Compute!’s Gazette (June 1987)

Source: Compute!’s Gazette – Issue Number 48 – June 1987

Compute!’s Gazette was Compute!’s Commodore 64 spin-off magazine. My Commodore 64 magazine of choice was RUN but that had more to do with what was on the shelves near me. Both were excellent. The June 1987 issue of Gazette includes:

Features

The Evolution of Commodore BASIC – A history of BASIC in general plus the differences in BASIC between the PET, VIC-20, Commodore 64 and Commodore 128.

A Buyer’s Guide to Programming Languages for the Commodore 64 and 128 – An overview of the many programming languages available for the Commodore 64/128, including Ada, COMAL, Forth, Pascal, Logo, PILOT, PROMAL, Fortran, C, and more.

A Guide to Commodore User Groups, Part 2 – Continuing a listing of Commodore related user groups with contact information from the previous issue.

Reviews

Tas – Technical Analysis System – A stock market technical analysis system for the Commodore 128.

Starglider and Tracker – Starglider is a space flight combat sim with wireframe graphics while Tracker is more of a 3D shooter on rails.

Parallax – A unique arcade shooter with overhead and underground components.

Theatre Europe – A strategy game that simulates the first 30 days of World War III. Your goal, of course, is to win but without resorting to all out nuclear war.

Deceptor and Desert Fox – Desert Fox is a (relatively) simple World War II strategy game while Deceptor is an arcade game with some resemblance to Zaxxon.

Games

Going Up? – A type-in arcade game in which the goal is to reach the top of a high-rise building featuring runaway elevators.

Play Bingo – A type-in program that generates Bingo cards (which can be printed) and picks the numbers.

Education/Home Applications

Fraction Practice – A type-in educational program featuring fractions.

Computing for Families – Classrooms Without Walls – One school district’s experiment with using computers to communicate between schools.

Programming

Free-Form Flier – An easily customizable type-in database program with which you could store recipes, magazine indexes, addresses, financial info or pretty much whatever you want.

ML Base: Sorting and Searching Capabilities Added to BASIC – Machine language sorting and searching routines which you can call from your BASIC programs. The advantage of course being that machine language is much faster for such things.

Directory Filer Plus – A type-in program for managing disks. It lets you do things like lock files, delete files, print out a directory, and much more.

Disk Vacuum – A type-in utility that gives you a menu driven way to quickly delete batches of files.

Hi-Res Graphics on the 128, Part 1 – Using the Commodore 128’s enhanced BASIC to manipulate high resolution screens. Something that was much easier on the Commodore 128 than on the Commodore 64.

BASIC for Beginners: The Advantages of GET – All you ever wanted to know about the BASIC statement GET.

Machine Language for Beginners: Tools of the Trade – All about the tools used for machine language programs, including assemblers, disassemblers, monitors, and more.

Power BASIC: Impatient INPUTs – A technique for putting a time limit on INPUT statements so that they don’t wait forever for input.

Departments

The Editor’s Notes – A look back at the Commodore PET on its 10th anniversary.

Gazette Feedback – The VIC-20 vs. the Commodore 64, saving arrays to disk, using a 1571 disk drive with a Commodore 64, reading and writing files, adventure games, and more.

Simple Answers to Common Questions – Questions answered about submitting programs to the magazine, double precision math, a Commodore 64 emulator for the Amiga, and more.

Horizons: A Hard Disk Drive – A look at the new Xetec Lt. Kernal 20MB hard drive for the Commodore 64/128 for $899. 20 MB may not sound like much but for the Commodore 64 that was a massive amount of space.

News & Products – A glance at new products including Scenery Disk #7 for Flight Simulator II and Jet, Super Disk Utilities for 1571 disk drive owners, Business Accounting integrating accounting program, three collections of clip art for GEOS, Pitfall!, Demon Attack, and more.