The Amazing Programming Language Lost For 40 Yrs: C64 Microtext

[@RetroRecipes]

Thanks for watching! If you like the music you can download the single version of _northlight_ free with a 7-day trial and you'll also get ad-free early access to our videos 👉 www.patreon.com/posts/112114149 🚀By supporting ЯR you help us keep the lights on in the studio & nostalgia alive ✨ Thank you.

[@yootoobnz8109]

Back in the eighties, when I was a little younger, I was obsessed with Star Raiders on my Atari 400. So I tried to write games in Basic, hopeless as it was too slow. So I started to learn assembly language. By then I also had a C64, bought an assembler cartridge that I think was called Hesmon 64 (or something similar sounding), which I thought was so crudely written, even though it worked. So I spent many, many months writing my own assembler/disassembler which I called Codebreaker One - which worked really really well. Being a musician, back then, there was no good music software available for the C64. So I decided to write my own. After a year or two development, I was broke, so decided to show Commodore here in NZ what I had done so far, with the hope of getting some financing. First visit, they liked it. I explained that there is currently nothing like it in the world. I had full smooth scrolling music playing across the screen while all three SID voices were in use. Each SID voice could be set differently and changed on every note throughout the song as needed, and the SID controls were displayed beneath the scrolling music, with a full 88 note animated keyboard at the bottom. I could see that they were genuinely impressed, and they then said that they wanted to take it to some computer show in Australia in a couple of months' time. I said: but it isn't finished, I need more time and some financial help as I am out of cash. They said, don't finish it, just clean it up a bit like it is, and we will take it over to Australia. We argued back and forth over the next couple of weeks. Being a naive young fella, I was shocked that a respected company like Commodore, would want to rush a product out before it was finished. So we fell out. About six months later, having struggled financially, I contacted Commodore NZ again, talked to the same managing director, told him that I now had a more complete product that was ready. He was extremely rude, pretended he had never heard of me, gave me the brush off, and he ended the call, refusing to let me come and show him. About a couple of years later, I noticed that Commodore NZ had closed down, disappeared. I had little satisfaction noting that the rude manager had lost his job. By that time I had had to abandon all programming, sell almost everything, and climb back to a " normal" conventional life. I am in my sixties now, strangely enough, I still have that old C64 and those old floppies. No idea if they work, doubtful, irrelevant really. I sometimes think back, with the advantage of a lifetime of hindsight, and think: oh I wish I could have told my young self to take this turn or that! Something I think we all do, 20/20 hindsight. I do enjoy your videos, thank you!

[@yootoobnz8109]

Was my comment deleted? Why?

[@RetroRecipes]

@@yootoobnz8109 Probably the YT spam filter, unless the comment broke the usual rules. Pay it no mind.

[@yootoobnz8109]

​@RetroRecipes Thanks for replying. I am relieved that it wasn't you. Shame though, it was about an assember/disassembler and music software I wrote in the eighties for the C64, and my bad experience with Commodore trying to market it. My comment was very long, that might have been the problem. No worries, it wasn't important, just going down memory lane. I enjoy your videos.

[@BCADws]

Did you just copy the files of the disk or did you make a nibble copy? You won't believe what things are not actually listed on some disks. Make a full image of the disk, please, preferrably .g64 - thanks!

[@andythedishwasher1117]

I really love the fact that you remembered the smart guy upstairs from your childhood well enough to track down his work as an adult. It motivates me to continue trying to be the smart guy upstairs. Thanks for this.

[@RetroRecipes]

Well put

[@r.l.royalljr.3905]

This feels very much like a text version of HyperCard on the old 68k Macs.

[@jinchoung]

@@r.l.royalljr.3905 totally thought the same. I wonder if there was some kind of zeitgeist of the card/page/screen analogy back then that was the prototype for these implementations....

[@theParticleGod]

This software is old enough and the field is small enough that the authors of Hypercard might well have heard of, or even seen this software before. It wouldn't surprise me if this helped to inspire hypercard or had a common source of inspiration. Through an academic paper perhaps?

