Revisions: 08/24/01--minor changes; 10/07/02--replaced tty art; 08/17/06--format changes

CHAPTER 5 — Beginning Graphics

Up until now, our programs did output by printing characters to the monitor. Programs can also output graphics to the monitor. This chapter discusses ways to draw simple pictures on the monitor screen.

Chapter Topics:

Different computers have different graphics hardware. Electronic signals must be sent to this hardware to start it going before your program can do graphics. The QBasic statement that starts up graphics is:

SCREEN 12

This SCREEN statement says we want to use graphics in "mode 12." There are about 13 modes. Most modes are for older computers and are of no interest to us.

QUESTION 1:

Do you think that your computer has graphics hardware?