Memory: 16K
Price: £6.95

Spectrum Information Handling Routines is a collection of 30 programs used in the book Information Handling for the ZX Spectrum, published by McGraw Hill. The book is a good introduction, containing many ideas and explanations. It covers basic programming, loops, branching, strings and Boolean algebra in detail. Then it moves to simple data file handling, and various methods of collecting, checking and organising the data.

A few of the programs use short machine code routines. They are held in the program as DATA statements and POKEd into memory as required. In one program it is put into a REM statement, with no warning as to what could happen with a microdrive attached.

It seems excessive to charge £6.95 for a tape which can be used only with a book when that book already contains the listings. The only reason to buy the tape can be laziness on the part of the purchaser. In the first half of the tape, for example, the programs probably do not average more than 20 lines apiece, and one has only eight.