Margot Comstock, co-founder and editor of the much-loved Softalk magazine, will join us with a keynote presentation at KansasFest 2014, which is scheduled for July 22 –27 in Kansas City, Missouri. Comstock and Al Tommervik founded Softalk in 1980 to share the hardware, software, and people behind the Apple II. At its peak, Softalk had 250,000 readers and uniquely offered broad and deep coverage of everything Apple II related, including programming, game playing, business use, and home use. The Apple II magazine ran for four years before…
Bill Buckels, curator of the Aztec C Museum has released a new image comverter for the Apple IIgs. According to the announcment on CSA2, “BMP2SHR is a command line utility to convert BMP files to Apple IIgs SHR Files. Please see the User’s Manual and the Tutorial for information on using BMP2SHR. If you have BMP2SHR Version 1.0 upgrading to Version 2.0 is well worth the effort. If you want to learn more about the SHR (Super Hi-Res) display on…
The Kansasfest committee has release a teaser email containing the 2014 rendition of the Kansasfest Logo. Kansasfest is an Apple II centric enthusiast convention which happens each year in Kansas City, Missouri. The event draws hobbyists from around the globe and is usually inundated with advancements in the hardware and software on the Apple II series platforms. The 2014 Kansasfest will take place July 22nd to 27th. For more information, check the Kansasfest website at: http://www.kansasfest.org
Virtual Apple ][‘s database has been updated this week with the release of Version 1.22. Current efforts include adding the blurbs of all of the games in the system as well as adding a new EBay pricing guide with the High and Low prices for items being sold on Ebay. The current database sports nearly 1500 records and is expanding daily. If you have the iOS version of the ActiveGS app, just click the update button at the top of…
Thanks to Charlie Reiman, the following typeset Aztec C Manuals originally scanned by the late Paul R. Santa-Maria have been reformatted (they are now smaller and searchable and pastable as plain text), and are now available for download at the following links: Aztec C 65 Version 3.2 cross-compiler http://www.aztecmuseum.ca/docs/CG65A.PDF http://www.aztecmuseum.ca/docs/CG65B.PDF Aztec C 65 Version 3.2 ProDOS native-mode compiler http://www.aztecmuseum.ca/docs/MANXC65B.PDF http://www.aztecmuseum.ca/docs/MANXC65B.PDF ProDOS Aztec C Unix-Like Shell http://www.aztecmuseum.ca/docs/SHELLC65A.pdf Charlie did a great job with these. Before Paul passed-away (June 19, 2010), he…
A posting in the CSA2 Users Group has announced a cracked version of the EA game Amnesia. According to the posting by a CSA2 user going by the moniker Random J Hacker, ” Amnesia is an Apple II text adventure written by science fiction author Thomas M. Disch. Its copy protection is in the form of a disk check that upon failure prevents the player from picking up any objects in the game, including the bedsheet you are required to…
The Spy and wife own and she drives a 1991 Buick Regalthat in today’s terms is generally regarded as hopelessly obsolete driving technology. It has no informative car computer display, not GPS, no telephone, no heated seats, TV in the back seating area or anti-lock /skid braking system, and the climate control system is primitive and manual. Even the 2002 Buick Regal he drives has some of that, though it too is regarded as ancient by some people. Yet both…
Earl L. Keyser, Jr., long time programmer and A.P.P.L.E. Member died on the 29th of January. He passed away peacefully on Wednesday, January 29, 2014 at Windmill Manor in Coralville, Iowa, after battling Parkinson’s disease. Earl, 70, of North Liberty,Iowa, was best known in the Apple world for his programs on the early Apple II computer. He produced over 20 programs for the early Apple II under the Rainbow Computing moniker which were carried by Apple Computer in the Contact…
Apple has released a minor update to the iOS operating system. iOS 7.0.5 is intended to primarily provide support for the networks run by China Telecom. This was necessitated by Apple’s recent agreement with China Telecom to provide the iPhone through them. The update addresses issues with the iPhone 5c and the iPhone 5S connecting to the network. For more information, see the iOS 7.0.5 update page at: http://support.apple.com/kb/DL1718
Brian Picchi, the author of Lamb Chops, has announced the release of his latest Apple ][ Game. Retro Fever is the first release of 2014 for the Apple ][ series computer and is Brian’s second foray into the realm of Apple ][ action games. According to the release on Facebook, ” For this game I teamed up with programmer and friend Brandon Bogle of retroswitch.com (some of you may know him as the creator of the Flyer Internet Modem for…
