I've just watched this fascinating excerpt from a 1983 episode of BBC's Micro Live, in which they cover the broadcasting of computer software by radio and television!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qtTVczVmV8w

A few things stood out to me:

• 2m35s: I always wondered what these dots were above the video. That I remember seeing them all the time (before the switchover to fully digital TV signals in around 2010) implies that the picture must never have been properly adjusted on the television sets I used!
• 5m17s: This is very cool! Being able to parse real live data from Ceefax must have seemed very exotic before domestic connections to the Internet became generally available.
• 6m29s: I don't agree with the interviewee Lawson Brown here at all! There's no reason you couldn't have error checking of a digital radio broadcast. I'm sure he knew that, but it's still a weak argument IMHO.
• 7m48s: The interviewer Ian McNaught-Davis touches upon some really interesting questions about the quality of free software. The topic doesn't really get fleshed out in this video, but it's fascinating to think that this episode aired literally five days before the GNU project was announced, which, after a bit of time, would essentially demonstrate the answer to those questions!

#retrocomputing #bbcmicro #teletext #ceefax

Two-player #BBCMicro #Elite is coming along nicely.

It now supports two pilots in two ships with two controllers and a split-view screen

Here are some work-in-progress videos - see the thread for an explanation

There’s lots to fix, but at least we have a proof-of-concept…

(1/6)

#retrocomputing

RE: https://digipres.club/@philpem/116613275145567112

There's an approach to Conway's Game of Life which computes small rectangular tiles of results, with a cunning coordinate transformation such that each tile depends on just 4 predecessor-neighbours instead of 9.

The larger the tile, the less communication between neighbours.

This might be a good match for a small transputer network.

We made a nice 6502 version for the BBC Micro with 64k second processor - not as a general network, but separating compute from display.

Thread here
Conway's Game of Life for Atom, Beeb, Elk? https://stardot.org.uk/forums/viewtopic.php?t=12010

and see also
Conway's Life on 6502 https://6502.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=4293

Here's a 6502 life (expanded 6502 memory space) running a Turing Machine pattern
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JjUb8g2kED0

#bbcmicro #gol #mos6502 #transputer #retrocomputing

@philpem
@anachrocomputer

People ask me how I do my epic software archaeology projects.

So when I spent seven months over the winter documenting Geoff Crammond’s epic game The Sentinel, I kept a diary of pretty much everything that I did.

It’s not exactly Samuel Pepys, but it does explain exactly how I disassembled and documented this #8bit classic:

https://bbcelite.com/disassembly_diary/

I also talk about the tools and methods I use, and how I keep track of progress as I slowly work through the code.

I hope you enjoy it!

#retrocomputing #BBCMicro #C64

MIST0426/BLIPPYPIXEL-J_R_R_TOLKIEN-MORDOR

Mistigram: in this scene from #ReturnOfTheKing, #Gandalf the White (atop Shadowfax) surveys siege towers approaching Minas Tirith, Mordor smouldering in the distant background. This #BBCMicro high resolution graphics screen was drawn by @blippypixel and included in last month’s books-themed MIST0426 artpack collection. For Gondor!

Nightshade poster (Ultimate 1985).

#retrogaming #8bit #zxspectrum #amstradcpc #amstrad #sinclair #bbcmicro #msx #commodore64 #commodore128 #dragon #drago