Radio Shack TRS-80 model III Owner's Manual page 124

DISK BASIC
File
Access
This section
is
divided
into
four parts:
1.
Creating
files
and assigning buffers
—
open and close
2.
Statements
and
functions
3.
Sequential
i/o
techniques
4.
Random
i/o
techniques
If this
is
your
first
experience with
disk
file
access,
you
should concentrate
on
parts
1
,
3
and
4,
perhaps
just
skimming
through
part
2
to
get a
general idea of
how
the functions
and statements
work.
Later
you can go back
to part
2 and
learn the details
of statement
and
function syntax.
Creating
Files
and
Assigning Buffers
During
the initialization
dialog,
you
type in a
number
in
response
to
how many
files?
The number you
type in
tells
basic
how many
buffers
to
create
to
handle
your disk accesses (reads
and
writes).
Each
buffer
is
given a
number
from
1
to 15. If
you
type:
HON MANY FILES? 3V
(ENTER)
basic
sets
aside 3 buffers,
numbered
1,2,3.
You
can think of a buffer as
a waiting area that
data
must pass through
on
the
way
to
and from
the disk
file.
When
you want
to
access a particular
file,
you
must
tell
basic
which
buffer to
use
in
accessing
that
file.
You
must
also
tell
basic
what kind of access
you want
—
sequential output, sequential input, or
random
input/output.
All
this is
done
with the
open
statement,
and
"undone"
with the
close
statement.
OPEN
Open
a
File
it
will
be created.
123