Fediverse culture is complaining about one of your instances being down from another instance
ELI5: Let's say that I want to learn how programming GUIs on Amigas was like (boopsi, MUI). What would I need to do that, with no attempts at being truly period-correct?
Talking about OS versions, emulator/actual hardware, editors, compilers and of course official and inofficial documentation?
(For comparison's sake, f I were to do the same for Windows win32, it would be any PC, Windows 7, Visual Studio 6, the Petzold book, win32.hlp and probably vodka)
In case you were wondering, the following domain name is somehow still available:
bloody.computer
- malware
- malware
- 2-factor authentication
- malware
- malware
what a lovely device
Oh yes, living in a cyberpunk dystopia, except we didn't even get the cool skyscrapers, amazing cityscapes, or awesome cybernetics. :/
# What is a permacomputer?
A permacomputer is a computer which attempts to embody the virtues of permacomputing.
Foundationally, permacomputing itself is set of community practices and traditions which shares a set of social and ecological values inspired by the land management and settlement design of permaculture.
# What is the point of this project?
There are many different dialectical approaches to making an introduction to the people's permacomputer. One thought experiment that has proved especially popular and easy to grasp sums up the mindset behind which we are functioning:
$>>> Industrial society has collapsed. All semiconductor fabrication has ceased, society-wide electrification is no longer guaranteed. There is no longer any internet. Computing as it was once known in the early 21st century is impossible. You need a computer for a task. What do you do? <<<$
This project is a response to the challenge posed by the above problem. The purpose of this project is to design and then construct computers that will be able to survive a societal collapse.
# The response
A permacomputer for the people involves two radically differing criteria of success, yet these requirements, paradoxically, cannot be separated from one another--fulfilling both these two criteria is required for a successful project.
The first criterion is a computer which is well-engineered. The computer offered up by this project aim to be easy to grasp upon immediate interaction, and have a profound, transformational effect on the power of the user's capacity for rational and critical thought.
## Engineering prowess
Permacomputers must also be rugged and durable. An inoperable computer is otherwise known in hacker circles as a "brick". The length of time the project determined adequate for the "life span" of a permacomputer is a duration far in excess of contemporary standards. The intention behind this project's design was to allow communities of people to possess and maintain a computer collectively.
It is difficult to provide an accurate estimate for exactly how many years the life cycle of a permacomputer design can be. This project suggests a life span beyond that of a human individual.
Despite this concern, this project assumes that are threats outside the domain of engineering to the permacomputer, which would otherwise possess indefinite operation:
## Preservation of meaning
The second criterion is to ensure that there continues to be a human cultural tradition of electronic computing, or that this tradition may be able to be rediscovered or reconstructed. The project does not want to merely effect an engineering feat, but also transmit the cultural memory of electronic digital computing into the future.
It is hoped that, should the project succeed, humanity will be able to be saved from the grueling tedium of many forms of onerous economic work. Without a computer, these necessary social roles would involve either great effort, or be personally unfulfilling or degrading; shameful.
# hackaday project page update
https://hackaday.io/project/191174/log/236912-project-phase-2
-*-BEGIN QUOTATION-*-
Please refer to the following homebrew projects:
- https://github.com/adumont/hb6502
- https://awsh.org/homebrew-6502-computer-part-1/
- https://www.grappendorf.net/projects/6502-home-computer/#table-of-contents
- https://pmig96.wordpress.com/2020/07/15/mc6847-test-circuit/
Project Phase #2:
- build the first MC6847 video display 'warmup' computer.
- i have found three projects based on the 6502 which make use of the MC6847 and have published their schematics. so far so good. when the parts arrive i have to trust my breadboards and little wires are of a sufficient quality as not to bounce and ring, we're dealing with sub-1 MHz TTL-level digital signals so.... maybe my dodgy tools and components will be good enough.
- build the first permacomputer prototype
- the next step after i have honed my practicals skills on a simpler task is this: construct a custom video display for the permacomputer, based on the information contained in don lancaster's cheap video cookbook
https://www.tinaja.com/ebooks/cvcb1.pdf
https://archive.org/details/donlancaster_cvcb1
- the reason for using custom logic for the display is the limited number of columns the MC6847--it is my hope to have 40 columns, not a mere 32. i wish i could say more, but the short story is this: using EEPROMs in place of discrete logic is the ticket to having a simple design.
-*-END QUOTATION-*-
# main project page update
https://sr.ht/~vidak/peoples-permacomputer/#what-is-the-point-of-this-project
-*-BEGIN QUOTATION-*-
A permacomputer for the people involves two radically differing criteria of success, yet these requirements, paradoxically, cannot be separated from one another--fulfilling both these two criteria is required for a successful project.
