MAMEWorld Forums - EmuChat - 2019 Apple II current status thoughts from 4AM

*keeping similar topic post in old thread*

A retrospective from 4am after seeing how quickly things have improved with the way how Apple II floppy diskettes can now be handled compared to prior times. All the fans and users of various Apple II computer systems can rejoice that maybe their favorite Apple II program (game, education, etc.) has a chance of being preserved.

--
https://twitter.com/a2_4am

https://twitter.com/a2_4am/status/1103486702990053376

archive.org has over 8,000 raw .a2r flux files of Apple II software ripped by ~dozen people. passport can convert over 5,000 of them to .woz format. Of those, about 4,500 work unmodified (pass their own protection checks) in 4 different emulators.

A2R and WOZ are very good specifications. I implemented readers and writers for both formats by reading the specifications. Find the most senior software engineer you know, and ask her how often that happens. How often that's even possible.

A year ago we had basically none of this. A few hardware prototypes, a few privately shared rips in undocumented formats created by intrepid alpha testers. No specifications, no emulator support.

Now we can boot SpiraDisc in a browser.

That's astonishing.

The hardware and ripping software is https://applesaucefdc.com by DiskBlitz . Emulator support also DiskBlitz (OpenEmulator), Gerard Putter (Virtual II), retrogeekette and jmpindirect (MicroM8), and o_galibert and R. Belmont (MAME).

After all of that work, I was able to make a few .woz files Trust me, I had the EASY part.

I used to send qkumba physical floppy disks, through the post office, like some kind of 20th century peasant. Now I send him .woz files in seconds and it's trivial. Sending perfect, working, digital representations of copy protected software is TRIVIAL. That's astonishing.
--

It somewhat reminds me of the past obstacles and challenges that CPS-2 and -3 hardware, FD 1089 and 1094 hardware, and the dreaded mcu used with Gaelco games and other products would make coinop games either becoming 'lost' or never playable. Apple II users can now relax knowing that a good chance their Apple II software item might not disappear.....assuming their software item can still be found in this day and age.