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23 Years Later: the Apple II Receives Another OS Update (arstechnica.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Yesterday, software developer John Brooks released what is clearly a work of pure love: the first update to an operating system for the Apple II computer family since 1993. ProDOS 2.4, released on the 30th anniversary of the introduction of the Apple II GS, brings the enhanced operating system to even older Apple II systems, including the original Apple ][ and ][+. Which is pretty remarkable, considering the Apple ][ and ][+ don't even support lower-case characters. You can test-drive ProDOS 2.4 in a Web-based emulator set up by computer historian Jason Scott on the Internet Archive. The release includes Bitsy Bye, a menu-driven program launcher that allows for navigation through files on multiple floppy (or hacked USB) drives. Bitsy Bye is an example of highly efficient code: it runs in less than 1 kilobyte of RAM. There's also a boot utility that is under 400 bytes -- taking up a single block of storage on a disk. The report adds: "In addition to the Bitsy Boot boot utility, the ProDOS 2.4 'floppy' includes a collection of utilities, including a MiniBas tiny BASIC interpreter, disk imaging programs to move files from physical floppies to USB and other disk storage, file utilities, and the 'Unshrink' expander for uncompressing files archived with Shrinkit."
OpenApple - Reset
than Windows 10.
We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
> is pretty remarkable, considering the Apple ][ and ][+ don't even support lower-case characters.
Wrong, there was a Prodos for the Apple][
> Apple ][ and ][+ don't even support lower-case characters
There was a program that piggy-backed the char display and used graphic mod to display lowercase characters, even supported accentss. Had bee used by word-processors back then. AppleWord and the Jane environment.
And Yes I affirm, there was a Prodos for the Apple][ back then.
Léa Gris
My dual floppy drive Apple II plus with 128K RAM drive (172K total) uses floppies that, um, melted.
Going to be hard to update that.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
The point is, Apple still sold the same Apple II-whatever until 1993, for the same price as the day it was released with no change is specs, at all. So yeah, comparing Commodore to Apple is justified.
I recall that when Apple decided stop selling the Apple IIe, school districts were genuinely upset because they were still using them heavily. They had very large educational software libraries that would now become obsolete as they could no longer buy replacement systems.
If the market is there and willing to pay, Apple would have been foolish to not serve it. They could have probably continued selling IIe systems well into 1995 if they wanted. It's pretty crazy just how entrenched the Apple II was in schools.
A computer that came out 6 years after another one was more powerful?? I'm shocked!
I think the OP meant the price was more expensive for the older Apple computer at the time than was a newer Commodore Amiga. Personal computers had more personality back in the day (early to mid 1980s). I fondly remember developing some fairly sophisticated utilities for my Commodore VIC-20 using 6502 assembly language after typing in the listing for TinyMon and later buying the VIC-20 Assembler cartridge.
I understand this is an independent developer's work. How can he name the software like Apple's product, and even print "(c) Apple Computers Inc" on it? Shouln'd that awake Apple's army of evil lawers?
Not everything is about the newest and shiniest, AC.
Sometimes a nice jolt of nostalgia for a lost era in time just feels good. That's what this is for. Running a game in an emulator does not recreate the experience.
The whir and grind of the disk drive, the clacking of the keys, the authentic tones from the real sound chips... For a brief moment, one can feel like they were 8 years old again.
That is what this is about. Now, go take your soulless devotion to consumerism elsewhere.
Apple made an add-in card for Macintosh LCs (Popular in education) that let it run apple II software, and was designed to be IIe compatable. It was pretty popular and apple made a LOT of them - So many that I remember about a decade ago someone was selling off a warehouse of them for about 20 bucks each. (Should have picked one up. Now they go for 200)
Pretty clever bit of kit too. It had an interface for the older drives, and could use/create disk images as needed. (You could copy your entire library and run it off the mac hard disk) Some hardware was on the card, the rest was implemented in software. Ran great. Even emulated the color artifacts in the display hardware a lot of software relied upon to work properly.
Maybe he's practicing before he gets into updating orphaned Android smartphones? (we can only hope)
"Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
this?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
supports rs232, ppp, tcp/ip, multitasking, and some other useful bits...
sure. i can think of some uses for such a system.
