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Comment by mbertschler | Hacker News Reader

What is the most capable programmable device, that would not be considered a computer by the rules? How about a graphical calculator like a TI-83?

While I was stuck in school and did not have access to a computer, I wanted to challenge myself during classes. The most interesting distraction by far was to play around with the programming functions of my TI-82 calculator that was required for math classes. Even with almost no idea about programming I could soon do interesting things with it, because it is programmed using a version of BASIC. In the end I even created a clone of snake. It worked, but moving one block ahead would take 2 seconds.

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A graphical calculator is an excellent idea if it is allowed by the rules!

I also did programming with my TI calculators back in school.

I don't get why people continue to recommend TI-83s. I showed up to Algebra II with an 85, but 83s were weirdly prevalent until calculus "strongly recommended" TI-89s.

In this context, the 83 is an awful, awful choice, because TI-83 programs only allow for variable names to be one character long. I was lucky, when someone asked me to copy my TI-85 blackjack program into their TI-83, that I had used less than 28 variables.

True, though you could also create lists freely. I remember writing an artillery game (using the equations learned in our physics class!) and storing the player information in a list each.

I've never used a TI-85 or 86. From what I remember, we were told that an 83 or 89 had some particular feature that the 86 lacked (apparently some statistics functions, or something?) People are more likely to recommend based on what they know, and with school recommendations being what they've been, more people know the 83/84. I was envious of my friend's 89, but my parents wouldn't pay the higher cost.

> People are more likely to recommend based on what they know

True, but very sad. I am given to understand, from an HN thread months ago, that the state of the art in school graphing calculators now is the HP Prime. But that never even gets mentioned in recommendations, because no one's ever heard of it. (And there's very little incentive to learn what to recommend, because the only value of a graphing calculator is that it's permitted on standardized tests -- the HP Prime is $165; the HP Prime software for your Android phone is $10.)

> I was envious of my friend's 89, but my parents wouldn't pay the higher cost.

Also sad. I read the manual for my TI-85 cover to cover; it taught me about polar coordinates and euclidean vectors before my school covered them. For a child interested in math, these calculators can be wonderful.

The 85 was okay, but the 89 was much harder to program without the aid of the computer-based IDE.

Hint: if you use more than 28 variables, you can still put some in matrices. (Naming is still awful, though).

The first programs I wrote were written in TI-82 basic language. It's possible to create simple interactive text prompt UI and even Gameboy-like GUI programs. Since the TI-82 memory didn't survive battery replacement, I'd "save" programs by transcribing them on to paper. Since memory was limited, it became a fun challenge to find concise ways to write programs.

> In the end I even created a clone of snake. It worked, but moving one block ahead would take 2 seconds.

Nice! I ended up creating a Minesweeper clone. I remember the program being really long, and really annoying to write without having access to actual recursion.

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