I built the world’s worst paper tape reader some weeks ago. It works pretty okay on anything with a USR-style port like a KIM-1 clone or a VIC-20.

It at least attempts to live up to the world’s worst name. Paper tape was (and is) an interesting medium. Sure it’s hard to work with and fragile, but it also has the advantage of being slow. I mean, what’s not to like??!!!

There’s a wonderful yearly online event called Advent Of Code (#adventofcode). Each day there are two code challenges that follow a holiday narrative. Some of them are easy, and some of them are quite difficult.

This year I’ve attempted to do as much of it as I can on 8-Bit Machines. Mostly Commodore 64 because it’s what I know the best, and also what I like most to actually code on.

I’m a Commodore guy through and through. This isn’t tribalism, it’s what was in my room from 1983 to when I graduated High School in 1993.

After my sorta failed attempt at spending the month of September with my Coco 2, I decided for October to try spending a week at a time with a particularly less familiar computer.

So starting on October 1st, and ending on the 7th, I spent my free time with the Atari Systems that I have.

One of my main goals in sharing retro computing is to help people DO things with these machines. They are useful for all sorts of reasons, not the least of which is education and demonstration. The constraints are wonderful for this.

Using 30-50 year old hardware comes at a price. They are, well… old.

They require constant care and maintenance and parts are becoming more and more scarce.

Enter the retro pinout project

In fixing or maintaining these old computers, one of the best resources you can have is a similar working model next to it. Being able to test things out on a working example is invaluable.

An “almost teenager”, Josh, sent me an email yesterday asking how I do slow text on the Commodore. He is just starting assembly at 12 which is pretty impressive. He’s been using KickAssembler, but wants to try it “on hardware”.

It’s not difficult really. There are probably a lot of ways to do this, here’s how I do it in Turbo Macro Pro.

Let’s start with some text: ARE YOU KEEPING UP?

Some time in the month of September 2020 I dug out the old Commodore 64 that my Dad bought for himself in 1983. It quickly migrated its way into my room and stayed there until 1993 when I joined the Navy. Someone in my family, probably Mom, carefully packed it back into its original box and put it into storage. Despite its many years of use/ abuse by a messy teenager, it’s in surprisingly good condition, 38 years later. (You’re old.) Back then, I had attempted some programming on it, but I had the patience and focus of your typical suburban kid. Over the years I’ve thought about the many hours I spent on that machine (remember when computers lasted more than a single year?) and as a seasoned developer I began looking at the computer and seeing more potential than I was able to realize as a kid. Modern software is very powerful. Unfortunately, if you program with it long enough, it stops feeling “real.” It’s like learning to fly on Microsoft Flight Simulator, versus taking private pilot lessons to actually control and fly a real aircraft. My experience with flying actual planes prepared me to recognize the distinction that afternoon in September when I pulled out my old machine. I had the idea that if I could get closer to the bites, I could become a better programmer. And if that didn’t work, I could at least have fun with it. (nostalgia is a hell of a drug.)

People are funny on the internet. We always seem to divide into tribes even when it’s not necessary or advantageous to do so.

I wasn’t surprised to see someone (there’s always one isn’t there?) comment that I might be using real hardware, but for only part of my retro setups.

“I’m disappointed that you’re using an LCD monitor on your retro computers”

You’re… disappointed? Kinda dramatic isn’t it?

Do I get more pleasure out of doing retro on real hardware rather than emulators? I do. Do I think less of someone who only uses emulators? Absolutely not, it would be silly to. Besides, emulators like VICE are incredible feats. They work REALLY REALLY well and represent many thousands of hours of hard work over decades. I’m in awe of these kinds of projects, not ashamed of them.

It was just a few months ago that I started to get back into 8-Bit computing. It started with Ben Eater’s Breadboard 6502 build. Something about his complete exploration of that build including single stepping the clock and watching the processor registers was really compelling to me.

I built Ben’s project by following along with the videos. It’s currently inside a shadowbox in my office wall blinking away :-)