted will be dead and gone before you can say Frogger.