>One question popped into my mind as I read Wirt's response....
Joe Howell wrote:

>Wirt Atmar wrote:
>>
>> donna asks:
>...........
>>
>> As it occurs, twenty-two years ago I wrote a cross-compiler in HP3000 BASIC
>> for the 8080/8085 processor. The cross-compiler takes "high-level" assembly
>> code and generates hexadecimal binary, ready to be downloaded into either a
>> 2649 or an Altair-based prom programmer connected to an HP3000 as terminal.
>
>Why did you write it?  Because it was there? Because it looked
>like fun?  Answers to questions such as these help others
>of us to develop our own 'atmarian' traits.

One of the things I occasionally find distressing about Wirt's posts is
how much time Wirt and I seem to have spent duplicating each others' odd
jobs. I wrote a Z-80 assembler in HP3000 BASIC all those years ago
because I wanted to keep my Z-80 source code on a computer where I could
trust it to be there the next day. The 100K hard-sector floppies I had
for my "real" development system were terribly unreliable, and with only
one floppy drive, backups were problematic. I had (and still have) a
stand-alone EPROM programmer with a 2400-baud serial interface that I had
connected as a terminal.

Later, when I could get a controller that supported a pair of 360K floppy
drives, I switched back to the regular development system. Our company's
first product was in fact hardware that allowed the HP LaserJet to be
used on an HP 3000 by emulating a faster, supported printer. I should
note that when I showed the device to the product manager and chief
visionary in charge of HP's host-based word processor, HPWord, she
pronounced the product technically interesting but worthless. "Why should
anyone want to use a LaserJet?"

-- Bruce


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