Paul Hagstrom has posted a number of the ST.MAC magazines on his blog. Known as Softtalk Mac officially or Saint Mac unofficially, the magazine was the natural progression for the SoftTalk enterprise which ran from 1980 to 1984. The first issue of ST.MAC was released in February 1984 but was to run only until August of that year due in part to the shut down of the Softtalk enterprise. Now enjoy a bit of that era as we face the…
Apple, Inc. celebrated the 30th anniversary of the introduction of the Macintosh this week. January 24th, 1984, Steve jobs showed the world his new machine complete with graphical user interface. The machine initially envisioned by The like of Jef Raskin and Steve Jobs had come to a fruition and Apple introduced it in a manner which has never been forgotten. Few can forget the image of Steve Jobs up on stage two days after the commercial aired during the Superbowl,…
An announcement by chat leader Andrew Roughan says that the DownUnder Chat which occured on local time Friday Evenings in Australia is once again a weekly event. According to the posting in CSA2, ” After a hiatus… it is time for a come back. Calling all Apple II enthusiasts who are awake between 9pm and 11pm Australian Eastern Summer Time on Friday nights to visit the #a2c.chat channel on the A2Central IRC server. That’s probably likely to be Aussies, Kiwis,…
The Applewin Apple2 Emulator has been updated to version 1.24.0. Applewin is currently being maintained by Tom Charlesworth. According to the posting on CSA2, this update is intended to address a number of issues with the emulator as shown below: 1.24.0 – 11 Jan 2014——————–Changes:. Support cursor keys (in addition to numpad) when using keyboard for joystick emulation. Support auto-fire for all 3 joystick buttons (via Config->Input). [Feature #5668] Added confirmation message box for reboot (F2). [Feature #5715] Added -no-printscreen-dlg…
The Silvern Castle RPG by Jeff Fink has been updated to version 9.5. Silvern Castle is the longest running RPG specifically for the Apple II series computers which still recieves regular updates. Bugs Fixed in v9.5: Thanks to Choi Youngjoo for reporting error #53-4035 (and subsequent #53-143 at title page) due to potential overflow of message time delay variable at Red Dragon Inn. Stuff Changed in v9.5: Added rarity byte to each monster. Low-level encounters more likely to be patrols…
MacNN reports that Apple has released a third beta of iOS 7.1 to developers, accounts say. The code was seeded to select testing partners on December 23rd, but at the time, not the general developer community. The beta is said to make a number of adjustments and bugfixes, bringing v7.1 much closer to its finished state. Some fixes deal with listening to audiobooks, creating a new iCloud account during device setup, and errors seen when enabling iCloud Keychain. Read More
Message from Daniel Kruszyna: Hello All, I’ve released a new version of sixtyfive, my forth-style assembler. http://krue.net/sixtyfive/ Here are the changes: Miscellaneous new 8 bit definitions: prntx and text window direct page locations. Miscellaneous new IIgs bit definitions: ADB modifier and status registers. New standalone script which converts the sector order of floppy images from the command line. The existing sector conversion support was limited to operating on assembler segments. New higher level interface for creating ProDOS images. Includes volume …
OMF Analyzer is a command-line tool for Windows to analyze OMF Files we can find on 16 bits Apple IIgs operating systems like Prodos 16 or GS/OS. Because OMF files are the core of any executable code on the Apple IIgs system (S16, Exe, CDA, NDA, FST, PIF, Library, Tool…), OMF Analyzer will be helpful for anyone wanting to write an Assembler, a Compiler, a Linker or a Disasembler… Find more @ http://www.brutaldeluxe.fr/products/crossdevtools/omfanalyzer/ OMF Analyzer is part of the Brutal…
A year of consolidation looms in parts of the high-tech landscape. For instance, television manufacturers will continue to exit this unprofitable sector and find other ways to (try to) make money. Sony in particular remains problematic. The Spy recently purchased a Sony 1040 receiver as both reviews and specs seemed promising. After all, very few receivers at any price have all of AirPlay, Wi-Fi, Ethernet, and BlueTooth, and many no longer offer phono inputs. Sony’s model has them all at…
Win32 etc. http://www.aztecmuseum.ca/extras/bmp2shr.pdf Apple II http://www.aztecmuseum.ca/extras/PicSave.pdf Download it here: http://www.aztecmuseum.ca/extras/B2S.zip This download contains programs, source code, documentation, and disk images for creating Super Hi-Res Pictures, and for viewing and saving Super Hi-Res pictures on an Apple II GS, or on an Apple //e with a Carte Blanche, or an Apple //e or Apple II GS equipped with an Apple II VOC (Video Overlay Card), or in an Apple II GS emulator (like Kegs32). 1. BMP2SHR – converts BMP Files to…
