Bought: complete Wordcraft20 and Screen Master manual + disk

[orion70]

Hi all, I recently received from an Ebay seller in Spain the following two items:
- Boxed Wordcraft20 by Audiogenic (VP060), complete with working cart, manual, and a cassette containing some demos and a conversion program for text files created with Wordcraft80 on CBM computers.
- Micro Application's VIC20 Screen Master user manual and demo disk (no cart unfortunately).

A quick look at the stuff:


The Screen Master manual is in good condition. I see in the funet archive that it may be required, so I'll scan it asap (to whom should I send it?):

Screen Master.prg
"Master VIC=20 Micro Application" by Handic. This looks like a BASIC expansion. Many of the commands have not been implemented. The added keywords are: IREAD IOPEN ICLOSE IDELETE IUPDATE IEXIST IWRITE ISTART INEXT IRESET IUPGRADE ONERROR CREATST PUTST GETST OUT CLEAR TLINE TCOL DECZ INZ REQZ SSET SEXCH SSAVE SLOAD SCOPY SCROLL MADD MSUB MMUL MDIV REV SCLEAR PCREATE POPEN PCLOSE PERASE POUT PCLEAR PDECZ PPRINT ONKEY KEYSET KEYCLR CLRKEY INBLOCM TAKBUF PUTBUF PUTBLOCK HUNT DATEPACK DATEUNPACK SRESET NOLIST IRESTORE IDATA IADD IVALIDATE UPLOW UTI SCREEN. Does anyone have a user's guide?

I'll also rip the demo disk, but for this you have to wait a little bit more, say until summer, when I'll finally have room for a complete VIC setup .

As a sidenote, I see that both programs are listed as produced by different manufacturers: Wordcraft20 is by Audiogenic and not UMI, and Screen Master is by Micro Application (Paris, France) and not Handic. Maybe European versions?

[Mayhem]

Yes. Audiogenic released a lot of UMI product in the UK for example.

[beamrider]

just Googled it...

does that cartidge contain both the program ROM and 8K of RAM?

[orion70]

Left it at work . Will check on monday, but IIRC, yes.

[orion70]

Confirmed.

For the technically minded the cartridge contains the WORDCRAFT 20 program in four 4k ROM chips plus 8k of additional RAM memory. This 8k is available for use in BASIC as well as when running WORDCRAFT 20.

(btw, should I scan Audiogenic's W20 manual as well?)

[orion70]

OK, here we go:

Wordcraft20 by Audiogenic (pdf, 7.7 Mb)
VIC Screen Master (pdf, 3.6 Mb)

[ral-clan]

It's great to see productivity software being archived. It always seems to be second fiddle to games.

Has anyone ever written a real university paper, novel, or business document using the VIC-20? Did it have useable word processors that could do a decent job? I guess SpeedScript would be considered the best word processor in today's judgement, eh?

[orion70]

Agree. IMO, Speedscript 3 (latest incarnation) is by far the best and easiest wp for the VIC. Back in the day, I was too young to use the VIC for anything different from games and some trivial attempt in BASIC programming. My first text on a computer was circa 1986/87 - a list of pirated cassettes made with GEOWrite (pirate's skull included to my friends' wonder), saved on disk, and printed with a pal's Epson printer.

One of my projects now is to use a real VIC with a modern printer via lpt port and appropriate interface. I have no experience in this field, but I'll look for inspiration and advice in the internet and from my fellow Denialers . This will make VIC's word processing and spreadsheets (see Practicalc plus) a fun experience.

[ral-clan]

Agree. IMO, Speedscript 3 (latest incarnation) is by far the best and easiest wp for the VIC. Back in the day, I was too young to use the VIC for anything different from games and some trivial attempt in BASIC programming. My first text on a computer was circa 1986/87 - a list of pirated cassettes made with GEOWrite (pirate's skull included to my friends' wonder), saved on disk, and printed with a pal's Epson printer.

One of my projects now is to use a real VIC with a modern printer via lpt port and appropriate interface. I have no experience in this field, but I'll look for inspiration and advice in the internet and from my fellow Denialers . This will make VIC's word processing and spreadsheets (see Practicalc plus) a fun experience.

I've had success using an old Canon Bubblejet (BJ-10?) printer (parallel port interface) with the VIC-20. I used a User port to Parallel interface (sometimes simply called a printer interface). These were popular in the C64 hayday in order to allow people to use non-Commodore printers with their C64s. Some even allowed the Commodor PETSCII graphics set to be printed on non-Commodore printers. The bubblejet could be set to EPSON compatibility mode and fortunately so could the printer interface. I think the printer interface might have been a Xetec Super Graphics Jr., but there were many models made that could fulfill a similar function?

With modern USB printers it might be more difficult. I don't know how well those Parallel to USB convertors work and even so, I'm not sure if new printers can roll back to basic EPSON compatibility mode.

