This reminds of a quixotic quest I undertook once - implementing enough of a SLIP and TCP/IP stack to send mail with SMTP and retrieve it with POP3, all in PC BASIC (the kind that still required line numbers).
Amongst other problems, it wouldn't work properly (dropped characters) at anything faster than 9,600 baud, and on an original PC needed to go a bit slower than that; computing things like checksums was exceedingly painful; there wasn't enough RAM (it was limited to 64K for program plus data, which in practical terms meant a PC with at least 96K of RAM); it would have to drop the connection if it shelled out to an external editor. But it did work.
Might as well go the full insanity.. if you can get it work on the ACE, then surely you can make it work on a ZX81 with a rampak?
I remember as a kid in the 80s writing a program in BASIC to get my Spectrum 128 to connect over serial to my Sirius 1 PC so my buddy and I could have a chat application across my bedroom. Wild times.
Now seems to be the trend to bring TCP to retro machines from first principles.
8088 PC's already have M Brutman's "mTCP" driver. And DogCow (D. Finnigan) has been working on and off on the "Sabina" networking suite for the original 128K Macintosh on the MacGUI site: https://macgui.com/sabina/ https://macgui.com/news/article.php?t=550
Though it's a been slow going, apparently because of a day job. (Also note that the MacGUI site now requires an account to read progress posts.)
This reminds of a quixotic quest I undertook once - implementing enough of a SLIP and TCP/IP stack to send mail with SMTP and retrieve it with POP3, all in PC BASIC (the kind that still required line numbers).
Amongst other problems, it wouldn't work properly (dropped characters) at anything faster than 9,600 baud, and on an original PC needed to go a bit slower than that; computing things like checksums was exceedingly painful; there wasn't enough RAM (it was limited to 64K for program plus data, which in practical terms meant a PC with at least 96K of RAM); it would have to drop the connection if it shelled out to an external editor. But it did work.
Shit I'd love: minimal slip/ppp over serial enough to run a gopher client with a Jupiter ACE and some RAM expansion (16k or 32k).
If a Speccy can be connected to the internet with a Gopher client...
A small IRC would he half useful too.
Might as well go the full insanity.. if you can get it work on the ACE, then surely you can make it work on a ZX81 with a rampak?
I remember as a kid in the 80s writing a program in BASIC to get my Spectrum 128 to connect over serial to my Sirius 1 PC so my buddy and I could have a chat application across my bedroom. Wild times.
Interesting piece of history.