[@cossackpatrol]

the moment he said “like a webpage”, i immediately said “or 68k HyperCard.” nailed it. high five ✋🏻

[@mjeromee]

I was just about to say that here, we spent a bunch of time with Hypercard in school on the old b/w Mac classics. I remember making a Jeopardy clone with it.

[@mikeh_nz]

Agreed - very much like HyperCard - though which came first? I remember HyperCard on the mac

[@konsul2006]

This guy should have governmental funding! Digital archaeology at its finest❤ Wish you had a picture of the creator.

[@nicholas_scott]

Microtext works like Gopher. Gopher was a early way to use the internet, before the web, and it used frames. If you mixed gopher and Rexx, you would have something very similar to Microtext. Facinating. For most of us, programming the C64 was brutal. Either you used assembly, or basic.

[@mattgraham4340]

I had forgotten about gopher before your comment. I remember using gopher on a modem. Local university had some kind of service available over modem. You could break out of the service and get a command prompt on some computer that had Internet access

[@kevinfisher5492]

Forth was a very viable alternative, and was bloody fast as well.

[@TheUAoB]

Gopher was a good protocol, much better for interactive menu driven content than HTML. It was completely focussed on content over presentation though so didn't have the wide appeal of web pages. Mozilla web browsers actually natively supported it for a long time until policy was unfortunately dominated by those pushing agendas.

[@absurdengineering]

Gopher was great. Dissatisfied with what was preinstalled on a university CP/CMS mainframe system, I wrote my own client in Rexx. It was such a nice protocol to make a client for. Changing the terminal from line to character mode was fun. If you messed up, you had to go back to CP and restart the CMS session.

[@NorseGraphic]

@@nicholas_scott Used basic. Was 16 at the time.

[@Rezmason]

I can't imagine a better process and reception for recovering a lost software environment. Maybe all this time, it was Microtext that was looking for you?

[@MK-of7qw]

or maybe the real microtext is to friends we made along the way?

[@sutorippuwebmaster8783]

This is insane! It's amazing how much forgotten stuff is out there even for popular systems. This just proves we need to preserve computing, gaming, and technological history as best we can!

[@henryvanweeren7233]

We had such a place in Brantford, Ontario, Canada. All the machines worked and all had running OS systems. When the owner died, all the stuff was relocated. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_Computer_Museum

[@typingcat]

I wonder what Microsoft have been doing with project silica. That sounded really promising for preserving data.

[@antonrr90]

By the looks of it, NPL was literally developing HTML Precursor.

[@carbonmolecules4504]

Your Commodore 64 videos have been a blast to watch. I’ve never gotten the opportunity to use one, and I never really gave it any thought before this series(I’m 30). Thanks for giving me a new appreciation in tech by expressing your love for it. Can’t wait for more!

[@cvdm9663]

The C64 is the reason why I studied and chose to make programming my career. I would have had so much fun with this software as a kid. Thank you for bringing this back into the world.

[@tmbrwn]

It's this kind of mystery, discovery, recovery, and exploration that made me subscribe to your channel in the first place. Thanks for always digging for treasure, and letting us all tag along!

[@epremeaux]

@6:33 second paragraph: "A run-time only system is also available at a low rate.." This would imply that they also had a stripped down runner to be included in commercial releases to allow distributing stand alone Microtext based software without distributing the full editing features.

[@RetroRecipes]

Good eye!

[@KennethSorling]

Chris, did you compose all of the music we heard during this episode? If so, I'd like to convey my admiration. This is some great music!

[@RetroRecipes]

Yes sir, thank you! Single of "Northlight" coming soon.

[@dukeofearl8078]

Another absolutely wonderful lost, 40-year-old C64 language is Promal. It was a joy to use .. .very much like Python today (including indentation being part of the language).

