This book is intended as a compact reference guide to the Atari ST range of computers, it provides detailed information on the Atari ST hardware, an overview of the operating systems and the operating system calls.
The majority of the book has been prepared in both decimal and hexadecimal notation to make reading and data entry less complicated for the beginner, and those who wish to use the VDl and AES tables from BASIC. I hope the use of decimal will not be too distressful to the purists, but most assemblers will accept either format as an input. The diagramatic presentation of data in memory and of stacks follows the Motorola MC68000 user's manual format of low memory towards the top of the page. All memory representations are annotated to avoid confusion.
The Atari ST range of computers contain the largest ROM (192K) of all the current home/low cost business computers available. This offers an enormous wealth of data and routines that the user may wish to access; about six times that of most other computers, this information is presented in a condensed group tabular form to provide association. General descriptions of all the facilities available (disk, file, interfaces etc) are provided to present the reader with at least an outline understanding of their operation.
The book covers the programming of an Atari ST l6-bit computer in three parts:
Chapter 1 gives an overview of the Atari ST hardware, and expansion ports, also included is a short description of the peripheral interface circuits.
Chapter 2 presents an overview of the operating systems, the management of memory and resources, control of serial I/O, screen functions and file handling.
Chapter 3 provIdes the operatIng system calls for both GEM and TOS, the A-line graphic functions and the intelligent keyboard command instructions.
Appendices contain the system variables, configuration registers and a summary of the MC68000 instruction set.
The new mega STs offer a number of additional facilities over the 520 and 1040, besides the obvious increase in available memory. A battery-backed real-time clock; an internal socket for the addition of plug-in expansion cards and full access to the 68000 bus via an external expansion socket. These facilities are at the time of writing not fully defined and subject to possible change, they are therefore not included in this edition of the book. It is hoped, however to include the details in subsequent editions.