Bugs and Anomalies in The Write Stuff by Dick Estel As I used The Write Stuff 128 over the years, I discovered some annoying behaviors. I hesitate to call them all bugs, since the program's author has discussed one of them, and apparently feels it is part of the normal operation. So I will call it an anomaly. It is related to the macro feature and the sequence of events is as follows: You call up the macro file in order to make a temporary macro, by typing [CONTROL] [SHIFT] M. At this point, the entire macro file is merged above your current document. This does not make sense to me, since you must delete it before you save your document. When you delete it, the macro file gets trashed. After this, you can no longer use the macro feature. Every time you type a one- or two-letter word, the cursor either locks up or disappears entirely. After this you can't type or move the cursor. You can always recover by pressing [RUN/STOP] [RESTORE], then typing RUN. You can eliminate the problem by turning off the macros, by typing [CONTROL] m. But you are without macros until you re-boot. You can retain the macro file by transferring into a second text area, assuming the size of your document allows this. I don't think this is an elegant solution. Another problem, which may be related to the above, occurs in relation to the multiple text area feature. Sometimes when I create a document, then switch to the alternate text area via [CONTROL] [SHIFT] Q, the same document appears in the other area. Additionally, any text clear action performed on one area acts on the other area; for example, using [CONTROL] [SHIFT] [CLR] to erase all or part of the document erases BOTH documents. Several times I have had a problem with sections of text not printing when using columns. I created a list of items several pages long. Since each item was fairly short, I wanted to print in columns. At the point a new column began, I noticed that anywhere from one to five lines of text would disappear when printing or viewing in print preview. I was able to correct this by adding returns above the line that disappeared. This required adding one return, previewing; then adding additional returns and previewing until all the text appeared. When I edited the Commodore MaiLink in January of 1999, I encountered the same thing with portions of text lost at the top of each page. I ended up printing each page separately, since adding returns in the middle of a paragraph threw the formatting off. For the January 2000 MaiLink, I created three files of several pages each, and used the command to link them so I could print the entire publication at once. For one section, I had to place a return at the top of the page, or the first line would not print. This created an extra line, which then affected the formatting for the rest of the issue. Finally, there is a definite bug relating to use of the print to memory feature. After using this feature several times, the program crashes in various interesting ways. The crashes I experience usually but not always occur after a SAVE. However, they can happen after a LOAD or even while I am going through the file with the function or cursor keys. I don't believe it has happened during actual typing (text entry). Crashes take one of the following forms: 1. The cursor disappears and no screen movement is possible. 2. The screen fills with what appears to be at least partly program code -- some basic keywords, but mostly garbage. I can go to top and bottom using CLR and HOME, but there is no other cursor movement. Sometimes all but the top few lines of the screen will shift down a line, then back up (like a return is entered then deleted). Often there is a "cursor" where the character in that spot is constantly changing. 3. While paging through a document with F7 the document scrolled up out of sight and was gone. 4. A series of numbers appears and the computer dumps out of the program to the monitor. Garbage or part of the text may or may not appear on the screen. Recovery: Pressing RUN/STOP RESTORE reverts to the basic start-up screen. Typing RUN with RETURN may recover to the garbage screen, but usually does not recover at all. Entering the POKE and SYS codes from the manual virtually always recovers but the RETURN character looks different (the horizontal bar is two pixels high instead of the normal 1 and the vertical arrow part is also wider). The REU drive is gone. Preview mode sometimes (not always) yields a display in which graphic characters replace upper case and embedded code characters; but normal hard-copy printing seems to be OK. During situation #2, I can access the command line. I did this and attempted to load a file, but the garbage display remained. When I recovered with the POKE/SYS, the file was there. Often after recovery, and sometimes before a crash, a light grey character 0 (zero) appears above the extreme upper left cursor position, below the command line. This problem nearly always occurs after I have used the print to memory command a number of times. When I am doing this, I always make sure I save the document frequently. I suspect that something about using print to memory eventually corrupts the program. None of these problems are frequent or severe enough to change my opinion that TWS is the world's best Commodore word processor. Like everything, the "best" can always be better. (A version of this article first appeared in the Commodore MaiLink, newsletter of Meeting 64/128 Users Through the Mail; this version downloaded from via the Commodore Information Center, http://home.att.net/~rmestel/commodore.html)