| Posted By
Luca
on 2013-11-05
08:29:26
 |  Plus Graph 2.0: New Life For A Golden Oldest
  Everything can be improved, and time does not count! This time, SVS/FIRE will use his own words to present here his new effort!
"When the Plus/4 was launched in the '80s, it was intended to be a business machine. The original plan was to sell the machine with programs built into its internal ROM, ready to use. The user could choose which embedded program to have. They were ready but the fact is that just a month before the launch date, Commodore decided to include only a single ROM program, the same for everyone. David W. Johnson - a developer at Tri Micro - gathered 4 applications and built the so called 3+1 (a Word Processor, a Spreadsheet, a Database and Graphics). In order to fit all of the programs into 32K, and to integrate between them, he had to reduce their code by cutting some features. The most penalised was the Graphics program, reduced to a single command which generated a text histogram (GR).
Years later, some of these ghost programs were discovered by Plus/4 users, for example Plus/Extra – the original Word Processor – with the original features. This year (2013), Gary "gc841" Cooper found a copy of Plus Graph, the graphic program excluded from 3+1. When it was available here I confess to having felt the original feeling of the Plus/4's golden era.
Would the fate of our machine have been any different if they had been released? What features should there be in a 2.0 version of these programs? Well, Plus Graph 2.0 is my answer: by modifying and improving the original Plus Graph code from Tri Micro".
Briefly, SVS/FIRE has improved and fixed Plus Graph releasing Plus Graph 2.0 and that's quite a great release, try it!
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Posted By
Csabo
on 2013-11-10
08:29:26
| Re: Plus Graph 2.0: New Life For A Golden Oldest
I needed some time to properly check this out, but now I've done so. I have to admit, I didn't know the original either, so I downloaded and played with that first.
SVS, I have to say you've improved it very nicely. The grid lines really help, they make it look like SVS Calc  The built in help is nice (and a must), otherwise the user would be pretty lost. I made a huge mess in graphic mode first; not knowing how to exit I just kept pressing each letter, and when that still didn't work, any keys in random. The screen kept looking worse and worse! Eventually I stumbled on C= + C to exit, and later realized that graphics mode is actually interactive. It's... really pretty impressive.
Congratulations man, you've put out a very polished utility with tons of options - in my opinion, if anyone were to use this to make graphs it should be more than enough.
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Posted By
Litwr
on 2013-11-14
12:37:53
| Re: Plus Graph 2.0: New Life For A Golden Oldest
I want to have an opportunity to use it with some kind of presentation at the retro style...
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