How to SAVE your BASIC programs on The Spectrum.

In this video I explain how I save my BASIC programs on The Spectrum, hopefully it maybe of some help.
#zxspectrum #thespectrum #basicprogramming
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/ @animatedal
#animation

[@mondrus72]

From my experience the nature of a TAP file is that you can have many spectrum files/programs on a single TAP file. This is especially useful for a game to be contained in a single TAP file. Typically for a game you have at least 3 spectrum files in your tap. BASIC loader which autoruns by using LINE 10 when you save, eg SAVE "Game" LINE 10 Loading SCREEN$ Game CODE The BASIC loader as the name suggests takes control of the rest of the loading process, it loads the SCREEN$, the CODE and then finally runs the game when loading is complete. I used the virtual cassette feature on the FUSE emulator to build up the TAP file to assemble my puzzle game BlockZ into a finalized TAP. From your video it would seem "The Spectrum" cassette system seems to work in a similar fashion. Here is a weird tip. If you have the +2A ROM then go into +3 BASIC with a tap file selected then type "CAT t:" and it will catalogue all the individual files on a single tap. Can be useful.

[@animatedAL]

Thank you for your comment, your explanation on the loading process of a BASIC loader for a game is exactly what I needed to know, you wouldn't happen to know by chance how to disable the BREAK key to stop the user from gaining access to BASIC program?

[@mondrus72]

@@animatedAL Disabling the BREAK is not so straight forward. You can do it with some fancy machine code and manipulating interrupts. So ironically that is beyond most people who are using BASIC. There are ways of protecting your BASIC program so that when it is broken into it cannot be easily viewed/copied. This is a bit of a cop out but you would have to do your own research on that. I never employed any of these methods myself but I certainly came across them trying to break into BASIC programs back in the day. A really simple technique is to 'hide' your listing by simply setting INK to the same colour as the PAPER and you won't be able to see your LISTing. This only works in 48k mode and can be easily defeated by changing the INK to another colour.

[@erazered]

Thanks very useful

[@animatedAL]

You're very welcome.

[@tomclark9635]

Absolutely fantastic video Alex. Where once I was blind, now I can see (and more importantly program!). This issue was driving me crazy. Top drawer stuff. Just subscribed and can't wait to see more of your content. Great work 👍

[@animatedAL]

Glad it helped my friend, happy programming!

[@mikehaxell]

Great video. I've played around with the tape rewind and sort of figured a way to load one of my multiple saves into memory. This seemed a little hit and miss as you need to stumble on the correct tape time/position. Doing multiple loads as shown in your video seems more straight forward somehow. Thanks! It would help with the tape rewind if it could recognise each save as the save names must be held with some "header" info(as did the original speccy cassette saves)

[@animatedAL]

Ah yes, I remember now that's the exact reason I didn't like the rewind option, like you say it doesn't recognise anything.

[@nimzoknimzok]

Great video, thanks a lot. It almost drove me mad while struggling with saving my Basic programs. Hope Retro Games will make it more logically in a future release. The tape rewind feature appears useless to me as I don't know how far to rewind for the entire previous program to load. Forty years I had a cassette player with a mechanical counter. And could write down the counter numbers to know where which program started

[@animatedAL]

Yeah, that rewind feature is a waste of time, ok I guess for game play but it's not so good for classic mode. I remember the counters too on cassette recorders, the good old ways were the best.

[@JuanColmenar-d1b]

I found another way to solve the problem with SAVE for BASIC of The Spectrum. It is not the best solution but it works. You start making a Basic program, at one point you save it in the USB, for example you put SAVE “AA” and press ENTER. The program is then saved as AA_WR.TAP in the USB. You take the USB off from the Spectrum and put it in your PC and there you change the name of AA_WR to AA (it continues being a TAP file). You then take the USB to the Spectrum back again and recover the program from the USB where you can see it as AA.TAP and continue programming over AA.TAP. When you want to save the program again you put for example SAVE “BB” and press ENTER. The program is then saved as BB_WR.TAP. Then you will have to take the USB off again to the PC to rename it again (and also keeping it safe) and so on. The method is kind of SHIT but works, because as I said Saving normally does not work.

[@animatedAL]

hopefully in time improvements will be made in future firmware updates.

[@3057luis]

If you select the file with"M" that will be the current file for saving

[@animatedAL]

Yes

[@3057luis]

How do you switch to 128k mode? I was able to load other 48k roms, (the original among others) but the 128k using 128_0 and 128_1 never work. But I assume the machine can emulate the 128k, because there are 128k games on the carrousel, right?

[@animatedAL]

@3057luis if you go in to the media select screen and then press space for game settings you'll be greeted with the option to change ROM model.