knowledge that I have   
   gained over the time and see where the problems lie in the program's   
   construction and what can be done to fix it, if anything at all.  This   
   article will focus on the companion program to "Check It Out" called "Check   
   Mate."   
      
   "Check Mate" was written under the influence of egomania as I had signed   
   the contract with RUN Magazine over "Check It Out." Back in 1992 (when   
   "Check It Out" made it's debut), I had this outrageous idea that I could   
   sit on my backside, in my underwear, and program on the Commodore all day   
   and never have to see the inside of a factory or workplace ever again.  My   
   soon to be ex-wife just had our second son and I was thinking (at the time)   
   that it would be great to sit at home, in the aforementioned attire, and be   
   Mr.  Mom and Mr.  Commodore Programmer, and she could go out and do woman   
   things and never have to worry about money again.  Whenever she would see   
   me pounding on the Commodore she knew I was in the process of making money   
   so we could eat, pay bills, and she could hang with her girlfriends during   
   the day and we could, well, you know, at night.  Little did I know that   
   such a glamorous plan would change in the blink of an eye, or in this case,   
   the flip of the calendar page.   
      
   It took me about one month to code "Check Mate" before I saw the first   
   problem there would be with the program, and the problem wasn't with the   
   program itself, but with its intended destination, which was to help with   
   inputs to "Check It Out." As I looked over the work, I realized that I   
   needed to make major improvements to "Check It Out" so what was written and   
   saved to disk by "Check Mate" would cooperate with the code written in   
   "Check It Out." Now how in blazes was I going to do this when "Check It   
   Out" just went to press?  This required a phone call to the offices of RUN   
   Magazine in Arizona and speak to the HMIC (Head Man In Charge).  Since I   
   had the phone number close at hand, I quickly made the call.  The phone   
   rang and rang, but no answer came.  I figured that everyone was out to   
   lunch, at the same time.  Yeah.  That's it.  I tried again several hours   
   later, close to 5:00 pm Arizona time.  Again the phone rang and rang, but   
   no answer.  Did they leave early on this day?  To make a long story short I   
   later found out that RUN Magazine had published its last issue and was no   
   longer in business.  "Check It Out" was placed in the very last issue of   
   the magazine.  Fine.  I just got hosed by a bunch of Arizonians who gave   
   not one indication of closing up shop.  All my plans of being an at home   
   Commodore programmer went up in smoke and down the drain all at the same   
   time.  I guess I'll have to get out the Sunday paper and peruse the Want   
   Ads in search of that dreaded thing we Americans call, "a job."   
      
   Oh snap!  What was I going to do with contacting anyone and letting them   
   know that "Check It Out" was in need of revamping?  I still sat on the   
   original program, but I signed all the rights over to RUN in lieu of   
   publication.  If I allow anyone else, including myself, to release a   
   re-manufactured copy of "Check It Out" I would be in violation of United   
   States Copyright laws.  This little thing of copyright laws also affected   
   "Check Mate" since "Check Mate" uses part of the coding for "Check It Out."   
   to make "Check Mate" work.  This was a real mess legally, but privately   
   there was no problem.  I could continue to make changes to "Check It Out"   
   and develop "Check Mate" in the privacy of my own home, but when the work   
   was done, what then?  The legal blockade was still in place and would be in   
   place for the next seventy five years after 1992, which would make it 2067.   
   I would either be very dead at 103 or, if I live that long, I will be   
   defecating and urinating on myself in some nursing home with no memory of   
   who I am.  What was I going to do?   
      
   At the time, I told myself I wasn't going to worry about it.  Seventy five   
   years will give me more than enough time to work out all the problems with   
   both programs, and hopefully I'll have time to spare to wrestle with this   
   legal snafu.  For now, let's make "Check It Out" and "Check Mate" the best   
   BASIC programs written by a custodian that ever hit the Commodore universe.   
   The first thing I had to look at was the set up of "Check Mate" itself.   
      
   When "Check Mate" was written I completely had in mind for it to be   
   published by RUN magazine, so I kept the program within the parameters   
   specified by that magazine.  Their biggest concern was to make sure the   
   programs published by the magazine were no more than twenty six blocks in   
   length, which meant I had to do a lot of crunching in BASIC before I could   
   send it.  Also, the program lacked any sort of panache that would set it   
   apart from other programs that it would share in the same pages.  You don't   
   mind selling the program to the publisher (or software developer) as long   
   as you can see Joe Shmoe in the mall food court using your creation on his   
   SX64.  Because of the limitations, "Check Mate" lacked such fortitude.  It   
   was a plain, generic, database style program that would cooperate with   
   "Check It Out."   
      
   As I sit back and look at this work over twenty years after I put the code   
   into the Commodore 64, I realize that the whole program cannot stand alone;   
   it must have "Check It Out" to work with, and, as I said before, "Check It   
   Out" needed to be modified to accept the data created by "Check Mate" in   
   order to work.  The good thing about waiting all these years to open the   
   program up again is that I have a carte blanche situation now, meaning I   
   can do whatever I want to do to it without worries of breaking some   
   publication's guidelines.  The only person I have to impress right now is   
   the man I see in the mirror every day at shaving time.  Once it meets my   
   specifications, I can release it to a select few for beta testing and ask   
   them what I can do to improve the work.  The one thing I like about   
   programming is that nothing is ever set in concrete.  A programmer can keep   
   changing and modifying his creation, expanding it to its fullest potential,   
   until the work has reached the pinnacle of perfection.  The sad thing about   
   programming is that, even when you think you've reached this pinnacle, some   
   greasy haired, glasses-wearing programming guru will take your work and   
   expand it even more to cover areas that the original programmer never   
   thought about.  Such is the nature of the beast.   
      
   I'm not saying to anyone reading this that "Check Mate" is a piece of   
   coding trash that should be erased from every Commodore disk still in   
   existence; I'm saying that with a little love and thinking this program   
   could make itself out to be a better work.  I would like to add more colour   
   to the image of the opening screen and get more into detail on what options   
   there are in the program and add some more options, if that will make it a   
   better program.  What I have to remember as I look at the code or run the   
   program is that this program was never meant to be alone like "Check It   
   Out," it is a helper to the same and will always be that way.   
      
   All in all, most of the work on "Check Mate" needs to be cosmetic and very   
   little on structure and function.  If anyone has seen (or perhaps owns a   
   copy of) my program "Obligator Coordinator" then they will know the extent   
   to which I want to take "Check Mate" in the way of cosmetics.  I want more   
   colour and a few more functions to make the program a little more   
   practical.  I piggy-backed both "Check It Out" and "Check Mate" to load   
   back and forth between each other.  One thing I have to do when I go back   
   in is to make sure all of the data strings are cleared out before another   
   piece of information is inputted and clean up after the program has been   
   used is thorough and complete.   
      
   When it comes to writing, be it coding or story telling, I hate the part of   
   the job called the "editing mode." I want everything to flow and the piece   
   to make an impression when either read or used the first time without any   
   changes.  This is fine for stories but try tha   
      
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