Alex Freed has created a modernized clone of the PCPI AppliCard (also distributed as the Franklin ACE-80 and MicroPro StarCard) and released it as a free, open project. The original AppliCard is a popular peripheral; it is generally considered by most Apple II CP/M enthusiasts as being one of the most capable Z80 cards ever […]
January 2009
Posted inHelp
Help request: reverse-engineer and document VisiCalc for posterity
Tim McNerney wrote in with a surprising and intriguing request: I am looking for volunteers to help reverse-engineer and document Apple II VisiCalc, recreating fully commented source code from the binaries in the process. Besides documenting this historic work for engineering students, educators, and future historians, in fact, I plan to give all this work […]
Posted inElsewhere, People
8 Bit Weapon releasing new CD featuring Apple II effects
Seth wrote in, with news from retro-music group 8 Bit Weapon: Hi A2Central! I have some news for you and your patrons. ? Coming Spring 2009 Sony Creative Software will be releasing a loop and sample library called, “8 Bit Weapon: A Chiptune Odyssey”. The library covers Apple II (E and C), Commodore 64, NES, […]
Posted inProduct News
ProFUSE extension reads ProDOS volumes on Mac OS X
Kelvin Sherlock, prolific programmer of iShisen, Silver Platter, and PNG Floyd, is now developing ProFUSE, a command line tool for Macintosh OS X that mounts ProDOS-formatted disk images as volumes on the Mac desktop. These volumes are read-only, allowing files from the disk images to be opened and read in any Mac program, or copied […]
Posted inSoftware
Kelvin Sherlock’s Java-based Apple II developer tools
Kelvin Sherlock has been developing new Java-based developer tools for the Apple IIgs. These projects have been in work for some time now, but aren’t getting as much attention as they might deserve. They’re open source projects, all hosted on Google Code. First, there’s his 6502/65C02/65816 assembler. The project’s goal is to support ORCA/M syntax, […]
Posted inGeneral
A2Unplugged show #0031 released
Ryan Suenaga presents A2Unplugged, show #0031. In this episode, Ryan hosts his annual combination end of year review, and beginning of the year preview. A2Unplugged can be freely downloaded from the podcast’s web site, or subscribed to from the Apple iTunes store.
Posted inRants and Raves
Macintosh turns 25
You’ve probably seen or heard it somewhere in the media recently, Macintosh turned 25 years old today. They’re saying the Mac is the computer that revolutionized microcomputing… but I would argue otherwise. I think we all know it was really the Apple II that kicked off the microcomputer revolution. Still, the Mac quickly replaced the […]
Posted inHardware
VGA interface for 8-bit Apple II update
Back in April and July of 2008, and again during KansasFest we posted exciting news about Ferdinand Meyer-Hermann’s VGA project. Ferdinand has since been collaborating with ReactiveMicro, leading to design and specification enhancements that have delayed the card. The news isn’t all bad, the VGA card is anticipated to work with practically any 8-bit Apple […]