I eventually switched back to real commodore dot matrix printers for the fun of the retro experience, the retro-sounds and dot matrix look. Also, it's actually easier to maintain these old printer ribbons (re-ink, transplant new ribbons into old cartridges) than to maintain the Bubblejet ink cartridges.

For now you may still be able to source replacement early-bubbleject cartridges. You can re-fill the ink cartridges a few times, but eventually, something electronic dies inside the print head (I think it uses static electricity).

With the old Commodore printers, if you cannot buy the proper ribbon cartridge, there are still modern dot matrix cartridges being sold that use the same width ribbon inside. When the ribbon of a Commodore printer cartridge becomes too battered to be re-inked. I open the shell of a new off-the-shelf ribbon cartridge transplant the new ribbon into the old cartridge's shell.

[orion70]

Thank you ral-clan. Very interesting. I already have a Protecto parallel printer interface somewhere in the garage, so: in your - or anyone else's - opinion, would it be possible to connect a VIC to an old inkjet provided that it has the lpt port, or the connection only works with specific models? I wouldn't buy a Commodore printer for now if I can use say a €15 Epson inkjet

[ral-clan]

Thank you ral-clan. Very interesting. I already have a Protecto parallel printer interface somewhere in the garage, so: in your - or anyone else's - opinion, would it be possible to connect a VIC to an old inkjet provided that it has the lpt port, or the connection only works with specific models? I wouldn't buy a Commodore printer for now if I can use say a €15 Epson inkjet

I definitely think most inkjet and laser printers that had a parallel / centronics / LPT interface would work with your Protecto printer interface. Especially printer models from the 1990s. I used a Canon BJC-4000 series printer with my Amiga, and I believe it could go into EPSON compatibility mode as well. The early BJ-10 had dip switches. They later BJC-4000 might have had them as well, or perhaps it involved a series of button presses on power-up to set the printer compatibility mode.

A laser printer on a VIC-20 would be very nice.

Commodore actually re-badged some Hewlet-Packard(?) inkjet printers for use with the Amiga line. It would be neat to get one of these to use with the VIC-20 - as it would have the Commodore logo on it. Some even still had the IEC serial port!

http://www.computinghistory.org.uk/det/ ... 20Printer/
http://www.nightfallcrew.com/30/06/2011 ... mps-1270a/

I see someone else on a C64 forum asked the same question as you and got some good answers:

http://www.lemon64.com/forum/viewtopic. ... 4f358fd42e

[RobertBe]

I used a User port to Parallel interface (sometimes simply called a printer interface). These were popular in the C64 hayday in order to allow people to use non-Commodore printers with their C64s. Some even allowed the Commodor PETSCII graphics set to be printed on non-Commodore printers.

Well, some of the printer interfaces were marked to work with the VIC-20, too.

I eventually switched back to real commodore dot matrix printers for the fun of the retro experience, the retro-sounds and dot matrix look.

To go even more retro, there are the daisywheel printers, like the Commodore DPS-1101.

Truly,
Robert Bernardo
Fresno Commodore User Group
http://videocam.net.au/fcug

[orion70]

Update: I found the printer interface in my garage, and my dad tells me he has a (relatively old) printer in his garage.
The interface is not a Protecto, but a Xetec Graphics Printer Interface (GPI, manual here). If it's still working, it should be OK at least to print in Epson compatibility mode, ASCII only.
The printer is an Epson Stylus Color C460, which I see it was designed as "MS Windows Only", but it has a "Centronics -type 8-bit parallel interface" via a "a shielded, twisted-pair parallel cable", so why not give it a try .

Of course, I still have to: clean the printer and find new ink for it; test the printer; find the time to bring it home from there (100 Km away); find the time and space to install everything (including the VIC-20) and try the GPI. Sadly, this may not be as immediate as I'd like to think.

[ral-clan]

Update: I found the printer interface in my garage, and my dad tells me he has a (relatively old) printer in his garage.
The interface is not a Protecto, but a Xetec Graphics Printer Interface (GPI, manual here). If it's still working, it should be OK at least to print in Epson compatibility mode, ASCII only.
The printer is an Epson Stylus Color C460, which I see it was designed as "MS Windows Only", but it has a "Centronics -type 8-bit parallel interface" via a "a shielded, twisted-pair parallel cable", so why not give it a try .

Of course, I still have to: clean the printer and find new ink for it; test the printer; find the time to bring it home from there (100 Km away); find the time and space to install everything (including the VIC-20) and try the GPI. Sadly, this may not be as immediate as I'd like to think.

I believe the Xetec interfaces (which were very good) allowed any non-Commodore printer to print Commodore PETSCII symbols as well, if configured properly.

[RobertBe]

...the Xetec interfaces (which were very good) allowed any non-Commodore printer to print Commodore PETSCII symbols as well, if configured properly.

You're right.

Truly,
Robert Bernardo
Fresno Commodore User Group
http://videocam.net.au/fcug