Today I’d like to talk about a website which I feel extremely interesting for those who develop on the QL: KNOWARE (www.knoware.no).

Knoware exists since over 15 years and offers free software, games, utilities, documents, stories and ideas for everyone wishing to develop on our little black friend.

Now let’s talk about the person who manages Knoware: it’s Per J. Witte, a well-known norwegian QL developer.

Per developed much interesting and great quality software, among them Qwirc, a .WIN disk manager, and D-Miner – the best minefield game developed for the QL. Also, he contributed in developing the SMSQE operating system.

The site has a nice “retro” look, and it’s divided into several sections.

The games section is mostly dedicated to the user who likes to play and have some fun. Into this section you will find several games, two of which I’d like to highlight:

the first is the already noted D-Miner, which has really nice graphics and sports many options. The second is also the last one appeared: Qombi, a card game on which I personally spent several evenings. .

The program section lists many good programs, starting from sprite visualization to printer handling.

But the real heart of the site is the programmer utility section,

where you will find an authentic treasure.

You will be able to discover several SuperBASIC extensions, with excellent documentation.

A developer will have a real good time browsing the site discovering dozens of utilities.

The site contains also many demos and sources, aiming to guide the developer in using those extensions.

Last, you can find an article section, containing many stories from magazines.

If you think this is the classic website to search for a specific program, you’re wrong.

Knoware is like a good book; you’ll have to read and re-read it.

You know that, the first time you browse a site, you search for what you need and find not interesting the other pages of the site. This is the opposite with Knoware: the best approach is to look, read, discover and let it inspire you in creating something, thanks to the ideas you’ll find in.

The true aim of the site is not letting you have already made programs (but yes, there are) but utilities, instruments, and – most important – knowledge.

The name itself of the site (knoware) is a word play for Nowhere, To know and softWare.