test-drb

test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

101090 discussions

by dgriffi＠cs.csubak.edu

Does anyone here collect HP calculators? -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail?

14 years, 2 months

Movie of ETH Lilith Comdex demo

by jdr_use＠bluewin.ch

I put op a movie of the demo that Diser displayed at Comdex to advertise the Lilith. It give a decent display of its capabilities. Too bad I don't know which year's Comdex it was.... Find the movie LilithComdexDemo.mpg at ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ Its a 30MB download, 5 min long, and created with my Lilith emulator. A complete and compilable Medos V4.2 should be available in a few weeks time. Enjoy, Jos

14 years, 2 months

Apple II convention "KansasFest" opens for registration

by pr＠kansasfest.org

KANSAS CITY, MO -- March 7, 2012 -- KansasFest, the 23rd annual convention dedicated to the Apple II computer, is now open for registration. Users, programmers, hobbyists, and retrocomputing enthusiasts are invited to Rockhurst University in Kansas City, Missouri, from Tuesday, July 17, through Sunday, July 22, for six days and five nights of sessions, demos, announcements, contests, and camaraderie. The week kicks off with a keynote speech John Romero, co-founder of id Software and creator of Wolfenstein 3D, Dangerous Dave, and nearly a hundred other popular computer and video games. Romero will be available immediately afterward for a Q&A and autograph session. The week then offers a variety of presentations and workshops, including but not limited to: * The history of AppleWorks, presented by Randy Brandt * Andy Molloy looks at the best of the Apple II demo scene * Apple II Road Show -- Tony Diaz shows you how to tell authentic hardware from a fake * Build your own Apple II WordPress site with Ken Gagne * Learn to program interactive fiction in Inform 7 with Carrington Vanston * A Kickstarter brainstorming session * HackFest, an annual programming challenge open to coders of all skill levels * A vendor fair and exhibit hall for attendees and the general public to show off, play with, and buy and sell new or unusual hardware and software Attendees are encouraged to share their knowledge by presenting their own hardware and software sessions, especially of the Apple II but including Macintosh, Windows, Linux, iOS, and others. All KansasFest sessions are presented by the attendees, who are known for unscheduled events and debuts, too. Whether it's a behind-the-scenes look at new software, preorder opportunities for new hardware, a live-action text adventure, a podcast recording session, GShisen and Dueltris tournaments, or an athletic round of Bite the Bag, there are experiences to be had and memories made at KansasFest that aren't possible except in the company of surprising, brilliant, diehard Apple II fans. Register before June 1 to guarantee a price of $375 for a double room or $445 for a single, which includes admission to all sessions as well as most meals. Official KansasFest shirts are extra and optional and must be ordered by May 31; registration for staying on-site closes July 8. Veterans of the event are invited to bring a first-time attendee; if each indicates the other's name on the registration form, both will receive a $25 referral rebate at the event. To register, please visit the official Web site at http://www.kansasfest.org/ KansasFest sponsor 16 Sector invites any and all Apple II users, fans, and friends to attend the world's only annual Apple II conference. For photos, videos, schedules, and presentations from past year's events, to sign up for the email list and for inquiries, please visit the event's Web site. CONTACT: Email: http://www.kansasfest.org/contact/ Register: http://www.kansasfest.org/register/ Twitter: http://twitter.com/kansasfest Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/events/382225585123061/

14 years, 2 months

Discferret Broken?

