Using 40 And 80 Columns Together - Commodore 128D User Manual

D
Using 40 and 80
Columns Together
The main advantage of 40-column composite video output is the
availability of bit mapped graphics, while 80 columns gives you out
put for word processing and other business applications. If you have
two monitors, you can write programs that are "shared", using the
text features 80 columns affords you and the graphics of 40
columns. A special command, (GRAPHIC 1,1) can be used within a
program to transfer the execution of graphics commands to the 40-
column display. If you have a dual monitor (one that can display both
40- and 80-column formats) you can place GRAPHIC 1,1 statements
in your program so that graphics will be output in 40-column screen
format. In order to view the graphic output, however, you will need to
change the video switch on the monitor to 40 columns. If you write a
program like this, it might be a good idea to include on-screen direc
tions to the user to change the video switch.
For example, you might write a program which asked the user to
input data, then created a bar graph based on the user's input. The
message "CHANGE TO 40 COLUMN TO VIEW GRAPH" would tell
the user to switch modes and see the results.
As noted previously, you can switch between the 80- and 40-column
formats after power up, with the ESCape/X sequence.
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USING C128 MODE-Using 80 Columns