
Creative Computing Magazine - yitchelle
https://archive.org/details/creativecomputing&tab=collection
======
JoeDaDude
Like Creative Computing, I remember the pleasure I got from Algorithm
Magazine, which included pseudocode for fractals, neural nets, cellular
automata, and all those things that attracted me to computers. Algorithm
Magazine was put out by noted computer scientist and author Alexander Dewdney
([http://www.csd.uwo.ca/faculty/akd/akd.html](http://www.csd.uwo.ca/faculty/akd/akd.html)).

I would gladly scan the few hardcopies I still have (not a complete set
though) if someone else would host them.

~~~
amenghra
Put them on github or dropbox?

~~~
9erdelta
Putting them on github would be really cool.

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itgoon
This is what got me into computers at age 9. There were comics, and I didn't
understand them. So I started reading the articles.

The articles didn't have anything to do with the comics, but I was fascinated,
and ended up buying a ZX-81, then a Commodore 64, and...well, I'm still doing
it.

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johnhattan
Here's the instructions if you want to do a batch download to your favorite
offline e-whatever.

[https://blog.archive.org/2012/04/26/downloading-in-bulk-
usin...](https://blog.archive.org/2012/04/26/downloading-in-bulk-using-wget/)

~~~
greglindahl
Our new command-line tool makes that even easier:

[https://github.com/jjjake/internetarchive](https://github.com/jjjake/internetarchive)

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WalterBright
I loved that magazine. The first years of it had a charming quality to them
I've never seen anywhere else. The early issues are treasures.

The later ones got more conventional.

~~~
tomcam
Very well put. The issues in that first year made those of us who weren't
programmers feel like we could be. It was thanks to them and COMPUTE! that I
actually did become one, and eventually a consumer of Walter Bright products!

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ryandrake
Nice blast from the past. My intro to programming was as a 9 or 10 year old
manually typing most of the samples from Creative Computing's _BASIC Computer
Games_ [1] into a Commodore 64 and actually getting them to work. The best one
was this one [2], 2.5 pages of densely packed no-whitespace all-caps BASIC. No
OCR!

1:
[http://www.atariarchives.org/basicgames/index.php](http://www.atariarchives.org/basicgames/index.php)

2:
[http://www.atariarchives.org/basicgames/showpage.php?page=15...](http://www.atariarchives.org/basicgames/showpage.php?page=157)

------
Pamar
Oh Wow!

They have Byte, too... [https://archive.org/details/byte-magazine-
rescans](https://archive.org/details/byte-magazine-rescans)

~~~
yitchelle
Jason Scott has been really busy in recent times. Just saw on twitter of him
announcing Joe Decuir's Engineering Notebook during his Atari days from 1977.

[https://archive.org/details/JoeDecuirEngineeringNotebook1977](https://archive.org/details/JoeDecuirEngineeringNotebook1977)

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dnewton99
I just found about 50 issues of Creative Computing in my Dad's old stuff. Any
thoughts on who might want them?

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andreygrehov
Text version of the magazine:
[http://www.atarimagazines.com/creative/index/](http://www.atarimagazines.com/creative/index/)

~~~
yitchelle
Thanks, but there is nothing like seeing it in "print" to bring back the
memories.

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walshemj
Takes me back seeing adverts for s100 cromenco and USCD Pascal - I once had to
stay late to call Microsofts help desk with a tricky USCD Pascal query (that
was when they where in new mexico I think)

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sitkack
I found an copy of The Best of Creative Computing Vol 2
[http://www.atariarchives.org/bcc2/](http://www.atariarchives.org/bcc2/) at a
thrift store years ago and was immediately hooked. It reminded me of all the
neat hobby projects that would come across fidonet when I was a kid. Now
everything is an acqui-hire or flip, the ratio of exploration and art in
coding projects has definitely dropped.

~~~
DonHopkins
I love the cover by Gilbert Shelton, with Fat Freddy's Cat fleeing in front of
the the pick-up truck!

[http://www.atariarchives.org/bcc2/showpage.php?page=cover](http://www.atariarchives.org/bcc2/showpage.php?page=cover)

------
jejones3141
Oy, I wish I'd kept a listing of the Algol W snowflake curve program I wrote
up for Creative Computing and that they published in the Nov-Dec 1978 issue.
The printout combined with the scan makes it hard to read. Ah, well; I did it
to myself.

