I hope that wasn't too confusing.   
      
   For a text editor you don't want a Word Processor because it will mess up the   
   formatting of your code and save by default in a non-text format.   
      
   If you use Notepad or Wordpad you can save in text only format but if you name   
   it as hello.pas it might save it as hello.pas.txt and then you have to rename   
   it to hello.pas or run the compiler on hello.pas.txt instead.   
      
   You might not want to save source code and binary files in the same directory   
   as the compiler, I only did that to make it easier to get it to compile.   
   Compiling with using long path names can be a big pain. It might be easier to   
   add the compiler into the path in autoexec.bat so you can run it without the   
   long path name. It requires some knowledge of the OS.   
      
   Yeah I know Windows is not DOS, but it runs command line programs and still   
   uses DOS commands like "dir", "copy", "del", "ren", and uses the autoexec.bat   
   file. That the 64 bit version did away with the 16 bit sub system. But Free   
   Pascal compiles into 32 bit or 64 bit executables. While there is no GUI, it   
   is still text based like a terminal program or BBS.   
      
   I know we are starting out just compiling text files and printing to the   
   console screen, but we have to start somewhere. I figured the basics was just   
   do a hello world program and then get into variables and then loops and   
   whatnot.   
      
   Free Pascal is good not just because it is free, but because it is cross   
   platform. If we write a Free Pascal program for Windows, it can be compiled   
   under Mac OS X, Linux, OS/2, etc. I figure it is good for BBS Games to be   
   written cross platform. But it is not a RAD language like Delphi, and it does   
   not have an IDE like Visual Studio, but it is free and open sourced. I am sure   
   later we can find some libraries to do graphics and make easier to use   
   programs. I am sure there are IDEs out there and the Lazarus add on to make   
   easier to use programs. But I want to start out at ground zero and work our   
   way up one step at a time.   
      
   If you get stuck, don't give up, post your source code here and let me look at   
   it. The FPC gives error messages so I'd need that as well. Usually the first   
   number is the row and the second number is the column in the text file where   
   the problem happened. I'll try to get into debugging some how and show you how   
   to fix typos and other things later.   
      
   --- BBBS/Li6 v4.10 Dada-1   
    * Origin: Prism bbs (1:261/38)