by jgevaryahu＠gmail.com

Christian Bartsch | Kryoflux LTD. (cb at kryoflux.com) wrote on Tue Mar 6 02:30:32 CST 2012: Hi Tony, ... >/ 2) Is there any truth to the comments about a 'conflict of interests' if />/ somebody wants to devleop both for your device and the Diskferret? / Suggestions like that (the original statement, not your question here) would you get thrown out of my house for sure. Why would any large, big, mighty institution be hindered by us to look at a competitive product? Why would they let us hinder them? If they could get something better that would be completely free, why would they want to take the solution that needs to be paid for? How could I stop them from using publically available sources? Christian, if there's no anti-compete clause in the license, then please explain what exactly clauses 3.a.v and particularly 3.a.vi do. Also, for third party/open-source IPF stuff (other than the potential for GPL software to be used commercially, already expressly forbidden by 3.a.v), clauses 3.d.i and 3.d.ii would also seem to expressly forbid it? 3.d.ii seems to imply that it violates the license to even convert an IPF to other formats, which makes IPF images entirely useless as a general preservation format because of the legal minefield they're stuck in. This is one of the most deceptive licenses I've ever read; the top preamble implies it gives the user great freedom but instead it almost totally locks everything they've done and can do down to "a SPS product defined by SPS". I'm going to stay far, far away from any products Kryoflux LTD./SPS puts out unless you seriously rethink your licensing, since by contributing to the Discferret project I'm apparently already in violation of it. No wonder none of the organizations you sold your CTA analyzer to want anything to do with Phil's product, the license expressly forbids them >from even considering it. For reference: 2. LICENCE. I. LICENCE for IPF SUPPORT LIBRARY SPS hereby grants you (each licensee is addressed as "you") a non-exclusive, non-transferable licence to use the Technology, on the following terms and only for private, non-profit purposes (see Section 3 below). You may: ... c. inspect ("understand") the source code (if provided); and ... 3.LIMITATIONS ON LICENCE.The licence grantedin Section 2 is subject to the followingrestrictions: a.The Technology is to be used onlyfor non-profit purposesunless you obtain prior written consent fromSPS.Prohibited for-profit and commercial purposesinclude, but arenot limitedto: ... (v) Using the Technology to develop a similar application on any platform for commercial distribution, except to the extent this restriction is prohibited by applicable law; or (vi) Using the Technology in any manner that is generally competitive with a SPS product as defined by SPS, except to the extent this restriction is prohibited by applicable law. ... d. You may not modify, combine commercial applications with the Technology. You may not prepare derivative works of the Technology, except to the extent this restriction is prohibited by applicable law. Derivative works are defined as but not limited to: (i) Alternative support libraries. We are open to porting to other platforms, and so third parties doing such is unnecessary and violates the terms of this licence. If you want to port the library, please contact us. We will host it on our site and ensure that only the latest version is being distributed. (ii) Alternative tools that operate on files of the format as defined by the Technology. This includes but is not limited to: mastering tools(tools that enable Content to be written back to physical media like a floppy disk). Reproducing Content provided through or by the Technology to any other kind of media, such as alternative content provider technology(this also covers any kind of converter with the intention of extracting the Content to held by any other alternate media format that represents the same independently working Content). Additions, removals or other modification of data contained by the images. ... To anyone who wants to read further, the license text can be seen in full as "LICENCE.txt" in the "Download the latest software" archives at http://www.kryoflux.com/ -- Jonathan Gevaryahu AKA Lord Nightmare jgevaryahu at gmail.com jgevaryahu at hotmail.com

14 years, 2 months

PDP 11/04 w/RX01 and spares available, Cambs UK

by witchy＠binarydinosaurs.co.uk

Folks, I know a few people who'll be interested in this, given my recent need to find a new home (again) for me and my collection I need to shift more DEC stuff, in this case a PDP 11/04 with boxes of spare core etc and a complete RX01 floppy drive. The machine's PSU is toast (and set to 110V, beware!) which is why we got it at work in the first place, but that's all that's wrong with it. Shipping isn't an option unless you've got deep pockets I guess, so collection from Cambs in the UK, postcode CB6 please. Cheers! -- Adrian/Witchy Binary Dinosaurs creator/curator Www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk - the UK's biggest private home computer collection?

14 years, 2 months

Moving DEC racks (was Re: Free DEC SA600 Rack - Illinois)

