Goto 10: Retro Computing & Gaming

Goto 10: Retro Computing & Gaming

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Goto 10: Retro Computing & Gaming
Goto 10: Retro Computing & Gaming
Anatomy of a C Program
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Anatomy of a C Program

STalky, written in Heat-and-Serve C

Paul Lefebvre's avatar
Paul Lefebvre
Jul 17, 2023
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Goto 10: Retro Computing & Gaming
Goto 10: Retro Computing & Gaming
Anatomy of a C Program
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In 1992 and 1993, I was using C for a lot of college assignments. I also had many C compilers for my trusty Atari Mega STe.

About this time I was selling a shareware program that let you schedule the download of emails, message board posts, and file downloads. As a companion to that I decided to create a small program to work as a “type-ahead” buffer for when you were actually online.

STalky running on my Mega STe

Keep in mind that being online back then meant you were paying by the hour for a service and also possibly for the phone call itself. Things are cheap today!

I called this program STalky (as a play on the name STalker, which was the programmable terminal software I used) and decided I would write it in C to keep it as small as I could. Here’s a pic of the first page of the source code:

First page of STalky source code. Full source code and more information about how it was made continues in the rest of the article for paid subscribers.

Keep reading about how I made STalky by becoming a Goto 10 member with a paid subscription. You’ll get access to the rest of this article and 100+ other articles about retrocomputing.

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