In the old days, shops sold things called compendiums, large boxes that held ludo, snakes and ladders, tiddlywinks and the like under one lid.

Colin Carter's book is the modern equivalent. Its 30 programs, games for the most part, will fill many a rainy afternoon. All you need is a Dragon 32 and a steady typing finger to copy Mr. Carter's listings from the book to the system.

But ludo never pretended to teach you much, apart perhaps from stoicism. Enter The Dragon is more ambitious and it is intended to improve your grasp of computing in general and the Dragon 32 in particular.

It begins with an introduction to the machine's keyboard and a couple of tips on procedures.

The contents - program listings of various lengths - are split into sections: general, educational, gambling and so on. There are utilities of a kind in the mathematical and extended application sections, and harmless fun under action, arcade games and strategy.

Before each program, the author gives a description and a breakdown of the program's structure and variables. Some have special notes and hints.

You may never have as much fun with ludo again.