by ethan.dicks＠gmail.com

On Wed, Mar 7, 2012 at 1:23 PM, Jochen Kunz <jkunz at unixag-kl.fh-kl.de> wrote: > On Tue, 6 Mar 2012 17:59:21 -0500 > Ethan Dicks <ethan.dicks at gmail.com> wrote: > >> In the end I did succeed, but had the rack slipped (which it almost >> did do!) I would probably have severely regretted the consequences. > > Well. Remove everything that you can remove easyly so that only the > four posts, bottom and top are left over. Lay the rack on its left or > right side. Step _into_ the rack so that you look at the bottom. Pick > it up, so that the posts stay horizontal. You have to try a bit to find > the right position to grab to have the whole thing in balance. Now > walk. Surprisingly easy. I even got a rack upstairs that way. I understand the technique, and for a straight stairway, I think it would work just fine. In the 100-year-old house I was doing this in, there's a landing and a 90 degree turn to the left in the middle. The top of the rack would hit the wall while the bottom of the rack was still 3-4 stairs from the landing. Oh... and there was a stained-glass window at the landing as well (not broken by me, but later, when someone was moving a mattress, the window did not fare well). The rack had to go up the stairs nearly perfectly upright, except for the middle of the stairs, when it had to be tipped back about 10 degrees to clear the sloped ceiling. Again... I will never repeat that experience solo. I almost ended up at the bottom of the stairs under the rack. >> Is there clearance between the side of the H960 and the grey sides for >> the M6 bolt heads, or does your rack lack the hang-on metal sides? > There is plenty of space. The rivertrs aren't that small too. > > Ohhh, sorry. I just noticed that my racks are not H960. They look much > more than the aforementioned SA600 rack. That confused me. So they may > be of the H9612 / H9613 variety. Actually the H960 is welded. My > PDP-11/34A came in a H960. I had to leave the rack behind as I could > not dismount it. It didn't fit my car... :-( Gotcha. I remembered that some racks had the cluster of large pop rivets and some were welded but I wasn't sure which were which by model number. I spend more time in front of the machines than figuring out how to move the empty racks up impossible inclines or into impossibly small automobiles. A VW Microbus, BTW, can haul two H960s if you drop the rear seat and remove the middle seat - you just slide them in one at a time and load the middle area where the bench seat used to be with all the CPUs and disks you just removed from the racks. Easiest time ever. *That* works solo. Second easiest move was a VAX-11/750 in an Astro Minivan with no middle seats. The only hitch was the swivel chair mounts were taller than the casters, so the bottom of the VAX hung up on insertion and removal. Even so, it was still possible (and safe) solo. An 11/750 is mostly air and not as heavy as some things of similar size (like tape drives). -ethan

14 years, 2 months

Discferret broken?

by cb＠kryoflux.com

Hi Brian, > * I do cost reduce solutions. However, I feel designs should "do no > harm". In other words, the cost reduction might create units that > do not function, but they should never adversely affect the target > vintage equipment. I can assure you that our choice of parts does not harm anything. Unless you actively want to damage the unit (try hot plugging the drive; I still do this all the time), I don't see an issue here. Ask ten architects about how to build a house and I am sure you will get varying results. I would really like to avoid the impression something is broken. It's not, it's working. > * As a fellow enthusiast, I share David's concern over the closed and > guarded nature of the KryoFlux Analyzer. I don't buy the arguments > in the FAQ. I see no issue with letting anyone creating IPFs, as I > feel the community will self select the people who do it well. As > well, it's been my experience that there are lots of very > intelligent people in this community, and one delude themselves > thinking a "complex" solution is not useful to others without > extensive training/education. We have two separate products for this, one is KryoFlux with DTC (the disk tool console) that will completely satisfy many private users. The other is our Analyser that will aid a preservationist to verify authenticity and integrity of data ingested. This is aimed at institutions. We might change that in the future due to many requests, however, we still have to figure out to make sure it's understood as an IDE and that you need to understand how disk coding works, otherwise it's useless. Someone not familiar with C++ also won't have much fun with an IDE for that. If you would have to handle all the feedback and questions, you might see this in a different light. It helps discouraging those that have no serious interest, users that really want it usually just contact us and we arrange for something. As a side note: Everyone is free to come up with their own format or do their own Analyser, no one is forced buying into our solution. > * I disagree with Christian's "audit" response. I don't think the OP > was lamenting the fact that he/she could not audit the source, but > that a closed source product can never be truly "audited", as the > author can always doctor the version provided for audit. And, even > if I am wrong and it can, it creates a perception problem. I can't argue against that. However, it would require criminal energy to pimp or change a version meant for audit. And I don't see why we'd break something in the official version that would only work in the audit version. > * The legal concerns about "conflict of interest" do concern me. > There are precious few people in this area of expertise, I think > it's the responsibility of hardware and software vendors to ensure > such a product or offering does not fragment the group. Christian's > response did not clear things up. I don't understand how " > > What I find interesting is that several of my UK, European and Japanese > contacts (at various computer museums in those countries) were scared > off of working with the DiscFerret. Nearly every one of them cited the > same reason: "conflicts of interest" between assisting with DiscFerret > and using commercial versions of the Kryoflux analysis software (which I > suspect would be CTA or a variant thereof). > > " would get one "thrown out of the 'house'". While it's an unsavory > topic, it's one that demands some type of response. If someone said > that to me, I believe I would send a note to the individual and > request he/she forward it on, assuring them that they can work on > both projects without fear of litigation. There's nothing to clear up, and it does not demand a response. I am not aware of any issues, except what I heard via a mailing list from a competitive developer. To me this is not a trusted source of information. I am in contact with our customers directly. As I said in another reply: There is no NDA involved, no contract, nothing. If someone is scared working with a competitive product that maybe has to do with the quality of the product or the demeanour of the person representing it. If I was to damage a project's reputation in public, such created scenario would for sure fit pretty well. > * I agree that you're paying someone not to develop a solution, but to > *NOT* do something else. I'm a good example. I give up weeknights > and weekends to develop products because I get paid to do so. I > could enjoy another hobby if I was so inclined. That's very well worded and hits the nail on the head. It happens that our "hobby", preserving software, is very costly because it's hard to find a game (or application) in good shape for a decent price these days.

