ascii85x
Introduction
This module is meant to display information from TI-85 variable files in a human readable way.
There were a few reasons for making this in 2021:
- ascii85p, an ancient program for displaying program text, does not come with source code
- TokenIDE, a more modern and very featureful tool, is written in C#, and I didn't want to use mono.
- TokenIDE also does not come with source code.
- Just let me have some fun.
Background
Perhaps you, like many technically minded folks who went through school with their trusty TI calculator, have a catalog of TI-BASIC programs that you wrote for both fun and utility.
If I look through my backup directory and see RND.85p,
I might wonder what's in there and try vim RND.85p:
**TI85**^Z^L^@Group file dated Sun Sep 26 16:12:47 202^@^@^L^A^G^@^A^A^R^CRND^A^Aÿ^@D0^@^K3AoD0^@^K3BoD0^@^K3CoD0^@^K3DoD0^@^K3SoD0^@^K=^DoD100^@^K=^Eo¡D35^@^K=^FoD35^@^K=^GoD25^@^K=^BoD5^@^K=^Coìo<91>o<83>oÛ^P^PCUD22^@^Q@^P3CSD500^@^Q^QoØ^P^P¥^PApD2^@^Q^QPD1^@^QoÙo3A`D1^@^K3AoÚo3B`D1^@^K3BoÞo3C`D1^@^K3Co3S`^P3Aa3B^Q^K3So<98>^P3CqD5^@/3Aa3B^Qo<98>^P3CqD5^@/3Sq3C^QoÞoë^PD2^@/D1^@/3Aoë^PD3^@/D1^@/3Boë^PD4^@/D1^@/3Sq3Cv?
Not so nice. As mentioned above, there are some options for decoding these files, but they didn't work for me, so I made ascii85x.
$ ascii85x RND.85p
Program "RND":
0→A
0→B
0→C
0→D
0→S
0→xMin
100→xMax
-35→yMin
35→yMax
25→xScl
5→yScl
ClLCD
FnOff
ClDrw
While ((getKy≠22) and (C<=500))
If ((int(rand*2))==1)
Then
A+1→A
Else
B+1→B
End
C+1→C
S+(A-B)→S
PtOn(C/5,A-B)
PtOn(C/5,S/C)
End
Outpt(2,1,A
Outpt(3,1,B
Outpt(4,1,S/C
Much better!
Usage
ascii85x will read and display any variable or group file as output by the TI-85 link backup utility.
The variable types supported are:
| Type | Extension |
|---|---|
| RealValue | 85n |
| ComplexValue | 85c |
| Vector | 85v |
| List | 85l |
| Matrix | 85m |
| Constant | 85k |
| Equation | 85y |
| String | 85s |
| Program | 85p |
| Picture | 85i |
| Settings | 85? |
| GDB | 85d |
A group file (85g) may contain many of these types of variables.
$ ascii85x --help
Usage: ascii85x [-i|--info] [-D|--debug] [-v|--verbose] VARFILE [-V|--version]
Convert TI-85 variable files to text
Available options:
-i,--info Show file info only
-D,--debug Show extra variable details
-v,--verbose Show variable file summary
VARFILE 85x variable file
-V,--version Show version only
-h,--help Show this help text