I guess this is another example of how weird I am, or at least an example of how different people learn differently. Since the kits "worked" when wired correctly, it allowed me to question/learn what was going on to make it work. I doubt I even made it through through all of the projects in the manual. Instead, it showed me it was pretty safe to just start playing/experimenting. That's what I loved about it. The main thing I learned with it is that 3.3v, 5v, 6v, 9v is not going to hurt me. I even learned that when you do send to much current through something and it broke, I could replace the damaged component with something else from Radio Shack. On my own with out having to take it to be repaired. This was huge for me. This kit properly started me down the path of a hacker/tinkerer.
As for the programming in BASIC the long chunks of DATA hex was confusing, but also made me very curious about what was hidden in that hex (even though I had no idea of the word hex). It might have bee frustrating, but it was a crucial learning step in efficient ways to debug typos.
Going down memory lane, in the back of I think Byte magazine, they would have a program's BASIC code printed out in the back (usually a game or Turkey In The Straw type of things). A friend of mine had a C64, and we would buddy program the code. As a kid, we would make all sorts of typos, and it would become mindnumbing debugging all of that hex in the DATA sections. One of us would hunt-and-peck type the code in while the other would compare the page to the screen. We were finding typos in realtime. When we got to the DATA sections, one would read the hex while the other typed. Doing this, we brought our errors down significantly. Which meant we were playing the game much faster.
As for the programming in BASIC the long chunks of DATA hex was confusing, but also made me very curious about what was hidden in that hex (even though I had no idea of the word hex). It might have bee frustrating, but it was a crucial learning step in efficient ways to debug typos.
Going down memory lane, in the back of I think Byte magazine, they would have a program's BASIC code printed out in the back (usually a game or Turkey In The Straw type of things). A friend of mine had a C64, and we would buddy program the code. As a kid, we would make all sorts of typos, and it would become mindnumbing debugging all of that hex in the DATA sections. One of us would hunt-and-peck type the code in while the other would compare the page to the screen. We were finding typos in realtime. When we got to the DATA sections, one would read the hex while the other typed. Doing this, we brought our errors down significantly. Which meant we were playing the game much faster.