14 years, 2 months

In defense of wire-wrap; was: Cosmac Elf on breadboard

by technobug＠comcast.net

On 6 Mar 2012 at 20:15, David Riley wrote: > I should also point out that all of the original Macintosh > prototypes were wire-wrapped, which should probably indicate that it's > a pretty sound methodology for assembling microcomputers. It worked > well enough in '83, anyway. In the latter half of the '70s, I ran a Modcomp II that was mounted in a trailer. The computer, with the exception of the power supplies, was entirely wire-wrapped. During the 10k miles that we put on the beast, the only failures were the capacitors in the power supplies coming unscrewed and a bad lot of 74S172s. That computer was the easiest machine I have ever worked on to maintain. -> CRC

14 years, 2 months

John Many Jars <john@yoyodyne-propulsion.net>

by bqt＠softjar.se

On 2012-03-06 12.45, cctalk-request at classiccmp.org wrote: On Tue, Mar 6, 2012 at 7:36 PM, David Griffith <dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu> wrote: >> > I know they had at least Zork I. ?I sold a command summary card for it a >> > while ago. ?I probably shouldn't have done that. > I have an image of a PDP 11 RSTS/E with Dungeon (zork 1 -3) installed. > > It's also available to play online... on a "real" emulated PDP 11... Well, that is technically a reimplementation of the original Zork for the PDP-10. It is not the same as Zork 1-3, although there are similarities. The original Zork was way too big, when Infocom was founded and they wanted to release Zork for microcomputers. So they split Zork into three parts. Zork 1 is pretty much most of the original Zork, but without parts on the other side of the river (if I remember right). Zork 2 is parts of the other side of the river, and then lots of totally new stuff that does not exist in PDP-10 Zork. Zork 3 is more new stuff that don't exist in PDP-10 Zork, and then also the endgame, which I remember as being pretty much straight off the same. Johnny

14 years, 2 months

Cosmac Elf on breadboard

by jonas＠otter.se

> I wonder, which one is more reliable, wire-wrapping or soldering on a > vero/stripboard? I fancy learning wire wrapping but it's expensive. IIRC wire wrapping is supposed to be more reliable. I certainly remember that it is supposed to be easier to see whether a wrapped joint is good or bad than it is to see whether a soldered joint is good or bad. For a soldered joint to have maximum reliability, among other things the parts to be soldered must be solidly joined before soldering, and not held together by the solder. It is not hard to learn to wire wrap, certainly not with an electrical tool. You more or less just do it. I have never tried wrapping with an unpowered tool. I doubt that would be much more difficult, just harder on your hands. /Jonas

14 years, 2 months

DEC and Osborne Infocom Games

by rickthornquist＠gmail.com

All - Since everybody has been so helpful with my previous queries, I have one more... In 1983/84, DEC came out with their own versions of the Infocom games. They were in DEC's 'Digital Classified Software' line and were for the Rainbow and the DECMate II (and perhaps other systems). They came in large gray sleeves that were different than the usual Infocom packaging. Here's an example: http://yois.if-legends.org/vault.php?id=553 I've been having a heck of a time finding someone who still has these things. I'd very much like to scan the covers to use with the book. If anyone has any of these, I'd appreciate hearing from you. Also, I understand there was a version of Deadline that came with the Osborne. If anyone has this I'd like to hear from them as well. Thanks! - Rick

