Apple //gs Emulator with Best of FTA on App Store

[MacRumors]

This one's going to be for only a select audience. Old Apple //gs owners who enjoyed graphical demos by the Free Tools Association (FTA) will be surprised to find that they have released a "Best Of" collection for the iPhone:

To celebrate the 20 years of the *Free Tools Association*, here comes a collection of the best programs developed by the members of the FTA team : Nucleus, Modulae, Photonix, Delta Demo and much more!!! Enjoy this journey back into time

The app is the ActiveGS emulator bundled with many of FTA's Apple //gs demos.

There's probably some legal issues with an emulator that presumably includes Apple owned ROMS, but we're going to hope that Apple turns a blind eye to this one. But you shouldn't hesitate in downloading it if you are at all interested, just in case. It's free.

Article Link: Apple //gs Emulator with Best of FTA on App Store

 

[franswa za]

interesting and quite retro, thanks!

 

[rshanahan]

Fond Memories

Oh that was the day! FTA really pushed the sound and video controllers in the GS. Their demos were fun to watch and show off at the Maryland Apple Users Group (Maug) IIGS Sig back in the late 80's!

 

[anthonymoody]

I still have my Woz signed limited edition (hah!) IIGS in a closet somewhere...

Release Wizardy for iOS and i am so there...

 

[50548]

Oh that was the day! FTA really pushed the sound and video controllers in the GS. Their demos were fun to watch and show off at the Maryland Apple Users Group (Maug) IIGS Sig back in the late 80's!

This brings me back some great memories - in my view, the Apple IIGS was by far Apple's most gifted personal computer ever - the best sound capabilities of all machines in that era, excelent graphics, incredible compatibility and some wonderful developers like FTA to show its capabilities in the good ol' 80s..!

Even better now with modern emulation facilities such as Bernie II The Rescue of Sweet16...ah, those days playing Task Force, DragonWars et al...good times!

 

[Anonymous Freak]

Hrm, downloaded it directly to my iPad at work. Has anyone used PhoneView or similar to see if you can drop new files in (a la iDOS/DOSpad) to add new apps?

Between iDOS, this, and the Commodore 64 app, nearly all our retro computing needs are being addressed!

 

[Anonymous Freak]

Alright, I'm home, and I have verified that you can use PhoneView to drop new Apple IIgs apps in!

Specifically, you download an XML file from the "Best of FTA" app (in PhoneView, go to Data -> Apps, then into "Best of FTA.app", and download list.activegsxml.

In that file you can see the file structure, and that it accepts both .2mg and .dsk.zip files. There are even two apps that are already supplied, but are commented out! (Pom's Animations and Noise Tracker.)

Just create a new section, add the details for your desired app, and save the XML file (I would suggest making a backup first.)

Then drag your edited XML file, along with the .dsk.zip and/or .2mg files, and (if you want thumbnails) .png files back into the Best of FTA.app directory on your iPad, and there you are! I have the "Your Tour of the Apple IIGS" disk running right now.

I wouldn't expect this app to last long!

 

[nsayer]

ROMs

Didn't Woz once say out loud somewhere that in his opinion it was ok for non-commercial distribution of Apple // ROMs given that he was responsible for most of that code?

 

[mainstreetmark]

"Apple IIgs" not "Apple //gs"

Apple ][
Apple //e
Apple IIgs

 

[call-151]

"Winners don't use tools!"

A great offering from the undisputed masters of On The Metal 65816 coding. Thanks.

 

[Anonymous Freak]

Didn't Woz once say out loud somewhere that in his opinion it was ok for non-commercial distribution of Apple // ROMs given that he was responsible for most of that code?

But sadly, his opinion is not legally binding, as he assigned the legal rights to Apple Inc.

 

[thogs_cave]

But sadly, his opinion is not legally binding, as he assigned the legal rights to Apple Inc.

Yeah, and what a shame it is. That's why I keep a few machines tucked away for the ROMs. I really wish Apple would release them into the wild: I don't know if there's anything of value in the IIgs ROMs, but I can't imagine there's anything in the II-series, unless it has to do with AppleSoft BASIC. (I seem to remember having an original II that included an assembler listing of the ROM with the manual. I could be wrong, it was a long, long time ago...

 

[HyperZboy]

I still have my WOZ limited edition Crystal Apple on display in my house and it's numbered!
Not many people can say that.

I donated the IIGS to a handicapped child a long ago since I had lots of children's learning programs on it at the time I decided to get rid of it to buy my first Mac and it was used for quite a few more years I'm told. I kept my Apple ][e card though and I even have my 3 1/2" & 5 1/4" disks and external disk drives, not that they're good for anything anymore, but yeah, those were the days.

My favorite game was Tass Times in Tonetown made by Activision. The game has the distinction of being the first commercial game made available for the Apple IIGS that took advantage of the ENSONIQ sound chip which made the IIGS one of the first computers to have a commercial sound sampling chip in it that was actually used by musicians (ENSONIQ made some of the first sampling keyboards in the music industry). Woz always knew his tech. The fatal flaw in the computer however was lack of memory and hard drive and the extremely underpowered Western Design 65816 which really could barely keep up with the WOZ wizardry surrounding the ENSONIQ sound chip.

Somewhere in the house (god only knows) lurks an Apple Mac II and an LC III. LOL

 

[rshanahan]

I still have my WOZ limited edition Crystal Apple on display in my house and it's numbered!
Not many people can say that.

I can, haha!! What number is yours. I have 719.

And one other worthless bit of info. I owned the 1st 'delivered' Apple IIGS, possibly in the entire metro Balto. area, but for sure the 1st from the old Micro Computer Center in Fullerton, MD. The store was only allocated 4 units on initial delivery. I was number 5 on the list. That Saturday morning, I was called informing me that one had canceled. I lived 5 mins from the store and took delivery of the 1st of the initial 4!

It took a LOT of convincing to let them let me 'copy' the IIGS demo disks. If I recall I purchased a box of floppies at the same time (I didn't come prepared as I already had two 800K drives on my //c) for the bargain price of $25 or so!! Well worth it to have that cool music to play at home!!

I was an Apple ][ guy til '91. Eventually they hired me part time as I hung out a lot. Most of the staff were 'mac people'. I spent more than I made there but it was fun. The most amusing thing is up until I no longer worked there, sometime in the early 90's, the cash register was STILL running on an Apple IIe printing on an original Imagewriter w/2 ply ncr paper!!

Those were the days.