~~~
Lord_Nightmare
It looks reasonably readable to me if zoomed in. It should be possible to
retype from the scan, if someone wanted to.

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state
This is fantastic. I wonder what the contemporary equivalent is.

~~~
sharmi
I would like to know what the modern equivalent of this is too. Obviously
blogs are there. But it is not for me but my kid. Something that can pique his
interest.

~~~
matt_o
I too would like to know of a modern equivalent.

Magazines are able to deliver something that blogs often can't - like pieces
of work that have been refined, and then refined again by an editor. Or
diverse topics that still fall within a certain discipline.

This is an itch that blogs can't seem to scratch for me.

~~~
fit2rule
Tried the PICO8 fanzine?

[http://pico8fanzine.bigcartel.com](http://pico8fanzine.bigcartel.com)

Its tailored for PICO8, which is a 'fantasy console' in the same light as 80's
8-bit machines, but still .. its one of those 'zines that really takes you
back once you get through an issue or two ..

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contingencies
Haha! "Several years ago it was all the rage to forecast when each computer
maker was going to graduate from an 8-bit cpu to a 16-bit cpu. However, it
turned out that consumers didn't need 16-bits and computer makers were really
quite content to stay with 8-bit machines".

[https://ia601604.us.archive.org/3/items/creativecomputing-19...](https://ia601604.us.archive.org/3/items/creativecomputing-1982-04-a/Creative_Computing_v08_n04_1982_April.pdf)

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PaulHoule
This is great!

One problem with Creative Computing is that most libraries seemed to think it
was ephemeral and they got rid of their holdings in the early 1990s, so it has
been really hard to find. Even my mom thought it was ephemeral and she threw
out most of my collection.

~~~
johansch
That's the thing I don't really get about libraries. They are incredibly
deletionist.

My pet theory: the librarians feel they have power that way, by "curating" the
collection that will presented to the peasants.

~~~
ovt
I don't like deletion very much either in general, although I've seen
librarians defend themselves with 1. that they totally don't have room for
stuff 2. for kids' stuff, at least, if it's science, our knowledge has grown
so much that it's a disservice for them to read the old book without context.
Or if it's fiction, it can be full of social norms and beliefs that we've
grown beyond, where...we'd also want them to have context if they were going
to read it.

But it sucks when you hear how they often don't have a good sense of the value
(intellectual or otherwise) of what they cull. And it sucks if everyone makes
the same judgment and all throw away our ephemera that we wish to look back,
evoke memories, reveal something of our time.

~~~
johansch
Most libraries (in Europe, at least) tend to have an incredibly low density of
books. I think the image of a good-looking library is more important to them
than to actually have more books on the shelves.

E.g. something like this (the main public library in Linköping, Sweden):

[https://cdn3.cdnme.se/cdn/7-2/1081760/images/2012/dsc_0337_1...](https://cdn3.cdnme.se/cdn/7-2/1081760/images/2012/dsc_0337_189053713.jpg)

rather than something like

[http://f.tqn.com/y/seattle/1/W/V/F/-/-/IMG_8459.JPG](http://f.tqn.com/y/seattle/1/W/V/F/-/-/IMG_8459.JPG)

~~~
WalterBright
Kenmore's public library has a low density of books as well - wide aisles, low
shelves. I suspect it is partly due to wanting to be accessible to people in
wheelchairs. But few books kinda defeats the purpose of having a library.

Half-Price Books in Bellevue is more my speed. It's completely packed with
books. I could putter away hours in there.

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avifreedman
Awesome!

This was my goto magazine :)

Much more code per issue than Byte, and easily modifiable games, which were
great for learning.

Thanks to the Archive for scanning! If there are any issues missing, I may
have them and be able to help contribute.

------
JustSomeNobody
I used to love all these old magazines. Learned so much from Creative
Computing, RUN, Compute (and compute's gazzette), Dr Dobbs (when it was a real
magazine), etc.

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rwallace
Ah, this is one I missed back in the day! It looks interesting, but viewing
the PDFs in Foxit, the pages are all black text on dark gray background. Is
anyone else getting that? Any known fix? For reference, Byte scans from
archive.org display correctly on my system.

~~~
teddyh
Works for me in MuPDF.

Get an alternate PDF reader here:
[https://pdfreaders.org/](https://pdfreaders.org/)

~~~
rwallace
Ah, tried MuPDF just now and it's still coming out dark gray, but at least now
I know it's not a problem with Foxit. Thanks.