14 years, 2 months

DEC and Osborne Infocom Games

by rickthornquist＠gmail.com

Zane, Ethan's list of PDP-11 games agrees with mine. Note that the PDP-11 games would have come in Infocom's regular packaging, not the DEC gray sleeve packaging. Stefan, I have a press release which mentions that Infocom was going to do games for the Professional, but I haven't actually found any nor are any listed in their catalogs. - Rick

14 years, 2 months

Latest VCF East update

by evan＠snarc.net

Here's the majority of the lecture and workshop lineup for Vintage Computer Festival East 8.0, May 5-6, Wall, N.J. (we will announce one more lecture in the near future): On the lecture front: - Saturday opening: me - History of Commodore part 2: Bil Herd - Life, Death, and Afterlife of Charles Babbage's Difference Engine No. 2: Marcin Wichary - The Invention of BASIC: Thomas Kurtz - Sunday opening: me - History and Impact of Analog Computing: Kent Lundford - Apple's Early Years: Dan Kottke On the workshop front, we've got: - Intro to Vintage Software Restoration: Bill Degnan - Intro to Minicomputer Care & Feeding: Dave McGuire - How it's Done: 8-Bit Chiptune Music: Don Miller & friends - Intro to Commodore 8-Bit Maintenance: Bil Herd - Intro to Apple II Maintenance: Mike Willegal - Intro to S-100 Zen & Innerworkings: Jon Chapman - Build a Vector Graphics Kit: Dan Roganti

14 years, 2 months

Discferret broken?

by cb＠kryoflux.com

Hi Tony, > I beleive that for the Diskferret I can get sources for everything (of > course soembody might write closed-source softwre to work with it). For > your device, which parts can I get the soruce for, and which can I not > get it for? Are there any file formats involved that are not fully > docuemtned? You get the schematics for the hardware (PDF) and you get the software (binary). Both are free for private, non-commercial usage. You also have access to our own formats, STREAM (as documentation) and IPF (storing the mastering data, created by us; comes as fully documented source and you have the forums with more information as well). That means you have full control over the data you ingested. > No, I think you misunderstood me here. I was talking aobut modifying > the hardware to talk to other types of drives, other devices even. Not > hadnling unusual ewncoding schems on devices (such as flopy drives) > that are supported by the hardware. You can of course modify the hardware you built, or ours, as needed, as you will know where the signals go to. You would however need to work with us, to make us support the new formats. Nevertheless this would mean going beyond what it does now and what it was designed for. > That is correct (well, actually, I can't be sure becuase I don;t know who > is in yor organisation)/ You would for sure have noticed, as the team working on KryoFlux is pretty small (Istv?n, Kieron, two porters (Adam, Alex), me). I still hold on to my opinion that if someone does not know someone else, how can he make statements about them or their work ethic? > That is not what I am doing at all. I feel that money is not a motivator > at all (or at beast a very minor motivator) for good programmers and > designers. And thus that there's no correlation between whether or not > something costs money and how well-designed it is. I interpretted your > original message as implying that you clained your device was better than > the Diskferret becuase it was commercial amd you employed commerical > progrmmers. My ecperience suggests that is faulty reasoning. Then why do people get paid in their daytime job? I do like my daytime job, I get paid for it. But how could I afford leaving it for a week, working for free, to make something happen? This has grown beyond a hobby. We already support the formats we ever needed or wanted. We do enjoy doing this, but I don't see why I would assign someone to reverse and implement a format (take Emulator I+II for example), which takes a lot of expertise and manpower, to e.g. support a commercial studio that wants to recover sampling data from their old floppies. These people pay for the unpaid leave from daytime work, we make it happen, and private users enjoy the updates they get for free. I see no evil in this. > I fail to see how an open-source program cna be discontinmued. Ok, let's call it stalled then. I've "heard" the following pretty often: "Look, there's only one main developer, and he's so busy. Maybe if you would donate..?". I think it's really overestimated how many people would have the knowledge to continue with such a project. And how many of them would want to work on this? There aren't many floppy controller projects around apparently. Does that ring a bell? > Does this design inovle any programmed parts (microcontrollers, FPGAs, > etc)? If so, do you relase the code that goes into them? If not, then > presuambly I buy them from you, and toy do 'make a cent from me'. We don't have any. KryoFlux is so versatile and simple by design that all the magic happens in the microcontroller. The firmware is uploaded into RAM each time you use it, you don't even notice. It's included with the software distribution as a firmware.bin. No flashing needed. > > That is preceisely what I don't want or need. I want the information to > solve the problems myself. The reason is simple, you (and your company) > will not be around for ever, waht happens when I have problems in 10 > years time? If this was the case you'd have to write your own software for the board you have, but maybe USB would also not be around anymore to attach the board. I can't look into the future, but you would still be able to access the data ingested because the formats are documented. What I can say is that we don't have plans to let it fade into oblivion, so my understandig is that should we ever decide to not continue with the project, we'd pass it on and / or open it up or even make the latter happen before. We just don't have any intentions doing this now as this would discourage those that can help funding it. We're obviously not as exposed as a top notch browser or similar that would get large donations >from companies, financially, or by assigning engineers to it. As a sidenote: Even if you only had the binary and some STREAM dumps in the future, you could still decide to run it in emulation, like I do today for my Amiga stuff. Why you would want to do this: KryoFlux has a hardware independent, deviceless mode. It is able to "replay" any STREAM file and treat it like the data was coming in from the hardware this very moment. Because of this you can always use the software to transform any STREAM dump to a sector dump of your choice. > >> > Again, you never worked with us. How insulted would you feel if someone >> > judged about you in public, without ever having worked with you? > It happens all the tiem, I can assure you... That's sad but I don't see how this could be my or our fault. > Now, let me ask some spcific questions beased on statements that have > been made on this list and which you have not commetned on : > > 1) Did you use a 74HC244 buffer is the receiver for the drive cable. Did > you then cause Phil (I think) to be thrown off a forum/facebook group > when he commented on this? If you browse the net, you will find many comments on KryoFlux by Phil and maybe none on his solution by me/us. We really try to avoid this.The reason is we don't comment on competitive products as, being professional or not, your view is always biased to some extent. I call doing so bad style. I believe in word of mouth and others doing the comparison. If you'd come to my house and you continuously make fancy statements and suggest things (and have done so in other places in the past) it might happen you get thrown out for not behaving politely. We therefore make use of our householder's rights as needed. This also applies to our Facebook wall. > 2) Is there any truth to the comments about a 'conflict of interests' if > somebody wants to devleop both for your device and the Diskferret? Suggestions like that (the original statement, not your question here) would you get thrown out of my house for sure. Why would any large, big, mighty institution be hindered by us to look at a competitive product? Why would they let us hinder them? If they could get something better that would be completely free, why would they want to take the solution that needs to be paid for? How could I stop them from using publically available sources? This makes no sense. It really helps looking at this >from their point of view. I did not comment on this (and other statements) because I was under the impression that such a statement speaks for itself.

