First graphics resolution you programmed for?

[deathshadow]

The IGS folks also had a couple of Digigraphic (270) consoles--big round CRT with a flat face. When I first saw one operating, I thought it was a color display--it used a double phospor, such that it was blue when the beam was over a spot, but then decayed to a yellowish color once the beam moved off.

That was actually typical of early military grade white displays -- I dealt with those in the Air force a few times. Yellow phosphor that reacts to UV and blue/UV phosphor is cheaper than white. Blue+Yellow==white... so they just layered blue phosphor behind the yellow -- electron gun lit up the blue/uv, and the UV lit up the yellow. Problem is that as they aged the blue/uv phospher became less effective, giving it a faster decay rate.

We're starting to see that in new things like white light illumination LED's. There is no such thing as a white LED as yet, and again blue/uv is cheap to make... so once again we have a blue/uv light source underneath a yellow phosphor. This time out though since it's the LED making the UV/Blue we have the decay difference of a slow yellow fade when you turn them off.

I'm talking the type of LED's being put into flashlights and car headlamps... or custom handcrafted bicycle lamps)

 

[tezza]

The first graphics resolution I ever programmed for was 48 x 128. The good old TRS-80 Model 1 (well, actually a clone. A System 80).

Tez

 

[Chuck(G)]

That was actually typical of early military grade white displays -- I dealt with those in the Air force a few times. Yellow phosphor that reacts to UV and blue/UV phosphor is cheaper than white. Blue+Yellow==white... so they just layered blue phosphor behind the yellow -- electron gun lit up the blue/uv, and the UV lit up the yellow. Problem is that as they aged the blue/uv phospher became less effective, giving it a faster decay rate.

We're starting to see that in new things like white light illumination LED's. There is no such thing as a white LED as yet, and again blue/uv is cheap to make... so once again we have a blue/uv light source underneath a yellow phosphor. This time out though since it's the LED making the UV/Blue we have the decay difference of a slow yellow fade when you turn them off.

I'm sure the tube in the 240 was probably intended as a radar display tube with a P7 phosphor. As I understand it, the P7 characteristics were convenient for use with a light pen--the short-persistence component decayed quickly enough so that you could get an accurate position with the light pen, but the yellow component had enough persistence to remain visible for quite a while.

I've had high-brightness white LEDs in service long enough so that their output is considerably down. I suspect this will be even more severe in the very high-brightness ones.

Somehow, I find the claim that LEDs are going to solve all of our illumination problems hard to accept.

 

[harshbarj]

40x48x16 on an apple IIe. It was a simple splash screen for a text based game.

 

[CP/M User]

Technically speaking my first own program which was a crude Screen Designer (come Art Program) riddled with problems (not bugs), used the Low-Res Screen Mode on my Amstrad which is 160x200 with up to 16 colours, though like many BASIC programs it used Text Co-ordinate positioning which for that Low-Res Mode is 20x25.

 

[Zeela]

The first resolution i programmed for was 78x72 monochrome. Big white pixels on black background.
This was on the Luxor ABC 80 a very nice Swedish computer.

 

[Raven]

I first programmed for the Windows 9x-running PC, so multiscan any resolution... It was a brute-force attempt at using VB6 for a school project.

I did, however, use some DOS game creating programs when I was very young that likely operated at 320x200, if that counts.

 

[basman74]

Well, my first graphic screen resolution was a 128x64 4-color mode coded using BASIC on this CoCo 'deviate' - VTech Laser 200

 

[kiyotewolf]

My first resolutions, not sure which came first, were these.

Apple ][e, GR = 40x40x16, HGR = 192x???x7
TRS 80 Coco 2 = Funny CHR$(___) pseudo graphics

I think it may have been the Coco 2 which was first of the two, now that I think about it more carefully.
I remember using the large paperback manual, and combining two programs, so I had a face with a striped shirt. I felt so powerful cause I put two different programs together.

On the Apple, I was an innovator. I remember thinking up a Contra - like program, way way before I ever even saw an NES. It was going to be a side scroller, where you had a guy in a river, shooting skulls which floated up out of the water.
I remember making graphics for Charolettes Web, based on the cartoon movie. I had the rat, on the side of the barn, climbing. Made his tail wag.

Right before we moved from ND to IL, the Apple monitor broke. I had a very short amount of time, to try to find a suitable replacement, and I thought that like the TRS-80, I could use a phono plug wire, and connect the Apple to the RF box for the TV. At that time, I was ignorant of the fact that a VCR was required, and that an Apple computer put out a video signal, not an RF signal. Finally, I gave up and my whole WORLD felt like it imploded inwards. It was either fix the Apple, or watch it be sold on the estate sale.

For some reason, mom sold the computer, but kept all the software disks. Many years later, she got me a new one, and wow, I still had Apple disks!



~Kiyote!

 

[bettablue]

This question brought back some memories.

I was working at Radio Shack when the TRS-80 was introduced. All of who worked at Radio Shack then had to learn as least some BASIC before we could effectively demonstrate the computer. Most of the sales staff just let the computer do what it wanted. They would load a cassette and go from there. But, I was actually going to college to learn programming too. So, when it came right down to it, I was the only one in our store who knew anything at all about what the TRS-80 could do.
Then came the day when a cusomer came in with a race forse formula. He told me that he would buy 2 complete systems if I could write a program, save it to diskette so all he had to do was load it up. He wanted to have 10 frames, and each frame contained fields for him to enter his data points. When it was all done, all he had to do was look at the top of the screen to see which lane performed the best. Needless to say, I wrote the program, saved it on 4 cassette tapes, and gave him the lot. This was at a time when the largest screen resolution was only 80 X 25 or so. O do remember the 80 column width, but I don't remember the height. The systems he bought included 2 main computers and monitors, with 4Kb of RAM each, 2 - 16 K upgrades, a DMP, printer switch, and 2 tape recorders. It really only took me about 90 minutes to write the program; most of which was to fit the data to each of the frames properly. I made a whopping $250.00 for writing the program, and another $165.00 in commissions.

That was a lot of money for someone making just above minimum wage plus commissions. I remember everyone in the store thinking I was the guy.

Ever since then, the rest of the store pretty much left me alone when a customer came in looking for one of the computers. But that's another story!

BB

 

[Trixter]

40x48x16 on an apple IIe. It was a simple splash screen for a text based game.

Mine too, if we're counting the very first pixel I ever put onto a screen. For the first pixel I put onto a screen using my own code (ie. assembler and/or a deep understanding of how to set/unset pixels), then it would be CGA 320x200x4.