Hello - new forum member from Italy

ldxstx · Post by **ldxstx** » Tue Nov 27, 2012 5:02 pm

Hi, I've just signed up so... a couple of words about myself to introduce me to this GREAT community.

I'm from Vicenza (north Italy), my first home computer was the VIC-20 back in 1981, when I began coding in basic and in assembly. I then enjoyed the C64, the Amiga500 and later on PCs and Macs.

I hope to have the time to study again the Vic-20 (and the C64) and maybe be able to develop something new.

Thanks and nice to meet you!

JohnnyRockets · Post by **JohnnyRockets** » Tue Nov 27, 2012 5:08 pm

Hi ldxstx!

Great to meet you!

I am from the north in the US! (Michigan to be exact)!

My first computer was also the VIC-20 in 1981!

I am actually going down the save "road" that you are!

Relearning, having fun and thinking about trying to develop something cool!

Great talking to you!

Post by **Jeff-20** » Tue Nov 27, 2012 10:37 pm

Welcome! Very glad to have you here.

orion70 · Post by **orion70** » Wed Nov 28, 2012 2:21 am

Another Italian member, great news!

Welcome to the friendly forum. You'll have fun with the humble VIC, and discover that it's not so humble as it may look at the first glance...

ldxstx · Post by **ldxstx** » Wed Nov 28, 2012 10:51 am

Thank you all for your kind words!

The Vic-20 was my first "love" but I like it most of all because of its complete and at the same time simple system architecture, manageable staying at a low level (asm, kernal, etc).

I've already some homeworks

Last night I finished some books (the user manual by Commodore, "Vic 20 machine code", "Compute's creating arcade games on the Vic", "Mastering the Vic-20") so now I'll try to study these subjects:
- multicolor graphics in games, software sprites, plotting functions with pixels, pixel perfect scrolling
- simulated raster interrupts
- loaders, turbo loaders, autorun (if I'm right it's done by overwriting the CHROUT kernal routine) and program chaining

I've chosen dasm / exomizer / cbm prg studio to work with.

I'm really happy to have found this great community, since I remember back in 1981 how hard was to me to find info about assembly and game coding with it (I was 10 years old).

orion70 · Post by **orion70** » Wed Nov 28, 2012 10:54 am

Wow, are you a professional programmer? You are welcome... twice then, hope to see some new games from you soon

.

JohnnyRockets · Post by **JohnnyRockets** » Wed Nov 28, 2012 11:09 am

ldxstx wrote:"Compute's creating arcade games on the Vic"

I have most of these books, but not this one...

Can you tell me the author of this one?

ldxstx · Post by **ldxstx** » Wed Nov 28, 2012 12:02 pm

@Orion70: thanks

well, speaking about a new game, it will depend most of all on the amount of spare time and on how quickly I'll be able to find the info about those subjects, missing pieces of the puzzle; it seems that the books cover the "basics", so I suspect that I'll have to disassemble and it will take time, 'cause there are multiple subjects to cover.

@JohnnyRockets: sure! The author of the book is Robert Camp. I also found that you can even get a scanned version online. I don't know if the rules of the forum allow linking, so in case I'll send you a PM.

Cheers!

JohnnyRockets · Post by **JohnnyRockets** » Wed Nov 28, 2012 12:09 pm

ldxstx wrote:@Orion70: thanks well, speaking about a new game, it will depend most of all on the amount of spare time and on how quickly I'll be able to find the info about those subjects, missing pieces of the puzzle; it seems that the books cover the "basics", so I suspect that I'll have to disassemble and it will take time, 'cause there are multiple subjects to cover.

@JohnnyRockets: sure! The author of the book is Robert Camp. I also found that you can even get a scanned version online. I don't know if the rules of the forum allow linking, so in case I'll send you a PM.

Cheers!

Okay, hey thanks a lot!

Kweepa · Post by **Kweepa** » Wed Nov 28, 2012 1:10 pm

You can post a link to the book.
http://www.1000bit.it/support/manuali/c ... he_VIC.pdf
(As was done here:
http://sleepingelephant.com/ipw-web/bul ... php?t=5294)

ldxstx · Post by **ldxstx** » Wed Nov 28, 2012 2:14 pm

Perfect! So here is the site where I found the pdf version: http://www.bombjack.org/commodore/books-kim-pet-vic.htm
I've seen that there are many other pdf books there. I hope it helps.

Btw in case that someone of you has some pointers about the subjects I mentioned in my previous list, they are really appreciated. Thanks in advance

ajordison · Post by **ajordison** » Wed Nov 28, 2012 2:31 pm

Welcome aboard and good luck with your projects!

Witzo · Post by **Witzo** » Wed Nov 28, 2012 3:46 pm

Welcome!
This site has given me many pointers already, even helped me diagnose and fix a broken VIC. I hope we'll be as useful to you as Denial has been to me.

RobertBe · Post by **RobertBe** » Wed Nov 28, 2012 8:01 pm

Welcome! My friend, Michael Battilana of Cloanto Software, keeps asking me to visit him; he lives in the Venice area, and you're right there in Vicenza. Perhaps I can make it to northern Italy in 2014.

My next trip to Europe,
Robert Bernardo
Fresno Commodore User Group
http://videocam.net.au/fcug

ldxstx · Post by **ldxstx** » Thu Nov 29, 2012 12:54 pm

Thank you! It's great to see this kind of friendship in this community, cool! Glad to become a part of it.

@RobertBe: yours is a really nice idea, you'll enjoy Venice (btw: yes, to me it's just "behind the corner", living in Vicenza); just let me know when you'll come so we'll certainly meet there and will talk about our common passion for Commodore machines and more.