14 years, 2 months

Fancy a Lisa?

by lproven＠gmail.com

Same friend who is selling the SAM Coup? and the UK101 also has a Lisa for sale: http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/230756673113 By the way, yes, he will ship internationally, at cost. -- Liam Proven ? Profile: http://lproven.livejournal.com/profile Email: lproven at cix.co.uk ? GMail/G+/Twitter/Flickr/Facebook: lproven MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? Skype/AIM/Yahoo/LinkedIn: liamproven Tel: +44 20-8685-0498 ? Cell: +44 7939-087884

14 years, 2 months

Discferret broken?

by cb＠kryoflux.com

>> I do like my daytime job, I get paid for it. But how could I afford >> leaving it for a week, working for free, to make something happen? > > I don't know. Perhaps _you_ can't. But people regularly do build > things for no direct pay as a side-line, either while working for pay > or while between for-pay jobs. I, for example, worked for the second > half of '02 at a job that paid well enough I lived on the resulting > money for all of '03, which time I spent, in large part, creating > software to give away because I felt like it. > Mouse, I really envy you. I've I/we would be in this position, we'd enjoy this very much. If we could afford doing this because this would be funded somehow, we'd love to give it away for free, with GPL and all kinds of stuff. As prince charming did not come along yet, we still fund the preservation work we do, e.g. buying games to preserve them, with our own private money and what comes in via sales. > > Indeed. Was it lack of politesse, though, or was it criticism? There > is a very important difference. (I haven't seen any of the text in > question, so I don't know whether it was a questino of politeness. But > my experience has also been that honest technical criticism (and > pointing out a choice to use inappropriate line drivers/receivers is > that, even if it is also rude) usually is not impolite. The rabid > flamers generally don't have valid technical points. It's all about how you address things. You can send things in an email, or you can suggest something somewhere in public that will give people that don't have the skills the impression something is completely wrong. > >> Why would any large, big, mighty institution be hindered by us to >> look at a competitive product? Why would they let us hinder them? > > Perhaps they wouldn't. But if you consider it a conflict, and I have > seen companies take very similar stances often enough, then they would > have to choose between the two of you. (As a simple example of such a > conflict, it is extremely hard to find a restaurant, at least around > here, that serves products of both PepsiCo and Coca-Cola - the only > explanation I have heard suggested is that, in order for either to be > willing to sell to a restaurant, it has to agree to not deal with the > other.) Yes that's because both of them will require you to sign a contract that will not allow competing beverages to be sold. You also depend on them because the finance some of your interior. We don't have NDAs, and I don't see why we'd need those. We don't sell by telling stories about someone else, or by hindering someone to look at the competition. We sell because we care, and because we deliver.