[@cyberhawk99]

LOL! My wife and I was laughing so hard over the "sweating scene". Well done. :)

[@RetroRecipes]

🔥😅🔥

[@brianh2771]

It's really too bad they didn't call it "HyperCard" and introduce it on the Amiga in 1985!

[@iamdinkel]

Drawing a circle on an Apple II in the early 80’s same joy you woke up the raw programming feeling I had at 10, hugs. Very HyperText and maybe a little Swift 😊

[@LarryRobinsonintothefog]

The Hotel Fire option sounded like an 'adventure game' that were in Basic in the 1980s in computer magazines to type in and play (which many people did).

[@antonnym214]

I never heard of MicroText, but what struck me was that it is more a name I would expect of a word processor than a programming language. I designed a programming language, too, called LIM. for Limited Instruction Model or, Less Is More. There are only 25 keywords. It's great.

[@ChrisLeeW00]

Anton Nym Designer of LIM

[@benholroyd5221]

​@@ChrisLeeW00I'm going to go out on a limb, and ask, do you know him?

[@Mrshoujo]

Microtext should be on Cartridge & include a compiler to make standalone software. Back in the day, users would use Fast Hackem & Epyx Fast Load to zip off a copy. And with 2 drives, that would be called a Double Hackem.

[@mdrake42]

The amount of software that was in use at thousands of locations in the 1980's would boggle the mind. 99% of them are not found today. Its a shame we didn't have a software museum registry service, in operation back then.

[@shawnpgorman]

It's the "Choose your own adventure" of programming.

[@IanM-id8or]

You got off lightly for that poem. Lady Fractic was being far more forgiving than you deserve. You need to write her a new poem, and create an animation using Microtext to accompany it

[@limerickey]

Awesome! This would have been such a powerful tool to have back in the day for those of us who wanted to create something on the C= but found the programming part to be challenging and tedious. Microtext could have been a big hit with adventure game makers, perhaps they could have licensed it then included the interpreter with the game.

[@SimonZerafa]

Might be a good idea to see if Crown Copyright still applies to Microtext and see if it can be released under an Open Government Licence 🙂🤷‍♂️

[@RetroRecipes]

Oh interesting. I wouldn't know where to start, but for now it's on the Internet Archive.

[@syntaxerror9994]

I think Bob would be very pleased with what you've done. I'm surprised it didn't come with a compiler that merged your code with a base engine and saves it in assembly. Different era I guess. Also, thank you for sacrificing the condition of your manual for preservation. o7

[@more.power.]

What a blast Perifractic thank you for the demo. Cheers

[@82andymac]

Does anyone remember a quiz on channel 4 teletext called bamboozle? This would be perfect for a c64 de-make. I think it had 20 general knowledge questions and had 4 answers per page, this was in the UK.

[@Wanton110]

the sprites remind me of the old asci art.. imagine running a BBS on this

[@fragalot]

This reminds me of "choose your own adventure" books where each page is just like a "frame" in microtext. At the end of each page you're given a choice as to what to do next, and you simply flip to that page based on your choice and you keep reading, and do it again.

[@slaapliedje]

Back in the early 90s there was program on the ST that was for hypertext viewing. (Pre-www browser, basically), I had the idea to write a choose your own adventure with it. I still think it would be rather sweet to do that with html.

[@benholroyd5221]

And then you flip to the wrong page, lose where you are and get confused....

[@fragalot]

@@benholroyd5221 yep but i tend to cheat and keep my thumb on the last page i read, just in case i die all of a sudden.

[@paulwesterman]

Wow interesting birdfractic at 2:57!

[@TalmidAndy]

There have been many weird or single purpose programming languages over the years. I went to college in the mid '80s where we were taught BBC basic and CESIL. CESIL was developed as part of the Computer Education in Schools program in 1974 and was originally entered on punch cut or tape but later could be entered via keyboard on the BBC Micro which we used in the college in 1985.

[@GJ-mn9ly]

Microtext was a really cool machine language for the time, very ahead of its time.Great video as always👍.

