In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, Dave <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes
>On Thu, 2 May 2002, Norman Dunbar wrote: > >> And, they don't have any QLs anywhere nowadays. (hopeless attempt to get on >> topic) > >Yes. If I ever get to twist Nasta's arm to do it (which won't be for a >while as he's got more important things to do) I think the BBC was the >perfect education machine - it had usable programming language, deep >access to the machine (inline assembly, etc) and ports for everything. >I really think a QL could do the job better, if it was designed right, and >had programmable IO ports and a cleaned up (IE completely redefined to >look like it belongs in this century) windowing system. As a teacher in the English education system I have to agree. The BBC model 'B' was the best for control and electronic projects ... the 'user port' was well implemented and easy to program directly in a few lines of code. Either BASIC or direct Assembler. I had both the BBC B and the QL at my school in regular use, ( still have them too ... but not in use, as the 'kids' can't program these days :-) ). >From the early 1990's it all went 'industry standard', all at least schools' perception of it :-( ... so it became PC networks. In the beginning I even successfully ran a BBC emulator on the PC with a hardware version of the 'user port' to continue with control based projects ... even at University level teaching. Just now I'm having to use the Lego RCX 'brick' via a PC serial port ... with an infrared link, it only has 3 inputs and 3 outputs ... so not much progress. The local education advisors think it is the 'bees knees' :-) An Hitachi microchip is used with both ROM and RAM. It uses a graphical programming language known as 'G' - you arrange a program as a series of graphical items as 'icons', which is then interpreted for you ( hidden from view ). http:\\www.lego.com/dacta/robolab Of course, it is incompatible with the previous Dacta as it is 9v and not 6v. -- Malcolm Cadman
