Preface

1. System overview
    
2. ANTIC and the display list
   • Television Displays
   • Computers and Televisions
   • ANTIC, a Video Microprocessor
   • Building Display Lists
   • Writing to a Custom Display List Screen
   • Applications of display lists
      
3. Graphics indirection (color registers and characters sets)
   • Color registers
   • Character sets
   • Applications of character sets
      
4. Player-Missile Graphics
   • Difficulties with High-Speed Animation
   • Player-Missile Fundamentals
   • Vertical Motion
   • Horizontal Motion
   • Other Player-Missile Features
   • Missiles
   • Player and Playfield Priorities
   • Hardware Collision Detection
   • Applications of Player-Missile Graphics
   • Special Characters
      
5. Display List Interrupts
   • Theory of Operation
   • DLI Timing
   • DLI Example
   • Attract Mode
   • Detailed Timing Considerations
   • Multiple DLIs
   • Kernels
   • Applications of Display List Interrups
      
6. Scrolling
   • Horizontal Scrolling
   • Fine Scrolling
   • Applications of Scrolling
      
7. Sound
   • Definition of Terms and Conventions
   • Sound Hardware
     • AUDF1-4
     • AUDC1-4
     • Volume
     • Distortion
     • Volume Only Sound
     • AUDCTL
     • Clocking
     • 16-Bit Frequency options
     • High Pass Filters
     • 9-Bit Polynomial Conversion
   • Sound generation Software Techniques
     • Static Sound
     • Dynamic Sound
     • BASIC Sound
     • 60-Hz Interrupt
     • Machine-Code Sound Generation
     • Volume Only Sound
        
8. Operating system
   • Introduction
   • The Monitor
   • Memory Management
   • Interrupt Processing Structure
   • The System Vectors
   • The Centralized Input/Output Subsystem
   • Real-Time Programming
   • Floating Point Package
      
9. The disk operating system
   • The Resident Disk Handler
   • File Management System
   • Disk Utility Package
   • Random Access
   • FMS Disk Utilization
   • AUTORUN.SYS file
      
10. Atari BASIC Overview
    • What is ATARI BASIC?
    • How ATARI BASIC Works
    • The Tokenizing Process
    • The Token File Structure
    • The Program Execution Process
    • System Interaction
    • Improving Program Performance
    • Advanced Programming Techniques

Appendix

1. Memory Utilization
2. Human Engineering
3. ATARI Cassette Overview
4. Television Artifacts
5. GTIA

• Glossary