Category: Programming

The PLASMA (PLASMA: Proto Language AsSeMbler for Apple)programming language, developed and curated by  David Schmenk has gotten an overhaul and update. For those who have never used PLASMA, ” PLASMA is a medium level programming language targeting the 8-bit 6502 processor. Historically, there were simple languages developed in the early years of computers that improved on the tedium of assembly language programming while still being low level enough for system coding. Languages like B, FORTH, and PLASMA fall into this…

Mike Westerfeild, curator and owner of the ByteWorks and all related titles has announced the immediate availability of the Source Code for ORCALib and ORCA/C.   The GitHub Repository for the two titles contains all of the source code and is freely available for download and replication. According to the Facebook posting, this particular project was a long time coming and is “An Early Christmas Gift to all”.   You can download the libraries at: https://github.com/byteworksinc

Jeremy Rand has announced the release of a build environment for the Apple II gs.   According to his post to the Kansasfest list, During my lightning session at KFest 2017, I demonstrated a build environment for Apple //gs development which used Xcode.  At the time, I said it wasn’t ready for public consumption but would be available in two weeks.  To paraphrase Spock from Wrath of Khan, “weeks could seem like months” and here we are at v1.0 about two…

Buckshot is a free to use, open-source image conversion utility for Windows, Mac OSX and Linux. It is based on a command-line image conversion tool called “bmp2dhr”. It’s mostly a toy to play around with, as it doesn’t support all features available in bmp2dhr, but it works well and is fun for checking out possible conversions. Get Buckshot

Apple Pugetsound Program Library Exchange (A.P.P.L.E.) has updated the manual for the popular Apple II graphics programming tool Turtlesoft: Turtle Graphics for Applesoft with a new softcover manual. Originally published in 1983 by A.P.P.L.E., the new manual features revised formatting and now includes the 15 sample programs with screenshots. In addition to the original Turtlesoft DOS 3.3 version by Robert Gallup, John Brooks  converted it to work with ProDOS.  Both Turtlesoft disk images are available and also include sample programs….

FROM THE CSA2 This message to advise the community that an update of Peersoft has been posted on my Web site. This is version 1.5.6 which is a preview of version 1.6 due to be released this autumn^H^H^H^H^H^H^Hwinter^H^H^H^H^H^Hnext^H^H^H^Hthis year ;-). The download ilnk is http://bgilon.free.fr/apple2/Peersoftv1.5.6.zip . Two domains have been covered within this release: a) enhanced syntax and semantics: a.1) with a new integer subtype (byte) and the introduction of optional unsigned integer arithmetic; a.2) a new loop construct syntax…

Apple has announced that Swift is now Open Source as had been promised by Tim Cook.  According to the posting on the swift blog (https://developer.apple.com/swift/blog/ ), Apple has set up a new GITHUB account specifically for Swift source code.  The features of this new open source movement includes: A bug reporting and tracking system Mailing lists A blog dedicated to the engineering of Swift Community guidelines Getting started tutorials Contributing instructions Documentation on Swift Developer and API design guidelines You…

In the Assembly Lines Podcast #18, Chris Torrence displayed the capabilities of the Apple II based Web Server.  For those wanting to install their own, you will want to meander over to David Schmenk’s PLASMA Source page.  David has made the source code available as part of the samples package for PLASMA. Web Server Source Code: https://github.com/dschmenk/PLASMA/blob/master/src/samplesrc/httpd.pla

The October 2015 edition of the Marina IP stack for Apple II is now available. This project is a completely new TCP/IP networking implementation written in 6502 assembly language for the Apple II series. The Uthernet card is the network interface used, and programs interface with a Berkeley sockets-style API. Marina is not complete, for it has only a UDP implementation, and not TCP, but it does have a good DNS resolver and DHCP client. The October 2015 edition of…

Benoit Gilon has announced the immediate release of the Peersoft Applesoft Extensions version 1.5.5.  Shown extensively at the recent Apple II Festival France, this extension package allows for user defined functions to be added to Applesoft through both machine language and Applesoft.  What’s new? Ability to define up to 10 user defined functions. Such functions could handle up to 2 input arguments instead of just one. Sample functions provided, GCD, LCM, Factorial, Binary operations on 16bits integers, MAX and MIN…

