Ed S @EdS@mastodon.sdf.org

David Given has published "fforth", a small Forth written in C for the Fuzix OS (it compiles under POSIX compatible systems)

>> fforth is a small, reasonably fast indirect-threaded Forth written in portable C. It should Just Compile on most Unixy platforms. It’s intended as a scripting language for the Fuzix operating system but should work fine on any small system. It’s got reasonably complete basic bindings to most Unix ssystem calls — expect the functions to be there, although any constants probably aren’t. <<

The one source code is a C-Program, a Shell-Script and an AWk-Script

https://cowlark.com/fforth/

If you want to look at the Fuzix OS (a Unix clone for small machines), see

https://github.com/EtchedPixels/FUZIX

Back in 2010 I was playing with a cheap graphing calculator, the Sentry Ca756. It was programmable and I wrote a game for it. Then the calculator died before I typed the game in.

Last night I found the file on my drive so I typed it into BBC BASIC, converting it line by line. So I finally fot to see my game!

Only had one logic error, the line after LBL 7 is L>0=>GOTO 1 and should be L<0=>GOTO 1

I think there are other syntax errors in the Sentry version but it doesn't really matter. 😁

@niconiconi The CDC 6000 series (1964) had register B0 hardwired to 0.

#TIL In the Apollo Guidance Computer, register 7 is hardwired to zero, allowing one to zero out other registers, or to access the first element in the (base+offset) addressing mode.

I always thought the "$0 register" is a neat trick invented by MIPS. So this idea was actually much older...

H/T to @EdS for showing me a non-Facebook message board for #retrocomputing! retrocomputingforum.com/ retrocomputingforum.com/

#retrocomputing moment of the day. A ~7 minute marketing video on the massively parallel Thinking Machines CM-2 from back in the late-80s. 64K processors in 1988 w/28GFLOPS peak. Wow. youtu.be/BVtHh9JoS3s youtu.be/BVtHh9JoS3s

@bhtooefr That Omni laptop is awesome.

The UK #retrocomputing scene is amazing.

@mike
if you like #retroComputing, there's also https://retroComputingForum.com run by @EdS and other former members of their community that used to be on #GooglePlus before it shut down.

See also https://mastodon.sdf.org/@EdS/102220917374736140

After fixing the "memory write" timing violation, my breadboard #Z80 completed the π calculation program flawlessly, and was able to calculate π to 500+ digits.

In the troubleshooting process, boards were rewired based on a "bus-centric" approach - always use a row of rightmost boards as the system bus, so new modules can be daisy-chained, and the bus can be probed easily.

The Arduino board is only used as a PSU & USB serial, no cheating here.

TODO: in-system EEPROM programmer, video.

#retrocomputing

My old #ABC80 is restored and working again. This one is nearly 40 years old. #z80 #retrocomputing

"How computing's first 'killer app' changed everything"

If you're my age, you probably learned how to use VisiCalc on a 6502-based machine as your first introduction to spreadsheets.
https://www.bbc.com/news/business-47802280

"They were covered in (what else?) dust, but they were there, all 172 of them, each one containing about 2,500 feet of tape. The only problem was that they were in a format so obsolete that the data was beyond O'Brien's reach. He sent an email to NASA, offering to repatriate the tapes, but the agency politely declined."
#retrocomputing #IBM729Mark5 https://www.wired.com/story/moondust-nasa-lunar-ambitions/

@thomasfuchs This is haunting me. Possibly the worst example of key placement in history.

Run CP/M on your C64 – using Emulation!
https://www.pagetable.com/?p=1315
#commodore #c64 #cpm #retrocomputing
The Roßmöller CP/M Emulator for C64 "borrowed" an 8080 emulator for 6502, and the CP/M OS.

Interesting on-line puzzle game. Linjat. Read the "How To Play" and "Tutorial", then give the game a go.

https://linjat.snellman.net/

#Puzzles #Entertainment

For more, check out Simon Tatham's Portable Puzzle Collection [ https://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/puzzles/ ]

@EdS

This is what I learned to "program" on. #TI59 It wasn't until a couple years later that dad got a #PET2001 and I started to learn BASIC and 6502 stuff. I have no real recollection of how this thing worked. I feel old.
https://www.zdnet.com/pictures/10-awesome-handheld-computers-from-yesteryear/2/