Itty Bitty Computers

Small & Fast Software

(and other stuff)

Pittman's Occasional Blog, 2010

The Marketing Stuff:

Contact me for:
*  Compilers & Interpreters (I wrote the book!)
*  Custom software
*  Embedded microprocessor code
*  Unusual applications
Stuck with legacy code in an incompatible language? 
I'm an expert in code translation

email Tom Pittman
417-777-2492 (mention "Itty Bitty Computers" when you call)
(Biographical Info)
 

What's Happening with Tom Pittman & Itty Bitty Computers

Waking up BibleTrans
An Operating System for Real People
Getting started in Bio-Informatics (example: GeneScreen)

Thinking about What Really Matters
Complete Blog Index
 

Tiny Basic (and other Oldies)

Dr.Dobb's Journal, January 2006, page 24, is an article (written by me, of course) reviewing some of the thinking that went into TinyBasic.

People keep asking me about Tiny Basic, so I started up a page to collect the information available, including some downloads from my archives. Alas, most of it is on paper tape, which I can no longer read. You might also be interested in HTML copy of "A Short Course in Programming" for the 1802 microprocessor. It's not TinyBasic, but it's basic and tiny.

About the same time as Tiny Basic, I wrote a video game for a Hong Kong manufacturer. For what I can remember of it, see Tennis. You can also find software emulators on the collector sites.
 

Non-Technical Stuff

This cartoon resonates with me. I don't remember where I first saw it, but I liked it so much I commissioned a local artist to recreate it (perfectly legal, because she never saw the original, so it's not a "copy" in the sense of copyright). Sometimes I feel like the gun vendor trying to help people win their battles; other times, like the lord of the castle, I feel too overwhelmed by my own battles to look aside at new ideas. I hope not too often. This section is about some of those other things.

The Revolving Church Door is a collection of essays originally intended to represent one side of controversial or debatable topics, for the purpose of helping people to think about the issues involved, plus a few introspective meditations that I didn't know where else to put. Unfortunately, people don't want to analyze the issues. There was no debate. Maybe taking some of these positions in a public forum contributed to my termination at SBU, but I doubt it.
 

Book Reviews

God in the Dock, a posthumus collection of C.S.Lewis essays.
Three books by Edward Tufte on the Visual Display of Quantitative Information
The Purpose Driven Life by Rick Warren, a sort of running commentary on a read-through
John Piper's Desiring God, another running commentary on a read-through
What Hath God Wrought by Wm.Grady; errors and hypocrisy overwhelm any positive insights
The Last Disciple by Hanegraaff & Brouwer, a good story, but obviously very fiction
Heaven by Randy Alcorn, good theology despite bad exegesis and tedius writing
Michael Crichton Novel Reviews, a collection of blog posts covering several novels
Cryptonomicon by Neil Stephenson, a good description of how geeks think
The Shack by William Young, a Feeler view of God, not very Biblical
The Gospel According to Job by Mike Mason, another Feeler view of God, seeing in Job affirmation in times of despair
The Gift of Fear by Gavin de Becker; every woman and public office-holder and paid guard (and their employer) should read this book
On Killing by Lt.Col.Dave Grossman; how video games and TV are responsible for the increase in violence
The Irrational Atheist by Vox Day, a well-documented refutation of atheist arguments; and The Loser Letters by Mary Eberstadt, some novel feminist arguments against atheism cast in a dubious bubblehead framework
 
 

Half of the American people are MBTI Thinkers.
The American evangelical church is controlled and operated
exclusively by and for the benefit of the other half.
What are you doing to make Thinkers welcome in the church?
If you do not understand the problem, you are part of the problem.
If you find this message offensive, you are part of the problem.
Rev. 2010 July 10