> Which is pretty remarkable, considering the Apple ][ and ][+ don't even support lower-case characters.
Then why did Apple have a "Tech Note #141" describing how to install the Shift-Key Mod ???
* https://archive.org/stream/II_II-Shift-Key_Modification/II_II-Shift-Key_Modification_djvu.txt
Shift Key mod. Now that's something I haven't thought of 25 years.
Apple II did not use MFM encoding.
Aren't there better things to do than play with a 30+ year old computer? Don't you dorks have better things to do with your time? There is no practical use for the Apple II in the modern world, nor has there been for at least two decades. You can get a newer computer if you just leave your parents' basement.
Yes, rather than bringing a little bit of extra polish to a piece of hardware/software that's simple and elegant, and does everything that it needs to, he could be spending that time completely ripping out tech in the most obnoxious way, like developing systemd.
Hire a Linux system administrator, systems engineer,
In dos 3.2 and 3.3 days, yes. Not so much the case with prodos, which did indeed use 512 byte blocks, which were implemented as pairs of sectors as understood by the floppy disk controller, but could reflect the native block size used for some hard drives.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
I'm going to leave this conversation now, I'm afraid my geek will show too much.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
I don't know why...
>5 1/4" floppy drives had SECTORS, and they were 256 bytes each.....not BLOCKS of 512 bytes.
You're omitting several, key details:
* DOS 3.3 and ProDOS had sectors of 256 bytes each.
* ProDOS grouped *two* sectors together as a single block.
* A sector could be as long (or as short) as you wanted.
i.e.
- Copy ][+ versions before 4.0 had 1 sector the entire track which is why it was able to load so fast.
- Prince of Persia and other Broderbund game used Roland Gustafsson's RWTS18 which had 18 sectors / track -- it did this by having 6 sectors that were 768 bytes each.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
Right. It used GCR (Group Code Recording), which uses 5 bits to represent 4 bits of information. The whole point is because there were limits on how often the magnet flux reversals could occur on the disk.
The Apple //gs was compatible with the //e. In fact, it was widely known that the //gs has a single chip in it that did everything the //e did. // computers by apple donating them. Shame on the schools for not expecting the corporation to want the schools to BUY upgraded computers.
Many schools received their apple
5 Billion a year useful enough? That's just Amazon.
https://www.cnet.com/news/amaz...
~ People that think they are better than anyone else for any reason are the cause of all the strife in the world.
Without an 80-column card, those machines do NOT display lowercase characters. That is to say, out of the box, neither the ][ nor the ][+ does what you think it does. Your citation says as much.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Commodore used 5:4 GCR. Apple used a different 6:2 GCR.
I completely messed up the terminology in my parent post. I'll try to use standard RLL terminology here.
Commodore 1541 used an (0,2) RLL code that expands each 4 bits to 5 bits. This is similar to IBM GCR, but the code mappings differ.
The earliest model of Apple Disk II (13 sector, DOS 3.2) used a different (0,1) RLL code that expands 5 bits to 8. This allowed 3.25 KiB on each of 35 tracks, or 113.75 KiB per disk side. A later revision of Disk II (16 sector, DOS 3.3/ProDOS) kept the 8-bit words but improved detection of longer gaps between flux transitions, allowing a (0, 2) RLL code that expands 6 bits to 8. This allowed 4 KiB on each of 35 tracks, or 140 KiB per disk side.
IBM floppy drives and Mitsumi Quick Disk used MFM (Modified Frequency Modulation). This is a form of (1, 3) RLL that requires at least one bit of non-transition per transition, expanding 1 bit to 2 but allowing the overall bitrate to be doubled. This resulted in 4.5 KiB per track.
Compact Disc uses EFM, a (2,10) RLL that expands 8 bits to 14 with three linking bits between words. DVD uses the same expansion but with only two linking bits.
But the stage-0 bootloader on a standard floppy was only track 0, sector 0 - ie, 256 bytes. Granted, there was a hack that could trigger a multi-sector load on boot, but I don't recall ever seeing anyone do that (even the copy protection schemes). Everything I ever saw would do stage 0 in under 256 then bootstrap to the stage 1 loader that usually was on some part of the rest of track 0.
