Ewen Wannop has updated SNAP usenet reader to v1.1.6 to resolve a bug with the Marinetti 3.0b3 system init. You can get the latest SNAP and the rest of Ewen’s superbly useful software from http://www.wannop.info/speccie/Site/Speccies_Home_Pages.html

In addition, Ewen has been given the go ahead to also include the latest Marinetti 3.0b7 system init with his software, even though it’s not yet available on SourceForge.

Mark Pilgrim wrote on CSA2:

I just had a brief but constructive email discussion with Paul Lutus, the author and copyright holder of “Electric Duet,” the 2-note software synthesizer for the Apple II. He has generously agreed to release the music player routine itself under the GNU GPL. Paul requested that I credit it like this in my upcoming project:

Electric Duet Music Player
Copyright 1982, P. Lutus
Released under the GPL
(http://www.gnu.org)

Paul informed me that this open source license grant applies only to the player routine itself (the one you can tell Electric Duet to generate at any starting address and save as a separate file). The rest of the Electric Duet disk, including the editor, remains under his original copyright.

I don’t claim to speak for Paul. I’m just reporting the outcome of our conversation in a public forum in case anyone else is interested.

Cheers,
-Mark

Jeff Fink has released Silvern Castle 9.5, the popular Wizardry-like RPG game for the Apple II. You can download it from either:

http://webpages.milwpc.com/finkjc/silverncastle/
or
http://finkjsc.a2hq.com/silverncastle/

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 or swarms.
• MicroDot error codes are now reported in the range 256-511.
• Casting sleep or dispel now displays the total number of identical monsters affected instead of per group.
• Characters must have stowage containers to carry more than 100 coins without incurring an encumbrance penalty. You may carry as many containers as you have open slots, but to simplify game management, for those containers to be used to carry coins they must be equipped. Encumbrance is optional – see the preferences.
• Confirmation shown when Equip All selected.

New Stuff Added in v9.5:

• Stowage containers: Backpacks (2000 coin capacity) and sacks (500 coins).
• Camp now has a S)towage option to easily manage encumbrance.
• New status: DYING! When your hit points reach zero or below you are considered unconscious (DYING). You become DEAD when your hit points fall below a negative number equal to your maximum hit points. A DYING character is unable to act and takes damage like a POISONED character until DEAD.

And straight from Alex Lee’s “What is the 2gs?” website:

Hot on the heels of the educational and hardware related finds made amongst Tony Diaz’s collection, we now turn our attention to gaming related finds – and there’s quite a lot of new cool stuff archived.

Discover new titles and rarities at http://www.whatisthe2gs.apple2.org.za/news/

Straight from comp.sys.apple.2

Hi,

Here’s a new build of AppleWin which fixes a few issues: http://prdownload.berlios.de/applewin/AppleWin1.24.0.0.zip

As usual, if anyone spots any problems then either post here or file a bug report on berlios: https://developer.berlios.de/bugs/?group_id=6117

This is really just a maintenance release rolling up the small set of changes/fixes since April 2013.

NB. The Win8 full-screen issue has *not* been addressed yet.

Tom

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 to suppress the warning if AppleWin fails to capture the PrintScreen key
. Changed save-state file persisted to Registry from filename to pathame
. [Feature #5105] Added About dialog showing GPL (at startup, but only when AppleWin version changes)

Fixes:

. [Bug #19154] ProDOS Order 2IMG crashing
. [Support #103098] Sometimes swapping disk could cause INIT to fail with ERROR #8
. Fixed save-state bug for when 4K BANK1 is dirty (previously it would save the stale data instead)
. [Bug #18723,#19070] Mouse movement for CopyII+9.1 and ProTERM3.1

Debugger:

. Added “disk info” command
. [Bug #18940] Extend BSAVE and BLOAD Command To Memory Banks 0 and 1

Daniel Kruszyna, the man behind Drift, has just announced on comp.sys.apple2 the release of the latest version of his Forth-style assembler:

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 and subdirectory creation and allocation of directory entries.

New example OVERLAY40 which overlays one 40 column text screen over another.

New example REVERSEDUET which reverses an Electric Duet file. This program was used to create the back side of Drift.

New example REVERSEHGR which reflects a HIRES image about the origin.

New example SHOWKEYS which displays keypresses.

Refactored the cmp macro to support arbitrary operand widths and to work with both 8 and 16 bit accumulator modes.

Improved NakedOS support to write files from the host filesystem as well as assembler segments.

Fixed an issue when using else, in 6502 mode. else, now generates an absolute jump instead of a branch always in this situation. bra, is only available on the 65c02 and 65c816 processors.

And probably other minor changes as well.

Thanks and enjoy.

— Daniel

Paris, January 4th, 2014 – Brutal Deluxe Software introduces OMF Analyzer.

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 Deluxe’s Cross Development Tools Project, a full set of utilities available on Windows (and other) platforms to enable the creation of new Apple IIgs software : 65c816 Assembler, 65c816 Disassembler, 65c816 Simulator, Graphic File Converter, Resource Catcher…

At the dawn of 2014, Open Apple, the Apple II community’s only monthly podcast, engages in its annual tradition of reflecting on all that has transpired in the Apple II community in the past year. Ken Gagne moderates a panel of Mike Maginnis, Andy Molloy, Ivan Drucker, and David Schmenk to look at topics in news, emulation, hardware, software, conventions, and publications. Popular themes include the Raspberry Pi, the S-Prize, social media, JSMESS, the Jobs film, and KansasFest 2013.

Find the show at the Open Apple Web site or in the iTunes and Zune podcast directories.