14 years, 2 months

programmer for 8755

by kfergason＠gmail.com

Can anyone point me to a reasonably priced programmer for the 8755? Lots of programmers but none seem to program this chip. The one I have found is pretty expensive, as in out of my range ( a couple of Elnec at $1k and more). Was the 8755 that different? Thanks in advance, Kelly

14 years, 2 months

DEC and Osborne Infocom Games

by bqt＠softjar.se

On 2012-03-06 12.45, Ethan Dicks<ethan.dicks at gmail.com> wrote: > > On Tue, Mar 6, 2012 at 12:48 PM, Stefan Skoglund > <cpuser_stefskog at bredband.net> wrote: >> > On Tue, 6 Mar 2012 09:21:09 -0800,healyzh at aracnet.com wrote: >>>> >>> In 1983/84, DEC came out with their own versions of the Infocom games. >>>> >>> ?They were in DEC's 'Digital Classified Software' line and were for the >>>> >>> Rainbow and the DECMate II (and perhaps other systems). ?They came in >>>> >>> large >>>> >>> gray sleeves that were different than the usual Infocom packaging. ?Here's >>>> >>> an example: >>> >> >>> >> Do you have examples of the games they released for the PDP-11? >> > >> > Hmm, would they work on P/OS ?? > Infocom's releases for the PDP-11 ran on RT-11. I know you can run > RT-11 binaries under RSTS/E, but I can't remember if there was a way > to do that with RSX-11 (which is what P/OS descends from). You could > get RT-11 for the DECprofessional, so the hardware can do it, but I > only ever used P/OS at the menu level. There was this product called RTEM, which allows you to run an RT-11 environment under RSX. But that might not work under P/OS. Besides, that is more complex than the RT-11 runtime system under RSTS/E. >> > ANY GAMES for DEC Professional series ? > I don't remember for certain, but I don't think so, at least not > packaged games that were advertised for the machine. There were often > playable games that came as part of various operating systems, and, of > course, written by users and shared via DECUS and Usenet and such. There might have been a few around the time when P/OS was recently announced, but I doubt they sold many, and I would very much doubt you'd have much luck finding any of those today. There is atleast a Chess program for the windowing system for P/OS that DEC released. Johnny

14 years, 2 months

DEC and Osborne Infocom Games

by bqt＠softjar.se

On 2012-03-06 12.45, Stefan Skoglund<cpuser_stefskog at bredband.net> wrote: > > On Tue, 6 Mar 2012 09:21:09 -0800,healyzh at aracnet.com wrote: >>> >> In 1983/84, DEC came out with their own versions of the Infocom games. >>> >> They were in DEC's 'Digital Classified Software' line and were for the >>> >> Rainbow and the DECMate II (and perhaps other systems). They came in >>> >> large >>> >> gray sleeves that were different than the usual Infocom packaging. Here's >>> >> an example: >> > >> > Do you have examples of the games they released for the PDP-11? >> > >> > Zane > Hmm, would they work on P/OS ?? Most anything for RSX would also work on P/OS. That said, Infocom never released anything for RSX. They only did an RT-11 version of their games as far as I know. > ANY GAMES for DEC Professional series ? Any? Sure. ZEMU should work just fine under P/OS for one (well, maybe you need to change one thing or two, and recompile it, but it I think that the actual basic task, with no shared libraries and stuff should just work as is as well). Apart from that, I know I saw some weird graphic game for P/OS when I worked at DEC in the 80s, which I've never seen since, but which I'd like to find out more about. If I remember right, it was sortof a grid base, on which you had a robot which you moved around, and which fought others things. I'm very fuzzy on the details, since it was so long ago since I saw it, and I never played it myself, only watched other playing it. Looked cool though. You might find some stuff in the DECUS library, and as long as you are satisfied with text based stuff, almost anything for RSX will work as well. Johnny