[@darrenhunter2324]

Used to be a speci owner in the day, but I love your Commodore Videos, gives me Insite in to a system I never had when I was a kid. (47 now) so remember the Spec and 64 Arguments in the playground as a kid.

[@ianatkin542]

John Barry’s theme from The Persuaders at 33:34. Hands up if you’re old enough to remember it.

[@plan7a]

A-ha! I was going to mention that it was this theme; glad to see I wasn't alone in recognizing this music!

[@SatumangoTheGreat]

@@ianatkin542 I don't remember the theme, but I am old enough to vaguely remember The Persuaders.

[@martinda7446]

Great music. Tony Curtis and Roger Moore. Tony, Danny Wilde, Ferrari - a Dino? And Roger, Sir Brett Sinclair, had an Aston Martin DBS, er, not the V8? I didn't look a thing up. So may have messed up, but don't think so - The opening was so memorable. Such great music in lots of the 60s/70s TV. Even us kids had the greatest music that ever blessed a TV speaker from Barry Gray. UFO, Joe90, Thunderbirds, Captain Scarlet, etc. Man in A Suitcase, The Avengers was amazing music. The Saint too. Blimey I'm off on one...

[@The-truth-is-valuable.]

Perry, beside the point: Are you still planning on doing some "visit the location" vids on Airwolf, etc.?

[@RetroRecipes]

Absolutely! These things can take a while but it's inching closer.

[@hadtopicausername]

A few years ago, I had the pleasure of subtitling Airwolf for TV (no one had the old Norwegian files, or the rights to them). The first seasons were as awesome as I remembered them, and the final season was every bit as dreadful :)

[@NozomuYume]

@@RetroRecipes Will this be coupled with a "Teslawolf" segment where you modify a Model Y into a supersonic helicopter?

[@BlizzetaNet]

Bro, this is giving me canned heat with those sounds and amazing graphics of the past ❤❤❤

[@eskey691]

I love the fact that you found it after all these years. It's always a feeling of pure joy when you boot up something that you haven't used or seen for many years. Have to say the disk was in excellent condition and yes the first thing you should always do is make a copy of it. Great show as always and i love the look of joy when running parts of the program and i hope LadyFractic will go easy on you after that poem 🤣😂. As always looking forward to what you bless us with next time so until then you all take care and have a great weekend 🙂

[@RetroRecipes]

Thanks mate, I'm still drying off! Have a good one!

[@fischX]

For the Amiga there was a similar innovative hyper card ish software called Helm by eagle tree. It's lost software at this point only a demo version is saved - it's amazing though

[@adroharv5140]

I'd be handling the disk and manual with kid gloves if this was something this special. Thanks for preserving this

[@MonVonalot]

Do you ever fear that your 'feeling' of using an old piece of tech will change over time, that the "last time" you ever used the app wasn't when you were 12 but rather last week, or does that wonder last for you?

[@RetroRecipes]

It definitely evolves into a different kind of joy. Apart from fleeting glimpses through nostalgia, I don't think we can ever truly feel the same way our differently wired brains saw the world back then. But I still love this stuff, just through my adult eyes.

[@fredjones100]

The weirdest thing happened while watching this... at 35:38 when the "woof" noise played, an AH-64 opened fire at that exact moment on the weapons range ten miles away. This, despite it being a quarter to 11 at night on a Saturday and there having been no firing for an hour or so previously... I was very confused for a moment! The SID gets a lot of praise but it wasn't quite _that_ immersive...

[@RetroRecipes]

Ah I forgot to mention the Dolby Atmos 4D spacial audio feature of Microtext

[@bennysh]

I never had the c64 (my parents got me an Amstrad) but the memories of the joy in drawing lines and circles on the screen are quite similar..

[@PatrickJFurlong-c6z]

Perfect video thanks! Amazing you've finally found this program after so many years - looks something that can be made very good use of.

[@johna8509]

What a great story... loved it. And Microtext seems like a pretty amazing system, even by today's standards.