The source code to Taxman, one of the more popular Apple II games in the early 1980’s has been announced as being released very soon.   Hailed as the best Pac-Man clone available, Taxman plays nearly identical to the original Pac-Man. The original game was so accurate in detail, it drew the ire of the lawyers at Atari.  The game was a complete remake of Pac-Man right down to the animations which run between every few levels. Brian Fitzgerald wrote the…

From Facebook Apple II Enthusiasts Group: I know people have had trouble recently getting some of the old Byte Works products. I’m looking at a number of options, and wanted to gauge interest. All of our products that were produced at the Byte Works, and thus the ones we have clear copyright to, are on a CD called Opus ][. This includes ORCA/C, ORCA/Pascal, ORCA/M, and all of the support programs and so forth, but not ORCA/Modula 2. There are…

According to data released on the App Store Distribution page of the Apple Developer Support site, adoption of Apple’s latest version of their iOS 8 is now at a 68% of all iOS devices.  The site also says that 96% of the devices are using at least iOS 7 leaving just a miniscule 4% of devices using older iOS’s. It does not go into detail as to the device breakdown so it can only be assumed that the 96% is…

Paris, January 6th, 2015 – Brutal Deluxe Sofware releases Merlin 32 Merlin 32 is a multi-pass Cross Assembler running under Windows targeting 8-bit processors in the 6502 series (such as 6502 and 65c02) and the 16 bit 65c816 processor. It is compatible with Glen Bredon’s Merlin 16+ syntax, including support for Macros, Pre-processor, Logical Expressions, Conditional Operations, Variables, Loops, Local Labels… It can build fixed position object code or relocatable executables (OMF v2.1) as we can find on 16-bit APPLE…

The Apple2Scans Website has posted a scan of the Apple II book, Assembly Language Programming for the Apple II by Robert Mottola.  The book is a 96 mb PDF and is available for download at: http://www.apple2scans.net/2014/09/01/assembly-language-programming-for-the-apple-ii/

Legendary Apple II virtual machine programmer David Schmenk has returned from his secret underground Apple II lair to reveal a pre-release announcement of the next-generation virtual machine for the Apple II family: PLASMA 123. It is so called because the same code segments will run, without change, on the Apple I, the II, and the Apple III. PLASMA is the system behind the upcoming game for Apple II, Lawless Legends. Mr. Schmenk states that he has developed new interpreter technology that is…

Apple is making the push for iOS developers to adopt the iOS interface and standards. Chuong Nguyen writes on gottabemobile.com The company has advised iOS developers that all apps submitted after February 1, 2014 must be optimized for iOS 7 and built using Xcode 5. The move would at the very least remove visual fragmentation in the way apps look and feel for the iOS operating system. This is Apple’s plan to fight fragmentation of users who have not upgraded to…

The curator of the Aztec C Museum, Bill Buckels, has announce the immediate availability of two new directory builders for Dos 3.3.  The new Directory Builders Dir33 and LS33 are available from the Aztec C Museum as a free download.  Complete source code and documentation is included as part of the download. According to the note on CSA2 posted by Bill, “ The Aztec C65 DIR33 Project for Apple II DOS 3.3 – RWTS revealed with structures and everything… Download…

Dagen Brock has updated his recently released 65xx Programmers Reference for iOS.  This App is a great reference for programmers of the 65xx series CPU’s such as those found in the Apple II series computers. The latest version of the program has complete CPU separation allowing those who are programming a specific CPU to only see the commands for that particular CPU. According to his posting on CSA2, there are more updates to the application coming soon. The reference is…

Eric Shephard, owner and operator of the Apple IIgs Software producing SheppyWare, has announce a new push for an Apple IIgs based SMB2 client.  According to his posting on  CSA2, ” We’re now accepting pledges to increase the value of the S-Prize! The Prize has been established to encourage Apple II developers to create an open-source SMB2 file system for the Apple IIgs which meets certain functional requirements. We’ve started with the $400 seeded by myself and the Apple II…