14 years, 2 months

DEC Systems available

by snhirsch＠gmail.com

I had someone lined up to take my DEC systems, but it fell through. So, here we go again. Any interest in: Alpha UP2000+ system Large tower case, 2 x 700MHz. 21264 CPU, 512MB of memory. Onboard chipset is succumbing to electro-migration and will not drive more than one bank of memory - thus the 512MB (board can take 2G). Has Tru64 installed on an internal SCSI drive. Alpha PC64 system Medium tower case, 1 x 266Mhz 21164 CPU, 256MB of memory. Has Tru64 installed on internal RAID array. DecStation 5000 Bare-bones system, but worked the last time I fired it up (10+ years ago) VaxStation 3100 I know very little about this unit, but believe it's operational. 2 x Multia These are little mini-format machines using the 21066 CPU @ 166Mhz. I have (somewhere) a 266Mhz. upgrade motherboard also - unknown whether it functions. Other odds and ends: A couple of Alpha motherboards, misc parts. I'm located in Burlington, VT. No reasonable offer refused, I need the space. No, I will not ship them. I don't have the time to deal with packing and/or any associated shipping damage issues. Life is too short. Steve --

14 years, 2 months

SA600 cables

by ethan.dicks＠gmail.com

Hi, Jason, If nobody comes to claim your SA600, I would be interested in a few of the SDI cables if you would take the time to remove them and drop them in a box and mail them (just let me know what you'd want for postage and time). I have a couple of RA70s and I'd love some intracabinet cables to hook them up to a controller. I'd most likely be installing them into a BA123 I have in the dining room - it came to me empty, so I get to build it up however I want. Of course, I hope you find a taker for the whole thing - it's a nice cabinet but too far for me (and I'm more of an H960 guy anyway) -ethan

14 years, 2 months

short DEC racks

by chrise＠pobox.com

Speaking of DEC racks, What is the model number of the short rack that this 11/34 is shown mounted in? http://museum.dyne.org/index.php/File:P5182215.jpg And then just below the RL02 and above the 11/34 is a filler panel. How does that filler panel attach to the rack? I have this same rack, with 11/34 and two RL02 in it and I have the filler panel but no means to attach it to the rack. I can fabricate something but am interested in The Right Way(tm) it was done originally. There is a groved slot on the back of the filler panel that runs the entire width. It appears that this snapped onto a bracket of some sort that was bolted to the rack. Any ideas? Thanks. Chris -- Chris Elmquist

14 years, 2 months

might be landing an HP9K C8000

by spectre＠floodgap.com

I had root to K250 and L3000 PA-RISC systems back in the day (and a C3600 which the biology department used for visualization) and learned to loathe HP/sUX, but I found my pack of 11i CDs in the closet and got nostalgic for the old architecture (wonder what would have happened if Hombre had actually succeeded). I've got a line on a couple C8000 systems at what I consider to be a fair price, fully loaded. While I did a lot of work on the big iron systems, I don't have a lot of knowledge about the workstations. Anyone know any gotchas I should watch for? -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- Let us live! Let us love! Let us share our darkest secrets! ... you first. -

14 years, 2 months

Compukit UK101

by lproven＠gmail.com

On 6 March 2012 18:32, Bill Sudbrink <wh.sudbrink at verizon.net> wrote: > Liam Proven wrote: >> A friend of mine is selling another: >> http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/230755691414 > > Hi, > > ? It's not clear from your friend's auction page, is > ? he willing to sell/ship to the United States? I heard you the first time. ;?) I've forwarded your personal mail on to him. -- Liam Proven ? Profile: http://lproven.livejournal.com/profile Email: lproven at cix.co.uk ? GMail/G+/Twitter/Flickr/Facebook: lproven MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? Skype/AIM/Yahoo/LinkedIn: liamproven Tel: +44 20-8685-0498 ? Cell: +44 7939-087884

14 years, 2 months

BA123 power supply, AUI cables

by mcguire＠neurotica.com

I'm looking for a BA123 power supply. Anybody gots? I could also use a handful of short AUI cables. Thanks, -Dave -- Dave McGuire, AK4HZ New Kensington, PA

14 years, 2 months

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