[@Coffeeology]

Dear internet friend. Congrats on finding your grail. I smiled so much in this episode. I feel we are about the same age and due to life events I’ve been thinking about my early days in front of computers. I think we’re about the same age and played with very similar systems. Thank you for uploading the software to the archive. I wish you and your lovely family nothing but happiness and peace.

[@hartoz]

Frames in a nutshell. Microtext was an early procedural programming language, what Chris refers to as frames, we would now refer to as procedures. Each procedure is a separate code entity which is bound into the Microtext framework, allowing them to be referenced many times within the framework while making it easier to read the code and more efficient.

[@georgeyreynolds]

@@hartoz could also do procedures in BASIC

[@hartoz]

@@georgeyreynolds Yes, in some versions, but not on the C64. Also Microtext has procedures as frames, much easier to edit code etc.

[@joshuaheathcote2116]

Excellent report for 14 years old. Most 14 years old today probably couldn't spell one quarter of the words shown there. Whats going on with the justify though, you could fit a double decker bus in there.

[@RetroRecipes]

Explained later in the vid :)

[@janak132]

I remember Microtext being mentioned in an article in a Norwegian computer magazine back in the 80's. I'm a '78 model myself so this would have been in the later half of the 80's. I also do think it was in stock at my local computer store. Never having been a programmer myself I didn't purchase it. (Programming is counter to how my adhd works; I keep forgetting where I was going with what I were writing.)

[@crookedmouth1971]

Thank you for this Peri. Great work, as always. This might have been lost to time and now we all can enjoy it.

[@SiAnon]

When you think about all the games we have today you still can't beat an old 80s text adventure where you had to imagine the scene yourself. Even had some really good ones on my ZX81 many many years ago.

[@alancarr6314]

I used Microtext on the BBC for creating some interactive displays in a museum with a touch screen. The BBC version required a rom. In addition Microtext could also control lazerdisc. I think I may have some Micro text info etc

[@RetroRecipes]

Oh wonderful to find someone who actually used it (albeit the BBC version) back in the day!

[@lurkerrekrul]

Thank you for finding and preserving this piece of Commodore history. :)

[@JeffTiberend]

These videos are so good and interesting that he should be working for the BBC.

[@wiredmind]

congrats on being the one sponsored advert i chose to watch very relatable BC I can't do heat

[@basfinnis]

That's a great find. Looks like a really cool language.

[@ypey1]

I remember how exited the smell and feel of those 5” disks made me😅 good ol’ days

[@rickr530]

I'm very happy for you that you were able to obtain your lost software. It's wonderful to be able to reconnect with the past.

[@CaptainPanick]

The modern equivalent of this seems to be something like Renpy (for Visual Novels) and Twine for Interactive Fiction.

[@MrHolozip]

"This plug has come from an electric fire" - aaargh, I figured it meant in a burned down house not a 3kw space heater "electric" fire

[@MurderMostFowl]

So very cool! It definitely seems like it was a low volume production of the disks, since you can clearly see the tape on the write protect notch. ( for those who do not know, if it were a commercially produced disk with a high enough volume printing to justify it ) it would not have used disks that did not have any notch on the side at all instead of the piece of tape.

[@rhysun]

I wrote a lot of text adventures in BASIC on our C64 back in the day. It was a very tedious process, and even more tedious for my brothers and friends, whom I forced to play my games. I would have loved Microtext. I think I have a vague memory of the existence of Microtext, but it may be a false memory. I'm at an age where most of my memories are probably false.

[@RetroRecipes]

Me too. I wish I'd kept them. One you had to explore secret tunnels under Stowe School. It was very atmospheric, or at least felt so then.

[@Photon3d]

Wow, back then as a kid I tried to write text adventures in basic. When I would have this frendly programming language, would be cool. I see myself playing with it like weeks long. Thank showing this!

[@marcschuyesmans]

once again a fabulous episode technology down memory lane, I love it ! Thanx a lot, best regards, Marc

[@laustinspeiss]

Finally, a reason to consider getting a Commodore system…42 years later.

