Some common Basic programs: TRS-80 level II edition. (book reviews) Steve Gray.

Some Common Basic Programs:

TRS-80 Level II Edition

According to the title, these 76 programs, which will run on both the Model I and Model III TRS-80, are "common' ones. Well, perhaps if you work in the financial, statistical or mathematical field, these programs may be common to you. If not, you might never need any of them, other than perhaps some of the financial ones, and even those not all that often.

The 20 financial programs include Future Value on an Investment, Depreciation Rate, Term of a Loan, and Mortgage Amortization Table. Some of the 28 mathematical programs are Area of a Polygon, Coordinate Conversion, Integration by Simpson's Rule, and Matrix Inversion. Among the 17 statistical programs are Poisson Distribution, F-Distribution, Chi-Square Test, and Linear Regression. The remaining 11 programs are varied, such as Recipe Cost, Federal Withholding Texes, Day of the Week, and Check Writer. (The programs were also originally offered on cassette, but this is no longer available.)

This book doesn't teach Basic programming, but you don't have to understand the language. Just copy the listings into your TRS-80 and run the programs as shown in the examples. (The book is also available in editions for the Atari, Pet/CBM, Apple and IMB PC.)

As usual with an Osborne book, this one is meticulously prepared. Each program includes a good sprinkling of explanatory REM lines, and is accompanied by a description, example, and sample run. Some include optional changes for altering the input or output of the original program. All require at least 4K, and are designed to fit a 64-column screen.

If you need enough of these programs to make the price attractive, this book presents them much better than nearly all other similar collections.

Review Grade: C+