Craig Miller
Creative TI Entrepreneur
Craig Miller brought the TI community a huge volume of high
quality products: software, hardware and publications. In 1982 Craig Miller
started his commercial activities for the TI-99/4A and founded, together
with his wife Susan, the firm Millers Graphics. That name was later changed
to MG. The company was based in San Dimas, California.
Only some of the company's products were from his own hands, but he was far
more than just a vendor of somebody else’s software and books. If you
look at the manuals of the software he sold, you can see his contribution
clearly. Craig Miller was a publisher, a writer, a programmer and first of
all an entrepreneur. The products of his firm Millers Graphics make him indeed
a prominent TI99er.
PUBLICATIONS
- in 1984 Craig Miller published the first issue of The Smart Programmer newsletter.
- In March 1986 he sold the rights of this newsletter to Richard Mitchell, publisher of Super 99 Monthly.
The merged version of the two journals, also called The Smart Programmer, was published till 1988.
Craig also published a number of TI-99/4A related books. Some titles are:
- Fundamentals of Microcomputer Design
- Getting On-Line
- Illustrated Multiplan Dictionary
- The 9900 Microprocessor
- Agriculture Computer Programming
- The MG books Smart Programming Guide for Sprites and Night Mission (with
cassette), written by Craig Miller, helped many Exbas game programmers to control sprites and to use other Exbas functions.
- The book The Orphan Chronicles by Dr. Ron Albright was also published by MG and gave a clear report of the rise and fall of the home computer division of Texas Instruments.
GAMES
In 1982 Craig Miller wrote several Games in Exbas and Assembler for the TI-99/4A
and marketed these through his firm Millers Graphics. The most important were:
Battle Over Titan, Blackbeard's Treasure, Casino Blackjack, The Crazy Fun House
and The Pharaoh's Tomb. Later he wrote Alphabet Soup.
UTILITY SOFTWARE
Craig Miller published and marketed three important utility programs for the
TI-99/4A:
- Advanced Diagnostics(written by Steve Mildon)
- Explorer (written by Doug Warren)
- DisKassembler (written by Tom Freeman)
HARDWARE
- In 1985 Millers Graphics brought the GRAM Kracker on the market.
The design was a cooperative effort between Doug Warren and Craig Miller.
It is a device
which plugs into the cartridge port allowing you to save and load cartridges
to the device or the floppy drive. Early 1987 Craig Miller ceased
production of the GRAM Kracker, due to inability to deliver it on time.
- In 1987 Craig designed the Bridge Box, produced and marketed by Triton Products.
With this device you can use your TI-99/4A keyboard with an IBM Turbo XT clone.
The Bridge Box was not a commercial success.
- Craig Millar programmed the software for an EPROM to update the Corcomp 9900
disk controller to 80 tracks.
- Craig also created the Super Extended Basic cartridge, with contributions
by Doug Warren, Danny Michael, Mike Dodd and Mark Shillingburg. The module
was released by Triton Products.
At the end of 1987 Craig left the TI community unexpectedly. One of
his main reasons for quitting the TI99/4A market, was the appearance
of certain 'track
copiers' in the TI99/4A world, that could by-pass his disk protection
system for his company's software. Currently the whereabouts of Craig
Miller is not
known.
Biography prepared by Berry Harmsen based on information from Bill Gaskill’s TI Timeline
Inducted into the TI99ers Hall of Fame on June 8, 2008
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