[@mercster]

This reminds me vaguely of the 'dialog' program on modern Linux systems. 'dialog' doesn't have any graphics/sound capabilities that I know of, but it is sort of an easy way to use shell scripts to present menus, allow navigation, etc.

[@xredhead7135x]

I love the "press space to speed up" - I can either work /and/ update you, or just let me work and trust me.

[@JohnSmith-xq1pz]

PCB WAAAAAAY! and as we all know PCB stands for Peri's coding breakthrough Doesn't it?

[@mdrake42]

Microtext appears very similar to how many late 80's / early 90's 4GL's worked for UI control with the frames. Dataflex was somewhat similar, where not only frames for full screen were defined, but also popup frames etc. it was cross platform, so your compilation program files would often work on different platforms simply with different runtimes. Some did need a recompile with code to handle any OS calls made in code, but the languagee itself was fully portable. You would use underscore characters to denote fields, and control it from code later after all the frames were defined. Obviously micro text didn't handle database interaction, but it seems the design is similar to micro text. I love seeing those old languages. its interesting to see the language progression over the years.

[@MK-ge2mh]

Very interesting! The frames in Microtext are very similar to the block files of FORTH.

[@FFrrEEddRRiiKK1]

So fun to watch. The enthusiasm and knowledge. 👍🔙

[@bluefunkt]

Absolutely fascinating, what a great find and very informative video!

[@Robbnlinzi]

This feels like my friend is showing me his cool new software and I’m jealous that my dad can’t afford the new software so we copy.

[@ThorstenDrews]

Is it just me or does that tune at 33:33 sound like the beginning of John Barrys The Persuaders Theme?

[@ianatkin542]

It is.

[@bunni3140]

Your dog was incredibly interested in Microtext lol

[@Capt.Marco-Hawk-L.L.A.P]

Love to see what people come up with when people really push the programming language to the peak of what it will do, it's great that the software has now been saved big thumbs up Christian... This would of been great in the day if Steve Jackson and Ian Livingstone of Fighting Fantasy wrote their game books for the c64

[@RetroRecipes]

Well said

[@rick-deckard]

Thank you for preserving this treasure

[@toddtrann88]

Amazingly thorough video, thanks for all of that!

[@JrgenFrderbergTvedt]

Pretty sure there was Microtext for the Amiga computer as well, but perhaps that was a different creator 🤔 Anyways this was an awesome to see and really cool program

[@aresaurelian]

It feels like yesterday. Your beautiful wife did not agree with the poem, as expected.She looks 1:1. She is the one and only. She is identical to someone I saw as a child. Microtext is incredible for its time.

[@originalbrucesmith]

Love seeing your passion for this, keep it going. Love seeing content like this. ❤

[@AdamKadmon-cg5qs]

Brilliant! Congrats on finally bringing this software back from the shadows.

[@KennethSorling]

Just so you know, LadyFractic is still a scorcher of a woman.

[@RetroRecipes]

That's why I was sweating!

[@DarwinHandy]

How is this content so good?! These handsome people are only slightly older than me, so might know what I mean when I say I would have raptly watched this show as a youngster on PBS.

[@RetroRecipes]

Thank you for your kind words! Means a lot 👍🕹

[@DarwinHandy]

@@RetroRecipes I mean the pup too! Give all the pets a pat.

[@proteque]

Fantastic save. And good demonstration as well 🎉

[@OneAndOnlyMe]

Oh man, I'm so tempted to get me a C64 or Atari 800 and get back to the joy of programming these machines.

[@TheWeredude]

Just discovered your channel a few weeks ago and absolutely love the vibes. Love the retro feel and the knowledge you share. You got me on Ebay looking for a Commodore 64 right now!🙂

[@RetroRecipes]

Oh fantastic! Check out our C64 Buyer's Guide video

[@ASHdemoREEL]

super cool! LOVE your guys videos, a huge THANK YOU for all the work you do. Any chance there is a chat gpt for c64 basic or perhaps even assembler?