The first criterion is a computer which is well-engineered. The computer offered up by this project aim to be easy to grasp upon immediate interaction, and have a profound, transformational effect on the power of the user's capacity for rational and critical thought.
Permacomputers must also be rugged and durable. An inoperable computer is otherwise known in hacker circles as a "brick". The length of time the project determined adequate for the "life span" of a permacomputer is a duration far in excess of contemporary standards. The intention behind this project's design was to allow communities of people to possess and maintain a computer collectively.
It is difficult to provide an accurate estimate for exactly how many years the life cycle of a permacomputer design can be. This project suggests a life span beyond that of a human individual.
Despite this concern, this project assumes that are threats outside the domain of engineering to the permacomputer, which would otherwise possess indefinite operation:
The second criterion is to ensure that there continues to be a human cultural tradition of electronic computing, or that this tradition may be able to be rediscovered or reconstructed. The project does not want to merely effect an engineering feat, but also transmit the cultural memory of electronic digital computing into the future.
It is hoped that, should the project succeed, humanity will be able to be saved from the grueling tedium of many forms of onerous economic work. Without a computer, these necessary social roles would involve either great effort, or be personally unfulfilling or degrading; shameful.
-*-END QUOTATION-*-
Hmm, I know there's Whitespace, but is there an #esolang that's the opposite, without any whitespace? BASIC almost got there, I think.
(And no, just replacing whitespaces with some unused ASCII or Unicode would be a boring solution)
writing is hard! it requires discipline, determination, and persistence.
trying to palm it off to a computer has always struck me as a bizarre thing to do.
you're telling me this thing produced coherent writing but does not actually grasp any of its meaning?
writing is frequently a laborious process--and i think it has to be that way. i should be forced to consider my meaning.
we're cheapening the effect of the language we share with others by using AI. we are not really treating people as "ends in themselves".
to be sure, "automatic writing" is possible, but it is--despite what silicon valley says--unnecessary for mass human communication. automatic writing is also insufficient as a form of intelligence.
people's permacomputer project as of today (long)
things i wanna do:
permacomputer $0Ci4L M3D14Z
- fully update the @permacomputer project social media, which means:
- updating the hackaday profile;
- updating the master project page;
- releasing a new statement on the mastodon profile.
- (i think that covers it)
the permacomputer hardware itself
build the first MC6847 video display 'warmup' computer.
- i have found three projects based on 6502 which make use of the MC6847 and have published their schematics. so far so good. when the parts arrive i have to trust my breadboards and little wires are of a sufficient quality as not to bounce and ring, we're dealing with sub-1 MHz TTL-level digital signals so.... maybe my dodgy tools and components will be good enough.
build the first permacomputer prototype
- the next step after i have honed my practicals skills on a simpler task is this: construct a custom video display for the permacomputer, based on the information contained in don lancaster's cheap video cookbook or here if you wanna support the internet archive?
- the reason for using custom logic for the display is the limited number of columns the MC6847--it is my hope to have 40 columns, not a mere 32. i wish i could say more, but the short story is this: using EEPROMs in place of discrete logic is the ticket to having a simple design.
the permacomputer software
- it is still my plan to get lisp running on the permacomputer (much thanks @50htz ๐ ๐)
- to this end see this disassembly of Acornsoft LISP for the BBC Micro. the beeb is a 6502 machine. it is my hope it can be easily ported to the permacomputer and enable a suitable operating system environment.
- the problem is, this will make the permacomputer more like the beeb. it may not be a simple matter of reproducing the memory map of the beeb--it could require reproducing large parts of the beeb data pathways inside the permacomputer. watch this space.
- i do not want to get too involved in writing a lisp for the permacomputer, so i am postponing this possibility until the very last moment. if i have to do everything myself, sigh, i will.
the overall 'permacomputing' approach
what is a permacomputer? what does a permacomputer do?
the ultimate goal of the project is to construct computers which will last a really long time, and still stay operational.
are you serious?
i largely regard this project to be a piece of art. if someone finds some practical use for what i am building, however, that would also make me overjoyed.
is this a kit project?
it is my pipe-dream to end up manufacturing permacomputer units at a kind of cottage-industry level, perhaps something for my worker's co-operative to do--friendly computers. i want to make these babies really, really cheap--if it's not cheap, it's not accessible to the poor.
why 80s TTL micro-electronics?
it should be taken as given that 80s micros are one of the last generations of computers that people could have a hope of comprehending and mastering every element of its specification, from hardware to the top of the software stack.