No, this:
Is Your Son a Computer Hacker?
Author:
T Reginald Gibbons
Topic:
Internet Idiocy
Posted:
Dec 02, 2001
Comments:
5913
As an enlightened, modern parent, I try to be as involved as possible in the lives of my six children. I encourage them to join team sports. I attend their teen parties with them to ensure no drinking or alcohol is on the premises. I keep a fatherly eye on the CDs they listen to and the shows they watch, the company they keep and the books they read. You could say I'm a model parent. My children have never failed to make me proud, and I can say without the slightest embellishment that I have the finest family in the USA.
Two years ago, my wife Carol and I decided that our children's education would not be complete without some grounding in modern computers. To this end, we bought our children a brand new Compaq to learn with. The kids had a lot of fun using the handful of application programs we'd bought, such as Adobe's Photoshop and Microsoft's Word, and my wife and I were pleased that our gift was received so well. Our son Peter was most entranced by the device, and became quite a pro at surfing the net. When Peter began to spend whole days on the machine, I became concerned, but Carol advised me to calm down, and that it was only a passing phase. I was content to bow to her experience as a mother, until our youngest daughter, Cindy, charged into the living room one night to blurt out: "Peter is a computer hacker!"
As you can imagine, I was amazed. A computer hacker in my own house! I began to monitor my son's habits, to make certain that Cindy wasn't just telling stories, as she is prone to doing at times.
After a few days of investigation, and some research into computer hacking, I confronted Peter with the evidence. I'm afraid to say, this was the only time I have ever been truly disappointed in one of my children. We raised them to be honest and to have integrity, and Peter betrayed the principles we tried to encourage in him, when he refused point blank to admit to his activities. His denials continued for hours, and in the end, I was left with no choice but to ban him from using the computer until he is old enough to be responsible for his actions.
After going through this ordeal with my own family, I was left pondering how I could best help others in similar situations. I'd gained a lot of knowledge over those few days regarding hackers. It's only right that I provide that information to other parents, in the hope that they will be able to tell if their children are being drawn into the world of hacking. Perhaps other parents will be able to steer their sons back onto the straight and narrow before extreme measures need to be employed.
To this end, I have decided to publish the top ten signs that your son is a hacker. I advise any parents to read this list carefully and if their son matches the profile, they should take action. A smart parent will first try to reason with their son, before resorting to groundings, or even spanking. I pride myself that I have never had to spank a child, and I hope this guide will help other parents to put a halt to their son's misbehaviour before a spanking becomes necessary.
1. Has your son asked you to change ISPs?
Most American families use trusted and responsible Internet Service Providers, such as AOL. These providers have a strict "No Hacking" policy, and take careful measures to ensure that your internet experience is enjoyable, educational and above all legal. If your child is becoming a hacker, one of his first steps will be to request a change to a more hacker friendly provider.
I would advise all parents to refuse this request. One of the reasons your son is interested in switching providers is to get away from AOL's child safety filter. This filter is vital to any parent who wants his son to enjoy the internet without the endangering him through exposure to "adult" content. It is best to stick with the protection A
And people still bought them, so Apple kept making them. Just like they kept making the iPod Classic (the last model with a hard drive) for many years with no changes, until they had to stop because the manufacturers of the miniature hard drives stopped making them.
It was entirely possible for them to keep making iPod classics with a flash drive in them. People are retrofitting them actively to late-gen iPod classics.
Apple didn't want to.
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
I think you're missing the point. One of the big reasons for the Apple ]['s popularity with schools were the I/O slots and joystick port - of which the Macs had neither. Schools were regularly building their own I/O cards or just using the four digital and four analog inputs on the joystick port for all sorts of interfacing experiments and programming lessons, getting students into things from computer-controlled rubber band launchers to environment monitoring to robotics.
Good ol'e days never stopped :-)
i.e. 4am's "Passport" auto-cracking which uses the disk's own RWTS to read the rest of the disk.
https://archive.org/details/Pa...