[@RetroRecipes]

Thanks! Yep we actually showed ChatGPT on The ЯRetro Show maybe 6 months ago ish.

[@juschilltech]

As someone who is gen z, 33:33 BLEW MY MIND! The timeline is broken.

[@timvickerstaff3670]

I have the BBC Micro version of this. Not used it in eons. Must dig it out!

[@raresaturn]

For any non-Brits confused by 'electric fire', they mean a heater

[@therealyogibear2k225]

I was slightly disappointed that PCB way wasn't sponsoring you this episode because, of course, PCB stands for Perifractic Cuddles Baby, Still, an amazing find, Chris. Just watched your old video when Lady Fractic was pregnant and she was reviewing the Nintendo Sewing machine. Great episode (as they all are.) Keep up the great work. The U.K misses you! (I know, I live there and I do!) Also, one quick question, I don't know when you left the land of the gods to go to some unknown country call América,, but I am sure you remember the Speccy. Anyway, when I first saw Minecraft I immediately thought of an onld Spectrum game that I used to play. Now, am i mis-remembering or do you remember it too? Obviously it wasn't called Minecraft but I am so positive the Speccy had something like it.

[@RetroRecipes]

Thanks! Hmm I don't remember what that could be sorry.

[@nettlesoup]

Are you thinking of Ant Attack maybe? Me and my big brother used to play that endlessly.

[@HisVirusness]

You were sweating? Strange, I hadn't noticed.

[@thomasvnl]

Ah, the Britpit is back with a totally geek-out story 🎉

[@RetroRecipes]

I'm his brother, Brad Bit

[@DanBrickley]

“ONLY ONE INK COLOUR AND ONE PAPER COLOUR CAN EXIST IN ANY SINGLE BLOCK OF 8 * 8 FIXELS.” It’s like a ZX Spectrum -mode upgrade to the. C64, finally! Also kind of Hypercardy.

[@enverhaase8562]

14:26 Noooooo!!!! You finally set the time on the VCR!!!

[@enverhaase8562]

15:16 no longer, clock blinks again 15:30 back, no blink

[@alanicus6969]

Amazing! This takes me right back to my youth, programming from INPUT magazine, then developing my own programs on the commodore 64 and then on the Amiga (and yes, then on to PC in college). Here's a challenge for yourself / your viewers & subscribers - why not create a 'sprite editor' for microtext. It's theoretically a simple thing to do, right? But then you'll need to think about how to integrate your sprites into your programs. Feel free to use microtext to develop your sprite editor [Is there the option to input from peripherals? If not, cursor and space bar to toggle..?] or another platform to export across (this is what I'll be doing..) After this, you could develop more software to create add-ons for your MicroText gubbins, such as sound studios [special effects / MUSIC for games or even stand alone masterpieces]. Ha - I just found your 5 day challenge on Lemon, BTW. ;) Alanicus, Oxford, UK.

[@RetroRecipes]

Well, really the point of the 24x21 grid of asterisks and commas is that _is_ the sprite editor :)

[@alanicus6969]

@@RetroRecipes Lol, yes I suppose it is pretty simplistic, I guess I'm imagining a more 'GUI' / Mouse input kind of environment where you're not 'Programming' as such. Watch this space, I'll see if I can develop something, a graphic / sound studio if you will... ;)

[@IanM-id8or]

The capitals of the USA - there are three of them - are "U", "S" and :"A" ;-) Similarly, the capitals of the UK are "U" and "K" ;-) glad I could help :-)

[@davidkaye821]

Love your channel, and the awesome stash pictured behind you. I'm sure we'd all be interested to know, who is the gentleman in the b/w photo, on the top shelf in front of the Amiga? My guess is it's your father.

[@randaldavis8976]

Got the manual pdf from the archive. I didn't see the software

[@RetroRecipes]

It's right there on the same page. Click the power button at the top to run it instantly. Or "Show all files" to see the D64.